In Chapter nineteen, minister Increase Mather’s The Necessity of Reformation closely fits into the Puritan theological and cultural worldview. New England feared the onset of war with the Native Americans was God punishing the people for becoming disconnected with him, and breaking the covenant. To prevent future punishment, the General Court enforced several laws, restricting the people of “ungodly” behavior. For example, the laws prohibited profanity, unlawful consumption of alcohol and the wearing of wigs. After these laws were established, Increase Mather hoped to strengthen the community’s morality by “leading congregations and towns through a ceremony of repentance, and renewal, and to overcome the factionalism that was weakening the authority of the clergy” (194).
Increase Mather
Mather’s The Necessity of Reformation questions the “evils” that have caused God to punish the colonists as well as a solution to these “evils”. Mather’s explanation to what these “evils” are and how to overcome them fits into the Puritan theological worldview in that it states the “evils” to be when men no longer love and trust in God and “cease to know and fear” him, rather their love and trust lies within something else (195). Mather also states these “evils” to be the breaking of the covenant, or, the refusing to obey God. Contention, Mather states, is an evil that greatly goes against God’s word. Along with disobedience, the “evils” that Mather explains also consist of; families that do not pray as often as they should (or at all), the listening and spreading of lies and rumors, and being provocative. In order to improve these evils, Mather states there must be, “solemn and explicit renewal of the covenant” as well as obedience (199). The overall “solution” to these evils, Mather states in The Necessity of Reformation, is stronger obedience to and a closer relationship with God.
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