Hence putting people to trials, jails, and eventually hanging them. This is logical in that it was a practice that had been brought over from England and existed there in the sixteen hundreds. So at first glance it wouldn't be seen as anything bad or unusual. But it is quite possible that as tensions grew within colonies that people were picked out and accused just for being themselves, because as mentioned before individual differences were frowned upon. So as people saw the opportunity they jumped on the bandwagon screaming witch left and right creating mass hysteria. While this is a very logical explanation there are still other options and this one has a little bit of a glitch in it. This lies in the fact that while they thought all sins should be punished they thought that God would do the punishing. They believed that when something bad happened such as the ruining of crops and sick kin, were God's punishment for sinning. And since it was God's doing that wouldn't help or interfere in anyway. So it could be argued that in having the trials they were doing what was meant for God to do. Also within their religion they had a very strong belief in God but their belief in the devil was just a strong. They believed that he picked the weak and unstable mainly (children and women) to do his deeds. When he picked you to do this you were at once considered a witch, which was the biggest sin of all and was punishable by death. Hence once someone was convicted of being a witch they would be hanged. (http://school.discovery.com/schooladventures/salemwitchtrials/life/religion.html).
So as obviously stated life was very strict during and leading up to 1692, the year of the madness. This was not the best time for strict moral rules because outside of that the colony was in a state of turmoil. There was an elite of businessmen beginning to form and take over. While two groups of people, the Putnams and Porters were raging against each other over control of the village pulpit.
