An Empire of Reason - Born Again

American Political History · Oct 9, 2023 · 30m

In October 1740, a Connecticut farmer named Nathan Cole dropped his tools, threw his wife on a horse, and raced twelve miles in terror of arriving too late — to hear a traveling preacher named George Whitefield. He was one of thousands; whole counties emptied into the roads. This is the story of the First Great Awakening: Jonathan Edwards reading “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” in a flat quiet voice until the congregation cried out for him to stop; Whitefield emptying the pockets of a skeptical Benjamin Franklin; the revival that became the first event ever to sweep all thirteen…