VIII. Norton-Looked for Speedy Second Advent at Resurrection

JOHN NOR ION (1606-1663), Congregationalist Puritan pastor at New Ipswich, Massachusetts, and Cotton’s successor, was born in Herfordshire, England, and graduated from Cambridge University with a B.A. in 1627. He soon became curate at Stortford, where he was spiritually reborn, and subsequently was chaplain to Sir William Masham. Proficient in the “tongues and arts,” he gave himself to the study of divinity. He disliked rites and ceremonies, and, because of his growing Puritanism, declined several advances involving compromise. This drove him away from England, and in 1634 he sailed with Thomas Shepard for America. They had a narrow escape from shipwreck, Shepard gathering the sailors above deck, and Norton between decks, for earnest prayer. Turned back by the storm, they sailed again and reached Plymouth harbor.PFF3 93.2

Norton settled in Massachusetts Bay, became “teacher” in the church of Ipswich, and was ordained in 1638. In 1645 he wrote the first book to be composed in Latin in this country, ^{62Cotton Mather, Magnalia, book 3, The First Part, chap. 2, sec. 14, p. 34. (It was entitled Responsio ad totam quaestionum syllogen a darisdmo viro. London: Crook, 1648.)} on church government. And in 1647 he was one of those appointed to draw up revisions for the proposed Platform of Church Discipline, ^{63Ibid., pp. 34, 35.} accepted by the famous 1648 Synod at Cambridge, in which he had a leading part. He succeeded to John Cotton’s pastorate in Boston in 1652, upon the latter’s suggestion, and in 1654 was instated as overseer of Harvard. In 1662 he accompanied Bradstreet as an agent of the colonies to petition Charles II to continue civil and religious liberties, with pure Scripture worship and a good conscience, and without conformity.PFF3 93.3

He was bigoted and tyrannical in certain matters and had a prominent part in the persecution of the Quakers. A real scholar and grammarian, he was both an able speaker and a forceful writer. He was also an ardent student of the prophecies and held views similar to those of Shepard. Such are the inconsistencies of frail humanity. He was author of numerous works, the most important being the Orthodox Evangelist (1654), dealing with Cod, Christ, justification, and the future estate of the saints. He, too, looked to the near, pre-millennial coming of Christ, and the resurrection of the body at that time. ^{64John Norton, The Orthodox Evangelist, pp. 354, 355.}PFF3 94.1