"
Some of the early ministers, in addition to preaching in the meeting-house,
did not disdain to take care of the edifice. Parson Everitt of Sandwich was
paid three dollars a year for sweeping out the meeting-house in which he
preached; and after he resigned this position of profit, the duties were
performed by the town physician "as often as there shalbe ocation to keepe
it deesent." The thrifty Mr. Everitt had a pleasing variety of occupations;
he was also a successful farmer, a good fence-builder, and he ran a
fulling-mill.
So, altogether, as they were wholly exempt from taxation, the New England
parsons did not fare ill, though Mr. Cotton said that "ministers and milk
were the only cheap things in New England," and he deemed various ills,
such as attacks by fierce Indians, loss of cattle, earthquakes, and failure
of crops, to be divine judgments for the small ministerial pay; while
Cotton Mather, in one of his pompous and depressing jokes, called the
minister's stipend "Synecdotical Pay." A search in a treatise on rhetoric
or in a dictionary will discover the point of this witticism--if it be
worth searching for.
XXII.
The Plain-Speaking Puritan Pulpit.
One thing which always interests and can but amuse every reader of the
old Puritan sermons is the astonishingly familiar way in which these New
England divines publicly shared their domestic joys and sorrows with
the members of their congregations; and we are equally surprised at the
ingenuity which they displayed in finding texts that were suitable for
the various occasions and events.
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