Twas a Consideration of the Influence, which a Worthy preparing for, and partaking of, the Lords Supper has upon our whole Religion, and the Multitude of the Souls among us concerned in that Holy Ordinance, with the Paucity of the Books among us, which might be Companions and Monitors to them for their Assistance in it, that awakened me to write what is now in your Hands to Read; and it may not be accounted any wrong unto New-England, if any of its true Friend• endeavour to turn it from a ⟨image ?⟩Scythian Desert into a Kiriath-Sepher, by spreading the Harmless Issues of the Press in the midst of us. I were a very Degenerate person, if I should not be touched with an Ambition, to be a Servant of the Churches in this now famous Country, which my two Grand-fathers COTTON and MATHER had so considerable a stroke in the first planting of; and for the preservation whereof my Father, hath been so far Exposed. Their Services (for, Non ea Nostra voco•) were my greatest Blemishes and Reproaches, if I should not be studious to do what Little I can for the Children of my people. He that looks upon these Colonies, will see them filled with precious and Holy Churches, wherein the Lord Jesus Christ is Adored and Obeyed with (so far as we know) a strict, exact, entire Observation of His Glorious Institutions; and the Souls of many Hundreds are apace Ripening for, The Inheritance of the Saints in Light: He will see a great Instance of the Protestant Religion, in its purest, and fullest Reformation, maintained, by the Children, which are the product and Off-spring of that Choice Grain, which (as one says) God ⟨image ?⟩sifted Three Nations, to bring into this Wilderness; and he must have his Eyes not open if he do not make that Exclamation, How Goodly are thy Tents, O New-England, and thy Tabernacles, O thou American Israel! To serve these Churches, which have been so much Traduced and Maligned, by the Common Enemies of what is Holy, and Just, and Good, and which have yet been such a Burdensome […] as to break the backs of all that have hitherto been heaving at them, is an Honour that a far better man than I, were unworthy […] not only our Thoughts and Cares, but the very Lives of the best among us all, were too Little to be devoted unto their Interest.
TWas a Consideration of the Influence, which a Worthy preparing for, and partaking of, the Lords Supper has upon our whole Religion, and the Multitude of the Souls among us concerned in that Holy Ordinance, with the Paucity of the Books among us, which might be Companions and Monitors to them for their Assistance in it, that awakened me to write what is now in your Hands to Read; and it may not be accounted any wrong unto New-England, if any of its true Friend• endeavour to turn it from a ⟨image ?⟩Scythian Desart into a Kiriath-Sepher, by spreading the Harmless Issues of the Press in the midst of us. I were a very Degenerate person, if I should not be touched with an Ambition, to be a Servant of the Churches in this now famous Countrey, which my two Grand-fathers COTTON and MATHER had so considerable a stroke in the first planting of; and for the preservation whereof my Father, hath been so far Expos'd. Their Services (for, Non ea Nostra voco•) were my greatest Blemishes and Reproaches, if I should not be studious to do what Little I can for the Children of my people. He that looks upon these Colonies, will see them filled with precious and Holy Churches, wherein the Lord Jesus Christ is Adored and Obeyed with (so far as we know) a strict, exact, entire Observation of His Glorious Institutions; and the Souls of many Hundreds are apace Ripening for, The Inheritance of the Saints in Light: He will see a great Instance of the Protestant Religion, in its purest, and fullest Reformation, maintained, by the Children, which are the product and Off-spring of that Choice Grain, which (as one sais) God ⟨image ?⟩sifted Three Nations, to bring into this Wilderness; and he must have his Eyes not open if he do not make that Exclamation, How Goodly are thy Tents, O New-England, and thy Tabernacles, O thou American Israel! To serve these Churches, which have been so much Traduced and Maligned, by the Common Enemies of what is Holy, and Just, and Good, and which have yet been such a Burdensome 〈…〉 as to break the backs of all that have hitherto been heaving at them, is an Honour that a far better man than I, were unworthy 〈…〉 not only our Thoughts and Cares, but the very Lives of the best among us all, were too Little to be devoted unto their Interest.
