The most valuable and important authority which exists upon the history of New England, is the work of the Rev. Cotton Mather, entitled Magnolia Christi Americana, or the Ecclesiastical History of New England, 1620-1698, 2 vols. 8vo, reprinted at Hartford, United States, in 1820.[1] The author divided his work into seven books. The first presents the history of the events which prepared and brought about the establishment of New England. The second contains the lives of the first governors and chief magistrates who presided over the country. The third is devoted to the lives and labours of the evangelical ministers who, during the same period, had the care of souls. In the fourth the author relates the institution and progress of the University of Cambridge (Massachusetts). In the fifth he describes the principles and the discipline of the Church of New England. The sixth is taken up in retracing certain facts, which, in the opinion of Mather, prove the merciful interposition of Providence in behalf of the inhabitants of New England. Lastly, in the seventh, the author gives an account of the heresies and the troubles to which the Church of New England was exposed. Cotton Mather was an evangelical minister who was born at Boston, and passed his life there. His narratives are distinguished by the same ardour and religious zeal which led to the foundation of the colonies of New England. Traces of bad taste sometimes occur in his manner of writing; but he interests, because he is full of enthusiasm. He is often intolerant, still oftener credulous, but he never betrays an intention to deceive. Sometimes his book contains fine passages, and true and profound reflections, such as the following:
“Before the arrival of the Puritans,” says he (vol. i. chap, iv.), “there were more than a few attempts of the English to people and improve the parts of New England which were to the northward of New Plymouth; but the designs of those attempts being aimed no higher than the advancement of some worldly interests, a constant series of disasters has confounded them, until there was a plantation erected upon the nobler designs of Christianity: and that plantation, though it has had more adversaries than perhaps any one upon earth, yet, having obtained help from God, it continues to this day.”
Mather occasionally relieves the austerity of his descriptions with images full of tender feeling: after having spoken of an
- ↑ A folio edition of this work was published in London in 1702.
