Wigglesworth, Michael (1631-1705)

Wigglesworth, Michael (1631-1705)

Puritan clergyman and author of early New England, best known for his long poem The Day of Doom ( 1662), extremely popular, republished in the U.S. as late as 1867.

He also wrote Meat Out of the Eater, Or Meditations Concerning the Necessity, End, and Usefulness of Afflictions unto God's Children ( 1669), a theological poem almost as popular in its day as The Day of Doom; God's Controversy with New England, Written in the Time of the Great Drought, Anno 1662, by a Lover of New England's Prosperity, first published in 1871; and a number of shorter poems on theological subjects, such as Death, Expected and Welcomed and A Farewell to the World.

Wigglesworth, both minister and physician at Malden, Massachusetts, during most of career, was a characteristic Puritan of his time, but, unlike the Mathers, he did not take part in the Salem Witchcraft trials, instead ordering public repentance and humiliation of those who did participate in the trials.

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