Page:Anne Bradstreet and her time.djvu/201

Rh being sons, while Roger Clapp of Dorchester, handed down names that are in themselves the story of Puritanism, his nine, being Experience, Waitstill, Preserved, Hopestill, Wait, Thanks, Desire, Unite and Supply. The last name typifies the New England need, and Tyler, whose witty yet sympathetic estimate of the early Puritans is yet to be surpassed, writes: "It hardly needs to be mentioned after this, that the conditions of life there were not at all those which Malthus subsequently invented his theory of hospitality to infants. Population was sparce; work was plentiful; food was plentiful; and the arrival in a household of a new child was not the arrival of a new appetite among a brood of children already half-fed—it was rather the arrival of a new helper where help was scarcer than food; it was, in fact, a fresh installment from heaven of what they called, on Biblical authority, the very 'heritage of the Lord.' The typical household of New England was one of patriarchal populousness. Of all the sayings of the Hebrew Psalmist—except, perhaps, the damnatory ones—it is likely that they rejoiced most in those which expressed the Davidic appreciation of multitudinous children: 'As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man, so are children of the youth. Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them; they shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate. The New Englanders had for many years quite a number of enemies in the gate, whom they wished to be able to speak with, in the unabashed manner intimated by the devout warrior of Israel."

Hardly a town in New England holds stronger