.. yea, and sometimes evil angels." He
gives several cases of blasphemers struck by lightning, and
says, "Nothing can be more dangerous for mortals than to
contemn dreadful providences, and, in particular, dreadful tempests."
His distinguished son, Cotton Mather, disentangled himself
somewhat from the old view, as he had done in the interpretation
of comets. In his _Christian Philosopher_, his _Thoughts for the
Day of Rain_, and his _Sermon preached at the Time of the Late
Storm_ (in 1723), he is evidently tending toward the modern view.
Yet, from time to time, the older view has reasserted itself,
and in France, as recently as the year 1870, we find the Bishop
of Verdun ascribing the drought afflicting his diocese to the
sin of Sabbath-breaking.[335]
This theory, which attributed injurious meteorological
phenomnena mainly to the purposes of God, was a natural
development, and comparatively harmless; but at a very early
period there was evolved another theory, which, having been
ripened into a doctrine, cost the earth dear indeed.
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