N01899:186
India Christiana. A discourse, delivered unto the Commissioners, for the Propagation of the Gospel…
India Christiana. A discourse, delivered unto the Commissioners, for the Propagation of the Gospel among the American Indians : which is accompanied with several instruments relating to the glorious design of propagating our holy religion, in the Eastern as well as the Western, Indies. : An entertainment which they that are waiting for the kingdom of God will receive as good news from a far country. / By Cotton Mather, D.D. and F.R.S.
printed by B. Green, 1721
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.
The most Holy SPIRIT of GOD has used this Method from the very beginning of the World; that so He might communicate the Light, with which He would lead His People travelling on the Earth, to the Rest which the Saints have in the Heavens reserved for them. It hath seemed Good unto Him, to send down from on High, into the Children of Men, those Good Angels, who have always been the most proper and ready Instruments of the Eternal Spirit for such a Purpose; and the Favourites of GOD, who have been so managed and inspired by Angels, have been the Messengers and Proclaimers, by whom He has revealed His Will both in Word and Writing, to the Children of Men. Various a• Wondrous have been the Operations of the Angels in these Ministers of GOD; but all ⟨p. 70⟩these things worketh that one and self-same Spirit, who divides to every Man severally as He pleases.
This Angelical Possession and Energy of the Prophetic Spirit, has ever been to the People of GOD as a Light shining in a dark place; A Place, alas, how Dark, how buried in Darkness, would it have been, if it had not been allowed unto this our World; for to Rejoice in the Consolation of such a Light! The Immense Treasures of Truth, which we have treasured up for us in the Sacred Scriptures, we confess to be owing unto this Prophetic Spirit; yea, 'tis owing to the Afflations thereof, that the Church is continued against all the Hazards and Horrors of Extinction, tho' it be like a little spark in the midst of a Tempestuous Ocean.
This Angelical Possession and Energy of the Prophetic Spirit, has ever been to the People of GOD as a Light shining in a dark place; A Place, alas, how Dark, how buried in Darkness, would it have been, if it had not been allowed unto this our World; for to Rejoyce in the Consolation of such a Light! The Immense Treasures of Truth, which we have treasured up for us in the Sacred Scriptures, we confess to be owing unto this Prophetic Spirit; yea, 'tis owing to the Afflations thereof, that the Church is continued against all the Hazards and Horrors of Extinction, tho' it be like a little spark in the midst of a Tempestuous Ocean.