The extremely favourable assessment by historians of the life and career of Theodorus Jacobus Frelinghuysen (1691-c. 1748) as a forerunner of the Great Awakening is a puzzling one to those familiar with the Ecclesiastical Records of the State of New York. Three works are mostly frequently quoted in making this favourable assessment: Theodorus Jacobus Frelinghuysen by Peter H. B. Frelinghuysen (1938); The Great Awakening in the Middle Colonies, by C. H. Maxson (1920); and Eight Memorial Sermons and Historical Notes, by Abraham Messier (1873). Peter Frelinghuysen quotes Maxson and Messier extensively. Maxson quotes Messier extensively.