The Life and Death of John Eliot, Preliminary
PRAELIMINARY I. THE BIRTH, AGE, and FAMILY of Mr. ELIOT. 'Tis the Life of the Reverend John Eliot, which is to be now put into our Pages; a Life which commenced about the Year 1604. And Expired in the Year 1690.
THE inspired Moses relating the Lives of the Ante-diluvian Patriarchs, in whom the Church of God, and Line of Christ was continued, through the first Sixteen hundred Years of time, recites little but their Birth, and their Age, and their Death, and their Sons and Daughters. If those Articles would satisfy the Appetites and Enquiries of such as come to Read the Life of our Eliot, we shall soon have dispatch'd the Work now upon our hands. The Age, with the Death of this Worthy man, has been already terminated in the Ninetieth year of the present Century, and the Eighty sixth Year of his own Pilgrimage. And for his Birth, it was at a Town in England, the Name whereof I cannot presently recover; nor is it necessary for me to look back so far as the place of his Nativity, any more than 'tis for me to recite the Virtues of his Parentage, of which he said, Vix ea nostra voco. The Atlantick Ocean, like a River of Lethe, may easily cause us to forget many of the things that happened on the other side. Indeed the Nativity of such a Man were an Honour worthy the Contention of as many Places as laid their Claims unto the famous Homer's; but whatever Places may challenge a share in the Reputation of having Enjoy'd the first Breath of our Eliot, it is New-England that with most right can call him hers; his best Breath, and afterwards his last Breath, was here; and here 'twas that God bestow'd upon him Sons and Daughters.
He came to New-England in the Month of November, A. D. 1631. among those Blessed old Planters, which laid the Foundations of a remarkable Country, devoted unto the Exercise of the Protestant Religion, in its purest and highest Reformation: He left behind him in England a vertuous young Gentlewoman, whom he had pursued and purposed a Marriage unto; and she coming hither the year following, that Marriage was Consummated in the Month of October, A. D. 1632.
This Wife of his Youth lived with him until she became to him also the Staff of his Age; and she left him not until about three or four years before his own Departure to those Heavenly Regions, where they now together see Light. She was a Woman very Eminent both for Holiness and Ʋsefulness, and she excelled most of the Daughters that have done vertuously. Her Name was Ann, and Gracious was her Nature. God made her a rich Blessing, not only to her Family, but also to her Neighbourhood; and when at last she died, I heard and saw her aged Husband, who else very rarely wept, yet now with Tears over the Coffin, before the good People, a vast confluence of which were come to her Funeral, say, Here lies my Dear, Faithful, Pious, Prudent, Prayerful Wife; I shall go to her, and she not return to me! My Reader will of his own accord excuse me, from bestowing any further Epitaphs upon that gracious Woman.
By her, did God give him six worthy Children; Children of a Character which may for ever stop the mouths of those Antichristian Blasphemers, who have set a false brand of Disaster and Infamy on the Off-spring of a Married Clergy. His First-born was a Daughter, born Sept. 17. A. C. 1633. This Gentlewoman is yet alive, and one well-approved for her Piety and Gravity. His next was a Son, born Aug. 31. A. C. 1636. He bore his Father's Name, and had his Father's Grace. He was a Person of notable Accomplishments, and a lively, zealous, acute Preacher, not only to the English, at New-Cambridge, but also to the Indians thereabout. He grew so fast, that he was found ripe for Heaven many years ago; and upon his Death-bed uttered such penetrating things as could proceed from none but one upon the Borders and Confines of Eternal Glory. 'Tis pity that so many of them are forgotten; but one of them, I think, we have cause to remember: Well (said he) my dear Friends, there is a dark Day coming upon poor New-England; and in so dark a Day, I pray how will you provide for your own Security? My Counsel to you is, get an Interest in the Blessed Lord Jesus Christ; and that will carry you to the Worlds end. His Third was also a Son, born Decemb. 20. A. C. 1638. him he call'd Joseph, and made a Joseph of him: This Person is at this time a Pastor to the Church at Guilford, and one of great note, as well thro' the whole Country, as in the particular Colony of Connecticut, which God has made him considerable to. His Fourth was a Samuel, born June 22. A. C. 1641. who died, a most lovely young Man, Eminent for Learning and Goodness, a Fellow of the Colledge, and a Candidate of the Ministry. His Fifth was an Aaron, born Febr. 15. A. C. 1643. who tho he di'd very young, yet first manifested many good things towards the Lord God of Israel. His last was a Benjamin, born Jan. 29. A. C. 1646. Of all these Three it may be said, as it was of Haran, They died before their Father; but it may also be written over their Graves, All these died in Faith. By the pious Design of their Father, they were all Consecrated unto the Service of God, in the Ministry of the Gospel; but God saw meet rather to fetch them away, by a Death, which (therefore) I dare not call Pramature, to glorify him in another and better World. They all gave such Demonstrations of their Conversion to God, that the good old Man would sometimes comfortably say, I have had six Children, and I bless God for his free-grace, they are all either with Christ, or in Christ; and my mind is now at rest concerning them. And when some asked him, How he could bear the Death of such excellent Children? His humble Reply thereunto was this, My desire was, that they should have served God on Earth; but if God will chuse to have them rather serve him in Heaven, I have nothing to object against it, but his Will be done. His Benjamin was made the Son of his Right hand, for the Invitation of the good People at Ruxbury placed him in the same Pulpit with his Father, where he was his Assistant for many years; there they had a Proof of him, that as a Son with his Father, he served with him in the Gospel. But his Fate was like that which the great Gregory Nazianzen describes in his Discourse upon the Death of his honourable Brother, his aged Father being now alive and present: My Father, having laid up in a better World, a rich Inheritance for his Children, sent a Son of his before, to take possession of it.