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VirginiaHuguenot · #11 (**permalink**) 05-29-2008, 01:55 PM

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Originally Posted by KenPierce

Quote:

Originally Posted by VirginiaHuguenot

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Originally Posted by Daniel Ritchie

This post has been on half a day, and Andrew Myers still has not commented?

Perry Miller wrote two books with this title: The New England Mind: The Seventeenth Century (1939) and The New England Mind: From Colony to Province (1953). Which one are you reading? Both are on my wish list. Miller is a respected historian, but should always be read with caution.

Puritanism - questions about Perry Miller, William Haller, and Edmund Morgan

Respected by whom? Marsden's assessment of Miller (at least in part), "MIller's portrait is to Edwards what Hamlet is to the actual Danish prince, a triumph of the imagination."

That's the kiss of death from historian to historian. Marsden is by far the best living historian of the American church. I side with him.

And Schlesinger was equally worthless, IMHO. Factual accuracy was not his forte; intellectual axe grinding is.

Marsden was the preferred church historian of my former UNC professor, Bart Ehrman. I was not impressed. Miller is highly respected in academia and J.I. Packer, among others, commends Miller to students of Puritanism. I prefer to go back to the source material myself rather than wade through 20th century historians generally speaking, although Miller has a "sourcebook" of Puritan writings. I would rank Marsden and Miller similarly, gifted men, although I would not look to either one for the spiritual perspective required, imo, to be a truly good church historian.