Page "Cotton Mather" Paragraph 37

Cotton Mather strongly challenged the perception that inoculation was against the will of God and argued that the procedure was not outside of Puritan principles.

He wrote that " whether a Christian may not employ this Medicine ( let the matter of it be what it will ) and humbly give Thanks to God ’ s good Providence in discovering of it to a miserable World ; and humbly look up to His Good Providence ( as we do in the use of any other Medicine ) It may seem strange, that any wise Christian cannot answer it.

And how strangely do Men that call themselves Physicians betray their Anatomy, and their Philosophy, as well as their Divinity in their invectives against this Practice?

" The Puritan minister began to embrace the sentiment that smallpox was an inevitability for anyone, both the good and the wicked, yet God had provided them with the means to save themselves.

Mather reported that, from his view, " none that have used it ever died of the Small Pox, tho at the same time, it were so malignant, that at least half the People died, that were infected With it in the Common way.