The Puritans had no assurance?

[Ron Henzel]

Here's an excerpt from The Puritan Way of Death where the author seems to agree, although he only presents one supporting story in some detail. He relates the doubts of Increase Mather as told by his son Cotton.

...Or, as Allan I.Ludwig has more recently-and somewhat more dramatically-put it: "In the midst of darkness and confusion there was light, the triumph of Death was overcome by eternity. The fear of death gave way to the thrill of spiritual pleasures yet to come as archangels trumpeted the glorious day." The evidence does not confirm this interpretation. Instead, it suggests that the Puritans were gripped individually and collectively by an intense and unremitting fear of death, while simultaneously clinging to the traditional Christian rhetoric of viewing death as a release and relief for the earth-bound soul.

Note by me: Although the author suggests that most Puritans had a great fear of dying, he later says,

"None of this is to suggest, of course, that all New England Puritans faced the ends of their lives in desperate fear and trembling. Many of them did not, and, at least as reported in the didactic postmortem expositions of their ministers, perhaps most even gasped a sigh of personal conviction as their final breath escaped."​

Increase Mather provides a clear-cut example of this duality. Mather was fond of the kind of declaration cited earlier, indicating that believers should long for the deliverance of death. Indeed, in one of his sermons published in 1715, he cried, "I know that the time of my departure out of this World is now very near at hand.... And now that I am Preaching Christ, how glad should I be, if I might dye before I stir out of this pulpit!" But eight years later, when death was in fact near at hand, his reaction was quite different. As his son Cotton relates and explains it:

And in the Minutes of the Darkness wherein he lay thus feeble and sore broken, he sometimes let fall expressions of some Fear lest he might after all be Deceived in his Hope of the Future Blessedness. His Holy Ministry having very much insisted on that Point, that no care could be too much to prevent our being Deceived in that Important Matter; tis no wonder, that as the Dark Vapours which assaulted and fettered his Intellectual Powers, broke in upon him, his Head should run much upon the Horror of being Deceived at the last. Yea, had there not been anything at all of a Natural Debilitation and Obnubilation in it, yet it were a very Supposeable thing, and not at all to be wondered at, if the Serpent be let loose to vex a Servant of GOD in the Heel of his Life; and if the Powers of Darkness, knowing the Time to be short, fall with Great Wrath on the Great Opposers of their Kingdom, and make a very Dark Time for them just before the Break of the Eternal Day upon them. And how justly might it awaken the rest of us to Work out our own Salvation with Fear and Trembling, when we see such a man as Dr. Mather, concerned with so much Fear and Trembling, lest he should be Deceived at the Last?... The best Judges of Things have agreed in this Judgment; That going to Heaven in the way of Repentence, is much safer and surer than going in the way of Extasy.​

Not only does this passage illustrate the difference between Increase's earlier pronouncements and his actual deathbed behavior, but with equal force, it points out the dissonant nature of the father's experience of death and the son's "rhetorical" interpretation of it. Cotton, after all, remained clearly convinced of his father's salvation, despite the force of his father's despair.

David E. Stannard. The Puritan Way of Death: A Study in Religion, Culture, and Social Change (Kindle Locations 814-816). Kindle Edition.​

Ed,

Thanks so much for tracking down these quotes! I have purchased a copy of the Google Play edition of The Puritan Way of Death. Stannard seems to partially confirm Kendall's assessment. But to say, as he does, that "many did not" face "the ends of their lives in desperate fear and trembling" is pretty far from saying that "nearly to a man the great Puritan theologians lamented on their death beds that they probably were going to hell."

Although I haven't read his book yet, Stannard's comments seem limited to the New England Puritans, and Kendall's are not. I would be interested in finding out if there is much documentation with respect to how the English Puritans faced death, in addition to the reference to Perkins that I've already quoted.

 

[Ron Henzel]

John Knox wrote some letters to his mother-in-law who apparently struggled a lot with her assurance. She was not on her deathbed, as far as I know. But, the subject is discussed and Knox is left to give some counsel.
You'll find his letters to her in Volume 3: p.331-402 in the Banner of Truth edition.

This article references these Knox letters, but it is written from the perspective of a departure happening after Calvin regarding assurance. Some reformed might describe it differently. I'll post it here so you can see his use of the Knox quotes. http://archives.gcah.org/bitstream/handle/10516/6009/MH-1993-October-Reed.pdf?sequence=1

I suspect you'll find more of what you're looking for (if it exists) from authors who might differ from the puritans on assurance. Or, you'll find examples in letters of correspondence, or perhaps biographies.


Blessings!

Craig,

Thanks so much! This is extremely helpful!

 

[Contra_Mundum]

It is perhaps worth considering how the experiential nature--to the point of insistence--of certain strains of Puritanism could lend itself to just such a loss of confidence in an hour of weakness.

If we go to the "other end" of these sorts of Puritans' spiritual life, to their conversion, we find a heavy emphasis in their culture on a proper and true experience (something even more pronounced in an American context, where they had to begin with a majority of influence in the colonies they began). It was not sufficient for many of these to "know what and in Whom they believed," but to have gone through some deep wrestling and craving for emotional release.

Which having, brought many of them comfort. And which not having, left many of them "unconfirmed" or non-communing in the churches they faithfully attended; and which led to later expedients such as the "half-way-covenant," where these uncertain members relied on the grandparents' full-communion for the right to baptize their own children.

So, imagine two scenarios. 1) Someone who has longed for an experience all his life, refusing to make one up, unsure if he had a right to assurance with out it, now dying not having had it; but his pastors have insisted he should keep seeking it his whole life long. 2) Someone who put a great stock in his approved experience, and at last on his deathbed finds he has put more confidence there than in the Person of the Savior, or finds it hard on the wisps of his life to hold what (when stronger) he thought of as a convenient brace.

In neither case, would it be correct to assume the worst. The first case is a continuation of his earlier lack of assurance; the second a case of loss of assurance in that which never was properly a stay.

In no case would this be proper to the best Puritan theology. It would not be Westminsterian (but the WCF was not adopted in England, the Puritans fell from favor, and the American Puritans did not confess it). It would not be consistent with the best of the 16th & 17th century writers and pastors. It would only be consistent with whatever strains of Puritanism added an overabundance of experimentalism to their Reformed Faith.

Almost every Reformation Church developed strains of "pietism" of different strength and inclination. The Lutherans gave us the Pietists (capital P). The early English Puritans were simply aiming at finishing the Reformation in England, rather than settling for the half-measure Anglican Church. But after the high-water mark of the 1640s, and especially after the Great Ejection 1662, Puritanism was pushed to the margin. This is a condition ripe for an additional "inward thrust," an effort at validation for those who have been exiled from their religious home, yet keep God in their hearts. "They have the building, we have the faith," that sort of thing.

The Separatists (Pilgrims) and other Puritans were already colonizing North America when English Puritanism was dealt the blows; and those who went west over the sea would only reinforce the pietistic elements in the colonies. Finally, in time Puritanism becomes viewed as a monolith, without true regard for its origins, history, and variability. Find a deathbed agony, and (since this fits a certain caricature) it must be the norm, everywhere and always. Or the natural ending point for the movement.

Both the Scots and the Dutch had varieties of "Second Reformation" developments. What both these national churches had, which the English Puritans did not, were national church-Confessions. The Scots adopted the WCF (superseding their Scots Confession, 1560), and the Dutch had the Belgic, 1561. There is a tendency among some to feel as though the church of a settled Confession is insufficiently eager, disciplined, discriminating between the saved and the lost. And this will be true at times. And often the church needs a bit of stirring up to maintain its "edge." But it is not necessarily true.

The experience of the Faith is something we should be happy to have; but not everyone who has the Faith will have the same experience. I knew a man who has been overcome with emotion thinking about a father-in-the-faith, and what that man endured; while his own statement of religious devotion was that he NEVER had an emotional experience in a sermon or a worship service. Does that make his profession suspect? I don't think so.

Where there were Puritans (or anyone else) who put too much stock in experiences and emotions, they should not be faulted for valuing experience, but maybe for overvaluing it, and making it normative. But there's no reason to put all the Puritans in that category, or for discounting the many testimonies of having wonderful assurance of Christ's final call to them in their last moments--as much as they ever knew while they had their strength.

 

[moral necessity]

Craig,

Thanks so much! This is extremely helpful!

I stumbled across another example...

Walter Marshall (of The Gospel Mystery Of Sanctification) apparently struggled with assurance for several years of his ministry. He sought counsel from various pastors, particularly Richard Baxter, whose works he had studied. Baxter's reply was interesting, in which he told Marshall that he had taken his writings "too legally."

This information is found in the original preface to the 1692 edition of The Gospel Mystery Of Sanctification, written by N.N. and T. Woodcock.
I read where N.N. was Marshall's biographer, but I'm not sure who the initials stand for.

You can read the preface here on pp.8-9: http://www.digitalpuritan.net/Digital Puritan Resources/Marshall, Walter/The Gospel Mystery of Sanctification Opened.pdf

I've copied the preface over to this post for a quicker perusal...


PREFACE.

READER,
Mr. Walter Marshall, composer of these Directions how to attain to that practice and manner of life which we call holiness, righteousness, or godliness, was educated in New College of Oxford, and was a fellow of said college, and afterwards he was chosen a fellow of the college of Winchester, but was put under the Bartholomew Bushel,* with near two thousand more lights, (a sin not yet repented of) whose illuminations made the land a Goshen. He was esteemed a Presbyterian, and was called to be pastor to a people at Gosport in Hampshire, where he shined, though he had not the public oil. The substance of these meditations were there spun out of his own experiences; he having been much exercised with troubled thoughts, and that for many years. He had, by many mortifying methods, sought peace of conscience; but notwithstanding all, his troubles still increased. Whereupon he consulted others, particularly Mr. Baxter, whose writings he had been much conversant with; who thereupon told Mr. Marshall, he took them too legally. He afterwards consulted an eminent divine, Dr. T. G. (ie. Thomas Goodwin) giving him an account of the state of his soul, and particularizing his sins, which lay heavy upon his conscience; who, in his reply, told him that he had forgot to mention the greatest sin of all, the sin of unbelief in not believing on the Lord Jesus for the remission of his sins, and sanctifying his nature. Hereupon he set himself to the studying and preaching Christ, and attained to eminent "holiness, great peace of conscience, and joy in the Holy Ghost."

Mr. Marshall's dying words were these, "The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord;" having but just before, said to those about him, "That he now died in the full persuasion of the truth, and in the comfort of that doctrine which he had preached." The sum whereof is contained in the ensuing Discourse.

Some time since he was translated by death, Elijah-like, dropping these sheets as his mantle for succeeding Elishas to go forth with, for the conversion of sinners, and comfort of drooping souls.

These papers, are the profound experiences of a studious holy soul, learned of the Father, coming from his very heart; and smell of no party or design, but for holiness and happiness. Yet, it is to be feared, they will scarcely go down with the heady notionalists of this age, who are of the tribe of Reuben, wavering with every wind of modish doctrine; but in Judah they will be praised. And we hope that many shrubs and cedars may hereby advance in knowledge and comfort.

But, not to detain you longer, read over all these Directions, that you may fully understand the Author, or read none. If you do it with the serious humble spirit in which they were wrote, it may be hoped, (the matter being so weighty, and from so able a hand) through the grace of God, they will sink into thy conscience, and, make thee a solid Christian, full of faith, holiness, and consolation,
N.N.
July 21, 1692.

* This alludes to the Act of Parliament, after the restoration of Charles II. 1660. ejecting a vast number of eminent faithful ministers from their charges, because they could not comply with prelacy.

«
The Author of these Directions was well known to me, and was with me in my house a month together, about twenty years past; and I esteem him a person deserving the character which this Preface giveth him.
T. Woodcock
July 21, 1692.


I also came across a doctoral thesis here about Walter Marshall's view of sanctification: https://chesterrep.openrepository.c...reation+in+Christ++PhD+Thesis++Final.docx.txt

This is fairly long. Skimming through it, however, I found an interesting quote giving Marshall's comments on Baxter's teachings: The thesis reads, "It is nearly certain that Marshall’s spiritual melancholy was occasioned by the writings of Richard Baxter. N.N. says that Marshall knew Baxter’s writings well, and given Baxter’s prominence at the time, this is not surprising. Marshall seems to indicate a past experience with Baxter’s theology when he says concerning a view held by Baxter, “For my part, I hate it with perfect hatred, and account it mine enemy, as I have found it to be.” It is most probable that Baxter’s Neonomianism was Marshall’s enemy that caused him profound spiritual distress."


Blessings!

 

[Ron Henzel]

I stumbled across another example...

Walter Marshall (of The Gospel Mystery Of Sanctification) apparently struggled with assurance for several years of his ministry. He sought counsel from various pastors, particularly Richard Baxter, whose works he had studied. Baxter's reply was interesting, in which he told Marshall that he had taken his writings "too legally."

This information is found in the original preface to the 1692 edition of The Gospel Mystery Of Sanctification, written by N.N. and T. Woodcock.
I read where N.N. was Marshall's biographer, but I'm not sure who the initials stand for.

You can read the preface here on pp.8-9: http://www.digitalpuritan.net/Digital Puritan Resources/Marshall, Walter/The Gospel Mystery of Sanctification Opened.pdf

I've copied the preface over to this post for a quicker perusal...


PREFACE.

READER,
Mr. Walter Marshall, composer of these Directions how to attain to that practice and manner of life which we call holiness, righteousness, or godliness, was educated in New College of Oxford, and was a fellow of said college, and afterwards he was chosen a fellow of the college of Winchester, but was put under the Bartholomew Bushel,* with near two thousand more lights, (a sin not yet repented of) whose illuminations made the land a Goshen. He was esteemed a Presbyterian, and was called to be pastor to a people at Gosport in Hampshire, where he shined, though he had not the public oil. The substance of these meditations were there spun out of his own experiences; he having been much exercised with troubled thoughts, and that for many years. He had, by many mortifying methods, sought peace of conscience; but notwithstanding all, his troubles still increased. Whereupon he consulted others, particularly Mr. Baxter, whose writings he had been much conversant with; who thereupon told Mr. Marshall, he took them too legally. He afterwards consulted an eminent divine, Dr. T. G. (ie. Thomas Goodwin) giving him an account of the state of his soul, and particularizing his sins, which lay heavy upon his conscience; who, in his reply, told him that he had forgot to mention the greatest sin of all, the sin of unbelief in not believing on the Lord Jesus for the remission of his sins, and sanctifying his nature. Hereupon he set himself to the studying and preaching Christ, and attained to eminent "holiness, great peace of conscience, and joy in the Holy Ghost."

Mr. Marshall's dying words were these, "The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord;" having but just before, said to those about him, "That he now died in the full persuasion of the truth, and in the comfort of that doctrine which he had preached." The sum whereof is contained in the ensuing Discourse.

Some time since he was translated by death, Elijah-like, dropping these sheets as his mantle for succeeding Elishas to go forth with, for the conversion of sinners, and comfort of drooping souls.

These papers, are the profound experiences of a studious holy soul, learned of the Father, coming from his very heart; and smell of no party or design, but for holiness and happiness. Yet, it is to be feared, they will scarcely go down with the heady notionalists of this age, who are of the tribe of Reuben, wavering with every wind of modish doctrine; but in Judah they will be praised. And we hope that many shrubs and cedars may hereby advance in knowledge and comfort.

But, not to detain you longer, read over all these Directions, that you may fully understand the Author, or read none. If you do it with the serious humble spirit in which they were wrote, it may be hoped, (the matter being so weighty, and from so able a hand) through the grace of God, they will sink into thy conscience, and, make thee a solid Christian, full of faith, holiness, and consolation,
N.N.
July 21, 1692.

* This alludes to the Act of Parliament, after the restoration of Charles II. 1660. ejecting a vast number of eminent faithful ministers from their charges, because they could not comply with prelacy.

«
The Author of these Directions was well known to me, and was with me in my house a month together, about twenty years past; and I esteem him a person deserving the character which this Preface giveth him.
T. Woodcock
July 21, 1692.


I also came across a doctoral thesis here about Walter Marshall's view of sanctification: https://chesterrep.openrepository.c...reation+in+Christ++PhD+Thesis++Final.docx.txt

This is fairly long. Skimming through it, however, I found an interesting quote giving Marshall's comments on Baxter's teachings: The thesis reads, "It is nearly certain that Marshall’s spiritual melancholy was occasioned by the writings of Richard Baxter. N.N. says that Marshall knew Baxter’s writings well, and given Baxter’s prominence at the time, this is not surprising. Marshall seems to indicate a past experience with Baxter’s theology when he says concerning a view held by Baxter, “For my part, I hate it with perfect hatred, and account it mine enemy, as I have found it to be.” It is most probable that Baxter’s Neonomianism was Marshall’s enemy that caused him profound spiritual distress."


Blessings!

Thanks!

Of course, I'm still a long way from corroborating Kendall's contention, as channeled by Wilkin, that "nearly to a man the great Puritan theologians lamented on their death beds that they probably were going to hell." But I want to have as accurate a picture as I can get.