No CrossRef data available.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 30 July 2009
When Edward Johnson needed to express his deepest hopes about history, he found in the Bible an encoded emblem for the destiny of America. In the proclamation from Christ's herald that begins The Wonder-Working Providence of Sions Saviour in New England, he concludes with an urgent appeal to all believers:
Pray, pray, pray, pray continually with the valiant worthy Joshua that the Sun may stand still in Gibeon, and the Moone in the vally of Aijalon, for assuredly although some small battailes may be fought against the enemies of Christ, yet the great day of their finall overthrow shall not come till the bright Sonne of that one cleare truth of Christ, stands still in the Gentile Churches, that those who fight the Lords Battells may plainly discerne his enemies in all places, where they finde them, as also such as will continue fighting must have the World kept low in their eyes, as the Moon in the valley of Aijalon.
Author's note: The author wishes to thank Dorothy Ross, Dewey Wallace, Donald Weber, Robert Silberman, Robert Daly, and Philip Gura for helpful readings of this essay.
1. Johnson, Edward, Wonder-Working Providence of Sions Saviour in New-England (1654; rept. Delmar, N.Y.: Scholar's Facsimiles and Reprints, 1974), pp. 12–13Google Scholar. Further references to this edition are given in the text.
2. Joshua 10: 13–14, The Geneva Bible (1560; rept. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1969), p. 101.Google Scholar
3. Jameson, J. Franklin, “Introduction,” in Johnson's Wonder-Working Providence 1628–1651 (New York: Scribner's, 1910), pp. 6–8.Google Scholar
4. The work of Sacvan Bercovitch, Ursula Brumm, Cecilia Tichi, Edward Gallagher, and Philip Gura in particular has helped to encourage a more careful look at Johnson's history. Bercovitch points out that Johnson, despite the awkwardness and overreaching of his prose, has a readily discoverable structure and employs typological parallels systematically through the work (“The Historiography of Johnson's Wonder-Working Providence,” Essex Institute Historical Collections 104 [1968]: 138–61Google Scholar). Ursula Brumm has shown the linkage of theology and history in the Puritan mind as exemplified by Johnson, where “history is a territory between the present and the eternal truth of God's word … both a memorial of past events and a fulfillment of God's providence.” Brumm has noted the way that Johnson uses the present tense to convey the intense continuing importance of divinely directly events to his readers (“Edward Johnson's Wonder-Working Providence and the Puritan Conception of History,” Jahrbuch fur Amerikastudien 14 [1969]: 140–51Google Scholar). Tichi and Gallagher have both pointed to the work's function as a group spiritual biography, and Gallagher has noted (without expanding on the observation) that the work should be seen in its polemical context, among other defenses of the New England Way written in the 1640s and 1650s in response to criticisms from both Presbyterians and Independents (Tichi, Cecilia, “Spiritual Biography and the Lords Remembrancers,” William and Mary Quarterly 28 (1971): 64–85CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Gallagher, Edward J., “The Wonder-Working Providence as Spiritual Biography,” Early American Literature 10 [1975]: 75–87Google Scholar). Philip Gura describes Johnson as “the locus classicus for understanding the shift in the colonists' way of understanding their nature and destiny in the New World” (A Glimpse of Sion's Glory: Puritan Radicalism in New England, 1620–1660 [Middletown, Ct.: Wesleyan University Press, 1984], p. 229Google Scholar and elsewhere). Even these interpreters of Johnson do not claim that he was a powerful and original mind or a graceful literary stylist. But he could exercise competently the complex intellectual equipment of 11th-Century Puritanism, and his energy of expression bears witness to the vitality of that belief in New England.
5. Brumm, , “Edward Johnson's,” p. 148.Google Scholar
6. Gallagher, Edward J., “An Overview of Edward Johnson's Wonder-Working Providence,” Early American Literature 5 (1971): 38.Google Scholar
7. On the character of redemptive history, see Bercovitch, Sacvan, The Puritan Origins of the American Self (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1975), pp. 53–62, 71–84.Google Scholar
8. See Tichi, , “Spiritual Biography,” pp. 83–84.Google Scholar
9. See, for example, Ward, Harry M., “The Search for American Identity: Early Historians of New England,” in Perspective on Early American History: Essays in Honor of Richard B. Morris (New York: Harper and Row, 1973), pp 40–62Google Scholar; Dunn, Richard S., “Seventeenth-Century English Historians of America,” in Seventeenth-Century America: Essays In Colonial American History (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1959), pp. 195–225Google Scholar; Gay, Peter, A Loss of Mastery: Puritan Historians in Colonial America (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1966)Google Scholar; Murdock, Kenneth, “Clio in the Wilderness: History and Biography in Puritan New England,” Church History 24 (1955): 221–38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
10. Bradford, William, History of Plymouth Plantation, 1620–1647 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1912), vol. 1, p. 76Google Scholar; Levin, David, “William Bradford: The Value of Puritan Historiography,” in Major Writers of American Literature, ed. Emerson, Everett (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1972), pp. 11–31Google Scholar; Rosenmeier, Jesper, “‘With my Owne Eyes’: William Bradford's Of Plymouth Plantation,” in Typology in Early American Literature, ed. Bercovitch, Sacvan (Amherst, Mass.: University of Massachusetts Press, 1972), pp. 69–105Google Scholar; Howard, Alan B., “Art and History in Bradford's Of Plymouth Plantation,” William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd ser., 28 (1971): 237–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
11. Bradford, , History, vol. 2, p. 369.Google Scholar
12. Bradford, , History, vol. 1, p. 1.Google Scholar
13. Bradford, , History, vol. 1, p. 156.Google Scholar
14. Bradford, , History, vol. 1, p. 155Google Scholar. Robert Daly has persuasively argued that Bradford may have composed the earlier part of his history with the notion of publication in mind (“William Bradford's Vision of History,” American Literature 44 [1973]: 557–69).Google Scholar
15. Goodwin, Thomas et al. , An Apologeticall Narration, Humbly Submitted to the Honourable Houses of Parliament, ed. Paul, Robert S. (1643; rept. [with notes] Philadelphia: United Church Press, 1963), p. 5.Google Scholar
16. Taylor, John, The Anatomy of the Separatists, alias Brownists, the factious Brethren in these Times (London: n.p., 1642), p. 1.Google Scholar
17. Ashe, Simeon, ed., A Letter of Many Ministers in Old England, Requesting the Judgement of their Reverend Brethren in New England, Concerning Nine Positions (London: Thomas Underhill, 1643), p. A2.Google Scholar
18. Edwards, Thomas, Antapologia: or, A Full Answer to the Apologeticall Narration (London: John Bellamie, 1644), pp. 40–41.Google Scholar
19. On these controversies, see Haller, William, Liberty and Reformation in the Puritan Revolution (New York: Columbia University Press, 1955)Google Scholar; Woodhouse, A. S. P., Puritanism and Liberty (London: J.M. Dent, 1938)Google Scholar; Hill, Christopher, The World Turned Upside Down: Radical Ideas during the English Revolution (London: Temple Smith, 1972)Google Scholar; Gura, , A Glimpse of Sion's Glory.Google Scholar
20. Quoted in Haller, , Liberty and Reformation, p. 118.Google Scholar
21. Baillie, Robert, A Dissuasive from the Errours of our Time (London: S. Gellibrand, 1645), pp. 62–63.Google Scholar
22. Baillie, , Dissuasive, p. 64.Google Scholar
23. Rathband, William, A Brief Narration of Some Church Courses Held in Opinion in the Churches lately erected in New England (London: Edward Brewster, 1644), pp. 9–10Google Scholar; Baillie, , Dissuasive, pp. 59–60.Google Scholar
24. Rathband, , Briefe Narration, p. 2.Google Scholar
25. Rathband, , Briefe Narration, p. 4.Google Scholar
26. Winthrop, John, Papers, ed. Mitchell, Stewart (1931; rept. New York: Russell and Russell, 1968), vol. 2, p. 295.Google Scholar
27. On the distinction between church and sect, see Troeltsch, Ernst, The Social Teaching of the Christian Churches, trans. Wyon, Olive (London: George Allen and Unwin, 1931), vol. 1, pp. 328–43.Google Scholar
28. Rathband, , Briefe Narration, p. 26.Google Scholar
29. Rathband, , Briefe Narration, p. 26.Google Scholar
30. Edwards, Thomas, Gangraena; or A Catalogue and Discovery of Many of the Errours, Heresies, Blasphemies and Pernicious Practices of the Sectarians of this Time (London: R. Smith, 1646), p. 40.Google Scholar
31. Edwards, , Gangraena, p. 69.Google Scholar
32. Baillie, , Dissuasive, p. 7.Google Scholar
33. Breen, T. H., “Persistent Localism: English Social Change and the Shaping of New England Institutions,” in Puritans and Adventurers: Change and Persistence in Early America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1980), pp. 3–24Google Scholar; Jordan, W. K., The Development of Religious Toleration in England (London: George Allen and Unwin, 1936–1938), vol. 4, pp. 265–69.Google Scholar
34. Goodwin, et al. , Apologeticall Narration, p. 5.Google Scholar
35. Sir Richard Saltonstall had settled his family in Massachusetts in the 1630s before returning to England; in the early 1650s he wrote to the Boston ministers Cotton and John Wilson to warn them of the reports about the colony among the Independents. “It doth not a little grieve my spirit to heare what sadd things are reported dayly of your tyranny and persecutions in New-England, as that you fyne, whip and imprison men for their consciences…. These rigid wayes have layed you very lowe in the hearts of the saynts. I doe assure you I have heard them pray in the publique assemblies that the Lord would give you meeke and humble spirits, not to stryve soe much for uniformity as to keepe the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace” (Hutchinson Papers [1865; rept. New York: Burt Franklin, 1967], vol. 2, pp. 127–28Google Scholar). In 1645 Sir Henry Vane, now an Independent political leader, wrote to New England chiding Winthrop for the New England attachment to doctrinal purity and warning of the potential consequences:
The exercise and troubles which God is pleased to lay upon these kingdomes and the inhabitants in them, teaches us patience and forebearance one with another in some measure, though there be difference in our opinions, which makes me hope that, from the experience here, it may also be derived to yourselves, least whilst the congregationall way amongst you is in its freedom, and is backed with power, it teach its oppugners here to extirpate it and roote it out, from its owne principles and practice. (Hutchinson Papers, vol. 1, pp. 152–53)Google Scholar
During the same month Thomas Goodwin, Philip Nye, and John Owen wrote to the Massachusetts General Court to complain about the laws against Anabaptists, on the grounds that the Independent position in England was undermined by such laws (Miller, Perry, The New England Mind: From Colony to Province [1953; rept. Boston: Beacon, 1961], p. 9).Google Scholar
36. Goodwin, et al. , Apologeticall Narration, pp. 10–11.Google Scholar
37. Goodwin, et al. , Apologeticall Narration, p. 3.Google Scholar
38. Shepard, Thomas, New Englands Lamentation for Old Englands Present Errours, and Divisions (London: G. Miller, 1645), pp. 1–2.Google Scholar
39. Weld, Thomas, An Answer to W.R. his Narration (London: H. Overton, 1644), p. 66; see also p. 12.Google Scholar
40. Shepard, , New Englands Lamentation, p. 5.Google Scholar
41. Waller, Williston, The Creeds and Platforms of Congregationalism (1893; rept. Boston: Pilgrim Press, 1960), p. 203.Google Scholar
42. Saltmarsh, John, A New Quere, at this time seasonably to be considered (London: C. Calvert, 1645), p. 4.Google Scholar
43. Walker, , Creeds and Platforms, p. 207.Google Scholar
44. Mather, Richard, Church-Government and Church-Covenant Discussed (1643; rept. New York: Arno, 1972), p. 39.Google Scholar
45. Walker, , Creeds and Platforms, p. 354.Google Scholar
46. Walker, , Creeds and Platforms, p. 356.Google Scholar
47. Walker, , Creeds and Platforms, p. 359.Google Scholar
48. Walker, , Creeds and Platforms, p. 194.Google Scholar
49. Hooker, Thomas, A Survey of the Summe of Church Discipline (1648; rept. New York: Arno, 1972), p. 80.Google Scholar
50. Mather, Richard, Church-Government and Church-Covenant, pp. 64–65 and passim.Google Scholar
51. Mather, Richard, An Apologie of the Churches in New England for Church-Covenant (1643; rept. New York: Arno, 1972), p. 14Google Scholar; Hooker, , Survey, pp. 5–11Google Scholar; Cotton, John, The Way of the Congregational Churches Cleared (1648)Google Scholar, in John Cotton on the Churches of New England, ed. Ziff, Larzer (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1968), pp. 293–97.Google Scholar
52. Winthrop, , Papers, vol. 2, p. 292.Google Scholar
53. Bradford, , Of Plymouth Plantation, vol. 1, p. 44.Google Scholar
54. Quoted in Jameson, , “Introduction” to Johnson's Wonder-Working Providence, p. 4.Google Scholar
55. Ames, William, The Marrow of Theology, trans. Eusden, John D. (Boston: Pilgrim Press, 1968), p. 158.Google Scholar
56. Solberg, Winton U., Redeem the Time: The Puritan Sabbath in Early America (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1977)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Walsh, James P., “Holy Time and Sacred Space in Puritan New England,” American Quarterly 32 (1980): 79–95.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
57. Winthrop, , Papers, vol. 2, p. 285.Google Scholar
58. Turner, Victor, The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1969), p. 96.Google Scholar
59. Bercovitch, Sacvan, “New England's Errand Reappraised,” in New Directions in American Intellectual History, ed. Higham, John and Conkin, Paul K. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1979), pp. 96–97.Google Scholar