Supplemental Notes on Cotton Mather (1663-1728)
Real New England heritage doesn't get any better than this! Cotton Mather's grandfathers were the ministers John Cotton and Richard Mather, both of whom emigrated in the early 1630s.
Mather was a genius who was constantly on the edge of breaking apart. (The fact that he outlived three wives and 14 of his 15 children had to have taken an enormous emotional toll.) It was Mather's fate to fight vainly against the declining power of the ministry which developed in the late 1600s and early 1700s. The reasons for this decline were:
- Because the economy and lifestyle improved, people naturally began thinking more about this life than the next. Since life wasn't as difficult any longer, people did not depend on the ministry as much as they had previously.
- New religious beliefs from Europe, such as Unitarianism, were becoming popular and caused the Puritan clergy to lose power.
- Royal Governors sent by England were Anglican.
- The power of the people increased as church membership was no longer as important as land ownership in determining suffrage.
Because of Mather's ministerial heritage, he felt a particular responsibility to maintain the power of the Puritan clergy. Much of Mather's writing was an effort to keep alive the original Puritan spirit.
Take a look through Mather's "Magnalia Christi Americana" (pp. 379-400).
What does "Magnalia Christi Americana" mean?
What do you note about the general content of this work?
A couple of interesting miscellaneous facts about Cotton Mather...
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For someone so conservative, he could be startlingly cutting edge in some matters. During the smallpox innoculation controversy of 1721, he was a tireless advocate for innoculation.
- He has the distinction of being the very first American Member elected to the prestigious Royal Society which recognizes scientific achievement.