Download or read book An Essay for the Recording of Illustrious Providences written by Increase Mather and published by Academic Resources Corp. This book was released on 1977 with total page 432 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Providential explanations for "notable happenings" in Puritan history, such as cases of Indian captivity, shipwreck, natural disaster, & diabolic manifestations, possessions, & witchcraft. Essential to an understanding of Puritan society & culture in colonial America. The Essay is also one of America's earliest scientific works. Mather, shortly to become President of Harvard College, discusses magnetism, earthquakes, & medicine, with specific examples drawn from the New England experience, as in other accounts of the period, but differing from them in his "more scientific method, & in the devotion of some space to the exploding of superstition & the treatment of purely scientific subjects" (DAB). The book is still eminently & entirely readable, its vigorous & colloquial prose constantly equal to its extraordinary content.