Still, these were the exception
in a commonwealth where amusements were considered as wiles of the
Devil, against whom the ministers constantly warned the congregations
committed to their charge.
Home in the seventeenth century--and indeed in the eighteenth
century--was a place where for children the rule "to be seen, not
heard," was strictly enforced. To read Judge Sewall's diary is to be
convinced that for children to obtain any importance in life, death was
necessary. Funerals of little ones were of frequent occurrence, and were
conducted with great ceremony, in which pomp and meagre preparation were
strangely mingled. Baby Henry Sewall's funeral procession, for instance,
included eight ministers, the governor and magistrates of the county,
and two nurses who bore the little body to the grave, into which, half
full of water from the raging storm, the rude coffin was lowered. Death
was kept before the eyes of every member of the colony; even
two-year-old babies learned such mournful verse as this:
"I, in the Burying Place may See
Graves Shorter than I;
From Death's Arrest no age is free
Young Children too may die;
My God, may such an awful Sight
Awakening be to me!
Oh! that by Grace I might
For Death prepared be.
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