the faithful Puritans they were, to penetrate the veil of eternity, they attempted a spiritual feat for which all their centuries of European ancestry had increasingly tended to make them unfit.

Of Howes little more is known; of Mather, it is sadly certain that his words and conduct, devout in persevering purpose throughout his life, impressed unsympathetic contemporaries, and have impressed unsympathetic tempers ever since, as wanting in candour, in trustworthiness, and even in honesty. The considerations now before us should help us to see why. From childhood to the verge of an old age which he was spared, he incessantly strove to see God, even as the Beatitude gives hopeful promise that He shall be seen by the pure of heart. Such strivings demand, for fulfilment, complete spiritual freedom. Any effort to make mystic perception conform to a preconceived system must probably distort it; any effort to combine mystic perception with the practical conduct of human affairs must bewilderingly confuse it with the phantasmagoric quiverings of earthly atmosphere. Yet Cotton Mather, Puritan of Puritans, would never suffer himself for an instant to admit any gleam of perception not completely harmonious with the dogmas of Calvin, nor yet tolerate the passing of a single day in which he had failed to do something tangible for the glory of God at Boston in Massachusetts. Had he relaxed either of these purposes, and thus soared into spiritual freedom, he would not have been what his diary proves him-magnificently faithful. Had his enmeshments with earth, as he aspired heavenward, failed to make those who have been blind to his spiritual life distrustful of his honesty, his enemies would not have been human.

Among his essays to do good, none were more incessant than the labours of his pen. Sibley's 'Harvard Graduates' names more than four hundred of his works. On February 1, 1701/2, Mather himself records that he prayed for two hundred and five of them, title by title; in the last three years of life he added fifty to the list of his publications; and not a few of them, sent forth anonymously, remain unidentified. They are of all sorts and sizes for the most part sermons, biographies, tracts, books of good counsel, and the like. In August 1713 he even thought of sending some 'agreeable Thing' to the

'Spectator,' though whether he ever did so does not appear. Among all these works, however, three surpass the rest, both in bulk and in general interest. The first, the Magnalia Christi Americana,' was published in England, and finally reached his hands, in folio, on October 29, 1702; wherefore he set apart the next day 'for solemn Thanksgiving unto God, for his watchful and gracious Providence over that Work, and for the Harvest of so many Prayers, and Cares, and Tears, and Resignations, as I had employ'd upon it.' The second, the 'Angel of Bethesda,' completed after many years' work in February 1723/4, has remained in manuscript, but is shortly to be published by the Massachusetts Historical Society. The third, the Biblia Americana'-to his mind the most important of all-was begun in August 1693, finished on May 28, 1706, and augmented throughout his remaining twenty-one years; it remains, as the publishers of his time found it, far too bulky for publication. Together, these three books show how he believed that his pen might best do the earthly work of the Lord.

The Magnalia Christi Americana 'is an 'Ecclesiastical History of New England, from Its First Planting in the year 1620 unto the year of our Lord 1698.' Approached as if it were intended to set forth that history in modern spirit, it may well seem perversely irregular, overemphasising such events and persons as enjoyed Mather's approval, neglecting or abusing the rest. The dates of its composition should correct this impression. He conceived the plan of it in 1693; he finished the first draft in August 1697; the manuscript, revised and added to meantime, was dispatched to England, in 'near 300 sheets,' on June 8, 1700; the printed volume, as we have seen, arrived in Boston on October 29, 1702. These years, from 1693 to 1702, were precisely those between the witchcraft trials and the resignation of Increase Mather from the presidency of Harvard College, the years in which the power of theocracy was broken, and New England finally abandoned what Cotton Mather believed to be the divinely ordered policy of the Puritan Fathers.

The Magnalia' is at once an epic celebration of these ancestors and a passionate controversial document. By means of it Mather hoped to prove that during the early years of the New England colonies the conduct of life and

affairs there had been so nearly pleasing to God that God had been moved to designate from among the New England colonists an unprecedented proportion of His elect. This admitted, the divine right of New England theocracy should logically follow; and there might still be hope for it. The work is hastily written and hardly composed at all. The first of its seven books recounts in epic temper the history of New England; the second contains the lives of godly governors and magistrates there, from the landing of the Pilgrim Fathers to the time of Sir William Phipps; the third contains lives of some sixty emigrant ministers of the Gospel; the fourth tells the history of Harvard College, and includes lives of ten eminent ministers who graduated there; the fifth sets forth the orthodox doctrine and discipline of the New England churches; the sixth records remarkable judg ment and providences which have occurred in New England; the seventh tells of the Wars of the Lord,' that is, of the various disturbances which have harassed the New England churches and the New England people. The style of the book has been remarkably appreciated by M. Chevalley. He admits its pedantries and oddities and prolixities; but these, he says, in no wise affect its marvellous lucidity; nor has he found from beginning to end a single paragraph which, for all the aridity of the subjects, is quite uninteresting.

'On the other hand' (he goes on) it is full of happy expressions, of phrases which one might quote for the harmony of their rhythm, of passages worthy of an anthology for the solemn emotion, the enthusiasm, the fervour of spirit which conceived them and has imparted itself to the style. . . . The Magnalia is the work of a man inspired by profound convic tion, who writes to communicate it to his readers; it is the work of a poet, who sets forth in prose, under the cloak of imaged history, the preoccupation, the effort, the torment, the love and the faith of his whole life.'

The Angel of Bethesda' is a treatise on medicine, little more systematic than the 'Magnalia,' but more compact. The manuscript comprises 410 quarto note pages, evidently written and added to at various times. As might be expected, it touches so often on divine interposition that it has been pleasantly described as the On the whole, how

fountain-head of Christian Science.

ever, its purpose is benignly practical. In popular terms it describes the maladies prevalent in New England, and, without pretence to scientific generalisation, indicates remedies which have been found, or are said to be, useful. Some of these are still approved; many are absurd; but few, if any, would have been condemned by the medical practice of contemporary Europe. Three facts about the book are noteworthy. First, in an early chapter, he expounds a conjectural theory of disease, substantially tending toward the modern science of bacteriology; although he describes his malignant germs as 'insects,' too small to be observed by the instruments of his time, his conception is surprisingly like those held nowadays. Secondly, he seldom fails to distinguish between matters which he has observed and matters of hearsay; in this respect his book is authoritative. Thirdly, his account of smallpox, and of inoculation, may fairly be held a document in the history of English medicine.

The Biblia Americana' was begun in 1693, at the same time as the 'Magnalia.' The note in his diary when he conceived the work indicates both his purpose and his method:

'With many cries unto the God of Heaven, that Hee would by His good Spirit Assist me, in my Undertaking, and that Hee would employ his good Angels to supply me from Time to Time, with materials for it, I sett myself every Morning to write upon a Portion of Scripture, some Illustration, that should have in it, something of Curiositie. I considered that all the Learning in the World might bee made gloriously subservient unto the Illustration of the Scripture.'

So, omnivorous reader that he was, he added something to the notes every day of his life. The result is preserved in six folio volumes, closely written on both sides of the sheets, and interspersed with memoranda on smaller; the total number of pages exceeds 5000. To summarise such a work is impossible; one or two quotations may give some notion of its temper and style.

We have glanced already at his explanation of how the Holy Ghost descended 'like a dove' before the eyes of John the Baptist. In the matter of the harmony of the Gospels, he accepts the views of William Whiston, almost exactly his contemporary. At the beginning of

the Psalms he enters into a considerable discussion of Hebrew prosody, coming to this conclusion:

'I must keep to the Opinion That the Poesy of the Ancient Hebrews knew no Measure but that of the now unknown Music whereto it must be accordant.... [Certain authorities] go to resolve the Hebrew Poesy into I know not what Lyricks and Hexameters. But from the present practice of the Jews to Sing what they should Read in their Synagogues I rather gather a Concession that the Lawes of Song were the only ones that were considered in their primitive Poesy.'

In a comment on Jeremiah viii, 7, he proceeds thus: 'Among the Season-Birds we read of the Crane and the Swallow: Are the names truly translated? A. Bochart says, No, but reads the Swallow and the Crane. The Hebrew (DID) sus or rather (DD) sis is to be translated not a Crane but a Swallow;' and so on, with a long philological dissertation, in which he cites the Septuagint, Theodotus, Jerome and Symmachus; and, in support of certain onomatopoeic conjectures, incidentally refersperhaps on the authority of Bochart-to examples of relation between sound and meaning in languages so diverse as the Arabic and the Italian. To venture a final opinion on his work would require not only deep learning, but long study of his rather illegible handwriting. Casual examination suggests that, if it ever sees the light, it may conceivably prove to be an unexpectedly enlightened precursor of the Higher Criticism.

On February 11, 1728, when he lay dying, his son, Samuel, asked him, 'What sentence or word he would have me think on constantly, for I ever desired to have him before me and hear him speaking to me. He said, "Remember only that one word Fructuosus." His diary demonstrates how he strove all his life to cultivate what fruitfulness was in him. His life and his works make clear how perseveringly he hoped that the fruit of his labours would eventually be garnered in the harvests of the Lord.

BARRETT WENDELL.