Meanwhile my Soul shall enter into Peace,
Where Fears and Tears, where Sin and Smart shall cease.
FUNERAL SERMON
A CHARACTER
OF THE REVEREND AUTHOR,
Mr. MICHAEL WIGGLESWORTH,
PREACHED AT MALDEN, JUNE 24, 1705.
BY THE REVEREND DR. COTTON MATHER.
He was Descended of Eminently Religious Parents, who were Sufferers for that which was then The Cause of God and of New-England. While he was yet a youth, he was marvellously concerned that he might have an Heart filled with the Spirit of God. This Concernment upon his mind appeared especially in his watchful Endeavors to have Spiritual Sins chased out of his cleansed Heart. Pride, the Sin of Young Men, yea, of all Men; Pride, the Sin which few Men try or trouble themselves about; this Devout Youth was full of Holy and Watchful Trouble about it: And he then wrote a very Savoury Discourse, Entituled, Considerations against Pride, and another, Entituled, Considerations against Delighting more in the Creature than in God. This was to Mortify in himself the Sins rarely minded by the most of men.
Having had a Pious and a Learned Education, the first Publick Station wherein I find him, was that of a Fellow and a Tutor in Harvard Colledge. With a rare Faithfulness did he adorn that Station! He used all means imaginable to make his Pupils not only good Scholars, but also good Christians, and instil into them those things which might render them rich Blessings unto the Churches of God. Unto his Watchful and Painful Essays to keep them close under their Academical Exercises, he added Serious Admonitions unto them about their Interior State; and he Employed his Prayers and Tears to God for them, and had such a flaming zeal to make them worthy Men, that upon Reflection he was afraid Lest his cares for their Good, and his affection to them, should so drink up his very Spirit, as to steal away his Heart from God.
From Cambridge he made his remove to Malden, and was their Faithful Pastor for about a Jubilee of years together.
It was not long after his coming to Malden that a sickly Constitution so prevailed upon him, as to confine him from his Publick Work for some whole seven of Years. His Faithfulness continued when his Ministry was thus interrupted. The Kindness of his Tender Flock unto him was answered in his Kind Concern to have them served by other Hands. He took a short voyage unto another Country for the Recovery of his Health; which, though he recovered not, yet at his Return I find him comforting himself with inserting of this Passage in his Reserved Papers:
Peradventure the Lord Removed me for a season that he might set a better Watchman over his Flock, and a more painful Laborer in his Vineyard. This was one thing that I aimed at in Removing (to help the People's Modesty in the case), and I believe the Lord aimed at it, in Removing me for a season.