General Introduction for 1742
The American Antiquarian Society acquired Ebenezer Parkman’s diaries for 1736 and 1742 in 1985, some two decades after the serial publication of Parkman’s diary, through 1755, in the Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society. Portions of the diary for 1742 had appeared in Joseph Tracy’s History of the Great Awakening, but the manuscript remained in private hands for another 143 years. Like Joseph Tracy, readers of the diary for 1742 will find fascinating details about the religious revivals as they affected Parkman and individuals and families in Westborough and neighboring communities. And, of course, there are many more details about the day-to-day life of Parkman’s ministry, his family, his farm, and his extended networks of neighbors, parishioners, kin, and ministerial colleagues, all part of the literally hundreds individuals, some identified, others anonymous, whom he mentioned in the course of a year.
This transcription of the diary for 1742 uses the so-called “expanded” editorial method (as described in the Harvard Guide to American History).
The following abbreviations have been used for sources cited in the footnotes:
| CVR | Vital Records of Cambridge, Massachusetts, to the Year 1850 (Boston: Wright & Potter, 1915) |
| DYG | Franklin Bowditch Dexter, Biographical Sketches of the Graduates of Yale College with Annals of the College History (6 vols. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1885-1912) |
| HVR | Vital Records of Hopkinton, Massachusetts, to the Year 1850 (Boston: New England Historic Genealogical Society, 1911) |
| LVR | Vital Records of Leicester, Massachusetts, to the End of the Year 1849 (Worcester: Franklin P. Rice, 1903) |
| MVR | Vital Records of Marlborough, Massachusetts, to the End of the Year 1849 (Worcester, MA: Franklin P. Rice, 1908) |
| Newbury VR | Vital Records of Newbury, Massachusetts, to the End of the Year 1849 (Salem, MA: The Essex Institute, 1911) |
| Northborough VR | Vital Records of Northborough, Massachusetts, to the End of the Year 1850 (Worcester; Franklin P. Rice, 1901). |
| RVR | Vital Records of Rutland, Massachusetts, to the End of the Year 1849 (Worcester: Franklin P. Rice, 1905) |
| Sherborn VR | Vital Records of Sherborn, Massachusetts, to the Year 1850 (Boston: New England Historic Genealogical Society, 1911) |
| SHG | Sibley’s Harvard Graduates, more formally known as John Langdon Sibley and Clifford K. Shipton, Biographical Sketches of Graduates of Harvard University, in Cambridge, Massachusetts (18 vols.; Cambridge, MA, and Boston, 1873-1999). Vol. 18 is by Conrad Edick Wright and Edward W. Hanson. |
| Shrewsbury VR | Vital Records of Shrewsbury, Massachusetts, to the End of the Year 1849 (Worcester: Franklin P. Rice, 1904) |
| Southborough VR | Vital Records of Southborough, Massachusetts, to the End of the Year 1849 (Worcester: Franklin P. Rice, 1903) |
| WCR | Westborough Church Records (Local History Room, Westborough Public Library |
| WVR | Vital Records of Westborough, Massachusetts, to the End of the Year 1849 (Worcester, MA: Franklin P. Rice, 1903) |
Diary Entry
1742 January 1 (Friday). I may with the utmost reason admire and adore the infinite Patience and Long Suffering of God towards so ungrateful, vile unprofitable Worm! O may I with deep Unfeigned Repentance humble my self for the sins of my Life Past, and especially for the neglects and miscarriages of the year past; and might it please God to enable me to fix my Resolutions, touching my Conduct and future part of my Life; but in peculiar what I may be allowed of this Year! O that God might glorify himself by me; and that He would please to lay out all the Events of this year! All my Times are in his Hand; and, Lord, all my Springs are in Thee!