The Puritans. By Perry Miller and Thomas H. Johnson. (Allen
and Unwin. 16s.)
THE plan of this book is excellent, given the purpose of bringing within a single volume, of 800 pages, a conspectus of New England Puritanism—its history and politics, its theology, ethics, social habits, education, literary practices and a who's-who of its worthies. The introductory chapter, 8o pages of exposition which should serve to correct a good many common mistakes, sets forth the main features of the Puritan scheme of life. The point is made that the Pilgrims, " those beloved old planters," as Cotton Mather called them, " who laid the foundations of a remarkable country," were in fully 90 per cent. of their thoughts and ways like the rest of England; it was a smallish difference of conviction and habit that drove them out. Brief biographies are given here of their leading men of action and of those who wrote memoirs or journals, political treatises, sermons, meditations. The range and variety of the material is remarkable, and each section is prefaced with a sound ex- planatory essay. The authors could not be other than expan- sive in their extracts from sermons and theological writings, and they rightly call attention to the rarity in all such works of loose and cumbrous writing.
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