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Gigachad John Winthrop and His Merry Band of Chadly Puritans

slopifexmaximus said in #3466 2w ago: received

Harvardtards know Winthrop House, but have they read the works of its titular figure? I think not, but you can, anon. Here’s a nice cold plunge for you:

>If we should change from a mixed aristocracy to mere democracy, first we should have no warrant in scripture for it: for there was no such good government in Israel … A democracy is, amongst civil nations, accounted the meanest and worst of all forms of government. [To allow it would be] a manifest breach of the 5th commandment.

Democracy violates the 5th commandment? The American Nehemiah founded the Massachusetts Bay Colony on aristocracy? Yes, your conception of the Puritans as stodgy, gloomy, life-denying retards is probably inherited from the veritable retard HL Mencken. Consider instead the perspective of CS Lewis:

>We must picture these Puritans as the very opposite of those who bear that name today: as young, fierce, progressive intellectuals, very fashionable and up-to-date. They were not teetotallers; bishops, not beer, were their special aversion

Did you really think you could cross the Atlantic, show up on the 17th century equivalent of Mars, and thrive without being a nasty physical beast, dude? Did you think that cohering a community in the face of such grand difficulties would be possible without utterly fucking nuclear, divinely-inspired philosophy?

Here’s what Cotton Mather (yeah the witch trial Cotton Mather, the most influential Puritan minister of his time) had to say about Winthrop in the Magnalia Christi Americana:

>Let Greece boast of her patient Lycurgus, the Lawgiver, by whom Diligence, Temperance, Fortitude and Wit were made the Fashions of a therefore Long-lasting and Renowned Commonwealth: Let Rome tell of her Devout Numa, the Lawgiver, by whom the most Famous Commonwealth saw Peace Triumphing over extinguished War, and cruel Plunders, and Murders giving place to the more mollifying Exercises of his Religion. Our New-England shall tell and boast of her Winthrop, a Lawgiver, as patient as Lycurgus, but not admitting any of his Criminal Disorders; as Devout as Numa, but not liable to any of his Heathenish Madnesses; a Governour in whom the Excellencies of Christianity made a most improving Addition unto the Virtues, wherein even without those he would have made a Parallel for the Great Men of Greece, or of Rome, which the Pen of a Plutarch has Eternized.

Tradcaths BTFO! We already have a Christ-loving King, a Gigachad Lycurgus of the New World, and he was called John Winthrop. Now we're deep, so one may faithfully attempt the sermon which every man woman and child in America has heard at least a bit of: A Modell of Christian Charity. Enjoy it: https://minio.la.utexas.edu/webeditor-files/coretexts/pdf/163020model20of20christian20charity.pdf

referenced by: >>3634

Harvardtards know Wi received

anon_hwsu said in #3470 2w ago: received

I wish there were more period literature and accounts of daily happenings and society from the first and second generation Puritans. This sermon is good, but I wish we had memoirs. If there are good ones, and I have missed them, please inform me. I read Bradford's History of Plymouth Colony and found it edifying, albeit a bit of a slog. But he was a Brownist, not a Puritan. I started on Winthrop's journal, but it was very matter of fact, it did not give me a sense of their culture. Hawthorne's historical fiction set in Puritan times is what most people are familiar with, but it was a slander written two hundred years later.

referenced by: >>3472

I wish there were mo received

anon_hwsu said in #3471 2w ago: received

Maybe I just need to give this sourcebook a read: https://annas-archive.org/md5/09c11c6dc4adfb2b7230ba4dbf61d23e

referenced by: >>3472

Maybe I just need to received

slopifexmaximus said in #3472 2w ago: received

>>3470
>>3471
I would've recommended Bradford, but that sourcebook also looks great. Anything with Perry Miller's name on it is quite worth reading, especially something like a compendium. He's a giant. Skimming through the table of contents, I'd actually be quite interested in doing a bookclub on it. Say one chapter and one effortpost a week, here in this thread? Sunday to Sunday cadence?

I would've recommend received

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