The New International Encyclopædia/Willard, Samuel

WILLARD, Samuel (1640-1707). A colonial clergyman. He was born in Concord, Mass.; graduated at Harvard in 1659; was minister at Groton from 1663 to 1676, whence he was driven by the Indians during King Pliilip's War; was pastor of the Old South Church, Boston, from 1678 until his death; strenuously opposed the witchcraft persecutions in 1692; and was acting president of Harvard from 1701 until his death. He published many sermons, including: The Duty of a People that Have Renewed Their Covenant with God (1680); Brief Animadversions upon the New England Anabaptists' Late Fallacious Narrative (1681); and Mourner's Cordial Against Excessive Sorrow (1691). A folio volume entitled A Compleat Body of Divinity was published posthumously, by Joseph Sewall and Thomas Prince, in 1726.