Let the Lord have the Praise

The following sentences brought mixed feelings, as they were the last words in a book that took me a year to read/listen [click here for the LibriVox.org free audiobook.]

Of these 100 or so of persons who came over first, more than half died in the first general sickness. Of those that remained, some were too old to have children. Nevertheless in those thirty years there have sprung up from that stock over 160 persons now living in this year 1650; and of the old stock itself nearly thirty persons still survive. Let the Lord have the praise, Who is the High Preserver of men.

William Bradford
Bradford's History of Plymouth Settlement, 1608-1650

I was glad to reach an end to the narration of so many hard years of trials and testing in the lives of the Pilgrims of Plymouth, Massachusetts. And yet, these firsthand accounts and documents testify to so much more than hardship. Oh, that every American knew this part of our history!