SOURCE: Bensick, Carol M. “Preaching to the Choir: Some Achievements and Shortcomings of Taylor's God's Determinations.” Early American Literature 28, no. 2 (1993): 133-47.

In the following essay, Bensick contends that Gods Determinations should be appreciated for its historical importance rather than for its aesthetic value.

It is no longer necessary to argue for a dimension of joy, even fun, to Puritan spirituality. Though various forms of evidence—the Puritans' century-long mania for acrostics, the various kinds of play exhibited by their almanacs, to say nothing of the dry jokes in Of Plymouth Plantation or the sprightliness of Bradstreet's “Prologue” and other poems—might have obviated the need for such argumentation, various factors, of no relevance here, long prevented such evidence from doing its work. But by now the balance has been adequately redressed. The poems of Edward Taylor above all, and in particular the commentary of John Gatta upon them...