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Notes
New York, 1891, and Cambridge, 1926, generally regarded as the most satisfactory life of Mather.
Published in the Massachusetts Historical Society Collections, Ser. 7, Vols. VII-VIII (1911-12) and reprinted in 1957 by the Frederick Ungar Publishing Company. All references to this edition are identified in the text by page and volume number and by date.
The manuscripts both of "Paterna" and of the Diary of 1712 are part of the Mather collection of the Tracy W. McGregor Library at the University of Virginia.
Samuel Mather, The Life of the Very Reverend and Learned Cotton Mather, D.D. & F.R.S. (1729), p. 82.
Quoted from a holograph letter (October 29, 1890) to Samuel A. Green in the library of the Massachusetts Historical Society.
An unsigned article in the Massachusetts Missionary Magazine, I (July, 1803), p. 83, asserts that Mather "was an illustrious imitator of his glorious Pattern."
Bonifacius (1710). This work has been frequently reprinted, most often under the title Essays to do Good.
The Diary entry for May 1, 1711 (II, 68) describes yet another possibility. "What if I should be so communicative, as to lodge my Paterna a while in the hands of my Brother-in-Law, Mr. Walter; but with a due Care to preserve Modesty and Concealment? It may sensibly assist him to discharge his Ministry, and improve in experimental Christianity!"
"Mr. Holmes, you are getting into that Mather bog. I warn you, you will never get out of it again." Quoted by Holmes in "The Mather Bibliography," PBSA, XXXI (1937), 67.
The evidence indicates that these pages contain that rare thing—a passage composed originally for "Paterna" and unique to it. For this reason and since they have a kind of morbid fascination in themselves and are rather typical of the book as a whole, I have appended Mather's answers at the end of this article. I have found only one other similar instance. The Diary records (October 13, 1717) Mather's intention to consider and meditate upon the "Heavenly Affections . . . and Impressions . . . made on the Minds of the Writers . . . [of the Scriptures] . . . [when] . . . inspired . . . by . . . the holy Spirit of GOD." Mather adds, "This Design must be pursued. It will be elsewhere more largely spoken to" (II, 479-480); "elsewhere" turns out to be pages 313-315 of "Paterna" where the "Design" is "pursued" in somewhat greater detail. The Diary provides what amounts to a summary of the more fully developed, later passage.
I am assuming that the year of Dr. Jenks's death is also that of the sale. The only evidence I have of his ownership is the following passage from Justin Winsor, Memorial History of Boston (1881): "A MS Autobiography by Cotton Mather was sold in the library of the late Rev. Dr. William Jenks of Boston, and is now in the possession of Judge Mark Skinner, of Chicago" (II, 302).
I am indebted to Mr. Kendon Stubbs of the University of Virginia's Alderman Library for the bibliographical details presented in these four paragraphs.
Possibly, but improbably, p. 355 at one time concluded some kind of structural division and p. 357 began yet another. With the exception of page 206, this is true of all the other blank pages in "Paterna." Page 10 immediately precedes the beginning of "The Fourth Lustre"; page 60, "The Fifth"; page 110, "The Sixth"; and page 126, "The Seventh." But except for page 60 these other blank pages are all numbered. See page 197 and footnote 22 for additional indirect evidence.
In the text of "Paterna," this concluding passage immediately follows Mather's description, quoted in the appendix at the end of this article, of his proposed state of mind while "under all the Circumstances of a Crucifixion."
This further confirms that the missing sheets at the end did not constitute some new part. From this point on no structural principle is operative and there is simply no basis for division.
His statement of September 7, 1683, cannot be taken as conclusive. "My Diaries, wherein I had written the Course of my Study and preaching, and the Resolves of Piety upon my Daily course of Meditation, I have thrown, as useless Papers into the Fire" (I, 73). In spite of this assertion the Diary of 1681 is still with us and the chronological chart gives evidence that the "Diary of 1682" was not only extensive but still available to Mather when writing "Paterna."
One is inclined after close acquaintance with "Paterna" to share the extreme vexation that Ford's cryptic comment on a Mather allusion to "some other papers" nicely reveals. Ford's note merely says, "fortunately not preserved" (Diary, II, 584).
Excluding blank (10, 60, 110, 126, [164 x'd out], and 206) and missing pages as well as the six unnumbered preliminary pages which consist of title page, three blank pages, and two pages in which Mather quotes authorities on the values of parental autobiography.
The table which concludes this study identifies all such passages and their location in other works.
All of the located passages are marked in my typescript which is available at the McGregor Library.
These passages concern what Mather called "Particular Faiths" in a number of which he had been "so baffled" as to necessitate his entering into the margin of "Paterna" a "Caution" against placing too much confidence in them. He states that he added this warning "Several Years" after writing "the Pages of this Book" (p. 125). The date of Parentator, then, has no bearing on our conclusions regarding the terminal date of "Paterna's" composition.
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