[Also the honourable Commissioners in Boston, of the incorporated society in London for [♦]propagating the gospel in New-England, and parts adjacent, having a legacy of the late Dr. Daniel Williams of London, for the support of two missionaries to the Heathen, were pleased, while he was at Boston, to consult him about a mission to those Indians called the Six Nations; and were so satisfied with his sentiments on this head, and had that confidence in his faithfulness, and judgment, that they desired him to recommend a couple of persons fit to be employed in this business.
[♦] “propogating” replaced with “propagating”
Mr. Brainerd’s restoration from his extreme low state in Boston, so as to go abroad again and to travel, was very unexpected to him and his friends. My daughter who was with him writes thus concerning him in a letter dated June 23.—“On Thursday he was very ill of a violent fever, and extreme pain in his head and breast, and at turns, delirious. So he remained till Saturday evening, when he seemed to be in the agonies of death: the family was up with him ’till one or two o’clock, expecting every hour would be his last. On sabbath day he was a little revived, his head was better, but very full of pain, and exceeding sore at his breast, much put to it for breath. Yesterday he was better upon all accounts. Last night he slept but little. This morning he is much worse.——Dr. Pynchon says, he has no hopes of his life; nor does he think it likely he will ever come out of his chamber.”
His physician, the honourable Joseph Pynchon, Esq. when he visited him in Boston, attributed his sinking so suddenly into a state so nigh unto death, to the breaking of ulcers, that had been long gathering in his lungs, and there discharging and diffusing their purulent matter; which, while nature was labouring and struggling to throw off, (that could be done no otherwise, than by a gradual straining of it through the small vessels of those vital parts,) this occasioned an high fever and violent coughing, and threw the whole frame of nature into the utmost disorder; but supposed if the state of nature held till the lungs had gradually cleared themselves of this putrid matter, he might revive, and continue better, till new ulcers gathered and broke; but then he would surely sink again; and that there was no hope of his recovery; but (as he expressed himself to one of my neighbours) he was as certainly a dead man, as if he was shot through the heart.
But so it was ordered by divine Providence, that the strength of nature held out through this great conflict, and then he revived, to the astonishment of all that knew his case.
After he began to revive, he was visited by his youngest brother Mr. Israel Brainerd, a student at Yale-college; who having heard of his extreme illness, came to Boston to see him.
This visit was attended with a mixture of joy and sorrow to Mr. Brainerd. He greatly rejoiced to see his brother, especially because he had desired an opportunity of some religious conversation with him before he died. But this meeting was attended with sorrow, as his brother brought to him the tidings of his sister Spencer’s death at Haddam: a sister, between whom and him had long subsisted a peculiar dear affection, and much intimacy in spiritual matters. He had heard nothing of her sickness. But he had these comforts together with the tidings, a confidence of her being gone to heaven, and an expectation of soon meeting her there.—His brother continued with him till he left the town, and came with him from thence to Northampton.
[Concerning the last Sabbath Mr. Brainerd spent at Boston, he writes in his diary as follows.]
Lord’s-day, July 19. I was just able to attend public worship, being carried to the house of God in a chaise. I heard Dr. Sewall preach in the forenoon; partook of the Lord’s supper at this time. In the sacrament, I saw astonishing wisdom displayed; such wisdom as required the tongues of angels and glorified saints to celebrate. It seemed to me I never should do any thing at adoring the infinite wisdom of God discovered in the contrivance of man’s redemption, until I arrived at a world of perfection. Yet I could not help striving to “call upon my soul, and all within me, to bless the name of God.”
[The next day he set out in the cool of the afternoon, for Northampton, attended by his brother, and my daughter that went with him to Boston; and would have been accompanied out of the town by a number of gentlemen, had not his aversion to any thing of pomp and shew prevented it.]