N00594:113
Johannes in eremo. Memoirs, relating to the lives, of the ever-memorable, Mr. John Cotton,…
Johannes in eremo. Memoirs, relating to the lives, of the ever-memorable, Mr. John Cotton, who dyed, 23.d. 10.m. 1652. Mr. John Norton, who dyed, 5.d. 2.m. 1663. Mr. John Wilson, who dyed, 7.d. 6.m. 1667. Mr. John Davenport, who dyed, 15.d. 1.m. 1670. Reverend and renowned ministers of the Gospel, all, in the more immediate service of one church, in Boston; and Mr. Thomas Hooker, who dyed, 7.d. 5.m. 1647. Pastor of the church at Hartford; New-England. / Written, by Cotton Mather. ; [Three lines of Latin quotation]
Boston : Printed for and sold by Michael Perry, at his shop, under the west end of the Town-House., 1695
Title page typeset from the transcription.
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.
Actus Regiminis, quos vos a Synodis peragi Velletis, •os a Synodis porrigi Ecclesits, et ab Ecclesi•s, ex ⟨p. 44⟩Synodali DIORTHOSEI peragi peteremus. Charge not our Cotton with an, ATAXIAS Promotor Extitit, until you, your self, Doctor, have Revoked your own two Concessions, which are all the Ataxies that ever could, with so much as the least Pretence, be imputed unto this Renowned Person; Ecclesia particularis quaelibet Subjectum est Adaequatum & proprium plen•• potestatis▪ Ecclesiasticae; nec Congrue dicitur ejus a Synodo Dependentia, And, Neque enim Synodi in alias Ecclesias potestatem habent Imperantem, quae Superiorum est, in Inferiores sibi Subditos; Non-Communionis Sententia Potestatem Summam denotat. As for the, Cottonus Plur•morum Errorum Hoeresiumque Reus, were Old Austin alive, he would have charged no less a Crime than that of Sacrilege upon the Man, that thus without all Colour, should Rob the Church of a Name which would justly be Dear unto it; for as the Great Caryl hath expressed it, The Name of Cotton is as an Ointment poured forth. But for the Top of all these Calumnies, Cottoni Hutchinsona, instead of a Resemblance therein to Montani Maximilla, the truer Comparison would have been, Mulier ista, quae per Calumniam notissimam Objiciebatur Athanasio; All the Favour, which that Prophetess of Thyatira had from this Angelical Man, was the same, that the provoked Paul showed unto the Pythoness. In fine, The Histories, which the World has had of ⟨p. 45⟩the New-English Churches, under the Influence of Mr. Cotton, I have sometimes thought much of a piece, with what we have in the Old Histories of Lysimachus; That when a Leprous, and Scabby fort of a People were Driven out of Egypt, into the Wilderness, there was a certain man called Moses, who counselled them to March on in a Body, till they came to some Good Soil. This Moses commanded them to be Kind unto no man; To give Bad Advice rather than Good, upon all Occasions; and to Destroy as many Temples as they could find; So, after much Travail, and Trouble, they came to a Fruitful Soil, where they did all the Mischief that Moses had recommended, and built a City, which was, at first, called Hiersyla, from the spoiling of the Temples: but afterwards, to shun the Disgrace of the Occasion, they changed it into Hierosolyme, and bore the Name of Hierosolymitans.