The founders of the colony in the Massachusetts Bay, and most of those who immediately followed them, were men who did not conform to the ritual and government of the Established Church in England. They were followers of John Calvin whose Geneva Bible was widely read in England and whose teachings had profoundly influenced English thought and manners. Calvin taught a great simplicity of life and a personal application of the teachings found in the Bible. In the Commonwealth that he set up in Geneva, the daily life and actions of its citizens were as closely guarded as if in a nursery for children. All frivolous amusements were forbidden; a curfew was established; and all were constrained to save souls and to labor for material development. There was a minute supervision of dress and personal conduct, and a literal construction of Bible mandates was carried so far that children were actually put to death for striking their parents.
Calvin's theology was based on the belief that all men were born sinners and since Adam's fall, by the will of God, predestined from birth to hell and everlasting torment, unless, happily, one of the elect and so foreordained to be saved. In this belief the Puritans found life endurable because they considered themselves of the elect; and in cases of doubt, the individual found comfortable assurance in the belief that although certain of his neighbors were going to hell he was one of the elect. It naturally followed that the imagination of the Puritans was concentrated on questions of religion.
The teachings of Calvin spread rapidly in England and among his followers there came about an austerity of religious life and a great simplicity in dress and manners.
It is true that most of the settlers of Massachusetts were poor in purse and with many of them mere existence was a struggle for a long time. But the growth of wealth in the Colony, although it brought with it more luxury in living and better dwellings, did not add much to the refinement of the people. It was the influence and example of the royal governors and a more frequent commercial intercourse with England and the Continental peoples that brought about a desire for a richer dress and an introduction of some of the refinements of life. This by no means met the approval of the Puritan ministers who frequently inveighed against "Professors of Religion who fashion themselves according to the World." The Rev. Cotton Mather, the leading minister in Boston and the industrious author of over four hundred published sermons and similar works, again and again exhorted against stage plays and infamous games of cards and dice. "It is a matter of Lamentation that even such things as these should be heard of in New England," he exclaimed. "And others spend their time in reading vain Romances," he continued. "It is meer loss of time."
With such a background and burdened with such a far-reaching antagonism toward the finer things of life, that help to lighten the burden of existence and beautify the way, it is small wonder that the esthetics found little fertile soil in New England; and much of this prejudice and state of mind lingered among the old families in the more remote and orthodox communities, until recent times.
The New England Puritans only allowed themselves one full holiday in the course of the year and that was Thanksgiving Day, a time for feasting. To be sure, there was Fast Day, in the spring, which gave freedom from work; but that was a day for a sermon at the meetinghouse, for long faces and a supposed bit of self denial—somewhere. The celebration of Christmas was not observed by the true New England Puritan until the middle of the nineteenth century.
A number of sermons preached by Rev. Samuel Moodey, an eccentric minister at York, Maine, for nearly half a century, were printed and among them: "The Doleful State of the Damned, especially such as go to hell from under the Gospel." This sermon was followed by its antidote, entitled: "The Gospel Way of Escaping the Doleful State of the Damned." Another of his sermons was upon "Judas the Traitor, Hung up in Chains." Parson Moodey's son, Joseph, followed him in the pulpit at York. He was known as "Handkerchief Moodey," as he fell into a melancholy; thought he had sinned greatly; and after a time wore a handkerchief over his face whenever he appeared in public. In the pulpit he would turn his back to the congregation and read the sermon, but whenever he faced his people it would be with handkerchief-covered features. Think what must have been the influence of two such men on the life and opinions of a town covering a period of two generations!
During the late seventeenth century and well into the eighteenth, the books usually found in the average New England family were the Bible, the Psalm Book, an almanac, the New England Primer, a sermon or two and perhaps a copy of Michael Wigglesworth's terrific poem—"The Day of Doom." The latter was first printed in 1662 in an edition of 1800 copies not one of which has survived. Every copy was read and re-read until nothing remained but fragments of leaves. Seven editions of this poem were printed between 1662 and 1715 and few copies of any edition now exist. The book expressed the quintesscence of Calvinism. Here is stanza 205, expressing the terror of those doomed to hell:
"They wring their hands, their caitiff-hands,
and gnash their teeth for terrour:
They cry, they roar, for anguish sore
and gnaw their tongues for horrour.
But get away without delay,
Christ pities not your cry:
Depart to Hell, there may you yell,
and roar Eternally."