The Witchcraft Delusion in New England: Its Rise, Progress, and Termination, (Vol. 1 of 3)Mather, Cotton
History
The Witchcraft Delusion in New England: Its Rise, Progress, and Termination, (Vol. 1 of 3)
Mather, Cotton
Witchcraft -- New England
V. To _distrust_ Gods Providence and Protection, is one of the worst
things, into which the Devil by his _Temptations_ would be hurrying
of us. He would fain have driven our Lord unto a Suspicion of Gods
care about Him, said the Devil, _You may dy for lack of Bread, if you
do not look better after your self, than God is like to do for you_.
It is an usual thing for Persons to dispair of Gods _Fatherly Care_
Concerning them; they torture themselves with distracting and amazing
Fears, that they shall come to want before they dy; Yea, they even say
with _Jonas_, in Chap. 2. 4. _I am cast out of the sight of God;_
He wont look after me! But it is the Devil that is the Author of all
such Melancholly Suggestions in the minds of men. It is a thought
that often raises a Feaver in the Hearts of _Married_ Persons, when
Charges grow upon them; _God will never be able in the way of my
calling, to feed and cloath all my Little Folks_. It is a Thought with
which _Aged_ persons are often tormented, _Tho' God has all my dayes
hitherto supplied me, yet I shall be pinched with Straits before I come
to my Journeys end_. 'Tis a malicious Devil that raises these _Evil
surmisings_ in the hearts of Men. And sometimes a distemper of Body
affords a Lodg[56]ing for the Devil, from whence he shoots the cruel
Bombs of such _Fiery Thoughts_ into the minds of many other persons.
With such thoughts does the Devil choose to persecute us; because
thereby we come to _Forfeit_ what we _Question_. We _Question_ the Care
of God, and so we _Forfeit_ it, until perhaps the Devil do utterly
_drown us in Perdition_. Our God says, _Trust in the Lord, and do good,
and verily thou shalt be fed_. But the Devil says, _don't you trust in
God; be afraid that you shall not be fed;_ and thus he hinders men from
the _doing of Good_.
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