N00498:78
A midnight cry an essay for our awakening out of that sinful sleep, to…
A midnight cry an essay for our awakening out of that sinful sleep, to which we are at this time too much disposed; and for our discovering of what peculiar things there are in this time, that are for our awakening. In a discourse given on a day of prayer, kept by the North-Church in Boston. 1692. / By Cotton Mather. ; Now published for the use of that church, together with a copy of acknowledgements and protestations made in pursuance of the reformation, whereto we are to be awakened. ; [One line of Latin text]A midnight cry an essay for our awakening out of that sinful sleep, to which we are at this time too much disposed; and for our discovering of what peculiar things there are in this time, that are for our awakening. In a discourse given on a day of prayer, kept by the North-Church in Boston. 1692. / By Cotton Mather. ; Now published for the use of that church, together with a copy of acknowledgments and protestations made in pursuance of the reformation, whereto we are to be awakened. ; [One line of Latin text]
Boston: printed by John Allen for Samuel Phillips, 1692
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.
Now God forbid, That as it was of old said, He would have Healed Babylon, and she would not be Healed, it should be now said, We would have Awakened New-England, and she would not be Awakened!
I now have only this more to say.
Assertion III. There are Great Works to be done by us, that we may have our Sinful Sleep evidently laid aside. As Deborah called upon her self, Awake, Awake, and utter a Song! So would I call upon all my Friends, Awake, Awake, and let that be done that should be done. Our Natural Sleeping is a most Necessary Refreshment for us; at least, when it is not become irregular, by the Hebetude of our Spirits, or by the undue pressure of any Viscous or Aqueous particles thereupon; 'tis but the Recruit of our Animal Spirits, by a New Digestion to Repair and Supply the Loss of those that have been Exhausted thro' our Enlarged Pores, while our External Senses were in their Activity. But our Spiritual ⟨p. 51⟩Waking is infinitely more Necessary, both for our Temporal and Eternal Welfare. Indeed, if any of us will really and thoroughly Awake our selves, we shall grievously Anger those who think our Lord says to them, what He said unto His Disciples of old, Sleep on! We must look to meet with foolish and absurd Censures, from the Sleepers, whom like Noah, we Condemn, when we Awake. When the Holy Vigilantius vigorously appeared against the Abuses creeping into the Sleeping Church, in the Beginning of the Fifth Century, no less a man than Jerome gave Opiates to that Sleeping Church, by undertaking the Patronage of those Abuses, and bestowed the Name of Dormitantius, with other base Terms, upon the almost only Vigilant Servant of God in the World. Give me leave […] speak it; As he that Slept hath formerly murmured at him that Waked, even so it is Now! Some Cavil or other will certainly be Excogitated, whereby all Essays towards Waking will be ridiculously blown upon; and if nothing else […] be invented, the Cavil will be 'Tis a […] Thing that you are upon. Thus when the was a Church among our selves that set apart a Day of Prayer with Fasting that they might Cry to Heaven for Converting Influences of Grace to be poured from Heaven, upon their Children, there were some [Shall I tell it?] Professors of Religion, so excessively Ridiculous, that they Exclaimed