Becoming America - An Exploration of American Literature from Precolonial to Post-Revolution, 2018a

BECOMING AMERICA
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY ENGLISH COLONIAL LITERATURE
2.8.2 Reading and Review Questions
1. Who are the sinners whom Wigglesworth identies in The Day of Doom?
How do you know?
2. How does Wigglesworth characterize God’s approaching judgment of
the sinner? Why?
3. What knowledge of the Puritan faith and the Elect does this poem oer?
How? To what eect? How, if at all, does he make his “message” palatable
to his readers?
4. Against what possible failures in Puritan’s faith does Wigglesworth
caution? Why?
5. Who does Wigglesworth believe can hope for God’s mercy? Why?
2.9 MARY ROWLANDSON
(c. 1637–1711)
Mary Rowlandson (née White) was
born in Somersetshire, England around
1637. Two years later, her family joined
the Puritan migration to America and
settled in the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
They then lived in Salem, Massachusetts,
before moving to Lancaster, a frontier
settlement comprising of fty families and
six garrisons. In 1656, she married Joseph
Rowlandson (1631–1678) who became an
ordained minister. They had four children,
one of whom died in infancy.
In 1676, Lancaster was attacked in
the ongoing conict now known as King
Philip’s War (1675–1678). Metacomet
(1638–1676), called King Philip by the
Puritans, was chief of the Wampanoags.
His father, Massasoit (1580–1661), signed
a treaty with the Pilgrims at Plymouth in
1621. By 1675, white settlers were pushing
Native Americans from their land to such
a degree that Algonquian tribes formed
Image 2.9 | Illustration of Mary
Rowlandson from A Narrative of the
Captivity, Sufferings and Removes of
Mrs. Mary Rowlandson
Artist | Coverly/Rowlandson
Source | Wikimedia Commons
License | Public Domain
a coalition and raided white settlements. Among these was Lancaster, where
Rowlandson’s garrison was attacked and burned. She, along with twenty-three
other survivors, was taken prisoner by the Native Americans.
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