Pestilence

“ Do you fear that you too may be taken off by this pestilence? Who, then, has told you that you shall not die if only you can escape the pestilence? Daily you pray, 'Thy kingdom come,' and daily you seek that it shall not come to-day. ”

“ Heaven speaks first: the pestilence that walketh in darkness is made the earliest minister of the discovery,—the pestilence it is, scourging the seven-gated Thebes, as very soon the Sphinx will scourge her, that is appointed to usher in, like some great ceremonial herald, that sad drama of Nemesis,—that vast procession of revelation and retribution which the earth, and the graves of the earth, must finish. ”

“ Rose up to solve the problem why they died;
'Twas in the atmosphere—'Twas in the clothes—
The food—the blood—the lungs—the mind—’twas fear—
’Twas constitutional—contagious—mild—
Severe—incurable—a simple thing—
A mighty mystery ne'er to be disclos’d.
Such were the vulgar theories pursu’d,
All empty as the breath that gave them birth,
And spite of all, the pestilence jogg’d on
With silent step, and sudden death, and woe,
And bitterness to many; and to all
Dismay and terror. Men’s hearts fail’d for fear. ”

“ As soon as the pestilence appeared on the continent, horrifying accounts of the unheard-of sufferings of those affected, and the certainty of their death, passed like wild-fire from mouth to mouth. Men’s minds were paralysed with terror, and the imagination exaggerated the calamity, which seemed to have come upon them like a last judgment. The English Sweating Sickness was the theme of discourse everywhere, and if any one happened to be taken ill of fever, no matter of what kind, it was immediately converted into this demon, whose spectre form continually haunted the oppressed spirit. ”

“ Or if I send a pestilence into that land, and pour out My fury upon it in blood, to cut off from it man and beast.—God will permit a pestilence, both of literal disease and of pestilential errors in Christendom, in wrath to take away life.
14:20, 21. Though Noah, Daniel and Job were in it, as I live saith the Lord God, they shall deliver neither son nor daughters; they shall but deliver their own souls by their righteousness. ”

“ AS the Pestilence is the most powerful of all other Distempers, so it also claims a particular Privilege of joining with all others; so that it does not more excel in its own Contrariety and Antipathy to Nature, than it asserts a Prerogative over all those various Evils which the humane Frame is subjected to, and draws them into its Assistance in exercising its cruel Power over Mankind. ”

“ As the unseen pestilence sweeps through the atmosphere, from one nation to another, so will a moral plague, like the delusion of witchcraft, enchain the minds of a Christian community, and spread death and devastation before it. ”

“ The opinion that pestilence is a manifestation of the Divine anger, though it has long been dying away, is by no means extinct, even in the most civilised countries. Superstitions of this kind will, of course, be strongest either where medical knowledge is most backward, or where disease is most abundant. ”

“ THAT the Truth therefore may at once be brought into an open Light, and the Pestilence appear in its genuine Affections, I think it proper to premise this one Thing, because the whole depends upon it, viz. That the Pestilence is the most notorious of all popular Diseases, and depends upon some Cause equally common, and in every respect adequate to its extensive Effects ”

“ The Lord shall make the pestilence cleave to thee until he have consumed thee from off the land.—The Lord shall smite thee with a consumption, and with a fever, and with an inflammation, and with an extreme burning, and with the drought, and with blasting, and with mildew, and they shall pursue thee until thou perish.—The Lord shall make the rain of thy land powder and dust: from heaven shall it come down upon thee until thou be destroyed. ”

“ Besides, though the pestilence was stayed, this was not because the voluptuous madness of stage-plays had taken possession of a warlike people hitherto accustomed only to the games of the circus; but these astute and wicked spirits, foreseeing that in due [Pg 45] course the pestilence would shortly cease, took occasion to infect, not the bodies, but the morals of their worshippers, with a far more serious disease. ”

“ For nothing is better fitted to produce this than the unburied bodies of the slain; the filth of a camp; the want of food; and the crowding together of multitudes in a besieged city; and, accordingly, the pestilence, especially in Oriental countries, has been often closely connected with war. That the pestilence is referred to here is rendered more certain by the fact that the Hebrew word דֶּבֶר, pestilence, which occurs about fifty times in the Old Testament, is rendered θάνατος, death, more than thirty times in the Septuagint. ”

“ It is not sufficient, that the pestilence should be considered as a judgment, and thus made the occasion of private and public exhortation; the press should teem with tracts on this most important and engrossing subject; and there should be diffused throughout the country, under every form, and adapted to every rank in life, admonition and entreaty for all to improve to their soul’s health the spread of a pestilence, which so often destroys the body which it attacks. Every clergyman has his own sphere of influence within which, at least, his labours may be beneficially exercised ”

“ Then towns once full of men became destitute of inhabitants, and so violently did the pestilence increase that the living were scarce able to bury the dead," So sudden, so mysterious, so fatal was this pestilence that even the dry medieval annalist personified it, spoke of it as if it were some active sentient personality. "Very many of those who were attacked in the morning it carried out of human affairs before noon; and no one whom it willed to die did it permit to live longer than three or four days." ”

“ On th' other side, Incensed with indignation, Satan stood Unterrified, and like a comet burned, That fires the length of Ophiuchus huge In th' arctic sky, and from his horrid hair Shakes pestilence and war. ”

“ A Pestilence that is fierce and deadly in its first Attack, soon ceases.
I call such a Pestilence fierce, that immediately destroys the strongest Constitutions, and which being every where diffused, seizes all at once; for the sooner the venomous Seminium is spread and wasted, the sooner will its Fury be over.
THE Times of a Pestilence in its Decrease, are in Proportion to the Times of its Increase.
FOR the infectious Poison does not act precariously, but in a regular and uniform Manner, as it fully appeared by the Course of the late Sickness amongst us ”

“ The experience of our own times exemplifies in the fullest manner the concurrence, from physical causes, of famine with pestilence—facts which the prophets of old always connected, viz., the sword, famine, and pestilence, as being three evils which generally accompanied or followed each other ”

“ Pestilence was frequent throughout the Middle Ages, but this attack was not only vastly more destructive and general than any which had preceded it, but the disease when once introduced became a frequent scourge in subsequent times, especially during the remainder of the fourteenth century. ”

“ THE Pestilence is a Disease arising from an Aura that is poisonous, very subtle, deadly, and contagious, affecting many Persons at the same Time together in one Country, chiefly arising from a Corruption of the nitrous Spirit in the Air, attended with a Fever, and other very grievous Symptoms. ”

“ For the Lord Almighty sometimes permits those whom he loves to be chastised, since strength, by the infusion of spiritual grace, is made perfect in infirmity. It is known to all what a mortal pestilence and infection of the atmosphere is hanging over various parts of the world, and especially England, in these days. This, indeed, is caused by the sins of men who, made callous by prosperity, neglect to remember the benefits of the Supreme Giver. ”

“ Near the close of the first half of the fourteenth century, after the terrible ravages of the great plague had abated, the people were prostrate with fear and terrorized by the merciless words of the priests, who had not been slow to declare the pestilence as a mark of the wrath of God and who were utilizing the peculiar possibilities of this psychological moment for the advancement of the interests of the Church. ”

“ The enormous vegetable and animal accumulations of such a multitude, living more like brutes than men, produced a continual miasma, which prepared the constitutions of thousands for any infection which might chance to light among them. Pestilence is, in fact, the rude and dreadful remedy which nature provides for the human misery which man himself can not or will not cure. ”

“ But it is in the spirit of a Jew, I think, and in keeping with their bitter animosity, and baseless and even improbable calumnies against Jesus, that he adds: “Nor did the prophets predict such a pestilence.” [107] For neither Jews, nor Celsus, nor any other, can bring any argument to prove that a pestilence converts men from the practice of evil to a life which is according to nature, and distinguished by temperance and other virtues. ”

“ To arrest this contagion, to help those exposed to its ravages, we perform a simple duty, as when we direct water upon the bursting blaze. Pestilence is a conflagration, and human life is the sacrifice. In this illustration I bring home to Boston merchants the urgency of the present call. ”

“ I know very well that if the pestilence comes there are men who trace it to no higher than physical causes. I know very well that if great calamities happen in storm or tempest the physical cause is alone recognised. ”

“ For [Pg 26] the gods have made me a curse and a pollution, and by my death alone will the land have rest from the pestilence."
And the people would have taken him at his word; for fickle is the heart of the multitude, and swayed this way and that by every breath of calamity. They were sore stricken, too, by the pestilence, and in their wrath against the cause of it they forgot the slaying of the Sphinx and the long days of peace and prosperity. ”

“ The plague or pestilence first attacked horses, oxen, mules, sheep, dogs, cats, and even birds, and then it affected mankind; death was sudden, and the streets were choked with the carcases of men and beasts, and universal nature seemed to be suffering from premature caducity. ”

“ That very mysterious pestilence has turned attention toward its causes, and thus the race has been made cleaner, purer, more fit to endure. Why do men live in houses with scientific plumbing, fresh air, and have well-cooked food? Because that fierce teacher, pestilence, has taught them that any other course means weakness and death. Whom nature loveth she chasteneth is a truth as clearly written in human history as "Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth" is written in the Bible. The true attitude toward the austere, for a philosophic as for a Christian mind, is one of complacency. ”

“ Men met the pestilence in various moods: the brave with fortitude, the pious with resignation, the cowardly and turbulent with outbursts of despair and fury. Among the lower classes the wildest rumors gained credence. Some assigned the pestilence to witchcraft, others declared that the waters of the wells and streams had been poisoned. Serious riots occurred in many places, and great numbers of people fell victims to the fury of the mob under the suspicion of being connected in some way with the ravages of the pestilence. ”

“ Overlooking the omnipotence and all-wise direction of their Creator, they exhorted the people to bear patiently that which had befallen them, and to believe in no other causes of the pestilence which was effecting their destruction than those springing from the operations of nature, which at certain revolutions of time produce such mutations in the bodies of men, in the earth, in plants, and in all things grown out of the earth, as to excite disease. ”

“ But there is an objection which may arise in some of your minds, and if it has not risen in your minds, still it has in other people’s often enough; and therefore I will state it plainly, and answer it as far as God shall give me wisdom. For it is well to get to the root of all matters, and of this matter of Pestilence among others; for if we do believe this Pestilence to be God’s judgment, then it is a spiritual matter most proper to be spoken of in a place like this church, where men come as spiritual beings to hear that which is profitable for their souls. ”

“ The triumphant assurances of this psalm, 'There shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling,'—'the pestilence shall smite thousands and ten thousands beside thee, but not come nigh thee,'—seem to be entirely contradicted by experience which testifies that 'there is one event to the evil and the good,' and that, in epidemics or other widespread disasters, we all, the good and the bad, God-fearers and God-blasphemers, do fare alike, and that the conditions of exemption from physical evil are physical and not spiritual. ”

“ At my words the common people at once became suspicious, for they have heard for a long time that the gentry were expecting a pestilence, and as this was the first explanation of the prophesied epidemic that had come to their ears, they believed it at once. ”

“ But by means of the very same signs, if at any time plague and corruption is sent upon the earth for the sins of men, the air is disturbed, pestilence is brought upon animals, blight upon crops, and a destructive year in every way upon men ”

“ Having failed by their superstitious rites to ameliorate the condition of the people, the medicine-men now accused the fathers of being the cause of the pestilence, and even of having a design of destroying the country. ”