(no subject)

[theweaselking]

Puritanism:

September 15, 1682
To the Aged and Beloved
Mr. John Higginson:

There is now a ship at sea called the Welcome which has on board an hundred or more of the heretics and malignants called Quakers, with W. Penn who is the chief scamp at the head of them.

The General Court has accordingly given secret orders to Master Malachi Huscott, of the Brig Porpoise, to waylay the said Welcome, slyly as near the Cape of Cod as may be, and make captive the said Penn and his ungodly crew, so that the Lord may be glorified, and not mocked on the soil of this new country with the heathen worship of these people. Much spoil can be made by selling the whole lot to Barbados, where slaves fetch good prices in rum and sugar, and we shall not only do the Lord great service by punishing the wicked, but we shall make great good for his ministers and people.

Master Huscott feels hopeful, and I will set down the news when the ship comes back.

Yours in the Bowels of Christ.
Cotton Mather

quoted by bradhicks from Ian Williams, Rum: A Social and Sociable History of the Real Spirit of 1776. New York: Nation Books, 2005. pp 71-72.
===========================

All I have to say is that I agree with some of the other commenters: "Yours in the Bowels of Christ" really does sound like bad slashfic.

Comments

[being-here.livejournal.com]

"Yours in the Bowels of Christ" really does sound like bad slashfic.

Either that or something ghastly would draw :-S

[fengi.livejournal.com]

Ah yes the Puritans - England's Taliban.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Don't be silly. In England, they never had power or authority. They weren't the Taliban until they reached America.

(Americans sometimes get mad when you point out that the original settlers were NOT trying to escape religious persecution. They were looking for a place where THEY COULD BE THE PERSECUTORS.)

[rimrunner.livejournal.com]

This is because the bit about escaping religious persecution is (or used to be, anyway) one of the Lies Our Teachers Told Us ™. It's only later when you study what they were actually like (or just read The Witch of Blackbird Pond) that a different picture emerges.

Also, I suspect that acknowledging this means acknowledging a number of uncomfortable truths about American culture, such as the whole sex = TEH EBIL! but violence is a-ok thing. (To be clear, there really are things that I like about American culture, such as our habit of throwing together disparate elements and coming up with things like jazz and Thai boxty. It's kind of like voodoo that way.)

[paoconnell.livejournal.com]

I seem to remember the subject coming up in high school, that the different colonies were really strongholds for specific religions. Catholics were in Maryland. Quakers were in Pennsylvania. Pilgrims were in the Cape Cod area, and the Puritans were in the rest of Massachusetts. Rhode Island is a separate state for similar reasons, but I forget the religion involved. Also true of Delaware and Southern states, but again I've forgotten which states were connected with which religions.

This issue is why the First Amendment was written in the first place, to keep the Federal government and the states from "establishing" favored religions.

speaking of rum...

[rimrunner.livejournal.com]

Also, it's astonishing how few people in this country know what you're talking about when you mention the Triangle Trade.

Re: speaking of rum...

[corruptedjasper.livejournal.com]

Salt, slaves, and what was it, again?

Re: speaking of rum...

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triangle_Trade

"The triangular trade involved three principal commodities: sugar, rum, and slaves. European distillers made rum from Caribbean sugar. European slave ships took vats of the rum to Africa and bought African slaves from their African owners/dealers with the rum. (Guns were also sold to the slavers, which facilitated them in obtaining more slaves.) The bulk of the human cargo was sold in the Caribbean in trade for cane sugar. The sugar was then taken back to Europe, and the cycle continued. At each stop along the way, an excellent profit was made."

[anton-p-nym.livejournal.com]

Don't be silly. In England, they never had power or authority. They weren't the Taliban until they reached America.

Well, let's not forget noted Puritan Oliver Cromwell... (the Irish won't.)

-- Steve's had a hate-on for Puritans ever since reading up on the English Republic. They were nasty, nasty people... and Simon Schama's "Protestant Taliban" moniker for them is bang-on.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Cromwell believed in freedom of conscience and religion, for everyone but Catholics (and that, because he felt that the Catholics really were an evil, deceptive cult).

He hardly qualifies as "Taliban", and Puritans like Cotton Mather would have hated him.

//Cromwell wasn't a nice guy, but given a choice between him and either Charles I or Charles II, sign me up for the New Model Army.

[fengi.livejournal.com]

Somehow I think banning pubs, theater, sport, Christmas and everything "decadant" and carrying out wholesale slaughter of members of one of the largest religious groups on the British Isles fails to qualify as being moderate. He also betrayed many in parliment who supported him during the English civil war.

He was about equal to Charles I, a weak royal tyrant who often lost his struggles with Parliment despite repeatedly dissolving them, and he was far worse than Charles II who worked with Parliment and tolerated Catholics.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

> I think banning pubs, theater, sport, Christmas and everything "decadant"

Again, link me up with that. I can't find a reference to it that's anything approaching objective.

> carrying out wholesale slaughter of members of one of the largest
> religious groups on the British Isles

Banning the practice of Catholicism, executing military garrisons who refuse to surrender, and executing Catholic priests doesn't count as "wholesale slaughter". It's almost *kind* by the standards of the 17th century and the wars the other ignorant religious savages got up to.

History wonkiness

[fengi.livejournal.com]

Actually, the Puritans killed King Charles II, had Oliver Cromwell installed as Lord Protector and then did their damndest to establish a theocracy. They closed down all pubs and theatres and destroyed Shakespeare's Glove theater. They banned all sports including soccer. They also banned Christmas celebrations, sending soldiers to peoples houses to take away any presents or
Christmas food.

So they were the Taliban, and once they fell from power they ran away to find a better place to do be biblical tyrants. It's interesting how this whole "religious civil war, destroying culture and war on Christmas" part is entirely omitted from the whole "fleeing religious persecution" part about Thanksgiving.

Re: History wonkiness

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

I tend not to think of Cromwell as a Puritan, honestly. He was far too devoted to *opposing* a theocracy and allowing religious freedom to everyone but the Catholics to qualify on my mental map of them.

I can't find a reference to "closing all pubs and theatres" in the Commonwealth or the Protectorate, or sending soldiers to confiscate Christmas things. The only thing I can find are references to the American Puritans, who were notably far more strict than Cromwell, fining people who celebrated Christmas in public. Got a link for those?

Re: History wonkiness

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

PS: Banning soccer? Which was invented in the 1860s?

Cromwell was a dick, I'll grant, but enough to a dick to ban children's games that won't be formalised for another two centuries? That's REAL dickery. Superman ain't got nothin' on him, if that's true.

[culfinriel.livejournal.com]

That's the actual wording? Weird.