Upon the tomb of the most Reverend Mr. John Cotton, late teacher of the church of Boston, in New England.
Majesty, meekness, Christian apathy
On soft affections; liberty in thrall;
A noble spirit, servant unto all.
Learning’s great masterpiece; who yet could sit
As a disciple at his scholar’s feet.
A simple serpent, or serpentine dove,
Made up of wisdom, innocence, and love,
Neatness embroider’d with itself alone;
And civils canonized in a gown:
Embracing old and young, and low and high;
Ethics embodied in divinity.
Ambitious to be lowest, and to raise
His brethren’s honour on his own decays.
Thus doth the sun retire into his bed,
That being gone, the stars may show their head.
Could wound at argument without division;
Cut to the quick, and yet make no incision;
Ready to sacrifice domestic notions
To churches peace and minister’s devotions.
Himself indeed (and singular in that)
Whom all admired, he admired not.
Liv’d like an angel of a mortal birth,
Convers’d in heaven while he was on earth:
Though not, as Moses, radiant with light,
Whose glory dazzled the beholders’ sight;
Yet so divinely beautified, you’d count
He had been born and bred upon the mount.
* A living, breathing Bible; tables, where
* Both covenants at large engraven were;
* Gospel and law in’s heart had each its column,
* His head an index to the sacred volume.
* His very name a title-page; and next,
* His life a commentary on the text.
* O what a monument of glorious worth,
* When in a new edition he comes forth,
* Without erratas, may we think he’ll be,
* In leaves and covers of eternity!
A man of might at heavenly eloquence,
To fix the ear and charm the conscience;
As if Apollos were revived in him,
Or he had learned of a Seraphim.
Spake many tongues in one: one voice and sense
Wrought joy and sorrow, fear and confidence.
Rocks rent before him, blind received their sight;
Souls levell’d to the dunghill, stood upright.
Infernal furies burst with rage to see
Their pris’ners captiv’d into liberty.
A star, that in our Eastern England rose,
Thence hurry’d by the blast of stupid foes,
Whose foggy darkness, and benumbed senses,
Brook’d not his dazzling fervent influences.
Thus did he move on earth from east to west;
There he went down, and up to heaven for rest.
Nor from himself, whilst living, doth he vary,
His death hath made him an ubiquatary:
Where is his sepulchre is hard to tell,
Who in a thousand sepulchres doth dwell;
(Their hearts, I mean, whom he hath left behind,)
In them his sacred relique’s now enshrin’d.
But let his mourning flock be comforted,
Though Moses be, yet Joshua is not dead:
I mean renowned Norton; worthy he
Successor to our Moses is to be,
O happy Israel in America,
In such a Moses, such a Joshua.
—B. W.2
1653.
This year Mr. William Bradford was elected governor of the jurisdiction of New Plimouth. Mr. Thomas Prince, Capt. Miles Standish, Mr. Timothy Hatherly, Mr. John Brown, Mr. John Alden, Capt. Thomas Willet, and Lieut. Thomas Southworth, were chosen his assistants in government.
Mr. Thomas Dudley, who was a principal founder and pillar of the colony of the Massachusetts, in New England, and sundry times governor and deputy-governor of that jurisdiction, died at his house in Roxbury, July 31, in the seventy-seventh year of his age. He was a person of quick understanding, and solid judgment in the fear of the Lord. He was a lover of justice, order, the people, Christian religion, the supreme virtues of a good magistrate. 1. His love to justice appeared at all times, and in special upon the judgment- seat, without respect of persons in judgment; and in his own particular transactions with all men, he was exact and exemplary. 2. His zeal to order appeared in contriving good laws, and faithfully executing them upon criminal offenders, heretics, and underminers of true religion. He had a piercing judgment to discover the wolf, though clothed with a sheepskin. 3. His love to the people was evident in serving them in a public capacity many years, at his own cost, and that as a nursing father to the churches of Christ. 4. He loved the true Christian religion, and the pure worship of God, and cherished, as in his bosom, all godly ministers and Christians. He was exact in the practice of piety, in his person and family, all his life. In a word, he lived desired, and died lamented by all good men.
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