.. remove me to another people, who will take care of me, that so I may
be in a capacity to attend his work, and glorify his name in my
generation." [Footnote: _Idem_, p. 33.] However, matters mended with
him, for we are assured that "the Glorious One who knew the works, and the
service and the patience of this tempted man, ordered it, that several
gentlemen of good estate, and of better spirit, were become the members of
his church;" and from them he had "such filial usages... as took away from
him all room of repenting, that he had not under his temptations
prosecuted a removal from them." [Footnote: _Parentator_, pp. 34, 35.]
The presidency of Harvard, though nominally the highest place a clergyman
could hold in Massachusetts, had always been one of poverty and self-
denial; for the salary was paid by the legislature, which, as the
unfortunate Dunster had found, was not disposed to be generous. Therefore,
although Mr. Mather was chosen president in 1685, and was afterward
confirmed as rector by Andros, he was far too pious to be led again into
those temptations from which he had been delivered by the interposition of
the Glorious One; and the last thing he proposed was to go into residence
and give up his congregation. Besides, he was engrossed in politics and
went to England in 1688, where he stayed four years.
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