SNOW 197 
pictures the quaint lore contained in one of the 
multitudinous sermons of Increase Mather, 
printed in 1704, entitled “A Brief Discourse 
concerning the Prayse due to God for His 
Mercy in giving Snow like Wool.” One can 
fancy the delight of the oppressed Puritan boys 
in the days of the nineteenthlies, driven to the 
place of worship by the tithingmen, and cooped 
up on the pulpit and gallery stairs under charge 
of the constables, at hearing for once a dis- 
course which they could understand, — snow- 
balling spiritualized. This was not one of Em- 
erson’s terrible examples, — “the storm real, 
and the preacher only phenomenal ;” but this 
setting of snowdrifts, which in our winters 
lends such grace to every stern rock and rugged 
tree, throws a charm even around the grim the- 
ology of the Mathers. Three main propositions, 
seven subdivisions, four applications, and four 
uses, but the wreaths and the gracefulness are 
cast about them all, while the wonderful com- 
monplace books of those days, which held 
everything, had accumulated scraps of winter 
learning which cannot be spared from these 
less abstruse pages. 
Beginning first at the foundation, the preacher 
must prove, “Prop. I. That the Snow is fitly 
resembled to Wool. Snow like Wool, sayes the 
Psalmist. And not only the Sacred Writers, 
