32 Quotes by Cotton Mather

Be not so set upon poetry, as to be always poring on the passionate and measured pages. Let not what should be sauce, rather than food for you, engross all your application. Beware of a boundless and sickly appetite for the reading of poems which the nation now swarms withal; and let not the Circaen cup intoxicate you. But especially preserve the chastity of your soul from the dangers you may incur, by a conversation with muses no better than harlots.

You may ... make a little recreation of poetry, in the midst of your painful studies. Nevertheless, I cannot but advise you. Withhold thy throat from thirst. Be not so set upon poetry, as to be always poring on the passionate and measured pages. ... let not the Circean cup intoxicate you.

You are young and have the world before you; stoop as you go through it, and you will miss many hard bumps.

Wilderness is a temporary condition through which we are passing to the Promised Land.

Ignorance is the Mother not of Devotion, but of Heresy.

The Word of God must be Read and Heard with Diligence that so you may arrive to the Knowledge that is needful for you.

Religion brought forth Prosperity, and the daughter destroyed the mother.

That there is a Devil is a thing doubted by none but such as are under the influence of the Devil. For any to deny the being of a Devil must be from ignorance or profaneness worse than diabolical.

The Spirit of Slumber which the Poison of the old Serpent has brought upon the children of Men is to be deplored exceedingly.