who indeed have been a very scourge unto New England, especially unto the Jurisdiction of Massachusetts.
2dly. To teach war to the young generation of New England, who had never been acquainted with it; and especially to teach old and young how little confidence is to be put in an arm of flesh; and to let them see if God give commission to a few (comparatively) of naked men to execute any work of God, how insignificant nothings are numbers of men well armed and provided, and endowed with courage and valor, to oppose and conquer the enemy, until God turn the balance. It was observed by some judicious, that, at the beginning of the war, the English soldiers made a nothing of the Indians, and many spake words to this effect, that one Englishman was sufficient to chase ten Indians;[1] many reckoned it was no other but Veni, vidi, vici. Surely the Lord well knew, that if he should have given his people victory, before they were in some measure corrected of this sin of trusting in arm of flesh, that little glory would accrue to his name by such a deliverance.
3dly. The purging and trying the faith and patience of the Godly English and Christian Indians, certainly was another end God aimed at in this chastisement. And the discovery of hypocrisy and wickedness in some that were ready to cry “Aha!” at the sore calamity upon the English people in this war, and as much as in them lay to overthrow God's work in Gospelizing the poor Indians.
4thly. Doubtless one great end God aimed at was the punishment and destruction of many of the wicked heathen, whose iniquities were now full; the last period whereof was their malignant opposition to the offers of the Gospel, for the Paka
- ↑ This was no doubt true; and no remark on the contempt, in which the poor Indians were held by men on so many accounts to be venerated, can be more appropriate than the following note by Governor Hutchinson. "It seems strange," says he, "that men, who professed to believe, that God hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, should so early and upon every occasion, take care to preserve this distinction. Perhaps nothing has more effectually defeated the endeavours for Christianizing the Indians. It seems to have done more to have sunk their spirits, led them to intemperance, and extirpated the whole race." — Col. Papers, 151. This remark was made upon a passage in Major Gibbon's instructions, on being sent against the Narragansets in 1645, in these words: "You are to have due regard to the distance which is to be observed betwixt Christians and Barbarians, as well in wars as in other negotiations."
