Connecticut but Advice being dispatch'd unto the Towns upon Connecticut-River a party immediately Salley'd out after the Spoilers and leaving their Horses at the Entrance of a Swamp whither by their Track they had followed them they come upon the Secure Adversary and kill'd the most of them and Recovered the Captives with their Plunder and Returning home had some Reward for so brisk an Action But now the Indians in the East probably Disheartened by the Forts Erecting that were like to prove a sore Annoyance to them in their Enterprizes and by the Fear of wanting Ammunition with other Provisions which the French were not so Able just now to dispence unto them and by a presumption that an Arrâ—y of Maqua's part of those Terrible Cannibals to the West-ward whereof 't is affirm'd by those who have published the Stories of their Travels among them That they have destroy'd no less than Two Million Salvages of other Nations about them through their being Supplyed with Fire-Arms before Hundreds of other Nations lying between them the River Meschasippi was come into their Country because they found some of their Squa's killed upon a Whortle berry Plain and all the Charms of the French Fryar then Resident among them could not hinder them from Suing to the English for Peace And the English being so involved in Debts that they Scarce knew how to prosecute the War any further took some Notice of their Suit Accordingly a Peace was made upon the Ensuing Articles Province of the Massachusetts Bay in new-New-England The Submission and Agreement of the Eastern Indians at Fort William Henry in Pemmaquid the 11th day of August in the Fifth year of the Reign of our Soveraign Lord and Lady William and Mary by the Grace of God of England Scotland France and Ireland King and Queen Defenders of the Faith c. 1693. WHereas a Bloody War ha's for some years now past been made and carryed on by the Indians within the Eastern parts of the said Province against Their Majesties Subjects the English through the Instigation and Influences of the French and being sensible of the Miseries which we and our People are reduced unto by adhearing to their ill Council We whose names are hereunto Subscribed being Sagamores and Chief Captains of all the Indians belonging to the several Rivers of Penobscote and Kennebeck Amanascogin and Saco parts of the said Province of the Massachusetts Bay within Their said Majesties Soveraignty Having made Application unto his Excellency Sir William Phipps Captain General Governour in Chief in and over the said Province that the War may be put to an end Do lay down our Arms and cast our selves upon Their said Majesties Grace and Favour And each of us respectively for our selves and in the Name with the free consent of all the Indians belonging unto the several Rivers aforesaid and of all other Indians within the said Province of and from Merrimack River unto the most Easterly Bounds of the said Province hereby acknowledging our hearty Subjection and Obedience unto the Crown of England and do solemnly Covenant Pâ—omise and Agree to and wiâ—h the said Sir William Phipps and his Successors in the place of Captain General and Governour in Chief of the aforesaid Province or Territory on Their said Majesties behalf in manner following viz. That at all time and times for ever from and after the date of these Presents we will cease and forbear all acts of Hostility towards the Subjects of the Crown of England and not offer the least hurt or violence to them or any of them in their Persons or Estate But will henceforward hold and maintain a firm and constant Amity and Friendship with all the English Item We abandon and forsake the French Interest will not in any wise adhere to joyn with aid or assist them in their Wars or Designs against the English nor countenance succour or conceal any of the Enemy Indians of Canada or other places that shall happen to come to any of our Plantations within the English Territory but secure them if in our power and deliver them up unto the English That all English Captives in the hands or power of any of the Indians within the Limits aforesaid shall with all possible speed be set at liberty and returned home without any Ransome or Payment to be made or given for them or any of them That Their Majesties Subjects the English shall and may peaceably and quietly enter upon improve and for ever enjoy all and singular their Rights of Lands and former Settlements and possessions within the Eastern parts of the said Province of the Massachusetts-Bay without any pretentions or claims by us or any other Indianâ— and be in no wise molested interrupted or disturbed therein That all Trade and Commerce which hereafter may be allowed between the English and Indians shall be under such Management and Regulation as may be stated by an Act of the General Assembly or as the Governour of the said Province for the time being with the Advice and Consent of the Council shall see cause to Direct and Limit If any controversy or difference at any time hereafter happen to arise between any of the English and Indians for any â—eal or supposed wrong or injury done on one side or the other no private Revenge shall be taken by the Indians for the same but proper Application be made to Their Majesties Government upon the place for Remedy thereof in a due course of Justice we hereby submitting our selves to be ruled and governed by Their Majesties Laws and desire to have the benefit of the same For the more full manifestation of our sincerity and integrity in all that which we have herein before Covenanted and Promised we do deliver unto Sir William Phipps Their Majesties Governour as aforesaid Ahassombamett Brother to Edgeremett Wenong ahewitt Cousin to Madockawando and Edgeremett and Bagatawawongon also Sheepscoat John to abide and remain in the Custody of the English where the Governour shall direct as Hostages or Pledges for our Fidelity and true performance of all and every the foregoing Articles reserving Liberty to exchange them in some reasonable time for a like number to the acceptance of the Governour and Council of the said Province so they be persons of as good account and esteem amongst the Indians as those which are to be exchanged In Testimony whereof we have hereunto set our several Marks and Seals the Day and Year first above written The above written Instrument was deliberately read over and the several Articles and Clauses thereof Interpreted unto the Indians who said they well understood and consented thereto and was then Signed Sealed Delivered in the Presence of us John Wing Nicholas Manning Benjamin Jackson Egeremeâ—t Madockawando Wessambomett of Navidgwock Wenohson of Teconnet in behalf of Moxis Ketterramogis of Narridgwock Ahanquit of Penobscot Bomaseen Nitamemet Webenes Awansomeck Robin Doney Madaumbis Paquaharet alias Nathaniel Inrerpreters John Hornybrook John
Deerfield in the Night they presently Dispatched away Twelve men to way lay the Enemy coming up the River having first Look'd up unto the Lord Jesus Christ that they might find the Enemy and harm none but the Enemy and Rescue the Children which the Enemy had Seized upon After a Travel of near Twenty Miles they perceived the Indians in their Canooes coming up the River but on the other side of it within a Rod or Two of the opposite Shore Whereupon they so Shot as to Hitt one of the Indians and then they all Jump't out of the Canooes and one of the Boyes with them The wounded Salvage crawled unto the Shoar where his back being broken he lay in great Angush often Endeavouring with his Hatchet for to knock out his own Brains and tear open his own Breast but could not and another Indian seeing the Two Boyes getting one to another design'd 'em a Shot but his Gun would not go off Whereupon he followed 'em with his Hatchet for to have knock'd 'em on the Head but just as he come at 'em one of our men sent a Shot into him that Spoilt his Enterprize and so the Boyes getting together into one Canooe brought it over to the Friends thus concerned for them These good men seeing their Exploit performed thus far Two Indians destroy'd and Two Children delivered they fell to Praising of God and one young man particularly kept thus Expressing himself Surely T is God and not we that have wrought this Deliverance But as we have sometimes been told That even in the Beating of a Pulse the Dilating of the Heart by a Diastole of Delight may be turned into a contracting of it with a Systole of Sorrow In the Beating of a few Pulse after this they sent five or six men with the Canooe to fetch the other which was lodged at an Island not far off that they might pursue the other Indians when those two Indians having hid themselves in the High-grass unhappily Shot a quick Death into the young man whose Expressions were but now recited This Hopeful young mans Brother-in-Law was intending to have gone out upon this Action but the young man himself importuned his Mother to let him go which because he was an only Son she denyed but then fearing she did not well to withold her Son from the Service of the Publick she gave him leave saying See that you do now and as you go along Resign and give up your self unto the Lord and I desire to Resign you to Him So he goes and so he dies And may he be the last that falls in a Long and Sad War with Indian Salvages ARTICLE XXVIII The Epilogue of a Long Tragaedy FOr the present then the Indians have Done Murdering They 'l Do so no more till next Time Let us then have done Writing when we have a little informed our selves what is become of the chief Murderers among those Wretches for whom if we would find a Name of a Length like one of their own Indian Long-winded words it might be Bombardo-gladio-fun-hasti-flammi-loquentes Major Convers and Captain Alden in pursuance of Instructions Received from the Lieut. Governour and Council arriving at Penobscet on Oct. 14. 1698. were there informed That Madockawando the noted Sagamore with several other Sachims of the East were lately Dead And six days after this the chief Sachims now Living with a great Body of Indians Entertained them with a Friendly Discourse wherein they said That the Earl of Frontenac had sent them word there was a Peace concluded between the Kings of France and England and that one of the Articles in the Peace was for Prisoners on both sides to be Returned and they were Resolved to obey the Earl of Frontenac as their Father and accordingly such Prisoners of ours as they had now at hand might immediately Return if we could perswade them for They would not Compel them When our English Messengers argued with them upon the perfidiousness of their making a New War after their Submission the Indians replied That they were Instigated by the Erench to do what they did against their own Inclinations adding That there were two Jesuites one toward Amonoscoggin the other at Narridgaway both of which they desired the Earl of Bellomont and the Earl of Frontenac to procure to be Removed otherwise it could not be expected that any Peace would continue long The Indians also and the English Prisoners gave them to understand that the last Winter many both Indians and English Prisoners were Starved to Death and particularly Nine Indians in one company went a Hunting but met with such hard circumstances that after they had Eat up their Dogs and their Coats they Dyed horribly Famished And since the last Winter a grievous and unknown Disease is got among them which consumed them wonderfully The Sagamore Saquadock further told them That the Kennebeck Indians would fain have gone to War again this last Summer but the other Refused whereupon they likewise Desisted And they Resolved now to Fight no more but if any Ill Accident or Action should happen on either side he did in the Name of the Indians Desire That we would not presently make a War upon it but in a more amicable way compose the Differences That the Indian Affayrs might come to be yet more exactly understood the General Assembly of the Province Employ'd Colonel John Phillips and Major Convers to Settle them These Gentlemen took a Difficult and a Dangerous Voyage in the Depth or Winter unto the Eastern parts in the Province-Galley then under the Command of Captain Cyprian Southack and the principal Sagamores of the Indians there coming to them did again Renew and Subscribe the Submission which they had formerly made in the year 1693. With this Addition unto it And whereas notwithstanding the aforesaid Submission and Agreement the said Indians belonging to the Rivers aforesaid or some of them thro' the ill counsel and instigation of the French have perpetrated sundry Hostilities against His Majesties Subjects the English and have not Delivered and Returned home several English Captives in their Hands as in the said Submission they Covenanted Wherefore we whose Names are hereunto Subscribed Sagamores Captains and principal men of the Indians belonging unto the Rivers of Kennebeck Ammonoscoggin and Saco and parts adjacent being sensible of our great Offence and Folly in not complying with the aforesaid Submission and Agreement and also of the Sufferings and Mischiefs that we have hereby exposed our selves unto Do in all Humble and most Submissive manner cast our selves upon His Majesties Mercy for the pardon of all our Rebellions Hostilities and Violations of our promises praying to be Received into His Majesties Grace and protection And for and on behalf of our selves and of all other the Indians belonging to the several Rivers and places aforesaid within the Soveraignty of His Majesty of Great Britain do again acknowledge and profess our Hearty and Sincere Obedience unto the Crown of
it self against them And that the Venome of this Pamphlet might be Improved unto the Heighth of Slanderous Wickedness there hath been since added unto it in another Pamphlet a parcel of Ingredients compounded for mischief as if by the Art of the Apothecary None but he whom the Jewes in their Talmuds call Ben-tamalion could have inspired such a Slanderer Have the Quakers ever yet Censured this their Author for holding forth in his Alcoran pag. 221. That the Devil Sin Death and Hell are but Nothing they are but a Non-Entity And pag. 183. That all men who have a Body of Sin remaining in them are Witches I have cause to believe that they never did Nor that they ever advised him to pull in his Horns from goring the sides of new-New-England with such passages as those in pag. 195. the same horrible Pamphlet God hath well Rewarded the Inhabitants of new-New-England for their Unrighteous Dealings towards the Native Indians whom now the Lord hath suffered to Rewâ—râ— the Inhabitants with a double measure of Blood by Fire and Sword c. And those Unrighteous Dealings he Explains to be the Killing of the Indians or Murdering of them by the Old Planters of these Colonies in their First Settlement Thus are the Ashes of our Fathers vilely staled upon by one who perhaps would not stick at the Villany of doing as much upon their Baptism it self I must tell you Friends that if you don 't publickly give forth a Testimony to Defy Tom Maule and his Works it will be thought by some who it may be don't wish you so well as I do that you own this Bloody Stuff which doubtless you 'l not be so ill advised as to do But certainly if the good people of New-England now make it not a proverb for a Lyar of the First Magnitude He is as very a Lyar as TOM MAULE they will deprive their Language of one Significant Expression which now offers it self unto them Let us now Leave our Friend Maules Works as a fit Volumn to be an Appendix unto the famous Tartaretus and worthy of a Room in Pantagruels Library The fittest way to answer him would be to send him to Boston Woods In the mean Time I owe unto the Publick a piece of History which it may be for the Safety of our Northern Towns to be acquainted withal Know Sirs That once the famous George Keith undertook to be the Champion of our New-English Quakers and bid fair to be the very Dalae or Prester John of all the English Tartars but a Minister of Boston upon that occasion publishing a Book Entituled Little Flocks guarded against grievous Wolves could not but complain of it as a very Scandalous Thing in George Keith to maintain the points of the Foxian Quakerism while he really differed from them All this while George Keith was admired by our Quakers as an Apostle or an Oracle but he finding it impossible to mentain the gross Tenets of the common Quakers preach'd unto them the Necessity of Believing on a Christ without as well as a Christ within Hereupon there grew such alienations between him and the other Quakers who had been taught by George Fox to say The Devil is in them who say they are Saved by Christ without them that he not only ha's written diverse Learned Books to confute those very Doctrines of the Common Quakers which the Pastors of New-England had upon his Provocation Written against but also ha's therefore undergone a Storm of Persecution from the Friends in Pensylvania Yea 't is verily thought that poor George would have been made a Sacrifice to Squire Samael Jennings and the rest of the Pensylvanian Dragons and that since a crime which their Laws haâ— made Capital was mention'd in the Mittimus whereby Keith was committed they would have Hang'd him if a Râ—volution upon their Government had not set him at liberty Being by the Fines and Gaols and Fierce Usages of the Quakers in Pensylvania driven over to England the Wonderful Hand of God hath made this very man I think I may say incomparably the greatest Plague that ever came upon that Sect of Energumens Although he do himself still retain the Name of a Quaker yet he hath in one Treatise after another Earnestly called upon the Divines throughout the Nation more Vigorously to Employ their Talants against the Quakers as a more Dangerous Generation of People than they are well aware and he did in the year 1696. with the leave of the Lord Mayor Challenge the Quakers to make their Appearance at Turners Hall in the chief City of Europe where he proved unto the Satisfaction of a vast Assembly that the chief Writers of the Quakers assert Christ neither to be God nor Man and that they deny Christ to be pray'd unto and that they had affirm'd Christs outward Blood shed on the Ground to be no more than the Blood of another Saint and that they had charged him with New-Doctrine for directing to Faith in Christ without us as well as within us and that at their Meetings they had censured him for saying That Christs Body came out of the Grave which they say It never did And many more such horrid matters To confirm these things Besides the grievous Bites which Francis Bugg one of their late Friends hath given them one Daniel Leeds without wholly casting off the Profession of a Quaker hath lately Printed a Book wherein he produces above Threescore Instances of the Flat Contradictions which he hath observed in the Books of the Friends that have most pretended unto Infallibility and he demonstrates from evident matter of East that though they declared unto the World That their Sufferings had been greater and more unjust than the Sufferings of Jesus and His Apostles yet they themselves were no sooner mounted into the Seat of Government than they fell to Persecuting as bad as any in the World Albeit Fox writes They that cause People to be put in Prison and have their Goods taken away are Disorderly Teachers and shall be rooted out Nevertheless Leeds proves by many Exemples that the Pensylvanians did it even upon their own Friends for meer Scruples of their Consciences 'T is reported The Quakers are so confounded at this Book of Leeds that they have been at the charge to buy up the whole Impression of it and so to Stiffle and Smother it If it be so I hope 't will but produce a New Impression of so rare a Book The Marvellous Providence of our Lord Jesus Christ having thus employ'd the Pens of the Quakers themselves to warn you that you beware of Quakerism it will be a marvellous Infatuation in any of you after this to be led away with that Error of the Wicked Reader make a Pause and here Admire the Marvellous Providence of our Lord Jesus Christ The first and great Apostle of the Quakers even George Fox the Shoe-maker in his Great Mystery Pag. 94. Excludes from the Church of Christ Those who are not Infallible
the Book brought unto the Blessed Prophet of old in Isa 29.12 The Book is delivered unto him that is not Learned Saying Read this I pray thee and he saith I am not Learned It will certainly be a work well becoming a Minister of the Gospel and every Serious Christian will be glad of seeing the Work done To take this Book and help you as well as we can to Spell the Divine Lessons contained in it Christians Let us now do a work for which the Great God hath given us that Warrant and that Command in PSAL. CVII 43. Who is Wise and will observe these Things THe various and marvellous Dispensations of the Divine Providence towards the Children of men are in this Elegant Psalm admirably set before us Among those Dispensations there is a particular mark set upon this That the God of Heaven Turns a Fruitful Land into Barrenness for the Wickedness of them which dwell therein thoâ—gh men have Sown Fields there and have multiplied greatly yet they are again Diminished brought Low through Oppression Affliction and Sorrow Of such Dispensations is this passage to be understood as a Quaestion Who is wise and will observe these things But if you will rather take it as a Sentence it still comes to the same sense Whose is wise will oserve these Things And the French Version very Expressively intimates the Design as well as the Event of this Observation That so they may consider the Favours of the Lord. No Less than Ten years have Rolled away since we have been plunged into the Distresses of a WAR with a Barbarous Enemy In this WAR we have seen the Fruitful Land of almost one whole Province and another whole County turned into Barrenness doubtless not without provocations of Wickedness in them who dwelt therein Men had Sown Fields there along the Shore in Settlements for an Hundred miles together and had Multiplied Greatly into a Cluster of Towns besides Lesser Villages that might Challenge the Name of a Decapolis but in this WAR we have seen them Diminished again and brought Low through Oppression Affliction and Sorrow I am to Lead you this day thro' a Spacious Country which has been on many Accounts the most Charming part of new-New-England and I must herewithal say Come Behold the works of the Lord what Desolations He has made in that Land Syrs 'T is time for us to Observe these Things and this not with a meer Athenian but with a more profitable Observation I must not be Discouraged from this Holy Service by the vain Scoffs of those that Blaspheme all Attempts to Consider the Wondrous Works of God as if it were nothing but a Telling of News in the Pulpit The Biggest part of the Holy Bible which is but a Relation of such Wondrous Works would be Scoffed by such profane men if they might not thereby become Obnoxius No If Whoso is wise will observe these things Then let no man call it Folly to make the Observation A Long WAR is the Text which I am now to insist upon And if we would approve our selves Wise after all the Stripes that have in this WAR been given us these things will occur to our Observation in it I. In the WAR that hath been upon us Whoso is Wise may observe the Consequence of Entertaining the Gospel of the Lord JESUS CHRIST and Obtaining and Mentaining the Ordinances of that Glorious Gospel The Gadarens of old were loath to have any thing of CHRIST in their Coast And anon comes a Roman War which distress'd all the Land But the woful Town of Gadara was the very first place besieged in that War and Sad Things were done unto it Alas How little of an Evangelical Church-State was there to be seen among all our Eastern Settlements It hath been for the want of this that the Judgments of God have more than once forbidden them to be called Settlements The Towns were generally without Preachers of CHRIST and much more generally without Churches of CHRIST for to Irradiate 'em Yea not one of the Towns that are utterly broken up had any Minister in it for a long while before their Final Darkness came upon them Such a Way of Living did content many of them that it were horrible to Tell what Ignorance of CHRIST they were thereby sunk into I would never have told you That some young men twenty years old in this Land never so much as once heard the Name of CHRIST in all their Lives if I did not think that the God of Heaven required us all to mourn before Him for such an Horrible Thing in the Land Indeed the Strange Disasters which attended the First Essayes to Settle that Good Country made many people Imagine the Indian Sorcerers had Enchanted the Ground so that no English could Thrive on such an Enchanted Soyl. But had they carried the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ with them doubtless they had confuted that vain Imagination all the Spells of Hell would have been insignificant there would not have prevailed any Enchantment against a Gods-Spel which we have in our Gospel The Original Design of NEW-ENGLAND was to Settle Congregations wherein the Lord Jesus Christ should be known and serv'd according to His Gospel and Instruct Families that should be the Nurseries of those Congregations The Plantations of the East had little of this Illustrious Design in their Eye The Enjoyments of Gadarens did seem too much to Satisfy too many of them For This cause we may Believe it is that our Lord JESUS CHRIST looking down from Heaven upon these Unchristian Undertakings Thunder-struck them with His Indignation He saw the Foolish taking Root but suddenly He Cursed their Habitation When some of our Eastern People have been Pining away under the Fatigues of their Captivity among the Indians who had Stript them of all they had Then they cryed out Now Now the Lord is punishing of us for our Leaving of His Ordinances and removing to a place of no Gospel for larger Accommodations in the World and Exposing our Children to be bred up like the very Indians into whose Hands we are fallen That which Invites one to think it may be For this Cause is the Singular Distinction and Protection which the CHURCHES of our Lord have Enjoyed throughout the whole progress of our Calamity No places that have had CHURCHES gathered in them have all this while been broken up however some of them have had much Bread of Adversity and Water of Affliction The Enemy that have come in upon our Land Like a Flood carried all before them as an Irresistible Torrent until they came to places that have CHURCHES as it were to Garrison them There the Almighty Lord hath check'd the Proud Waves and said Hitherto ye shall come and no further But here let me add a very observable Thing The Lord had some of His Elect among our Eastern People but He ha's brought those Elect Home unto Himself by burning them out of their
Homes and Habitations The Indians have driven 'em hither and here they have met with the Gospel of Christ and been effectually Called unto the Lord and Joyned unto our Churches and Blessed the Name of God for bringing them unto these Churches Periissent nisi Periissent Now Whoso is Wise and will observe these things cannot but wish That the Folly of Erecting Plantations without the worship of the Lord JESUS CHRIST may be no more committed among us It was wholesome Counsil Given and usually Taken in the Beginning of New-England Let Christians no where sit down without Good Ministers but let them rather tarry where they are as Ezra tarryed by the River Ahava till he had got some Levites to go with them And it was even Then observed That places which made Beginnings any long while without Ministers were with miserable Unsettlements broken all to pieces I suppose our Eastern Country will shortly again be peopled But let the people which intend there to Settle themselves in the Fear of God Remember this Admonition Don't venture to form Towns without the Gospel in them any more If the Lamentable Experience which you have more than once had of a Blast from Heaven upon Enterprizes to Live without the Gospel of the Son of God will not inspire you with more of Wisdom for the future I will foretel your Fate in those awful words Psal 28.5 Because they regard not the Works of the Lord nor the Operation of His Hands He shall destroy them and not Build them up Yea But let all new-New-England at the same Time Learn what the Welfare of the Ruine of all will Turn upon The whole World was made for our Lord-Messiah and the Curse of God will more or less plague the World according to the Respects which that Second Adam our Lord Messiah finds in it But new-New-England is by a more Eminent Profession that Immanuels Land Let the Interests of the Christian Religion in Reformed Churches be pursued and preserved among us Then All will go well Our Acknowledgment of our Lord JESUS CHRIST in CHURCHES that shall be so ordered as to Represent Him and His Kingdom unto the World This will be our Glory and this Glory will be our Defence or as 't is promised in Isa 4.5 Upon all the Glory shall be a Defence But if once the Spirit of this World Eat out the Spirit and Power of Religion and the Order of our Churches and mens value for a Room in the Churches be lost Then write Ichabod upon all our Glory and let us expect that our Holy Lord will Spue us out of His Mouth II. In the WAR that hath been upon us whoso is wise may observe in the very Instruments of our Calamity shrow'd Intimations of the provoking Evils for which the Righteous God hath Chastised us by such Instruments When the Miseries of the Sword are inflicted on a people it becomes them to consider what Provocations they have given to the Almighty God who makes peace and creates Evil for 't is He the Lord who doth all these things The Sword by which we have been so grievously harassed hath been in the Hands of God and if our Father had not been very Angry would He have taken a Sword into His Hands We are Blind before Lightning we are Deaf unto Thunder if we do not sensibly perceive the Anger of God in the Tremendous Rebukes that we have suffered And we are unaccountably and inexcusably stupid if we do not Enquire What means the Heat of this Anger It was once the Commirration of God in Ezek. 7.24 27. I will bring the worst of the Heathen and they shall possess their Houses and the Hands of the people of the Land shall be Troubled Such Trouble hath come upon us from the worst of the Heathen But what was the cause of all It follows I will do unto them after their way and I will judge them according to their Deserts and they shall know that I am the Lord. It is but seasonable for us now to Look back upon our own way and see how much we have Deserved all this Vengeance by going out of the way Two persons in their Travels beholding the horrid Ruines of Germany one of them said Hic fuit Hostilitas Behold the Fruit of Hostility his Friend answered Hic fuit Iniquitas Behold the Fruit of Iniquity If you will Travel over our East Countrey how frequent how dismal occasions will you see to Sigh See what has been done by Hostility But there will be as many occasions for a sadder Sigh than that Namely See the sad Effects of Iniquity Now in this Contemplation I do not go to charge them that were once Inhabitants of the Now Ruined Plantations with any Sins but what are more or less to be found in all our Colonies I ask no more from our Brethren who yet Survive the Desolations that have come upon their Estates and Neighbours in those Plantations but that they join with the rest of us all in Searching and Trying of our ways and in Judging of our selves For alas Every mouth must be stop'd and all the Land is become Guilty before God! Let us all then Enquire What may have been those provoking Evils for which the Holy and Blessed God hath given the Sword a Commission so dreadfully to devour us But then Let us be sure to Enquire wisely concerning that matter And here I will not Enquire whether those that went before us might never be too forward in any Unjustifyable Encroachments to possess and command those Lands which have since proved so Expensive unto us Older men then I are best able to manage that Enquiry though I also have heard it made But that whereupon I rather bespeak your Thoughts is This Will you please to Enquire into the Properties and Qualities of our Adversaries 'T is possible that in their Properties and Qualities we may read something of those Miscarriages for which our God hath Raised them up to be our Adversaries It hath been commonly seen That when the people of God have sinfully come to Imitate the Evil manners of other Nations God hath made those very Nations to be a soâ—e scourge unto them And the sense of This was that which long ago caused many sensible persons to foretel which of the Neighbour Nations would bring our dear England Low Now since the INDIANS have been made by our God The Rod of His Anger 't is proper for us to Enquire whether we have not in some Instances too far Imitated the evil manners of the Indians The Indians are Infamous especially for Three Scandalous Vices First They are Lyars of the first magnitude One cannot believe a word they speak Secondly They are Sluggards to a proverb they are for any way of Living rather than work Thirdly They are abominably Indulgent unto their Children there is no Family Government among them Will you now Enquire Sirs how far we have Indianized in every one but especially the last
this War to manage the terrible Controversy of God new-New-England sets a peculiar Accent of Grief upon this among all her Lamentations The Lord has trodden under foot my mighty men in the midst of me He hath called an Assembly against me to crush my young men Come then My Young men Be so Wise as to Observe these things and upon the Observation say Lord Let not me and the rest of my Generation continue among the Generation of thy Wrath. Yea to have done Children also have not been Excused from a snare in the Blows of this hideous War Little Boyes and Girls even these Little Chickens have been Siezed by the Indian Vultures Our Little Birds have been Spirited away by the Indian Devourers and brought up in a vile Slavery till some of them have quite forgot their English Tongue and their Christian Name and their whole Relation Yea Those Babylonians have Dash'd out the Brains of our Little Ones against the Stones And our Little Ones have been hideously whipped unto Death by those Merciless Tygres whose Tender Mercies are Cruelty Children God make you so wise as to Observe these things and upon the Observation Oh! See that you become Serious Pious Orderly Children Obedient unto your Parents Conscientious to keep the Lords Day and afraid of committing any Wickedness Upon the whole when a Dead man was thrown into the Grave of Elisha a Touch from the Bones of the Prophet in the Grave Rais'd him from the Dead I am desiring that Religion may be Revived out of the Death which has too much Enfeebled it among us Behold Syrs I have now cast you into the Graves of our Dead Friends It may be by wisely observing of them and the things that have beâ—allen them we may be somewhat Raised out of our Deadly Security Let our Observation of these things give some Life to the practice of Religion among us V. In the WAR that hath been upon us Whoso is Wise may Observe those Tragical Things undergone by many in Captivity that are full of Admonition unto us that have never felt the Tragaedies of such a Captivity Several Hundreds of our Neighbours first and last have been carried into Captivity by the most Beastly and Bloody things that ever wore the Shape of men in the World New-England makes that moan in Lam. 1.18 Hear I pray you all people and behold my Sorrow my Virgins and my Young men are gone into Captivity But Oh! the prodigious and stupendous Things that they have undergone in this Captivity What weary Dayes and Nights have rolled over the miserable Captives while they have not had a Bit of Meat allow'd 'em Except what a Dog would hardly meddle with While they have sometimes been pinched with the Bitter Frost without Rags to cover their Nakedness and sometimes been Parched with the Burning Heat without any Cordial or Shelter to Refresh them While they have seen their nearest Relations torn in pieces alive before their Eyes and yet those Eyes afraid of dropping a Tear at the mournful Sight Yea while they have every Hour look'd when they should be themselves Roasted alive to make a Feast and a Sport for the horrid Cannibals Need I tell you That those Devils Incarnate have Tyed their Captives unto Trees and first cutting off their Ears have made them to Eat their own Ears and then have broyled their whole Bodies with slow Fires dancing the mean while about them and cutting out Collops of their Flesh till with lingring Tortures they have Martyred them to Death Such Things have been done by the Inhumane Salvages upon our Captives that is a sort of Inhumanity barely to mention them Now shall we be Wise to Observe these things The Observation must be made with that Admonition in Luk. 13.4 5. Think ye that these were Sinners above all men I tell you Nay but Except ye Repent ye shall all likewise perish Wherefore let us penitently Confess That we have All deserved those Miserable Things wherewith Some have been so marked out by the Soveraignty of Heaven In the Things that have been done to our Captives the Great Lord of Hosts hath dealt with us as Generals use to do upon the Sedition and Mutiny of Military Legions He makes a sort of Decimation among the Offenders and by what He does to some He declares what He might justly do to all the rest We must all ascribe it unto the meer Soveraign mercy of God that we are not every one of us broken in the place of Dragons as these desolate Captives were That which the Scripture calls The place of Dragons I Remember one of the Jewish Rabbi's Expounds A Wilderness Truly our Wilderness hath been The place of Dragons But while we Observe these things we shall not be Wise if we do not Learn Oh! what an Evil and a bitter thing is our Sin And what horrendous miseries must we Expect among the Devils if we dy with our Sin impardoned VI. In the WAR that hath been upon us Whoso is wise may observe a Work a Strange Work of Heaven as it were Devising of wayes very strangely to Distress all sorts of people in all sorts of Interests Truly the very Character of our Calamity hath all along been This The Great God has written still upon it we may Read upon it in a very Legible Character those words in Jer. 18.11 Thus saith the Lord Behold I Frame Evil against you I devise a Device against you It hath been as if wayes had been deliberately and exquisitely Studied and as if with much Contrivance plotted for to bring us all within the Reach of the general Calamity We have now Languished thro' Ten Years which have been the Saddest and the Darkest and the Stormiest Years that ever we saw If the History of these Ten Years were to be written I am thinking What should be the Title Truly It might be Entituled as Ezekiels Roll was Lamentation and Mourning and Wo. Yea you shall now have the History of these Ten Years written for you I 'l give it you in as Expressive words as can be even in those words 2 Chron. 15.5 6. In those Times there was no peace to him that went out nor him that came in but great Vexations were upon all the Inhabitaâ—â—â— of the Countreys for God did vex them with an Adversity There is a Variety of Adversity with which the tedious War it self hath vexed us The General Fate of the War hath involved Numberless Families in several circumstances of Adversity and the Expensive part of the War hath been an heavy Scourge of Adversity upon those that could not be reach'd by the Destructive part of it You could not but Observe these things But then have you not observed what a further variety of Adversity hath been Contemporary with this Vexatious War Alas There hath been such a Complication of other Distresses added unto the War in the Time of it that no-body No I say No-body hath been left free from those
44.10 They are not Humbled even unto this Day VIII In the WAR that hath been upon us Whoso is Wise may Observe the Compassions of God wonderfully Exercised and Manifested and Magnified in the midst of our Confusions There was a Time when a Bush Burned with Fire and yet the Bush was not consumed whereupon said Moses in Exod. 3.3 I will now Turn aside and see this Great Sight Sirs I am now to call upon you O Turn aside and see such a Great Sight as that Indeed in the midst of all our Lamentations we must own with the Church in Lam. 3 22. It is of the Lords Mercies that we are not Consumed because His Compassions fail not But there are many Particular and Astonishing Articles of Mercy which we have seen in this Tedious War Sirs Come now to Observe some of those Things with prepared Hallelujahs It was the Petition in Hab. 3.2 O Lord In Wrath Remember Mercy New England Thy God hath heard this Petition for thee in very wonderful Instances For First After a very Amazing manner ha's Mercy been Remembred in the midst of Wrath when we have been Rescued by the Mercy of God at the very point of our being else Ruined by His Wrath. Lord Thou hast shewed thy People hard Things and made us Drink the Wine of Astonishment But our Extremity hath been Gods Opportunity to Relieve us Several Times in the late years of our Affliction we have been brought unto a dismal Non-plus in our Affayrs and we would scarce imagine it possible for us to subsist any longer But just Then the Bowels of our Compassionate God have been moved for us He hath said How shall I give thee up O New-England How shall I give thee up O Massachusetts And so He would not Execute upon us the Fierceness of His Anger but with some unexpected Succours from the Machin of Heaven He hath Relieved us We have several times been Like a Little Vessel in a Storm the Swelling Waves have Dashed Raged and Roared the Rude Billows have been going over us and we have been ready to Sink But just Then Our Compassionate Lord Jesus Christ hath Awaked for our Safety and marvellously calmed our Circumstances O thou Land strangely Saved by the Lord say now as in Psal 136.23 O Give thanks unto the Lord who Remembred us in our Low Estate because His Mercy Endureth for ever When our Debts have become Insupportable God has then Remembred us in our Low Estate because His Mercy Endureth for ever and strangely Extricated us When our Foes have been as an Overflowing Scourge like to carry all before them God has then Remembred us in our Low Estate because His Mercy Endureth for ever and strangely Lifted up a Standard against them When fearful Divisions have arisen among us and horrid Convulsions have been ready to pull all to pieces I don't care to Remember them any farther than to say God has then Remembred us in our Low Estate because His Mercy Endureth fer ever and strangely healed those Breaches that set the Land a Trembling Moreover It hath been a very Strange Thing and a Wondrous Remembrance of Mercy in the midst of Wrath That the Indians have been â—naccountably Restrained from giving us an Hundredth part of the Trouble which they might have done had they but known or us'd their own Advantages This One Thing Whosoever does wisely Observe it must needs ascribe it unto a Special Operation of that God who Forms the Spirit of man within him It was the promise of God unto His people Exod. 34.24 No man shall Desire thy Land when thou shalt go up to appear before the Lord thy God The Faithful God strangely Fulfilled this promise for many Hundreds of years together No Enemy desired the Land of that people at the Time of their going up to Worship the Lord in His Temple And whereas the Roman Enemy did at length Desire their Land at the Time of their going up to the Passover this one Thing was enough to prove that the Messiah was come and the Passover no longer commanded It shows That there is a Strange Operation of God upon the minds of men to curb and check and blind the Evil-minded Well We have had our Frontier Towns in many of which the Lord Jesus Christ hath been Worshipped and Sought and Serv'd continually Had the Lurking Enemy done as they might have done how easily might one dozen of them have kept the Towns in such perpetual and perplexing Alarms as would have caused them even to have broken up And what unknown mischiefs might a few more of 'em have brought upon our Scattered Plantations I do again and again say This is from the Strange Operation of God upon the Minds of the Enemy that they have no more Disturbed our Land For my own part I will observe it and Admire it in such Terms as Austin used upon a Remarkable Providence Quisquis non videt Caecus Quisquis videt nec Laudat Ingratus Quisquis Laudanti reluctatur Insanus They are Blind and Mad that are Insensible of it Yet again Have not our English Prisoners been favoured with such a Remembrance of Mercy in the midst of Wrath as ought never to be Forgotten The Mercy of God inclined the French to Buy 'em out of the Hands of the Indians and use them with an Exemplary Humanity and Civility The Mercy of God preserved many of them alive under prodigious and incredible Hardships and at length Returned many scores of them Home And may not our English Women that were Prisoners take Notice of one Singular Mercy shown by God unto them in preserving them from Violations by the Outrageous Lusts of the Salvages This One Thing will be thought by some almost as Great and Strange an Instance of an Immediate Interposition of the Angels of God as the muzzling of the Lions in the Den of Daniel O ye Redeemed of the Lord you whom He hath Redeemed from the Hand of the Enemy Give Thanks to the Lord for He is Good Charge your own Souls That you never forget His Benefits Ask your own Souls What you shall render to the Lord for all His Benefits and Remember that Admonition of the Lord Jesus Christ unto you Sin no more Lest a worst thing do come unto thee Furthermore Who could not see Mercy Remembred in the midst of Wrath when God hath put it into the Hearts of His people in the Southern parts of the Countrey to make Liberal Contributions of Money and Corn and Men for the Relief of the Northern parts More than once has the Noble Charity of our Brethren in Plymouth and in Connecticut as well as of this Town been Expressed in such Contributions Their Alms are Gone up for a Memorial before the Lord The Blessing of many that have been Ready to perish hath come upon you O ye Merciful Children of God and you shall obtain mercy from Him Once more Was ever Mercy Remembred in the midst of Wrath
more conspicuously than when powerful Adversaries Designing Inroads upon us have been Diverted wonderfully Advice hath been seasonably Dispatched unto us of the Intentions in our Enemies to fall upon our Frontiers and this Advice hath proved our Safety Yea sometimes when we have had no Advice a Strange Direction from Heaven has Led us to those Actions which have as much defeated the Intentions of our Enemies as if we had Received the fullest Advice in the world Besides this Boston and Salem and Portsmouth especially Will they ever forget the Last year It was a Year of Salvations yea It was a Year of Miracles Never Never such a Year passed over us The Almighty show'd that Favour to His people of old Zech. 9.8 I will Encamp about my House because of the Army because of him that passeth by and because of him that Returneth Alexander in an Expedition to the Southward did pass by the Land of Israel and he did Return again to the Northward without Hurting that Land that had the House of God in it Formidable French Squadrons have more than once passed by to the Southward and have Returned again to the Northward intending doubtless a Destroying Visit into this Land by the way but Our Lord Jesus Christ hath Encamped about His House here because of the Navy Yea once O new-New-England the Lord thy God He that would be the Holy One of New-England gave Carthagena for thy Ransome He gave men for thee and Spaniards for thy Life Another Time when a Force likely enough to have carried all before them were almost arrived unto us we are advised that God sent such a sudden and such a wasting Sickness among them as to make them for want of Hands to desist from their Attempt These were Illustrious Deliverances And yet give me leave to say We did the last year see another Deliverance that for ought I know may be aequal to any of the rest There was an English Fleet of our Good Friends with a direful Plague aboard 'em intending Hither Had they Come as they intended what an horrible Desolation had cut us off Let the Desolate places that some of you have seen in the Colonies of the South declare unto us And that they did not come it was the Signal Hand of Heaven by which the Goings of men are ordered In Fine Because God being full of Compassion would not Stir up all His Wrath He hath Remembred Mercy to us in the midst of Wrath by Raising us up Generous Benefactors who have been able and willing to oblige us with their Benefits It must be with shame acknowledged Our Usage of our Publick Servants has commonly been such that for any Thinking man to be willing at all to Serve the Publick seems to be a Mark and Fruit of no little Generosity Nevertheless we have had persons of Exemplary Patience and Prudence and Self denial Sitting at the Helm of our Government all this while that the Horrible Tempest hath been enough to make any man living Sick of being there We have had persons who have Disbursed and Expended of their Estates and considerably Damnified their Interests for us in our Distresses when yet they foreknew what pay they should have after all Yea we have had and still have I can at this moment fasten my Eye upon some of them in the Assembly where I am now speaking Brave men who have Bravely Jeoparded their Lives in the High places of the Field for our Defence O Treat 'em not with vile Ingratitude after all the Service they have done Prefer them on all fit occasions while they Live Embalm their Memories and Requite their Families when they are Dead But while we are Thankful to Them Let us much more give Thanks to God for Them even for such Gifts of Heaven as we have Enjoyed in them Well Will you Wisely Observe these Things Wisely That is to say Thankfully and Fruitfully It may be If more Distinct and Solemn THANKSGIVINGS were made unto God our Saviour for these things the Reliques of our Enemies would quickly feel the Rebukes of God upon them not unlike those in 2 Chron. 20.22 When they began to Sing and to Praise the Lord set Ambushments against their Enemies and they were Smitten IX In the WAR that hath been upon us Whoso is Wise may Observe those things that may Mightily Encourage our Prayer and our Faith for a Total Ruine to be hastened on the Remainders of our Enemies There yet Remains a Knot of our Enemies in those Inaccessible Thickets where we Despair ever to Find 'em out but I will Read their Doom from Psal 21.8 9 10 Thine Hand O Lord shall Find out all thine Enemies Thy Right Hand shall Find out thâ—se that Hate thee The Lord shall Swallow them up in His Wrath and the Fire shall Devour them Their Fruit shalt thou Destroy from the Earth and their Seed from among the Children of men What Remains for Us is That we do by Prayer and Faith put our Enemies over into those Omnipotent Hands that can Find them out and cut them off Oh! Let us keep our Hands Lifted up in Prayer for a Total Dissipation of those Amalekites which have thus long and thus far prevailed against us We have already had many Notable Answers of Prayer in this our War Every one of our Deliverances have been very Notably Such We cannot say How many particular Persons have Received Answers of Prayer in the particular Troubles which this Evil Time hath Ensnared them withal Doubtless many a Christian ha's in this Time had opportunity to say This poor man cryed and the Lord Heard him and Saved him out of all his Troubles And several Towns that have had a Remarkable Protection of God upon them in this long Time of Danger they have had a Praying People in them and that Praying People have been the Chariots and the Horse men thereof Why else does Deerfield Stand How should our Prayer be Quickened by such Experiences But there is this further Quickening for it That with the Cry of our Prayer there will go up unto the Lord the Cry of Blood much Innocent Righteous Precious Blood Cryes to Heaven from the Ground against those Bloody and Crafty men that have Treacherously shed it Certainly They must not Live out all their Dayes And we have this prevailing plea against them in the Court of Heaven That they have most Falsely Broken their Covenants in their Outrages We may venture to present our Memorials in the Court of Heaven against these Covenant Breakers who are Implacable and Unmerciful and we may use the words of Jephtah against his Heathen Adversaries The Lord the Judge be Judge between us and them We may use the words of Jehoshaphat against his Heathen Adversaries O our God wilt thou not Judge them Vladislaus the King of Hungary Scandalously breaking his League with Amurath the Turkish Emperour brought an Army into the Field against him The Turkish Army being horribly Broke