Religious Movement: The Age Of Faith Literary Movement

Religious groups such as the Puritans faced religious disputes from the Church of England thus they fled to the New England colonies for freedom. This commences the Age of Faith literary movement dating from 1630 to 1780. Many individuals involved in this movement wanted to spread their religion and write about their experiences. The Age of Faith literary movement was built upon gaining religious freedom, purifying sinners by using scare tactics and writing about God's influence on their daily lives.

After arriving in the American colonies, the Puritans were able to practice their faith(which they believed was the divine religion)freely. Prior to gaining religious freedom, they were under the law of the Church of England and believed the church

was too loose(Strynatka). Approximately 20,000 Puritans had traveled to New England to escape religious persecution and reform the Church of England(Freedom). During their journey, they wrote letters about their travel experiences and were supposed to be sent back home to England; these will later be called histories. The Puritans sought freedom but only for themselves. Tolerance was insignificant to them; they showed little-to-no respect to the Native Americans who lived nearby. They even referred to them as heathens(Freedom). The Puritans believed that Puritanism was the only religion that should be practiced. In fact, Reverend John Cotton said that those practicing a religion other than Puritanism were practically praising the devil(Freedom).
Writers in this movement often wrote about God's harsh treatment, to sinners who had forsaken Him, in attempt to make sinners repent.

One major way that they tried to purify sinners was to put fear into them. A commonly used technique would be scare tactics. Often times, authors who were a part of this movement tried to scare people into repenting and practicing Puritanism. Jonathan Edwards was an author during this time that had spoken about the wrath of God. In Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, Edward says, “unconverted men walk over the pit of hell on a rotten covering...He is not only able to cast wicked men into hell, but He can most easily do it...they deserve to be cast into hell”(Edwards). Edwards made it clear that God has enormous power and the ability to use that power to send “unconverted men” into hell; this is meant to intimidate people into converting into Puritanism. Edward Taylor took a similar approach. Taylor had stated, in Huswifery, when he said “they suffer martyrdom in the flames of hell forever”(Taylor). This excerpt speaks about how those who were sinners would burn in hell if they did not repent and

convert.
Puritans engaged in writing about God's contributions in their daily lives.

Most of the writings during this literary movement were plain, straightforward and literal texts. They preferred realistic writings involving religious themes and thought that writings should be instructive rather than entertaining(Britten). “The puritans had a passion for the Bible, a passion for the Church and a passion for seeing the gospel impact every area of life”(Loizides). In one of Anne Bradstreet's poems titled Meditation, she says “my soul rejoice thou in thy God, Boast of Him all the day, Walk in His law and kiss His rod, Cleave close to Him always”(Bradstreet). It is apparent that talking about their daily devotion and love to God was of high importance to

them.
Being able to reform the Church of England and pursue their own faith(whether others agreed with it or not) was a massive deal to Puritans. They yearned to cleanse people who have sinned which sometimes meant writing about frightening punishments that sinners would endure if they did not follow God's laws. Their admiration for God was so grand that they wrote religious poetry and routine diaries expressing their appreciation to him. Bringing purification, a burning passion for God and spreading their faith was the main goal to the Puritans and most of their writings were influenced from those aspects.