The Great Dying

After and during tonights reading, I was absolutely stunned by the fact that nearly 90% of the population was wiped due to the small pox pandemic. After the reading, I have come to understand just how much new diseases can affect a population. I have learned a little bit in the past about this fact, but never knowing its severity was to this extent. I was surprised to see that the Governor Bradford of Plymouth colony said that those extreme conditions "represented the good hand of god" This statement is saying that god has brought this plague among the population, as if to make room for the governors people, as he states later in the reading.  I personally have not learned a great deal about the small pox disease, and how badly it affected populations in this time period, but now I have been enlightened to a new level of understanding. This reading helped me to better understand the circumstances of the Black Death, as they were similar experiences.