Excerpt from Home!: Or the Pilgrims' Faith Revived The local and personal allusions, while I trust the will offend none, will I hope benefit some of my early an still loved associates. At the same time, to the general reader, they illustrate traits of human character and principles of action that are as universal as the elements of fallen or re generate manhood. The 'plot' is simply the decline of spiritual religion in a Puritan church, and its revival. The causes of both are illustrated by incidents of every kind, so as to present the contrast between the worldly and spiritual mind as vividly as may be. If one illustration provoke a smile, another may cause a tear. Smiles and tears make up our life. I love both, in their places. Sometimes they each spring from an heart of agony; sometimes each is the herald of joy. I have not avoided brief discussions of topics both pro found and exciting. And I never go out of my way to avoid a thought that is new, or possibly, offensive, so be, that I believe it true. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.