Question

How does Benjamin Franklin show humor in a witch trial at mount holly support your answer with evidence from the text???

Answer 1

The humor is shown in the way the trials were conducted; First of all, they were advertised - like an entertainment spectacle or a circus show.

• "Accordingly the Time and Place was agreed on, and advertised about the Country; "

These witch trials are ridiculed because they are referred to as an Experiment - supposedly based on facts and reason to prove someone is guilty, and alluding to science experiments - when in reality they were not logical at all.

• "(...) if the Accused were weighed in Scales against a Bible, the Bible would prove too heavy for them; or that, if they were bound and put into the River, they would swim;"

In the end they decide to repeat the trials, and they promise nudity to attract a bigger audience.

• " But it being the general Belief of the Populace, that the Womens Shifts, and the Garters with which they were bound help’d to support them; it is said they are to be tried again the next warm Weather, naked."