The Scourge Of God; A Sermon Preached In The First Presbyterian Church, July 6, 1832, On The Occasion Of A City Fast, Observed In Reference To The Approach Of The Asiatic Cholera

Summer 1832: fear moves through the streets. A city holds its breath. Disease tests faith and fellowship, too.On 6 July 1832, in the First Presbyterian Church, John W. Nevin speaks for a community ordered to a civic fast as the Asiatic cholera epidemic approaches. This presbyterian sermon text is a primary source sermon of uncommon immediacy: a pastor’s attempt to name grief without surrendering to panic, and to frame suffering within providence and divine judgment while insisting on responsibility, prayer, and neighbourly mercy. Read it for its clear-eyed Christian response to plague, and for the way it records the emotional weather of the 1832 cholera outbreak - when public health, public worship, and public fear collided. It also enriches church history research into antebellum American religion and the language of catastrophe.As a historic pamphlet reprint, The Scourge Of God sits alongside the great public fast day sermons and remains a sharp sermon study resource for ministers, students, and readers exploring the history of cholera pandemics. Its spare, urgent rhetoric suits courses in American preaching and frames pandemic reading lists with a period religious voice. For casual readers, it is a swift immersion in lived history; for classic literature collectors, a rare devotional artefact of civic crisis. Collectors will value its period voice and its place in American religious printing. Out of print for decades and now republished by Alpha Editions. Restored for today’s and future generations. More than a reprint - a collector’s item and a cultural treasure.