government encouraged their devotion, and appointed public prayers, and
days of fasting and humiliation, to make public confession of sin, and
implore the mercy of God to avert the dreadful judgment which hangs over
their heads; and it is not to be expressed with what alacrity the people
of all persuasions embraced the occasion, how they flocked to the
churches and meetings, and they were all so thronged that there was
often no coming near, even to the very doors of the largest churches.
Also there were daily prayers appointed morning and evening at several
churches, and days of private praying at other places, at all which the
people attended, I say, with an uncommon devotion. Several private
families, also, as well of one opinion as another, kept family fasts, to
which they admitted their near relations only; so that, in a word, those
people who were really serious and religious applied themselves in a
truly Christian manner to the proper work of repentance and humiliation,
as a Christian people ought to do.

Again, the public showed that they would bear their share in these
things. The very court, which was then gay and luxurious, put on a face
of just concern for the public danger. All the plays and interludes[61]
which, after the manner of the French court,[62] had been set up and
began to increase among us, were forbid to act;[63] the gaming tables,
public dancing rooms, and music houses, which multiplied and began to
debauch the manners of the people, were shut up and suppressed; and the
jack puddings,[64] merry-andrews,[64] puppet shows, ropedancers, and
such like doings, which had bewitched the common people, shut their
shops, finding indeed no trade, for the minds of the people were
agitated with other things, and a kind of sadness and horror at these
things sat upon the countenances even of the common people. Death was
before their eyes, and everybody began to think of their graves, not of
mirth and diversions.