N00446:93
The triumphs of the reformed religion, in America. The life of the renowned John…
The triumphs of the reformed religion, in America. The life of the renowned John Eliot; a person justly famous in the church of God, not only as an eminent Christian, and an excellent Minister, among the English, but also, as a memorable evangelist among the Indians, of New-England; with some account concerning the late and strange success of the Gospel, in those parts of the world, which for many ages have lain buried in pagan ignorance. / Written by Cotton Mather. ; [Two lines from Luke]
Boston: printed by Benjamin Harris for Joseph Brunning i.e, 1691
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
Article I.
His Ministerial Accomplishments.
The Grace of God, which we have seen so illustrious• Endowing and Adorning of our Eliot, as well Qualified him for, as Disposed him to, the employment wherein he spent about Sin Decades of his years; which was, The service of the Lord Jesus Christ, in the ministry of the Gospel. This was the work to which he applied himself; and he undertook it I believe, with as Right Thoughts of it, and as Good Ends in it, as ever any man in our Days was acted with. He looked upon the Conduct of a Church, as a thing flo less Dangerous than Important, and attended with so many Difficulties, Temptations, and Humiliations, as that nothing but a Call from the, Son of God, could have encouraged him unto the susception of it. He saw that flesh and blood would find it no very pleasant thing, to be Qblig'd unto the over sight of a Number, that by a solemn Covenant should be listed among the Volunteers of the Lord Jesus Christ; that it was ⟨p. 48⟩no easy thing to feed the souls of such a people and of the Children and the Neighbours which were to be brought into the same sheepfold with them; to bear their manners with all patience, not being by any of their Infirmities discouraged from Teaching of them, and from watching & praying over them; to value them highly as the Flock which God has purchased with his own blood, notwithstanding all their miscarriages and in all to examine the Rule of Scripture for the warrant of whatever shall be done; and to Remember the Day of Judgment, wherein an Account must be given of all that has been done; having in the mean time no expectation of the Riches & Grandeurs which accompany a worldly Domination. It was herewithal his opinion, That (as the great Owen expresses it) notwithstanding all the countenance that is given to any, Church by the public Ministry, yet whilst we are in this world, those who will faithfully discharge their Duty, as Ministers of the Gospel, shall have need to be prepared for sufferings; and it was in a sense of these things that he gave himself up to the sacred Ministry. A Stranger to Regeneration can be but poorly Accomplished, for such a Ministry; and however God may prosper the Sermons of such a man for the advantage of his Church: however the building of the Ark may be helped on by such Carpenters as perish in the Flood;