Editing Cotton Mather (section)

===Inoculation debate===
Boylston and Mather's inoculation crusade "raised a horrid Clamour"{{Sfn|Mather|1911–1912|pp=11, 628}} among the people of Boston. Both Boylston and Mather were "Object[s] of their Fury; their furious Obloquies and Invectives", which Mather acknowledges in his diary. Boston's Selectmen, consulting a doctor who claimed that the practice caused many deaths and only spread the infection, forbade Boylston from performing it again.{{Sfn|Blake|1952|p=493}}

''[[The New-England Courant]]'' published writers who opposed the practice. The editorial stance was that the Boston populace feared that inoculation spread, rather than prevented, the disease; however, some historians, notably [[H. W. Brands]], have argued that this position was a result of the [[contrarian]] positions of editor-in-chief [[James Franklin (printer)|James Franklin]] (a brother of [[Benjamin Franklin]]). Public discourse ranged in tone from organized arguments by John Williams from Boston, who posted that "several arguments proving that inoculating the smallpox is not contained in the law of Physick, either natural or divine, and therefore unlawful",<ref>{{Cite book | last = Williams | first = John | author-link = John Williams (New England minister) | year = 1721 | title = Several Arguments Proving That Inoculating the Smallpox is Not Contained in the Law of Physick | place = Boston | publisher = J. Franklin}}</ref> to those put forth in a pamphlet by Dr. [[William Douglass (physician)|William Douglass]] of Boston, entitled ''The Abuses and Scandals of Some Late Pamphlets in Favour of Inoculation of the Small Pox'' (1721), on the qualifications of inoculation's proponents. (Douglass was exceptional at the time for holding a medical degree from Europe.) At the extreme, in November 1721, someone hurled a lighted grenade into Mather's home.{{Sfn|Blake|1952|p=495}}<ref>{{cite web|url=http://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/special-edition-on-infectious-disease/2014/the-fight-over-inoculation-during-the-1721-boston-smallpox-epidemic|date=December 31, 2014|title=The Fight Over Inoculation During the 1721 Boston Smallpox Epidemic|publisher=Harvard University|first=Matthew|last=Niederhuber}}</ref>

====Medical opposition====
Several opponents of smallpox inoculation, among them [[John Williams (New England minister)|John Williams]], stated that there were only two laws of physick (medicine): sympathy and antipathy. In his estimation, inoculation was neither a sympathy toward a wound or a disease, or an antipathy toward one, but the creation of one. For this reason, its practice violated the natural laws of medicine, transforming health care practitioners into those who harm rather than heal.{{Sfn|Williams|1721|p=13}}

As with most colonists, Williams' Puritan beliefs were enmeshed in every aspect of his life, and he used the [[Bible]] to state his case. He quoted [[Matthew 9:12]], when [[Jesus]] said: "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick." [[William Douglass (physician)|William Douglass]] proposed a more [[secular]] argument against inoculation, stressing the importance of reason over passion and urging the public to be pragmatic in their choices. In addition, he demanded that ministers leave the practice of medicine to physicians, and not meddle in areas where they lacked expertise. According to Douglass, smallpox inoculation was "a medical experiment of consequence," one not to be undertaken lightly. He believed that not all learned individuals were qualified to doctor others, and while ministers took on several roles in the early years of the colony, including that of caring for the sick, they were now expected to stay out of state and civil affairs. Douglass felt that inoculation caused more deaths than it prevented. The only reason Mather had had success in it, he said, was because Mather had used it on children, who are naturally more resilient. Douglass vowed to always speak out against "the wickedness of spreading infection".<ref>{{Cite book | last = Douglass | first = William | year = 1722 | title = The Abuses and Scandals of Some Late Pamphlets in Favor of Inoculation of the Small Pox | place = Boston | publisher = J. Franklin |page=11}}</ref> Speak out he did: "The battle between these two prestigious adversaries [Douglass and Mather] lasted far longer than the epidemic itself, and the literature accompanying the controversy was both vast and venomous."<ref>{{Cite journal | last = Van de Wetering | first = Maxine | title = A Reconsideration of the Inoculation Controversy | journal = The New England Quarterly | volume = 58 | number = 1 | date = March 1985 | pages = 46–67 | doi=10.2307/365262| jstor = 365262 | pmid = 11619681 }}</ref>

====Puritan resistance====
Generally, Puritan pastors favored the inoculation experiments. Increase Mather, Cotton's father, was joined by prominent pastors Benjamin Colman and William Cooper in openly propagating the use of inoculations.<ref>Stout, ''The New England Soul'', p. 102{{full citation needed|date=December 2021}}</ref> "One of the classic assumptions of the Puritan mind was that the will of God was to be discerned in nature as well as in revelation."<ref>{{Cite book |first=Alan|last=Heimert|title=Religion and the American Mind|page=5 |publisher=Harvard University Press |date=1966}}</ref> Nevertheless, Williams questioned whether the smallpox "is not one of the strange works of God; and whether inoculation of it be not a fighting with the most High." He also asked his readers if the smallpox epidemic may have been given to them by God as "punishment for sin," and warned that attempting to shield themselves from God's fury (via inoculation), would only serve to "provoke him more".{{Sfn|Williams|1721|p=4}}

Puritans found meaning in affliction, and they did not yet know why God was showing them disfavor through smallpox. Not to address their errant ways before attempting a cure could set them back in their "errand". Many Puritans believed that creating a wound and inserting poison was doing violence and therefore was antithetical to the healing art. They grappled with adhering to the [[Ten Commandments]], with being proper church members and good caring neighbors. The apparent contradiction between harming or murdering a neighbor through inoculation and the Sixth Commandment—"thou shalt not kill"—seemed insoluble and hence stood as one of the main objections against the procedure. Williams maintained that because the subject of inoculation could not be found in the Bible, it was not the will of God, and therefore "unlawful."{{sfn|Williams|1721|page=2}} He explained that inoculation violated [[The Golden Rule]], because if one neighbor voluntarily infected another with disease, he was not doing unto others as he would have done to him. With the Bible as the Puritans' source for all decision-making, lack of scriptural evidence concerned many, and Williams vocally scorned Mather for not being able to reference an inoculation edict directly from the Bible.{{sfn|Williams|1721|page=14}}

====Inoculation defended====
With the smallpox epidemic catching speed and racking up a staggering death toll, a solution to the crisis was becoming more urgently needed by the day. The use of quarantine and various other efforts, such as balancing the body's [[humors]], did not slow the spread of the disease. As news rolled in from town to town and correspondence arrived from overseas, reports of horrific stories of suffering and loss due to smallpox stirred mass panic among the people. "By circa 1700, smallpox had become among the most devastating of epidemic diseases circulating in the Atlantic world."{{Sfn|Gronim|2006|p=248}}

Mather strongly challenged the perception that inoculation was against the will of God and argued the procedure was not outside of Puritan principles. He wrote that "whether a Christian may not employ this Medicine (let the matter of it be what it will) and humbly give Thanks to God's good Providence in discovering of it to a miserable World; and humbly look up to His Good Providence (as we do in the use of any other Medicine) It may seem strange, that any wise Christian cannot answer it. And how strangely do Men that call themselves Physicians betray their Anatomy, and their Philosophy, as well as their Divinity in their invectives against this Practice?"{{Sfn|Mather|1721|page=25, n. 15}}{{full citation needed|date=December 2021}} The Puritan minister began to embrace the sentiment that smallpox was an inevitability for anyone, both the good and the wicked, yet God had provided them with the means to save themselves. Mather reported that, from his view, "none that have used it ever died of the Small Pox, tho at the same time, it were so malignant, that at least half the People died, that were infected With it in the Common way."{{Sfn|Mather|1721|p=2}}{{full citation needed|date=December 2021}}

While Mather was experimenting with the procedure, prominent Puritan pastors Benjamin Colman and William Cooper expressed public and theological support for them.<ref>{{Cite book|first=William|last=Cooper|title=A Letter from a Friend in the Country, Attempting a Solution of the Scruples and Objections of a Conscientious or Religious Nature, Commonly Made Against the New Way of Receiving the Small Pox|place=Boston|publisher=S. Kneeland|year=1721|pages=6–7}} Apparently Cooper, also a minister, wrote this in cooperation with Colman because nearly the same response to the objections to inoculation is published under Colman's name as the last chapter to {{Cite book |first=Benjamin |last=Colman|title=A Narrative of the Method and Success of Inoculating the Small Pox in New England|year=1722}}</ref> The practice of smallpox inoculation was eventually accepted by the general population due to first-hand experiences and personal relationships. Although many were initially wary of the concept, it was because people were able to witness the procedure's consistently positive results, within their own community of ordinary citizens, that it became widely utilized and supported. One important change in the practice after 1721 was regulated [[quarantine]] of inoculees.{{Sfn|Van de Wetering|1985|page=66, n. 55}}