Yale University Library

39002015497069

YALE UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY Estate of
Miss M. D. Porter

THE

HISTORY

UNITED STATES OF NORTH AMERICA.

VOL. I.

THE

HISTORY

THE UNITED STATES

NORTH AMERICA,

THE PLANTATION OF THE BRITISH COLONIES

THEIR REVOLT AND DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE.

By JAMES GRAHAME, Esq.

IN FOUR VOLUMES.

VOL. I.

LONDON:
SMITH, ELDER AND CO., CORNHILL.
1836.

LONDON :
PRINTED BY STEWART AND CO..
OLD BAILEY.

ROBERT GRAHAME, ESQ.

OF WHITEHILL, LANARKSHIRE, SCOTLAND,

ffi&tB ?ia,lorfc is JBrfitralrtr.

WITH SENTIMENTS OF PROFOUNDEST REVERENCE AND AFFECTION,

HIS SON.

PREFACE.

This Historical Work is the fruit of more than
eleven years of intense meditation, eager research,
industrious composition, and solicitous revisal. To
the Author, the scene of labour which he now con
cludes, has been one of the most agreeable features
of his existence. And, should the perusal of his
Work afford to others even a slight share of the
entertainment that its production has yielded to him
self, he may claim the honour and gratification of a
successful contributor to the stock of human happi
ness and intelligence.
In the year 1827, I published a Work in two
volumes entitled, The History of the Rise and Pro
gress of the United States of North America till the
British Revolution in 1688. My plan, as I then
announced, was, and it still is, restricted to the his
tory of those provinces of North America (originating,
all except New York and Delaware, from British
colonization) which, at the era of the American

Vlll PREFACE.
Revolution, were included in the confederacy of The
United States .-—the illustration of the parentage and
birth of this great republic, being the end of my
labours. The first and second volumes of the present Work
may be considered as a second edition of the Work
which I formerly published. They embrace the rise
of such of those States, comprehended within my
general plan, as were founded prior to the British
Revolution in 1688 ; and trace their progress till
that epoch, and, in several instances, till a period
somewhat later. Various additional researches which
1 have made since my first historical publication, and
in which I have been assisted by suggestions kindly
transmitted to me from America, have enabled me
to correct some important errors by which that Work
was deformed, and to render the present an enlarged
and greatly amended edition of it. Of some of these
emendations the nature and effect are such as to
render it impossible (without making one volume
contradict the statements in another) to publish a
continuation of the History, except in connection
with the present edition of the first portion of it — a
circumstance which will perhaps expose me to blame,
and which I most sincerely regret. The respect
which I feel for the judgment of some intelligent and
estimable friends (and in particular of my Brother1)
has induced me to cancel various passages in the
original publication, which were censured as obtruding
> Author of " A Treatise on Internal Intercourse and Communication in civilized
Slates," and other scientific works.

PREFACE. IX
superfluous, perhaps irrelevant, reflections, or accu
mulating an excess of detail and illustration. A
diligent and laborious revision, frequently repeated,
has been productive of numerous alterations, and, I
hope, proportional improvement in the style of my
performance. The third and fourth volumes of the present Work,
form the second composition which was prospectively
announced in the preface to my first historical pub
lication. They continue the history (commenced in
the first two volumes) of the older American States,
and also embrace the rise and progress of those which
were subsequently founded,— till the revolt of the
United Provinces from the dominion of Britain, and
their assumption of national independence. Properly
speaking, they form a continuation, not of my original
publication, but of my original Work as it has been
subsequently altered and amended.
In the preface to my first publication, I announced
a third composition which was intended to embrace
the history of the Revolutionary War, and the esta
blishment and consolidation of the North American
Republic. But I have been induced by various rea
sons to abandon the purpose I had entertained of this
ulterior effort. My first publication has had such
scanty success, as forcibly to impress me with the
expediency of improving the execution rather than
extending the range of my historical design ; of
strengthening my claims, rather than multiplying
my demands on the attention of the public. And
since my first publication, I have met with and read

PREFACE.

Botta's History of the War of American Independ
ence — a work of so much merit, and so well suited,
I think, to the present era, that it seems to me to
render any other composition on the same subject,
at present, quite superfluous. Thirty or forty years
hence, a final and more compendious delineation of
the scene may be required.
In the collection of materials for the composition
of this Work, I have been obliged to incur a degree
of toil and expense, which, in my original contem
plation of the task, I was very far from anticipating.
Considering the connection that so long subsisted
between Great Britain and the American States, the
information concerning the early condition and pro
gress of many of these communities, which the public
libraries of Britain are capable of supplying, is
amazingly scanty. Many valuable works illustrative
of the history and statistics, both of particular States
and of the whole North American commonwealth,
are wholly unknown in th&JBritish libraries : a defect
the more discreditable, as these works have long
enjoyed a high repute at the seats of learning on the
continent of Europe ; and as the greater part of them
might be procured without difficulty in London or
from America.
After borrowing all the materials that I could so
procure, and purchasing as many more as I could
find in Britain or obtain from America, my collection
proved still so defective in many respects, that in the
hope of enlarging it, and in compliance with the
advice of my friend Sir William Hamilton, (of whose

PREFACE. XI
counsel and assistance I can better feel the obligation
than express the value) I undertook a journey in the
year 1825, from Edinburgh, where I was then re
siding, to Gottingen : and in the library of this place,
as I had been taught to expect, I found a richer
treasury of North American literature, than any, or
indeed, all of the libraries of Britain could at that
time supply. From the resources of the Gottingen
library, and the liberality with which its adminis
trators have always been willing to render it subser
vient to the purposes of literary inquiry, I derived
great advantage and assistance. I am indebted also
to the private collections of various individuals in
England and France, for the perusal of some very
rare and not less valuable and interesting works,
illustrative of the subject of my labours. To parti
cularize all the persons who have thus or otherwise
assisted my exertions, and enriched my stock of
materials, would weary rather than interest the
reader, — whom it less imports to know what oppor
tunities I have had, than what use I have made of
them. Yet I must be indulged in one grateful allu
sion to the advantage I have enjoyed in the commu
nications which I have had the honour of receiving
from that illustrious friend of America and of human
nature, the late General La Fayette.
History addresses her lessons to all mankind :
but when she records the fortunes of an existing
people, it is to them that her admonitions are es
pecially directed. There has never been a people
on whose character their own historical recollections
*a 2

Xll PREFACE.
were calculated to exercise a more animating or sa
lutary influence, than the nation whose history I have
undertaken to relate.
In national societies established after the manner
of the United States of North America, history does
not begin with obscure traditions or fabulous legends.
The origin of the nation, and the rise and progress
of all its institutions, may be distinctly ascertained ;
and the people enabled to acquire a complete and
accurate conception of the character of their earliest
national ancestors, as well as of every succeeding
generation through which the inheritance of the na
tional name and fortunes has devolved on themselves.
When the interesting knowledge thus unfolded to
them reveals, among other disclosures, that their
existence as a nation originated in the noblest efforts
of wisdom, fortitude, and magnanimity, and that
every successive acquisition by which their liberty
and happiness have been extended or secured, has
proceeded from the exercise of the same qualities,
and evinced their faithful preservation and unim
paired efficacy, — respect for antiquity becomes the
motive and pledge of virtue ; the whole body of the
people feels itself ennobled by the consciousness of
ancestors whose renown will constitute, to the end
of time, the honour or reproach of their successors ;
and the love of virtue is so interwoven with pa
triotism and with national glory, as to prevent the
one from becoming a selfish principle, and the other
a splendid or mischievous illusion. If an inspired
apostle might with complacency proclaim himself a

PREFACE. Xlll
citizen of no mean city, a North American may feel
grateful exultation in styling himself the native of no
ignoble land, — but of a land that has yielded as rich
a harvest of glory to God and of happiness to man,
as any other portion of the world, from the earliest
lapse of recorded time, has ever had the privilege of
affording. A more elevated model of human cha
racter could hardly be proposed to the imitation of
the people of New England, Pennsylvania, and some
others of the North American States, than that which
their own early history bequeaths to them. It is at
once their interest and their honour to preserve with
sacred care a bequest so richly fraught with the. in
structions of wisdom and the incitements of duty.
They will cherish a generous and profitable self-re
spect, while they comply with the canon of Divine
wisdom, to "remember the days of old, and consider
the years of many generations ;" and the venerated
ashes of their fathers will dispense a nobler influence
than the relics of the prophet of Israel, in reviving
piety and invigorating virtue.1
The most important requisite of historical compo
sitions, and that in which, I suspect, they are com
monly most defective, is truth — a requisite, of which
even the sincerity of the historian is insufficient to
assure us. In tracing ascertained and remarkable
facts, either backward into their original, or forward
i " No people can be bound to acknowledge and adore the invisible hand which
conducts the affairs of men, more than the people of the United States. Every step
by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation, seems to
have been distinguished by some token of providential agency." — Washington's
Speech to Congress, 30th April, 1789.

XIV PREFACE.
in their operation, the historian frequently encounters,
on either hand, a perplexing variety of separate
causes and diverging effects ; among which it is no
less difficult than important to discriminate the pre
dominant or peculiar springs of action, and to pre
serve the main and moral stream of events. Indis
criminate detail would produce intolerable fatigue
and confusion ; while selection inevitably infers the
risk of error. The sacred historians often record
events with little or no reference to their moral origin
and lineage ; and have thus given to some parts of
the only history that is infallibly authentic, an ap
pearance of improbability, which the more reasoning
narratives of uninspired writers have exchanged, at
least as frequently, for substantial misrepresentation.
It may be thought an imprudent avowal, and yet I
have no desire to conceal, that, in examining and
comparing historical records, I have often been for
cibly reminded of Sir Robert Walpole's assurance to
his son, that " History must be false." 1 Happily, this
apophthegm applies, if not exclusively, at least most
forcibly, to that which Walpole probably regarded as
the main trunk of history, but which is, really, the

1 Horace Walpole's works. A curious illustration of historical inaccuracy was
related by the late President Jefferson to an intelligent English traveller. The
Abbe Raynal, in his History of the British Settlements in America, has recounted
a remarkable story which implies the existence of a particular law in New England.
Some Americans being in company with the Abb6 at Paris, questioned tie truth of
the story, alleging that no such law had ever existed in New England. The AbbS
maintained the authenticity of his History, till he was interrupted by Dr. Franklin,
who was present, and after listening for some time in silence to the dispute, said,
" I can account for all this : you took the anecdote from a newspaper, of which I
was at that time editor, and, happening to be very short of news, I composed and in
serted the whole story."— Hall's Travels in Canada and the United States.

PREFACE. XV
most insignificant branch of it, — the intrigues of ca
binets, the secret machinations and designs of minis
ters, and the conflicts of sordid unprincipled poli
ticians. In contemplating scenes of human dissension and
strife, it is difficult, or rather it is impossible, for an
observer, partaking the infirmities of human nature,
to escape entirely the contagion of those passions
which the controversies arose from or engendered.
Thus partialities are secretly insinuated into the
mind ; and in balancing opposite testimony, they
find a subtle and so much the surer means of exerting
their influence. I am not desirous of concealing that
I regard America with feelings of the strongest,
perhaps the most partial, regard. If my conscious
ness of the existence of such feelings should not
exempt my judgment from their influence, I hope
the avowal, at least, will prevent the error from ex
tending to my readers.
I am far from thinking or from purposing to assert
or insinuate, that every part of the conduct of the
American States throughout the various controversies
in which they have been involved, was pure and
blameless. Guile, evil passion, violence, and injus
tice, have in some instances dishonoured the councils
and proceedings of the leaders and assemblies of
America ; and it was the conduct of one of the States,
the most renowned for piety and virtue, that sug
gested to her historian the melancholy observation,
" that in all ages and countries communities of men
have done that, of which most of the individuals of

XVI PREFACE.
whom they consisted, would, acting separately, have
been ashamed."1 But mingled masses are justly
denominated from the elements and qualities that
preponderate in their composition ; and sages and
patriots must be regarded as the mere creations of
fancy, if we can never recognise the lineaments of
worth and wisdom under the vesture of mortal im
perfection. There exists in some romantic specula
tive minds, a platonic love of liberty, as well as
virtue, that consists with a fastidious disgust for every
visible and actual incarnation of either of these prin
ciples; and which, when not corrected by sense and
experience, conducts to ingenious error or to seem
ingly generous misanthropy.
Whoever, with attention minute and impartial, ex
amines the histories of individuals or communities,
must expect to be disappointed and perplexed by
numberless imperfections and inconsistencies, which,
wisely pondered, confirm the scriptural testimony
of the inherent frailty of human nature, and the re
flected lustre of human virtue. Much error is pro
duced and continued in the world by unwillingness
or inability to make candid concessions, or to admit
charitable interpretations — to acknowledge in an ad
versary the excellence that condemns our undiscri-
minating hate ; in a friend or hero, the defects that
sully the pleasing image of virtue, that diminish our

» Hutchinson's History of Massachusetts. This observation referred immediately
to the dispute between Massachusetts and the confederated States of New England
in 1649 : but, the general proposition which it involves is one which Hutchinson
(himself an ambitious and disappointed antagonist of popular assemblies) snatches,
throughout his work, every occasion to propound and illustrate.

PREFACE. XV11
exultation, and rebuke the excesses of inordinate
confidence. There is not a more common nor more
unhappy mistake, than that which confounds the im
pulse of sincerity with the virtue of candour. With
partial views, sincerely embraced but not candidly
appreciated, we encounter the opposite partialities of
antagonists ; and by mutual commission and percep
tion of injustice, confirm and reciprocate each other's
misapprehensions. It should be the great end of
history to correct the errors by which experience is
thus rendered useless : and this end I have proposed
to pursue, — with a humble reliance on the commu
nication and guidance of that wisdom which is
divinely declared to be without partiality and without
hypocrisy, and attainable by all who seek it in sin
cerity from its heavenly source. The lingering sale
of my first historical composition, and the general in
difference with which it has been received, have
contributed, I hope, to promote the rectitude and
elevation of my views : fixing them more on lasting
claims to success, than on a fleeting enjoyment ofthe
consciousness of this advantage.

L'Eperonmeue, near Nantes,
September, 1835.

CONTENTS

THE FIRST VOLUME.

BOOK I.
PLANTATION AND PROGRESS OF VIRGINIA, TILL THE BRITISH
REVOLUTION IN 1688.

CHAPTER I.
Cabot despatched by Henry VII. — visits the coast of North America.
Neglect of Cabot's discovery by Henry — and by his immediate succes
sors. Reign of Elizabeth favourable to maritime adventure. Rise of the
Slave Trade. Sir Walter Raleigh — projects a Colony in North Ame
rica. First expedition fails. Elizabeth names the country Virginia.
Grenville despatched by Raleigh — establishes a Colony at Roanoak.
Misfortunes of the Colonists — their return. Use of tobacco introduced
in England. Farther efforts of Raleigh — terminate unsuccessfully.
Accession of James to the English Crown. Gosnold's Voyage — its
effects. James divides North America between Two Companies. Tenor
of their Charter — Royal Code of Laws. The first body of Colonists
embarked by the London Company — arrive in the bay of Chesapeak —
found James Town. Dissensions of the Colonists. Hostility of the
Indians. Distress and confusion of the Colony. Services of Captain
Smith. He is taken prisoner by the Indians — his liberation. He pre
serves the Colony. The Colonists deceived by appearances of gold.
Smith surveys the bay of Chesapeak — elected President of the Colony.
New Charter. Lord Delaware appointed Governor. Newport, Gates

XX CONTENTS.

and Somers, sent out to preside till Lord Delaware's arrival — are wrecked
on the coast of Bermudas. Captain Smith returns to England. Page 3

CHAPTER II.
The Colony a prey to anarchy — and famine. Gates and Somers arrive
from Bermudas. Abandonment of the Colony determined — prevented
by the arrival of Lord Delaware. His wise administration — his return
to England. Sir Thomas Dale's administration. Martial law esta
blished. Indian Chief's daughter seized by Argal — married to Rolfe.
Right of private property in land introduced into the Colony. Expedi
tions of Argal against Port Royal and New York. Tobacco cultivated by
the Colonists. First Assembly of Representatives convened in Virginia.
New Constitution of the Colony. Introduction of Negro Slavery.
Migration of young Women from England to Virginia. Dispute between
the King and the Colony. Conspiracy of the Indians. Massacre of the
Colonists. Dissensions of the London Company. The Company dis
solved. The King assumes the government of the Colony — his death.
Charles I. pursues his Father's arbitrary policy. Tyrannical government
of Sir John Harvey. Sir William Berkeley appointed Governor. The
provincial liberties restored. Virginia espouses the Royal Cause — sub
dued by the Long Parliament. Restraints imposed on the Trade of the
Colony. Revolt of the Colony — Sir William Berkeley resumes the
government. Restoration of Charles II. Page 57

CHAPTER III.
The Navigation Act — its impolicy. Discontent and distress of the Colo
nists. Naturalization of Aliens. Progress of the Provincial discontent.
Indian hostilities. Bacon's rebellion. Death of Bacon — and restora
tion of tranquillity. Bill of Attainder passed by the Colonial Assembly.
Sir William Berkeley superseded by Colonel Jefferys. Partiality of the
new Governor — dispute with the Assembly. Renewal of discontents.
Lord Culpepper appointed Governor — severity and rapacity of his admi
nistration. An insurrection — punishment of the insurgents. Arbitrary
measures of the Crown. James II. — augments the burdens of the Colo
nists. Corrupt and oppressive government of Lord Effingham. Revolu
tion in Britain. Complaints of the Colonies against the former Governors
discouraged by King William. Effect of the English Revolution on the
American Colonies. State of Virginia at this period— Population —
Laws — Manners. Page 105

CONTENTS. XXI

BOOK II.
FOUNDATION AND PROGRESS OF THE NEW ENGLAND
STATES, TILL THE YEAR 1698.
CHAPTER I.
Attempts of the Plymouth Company to colonize the Northern Coasts of Ame
rica. Popham establishes a Colony at Fort Saint George — sufferings and
return of the Colonists. Captain Smith's voyage and survey of the
country — which is named New England. His ineffectual attempt to con
duct a Colony thither. The Company relinquish the design of colonizing
New England. History and character of the Puritans. Rise of the
Brownists or Independents. A congregation of Independents retire to
Holland — they resolve to settle in America. Their negotiation with King
James. They arrive in Massachusetts — and found New Plymouth. Hard
ships — and virtue of the Colonists. Their civil institutions. Community
of property. Increase of civil and ecclesiastical tyranny in England.
Project of a new Colony in Massachusetts. Salem built. Charter of
Massachusetts Bay obtained from Charles I. by an association of Puritans.
Embarkation of the emigrants — arrival at Salem. Their ecclesiastical
institutions. Two persons banished from the Colony for schism. Into
lerance of some ofthe Puritans. Page 155
CHAPTER II.
The Charter Government transferred from England to Massachusetts.
Numerous emigration — foundation of Boston — hardships of the new
settlers. Disfranchisement of dissenters in the colony. Influence of the
provincial clergy. John Cotton, and his colleagues and successors. Wil
liams' schism — he founds Providence. Representative Assembly esta
blished in Massachusetts. Arrival of Hugh Peters and Henry Vane ¦ —
who is elected Governor. Foundation of Connecticut — and Newhaven.
War with the Pequod Indians. Severities exercised by the victorious
colonists. Disturbances created by Mrs. Hutchinson. Colonization of
Rhode Island — and of New Hampshire and Maine. Jealousy and fluc
tuating conduct of the King. Measures adopted against the liberties of
Massachusetts — interrupted by the civil wars. State of New England.
Population — laws — manners. Page 217

XX" CONTENTS.

CHAPTER III.

New England embraces the cause of the Parliament. Federal union be
tween the New England States. Provincial coinage of money. Disputes
occasioned by the disfranchisement of dissenters in Massachusetts. Im
peachment and trial of Governor Winthrop. Arbitrary proceedings
against the dissenters. Attempts to convert and civilize the Indians.
Character and labours of Elliott and Mayhew. Indian Bible printed in
Massachusetts. Effects of the Missionary labour. A Synod of the New
England Churches. Dispute between Massachusetts and the Long Par
liament. The Colony foils the Parliament— and is favoured by Crom
well. The Protector's administration beneficial to New England. He
conquers Acadie. His propositions to the inhabitants of Massachusetts
—declined by them. Persecution of the Anabaptists in Massachusetts.
Conduct and sufferings of the Quakers. The Restoration. Address of
Massachusetts to Charles II. Alarm of the Colonists-their Declaration
of Rights. The King's Message to Massachusetts— how far complied
with. Royal Charter of Incorporation to Rhode Island and Providence
—and to Connecticut and New Haven. page 263
CHAPTER IV.
Emigration of ejected Ministers to New England-Royal Commissioners
sent thither. Petition of the Assembly of Massachusetts to the King-
rejected. Policy pursued by the Commissioners. Their disputes with
the Government of Massachusetts— and return to England Policy of
the Colonists to conciliate the King-effects of it. Cession of Acadie to
the French. Prosperous state of New England. Conspiracy of the
Indians. Philip's War. The King resumes his designs against Massa
chusetts. Controversy respecting the right to Maine and New Hamp
shire. Progress of the dispute between the King and the Colony State
of parties in Massachusetts. State of Religion and Morals in New
England. Surrender of the Charter of Massachusetts demanded by the
King-refused by the Colonists. Writ of Quo Warranto issued a^inst
forfehed MeSS Pe°Ple- Th6ir °harter adJud?ed ^° be
Page 319
CHAPTER V.
Designs and death of Charles II. Government of Massachusetts under a
temporary Commission from James II. Andros appointed Governor of
New England. Submission of Rhode Island. Z« to ^r "the
Charter o Connecticut. Oppressive government of Andros Colon a
policy of the King. Sir William Phipps. Indian hostilities renew d by

CONTENTS. xxiiJ
the intrigues of the French. Insurrection at Boston-Andros deposed-
and the ancient government restored. Connecticut and Rhode Island
resume thelr Charters. William and Mary proclaimed. War with the
French and Indians. Sir William Phipps conquers Acadie. Ineffectual
expedition against Quebec. Impeachment of Andros by the Colony-
discouraged by the English Ministers-and dismissed. The King refuses
to restore the ancient Constitution of Massachusetts. Tenor of the new
Charter Sir William Phipps Governor. The New England witchcraft.
Death of Phipps. War with the French and Indians. Loss of Acadie
Feace of Ryswick. Moral and political state of New England. Page 362
Notes  „
 Page 433

BOOK I.

PLANTATION AND PROGRESS OF
VIRGINIA,
TILL THE BRITISH REVOLUTION IN 1688.

VOL. 1.

THE
HISTORY

OF

NORTH AMERICA.

BOOK I.
VIRGINIA.
CHAPTER I.

Cabot despatched by Henry the Seventh — visits the Coast of North America. — Neg
lect of Cabot's Discoveiy by Henry, — and by his immediate Successors. — Reign
of Elizabeth — favourable to Maritime Adventure. — Rise of the Slave-Trade. — Sir
Walter Raleigh — projects a Colony in North America — first Expedition fails. —
Elizabeth names the Country Virginia. — Grenville despatched by Raleigh — estab
lishes a Colony at Roanoak. — Misfortunes of the Colonists — their Return. — Use
of Tobacco introduced in England. — Farther Efforts of Raleigh — terminate unsuc
cessfully. — Accession of James to the English Crown. — Gosnold's Voyage — its
Effects. — James divides North America between two Companies. — Tenor of their
Charters. — Royal Code of Laws. — The first Body of Colonists embarked by the
London Company — arrive in the Bay of Chesapeak — found James Town. — Dis
sensions of the Colonists. — Hostility of the Indians. — Distress and Confusion of
the Colony. — Services of Captain Smith — he is taken prisoner by the Indians —
his Liberation — he preserves the Colony. — The Colonists deceived by Appear
ances of Gold. — Smith surveys the Bay of Chesapeak — elected President of the
Colony. — New Charter. — Lord Delaware appointed Governor. — Newport, Gates,
and Somers sent out to preside till Lord Delaware's Arrival — are wrecked on the
Coast of Bermudas. — Captain Smith returns to England.
It was on the third of August, 1492, a little before sun-rise, chap.
that Christopher Columbus, undertaking the grandest enter- '•
prise that human genius has ever conceived, or human 1492.
talent and fortitude have ever accomplished, set sail from
Spain for the discovery of the western world. On the 13th
of October, about two hours before midnight, a light in the
island of San Salvador was descried by Columbus from the
deck of his vessel, and America for the first time beheld by
b2

4 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK European eyes \ Of the wide and important train of con-
' sequences that depended on this spectacle, perhaps not even
the comprehensive mind of Columbus was adequately sensi
ble ; but to the end of time, the heart of every human being
who reads the story will confess the interest of that eventful
moment, and partake the feelings of the illustrious man. On
the following day, the Spanish adventurers, preceded by
their commander, took possession of the soil; the external
emblems of Christianity were planted on the shores of tbe
western hemisphere ; and a connexion, pregnant with a vast
and various progeny of good and evil, was established between
Europe and America.
The intelligence of this successful voyage was received in
Europe with the utmost surprise and admiration. In Eng
land, more especially, it was calculated to produce a strong
impression, and to awaken at once emulation and regret.
While Columbus was proposing his schemes with little pros
pect of success at the court of Spain, he had despatched his
brother Bartholomew to the court of Henry the Seventh in
England, there to solicit patronage and tender the fruits of
discovery. Bartholomew was taken prisoner by pirates, and
after a long detention was reduced to such poverty, that on
his arrival in London he was compelled, by the labour of his
hands, to procure the means of arraying himself in habili
ments becoming his interview with a monarch. His proposi
tions were favourably entertained by Henry : but before a
definitive arrangement was concluded, Bartholomew was re
called by the intelligence that his brother's plans had at
1 Dr. Robertson is of opinion that the Ancients had no notion of the existence of
the western world, and has collected from ancient writers maoy proofs, not only of
ignorance, but of most barbarous error, respecting the extent and dimensions of the
eartli : Hist, of America, Book I. Yet a Roman writer, to whose sentiments he has
not adverted, is supposed to have prophesied the discovery of America, 1400 years
before this event took place. The passage occurs in one of Seneca's tragedies.
 " Venient annis
Secula seris, quibus oceanus
Vincula rerum laxet, et ingens
Pateat tellus, Tiphysque novos
Detegat orbes ; nee sit lerris
Ultima Thule." Medea, Act II. Choms.
This passage attiacted a good deal of comment from the early Spanish and
Flemish writers on America. Acosta opposed the common notion of its being a
prophecy, and maintained that it was a more conjecture ofthe poet. Natural and
Moral History ofthe Indies, B. I.

NORTH AMERICA. 5
length been sanctioned and espoused by Ferdinand and CHAP.
Isabella of Spain. Ij
If the wary and penurious disposition of Henry contributed
to diminish his regrets for the abandonment of a hazardous
and expensive undertaking, the astonishing; success with
which its actual prosecution by others had been attended,
revived the former projects of his mind, and inspired a degree
of enterprise that showed him both instructed and provoked
by the better fortune of the Spanish crown x. In this temper Cabot de-
he hearkened with satisfaction to the proposals of one Gabato ^Henr
or Cabot, a Venetian, residing in Bristol ; who, from reflection vii.
on the discoveries of Columbus towards the south-west, had
conceived the opinion that lands might likewise be discovered
towards the north-west, and now offered to the king to conduct
an expedition in this direction. Henry, prompted by his
avarice and stung with envy and disappointment, readily
closed with this proposal, and not only bestowed on its author
a commission of discovery, but, on two subsequent occasions,
issued similar commissions to other individuals for exploring
and appropriating the territorial resources of unknown portions
of the globe 2.
The commission to Cabot, the only one which was pro- 1-495.
ductive of interesting consequences, was granted on the 5th
of March, 1495, (about two years after the return of Columbus
from America), and empowered that adventurer and his sons
to sail under the flag of England in quest of countries yet
unappropriated by Christian sovereigns ; to take possession
of them in the name of Henry, and plant the English banner
on the walls of their castles and cities, and to maintain with
the inhabitants a traffic exclusive of all competitors, and
exempted from customs; under the condition of paying a
fifth part of the free profit of every voyage to the crown s.
About two years after the date of his commission, Cabot, 1497.
with his second son, Sebastian, embarked at Bristol *, in a
ship provided by the king, and was attended by four small
vessels equipped by the merchants of that city. Sebastian
1 Bacon's History of Henry the Seventh.
2 Bacon. ,
' Hakluyt. Chalmers's Annals of the United Colonies. Hazard's Historical
Collections. ¦i Smith's Histoiy of Virginia, New England, and the Somer-Isles.

THE HISTORY OF

BOOK I.

Visits the
coast of
North America.

1498.

Neglect of
Cabot's
discovery by Henry,

Cabot appears to have greatly excelled his father in genius
and nautical science ; and it is to him alone that historians
have ascribed all the discoveries with which the name of
Cabot is associated.
The navigators of that age were not less influenced by the
opinions than incited by the example of Columbus, who erro
neously supposed that the islands he had discovered in his
first voyage were outskirts or dependencies of India, and not
far remote from the Indian continent. Impressed with this
notion, Sebastian Cabot conceived the hope that by steering
to the north-west he might fulfil the design, and improve the
performance of Columbus, and reach India by a shorter
course than this navigator had attempted. Pursuing that
track, he discovered the islands of Newfoundland and St.
John ; and, still continuing to hold a westerly course, soon
reached the continent of North America, and sailed along it
from the confines of Labrador to the coast of Virginia. Thus
conducted by Cabot, whose own lights were derived from the
genius of Columbus, did the English achieve the honour of
being the second nation that had visited the western world,
and the first that had discovered the vast continent that
stretches from the Gulf of Mexico towards the North Pole:
for it was not till the succeeding year that Columbus, in his
second voyage, was enabled to complete his own discovery,
and advance beyond the islands he had first visited, to the
continent of America.
Cabot, disappointed in his main object of finding a western
passage to India, returned to England to relate the discoveries
he had already accomplished, — without attempting either by
settlement or conquest to gain a footing on the American con
tinent 1. He would willingly have resumed his voyages in the
service of England, but he found that in his absence the king's
ardour for discovery had greatly abated. Seated on a throne
which he had gained by conquest, in a country exhausted by
civil wars, — involved in hostilities with Scotland, — and haras-

i Churchill's Collection of Voyages. He composed, on his return, a chart of the
whole North-American continent. This interesting document (attached to which
was a portrait of the Navigator, and a brief account of his voyage,) was long sus
pended in the Privy Gallery of the kings of England, at Whitehall, and is supposed
to have perished by the fire which destroyed that Gallery, in the reign of William
Entick's Gen. Hist, of the Late War.

the Third.

NORTH AMERICA. 7
sed by the insurrections of his subjects and the machinations CHAP.
of pretenders to his crown, — Henry had little leisure for the L
execution of distant projects ; and his sordid disposition found
small attraction in the prospect of colonial settlement, which
was not likely to be productive of immediate pecuniary gain.
He was engaged, too, at this time in negotiating the marriage
of his son with the daughter of Ferdinand of Spain, — a
transaction that supplied additional reasons for relinquishing
designs which could not fail to give umbrage to this jealous
prince, who claimed the whole continent of America, in virtue
of a donative from the Pope. Nor were the subjects of Henry
in a condition to avail themselves of the ample field that
Cabot's discovery had opened to their enterprise and activity.
The civil wars had dissipated wealth, repressed commerce, and
even excluded the English people from partaking the general
improvement of the other nations of Europe: and all the
benefit which for the present they derived from the voyage
of Cabot was, that right of territorial property which is sup
posed to arise from priority of discovery — an acquisition which,
from the extent ofthe region, the mildness of its climate, and
the fertility of its soil, afforded an inviting prospect of advan
tageous colonization. But from the counteracting circum
stances to which we have already adverted, was England
prevented from occupying this important field, till the moral
and religious advancement which her people were soon to
undergo, should qualify her to become the parent of civility
and population in North America. Cabot, finding that Henry
had abandoned all colonial projects, soon after transferred his
own services to the Spaniards ; and the English seemed con
tented to surrender their discoveries and the discoverer to the
superior fortune of that successful people. The only imme
diate fruit of his first enterprise is said to have been the
importation from America of the first turkeys1 that had ever
been seen in Europe.
It is remarkable, that of these first expeditions to the
western world, by Spain and England, not one was either
projected or conducted by a citizen of the state which sup-
1 Why this bird received the name it enjoys in England, has never been satisfac
torily explained. By the French it was called coq d'Inde, on account of its American
original ; America being then generally termed Western India.

g THE HISTORY OF
book, plied the subordinate adventurers, defrayed the expense ofthe
I- equipment, and reaped the benefit of the enterprise. The
honour of the achievement was thus more widely distributed.
The Spanish adventurers were conducted by Columbus, a
native of Genoa; the English, by John Cabot, a citizen of
Venice:1 and though Sebastian Cabot, whose superior genius
assumed the direction of the enterprise, had been born in
England, it was by the experience and instructions of his
father that his capacity had been trained to naval affairs, and
it was to the father that the projection of the voyage was due,
and the chief command of it intrusted. Happily for the
honour of the English people, the parallel extends no farther;
and the treatment which the two discoverers experienced from
the nations that had employed them, differed as widely as the
histories of the two empires which they respectively contri
buted to found. Columbus was loaded with chains in the
region which he had the glory of discovering, and died the
victim of ingratitude and disappointment among the people
whom he had conducted to wealth and renown. Cabot, after
spending some years in the service of Spain, also experienced
her ingratitude; and returning, in his old age, to England,
obtained a kind and honourable reception from the nation
which had, as yet, derived only barren hopes, and a seemingly
relinquished title from his expedition. He received the
dignity of knighthood, the appointment of Grand Pilot of
England, and a pension that enabled him to spend his old
age in circumstances of honour and comfort.2
and by his From this period till the reign of Elizabeth, no fixed views
immediate were entertained, nor any deliberate purpose evinced in
successors. . J. r r
England of occupying territory, or establishing colonies in
America. In the earlier part of the reign of Henry the Eighth,
the attention and energy of the English government were
absorbed by the wars and intrigues of the continent: and the
innovations in religious doctrine and ecclesiastical constitution
that attended its close, supplied ample employment at home
for the minds of the king, and of the great bulk of the people.
It was during this reign that the full light of the Reformation
1 The first expedition of the French to America was conducted in like manner, by
an Italian, John Verazzan, a native of Florence.
= Smith.

NORTH AMERICA. 9
broke forth in Germany, whence it was rapidly diffused, on CHAP.
all sides, over the rest of Europe. Henry, at first, resolutely
opposed himself to the adversaries of the church of Rome,
and even attempted, by his pen, to stem the progress of the
innovations, — a service which the Pope rewarded by conferring
on him the title of Defender of the Faith. But his subsequent
controversy with the Papal See, awakened and sanctioned a
spirit of inquiry among his own subjects, which spread far
beyond his expectations and desires, and eluded all his at
tempts to control and restrain it. A discussion ofthe preten
sions of the church of Rome naturally begot inquiry into her
doctrines : for her grand pretension to infallibility formed the
only authority to which many of these doctrines were indebted
for their reception. This pretension indeed was so closely inter
woven with the whole fabric of her canons and institutions, that
even a partial dissent from any one of them, seemed to menace a
principle that pervaded them all. In a system so overgrown
with abuses, the spirit of inquiry, wherever it gained admis
sion, could not fail to detect error; and even a single instance of
such detection, by shaking the fundamental tenet of infalli
bility, arraigned the solidity of the whole structure. This
danger, which could not have been entirely evaded, was ag
gravated by the alarm with which it inspired the Roman
Pontiffs, and the imprudence of the defensive policy which
they adopted. Utterly proscribing the spirit of inquiry, which
it was no longer possible to suppress, they only stimulated
its vigour and hostility, and compelled the Reformers to extend
their views from an emendation of the church of Rome to an
unqualified impugnation of her authority, and revolt from her
communion. The progress of this growing spirit of inquiry ope
rated with strong and salutary influence on the character and
fortune of the nations in which it prevailed. A subject of
rational investigation had at length been found, that could
interest the dullest, and engross the most powerful capacities:
the contagion of fervent zeal and bold excursive thought was
widely propagated; and every people, by which the re
formed doctrines were embraced, was elevated in force
and dignity of intellectual character. Introduced into
England by the power of a haughty, capricious, and
barbarous tyrant, whose object was not the emancipation

10 THE HISTORY OF
book of his subjects, but the deliverance of himself from an
' authority which he wrested from the pope only to wield
with his own hands, — some time elapsed before these doctrines
worked their way into the minds of the people, and, expelling
the corruptions and adulterations of the royal teacher, at
tained a full maturity of reasonable influence. Besides lea
vening the national creed with much of the ancient super
stition, Henry encumbered the national worship with many
ofthe Romish institutions : retaining whatever was calculated
to prove a useful auxiliary to royal prerogative, or to gratify
the pomp and pride of his own sensual imagination. In the
composition of the ecclesiastical body, he preserved the splen
did hierarchy ; and in the solemnities of worship, the gor
geous ceremonial of the church of Rome. But he found it
easier to promulgate ecclesiastical ordinances, than to confine
the stream of human opinion, or stay the heavenly shower by
which it was gradually reinforced and enlarged : and in an
after age, the repugnance that manifested itself between the
constitution of the English church and the religious senti
ments of the English people, produced consequences of very
great importance in the history of England and the origina
tion of civilized society in North America.
The rupture between Henry the Eighth and the Roman
see, removed whatever obstacle the papal donative to Spain
might have opposed to the appropriation of American
territory by the English crown : but of the two immediate
successors of that monarch, the one neglected this advantage,
and the other renounced it. During the reign of Edward
the Sixth, the court of the royal minor was distracted by
faction, or occupied by the events and vicissitudes of a war
with Scotland ; and the attention of the king and of a great
portion of his people was engrossed by the care of extending
and confirming the establishment of the protestant doctrines.
Introduced by Henry, and patronized by Edward, these doc
trines multiplied their converts with a facility that savoured
somewhat of the influence of human authority, and the sug
gestions of secular interest ; till, under the direction of Pro
vidence, the same temporal power that had been employed
to facilitate the introduction of truth, was permitted to at
tempt its extinction. The royal authority, which Henry

NORTH AMERICA. 1 1
had blindly made subservient to the establishment of the C H A P.
protestant doctrines, was now employed by Mary, with equal L
blindness, as an instrument to sift and purify the protestant
body, to separate the genuine from the unsound portions of
it, and to enable the true believers, by more than mortal
fortitude, faithfulness, and patience, to illustrate the perfection
of Christian character and the plenitude of divine grace.
This princess, restoring the connexion between England and
the church of Rome, and united in marriage to Philip of
Spain, was bound by double ties to refrain from contesting
the Spanish claims on America. It was not till the reign of
Elizabeth, that the obstacles created by the pretensions of
Spain were finally removed, and the prospect of collision with
the designs of this state, so far from appearing objection
able, presented the strongest attraction to the minds of the
English. But, although during this long period, the occupation of
America had been entirely neglected, the naval resources
adapted to the formation and maintenance of colonies were
diligently cultivated in England, and a vigorous impulse was
communicated to the spirit of commercial enterprise. Under
the directions of Cabot, in the reign of Henry the Eighth, the
English merchants visited the coast of Brazil, and traded with
the settlements of the Portuguese. In the reign of Edward
the Sixth, the fisheries on the banks of Newfoundland, which
had been previously established, were extended and encou
raged ; and an association of adventurers for the discovery of
new countries was incorporated by royal charter. Even Mary
contributed to promote this direction ofthe national spirit : she
founded the Corporation of Merchants to Russia, and studied
to augment the security of their traffic, by cultivating a
friendly relation with the sovereign of that country. During
her reign, an attempt highly creditable to the national energy,
and not wholly unsuccessful, was made to reach India by
land ] ; and a commercial intercourse was established with the
coast of Africa. Many symptoms conspired to indicate with
what steady vigour and persevering ardour the English might
be expected to improve every opportunity of exerting and en-
1 Hakluyt.

12 THE HISTORY OF
book larging their resources, and how high a rank they were destined
L to hold in the scale of nations, when the force of their character
should be thoroughly developed by the progress of their recent
improvement, and when the principles and policy of their
government should more perfectly coincide with the genius
and sentiments of the people.
The Spaniards, meanwhile, had spread their settlements
over the southern regions of the new world, and achieved an
extent of conquest and accession of treasure that dazzled
the eyes and excited the emulation of all Europe. Men of
active and enterprising character in Spain; curbed and re
stricted at home by the illiberal genius of their government,
eagerly rushed into the outlet of grand adventure presented
to them on the vast theatre of Mexico and Peru. The
paganism ofthe natives of these regions, allured the invasion
of bigots long wedded to a faith that recognised compulsion
as an instrument of conversion ; and their wealth and effemi
nacy not less powerfully tempted the cupidity and ambition
of men in whom pride inflamed the thirst of riches, while it
inspired contempt of useful industry. Thus every prospect
that could address itself prevailingly to human desires, or to
the peculiarities of Spanish taste and character, contributed
to promote that series of rapid and vigorous invasions, by
which the Spaniards overran so large a portion of the con
tinent of South America. The real and lasting effect of their
acquisitions has corresponded in a manner very satisfactory
to the moral eye, with the character and merit of the achieve
ments by which they were earned. The history of the expe
ditions which terminated in the conquest of Mexico and
Peru, displays, perhaps, more strikingly than any other portion
of the records of the human race, what amazing exertions the
spirit of man can prompt him to attempt, and sustain him to
endure — how signally he is capable of misdirecting the ener
gies with which his Creator has endowed him, and of dis
gracing the most admirable capacities of his nature, by ren
dering them instrumental to sordid, unjust, and barbarous
ends. Religion, the grand corrective of human evil, error,
and woe, shared this fatal perversion ; and the crosses which,
as emblems of Christianity, successively announced the advent
of this faith to each newly discovered region, proved any

NORTH AMERICA. 13
thing but the harbingers of glory to God or good will to c H A P.
men. I.

The inflexible pride and deliberate tyranny of the Spanish
adventurers, their arrogant disregard of the rights of human
nature, and calm survey of the desolation of empires and de
struction of happiness and life, is rendered the more striking
and impressive by the humility of their own original circum
stances, which seemed to level and unite them by habit and
sympathy with the mass of mankind. Their conquests were
accomplished with such rapidity, and followed with such bar
barous oppression, that a very few years sufficed not only
to subjugate, but almost wholly to extirpate, the slothful and
effeminate idolaters, who were fated to perish by their hands.
The settlements that were founded in the conquered countries
produced, from the nature of the soil, a vast influx of gold and
silver into Spain, and finally exercised a pernicious influence
on the liberty, industry, and prosperity of her people. But it
was long before the bitter harvest of this golden shower was
reaped ; and in an age so darkly blind to the liberal truths
of political science, it could not be foreseen through the pomp
and renown with which the acquisition of so much empire,
and the administration of so much treasure, seemed to invest
the Spanish monarchy. The achievements of the original
adventurers, embellished by the romantic genius of Spain,
and softened by national partiality, had now occupied the
pens of Spanish historians, and excited a thirst for kindred
enterprise, and hopes of similar enrichment in every nation to
which the tidings were conveyed. The study of the Spanish
language, and the acquaintance with Spanish literature which
the marriage of Philip and Mary introduced into England,
contributed to cherish this impulse in the minds of the
English ; and gave to the rising spirit of adventure among
them a strong determination towards the continent of
America. The reign of Elizabeth was productive of the first attempts Reign of
of the English people to establish a permanent settlement in 1Z,) wll~
America. But many causes united to enfeeble their ex
ertions for this purpose, and to retard the accomplishment of
so great a design. The civil government of Elizabeth, in the
commencement of her reign, was acceptable to her subjects ;

14 THE HISTORY OF
book, and her commercial policy, though frequently perverted by
I- the interests of arbitrary power, and the principles of a narrow
and erroneous system, was in the main, perhaps, not less laud
ably designed than judiciously directed to the cultivation of
their resources and the enlargement of their prosperity. By
permitting a free exportation of corn, she promoted at once
the agriculture and the commerce of England ; and by trea
ties with foreign powers, she endeavoured to establish com
mercial relations between their territories and her own.1
Sensible how much the dignity and security of her crown and
the welfare of her people depended on a naval force, she
studiously addressed herself to encourage navigation ; and so
greatly increased the shipping ofthe kingdom, both by build
ing large vessels herself, and by promoting ship-building
among the merchants, that she was styled by her subjects the
Restorer of naval glory, and the Queen of the northern seas.2
Rigidly just in discharging the ancient debts ofthe crown, as
well as in fulfilling all her own particular engagements, — yet for
bearing towards her people in the imposition of taxes ; frugal in
the expenditure of her resources, and yet exerting a firm and
deliberate perseverance in the prosecution of well directed pro
jects, the policy of her civil government at once conveyed
good lessons to her subjects, and happily coincided with the
general cast and bent of their sentiments and character.
favourable During a reign thus favourable to commercial enterprise,
adventure6 ^e spirit tnat na(l Deen gradually pervading the steady
minds of the English, was called forth into active and
vigorous exertion. Under the patronage of Dudley, Earl of
Warwick, and conducted by Martin Frobisher, an expedition
was despatched for the discovery of a north-west passage to
1578. India : but after exploring the coasts of Labrador and Green-
1 She obtained from John Basilides, the czar of Muscovy, a patent which con
ferred the whole trade of his dominions on the English. With this grant, the
tyrant, who lived in continual dread of a revolt of his subjects, purchased from Eliza
beth the assurance of an asylum from their fury in England. But his son Theodore
revoked it, and answered to the queen's remonstrances, that he was determined to
rob neither his own subjects nor foreigners by subjecting to monopolies what should
be free to all mankind. Camden. So superior was the commercial policy which
natural justice taught this barbarian, to the system which Elizabeth derived from her
boasted learning and renowned ability, and which, in the progress of her reign,
loaded the freedom and industry of her people with patents, monopolies, and exclu
sive companies.
2 Camden. Strype.

NORTH AMERICA,

15

land, Frobisher was compelled to return with the tidings of CHAP.
disappointment. If the ardour of the English was damped L
by this failure, it was quickly revived by the successful
effort of Sir Francis Drake, who, with a feeble squadron,
undertook and accomplished the same enterprise that for
sixty years had formed the peculiar glory of the Portuguese
navigator Magellan, and obtained for England the honour of
being the second nation that had completely circumnavigated
the globe. A general enthusiasm was excited by this splendid
achievement, and a passion for naval exploits laid hold of
almost all the leading spirits of the age.
Yet still no project of effecting a permanent settlement
abroad had been entertained or attempted by the English.
The happiness that was enjoyed by the subjects of Elizabeth
enhanced those attractions that bind the hearts of men to
their native land, and are rarely surmounted but by the expe
rience of intolerable hardships at home, or the prospect of
sudden enrichment abroad. Now the territory of North
America presented none of the allurements that had incited
and rewarded the Spanish adventurers ; it encouraged no
hopes but of distant gain, and invited no exertions but of
patient industry. The prevalence of the protestant doctrines
in England, and the increasing influence of a sense of religion on
the minds ofthe people, disinclined many persons to abandon
the only country where the Reformation appeared to be securely
established ; engrossed the minds of others with schemes for
the improvement of the constitution and ritual of their na
tional church ; and probably repressed in some ardent spirits
the epidemical thirst of adventure, and reconciled them to
that moderate competency which the state of society in Eng
land rendered easily attainable, and the simplicity of manners
preserved from contempt.
But if the immediate influence of religious principle was
unfavourable to projects of colonization, it was to the further
development of that noble principle that England was soon to
be indebted for the most remarkable and interesting colonial
establishment that she has ever possessed. The ecclesiastical
policy of Elizabeth was far from giving the same general
satisfaction that her civil government afforded to her subjects.
Inheriting the arrogant temper, the lofty pretensions, and the

10

THE HISTORY OF

book taste for pompous pageantry by which her father had been
' distinguished, without partaking his earnest zeal and sincere
bigotry, — religious considerations often mingled with her
policy, but religious sentiments had little, if any, influence on
her heart. Like him, she wished to render the establishments
of Christian worship subservient to the indulgence of human
pomp and vanity : and by a splendid hierarchy and gorgeous
ceremonial, mediate an agreement between the loftiness of her
heart and the humility of the gospel. But the trials and af
flictions which the English protestants had undergone from
Mary had deepened and purified the religious sentiments of a
great body of this people, and at the same time associated with
many of the ceremonies retained in the national church, the
idea of popery and the recollection of persecution. This re
pugnance between the sentiments of the men who now began
to be termed Puritans, and the ecclesiastical policy of the
English government, continued to increase during the whole
of Elizabeth's reign : but as the influence which it exercised
on the colonization of America was not manifested till the
succeeding reign, the further account of it must be deferred
till we come to trace its effects in the rise and progress of the
settlements of New England.
Rise of the During the present reign, there was introduced into Eng-
slave trade. ian(j a Dranch 0f tnat inhuman traffic in negro slaves, which
afterwards engrossed so large a portion of her commercial
wealth and activity, and converted a numerous body of her
merchants into a confederacy of robbers, and much of what
she termed her trade into a system of deliberate fraud and
atrocious rapine and violence. The first Englishman who
exposed himself and his country to this foul reproach, was Sir
John Hawkins, who afterwards attained a high nautical cele
brity, and was created an admiral and treasurer ofthe British
navy. His father, an expert English seaman, having made
several voyages to the coast of Guinea, and from thence to
Brazil and the West Indies, had acquired considerable know
ledge of these countries, which he transmitted to his son in
the copious journals he had preserved of his travels and ob
servations. In these compositions, he described the soil of
America and the West Indies as endowed by nature with ex
traordinary richness and fertility, yet languishing in total un-

NORTH AMERICA. 17
productiveness from the actual want of cultivators. The chap.
natives of Europe were represented as unequal to the toil of  l_\ 
agriculture in so sultry a climate; but those of Africa as
peculiarly well adapted to this employment. Forcibly struck
with his father's remarks, Hawkins deduced from them the
project of transporting Africans into the western world ; and
having composed a plan for the execution of this design, he
produced it to some of his opulent neighbours, and solicited
their approbation and concurrence. A subscription was
opened, and speedily completed by Sir Lionel Ducket, Sir
Thomas Lodge, Sir William Winter, and other persons, who
plainly perceived the vast emolument that might be derived
from the adventure proposed to them. By their assistance
Hawkins was enabled to set sail for Africa in the year 1562 ;
and having reached Sierra Leone, he began his commerce
with the negroes. While he trafficked with them in the usual
articles of barter, he took occasion to give them an inviting
description of the country to which he was bound ; contrast
ing the fertility of its soil and the wealth of its inhabitants
with the barrenness of Africa and the poverty of the African
tribes. Finding that the unsuspecting negroes listened to
him with implicit belief, and were greatly captivated with the
European luxuries and ornaments which he displayed to their
view, — he offered, if any of them were willing to exchange
their destitute circumstances for a happier condition, to trans
port them to this more bountiful region, where he assured
them of a friendly reception, and of an ample participation
in the enjoyments with which he had made them acquainted,
as a certain recompense of easy labour. The negroes were
ensnared by his flattering promises ; and three hundred of them,
accepting his offer, consented to embark along with him for
Hispaniola. On the night before their embarkation, they were
attacked by a hostile tribe ; and Hawkins hastening with his
crew to their assistance, repulsed the assailants, and carried a
number of them as prisoners on board his vessels. The next
day he set sail with his mixed cargo of human creatures, and
during the passage treated the negroes who had voluntarily
accompanied him in a different manner from his prisoners of
war. On his arrival at Hispaniola, he disposed of the whole
cargo to great advantage, and endeavoured to inculcate on
vol. i. c

23 THE HISTORY OF
book the Spaniards who bought the negroes, the same distinction
L in the treatment of them which he himself had observed. But
having now put the fulfilment of his promises out of his own
power, it was not permitted to him so to limit the evil conse
quences of his perfidy : and the Spaniards who had purchased
all the Africans at the same rate, considered them as slaves
of the same condition, and consequently treated them all
alike. When Hawkins returned to England with a rich freight of
pearls, sugar, and ginger, which he had received in exchange
for his slaves, the success of his voyage excited universal
interest and curiosity respecting the sources from which so
much wealth had been derived. At first the nation was
shocked with the barbarous aspect of a traffic in the persons
of men ; and the public feeling having penetrated into the
court, the queen sent for Hawkins to inquire in what manner
this novel and extraordinary description of commerce was
conducted ; declaring to him that " if any of the Africans
were carried away without their own consent, it would be
detestable, and call down the vengeance of Heaven upon the
undertakers." Hawkins, in reply, protested that in no expe
dition which he conducted, should any of the natives of
Africa be carried away by compulsion, except such captives
as might be taken in war : and he declared that so far from
entertaining any scruple concerning the justice of his policy,he
deemed it an act of humanity to carry men from a worse con
dition to a better ; from a state of heathen barbarism to an
opportunity of sharing the blessings of Christianity and civili
zation.1 .It is believed, indeed, and seems consonant with
probability, that Hawkins did not himself contemplate the
perpetual slavery of the negroes whom he sold, but expected
that they would be advanced to the condition of free servants
whenever theiiiabours had yielded to their masters an equivalent
for the expense of their purchase. The queen appeared to be
satisfied with his explanation, and dismissed him with the
1 This was the plea by which all the conductors and apologists of the slave trade
attempted to vindicate the practice in its infancy. The danger of hearkening to a
policy that admits of " doing evil that good may come," was never more strikingly
illustrated than by the descendants of those men, whom we have seen (both in Ame
rica and the West Indies) enact laws prohibiting all education, moral, political, or
religious, of their negro slaves.

NORTH AMERICA. 19
assurance that, while he and his associates acted with hu-CHAP.
manity and justice, they might depend on her countenance *'
and protection.
The very next voyage that Hawkins undertook, demon
strated still more clearly than the former the deceitfulness of
that unction which he had applied to his conscience, and the
futility even of those intentions of which the fulfilment
seemed to depend entirely on himself. In his passage he
met with an English ship of war, which joined itself to the
expedition, and accompanied him to the coast of Africa. . On
his arrival, he began as formerly to traffic with the negroes,
and endeavoured, by reiteration of his former topics of per-
-suasion, to induce them to embark in his vessels. But they
had now become reserved, and jealous of his designs ; and as
none of their countrymen had returned from the former voy
age, they were apprehensive that the English had killed and
devoured them ; a supposition which, however offensive to
the English, did greatly and erroneously extenuate the inhu
manity of which they had been actually guilty. The crew of
the ship of war, observing the Africans backward and suspi
cious, began to deride the gentle and dilatory methods of
proceeding to which Hawkins confined himself, and proposed
immediate recourse to violence and compulsion. The sailors
belonging to his own vessels joined with the crew of the man-
of-war, and, applauding their proposal, made instant prepa
ration for carrying it into effect. Hawkins protested against
such lawless barbarity, and vainly endeavoured to prevail on
them to desist from their purpose. But the instructions of the
queen and the dictates of conscience were ineffectually cited
to men whom he had initiated in piracy and injustice, and
who were notable to discover the moral superiority of calm
treachery over undisguised violence. They pursued their de
sign, and after various unsuccessful attacks, in which many
of them lost their lives, another cargo of human beings was at
length collected by force and cruelty.1 Such was the origin
of the English branch of the slave trade, which is here related
the more minutely, not only on account of the remarkable
• Hakluyt. Hill's Naval History. Hewit's History of South Carolina and
Georgia.
c 2

20 THE HISTORY OF
book and instructive circumstances that attended the commence-
 ^__ ment of the practice 1, but on account of the influence which
it subsequently exercised on the colonization and condition of
some of the provinces of North America.
The spirit of adventure which had been excited in the
English nation found a more inviting scene of exertion in the
southern than in the northern regions of America : and when,
after twenty years of peace, Elizabeth was engaged in war with
her brother-in-law, Philip, the prospect of enrichment and re
nown by the plunder of the Spanish colonies opened a new
career, which was eagerly embraced and successfully prose
cuted by the enterprising spirit of adventurers of all ranks in
England. Accordingly, for many years, the most popular
and notable exploits of the English were performed in the
predatory hostilities which they waged with the colonies and
colonial commerce of Spain. Even in scenes so unfavourable
to the production or display of the better qualities of human
nature, the manly character and moral superiority of the Eng
lish were frequently and strikingly displayed. Drake and
many others of the adventurers in the same career were men
equally superior to avarice and fear; and though willing to
encounter hardship and danger in quest of wealth, they did
not esteem it valuable enough to be acquired at the expense of
honour and humanity.
And yet it was to this spirit, so unfavourable to industrious
colonization, and so strongly attracted to a more congenial
sphere in the south, that North America was indebted for the
first attempt to colonize her territory. Thus irregular and in
calculable (to created wisdom) is the influence of human pas
sions on the stream of human affairs.
Sir Walter The most illustrious adventurer in England was Sir Walter
Raleigh— Raleigh, a man endowed with brilliant genius, unbounded
ambition, and unconquerable activity ; whose capacious mind,
stimulated by an ardent spirit, and strongly impregnated with
the enthusiasm, credulity, and sanguine expectation peculiar
to the age, no single project, however vast or arduous, could
wholly absorb. The extent of his capacity combined acquire
ments that are commonly esteemed remote and almost incom-
1 See Note 1, at the end of the volume.

NORTH AMERICA. 2 1
patible with each other. Framed in the prodigality of nature, chap.
he was, at once, the most industrious scholar and the most L
accomplished courtier of his age ; as a projector, profound, in
genious, and indefatigable ; as a soldier, prompt, daring, and
heroic ; so contemplative (says an old writer) that he might
have been judged unfit for action; so active that he seemed
to have no leisure for contemplation.1 The chief defect of
his mental temperament was the absence of moderation and
regularity of thought and aim. He had unfortunately
adopted the maxim that " whatever is not extraordinary is
nothing ;" and his mind (till the last scene of his life) was
not sufficiently pervaded by religion to recognise that nobility
of purpose which ennobles the commonest actions, and ele
vates circumstances instead of borrowing dignity from them.
Uncontrolled by steady principle and sober calculation, the
fancy and the passions of Raleigh transported him in some
instances beyond the bounds of rectitude, honour, and rea
sonable propriety ; and, seconded by the perverse complexion
of his fortune, entailed reproach on his character and discom
fiture on his undertakings. But, though adversity might
cloud his path, it could never depress his spirit, or quench
a single ray of his genius. The continual discomfiture of his
efforts and projects, served only to display the exhaustless
opulence and indestructible vigour of that intellect, of which
no accumulation of disaster, nor variety of discouragement
could either repress the ardour or narrow the range. Amidst
disappointment and impoverishment, pursued by royal hatred,
and forsaken by his popularity, he continued to project and
attempt the foundation of empires ; and in old age and a
prison he composed the History of the World. Perhaps there
never was another instance of distinguished reputation as
much indebted to genius, and as little to success. So power
ful indeed is the association that connects merit with suc
cess, and yet so strong the claim of Raleigh to evade the cen
sure which this view implies, that we find it difficult to pro
nounce him, even amidst uninterrupted disaster, an unsuccess
ful man. Whatever judgment may be formed of his cha
racter, we must acknowledge that in genius he was worthy of
' Lloyd's State Worthies.

22

THE HISTORY OF

B 0 0 K the honour which he may, perhaps, be considered to have
*• attained, of originating the settlements that grew up into the
North American republic.
projects a In conjunction with a kindred spirit, his half-brother Sir
™]°2in Humphry Gilbert, Raleigh projected the establishment of a
America, colony in that quarter of America which Cabot had visited ;
and a patent for this purpose was procured without difficulty
1578. in favour of Gilbert, from Elizabeth. This patent authorized
him to explore and appropriate all remote and barbarous lands
unoccupied by Christian powers, and to hold them as a fief of
the crown of England, with the obligation of paying the fifth
part of the produce of all gold or silver mines: it permitted
the subjects of Elizabeth to accompany the expedition,1 and
guaranteed to them a continuance ofthe enjoyment of all the
rights of free denizens of England : it invested Gilbert with
the powers of civil and criminal legislation over all the in
habitants of the territory which he might occupy ; but with
this limitation, that his laws should be framed with as much
conformity as possible to the statutes and policy of England,
and should not derogate from the supreme allegiance due to
the English crown. The endurance ofthe patent, in so far as
related to the appropriation of territory, was limited to six
years ; and all other persons were prohibited from establish
ing themselves within two hundred leagues of any spot which
the adventurers might occupy during that period.2
The extraordinary powers thus committed to the leader of
the expedition did not prevent the accession of a numerous
body of subordinate adventurers. Gilbert had earned high
and honourable distinction by his services both in France and
Ireland ; and the attractive power of his reputation, concurring
with the spirit of the times, and aided by the zeal of Raleigh -
and the influence of Secretary Walsingham, enabled him.
speedily to collect a sufficient body of associates, and to ac
complish the equipment of the first expedition of British
1 Strange as it may appear, this provision was absolutely necessary to evade the
obstiuctionsof the existing law of England. By the ancient law, as declared in the
Great Charter of King John, all men might go freely out of the kingdom, saving
their faith due to the king. But no such clause appears in the charter of his succes
sor ; and during the reign of Elizabeth it was enacted, that any subject departing
the realm without a license under the Great Seal should forfeit his personal estate,
and lose the profits of his lands for life. 13 Eliz. cap. 3.
2 Stith's History of Virginia. Hazard's Historical Collections.

NORTH AMERICA. 23
emigrants to America. But in the composition of this body C H A P.
there were elements very ill fitted to establish an infant com- L
mon wealth on a solid or respectable basis; the officers were
disunited, the crew mutinous and licentious: and happily for
the credit of England, it was not the will of Providence that
the adventurers should gain a footing in any new region.
Gilbert, approaching the American continent by too northerly
a course, was dismayed by the inhospitable aspect of the
coast of Cape Breton: his largest vessel was shipwrecked: First expe-
and two voyages, in the last of which he himself perished, dltJ°5n8olls-
finally terminated in the defeat of the enterprise and dispersion
of the adventurers.1
But the ardour of Raleigh, neither daunted by difficulties
nor damped by miscarriage, and continually refreshed by the
suggestions of a fertile and uncurbed imagination, was inca
pable of abandoning a project that had gained his favour and
exercised his energy. Applying to the queen, in whose esteem
he then held a distinguished place, he easily prevailed with
her to grant him a patent, in all respects similar to that which
had been previously bestowed upon Gilbert.2 Not less 1584.
prompt in executing than intrepid in projecting his schemes,
Raleigh soon despatched two small vessels, commanded by
Amadas and Baiiow, to visit the districts which he intended
to occupy, and to examine the accommodations of their coasts,
the productions of the soil, and the condition of the inha
bitants. These officers, avoiding the error of Gilbert in
steering too far north, shaped their course by the Canaries,
and, approaching the North American continent by the
Gulf of Florida, anchored in Roanoak Bay, which now forms
a part of Carolina. Worthy of the trust that had been re
posed in them, they behaved with much courtesy to the
inhabitants of the region, whom they found living in all the
rude independence and labourless, but hardy simplicity of
savage life, and of whose hospitality, as well as of the mildness
of the climate and fertility of the soil, they published the
most flattering accounts on their return to England. This
1 Hakluyt, iii. 143. In Prince's "Worthies of Devon" it is stated, that Sir
Humphry Gilbert took possession of the river St. Lawrence in the name of Queen
Elizabeth. But his only act of possession (says Oldmixon,) was the leaving his
largest vessel a wreck there.
2 Stith. Hazard.

24

THE HISTORY OF

BOOK intelligence diffused general satisfaction, and was so agreeable
 ]'  to Elizabeth, that, in exercise of the parentage she proposed
Elizabeth to assume over the country, and as a memorial that the ac-
couTtry'16 quisition of it originated with a virgin queen, she thought
Vngiiiia. proper to bestow on it the name of Virginia.1
This encouraging prospect not only stimulated the enthu
siasm of Raleigh, but, by its influence on the minds of his
countrymen, enabled him the more speedily to complete his
preparations for a permanent colonial settlement; and he was
soon in a condition to equip and despatch a squadron of seven
Grenville sn;pS under the command of Sir Richard Grenville, one of the
despatched ' . ..
by Ra- most heroic spirits of the time, and eminent for valour in an
leigh— age distinguished by the numbers of the brave. But this
gallant leader unfortunately was more infected with the
spirit of predatory enterprise at that time so prevalent among
the English, than endued with the qualities which his peculiar
duty, on the present occasion, required: and, commencing his
expedition by cruising among the West India islands and
capturing the vessels of Spain, he initiated his followers in
pursuits and views very remote from peaceful industry,
Aug. 1585. patient perseverance, and moderation. At length he landed
establishes a hundred and eight men2 at Roanoak; and left them there to
a colony at attempt, as they best might, the arduous task of founding and
maintaining a social establishment. The command of this
feeble body was committed to Captain Lane, assisted by some
persons of note; of whom the most eminent were Amadas,
who had conducted the former voyage; and Thomas Heriot,
the improver of algebraical calculation, a man whose sense
and virtue might have preserved the colony, if these qualities had
been shared by his associates, and whose unremitted endeavours
to instruct the savages, and diligent inquiries into their habits
and character, by adding to the stock of human knowledge,
and by extending the example of virtue, rendered the expe
dition not wholly unproductive of benefit to mankind. The
selection of such a man to accompany and partake the en
terprise reflects additional honour on his friend and patron
1 Smith. The country was so called (says Oldmixon) either in honour of the
virgin estate of the queen, " or, as the Virginians will have, because it still seemed
to retain the virgin purity and plenty of the first creation." Oldmixon's British
Umpire in America. 2d edit.
• Smith, B. i.

NORTH AMERICA. 25
Raleigh. Heriot endeavoured to avail himself of the ad- CHAP.
miration expressed by the savages for the guns, the clock, the  '__
telescopes, and other implements that attested the superiority
of their visitors, in order to lead their minds to the great
Source of all sense and science. But while they hearkened
to his instructions, they accommodated the import of them to
their own depraved notions of Divine Nature: they acknow
ledged that the God of the strangers was more powerful and
more beneficent to his people than the deities whom they
served; and expressed an eager desire to touch and embrace
the Bible, and apply it to their breasts and heads.1 In the
hands of an artful or superstitious priest, such practices and
dispositions would probably have produced a plentiful crop of
pretended miracles and imaginary cures of diseases, and ter
minated in an exchange of superstition, instead of a renovation
of_ moral nature. But Heriot was incapable of flattering or
deceiving the savages by encouraging their idolatry, and
merely changing its direction: he laboured to convince them
that the benefits of religion were to be obtained by acquain
tance with the contents of the Bible, and not by an ignorant
veneration of the exterior of the book. By these labours,
which were too soon interrupted, he succeeded in making
such impression on the minds of the Indians, that Wingina,
their king, finding himself attacked by a severe malady, re
jected the assistance of his own priests, and solicited the
attendance and prayers of the English; and his example was
followed by many of his subjects.2
But unfortunately for the stability of the settlement, the
majority of the colonists were much less distinguished by
piety or prudence than by eager and impetuous desire to obtain
immediate wealth : their first pursuit was gold ; and, smitten
with the persuasion that every part of America was pervaded
by ramifications of the mines which enriched the Spanish
colonies, their chief efforts were directed to the acquisition of
treasures that happily had no existence. The natives disco
vering the object which the strangers sought with so much
avidity, amused them with tales of a neighbouring region
abounding with the precious metals, and possessing such
1 Heriot, apud Smith. 2 Ibid.

26 THE HISTORY OF
book, quantities of pearl, that even the walls of the houses glittered
Ij with its lavish display.1 Eagerly listening to these agreeable
fictions, the adventurers consumed their time and endured
extreme hardships in pursuit of a phantom, while they
neglected entirely the means of providing for their future
subsistence. The detection of the imposture produced mutual
suspicion and disgust between them and the savages, and
Misfor- finally led to open enmity and acts of bloodshed. The stock
tunes of 0f victuals brought with them from England was exhausted ;
lonists— the additional supplies they had been taught to expect did not
arrive ; and the hostility of the Indians left them no other
dependence than on the precarious resources of the woods and
rivers. Thus, struggling with increasing scarcity of food,
and surrounded by enemies, the colonists were reduced to a
state of the utmost distress and danger, when a prospect of
deliverance was unexpectedly presented to them bythe arrival
of Sir Francis Drake, with a fleet which he was conducting
home from a successful enterprise against the Spaniards in
the West Indies. Drake agreed to supply them with an
addition to their numbers, and a liberal contribution of pro
visions ; and if this had been done, it seems probable that,
with the ample reinforcement soon after transmitted by
Raleigh, the colonists might have been able to maintain their
establishment in America. But Drake's intentions were
frustrated by a storm, that carried out to sea the very ship
which he had freighted with the requisite supplies ; and, as
he could not afford to weaken his fleet, by a further contri
bution for their defence or subsistence, the adventurers, now
completely exhausted and discouraged, unanimously deter-
their re- mined to abandon the settlement. In compliance with their
desire, Drake accordingly received them on board his vessels,
1586. and reconducted them to England.2 Such was the abortive
issue of the first colonial settlement planted by the English
in America.
Of the political consequences that resulted from this
expedition, the catalogue, though far from copious, is not
entirely devoid of interest. An important accession was
made to the scanty stock of knowledge respecting North
America; the spirit of mining adventure received a salutary
' Smith. 2 Ibid.

turn

NORTH AMERICA. 27
check; and the use of tobacco, already introduced by the CHAP.
Spaniards and Portuguese into other parts of Europe, was
now imported into England. This herb the Indians esteemed Use of to-
their principal medicine ; J and some tribes are said to have t ^[^j"
ascribed its virtues to the inhabitation of one of those spiritual into Eng-
beings which they supposed to reside in all the extraordinary an '
productions of nature. Lane and his associates, contracting
a relish for its properties, brought a quantity of tobacco with
them to England, and taught the use of it to their coun
trymen. Raleigh, in particular, adopted, and with the help
of some young men of fashion, encouraged the practice, which
soon established itself and spread with a vigour that outran
the help of courtiers, and defied the hinderance of kings;
and, creating a new and almost universal appetite in human
nature, formed an important source of revenue to England,
and multiplied the ties that united Europe with America.2
But the disasters that attended this unfortunate enterprise
did not terminate with the return of Lane and his followers
to England. A few days after their departure from Roanoak,
a vessel, despatched by Raleigh, reached the evacuated set
tlement with a plentiful contribution of all necessary stores ;
and only a fortnight after this bark set sail to return from its
fruitless voyage, a still larger reinforcement of men and
provisions arrived, in three ships equipped by Raleigh, and
commanded by Sir Richard Grenville. Disappointed of
meeting the vessel that had preceded him, and unable to
obtain any tidings of the colonists, yet unwilling to abandon
the possession of the country, Grenville landed fifty men at
Roanoak, and leaving them in possession of an ample supply
of provisions, returned to England to communicate the state
of affairs and obtain further directions.3
1 Heriot ap. Smith.
2 Queen Elizabeth herself, in the close of her life, became one of Raleigh's pu
pils in the accomplishment of smoking. One day, as she was partaking this indul
gence, Raleigh betted with her that he could ascertain the weight of the smoke that
should issue in a given time from her majesty's mouth. For this purpose, he
weighed first the tobacco, and afterwards the ashes left in the pipe, and assigned the
difference as the weight of the smoke. The queen acknowledged that he had gained
his bet ; adding that she believed he was the only alchemist who had ever succeeded
in turning smoke into gold. Stith.
3 Smith. " The Virginians positively affirm that Sir Walter Raleigh made this
voyage in person." Oldmixon's Brit. Emp. in Amer. 2d edit. But the wish alone
seems to have been the parent of this notion.

28 THE HISTORY OF
book This succession of disasters excited much gloomy specu*
I- lation and superstitious surmise in England,1 but could neither
Farther ef- vanquish the hopes nor exhaust the resources of Raleigh,
Raleigh— whose dauntless and aspiring mind still rode in triumph over
1587. all mischance. In the following year he fitted out and
despatched three ships under the command of CaptaU White,
with directions to join the small body that Grenville had
established at Roanoak, and thence to transfer the settle
ment to the bay of Chesapeak, of which the superior advan
tages had been remarked in the preceding year by Lane.
A charter of incorporation was granted to White and twelve
of his principal associates, as Governor and Assistants of the
city of Raleigh, in Virginia. In the hope of evading the un-
prosperous issue of the former expeditions, more efficacious
means were adopted, in the equipment of this squadron, for
preserving and continuing the colony. The stock of provi
sions was more abundant; the number of men greater, and
the means of recruiting their numbers afforded by a compe
tent intermixture of women. But the full extent of the pre
cedent calamities had yet to be learned : and on landing at
Roanoak in quest of the detachment that Grenville had
placed there, White and his companions could find no other
trace of it than the significant memorial presented by a ruined
fort and a parcel of scattered bones. - The apprehensions ex
cited by this melancholy spectacle were confirmed by the
intelligence of a friendly native, who informed them that their
countrymen had fallen victims to the enmity of the Indians.
Instructed rather than discouraged by this calamity, they en
deavoured to cultivate the good will of the savages ; and, de
termining to remain at Roanoak, they proceeded to repair the
houses and restore the colony. One of the natives was bap
tized into the Christian faith, and, retaining an unshaken
attachment to the English, contributed his efforts to pacify
and conciliate his countrymen. 3 But finding themselves
destitute of many articles which they had judged essential to
their comfort and preservation, in a country thickly covered
with forests, and peopled only by a few scattered tribes of
savages, the colonists deputed their governor to solicit for
1 Smith. a Ibid. ? Ibid.

NORTH AMERICA. 29
them the requisite supplies; and White repaired for this pur- c H A P.
pose to England. On his voyage thither, he touched at a T-
port in Ireland, where he is reputed to have introduced the
first specimens ever seen in Europe ofthe potatoe plant, which
he had brought with him from America. But whether this
memorable importation was due to him, or, as some writers
have maintained, to certain of the earlier associates of Raleigh's
adventures, it must be acknowledged that to the enterprise of
Raleigh, and the soil of America, Great Britain is indebted
for her acquaintance with the potatoe, and with tobacco, the
staple article of diet, and the most cherished as well as the
most innocent luxury of a great portion of her people.
White arrived at a juncture very unfavourable for the
success of his mission. All England was now engrossed
with the more immediate concern of self-preservation : the
formidable armada of Spain was preparing to invade her, and
the whole naval and military resources of the empire were
placed under requisition for the purposes of national defence.
The hour of his country's danger could not fail to present the
most interesting employment to the generous spirit of Ra
leigh : yet he mingled with his distinguished efforts to repel
the enemy, some exertions for the preservation of the colony
which he had planted. For this purpose he had, with his
usual promptitude, equipped a small squadron, which he
committed to the conduct of Sir Richard Grenville, when the
queen interposed to detain the ships that were adapted for
battle, and to prohibit Grenville from leaving England at
such a crisis. White, however, was enabled to reimbark for 1588.
America with two small vessels ; but yielding to the tempta
tion of trying his fortune by the way, in a cruise against the
Spaniards, he was beaten by a superior force, and totally dis
abled from pursuing his voyage. The colony at Roanoak terminate
was therefore left to depend on its own feeble resources, of fun^"coess"
which the diligent cultivation was not likely to be promoted 1589.
by the hopes that were entertained of foreign succour. What
its fate was, may be easily guessed, but never was certainly
known. An expedition conducted by White in the following
year found the territory evacuated of the colonists, of whom
no further tidings were ever obtained1.
1 Smith. Stith. Williamson's History of North Carolina.

30

THE HISTORY OF

book This last expedition was not despatched by Raleigh, but
I- by his successors in the American patent: and our history is
now to take leave of that illustrious man, with whose schemes
and enterprises it ceases to have any farther connection.
The ardour of his mind was not exhausted, but diverted by a
multiplicity of new and not less important concerns. Intent
on peopling and improving a large district in Ireland which
the queen had conferred on him ; engaged in the conduct of
a scheme, and the expense of an armament for establishing
Don Antonio on the throne of Portugal ; and already re
volving his last and wildest project of an expedition for the
discovery of mines in Guiana; he found it impossible to con
tinue either the attention or the expenditure which he had
devoted to his American colony. Desirous, at the same time,
that a project which he had carried so far should not be en
tirely abandoned, and hoping that the spirit of commerce
would preserve an intercourse with America that might ter
minate in a colonial settlement, he consented to assign his
patent to Sir Thomas Smith and a company of merchants in
London, who undertook to establish and maintain a traffic
between England and Virginia. The patent which he thus
transferred had already cost him the enormous sum of 40,000/.,
without affording him the slightest return of pecuniary profit:
yet the only personal consideration for which he stipulated
with the assignees was a small share of whatever gold or
silver ore they might eventually discover ; and he now be
stowed on them, in addition to his previous disbursements, a
donation of one hundred pounds in aid of the efforts to which
they pledged themselves for the propagation of Christianity
in America1.
It appeared very soon that Raleigh had transferred his
patent to hands very different from his own. The last men
tioned expedition, which was productive of nothing but tidings
of the miscarriage of a prior adventure, was the most notable
exertion that the London company undertook. Satisfied with
a paltry traffic conducted by a few small vessels, they made
no attempt to take possession of the country; and at the
period of Elizabeth's death, not a single Englishman was
1 Hazard. Campbell's History of Virginia.

NORTH AMERICA. 31
settled in America. The exertions of Raleigh, however, chap.
bad united the views and hopes of his countrymen, by a __^ 
strong association, with settlements in Virginia, and given a
bias to the national spirit which only the encouragement of
more favourable circumstances was wanting to develope. But
the war with Spain, that endured till the close of Elizabeth's
reign, allured men of enterprise and activity into the career of
predatory adventure, and obstructed the formation of peace
able and commercial settlements.
The accession of James to the English crown was, by a 1603.
singular coincidence, an event no less favourable to the co- Accession
T . . . . 0I James
Ionization of America, than fatal to the illustrious projector of to the
this design. Peace was immediately concluded with Spain ; EnSllsh
and England, in the enjoyment of uninterrupted tranquillity,
was enabled to direct to more bloodless pursuits the energies
matured in a war which had excited the spirit of the nation
without impairing its strength. From the inability of govern
ment in that age to collect all the disposable force of the em
pire for combined operation, war was chiefly productive of a
series of partial efforts and privateering expeditions, which
widely diffused the allurements of ambition, and multiplied
the opportunities of advancement. This had been remarkably
exemplified in the contest with Spain ; and many ardent
spirits to which this contest had supplied opportunities of ani
mating exertion and flattering ascendancy, became impatient
of the restraint and inactivity to which the peace consigned
them, and began to look abroad for a new sphere of action and
enterprise. The prevalence of such dispositions naturally led to a revi
val of the project of colonizing North America, which gained
an additional recommendation to public favour from the suc
cess of a voyage that had been undertaken in the last year of
Elizabeth's reign. Bartholomew Gosnold; who planned and Gosnoid's
performed this voyage in a small vessel, containing only thirty v y °
men, was led by his experience in navigation to suspect that
the right track had not yet been discovered, and that in steer
ing by the Canary Islands and the Gulf of Florida, a circuit
of at least a thousand leagues was unnecessarily made. In
prosecution of his conjecture, he abandoned the southern
track, and steering more to the westward, was the first navi-

32 the history of
book gator who reached America by this directer course. He
J" _ arrived at a more northerly quarter of the continent than any
of Raleigh's colonists had visited, and landing in the region
which now forms the state of Massachussets 1, he conducted
an advantageous traffic with the natives, and freighted his
vessel with abundance of rich peltry. He visited two adja
cent islands, one of which he named Martha's Vineyard, the
other Elizabeth's Island. The aspect of the country appeared
so inviting, and the climate so salubrious, that twelve of the
crew at first determined to remain there ; but reflecting on the
melancholy fate of the colonists at Roanoak, they found their
resolution unequal to their wishes ; and the whole party re
luctantly quitting the agreeable region, returned to England
after an absence of less than four months.2
its effects. The report of this expedition produced a strong impression
on the public mind, and led to important consequences.
Gosnold had discovered a route that greatly shortened the
voyage to North America, and found a healthy climate, a fer
tile soil, and a coast abounding with excellent harbours. He
had seen many fruits that were highly esteemed in Europe
growing plentifully in the American woods ; and having sown
some European grain, had found it germinate with rapidity
and vigour. Encouraged by his success, and perhaps not
insensible to the hope of finding gold and silver, or some new
and lucrative article of commerce in the unexplored interior of
so fine a country, he endeavoured to procure associates in an
undertaking to transport a colony to America. Similar plans
began to be formed in various parts of the kingdom ; but the
spirit of adventure was controlled by a salutary caution
awakened by the recollection of former disappointments.
These projects were zealously promoted by the counsel and
encouragement of Richard Hakluyt, prebendary of West
minster, a man of eminent attainments in naval and com
mercial knowledge, the patron and counsellor of many of the
English expeditions of discovery, the correspondent of the
1 He appears to have been the second Englishman who landed in New England.
The first was Sir Francis Drake, who remained there a few days and traded with the
natives in his return from the West Indies in 1586. It is even said that Drake per
suaded one of the Indian chiefs of that region to declare his territories subject to
queen Elizabeth. Oldmixon.
3 Purchas. Smith. Stith.

NORTH AMERICA. 33
leaders who conducted them, and the historian of the exploits CHA 1'.
they gave rise to. At his suggestion1, two vessels were fitted I-
out by the merchants of Bristol, and despatched to examine 1603.
the discoveries of Gosnold, and verify his statements. They
returned with an ample confirmation of the navigator's
veracity. A similar expedition was equipped and despatched 1603.
by the Earl of Southampton and Lord Arundel of Wardour2,
which not only produced farther testimony to the same effect,
but reported so many additional particulars in favour of the
country, that all doubt and hesitation vanished from the
minds of the projectors of American colonization : and an
association sufficiently numerous, wealthy, and powerful to
undertake this enterprise, being soon formed, a petition was
presented to the king for his sanction of the plan, and the
interposition of his authority towards its execution.
The attention of James had been already directed to the
advantages attending the plantation of colonies, at the time
when he attempted to civilize the more barbarous clans of his
original subjects by introducing detachments of industrious
traders from the low country into the Highlands of Scotland. s
Well pleased to resume a favourite speculation, and willing to
encourage a scheme that opened a safe and peaceful career to
the active genius of his new subjects, he hearkened readily to
the application ; and, highly commending the plan, acceded
to the wishes of its projectors. Letters patent were issued to April,
Sir Thomas Gates, Sir George Somers, Richard Hakluyt, and jame's ^[.
their associates, granting to them those territories in America vides
lying on the sea-coast between the thirty-fourth and forty- America
fifth degrees of north latitude, together with all islands situated between
within a hundred miles of their shores. The design of the panies— m"
patentees was declared to be, " to make habitation and plan
tation, and to deduce a colony of sundry of our people into
that part of America commonly called Virginia;" and as the
main recommendation of the design, it was announced that
" so noble a work may, by the providence of Almighty God,
hereafter tend to the glory of his Divine Majesty, in propa
gating of christian religion to such people as yet live in dark
ness and miserable ignorance of the true knowledge and wor-
1 Smith. " Ib. Oldmixon. 3 Robertson's Hist, of Scotland.
VOL. I. l>

34

THE HISTORY OF

BOOK ship of God, and may in time bring the infidels and savages
T- living in those parts to human civility, and to a settled and
quiet government." The patentees were required to divide
themselves into two distinct companies ; the one con
sisting of London adventurers, whose projected establish
ment was termed the first or southern colony ; the second or
northern colony, devolving on a company composed of mer
chants belonging to Plymouth and Bristol. The territory
appropriated to the first or southern colony was generally called
Virginia, and preserved that appellation after the second or
northern colony obtained, in 1614, the name of New England.
tenor of The adventurers were authorised to transport to their respec-
their char- tjye territories as many English subjects as might be willing
to accompany them, and to make shipments of arms and pro
visions for their use, — with exemption from customs for the
space of seven years. The colonists and their children were
to enjoy the same liberties and privileges in the American
settlements as if they had remained or been born in England.1
1606. The administration of each of the colonies was committed to
two boards of council ; the supreme government being vested
in a board resident in England, which was to be nominated
by the king, and greeted in its proceedings by such ordinances
as he might enact; and a subordinate jurisdiction, which in
cluded the functions of executive power, devolving on a colo
nial council, which, like the other, was to be created by royal
appointment, and regulated by the inspiration of royal wis
dom and control. Liberty to search for and open mines
(which, under all the feudal governments, were supposed to
have been originally reserved to the sovereign), was conferred
on the colonists, — with an appropriation, however, of part ofthe
mineral produce to the crown : and the more valuable privilege
of unrestrained freedom of trade with other nations was also ex
tended to them. The president and council within the colonies
1 This provision (whether suggested by the caution of the prince or the appre
hension of the colonists) occurs in almost all the colonial charters. It is, however,
omitted in the most elaborate of them all, the charter of Pennsylvania, which was
attentively revised and adjusted by that eminent lawyer the Lord Keeper Guildford.
When King William was about to renew the charter of Massachusetts, after the
British Revolution, he was advised by the ablest lawyers in England that such a
provision was nugatory; the law necessarily inferring (they declared) that the colo
nists were Englishmen, and both entitled to the rights, and obliged to the duties at
tached to that character. Chalmers's Annals.

NORTH AMERICA. 35
were authorised to levy duties on foreign commodities, which, CHAP.
for twenty-one years, were to be applied to the use of the Ij
adventurers, and afterwards to be paid into the royal ex- 1606.
chequer.1 The terms of this charter afford an illustration both of the
character of the monarch who granted, and of the designs of
the persons who procured it. By neither of these parties, was
the foundation of a great and opulent society intended or
foreseen. The arbitrary spirit of the royal granter is discern
ible in the subjection of the emigrant body to a corporation in
which they were not represented, and over whose deliberations
they possessed no control. There is likewise a manifest in
consistency between the reservation to the colonists of all the
privileges of Englishmen, and the ascription of legislative
power exclusively to the king, — the control of whose legisla
tive functions constitutes the most valuable political privilege
that Englishmen enjoy. But we have no reason to suppose
that the charter was unacceptable to the patentees : on the
contrary, its most objectionable provisions are not more con
genial to the character of the king than conformable to the
views which the leading members of that body plainly appear
to have entertained. Their object (notwithstanding the more
liberal designs professed in the charter) was rather to explore
the continent and appropriate its supposed treasures by the
agency ofa body of adventurers over whom they retained a com
plete control, than to establish a permanent and extensive set
tlement. The instructions to the provincial governors which
accompanied the second shipment despatched by the London
company, demonstrated, very disagreeably to the wiser emi
grants, and very injuriously to the rest, that the purposes with
which their rulers were mainly engrossed, were not patient
industry and colonization, but territorial discovery and hasty
gain.2 In furtherance of these views the leading patentees
were careful, by mixing no women with the first emigrants, to
retain the colony in dependence upon England for its supplies
of people, and to give free scope to the cupidity and the roving
spirit of minds undivided by the hopes and unfixed by the
habits and attachments of domestic life.
1 Stith. Hazard. 2 Smith.

3^ THE HISTORY OF
J) o O K The king appears to have entertained more liberal ideas
L and a more genuine purpose of colonization than the patentees.
1606. While their leaders were employed in making preparations to
reap the benefits of their charter, James was assiduously
engaged in the task, which his vanity rendered a rich enjoy
ment, and the well guarded liberties of England a rare one,
Royaicode 0p digesting a code of laws, for the projected colonies. This
code, issued under the sign manual and privy seal, enjoined
- Nov. tne preaching of the gospel in America, and the performance
of divine worship, in conformity with the doctrines and rites
of the church of England. Legislative and executive functions
within the colonies were conferred on the provincial councils;
but with this controlling provision, that laws originating there
should in substance be consonant to the English laws; that
they should continue in force only till modified or repealed by
the king or the supreme council in England; and that their
penal inflictions should not extend to death or demembration.
Persons attempting to withdraw the colonists from their al
legiance to the English crown, were to be imprisoned; or, in
cases highly aggravated, to be remitted for trial lo England.
Tumults, mutiny, and rebellion, murder, and incest, were to
be punished with death ; and for these offences the culprit was
to be tried by a jury. Summary trial was appointed for in
ferior misdemeanours, and their punishment entrusted to the
discretion of the president and council. Lands were to be
holden by the same tenures that were established in England;
but for five years after the plantation of each colony, a com
munity of labour and gains was to have place among the
colonists. Kindness to the heathen inhabitants of America,
and the communication of religious instruction to them, were
enjoined. And finally, power was reserved to the king and
his successors to enact further laws, in consistence, always,
with the jurisprudence of England.1
These regulations in the main are creditable to the sovereign
who composed them. No attempt was made, nor right pre
tended, to legislate for the Indian tribes of America; and if
the ancient territories, which these savages rather claimed
than occupied, were appropriated and disposed of without any
1 Stith.

NORTH AMERICA. 37
regard to their pretensions, at least, no jurisdiction was as- CHAP.
sumed over their actions, and, in point of personal liberty, L
they were regarded as an independent people. This was an 1606.
advance in equity beyond the practice of the Spaniards, and
the ideas of queen Elizabeth, whose patent asserted the
jurisdiction of the English crown and laws over the old as
well as the new inhabitants of her projected colonies. In the
criminal legislation of this code, we may observe a distinction
which trial by jury has enabled to prevail over that ingenious
and perhaps expedient rule of ancient colonial policy, which
intrusted proconsular governors with the power of inflict
ing death, but restrained them from awarding less formidable
penalties, as more likely to give scope to the operation of
interest or caprice. If the charter, in some of its provisions,
betrayed a total disregard of political liberty, the code, in
establishing trial by jury, interwove with the very origin of
society a habit and practice well adapted to cherish the spirit
and principles of freedom.
The London company to which the plantation of the
southern colony was committed, applied themselves imme
diately to the formation of a colonial settlement. But though
many persons of distinction were included among the pro
prietors, their funds at first were scanty, and their first efforts
proportionally feeble. Three small vessels, of which the The first
largest did not exceed a hundred tons burthen1, under the i0nistsem-
command of Captain Newport, formed the first squadron that barked by
. i,, , , -i theLondon
was to execute what had been so long and so vainly at- company-
tempted ; and sailed with a hundred and five men destined Dec>
to remain in America. Several of these emigrants were
members of distinguished families — particularly George Percy,
a brother of the Earl of Northumberland: and several were
officers of reputation — of whom we may notice Bartholomew
Gosnold the navigator, and Captain John Smith, one of the
most distinguished ornaments of an age that was prolific of
memorable men.
Thus at length, after a research fraught with perplexity
and disappointment, but assuredly not devoid of interest, into
the great sources of the transatlantic commonwealth, we have
' Smith.

38

THE HISTORY OF

book reached the first inconsiderable spring, whose progress, feebly
I' opposed to innumerable obstructions, and nearly diverted in
1606. its very outset, yet always continuous, expands under the eye
of patient inquiry into the majestic stream of American popu
lation. After the lapse of a hundred and ten years from the
discovery of the continent by Cabot, and twenty-two years after
its first occupation by Raleigh, was the number of the
English colonists limited to a hundred and five; and this
handful of men undertook the arduous task of peopling a
remote and uncultivated land, covered with woods and
marshes, and inhabited only by tribes of savages and beasts
of prey. Under the sanction of a charter which bereaved
Englishmen of their most valuable rights, and banished from
the constitution of American society the first principles of
liberty, were the foundations laid of the colonial greatness of
England, and of the freedom and prosperity of America.
From this period, or at least very shortly after, a regular and
connected history ensues of the progress of Virginia and New
England — the two eldest-born colonies, whose example pro
moted the rise, as their shelter protected the weakness of the
others which were successively planted and reared.
Newport and his squadron, pursuing, for some unknown
reason, the original circuitous track to America, did not ac
complish their voyage in a shorter period than four months;
but its termination was rendered peculiarly fortunate by the
effect of a storm, which defeated their purpose of landing and
April, settling at Roanoak, and carried them into the bay of Chesa-
1607, peak. As they advanced through its waters, they easily
the bay of perceived the advantage that would be gained by establishing
Chesa- their settlement on the shores of this spacious haven, reple
nished by the tributary floods of so many great rivers which
fertilise the soil of that extensive district of America, and, af
fording commodious inlets into the interior parts, facilitate
their foreign commerce and mutual communication. Newport
first landed on a promontory forming the southern boun
dary of the bay, which, in honour of the Prince of Wales, he
named Cape Henry. Thence coasting the southern shore, he
entered a river which the natives called Powhatan, and explored
its banks for the space of forty miles from its mouth. Im
pressed with the superior advantages of the coast and region

NORTH AMERICA.

39

to which they had been thus happily conducted, the adven- c H A p.
turers unanimously determined to make this the place of L
their abode. They gave to their infant settlement, as well as 1607.
to the neighbouring river, the name of their king ; and James- found
Town retains the distinction of being the oldest existing ha- ^™es"
bitation of the English in America.1
But the dissensions that broke out among: the colonists Dissen-
soon threatened to deprive them of all the advantages of their cobnisis.8
fortunate territorial position. Their animosities were inflamed
by an arrangement which, if it did not originate with the king,
at least betrays a strong affinity to that ostentatious mystery
and driftless artifice which he affected as the perfection of
political dexterity. The names of the provincial council were
not communicated to the adventurers when they departed from
England ; but the commission which contained them was in
closed in a sealed packet, which was directed to be opened
within twenty-four hours after their arrival on the coast of
Virginia, when the counsellors were to be installed in their
office, and to elect their own president. The disagreements
incident to a long voyage, and a body of adventurers rather
conjoined than united, had free scope among men unaware of
the relations they were to occupy towards each other, and of
the subordination which their relative and allotted functions
might imply ; and when the names of the council were pro
claimed, the disclosure was far from giving general satisfaction.
Captain Smith, whose superior talents and spirit had excited
the envy and jealousy of his colleagues, was excluded from a
seat in the council which the commission authorized him to
assume, and even accused of traitorous designs so unproved
and improbable, that none less believed the charge than the
persons who preferred it. The privation of his counsel and
services in the difficulties of their outset, was a serious loss
to the colonists, and might have been attended with ruin to
the settlement, if his merit and generosity had not been su
perior to their mean injustice. The jealous suspicions of the
individual who had been elected president restrained the use
of arms, and discouraged the construction of fortifications ;
and a misunderstanding having arisen with the Indians, the 0f°stn(ly Indians.
' Stith.

40 THE HISTORY OF
book colonists, unprepared for hostilities, suffered severely from one
*• of the sudden attacks characteristic of the warfare of those
1607. savages.1 Newport had been ordered to return with the ships to
England ; and as the time of his departure approached, the
accusers of Smith, with affected clemency, proposed that he
also should return with Newport, instead of being prosecuted
in Virginia. But, happily for the colony, he scorned so to
compromise his integrity ; and demanding a trial, was honour
ably acquitted, and took his seat in the council.2
The fleet had been better victualled than the magazines of
the colony ; and while it remained with them, the colonists
were permitted to share the plenty enjoyed by the sailors. But
June. when Newport set sail for England, they found themselves
limited to scanty supplies of unwholesome provisions ; and the
sultry heat of the climate, and moisture of a country overgrown
with wood, combining with the defects of their diet, brought
on diseases that raged with fatal violence. Before the month
of September one half of their number had miserably perished ;
and among these victims was Bartholomew Gosnold, who
had planned the expedition, and materially contributed to its
Distress accomplishment. This scene of suffering was embittered by
and con- internal dissensions. The President was accused of embez-
the colony, zling tne public stores, and finally detected in an attempt to
seize a pinnace and escape from the colony and its calamities
At length, in the extremity of their distress, when ruin seemed
to impend alike from famine and the fury of the savages, the
colonists obtained a complete and unexpected deliverance,
which the piety of Smith ascribed to the influence of God in
suspending the passions and controlling the sentiments and
purposes of men. The savages, actuated by a sudden change
of feeling, not only refrained from molesting them, but gra
tuitously brought to them a supply of provisions so liberal, as
at once to dissipate their apprehensions of famine and hos
tility.3 Resuming their spirit, the colonists now proved themselves
not entirely uninstructed by their misfortunes. In seasons of
exigency merit is illustrated, and the envy that pursues it is
' Smith. J Ibid. 3 Ibid.

NORTH AMERICA.

41

absorbed by deeper interest and alarm. The sense of common chap
and urgent danger promoted a general submission to the *•
man whose talents were most likely to extricate his com- i607.
panions from the difficulties with which they were surrounded.
Every eye was now turned on Smith, and all willingly de
volved on him the authority which they had formerly shewn
so much jealousy of his acquiring. This individual, whose
name will be for ever associated with the foundation of
civilized society in America, was descended of a respectable
family in Lincolnshire, and born to a competent fortune. At
an early age his lively mind had been deeply smitten with the
spirit of adventure that prevailed so strongly in England
during the reign of Elizabeth ; and, yielding to his inclination,
he had passed through a great variety of military service, with
little pecuniary gain, but high reputation, and with the acqui
sition of an experience the more valuable that it was obtained
without exhausting his ardour or tainting his morals.1 The
vigour of his constitution had preserved his health unim
paired amidst the general sickness : the undaunted mettle of
his soul retained his spirits unbroken, and his judgment un
clouded, amidst the general misery and dejection ; and his
adventurous zeal, which once attracted the reproach of over
weening ambition, was now felt to diffuse an animating glow
of hope and courage among all around him. A strong sense
of religion predominated over the well proportioned qualities of
his mind, refreshed his confidence, extended and yet regulated
his views, and gave dignity to his character and consistency
to his conduct. Assuming the direction of the affairs of the Services of
colonists, he promptly adopted the only policy that could save Captain
them from destruction. Under his directions, James-Town""
was fortified by such defences as were sufficient to repel the
attacks of the savages ; and, by dint of great labour, which
he was always the foremost to share, its inhabitants were pro
vided with dwellings that afforded shelter from the weather,
and contributed to restore and preserve their health. Finding
the supplies of the savages discontinued, he put himself at
the head of a detachment of his people, and penetrated into
the interior of the country, where by courtesy and liberality to
1 Stith.

42 THE HISTORY OF
book the tribes whom he found well disposed, and vigorous retribu-
I- tion of the hostility of such as were otherwise minded, he suc-
1607. ceeded in procuring a plentiful stock of provisions. x
Heis taken In the midst of his successes he was surprised during an
theS°in-by expedition by a hostile body of savages, who, having made
dians. him prisoner, after a gallant and nearly successful defence,
prepared to inflict on him the usual fate of their captives. His
genius and presence of mind did not desert him in this trying
emergency. He desired to speak with the sachem or chief of
the tribe to which he was a prisoner ; and, presenting him
with a mariner's compass, expatiated on the wonderful dis
coveries to which this little instrument had contributed, — de
scribed the shape of the earth, the vastness of its lands and
oceans, the course of the sun, the varieties of nations, and the
singularity of their relative positions, which made some of
them antipodes to the others. With equal prudence and
magnanimity he refrained from any expression of solicitude for
his life, which would infallibly have weakened or counteracted
the effect which he hoped to produce. The savages listened
to him with amazement and admiration. They had handled
the compass, and viewing with surprise the play of the needle,
which they plainly saw, but found it impossible to touch, from
the intervention of the glass, were prepared by this marvel
lous object for the reception of those sublime and interesting
communications by which their captive endeavoured to gain
ascendancy over their minds. For an hour after he had
finished his harangue, they seemed to have remained un
decided; till, their habitual sentiments reviving, they re
sumed their suspended purpose, and, having bound him to a
tree, prepared to despatch him with their arrows. But a
deeper impression had been made on their chief ; and his soul,
enlarged for a season by the admission of knowledge, or subdued
by the influence of wonder, revolted from the dominion of habi
tual barbarity. This chief bore the harsh and uncouth appella
tion of Opechancanough, — a name which the subsequent history
ofthe province was to invest with no small terror and celebrity.
Holding up the compass in his hand, he gave the signal of
reprieve ; and Smith, though still guarded as a prisoner, was
1 Smith. Stilh.

NORTH AMERICA. 43
conducted to a dwelling where he was kindly treated and chap.
plentifully entertained. 1 But the strongest impressions pass

away, while the influence of habit remains. After vainly 1607.
attempting to prevail on their captive to betray the English
colony into their hands, the Indians referred his fate to
Powhatan, the king or principal sachem of the country, to
whose presence they conducted him in triumphal procession.
This prince received him with much ceremony, ordered a rich
repast to be set before him, and then adjudged him to suffer
death by having his head laid on a stone and beaten to pieces
with clubs. At the place appointed for his execution, Smith
was again rescued from impending destruction by the inter
position of Pocahontas, the favourite daughter of the king, who
finding her first intreaties disregarded, threw her arms around
the prisoner, and declared her determination to save him or
die with him. Her generous compassion prevailed over the
cruelty of her tribe ; and the king not only gave Smith his
life, but soon after sent him back to James-Town, where the his libera-
beneficence of Pocahontas continued to follow him with sup- tlon"
plies of provisions that delivered the colony from famine.2
After an absence of seven weeks Smith returned to James- He pie-
Town, barely in time to prevent the desertion of the colony. ^™s the
His associates, reduced to the number of thirty-eight, impa
tient of farther stay in a country where they had met with so
many discouragements, and in which they seemed fated to
re-enact the disasters of Roanoak, were preparing to abandon
the settlement ; and it was not without the utmost difficulty,
and alternately employing persuasion, remonstrance, and even
violent interference, that Smith prevailed on them to relinquish
their design.3 The provisions that Pocahontas sent to him
relieved their present wants ; his account of the plenty he had
witnessed among the Indians revived their hopes ; and he
endeavoured, by a diligent improvement of the favourable
impressions he had made upon the savages, and by a judicious
regulation of the intercourse between them and the colonists,
to promote a union of interests and reciprocation of advan
tages between the two races of people. His generous efforts
were successful ; he preserved plenty among the English, and
1 Smith. Stith. a Smith. 3 ibid.

44

THE HISTORY OF

BOOK extended his influence and consideration with the Indians,
*• who began to respect and consult their former captive as a
1607. superior being. If Smith had sought only to magnify his
own repute and establish his dominion, he might easily have
passed with the savages for a demi-god ; for they were not
more averse to yield the allegiance which he claimed for their
Creator, than forward to tender an abject homage to himself,
and to ratify the loftiest pretensions he might advance in his
own behalf. But no alluring prospect of dominion over men
could tempt him to forget that he was the servant of God, or
aspire to be regarded in any other light by his fellow creatures.
With uncompromising sincerity he laboured to divert the
savages from their idolatrous superstition, and made them all
aware that the man whose superiority they acknowledged^
despised their false deities, adored the true God, and obtained
from Him, by prayer, the wisdom which they so highly com
mended. His pious exertions were obstructed by imperfect
acquaintance with their language, and very ill seconded by
the conduct of his associates, which contributed to persuade
the Indians that his religion was something peculiar to his
own person. Partly from the difficulties of his situation,
partly from the defectiveness of his tuition, and, doubtless, in
no small degree, from the stubborn blindness and wilful igno
rance of the persons whom he attempted to instruct, Smith
succeeded no farther than Heriot had formerly done. The
savages extended their respect for the man, to a Being whom
they termed " the God of Captain Smith ;" and some of them
acknowledged that this Being excelled their own deities in the
same proportion that artillery excelled bows and arrows, and
sent deputies to James-Town to entreat that Smith would pray
for rain when their idols seemed unwilling or unable to grant
them a supply.1 They were willing enough to believe in gods
made after the image of themselves, and in the partial con
trol which these superior beings might be supposed to exercise
over the affairs of men : but the announcement of an
Almighty Creator, the great source and support of universal ex
istence, presented a notion which their understandings refused
1 Smith.

NORTH AMERICA.

45

to admit, and required a homage which their hearts revolted c n A p.
from yielding. *•
While the affairs of the colony were thus prospering under ifios.
the direction of Captain Smith, a reinforcement of a hundred
and twenty men, with an abundant stock of provisions, and a
supply of seeds and instruments of husbandry, arrived in two
vessels from England. Universal joy was excited among the
colonists by this accession to their comforts and their force.
But, unhappily, the jealousies which danger had restrained
rather than extinguished, reappeared in this ray of prosperity :
the ascendancy which Smith exercised over the Indians
excited the envy of the very persons whose lives it had pre
served ; and his authority now began sensibly to decline.
Nor was it long before the cessation of his influence, together
with the defects in the composition of the new body of emi
grants, gave rise to the most serious mischiefs in the colony.
The restraints of discipline were relaxed, and a free traffic
permitted with the natives, who soon began to complain of
fraudulent and unequal dealing, and to display their ancient
animosity. In an infant settlement, where the views and
pursuits of men are unfixed, and habitual submission to autho
rity has yet to be formed, the well-being, and indeed the
existence of society are much more dependent on the manners
and moral character of individuals, than on the influence of
laws. But in recruiting the population of this colony, too
little consideration was shown for those habits and occupations
which must every where form the basis of national prosperity.
This arose, as well from the peculiar views of the proprietors,
as from the circumstances of the English people, whose work
ing classes were by no means overcrowded, and among whom,
consequently, the persons whose, industry and moderation
best fitted them to form a new settlement were the least dis
posed to abandon their native country. Of the recruits who
had lately arrived in the colony, a large proportion were
gentlemen, a few were labourers, and several were jewellers and
refiners of gold.1 Unfortunately, some of this latter descrip
tion of artists soon found an opportunity of exercising their
1 Smith.

4Q THE HISTORY OF
book peculiar departments of industry, and of demonstrating (but
too late) their complete deficiency even of the worthless qua-
1608. lifications which they professed.
A small stream of water issuing from a bank of sand near
James-Town was found to deposit in its channel a glittering
sediment which resembled golden ore, and was fondly mis-
The colo- taken for this precious material by the colonists. Only this
ceived by discovery was wanting to re-awaken the passions which Ame-
appear- rica had so fatally kindled in the bosoms of her first invaders.
gold. The depositation of the ore was supposed to indicate the
neighbourhood of a mine ; every hand was eager to explore ;
and considerable quantities of the dust were amassed, and
subjected to the scrutiny of ignorance prepossessed by the
strongest and most deceptive of human passions, and misled
by the blundering guidance of superficial pretenders to supe
rior skill. Smith exerted himself to disabuse his countrymen,
and vainly strove to stem the torrent that threatened to devas
tate all their prospects : assuring them, with prophetic
wisdom, that to addict themselves to mining in preference to
agriculture, would be to squander in pursuit of a phantom,
the exertions on which their subsistence depended. The de
ceptive dust having undergone an unskilful assay of the
refiners who had recently been united to the colony, was pro
nounced to be ore of a very rich quality; and from that
moment the thirst of gold was inflamed into a rage that re
produced those extravagant excesses, but, happily, without
conducting to the same profligate enormities, for which the fol
lowers of Cortes and Pizarro had been distinguished. All
productive industry was suspended, and the operations of min
ing occupied the whole conversation, engrossed every thought,
and absorbed every effort of the colonists. The two vessels
that bad brought their late supplies, returning to England,
the one laden with this valueless dross, and the other with
cedar wood, carried the first remittance that an English colony
June, ever made from America. They carried back with them also
some persons who had been invested and despatched to the
colony with the absurd appointments of Admirals, Recorders,
Chronologers, and Justices ofthe Peace — a supply as useless
to America as the remittance of dust was to Europe. 1
1 Smith. Stith.

NORTH AMERICA. 47
Foreseeing the disastrous issue to which the delusion of the c II A P.
colonists inevitably tended, Captain Smith, in the hope of  ^

preventing some of its most fatal consequences, conceived the 1608.
project of extending his researches far beyond the range they Sm,a\ SU1"
had hitherto attained, and of exploring the whole of the great bayof Che-
bay of Chesapeak, for the purpose of ascertaining the qua- saPeak— "
lities and resources of its territories, and promoting a beneficial
intercourse with the remoter tribes of its inhabitants. This
arduous design he executed with his usual resolution and
success ; and while his fellow colonists were actively engaged
in disappointing the hopes of England, and rivalling the
sordid excesses that had characterized the adventurers of
Spain, he singly sustained the honour of his country, and,
warmed with a nobler emulation, achieved an enterprise that
equals the most celebrated exploits of the Spanish discoverers.
When we compare the slenderness of the auxiliary means
which he possessed, with the magnitude of the results which
he accomplished, the hardships he endured, and the diffi
culties he overcame, we recognize in this achievement a mo
nument of human power no less eminent than honourable,
and willingly transmit a model so well calculated to warm
the genius, to animate the fortitude, and sustain the patience
of mankind. With his friend, Dr. Russell, and a small com
pany of followers, whose fortitude and perseverance he was
frequently obliged to resuscitate, and over whom he possessed
no other authority than the ascendant of a vigorous character
and superior intelligence, he performed, in an open boat, two
voyages of discovery that occupied more than four months,
and embraced a navigation of above three thousand miles.
With prodigious labour and extreme peril, he visited every
inlet and bay on both sides of the Chesapeak, from Cape
Charles to the river Susquehannah ; he sailed up many of the
great rivers to their falls, and diligently examined the suc
cessive territories into which he penetrated, and the various
tribes that possessed them. He brought back with him an
account so ample, and a plan so accurate, of that great portion
of the American continent now comprehended in the pro
vinces of Virginia and Maryland, that all the subsequent
researches which it has undergone have only expanded and
illustrated his original view ; and his map has been made the

48

THE HISTORY OF

BOOK groundwork of all posterior delineations, with no other di-
L versity than what has inevitably arisen from the varieties of
1608. appropriation and the progress of settlements. But to come
and to see, were not his only objects : to overcome, was also
the purpose of his enterprise, and the effect of his exertions.
In his intercourse with the various tribes which he visited,
he displayed the genius of a commander, in a happy exercise
of all those talents that overcome the antipathies of a rude
people, and gain at once the respect and good will of man
kind. By the wisdom and liberality with which he negotiated
and traded with the friendly, and by the courage and vigour
with which he repelled and overcame the hostile, he suc
ceeded in inspiring the savages with the most exalted opinion
of himself and his nation, and paved the way to an intercourse
that promised important advantage to the Virginian colony.1
This was indeed the heroic age of North America : and such
were the men, and such the labours, by which the first foun
dations of her greatness and prosperity were appointed to be
laid. While this expedition was in progress, the golden dreams
of the colonists were at length dispelled ; and they had awaked
to all the miseries of sickness, scarcity, disappointment, and dis
content, when Smith once more returned to them, to reanimate
their spirits with his successes, and relieve their wants by the
resources he had created. Immediately after his return, he
elected pre- was chosen president by the council; and, accepting the
sidentoithe 0ffice, he employed his influence so efficiently with the
lOthSept. savages, that present scarcity was banished, and exerted his
authority so vigorously and judiciously in the colony, that a
spirit of industry and good order began generally to prevail,
and gave promise of lasting plenty and steady improvement.
If we compare the actions of Smith, during the period of his
presidency, with the enterprise that immediately preceded his
election, it may appear, at first sight, that the sphere of his
exertions was contracted and degraded by this event; and we
might almost be tempted to regret the returning reasonable
ness of the colonists, which, by confining this active spirit to
the petty details of their government, withdrew it from a range
i Russell, apud Smith. Bagnal, eod. loe. s Stith,

NORTH AMERICA. 49
more congenial to its excursive vigour, and more fraught with CHAP.
general advantage to mankind. Yet, reflection might persuade I'
us that a truly great mind, especially when united with an 1608.
ardent temper, will never be contracted by the seeming re
striction of its sphere: it will always be nobly, as well as
usefully employed, and not the less nobly when it dignifies
what is ordinary, and improves the models that invite the
widest imitation, and are most level with human opportunities.
Accordingly, when we examine the history of that year over
which the official supremacy of Captain Smith was extended,
and consider the results of the multifarious details which it
embraces,1 we discern a dignity as real, though less glaring
than that which invests his celebrated voyage of discovery;
and are sensible of consequences even more interesting to
human nature than any which that expedition produced. In
a small society, where no great actual inequality of accom
modation could exist, where power derived no aid from pomp,
circumstance, or mystery, and where he owed his office to the
appointment of his associates, and held it by the tenure of
their good will,2 he preserved order and enforced morality
among a crew of dissolute and disappointed men; and so
successfully opposed his authority to the allurements of in
dolence, strengthened by their previous habits and promoted
by the community of gains that then prevailed, as to introduce
and maintain a respectable degree of laborious, and even con
tented industry. What one governor afterwards achieved in
this respect by the influence of an imposing rank, and others
by the strong engine of martial law, Smith, without such aid,
and with greater success, accomplished by the continual ap
plication of his own superior sense and his matchless vigour
and activity. Some plots were formed against him: but these
1 Smith.
" It was the testimony of his soldiers and fellow adventurers, says Stith, " that he
was ever fruitful in expedients to provide for the people under his command, whom he
would never suffer to want any thing he either had or could procure ; that he rather
chose to lead than send his soldiers into danger;" that in all their expeditions he
partook the common fare, and never gave a command that he was not ready to exe
cute ; " that he would suffer want rather than borrow, and starve sooner than not
pay; that he had nothing in him counterfeit or shy, but was open, honest, and sin
cere." Stith adds, respecting this founder of civilized society in North America,
what the son of Columbus has, with a noble elation, recorded of his father, that,
though habituated to naval manners, and to the command of factious and licentious
men, he was never heard to utter an oath.
VOL. I. E

50 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK he detected and defeated without cither straining or compro-
_ mising his authority. The caprice and suspicion of the Indians
1608. assailed him with numberless trials of his temper and capacity.
Even Powhatan, notwithstanding the friendly ties that united
him to his ancient guest, was induced, by the treacherous
artifices of certain Dutchmen, who deserted to him from
James-Town, first to form a secret conspiracy, and then to
excite and prepare open hostility against the colonists. Some
1609. of the fraudful designs of the royal savage were revealed by
the unabated kindness of Pocahontas; others were detected by
Captain Smith: and from them all he contrived to extricate
the colony with honour and success, and yet with little, and
only defensive bloodshed ; displaying to the Indians a vigour
and sagacity they could neither overcome nor overreach — a
courage that excited their admiration, and a generosity that
carried his victory into their minds, and reconciled submission
with their pride. He was ever superior to that political timidity
which in circumstances of danger suggests not the propor
tionate, but always the strongest and most violent remedy and
counteraction; and admirably illustrated the chief political
uses of talent and virtue, in accomplishing the objects of
government by gentler efforts and milder means than stupidity
and ferocity could have ventured to employ. In demonstrating
(to use his own words) "what small cause there is that men
should starve or be murdered by the savages, that have dis
cretion to manage them with courage and industry1," he
bequeathed a valuable lesson to his successors in the American
colonies, and to all succeeding settlers in the vicinity of
savage tribes; and in exemplifying the power ofa civilized
people to anticipate the cruel and vulgar issue of battle, and
to prevail over an inferior race without either extirpating or
enslaving them, he obtained a victory which Caesar, with all
his boasted superiority to the rest of mankind, was too unge
nerous to appreciate, or was incompetent to achieve. There
was one point, indeed, in which it must be confessed that his
conduct to the Indians was chargeable with defect of justice
and good policy; though the blame of this error must be
divided between himself and the royal patentees whom he
' Smith.

NORTH AMERICA. 51
served; and, in addition to other palliating circumstances, CHAP.
was disguised by its conformity with the universal and unre- L
proved practice of European settlers in barbarous lands. No 1609.
part of the territory which the first colonists occupied was
purchased from the tribes who considered themselves its
owners, and who probably at first regarded, with little appre
hension, the settlement of a handful of strangers in a valueless
corner of their wide domains. The colonists, indifferent to
the opinion of the Indians, seem never to have apprehended
that the important right of property in land could be derived
from occasional visitations of savage hunters, and readily took,
as from the hands of nature, the territory which appeared to
them to have been never reclaimed from its natural wildness
and vacancy by deliberate occupation or industrial use. If
they had reasoned upon the matter, they would probably have
denied tbe right of the Indians to defeat the chief end of so
large a portion of the earth, and restrictto an ignoble minis
tration to the idle subsistence of a few barbarians, the territory
which industry and virtue might render subservient to the
diffusion of civility and the extension of life. If, however, they
had been actuated by the same equity and moderation which
distinguished so many ofthe later colonists of North America,
they might have ascertained that their interests would be at
once more cheaply and more humanely promoted by recogniz
ing than by disputing the pretensions of the Indians ; who, if
they claimed land by a title which Europeans accounted un
worthy of respect, were generally willing to part with it for a
price which Europeans found it very easy to pay. It was
reserved for the Puritan fathers of New England to set the
first example of more liberal justice, and more impartial con
sideration ofthe rights of mankind; and, by a transaction, in
which sound policy and refined morality were excellently
blended, to mediate an amicable agreement between their own
wants and the claim which the Indians asserted on the terri
torial resources of the country.
Captain Smith was not permitted to complete the work
which he had so well begun. His administration was unac
ceptable to the company in England, for the same reasons
that rendered it beneficial to the settlers in America. The
patentees, very little concerned about the establishment of a
e 2

-} 2 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK happy and respectable community, had fondly counted on the
I- accumulation of sudden wealth by the discovery of a shorter
T609. passage to the South Sea, or the acquisition of territory re
plete with mines of the precious metals. In these hopes they
had been hitherto disappointed; and the state of affairs in
the colony was far from betokening even the retribution of the
expenditure which they had already incurred. The prospect of
a settled and improving state of society at James-Town, so far
from meeting their wishes, threatened to promote the growth
of habits and interests perfectly incompatible with them.
Still hoping, therefore, to realise their avaricious dreams, they
conceived it necessary for this purpose to resume all authority
into their own hands, and to abolish all jurisdiction ori
ginating in America.1 In order to fortify their pretensions,
as well as to increase their funds, they now courted the ac
quisition of additional associates ; and, having strengthened
their interests by the accession of some persons of the highest
rank and influence in the nation, they applied for and ob-
New char- tained a new charter.
If the arbitrary introduction of a new charter avowed an
entire disregard of the rights of the colonists who had emi
grated on the faith of the original one, the provisions pecu
liar to the new charter demonstrated no less plainly the in
tention of restricting the privileges of those emigrants, and
increasing their dependence on the English patentees. The
new charter was granted to twenty-one peers, ninety-eight
knights, and a great multitude of doctors, esquires, gentlemen,
merchants, and citizens, and sundry of the corporations of
London, in addition to the former adventurers ; and the whole
body was incorporated by the title of '* The Treasurer and
Company of Adventurers of the City of London for the first
Colony in Virginia." The boundaries of the colonial territory
and the power of the corporation were enlarged ; the offices
of president and council in Virginia were abolished ; a new
council was established in England, and the company em
powered to fill all future vacancies in it by election ; and to
this council was committed the power of new-modelling the
1 Smith.

ter.
23d May,

NORTH AMERICA. 53
magistracy of the colony, of enacting all the laws that were to CHAP.
have place in it, and nominating all the officers by whom '

these laws were to be carried into execution. Nevertheless, 1609.
was it still formally stipulated that the colonists and their
posterity should retain all the rights of Englishmen. To pre
vent the doctrines of the church of Rome from gaining admis
sion into the plantation, it was declared that no persons would
be allowed to settle in Virginia without having previously
taken the oath of supremacy.1
The new council appointed Lord Delaware governor and Lord De-
captain-general ofthe colony; and the hopes inspired by the pointed go-
distinguished rank, and respectable character of this noble- vernor-
man, contributed to strengthen the company by a considerable
accession of funds and associates. Availing themselves of
the favourable disposition of the public, they equipped without
loss of time a squadron of nine ships, and despatched them
with five hundred emigrants, under the command of Captain
Newport, who was authorised to supersede the existing admi
nistration, and to govern the colony till the arrival of Lord
Delaware with the remainder of the recruits and supplies. But Newport,
by an unlucky combination of caution and indiscretion, the someis™
same powers were severally intrusted to Sir Thomas Gates sent out to
and Sir George Somers, without any adjustment of precedence comman(j
between the three functionaries ; and they, finding themselves tj11 his "-
unable to settle this point among themselves, agreed to embark
on board the same vessel, and to be companions during the
voyage, — thus deliberately hazarding and eventually producing
the disappointment of the main object which their association
in authority was intended to secure. The vessel that contained are wreck-
the triumvirate was separated from the fleet by a storm, and coag™/116
stranded on the coast of Bermudas.2 The residue of the Bermudas.
squadron arrived safely at James-Town: but so little were
they expected, that when they were first descried at sea, they
were mistaken for enemies ; and this rumour gave occasion to

•Stith. Hazard.
2 It was probably this disaster which produced the only allusion which Shake
speare ever makes to the American regions. In " The Tempest," which was com
posed about three years after this period, Ariel celebrates the stormy coast of " the
still vex'd Bermudas."

54 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK a very satisfactory proof of the friendly disposition of the In-
'  dians, who came forward with the utmost alacrity, and offered

1609. to fight in defence of the colony.1
These apprehensions, which were dissipated by the nearer
approach ofthe fleet, gave place to more substantial and more
formidable evils arising from the composition of the reinforce
ment which it brought to the colonial community. A great
proportion of these new emigrants consisted of profligate and
licentious youths, sent from England by their friends with the
hope of changing their destinies, or for the purpose of screen
ing them from the justice or contempt of their country; of
indigent gentlemen too proud to beg, and too lazy to work;
tradesmen of broken fortunes and broken spirit; idle retainers
whom the great were eager to get rid of; and dependents too
infamous to be decently protected at home ; with others, like
these, more likely to corrupt and prey upon an infant common
wealth than to improve or sustain it.2 The leaders of this per
nicious crew, though totally unprovided with legal documents,
entitling them either to assume or supersede existing authority,
proclaimed the changes which the constitution of the colony
had undergone, and proceeded to execute that part of the
innovation which consisted in the overthrow of the provincial
presidency and council. Their conduct soon demonstrated
that their title to assume authority was not more defective
than their capacity to exercise it. Investing themselves with
the power, they were unable to devise any frame of govern
ment, or establish even among themselves any fixed subor
dination : sometimes the old commission was resorted to;
sometimes a new model attempted ; and the chief direction of
affairs passed from hand to hand in one uninterrupted succes
sion of folly and presumption. The whole colony was
thrown into confusion by the revolutionary state of its go
vernment; and the Indian tribes were alienated and exas
perated by the turbulence, injustice, and insolence of the
new settlers.
This emergency summoned the man who had so often res
cued the settlement from ruin, again to attempt its deliverance.
i Smith. Stith. = Stith.

NORTH AMERICA. 55
Tbe call was seconded by the wishes of the best and wisest of chap.
the colonists ; and, aided as much by the vigour of his own
character, as by the co-operation of these individuals, Smith 1609.
once more assumed his natural ascendant and official supre
macy, and declared his intention of retaining the authority
created by the old commission till a legal revocation of it, and
legitimate successors to himself, should arrive. With de
cisive energy, he imprisoned tbe chief promoters of tumult ;
and having restored order and obedience, endeavoured to
prevent a recurrence of the former mischiefs by detach
ing from James-Town a portion of the new colonists to
form a subordinate settlement at some distance from this
place. This was an unfortunate step ; and it is remark
able that the only signal failure in the policy of this eminent
commander was evinced in the only instance in which he
seemed to distrust his own vigour and capacity. The de
tachments which he removed from James-Town conducted
themselves so imprudently as to convert all the neigh
bouring Indians into enemies, and to involve themselves in
continual difficulty and danger. The Indians assailed him
with complaints ; the detached settlers with requisitions of
counsel and assistance : and Smith, who never spent in
lamenting misfortunes the time that might be employed in
repairing them, was exerting himself with his usual vigour
and good sense in redressing these disorders, when he received
a dangerous wound from the accidental explosion of a quan
tity of gunpowder. Completely disabled by this misfortune, Captain
and destitute of surgical aid in the colony, he was compelled SmUh re"
to resign his command, and take his departure for England1. England.
He never returned to Virginia again. It was natural that he October-
should abandon with regret the society he had so often pre
served, — the settlement he had conducted through difficulties
as formidable as those which obstructed the infant progress of
Carthage or Rome, — and the scenes which he had dignified by
so much wisdom and virtue. But our sympathy with his
regret is abated by the reflection, that a longer residence in
the colony would speedily have consigned him to very subor-
1 Smith. Stith.

gg THE HISTORY OF
BOOK dinate office, r and might have deprived the world of that
• stock of valuable knowledge, and his own character of that
1609. accession of fame,2 which the publication of his travels has
secured and perpetuated.

1 See Note II. at the end of the volume.
5 He became so famous in England before his death, that his adventures were
dramatised and represented on the stage, to his own great annoyance. Stith.

NORTH AMERICA.

57

CHAPTER II.

The Colony a Prey to Anarchy — and Famine. — Gates and Somers arrive from Ber
mudas. — Abandonment of the Colony determined — prevented by the Arrival of
Lord Delaware. — His wise Administration — his Return to England. — Sir
Thomas Dale's Administration. — Martial Law established. — Indian Chief's
Daughter seized by Argal — married to Rolfe. — Right of private Property in
Land introduced into the Colony. — Expedition of Argal against Port Royal and
New York. — Tobacco cultivated by the Colonists. — First Assembly of Repre
sentatives convened in Virginia. — New Constitution of the Colony. — Intro
duction of Negro Slavery. — Migration of young Women from England to
Virginia. — Dispute between the King and the Colony. — Conspiracy of the
Indians. — Massacre of the Colonists. — Dissensions of the London Company. —
The Company dissolved. — The King assumes the Government of the Colony —
his Death. — Charles I. pursues his Father's arbitrary Policy. — Tyrannical Go
vernment of Sir John Harvey. — Sir William Berkeley appointed Governor, —
The provincial Liberties restored. — Virginia espouses the Royal Cause — subdued
by the Long Parliament. — Restraints imposed on the Trade of the Colony. —
Revolt of the Colony. — Sir William Berkeley resumes the Government. — Res
toration of Charles II.

At the period of Smith's departure, the infant common- CHAP
wealth was composed of five hundred persons, and amply n.
provided with all necessary stores of arms, provisions, cattle, '
and implements of agriculture1 : but the sense to improve its
opportunities was wanting ; and, with him, its good fortune
departed. For a short time the command was entrusted to
George Percy, a man of worth, but devoid of the vigour that
gives efficacy to virtue : and the direction of affairs soon re
lapsed into the same mischievous channel from which Smith
had recalled it. The colony was delivered up to the wildest The col
excesses of a seditious and distracted rabble, and presented a a prey to
scene of riot, folly, and profligacy, strongly invoking vindic- anarch>—
tive retribution, and speedily overtaken by it. The magazines
of food were quickly exhausted ; and the Indians, incensed
by repeated injuries, and aware that the man whom they
' Stith.

1609.

58 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK so much respected had ceased to govern the colonists, not
' only refused them all assistance, but harassed them with con-
1610. tinual attacks. Famine ensued, and completed their misery
mine.1" an(^ degradation by transforming them into cannibals, and
compelling them to support their lives by feeding on the
bodies of the Indians they had killed, and of their own com
panions who perished of hunger or disease. Six months after
the departure of Smith, there remained no more than sixty
persons alive at James-Town, still prolonging their wretch
edness by a vile and precarious diet, but daily expecting its
final and fatal close.1
May. In this calamitous state was the colony found by Sir Tho-
Gates and mas Gates, Sir George Somers, and Captain Newport, who
Somers ar- at length arrived from Bermudas, where the shipwreck they
Bermudas, encountered had detained them and their crew for ten months.2
The bounty of nature in that happy region maintained them in
comfort while they constructed the vessels that were to trans
port them to James-Town, and might have supplied them with
ample stores for the use of the colony ; but they had neglected
these resources, and arrived almost empty-handed, in the
expectation of receiving from the magazines of a thriving
settlement the relief that was now vainly implored from
themselves by the famishing remnant of their countrymen.
Their disappointment was equalled only by the difficulty of
ascertaining the causes of the desolation they beheld, amidst
the mutual and contradictory accusations of the surviving
colonists. But there was no time for deliberate inquiry, or
Abandon- adjustment of complaints. It was immediately determined
the colony to abandon the settlement ; and with this view all the people
deter- embarked in the vessels that had arrived from Bermudas,
and set sail for England. Their stores were insufficient for
so long a voyage ; but they hoped to obtain an additional
supply at the English fishing station on the coast of New
foundland. Such horror was entertained by some of the
colonists for the scene of their misery that they were impor
tunate with the commanders for leave to burn tbe fort and
houses at James-Town. But Sir Thomas Gates could not
find in their or his own distresses any reason for demolishing
Uic buildings, that might afford shelter to future settlers;
1 Stith. » Smith,

NORTH AMERICA. 59
and happily, by his interposition, they were preserved from chap.
destruction, and the colonists prevented from wreaking addi- ' '

tional vengeance on themselves.1 1610.
For it was not the will of Providence that this settlement
should perish : the calamities with which it had been visited
were appointed to punish merely, but not utterly to destroy ;
and the more worthless members being now cut off, and a
memorable lesson afforded both to the patrons who collect2,
and the members who compose such communities, a deliver
ance no less signal was vouchsafed by the Disposer of all
events, just when hope was over, and the colony advanced to
the very brink of annihilation. Before the fugitives had prevented
reached the mouth of James River, they were met by Lord r^a] 0f
Delaware, who arrived with three ships, containing a large Lord De_
supply of provisions, a considerable number of new settlers,
and an ample stock of every implement and commodity re
quisite for defence or cultivation.3
Lord Delaware, who now presented himself as captain-
general of the colony, was singularly well fitted for the exi
gency of the situation in which he was thus unexpectedly
involved. To an ancient lineage and a title of nobility, in an
age when such distinctions were regarded with much venera
tion, he joined a dignified demeanour, a disinterested cha
racter, respectable sense, and a resolute temper. The hope of
rendering an important service to his country, and the gene
rous pleasure of co-operating in a great design, had induced
him to exchange his ease and splendor at home for a situation,
of the general difficulties of which he was perfectly aware : and
the same firmness and elevation of purpose preserved him
undaunted and unperplexed by the unlooked-for scene of cala
mity which he encountered on his arrival in Virginia. Stem
ming the torrent of evil fortune, he carried back the fugi
tives to James-Town, and began his administration by attend
ance on Divine worship. After some consultation on the
affairs of the settlement, he summoned all the colonists to-
1 Smith. Stith.
2 The fate of this settlement probably suggested to Lord Bacon the following pas
sage in his essay on Plantations. " It is a shameful and unblessed thing to take
the scum ot the people, and wicked condemned men, to be the people with whom
we plant : and not only so, but it spoileth the plantation ; for they will ever live
like rogues, and not fall to work, but be lazy, and do mischief, and spend victuals."
3 Smith, Stith.

60

THE HISTORY OF

BOOK I.
1611.

His wise
adminis
tration —

his return
to Eng
land.

March,

May.
SirThomas
Dale's ad
ministra
tion —

gether, and addressed them in a short but judicious and
impressive harangue. He rebuked the folly, sloth, and im
morality that had produced such disasters, and recommended
a return to the virtues most likely to repair them : he declared
his determination not to hold the sword of justice in vain, but
to punish the first recurrence of disorder by shedding the blood
of the delinquents, though he would infinitely rather (he
protested) shed his own to protect the colony from injury.
He nominated proper officers for every department, and
allotted to every man his particular station and business.
This address was received with general applause and
satisfaction; and the factious humours of the multitude
soon appeared to have entirely subsided beneath the dig
nity and the prudent and resolute policy of Lord De
laware's administration. The deference which had been re
luctantly extorted by the superior talent and genius of Smith,
was more willingly yielded to claims of superior birth and
hereditary elevation, more palpable to the apprehension, and
less offensive to the self-complacency of the mass of man
kind. By an assiduous attention to his duty, and a
happy union of qualities fitted equally to inspire esteem
and command submission, Lord Delaware succeeded in
maintaining peace and good order in the settlement, — in
awakening a spirit of industry and alacrity among the colo
nists, — ahd in again impressing the dread and reverence ofthe
English name on the minds of the Indians. This promising
beginning was all that he was permitted to accomplish. Op
pressed by diseases occasioned by the climate, he was com
pelled to quit the country; having first committed the admi
nistration of this authority to George Percy. 1
The restoration of Percy to the official dignity which he had
once before enjoyed, seems to have been attended with the
same relaxation of discipline, and would probably have issued
in a repetition of the same disorders, that had so fatally dis
tinguished his former presidency. But happily for the colony,
a squadron that had been despatched from England before
Lord Delaware's return, with a supply of men and provisions,
brought also with it Sir Thomas Dale, whose commission au
thorised him, in the absence of that nobleman, to assume the
i Stith. Loid Delaware's Discourse, apud Smith.

NORTH AMERICA. Q]
chief command. This new governor found the colonists fast CHAP.
relapsing into idleness and penury; and though he exerted IL
himself strenuously, and not unsuccessfully, to restore better 1612.
habits, yet the loss of Lord Delaware's imposing rank and
authoritative character was sensibly felt. What Dale could
not accomplish by milder means, he was soon enabled to
produce by a system of notable rigour and severity. A code
of rules and articles had been compiled by Sir Thomas Smith,
the treasurer of the company of patentees, from the martial
law of the Low Countries, the most severe and arbitrary frame
of discipline then subsisting in the world ; and having been
printed by the compiler for the use of the colony, but without Martial
the sanction or authority of the council, was transmitted by h^}*"
him to the governor.1 This code did not long remain inope
rative. Dale caused it to be proclaimed as the established
law of the colony; and some conspiracies having broken out,
he administered its provisions with great rigour, but not
greater than was judged by all who witnessed it to have been
requisite for the general safety. The wisdom and honour of
the governor, who thus became the first depositary of those
formidable powers, and the salutary consequences that re
sulted from the first exercise of them, seem to have prevented
the alarm which the introduction of a system so arbitrary and
despotic was calculated to provoke. Dale was succeeded in
the supreme command by Sir Thomas Gates, who arrived with August.
six vessels, containing a powerful reinforcement to the numbers
and resources of the colonists. The late and the present go
vernors were united by mutual friendship and similarity of
character. Gates approved and pursued the system of strict
discipline and steady but moderate execution of the martial
code, that had been introduced by Dale ; and under the di
rections of Dale, who continued in the country and cheerfully
occupied a subordinate station, various detached parties of the
colonists began to form additional settlements on the banks of
James River, and at some distance from James-Town.2
An application was now made by the company of patentees 1612.
1 Stith. Nothing can be more fanciful or erroneous than Dr. Robertson's ac
count of the introduction of this system, which without the slightest authority he
ascribes to the advice of Lord Bacon, and, in opposition to all evidence, represents
as the act of the company. See Note III. at the end of the volume.
2 Smith. Stith.

Q-2 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK to the king, for an enlargement of their territory and jurisdic-
:- tion. The accounts they had received from the persons who
1612. were shipwrecked on Bermudas, of the fertility and conve
nience of this region, impressed them with the desire of ob
taining possession of its resources for the benefit of Virginia.1
Their request was granted without difficulty ; and a new
March, charter was issued, investing them with all the islands si
tuated within three hundred leagues of the Virginian coast.
Some innovations were made at the same time, in the struc
ture and forms of the corporation ; the term of exemption from
customs was prolonged ; the company was empowered to appre
hend and remand persons deserting the settlement, in violation
of their engagements ; and for the more effectual advancement
ofthe colony and indemnification of the large sums that had
been expended on it, license was given to open lotteries in any
part of England.2 The lottery which was established in
virtue of this license, was the first institution of the kind
that had ever received public countenance in England : it
brought twenty-nine thousand pounds into the treasury of the
company, but loaded this body with the reproach of defraud
ing the people, and corrupting their manners. The House of
Commons, which then represented the sense and guarded the
morality of England, remonstrated against the permission of
the lottery, as a measure equally unconstitutional and im
politic; and the license was soon after recalled.3 Happy if
their example had been copied by later times, and the rulers
of mankind restrained from polluting their financial adminis
tration by a system of chicane, promoting in their subjects
those gambling tastes and habits which dissolve industry
and virtue, and frequently beget even the most atrocious
crimes ! Notwithstanding the eagerness of the company to
acquire the Bermuda Islands, they did not long retain this ter
ritory, but sold it to a junto of their own associates, who were
united by royal charter into a separate corporation, named the
Somer-Islands Company.4
The colony of Virginia had once been saved, in the person
1 Stith. About this time the patentees promoted a subscription among devout
persons in London for building churches in the colony : but the money was di
verted to other purposes ; and it was not till some years after that churches were
built in Virginia. — Oldmixon.
2 Stith. a Chalmers's Annals. * Stith.

NORTH AMERICA. 63
of its own deliverer Captain Smith, by Pocahontas the CHAP.
daughter ofthe Indian king Powhatan. This princess had ever •
since maintained a friendly intercourse with the English, and 1612.
she was destined now again to render them a service of the
highest importance. A scarcity prevailing at James-Town,
and supplies being obtained but scantily and irregularly from
the neighbouring Indians, with whom the colonists were often
embroiled, Captain Argal was despatched to the shores of the
river Potomac in quest of a cargo of corn. Here he learned
that Pocahontas was living in retirement at no great distance
from him ; and hoping, by possession of her person, to obtain
such an ascendant over Powhatan, as would insure an ample
contribution of provisions, he prevailed on her, by some arti
fice, to come on board his vessel, and then set sail with her to Indian
James-Town, where she was detained in a state of honourable ^ hstet
captivity. But Powhatan, more indignant at such treachery seized by
than overcome by his misfortune, rejected with scorn the ga —
demand of a ransom : he even refused to hold any communi
cation with the robbers who still kept his daughter a pri
soner ; declaring, nevertheless, that if she were restored to
him he would forget the injury, and feeling himself at liberty
to regard the authors of it as friends, would gratify all their
wishes. The colonists, however, were too conscious of not
deserving the performance of such promises, to be able to give
credit to them ; and the most injurious consequences seemed
likely to arise from an unjust detention, which they could no
longer continue with advantage nor relinquish with safety, —
when all at once the aspect of affairs underwent a happy and
surprising change. During her residence in the colony, Po
cahontas, who has been described as a woman possessed of
uncommon beauty, gained the affections of a young man
named Rolfe, a person of rank and estimation among the
planters, who forthwith offered her his hand, and with her
approbation, and the warm encouragement of the governor,
solicited the consent of Powhatan to their marriage. This
the old prince readily bestowed, and sent some of his relations married to
to attend the ceremonial, which was performed with extraor- Rolfe"
dinary pomp, and laid the foundation of a firm and sincere
friendship between his tribe and the English. This fortunate
event also enabled the provincial government to conclude a

64 THE HISTORY OF
book treaty with the Chiccahominies, a horde distinguished by their
_ bravery and their military experience, who consented to ac
knowledge themselves subjects of the British monarch, and
style themselves henceforward Englishmen, — to assist the co
lonists with their arms in war, and to pay an annual tribute
of Indian corn.1
1613. But a material change, which now took place in the interior
privatepro- arrangements of the colony, contributed to establish its pros-
pertyin perity on foundations more solid and respectable than the
durad^nto alliance or dependence of the Indian tribes. The industry
the colony, which had been barely kept alive by the severe discipline of
martial law, languished under the discouraging influence of
that community of property and gains which had been intro
duced, as we have seen, by the provisions of the original
charter. As a temporary expedient, this system could not
have been easily avoided ; and the censure which historians
have so liberally bestowed on its introduction seems to be far
from reasonable. The impolicy consisted in prolonging its
duration beyond the time when the colony acquired stability, —
when modes and habits of life came to be fixed, — and when
the resources of the place and the productive powers of labour
being fully understood, the government might safely and ad
vantageously have remitted every individual to the stimulus of
his own interest and dependence on his own exertions. But,
in the outset, it was necessary, or at least highly expedient,
that the government should charge itself with the support of
its subjects and the regulation of their industry; and that
their first experimental exertions should be referred to the
principle and adapted to the rules of a system of partnership.
How long such a system may endure, when originated and
maintained by a strong and general impulse of that Christian ,
spirit which teaches every man to regard his office on earth as
a trust, his life as a stewardship, and the superiority of his
faculties and advantages as designating, not the enlargement
of his privileges, but the extent of his responsibility, is a- pro
blem to be solved by the future history of mankind. But as a
permanent arrangement, supported only by municipal law, it
attempts an impossibility, and commits its practical adminis-
1 Smith. Stith. 2 Stith.

NORTH AMERICA. (35
tration to an influence destructive of its own principles. As C H A P.
soon as the sense of individual interest and security begins to '
dissolve the bond of common hazard, danger, and difficulty. 1613.
the law is felt to be an irksome and injurious restriction : but
as in theory it retains a generous aspect, and the first symp
toms of its practical inconvenience are the idleness and im
morality promoted by its secret suggestions, it is not surpris
ing that rulers should seek to remove the effect while they
preserve the cause, and even by additional severities of regula
tion extinguish every remains of the virtue they vainly at
tempt to rekindle.
Sir Thomas Dale, by his descent from the supreme direction
of affairs to a more active participation in the conduct of them,
was enabled to observe with an accurate and unprejudiced eye
the operation of the provincial laws on the dispositions of the
colonists ; and soon discovered the violent repugnance between
a system which enforced community of property and all the
ordinary motives by which human industry is maintained.
He saw that every one was eager to evade or abridge his own
share of labour ; that the universal reliance on the common
stock impaired, universally, the diligence and activity on
which the accumulation of that stock depended ; that the
slothful trusted to the exertions of the industrious, while
the industrious were deprived of alacrity by impatience of
supporting and confirming the slothful in their idleness ; and
that the most conscientious citizen would hardly perform as
much labour for the community in a week as he would for
himself in a day. Under Dale's direction, the evil was
redressed by a radical and effectual remedy : a sufficient por
tion of land was divided into lots, and one of them was
assigned in full property to every settler. From that moment,
industry, freed from the obstruction that had relaxed its in
citements and intercepted its recompense, took vigorous root
in Virginia, and the prosperity of the colony experienced a
steady and rapid advancement. 1 Gates returning to England, 1614.
the supreme direction again devolved on Sir Thomas Dale,
whose virtue seems never to have enlarged with the extension
of his authority. He continued for two years longer in the
1 Smith. Stith.
VOL. I. F

QQ THE HISTORY OF
BOOK colony ; and in his domestic administration continued to pro-
• mote its real welfare ; but he launched into foreign operations
1614. little productive of advantage, and still less of honour. In
Captain Argal, the author of the fortunate seizure of Poca
hontas, he found a fit instrument, and perhaps a counsellor,
Expedi- of designs of a similar character. The French settlers in
A°r^i° Acadie had, in the year 1605, built Port Royal in the Bay of
against Fundy, and had ever since retained quiet possession of the
and New1 adjacent country, and successfully cultivated a friendly inter-
York, course with the neighbouring Indians. Under the pretext
that the French, by settling in Acadie, had invaded the rights
which the English derived from prior discovery of the con
tinent, was Argal despatched, in a season of profound peace,
to make a hostile attack on Port Royal. Nothing could be
more unjust or unwarranted than this enterprise. The Vir
ginian charters, with the protection of which alone Sir
Thomas Dale was intrusted, did not embrace the territory
which he now presumed to invade, and which the French had
peaceably possessed for nearly ten years, in virtue of charters
from their sovereign Henry the Fourth. Argal easily suc
ceeded in surprising and plundering a community totally un
suspicious of hostility and unprepared for defence ; but as he
established no garrison in the place, the French soon resumed
their station,1 and the expedition produced no other perma
nent effect than the indignant recollections it left in the minds
of the French, and the unfavourable impression it produced
on the Indians. Returning from this expedition, Argal under
took and achieved a similar enterprise against New York,
which was then in possession of the Dutch, whose claim
was derived from Captain Hudson's visit to the terri
tory in 1609, when he commanded one of their vessels, and
was employed in their service. Argal, however, maintained,
that as Hudson was an Englishman by birth, the benefit of
his discovery had accrued by indefeasible right to his native
country; and the Dutch governor being unprepared for resist
ance, was compelled to submit, and declare the colony a de
pendency of England, and tributary to Virginia. But another
'Stith. Escarbot's Hist, of New France. Purchas. Argal's piratical attack on
Port Royal was revenged by the French on Captain Smith in the following year.
See B. ii. cap. i. post.

NORTH AMERICA. 67
governor arriving soon after, with better means of asserting C HA p.
the title of his countrymen, the concession was retracted, and '
the English claim successfully defied.1
One of the first objects to which the increasing industry of *615-
the colonists was directed was the cultivation of tobacco, cultivated
which was now for the first time introduced into Virginia. J^n?sts
King James had conceived a strong antipathy to the use of
this herb, and in his celebrated treatise entitled Counterblast
against Tobacco, endeavoured to prevail over one ofthe strongest
tastes of human nature by the force of pedantic fustian and
reasoning as ridiculous as the title of his performance. The
issue of the contest corresponded better with his interests than
his wishes : his testimony, though pressed with all the vehe
mence of exalted folly, could not prevail with his subjects over
the solicitation and evidence of their own senses : and though
he summoned his prerogative to the aid of his logic, and
guarded the soil of England from pollution, by forbidding the
domestic culture of tobacco, he found it impossible to with
stand its importation from abroad : the demand for it continu
ally extended, and its value and consumption daily increased
in England. Incited by the hopes of sharing a trade so pro
fitable, the colonists of Virginia devoted their fields and labour
almost exclusively to the production of this commodity. Sir
Thomes Dale observing their inconsiderate ardour, and sensible
ofthe danger of neglecting the cultivation of the humbler but
more necessary productions, on which the subsistence of the
colony depended, interposed his authority to check the ex
cesses of the planters ; and adjusted by law the proportion
between the corn crop and the tobacco crop of every pro
prietor of land. But after his departure, his wise policy was 1616.
neglected and his regulations forgotten ; and the culture of
tobacco so exclusively occupied the attention of the settlers
that even the streets of James-Town were planted with it,
and a scarcity of provisions very soon resulted. The colonists,
unable to devise any better remedy for this evil than the
renewal of exactions upon the Indians, involved themselves in
disputes and hostilities which gradually alienated the regards
of these savages, and paved the way to one of those schemes
1 Stith. See the History of New York in Book v. post.
F 2

68 THE HISTORY OF

o o ic. of vengeance which they are noted for forming with impene
trable secrecy, maturing with consummate artifice, and exe-

1616. cuting with unrelenting ferocity.1 This fatal effect was not
experienced till after the lapse of one of those intervals which
to careless eyes appear to disconnect the misconduct from the
sufferings of nations, but impress reflective minds with an
awful sense of that strong, unbroken chain which, subsisting
unimpaired by time or distance, preserves and extends the
moral consequences of human actions.
But a nobler produce than any that her physical soil could
supply, was to grace the dawn of civilization in Virginia : and
we are now to contemplate the first indication of that active
principle of liberty which was destined to obtain the most
signal development from the progress of American society,
When Sir Thomas Dale returned to England, he had com
mitted the government of the province to George Yeardley,
whose lax administration, if it removed a useful restraint
on the improvident cupidity of the planters, enabled them to
taste, and prepared them to value, the dignity of independence
and the advantages of freedom. He was succeeded by Captain
1617.2 Argal, a man of considerable talent and activity, but sordidj
haughty, and tyrannical. Argal provided with ability for
the wants of the colony, and introduced some politic regu
lations of the traffic and intercourse with the Indians; but he
confined the liberty of the people by needless and minute re
strictions, and enforced a practical conformity to them by
harsh and constant exercise of martial law. While he pre
tended to promote piety in others by punishing absence from
ecclesiastical ordinances with a temporary servitude, he post
poned in his own practice every other consideration to the
¦Smith. Stith. Purchas. In the year 1615 was published at London. "A
true Discourse ofthe present State of Virginia." by Ralph Hamar, secretary to the
colony ; a tract which has no other merit but its rarity.
2 In the present year died Pocahontas. She had accompanied her husband on a
visit to England, where her history excited much interest, and the grace and dig
nity of her manner no less respect and admiration. Captain Smith introduced her
to the queen, and her society was courted by the most eminent ofthe nobility. But
the mean soul of the king regarded her with jealousy ; and he expressed alternate
murmurs at Rolfe's presumption in marrying a princess, and alarm at the title that
his posterity might acquire to the sovereignty of Virginia. Pocahontas died in the
faith, and with the sentiments and demeanour, ofa Christian. Smith. Stith. She
left a son by Mr. Rolfe, whose posterity, says a modern historian of Virginia, " are
not unworthy of their royal ancestry," — Campbell.

NORTH AMERICA. 69
acquisition of wealth, which he pursued by a profligate abuse CHAP.
of the opportunities of his office, and defended by the terrors  '__
of despotic authority. Universal discontent was excited by 1618.
his administration; and the complaints of the colonists at
length reached the ears of the company in England. In
Lord Delaware, their interests had always found a zealous
friend and powerful advocate ; and he now consented, for their
deliverance, to resume his former office, and again to under
take the direction of their affairs. He embarked for Virginia
with a splendid train, but died on the voyage. His loss was
deeply lamented by the colonists: yet it was, perhaps, an
advantageous circumstance for them that an administration of
such pomp and dignity was thus seasonably intercepted, and
the improvement of their affairs committed to men whose rank
and manners were nearer the level of their own condition ;
and it was no less advantageous to the memory of Lord
Delaware, that he died in the demonstration of a generous
willingness to attempt what he would most probably have
been unable to accomplish. The tidings of his death were
followed to England by increasing complaints of the odious
and tyrannical proceedings of Argal ; and the company having
conferred the office of captain-general on Yeardley, this new APril.
governor received the honour of knighthood, and repaired to
the scene of his administration.1
Sir George Yeardley, on his arrival in Virginia, plainly per- First as-
ceived that it was impossible to compose the prevalent jealousy jgp*Sen°t-
of arbitrary power and impatience for liberty, or to conduct his atives con-
own administration in a satisfactory manner, without reinstating y"!imia
the colonists in full possession of the privileges of English
men ; and accordingly, to their inexpressible joy, he promptly
signified his intention of convoking a provincial assembly,
framed with all possible analogy to the parliament ofthe Parent
State. This first representative legislature that America ever
beheld, consisted of the governor, the council, and a number
of burgesses, elected by the seven existing boroughs, who, as
sembling at James-Town, in one apartment, discussed all
matters that concerned the general welfare, and conducted
their deliberations with good sense, moderation, and harmony.
1 Smith. Stith.

70 THE HISTORY OF

¦ o o K The laws which they enacted were transmitted to England
for the approbation of the treasurer and company, and are no

June, longer extant : but it is asserted by competent judges that
they were, in the main, wisely and judiciously framed, though
(as might reasonably be expected) somewhat intricate and
New con- unsystematical.1 The company some time after passed an
stitutionof ,.J . , . , , , ¦ „ i i •» ,
the colony, ordinance by which they substantially approved and ratified
this constitution of the Virginian legislature. They reserved,
however, to themselves the nomination of a council of state,
which should assist the governor with advice in the executive
administration, and should also form a part of the legislative
assembly ; and they provided, on the one hand, that the
enactments of the assembly should not have the force of law
till sanctioned by the court of proprietors in England ; and
conceded, on the other hand, that the orders of this court
should have no force in Virginia till ratified by the provincial
assembly.2 Thus early was planted in America, that repre
sentative system which forms the soundest political frame
wherein the spirit of liberty was ever embodied, and at once
the safest and most efficient organ by which its energies are
exercised and developed. So strongly embued were the
minds of Englishmen in this age with those generous prin
ciples which were rapidly advancing to a first manhood in
their native country, that wherever they settled themselves,
the institutions of freedom took root and grew up along with
them. It had been happy for the morals and the welfare of Vir
ginia, if her inhabitants, like their brethren in Massachusetts,
had oftener elevated their eye from subordinate agency to the
great First Cause, and had referred, in particular, the signal
blessing that was now bestowed on them to the will and bounty
of God. Liberty so derived, acquires at once its firmest and
noblest basis, — it becomes respected as well as beloved ; the
dignity of the origin to which it is referred, influences the
ends to which it is rendered instrumental ; and all are taught
1 Rolfe, apud Smith. Stith. The assembly, when they transmitted their own
enactments to England, requested the general court to prepare a digest for Virginia
of the laws of England, and to procure for it the sanction of the king's approbation,
adding, " that it was not fit that his subjects should be governed by any other rules
than such as received their influence from him." — Chalmers.
2 Stith. Hazard.

NORTH AMERICA. 7 1
to feel that it can neither be violated nor abused without pro- c H A P.
yoking the Divine displeasure. It is this preservative prin- __^__
ciple alone which, recognizing in the abundance of Divine 1619.
goodness the extent of the Divine claims, prevents the choicest
blessings and most admirable talents from cherishing in
human hearts an ungrateful and counteracting spirit of inso
lence and pride — a spirit which led the Virginians too soon to
plant the rankest weeds of tyranny in that field where the
seeds of liberty had been so happily sown.
The company of patentees had received orders from the
king to transport to Virginia a hundred idle dissolute persons
who were in prison for various misdemeanours in London.1
These men were dispersed through the province as servants to
the planters ; and the degradation of the provincial character
and manners, produced by such an intermixture, was over
looked, in consideration of the advantage that was expected
from so many additional and unpaid labourers. Having once
associated felons with their pursuits, and committed the culti
vation of their fields to servile hands, the colonists were pre
pared to yield to the temptation which speedily presented
itself, and to blend in barbarous combination the character of
oppressors with the claims and condition of freemen. A introduc-
Dutch ship, from the coast of Guinea, arriving; in James River, tlon of ,
iiii /.i negro sla-
sold to the planters a part of her cargo of Negroes ; 2 and as very.
this hardy race was found more capable of enduring fatigue
in a sultry climate than Europeans, the number was increased
by continual importation, till a large proportion of the inhabi
tants of Virginia was composed of men degraded to a state of
slavery by the selfishness and ungrateful barbarity of others,
who, embracing the gifts without imbibing the beneficence of
their Creator, turned into a scene of bondage for their fellows
the territory that had proved a seat of liberty and happiness
to themselves.
But, about this time, another addition, more productive of Migration
of young
women
1 Stith. Captain Smith observes, that since his departure from the colony, the from Eng-
number of felons and vagabonds transported to Virginia brought such evil report on 'and to
Ihe place " that some did choose to be hanged ere they would go thither, and were." Virginia.
" This custom," says Stith, " hath laid one ofthe finest countries in America under
the unjust scandal of being another Siberia, fit only for the reception of malefactors
and the vilest ofthe people."
2 Beverley, Hist, of Virginia.

72 THE HISTORY OF
book virtue and felicity, was made to the number of the colonists.
' Few women had as yet ventured to cross the Atlantic ; and
1620. the English being restrained by the pride and rigidity of their
character from that incorporation with the native Americans
which the French and Portuguese have found so conducive
to their interests, and so accordant with the pliancy of their
manners, were generally destitute of the comforts and con
nexions of married life. Men so situated could not regard
Virginia as a permanent residence, and must have generally
entertained the purpose of returning to their native country
after amassing as expeditiously as possible a competency of
wealth. Such views are inconsistent with patient industry,
and with those extended interests that produce or support
patriotism : and in conformity with the more liberal policy
which the company had now begun to pursue towards the
colony, it was proposed to send out a hundred young women
of agreeable persons and respectable characters, as wives for
the settlers. Ninety were sent ; and the speculation proved
so profitable to the company, that a repetition of it was sug-
1621. gested by the emptiness of their exchequer in the following
year, when sixty more were collected and transported. They
were immediately disposed of to the young planters, and pro
duced such an accession of happiness to the colony, that the
second consignment fetched a larger profit than the first. The
price of a wife was estimated first at a hundred and twenty,
and afterwards at a hundred and fifty pounds of tobacco,
which was then sold at three shillings per pound. The young
women were not only bought with avidity, but received with
such fondness, and so comfortably established, that others
were invited to follow their example ; and virtuous sentiments
and provident habits spreading consequently among the plan
ters, enlarged the happiness and prosperity of the colony. 1 To
the blessings of marriage naturally succeeded some provision
for the benefits of education. A sum of money had been col-
i Stith. This interesting branch of traffic appears to have subsisted for many
years, during which its seeming indelicacy was qualified as far as possible by the
nice attention that was paid to the osceitainment of the moral character of every
woman aspiring to become a Virginian matron. In the year 1632, hy an order of
the provincial council, two young women who had been seduced during their passage
from England, were ordered to be sent back, as " unworthy to propagate the race of
Virginians." — Burk's History of Virginia.

NORTH AMERICA. 73

lected by the English bishops by direction of the king, for the c H A P.
maintenance of an institution in Virginia for the christian  '

education of Indian children; and in emulation of this good 1621.
example, various steps were taken by the company towards
the foundation of a provincial college, which was afterwards
completed in the reign of William and Mary.
It is remarkable that the rise of liberty in North America
was nearly coeval with the first dispute between her inhabit
ants and the government of the mother country. With the
increasing industry of the colony, the produce of its tobacco
fields became more than sufficient for the supply of England,
where its disposal, too, was vexatiously restricted by the wa
vering and arbitrary policy of the king, in granting monopo
lies for the sale of it, — in limiting the quantities to be imported,
— in appointing commissioners " for garbling the drug called
tobacco," with arbitrary powers to seize whatever portions of it
they might consider of inferior quality, — in loading the importa
tion with a heavy duty, and, at the same time, encouraging the
import of tobacco from Spain. The company, harassed by
these absurd and iniquitous restraints, had opened a trade
with Holland, and established warehouses there, to which
they sent their tobacco directly from Virginia ; but the king-
interposed to prohibit such evasion of his revenue, and directed
that all the Virginian tobacco should be brought in the first
instance to England. A lengthened and acrimonious dispute Disvutes
arose between this feeble prince and the colonists and colonial b,etw?en
. . , the king
corporation. Against the monopoly established in England, and the co
they petitioned the House of Commons; and in support of lon5'-
their practice of trading directly with Holland, they both con
tended for the general right of Englishmen to carry their com
modities lo the best market they could find, and pleaded the
particular concessions of their own charter, which expressly
conferred on them unlimited liberty of commerce. At length,
the dispute was adjusted by a compromise, by which the com
pany obtained, on the one hand, the exclusive right of im
porting tobacco into the kingdom, and engaged, on the other,
to pay an import duty of ninepence per pound, and to send all
tobacco the produce of Virginia to England.1
1 Stith.

74 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK I- But a cloud had been for some time gathering over the co-
1622. lony; and even the circumstances that were thought most
forcibly to betoken the prosperity of its inhabitants, were but
inviting and enabling the storm to burst with more destructive
violence on their heads. At peace with the Indians, unap
prehensive of danger, and wholly engrossed with the profitable
cultivation of a fertile territory, — their increasing numbers had
spread so extensively over the province, that no less than
eighty settlements had already been formed ; and every planter
being guided only by his own peculiar taste or convenience in
the choice of his dwelling, and more disposed to shun than to
court the neighbourhood of his countrymen, the settlements
were universally straggling and uncompact.1 In the Scrip
tures, which the colonists received as their rule of faith, they
might have found ample testimony to the cruelty and treachery
of mankind in their natural state; and from their own experi
ence, they might have derived the strongest assurance that
the savages by whom they were surrounded could claim no
exemption from this testimony of Divine wisdom and truth.
Yet the pious labours by which the evil dispositions of the
Indians might have been corrected, and the military exercises
and precautions by which their hostility might have been
overawed or repelled, were equally neglected -by the English
settlers; who, moreover, contributed to foster the martial
habits of the Indians by employing them as hunters, and en
larged their resources of destruction by furnishing them with
fire-arms, which they very soon learned to use with dexterity.
The marriage of the planter Rolfe to the Indian princess had
not produced as lasting a friendship between the English and
the Indians as it had at first seemed to portend. The Indians
eagerly courted a repetition of such intermarriages, and were
painfully stung by the disdain with which the English receded
from their advances, and declined to become the husbands of
Indian women.2 The colonists forgot that they had inflicted
this mortification ; but it was remembered by the Indians, who
sacredly embalmed the memory of every affront in lasting,
stern, wordless, and implacable resentment. Earnest recom
mendations had repeatedly been transmitted from England
1 Smith. 2 Beverley.

NORTH AMERICA. 75
to attempt the conversion of the savages ; but these recom- CHAP.
mendations had not been promoted by a sufficient attention  ; 
to the means requisite for their accomplishment. Yet neither 1622.
were they entirely neglected by the colonists. Some attempts
at conversion were made by a few pious individuals : and the
success of one of them undoubtedly mitigated the dreadful
calamity that was impending ; but these efforts were feeble and
partial, and the majority of the colonists had contented them
selves with cultivating a friendly acquaintance with the In
dians, who were admitted at all times into their habitations,
and encouraged to consider themselves as welcome and fami
liar guests.1 It was in the midst of this free and unguarded Conspiracy
intercourse that the Indians formed, with deliberate and un- °[^®<In"
relenting ferocity, the project of a general massacre of the
English, which devoted every man, woman, and child in
the colony to indiscriminate destruction. The death of
Powhatan, in 1618, devolved the power of executing a
scheme so detestable into the hands of a man fully capable
of contriving and conducting it. Opechancanough, who suc
ceeded to the supremacy over Powhatan's tribe, and possessed
extensive influence over all the neighbouring tribes of Indians,
was distinguished by his fearless courage, his profound dissi
mulation, and a rancorous hatred and jealousy ofthe European
colonists of America. He renewed the pacific treaty2 which
Powhatan had concluded with the English after the marriage
of his daughter to Rolfe ; and he availed himself of the secu
rity into which it lulled the objects of his guile, to prepare,
during the four ensuing years, his friends and followers for the
several parts they were to act in the tragedy which he contem
plated. The tribes in the neighbourhood of the English,
except those on the eastern shore, whom, on account of
their peculiar friendship for the colonists, he did not venture
1 Stith. — To the remonstrances of certain of the colonists against their worship of
demons, some of the Indians of Virginia auswered that they believed in two great
spirits, a good and an evil one ; that the first was a being sunk in the enjoyment of
everlasting indolence and ease, who showered down blessings indiscriminately from
the skies, leaving men to scramble for them as they chose, and totally indifferent to
their concerns ; but that the second was an active jealous spirit, whom they were
obliged to propitiate, that he might not destroy them. — Oldmixon.
2 Stith. — Opechancanough, in imitation of the English, had built himself a house,
and was so delighted with the contrivance of a lock and key, that he used to spend
whole hours in the repetition ofthe experiment of locking and unlocking his door. —
Oldmixon.

7(3 THE HISTORY OF
BO OK to intrust with the design, were successively gained over;
*• and all co-operated with that single-mindedness and inten-
1622. sity of purpose characteristic of Indian conspiracy and re
venge. In a tribe of savage idolaters, the passions of men
are left unpurified by the influence of religion, and unre
strained by a sound or elevated morality ; and human cha
racter is not subjected to that variety of impulse and im
pression which it undergoes in civilized society. The senti
ments inculcated, and the dispositions contracted, in the
family and in the tribe, in domestic education and in public
life, in all the scenes through which the savage passes from
his cradle to his grave, are the same ; there is no contest of
opposite principles or conflicting habits to dissipate his mind
or weaken its determinations ; and the system of morals (if it
may be so called) which he embraces, being the offspring of
wisdom and dispositions congenial to his own, a seeming dig
nity of character arises from the vigour and consistency of
that conduct which his moral sentiments never disturb or
reproach. The understanding, neither refined by variety of
knowledge, nor elevated by the grandeur of its contemplations,
instead of moderating the passions, becomes the abettor of
their violence and the instrument of their gratification. Men
in malice, but children in understanding ; it is in the direction
of fraud and cunning, that the intellectual faculties of savages
are chiefly exercised : and so perfect is the harmony between
their passions and their reflective powers, that the same delay
which would mitigate the ferocity of more cultivated men,
serves but to harden their cruelty, and mature the devices for
its indulgence. Notwithstanding the long interval that
elapsed between the formation and the execution of their
present enterprise, and the continual intercourse that subsisted
between them and the white people, the most impenetrable
secrecy was preserved by the Indians ; and so consummate
and fearless was their dissimulation, that they were accus
tomed to borrow boats from the English to cross the river, in
order to concert and communicate the progress of their
design.1 An incident which, though minute, is loo curious to be
1 Stith.

NORTH AMERICA. 77
omitted, contributed to stimulate the malignity of the Indians CHAP.
by the sense of recent provocation. There was a man, belong- II-
ing to one of the neighbouring tribes, called Nemattanow, 1622.
who, by his courage, craft, and good fortune, had attained
the highest repute among his countrymen. In the skirmishes
and engagements which their former wars with the English
produced, he had exposed his person with a bravery that
commanded the esteem of his fellow savages, and an impunity
that excited their astonishment. They judged him invul
nerable, whom so many dangers had vainly menaced : and the
object of their admiration partook, or at least encouraged,
the delusion which seemed to invest him with a character of
sanctity. Opechancanough, the king, whether jealous of this
man's reputation, or desirous of embroiling the English with
the Indians, sent a message to the governor of the colony, lo
acquaint him that he was welcome to cut Nemattanow's
throat. Such an indication of Indian character as this mes
sage afforded, ought to have excited the strongest suspicion
and distrust in the minds of the English. Though the offer
of the king was disregarded, his wishes were not disappointed.
Nemattanow, having murdered a planter, was shot by one of
the servants of his victim who attempted to arrest him. In
the pangs of death, the pride but not the vanity ofthe savage
was subdued, and he entreated his captors to grant his two
last requests, one of which was that they would never reveal
that he had been slain by a bullet, and the other, that they
would bury him among the English, that the secret of his
mortality might remain unknown to his countrymen. The
request seems to infer the possibility of complying with it ;
and the colonists, by whom it was totally disregarded, had
cause to regret their imprudent disclosure of the fatal event.
The Indians were filled with grief and indignation ; and Ope
chancanough inflamed their anger by pretending to share it.
Having counterfeited displeasure for the satisfaction of his
subjects, he affected placability for the delusion of his ene
mies, and assured the English that the sky should sooner fall
than the peace be broken by him. But the plot meanwhile
advanced to its maturity, and, at length, the day was fixed on
which all the English settlements were at the same instant to
be attacked. The respective stations of the various troops of

78 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK assassins were assigned to them ; and that they might be
I- enabled to occupy their posts without awakening suspicion,
1622. some carried presents offish and game into the interior ofthe
colony, and others presented themselves as guests soliciting
the hospitality of their English friends, on the evening before
the massacre. As the fatal hour drew nigh, the rest, under
various pretences, and with every demonstration of kindness,
assembled around the detached and unfortified settlements of
the colonists ; and not a sentiment of compunction, not a rash
expression of hate, nor an unguarded look of exultation, had
occurred to disconcert or disclose the purpose of their well-
disciplined ferocity.
The universal destruction of the colonists seemed unavoid
able, and was prevented only by the consequences of an event
which perhaps appeared but of little importance in the colony
at the time of its occurrence — the conversion of an Indian to
the christian faith. On the night before the massacre, this
man was made privy to it by his own brother, who communi
cated to him the command of his king and his countrymen to
share in the exploit that would enrich their race with spoil,
revenge, and glory. A summons of such tenor was well cal
culated to impress a savage mind : but a new mind had been
given to this convert, and as soon as his brother left him he
revealed the formidable intelligence to an English gentleman
in whose house he was residing. This planter immediately
carried the tidings to James-Town, from whence the alarm was
communicated to the inhabitants of the nearest settlements,
barely in time to prevent the last hour of the perfidious truce
from being the last hour of their lives.
22 March. But the intelligence came too late to be more generally
Massacre available. At mid-day, the moment they had previously fixed
ofthecolo- for this execrable deed, the Indians, raising a universal yell,
rushed at once on the English in all their scattered settle
ments, and butchered men, women, and children with undis-
tinguishing fury, and every aggravation of brutal outrage and
enormous cruelty. In one hour, three hundred and forty-
seven persons were cut off, almost without knowing by whose
hands they fell. The slaughter would have been still greater,
if the English, even in some of those districts where no prior
intimation of the danger was received, had not flown to their

NORTH AMERICA. 79
arms with the energy of despair, and defended themselves so c H A P.
bravely as to repulse the assailants, who almost universally 1I-
displayed a cowardice proportioned to their malignity, and 1622.
fled at the sight of weapons in the hands even of the women
and boys, whom, unarmed, they were willing to attack and
destroy.1 The colony received a wound no less deep and dangerous,
than painful and alarming. Six of the members of council,
and several of the wealthiest and most respectable inhabitants
were among the slain : at some of the settlements the whole
of their population had been exterminated ; at others a rem
nant had escaped the general destruction by the efforts of
despair ; and the survivors were impoverished, terrified, and
confounded by a stroke that at once bereaved them of friends
and fortune, and showed that they were surrounded by legions
of foes, whose enmity was equally furious and unaccountable,
and whose treachery and ferocity seemed to proclaim them a
race of fiends rather than men.2 To the massacre succeeded
a vindictive and exterminating war between the English and
the Indians ; and the colonists were at last provoked lo reta
liate, in some degree, on their savage adversaries, the fraudful
guile and indiscriminate butchery of which they had set so
bloody an example. But though a direful necessity was
thought to justify or palliate such proceedings, yet the
warfare of the colonists was never wholly divested of honour
and magnanimity. During this disastrous period, the design
that had been entertained of erecting a provincial college, and
various other public institutions, was abandoned ; the number
of the settlements was reduced from eighty to six; and an
afflicting dearth of food was added to the horrors of war. 3
1 Smith. Stith.
2 It was long before the British colonists were properly on their guard against the
ferocity of a race of men capable of such consummate treachery, and who " in anger
were not, like the English, talkative and boisterous, but sullen and revengeful."
Trumbull's History of Connecticut.
3 Stith. As far as I am able to discover, the retaliatory deceit practised by the
colonists in their hostilities with the Indians has been greatly overrated. Stith
seems to have mistaken expressions of indignation for deliberate desigDs; and Dr.
Robertson has extended the error by mistaking purposes for the execution they never
attained. The contemplation, and especially the endurance of cruelty, tends to make
men cruel ; — yet, to the honour of the colonists be it remembered, that even during
the pievalence of these hostilities, a deliberate attempt to cozen and subjugate a
body of Indians was punished by the provincial magistrates, as an offence against the
law of God, and the laws of nature and nations. Stith.

80 THE HISTORY OF
book When the tidings of this calamity arrived in England, they
' excited, along with much disapprobation of the defective
1622. policy and inefficient precautions of the Company of Pa
tentees, a lively sympathy with the danger and distress ofthe
colonists. By order of the king, a supply of arms from the
Tower was delivered to the treasurer of the company; and
vessels were despatched to Virginia with cargoes of such ar
ticles as were supposed to be most urgently needed by the
planters. Captain Smith submitted to the company the
project of an enterprise, which he offered to conduct, for the
deliverance of the colony, by the expulsion or subjugation of
all the Indian tribes within the limits of its territory; but,
though generally approved, this project was not adopted. By
dint of the exertions which they made in their own behalf,
and with the assistance of the supplies that were actually
sent to them from England, the colonists were barely saved
from perishing with hunger; and it was not till after a severe
and protracted struggle with their calamities, that they were
at length enabled again to resume their prosperous attitude
and extend their settlements.
Dissen- More ample supplies, and more active assistance, would
London'6 nave Deen extended to the colonists from England, but for the
company, dissensions among the company of patentees, which had been
spreading for a considerable period, and had at this juncture
attained a height that protended the dissolution of the cor
poration. The company was now a numerous body: and
being composed of able and enterprising men drawn from every
class in society, it presented a faithful abstract of the state of
political feeling in the nation ; while its frequent courts or
convocations afforded a convenient arena in which the parties
tried their strength, and a conspicuous organ by which the
prevailing sentiments were publicly expressed. At every
meeting, the transaction of business was impeded by the in
trigues of rival factions, and the debates inflamed and pro
tracted by their mutual altercations. At every election, the
offices of the company were courted and contested by the most
1623. eminent persons in the state. The controversy between the
court party and the country party that was spreading through
the nation, was the more readily insinuated into the assemblies
ofthe company from the infrequency and irregularity of itsmore

NORTH AMERICA. 81
legitimate theatre, the parliament ; and various circumstances CHAP.
in the history ofthe company tended to nourish and enlarge '
this source of disagreement. Many of the proprietors, dis- 1623.
satisfied with the slender returns that the colony had yielded,
were disposed to blame the existing officers and administration
for the disappointment of their hopes : not a few resented the
procurement of the third charter, the exclusion of Captain
Smith from the direction which he had shown himself so well
qualified to exercise, and the insignificance to which they
were themselves condemned by the arbitrary enlargement of
the association ; and a small but active and intriguing party,
who had laboured with earnest though unsuccessful rapacity
to engross the offices of the company, to usurp the direction
of its affairs, and to convert the colonial trade into their own
private patrimony by monopolies which they bought from
needy courtiers, naturally ranged themselves on the side of
the court, and by their complaints and misrepresentations to
the king and privy council, sought to interest them in the
quarrels, and infect them with suspicions of the corporation.1
At the head of this least numerous but most dangerous faction,
was the notorious Captain Argal, who continued to display a
rancorous enmity to the liberty of Virginia, and hoped to com
pass by intrigue and servility at home the same objects which he
had pursued by tyranny and violence abroad. Sir Thomas Smith
too, the treasurer, whose predilection for arbitrary government
we have already had occasion to remark, encouraged every com
plaint and proposition that tended to abridge the privileges
of the colonial company, and give to its administration a less
popular form. The arbitrary alterations of the charter taught
all the malcontents to look up to the crown for such farther
changes as might remove the existing obstructions to their
wishes; and the complete ascendancy which the country
party acquired in the company, strongly disposed the king to
suppress or modify an institution that served to cherish public
spirit and disseminate liberal opinions. The hardihood which
the company had displayed in their late dispute with him
concerning the restrictions of their tobacco trade, the free
dom with which his policy had been canvassed in their deli-
1 Stith.
VOL. I. G

82 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK berations, the firmness with which his measures had been
L resisted, and the contempt they had shown forthe supremacy
1623. alike of his wisdom and his prerogative, in complaining to the
House of Commons, eradicated from the mind of James all
that partiality to an institution of his own creation, that might
have sheltered it from the habitual dislike and suspicion with
which he regarded the authority of a popular assembly. But
the same qualities that rendered them odious, caused them
also to appear somewhat formidable, and enforced some atten
tion to equitable appearances, and deference to public opi
nion in wreaking his displeasure upon them. The murmurs
and discontents that were excited by the intelligence of the
massacre, furnished him with an opportunity which be did
not fail to improve. Having signalised his own concern for
the misfortunes of the colony by sending thither a quantity of
military stores for defence against the Indians, and by issuing
his mandate to the company to despatch an ample supply of
provisions, he proceeded to institute an inquiry into the cause
May. of the disaster. A commission was directed to certain of the
English judges and other persons of distinction, requiring
them to examine the transactions of the corporation since its
first establishment ; to report to the privy council the causes
thatmight seem to them to have occasioned thelate misfortunes;
and to suggest the expedients most likely to prevent their
recurrence.1 In order to obstruct the efforts of the company
for their own vindication, and to discover, if possible, addi
tional matter of accusation against them, measures the most
arbitrary and tyrannical were resorted to. All their charters,
books, and papers were seized ; two of their principal officers
were arrested ; and all letters from the colony intercepted and
carried to the privy council. Among the witnesses whom the
commissioners examined was Captain Smith, who might rea
sonably be supposed to entertain little favour for the existing
constitution of the corporate body, by which his career oi
honour and usefulness had been abridged, and who had re
cently sustained the mortification of seeing his offer to under
take the defence of the colony and subjugation of the Indians
treated with thankless disregard, notwithstanding the appro-
1 Stith.

NORTH AMERICA. §3
bation of a numerous party of the proprietors. l Smith c H A P.
ascribed the misfortunes of the colony, and the slenderness of n'
the income that had been derived from it, to the neglect of 1623.
military precautions; the rapid succession of governors, which
stimulated the rapacity of their dependents ; the multiplicity
of offices, by which industry was loaded and revenue ab
sorbed ; and, in general, to the inability of a numerous body
of men to conduct an undertaking so complex and arduous.
He recommended the annexation of the colony, and of all
jurisdiction over it to the crown, the introduction of greater
simplicity and economy into the frame of its government, and
an abandonment of the practice of transporting criminals to
its shores. 2
The commissioners did not communicate any of their pro
ceedings to the company, who first learned the tenor of the
report in which they were so deeply interested from an order October.
of the king and privy council, signifying to them that the mis
fortunes of Virginia had arisen from their misgovernment,
and that, for the purpose of repairing them, his majesty had de
termined to revoke the old charter and issue a new one, which
should commit the powers of government to fewer hands. In
order to quiet the minds of the colonists, it was declared that
private property would be respected, and that all past grants
of land should remain inviolate. An instant surrender of
their privileges was required from the company; and, in
default of their voluntary submission, they were assured that
the king was prepared to carry his purpose into effect by pro
cess of law.3
This arbitrary mandate produced such astounding surprise
and consternation in the assembled court of proprietors, that
a long and deep silence followed the announcement of the
order of council. But resuming their spirit, they prepared to
defend their rights with a resolution which, if it could not

1 Smith. 2 Ibid.
3 Stith. It was in the midst of those distractions, says Stith, that the Muses for
the first time opened their lips in North America. One of the earliest literary pro
ductions of the English colonists was a translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses, com
posed in 1.623 by George Sandys, treasurer of the Virginia company. It was af
terwards published in England, and dedicated to Charles the First, Stith terms it
"a laudable performance for the times;" and Dryden mentions the author with
respect in the preface to his own translations from Ovid.
g2

84 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK, avert their fate, at least redeemed their character. They in-
 '  dignantly refused to sanction the stigma affixed to their con-
1623. duct by the order of council, — to surrender the franchises
which they had legally obtained, and on the faith of which
they had expended large sums of money, — or to consent to
the abolition of a popular frame of government, and deliver
up their countrymen in Virginia to the dominion of a narrow
junto wholly dependent on the pleasure of the king. In these
sentiments they persisted in spite of all the threats and
promises by which their firmness was assailed ; and by a vote,
which only the dissent of Captain Argal and seven of his ad
herents rendered not quite unanimous, they finally rejected
the king's proposal, and declared their determination to defend
1624. themselves against any process he might institute. Incensed
at their audacity in disputing his will, James directed a writ
of quo warranto to be issued against the company, in order to
try the validity of their charter in the Court of King's Bench.
With the hope of collecting additional proofs of their mal
administration, he dispatched envoys to Virginia to inspect
the condition of the colony, and attempt to form a party
there opposed to the pretensions of the court of proprietors.
February. The royal envoys, finding the provincial assembly embodied,
endeavoured with great artifice and magnificent promises of
military aid, and of other marks of royal favour, to detach
the members from their adherence to the company, and to
procure an address to the king, expressive of *' their willing
ness to submit to his princely pleasure in revoking the
ancient patents." But their exertions were unsuccessful.
The assembly transmitted a petition to the king, professing
satisfaction to find themselves the objects of his especial care,
beseeching him to continue the existing form of government,
and soliciting, that if the promised military force should be
granted to them, it might be placed under the control of their
own governor and house of representatives. The domestic
legislation of this assembly was marked by the same good
sense and patriotism that appeared in the reception which it
gave to the propositions of the royal envoys. The governor
was deprived of an arbitrary authority which he had hitherto
exercised. It was declared that he should no longer have
power to withdraw the inhabitants from their private labours

NORTH AMERICA. 85
to his own service, and should levy no taxes but such as the [CHAP.
provincial assembly should impose and appropriate. White I •
women still were objects of great scarcity and value in the 1624.
colony ; and to obviate an inconvenience that resulted from
the ardour and frequency of amorous competition, a fine was
now imposed on any woman who should encourage the ma
trimonial addresses of more than one man at a time. Various
wise and judicious laws were enacted for the improvement of
manners and the reformation of abuses, the support of divine
worship, the security of civil and political freedom, and the
regulation of traffic with the Indians.
Whether fhe suit between the king and the company was
prosecuted to a judicial consummation or not, is a point in
volved in some uncertainty, and truly of very little import
ance ; for the issue of a suit between the king and any of his
subjects in that age, could never be doubtful for a moment.
Well aware of this, the company looked to protection more
efficient than the ordinary administration of law could afford
them, and presented a petition to the House of Commons,
detailing a part of their grievances, and soliciting redress.
Their application was entertained by the House so cordially,
that had it been sooner presented, it might have saved the
corporation ; but they had deferred this last resource till so
late a period of the session of Parliament, that there was not
time to enter on the wide inquiry which their complaints de
manded: and fearing to exasperate the king by preferring
odious charges which they could not hope to substantiate, they
confined their pleading before the House to the discouragement
of their tobacco trade, which the Commons without hesitation
pronounced a national grievance. They gained no other ad
vantage from their complaint, nor from their limitation of it.
The king, enraged at their presumption, and encouraged by
their timidity, issued a proclamation, suppressing the courts July.
of the company, and committing the temporary administration
of the colonial affairs to certain of his privy counsellors, in
conjunction with Sir Thomas Smith and a few other persons.1
The Virginia Company was thus dissolved, and its rights and The com-
privileges re-absorbed by the crown. panydis-
1 Rymer. Hazard.

86 THE HISTORY OF
book James did not suffer the powers he had resumed to remain
' long unexercised. He issued, soon after, a special commis-
1624. sion, appointing a governor and twelve counsellors, to whom
TheTlng tne direction of the affairs of the colony was intrusted. No
assumes mention was made in this instrument of a house of represen-
memoTthe tatives; a circumstance which, coupled with the subsequent
colony— imposition of royal proclamations as legislative edicts, has led
almost all the historians of Virginia into the mistaken belief
that the provincial assembly was abolished along with the
mercantile corporation.1 The commission ascribes the dis
asters ofthe settlement to the popular shape of its late govern
ment, which had intercepted and weakened the beneficial
influence ofthe king's superior understanding; and, in strains
of the most vulgar and luscious self-complacency, prospec
tively celebrates the prosperity which the colony must in
fallibly attain when blessed with the directer rays of royal
wisdom. With this demonstration of hostility to the political
liberties of the colonists, there was mingled, however, some
favourable attention to their commercial interests ; for, in con-
September, sequence of the remonstrance of the English parliament,
James renewed by proclamation his former prohibition of the
culture of tobacco in England, and restricted the importation
of this commodity to Virginia and the Somer Isles, and to
vessels belonging to British subjects.2 This was James' last
1625. public act in relation to the colony; for his intention of com
posing a code of laws for its domestic administration was
his death, frustrated by his death. He died the first British sovereign
of an established empire in America; and thus closed a reign
of which the only illustrious feature was the colonization
which he impelled or promoted. To this favourite object,
both the virtues and the vices of his character proved subser
vient. If the merit he might claim from his original patronage
of the Virginian colonists, be cancelled by his subsequent
efforts to bereave them of their liberties; and if his persecution
1 In the first edition of this work I repeated the mistake of these writers, and was
also betrayed into the erroneous view which they have taken (and which has hitherto
prevailed very generally in America, and universally in England) of the history of
Virginia from the accession of Chailes the First till the Restoration. I have been
enabled to correct these errors, by a perusal of the works of two modern historians of
Virginia — Burk, and Campbell.
2 Rymer. Hazard.

NORTH AMERICA. 87
of the puritans in their native country, be but feebly counter- c H A p.
balanced by his willingness to grant them an asylum in New IT-
England; — his attempts to civilize Ireland by colonization, 1625.
connect him more honourably with the great events of his
reign. Harassed by the turbulent and distracted state of
Ireland, and averse to the sanguinary remedy of military
operation, he endeavoured to communicate a new character to
its inhabitants by planting colonies of the English in the six
northern counties of that island. He prosecuted this plan with
so much wisdom and steadiness, as to cause, in the space of
nine years, greater advances towards the reformation of
Ireland than had been made in the four hundred and forty
years which had elapsed since the conquest of the country was
first attempted, and laid the foundation of whatever affluence
and security it has since been enabled to attain.1 It is difficult
to recognise the dogmatical oppressor of the puritans, and the
weak and arrogant tyrant of Virginia, in the wise and humane
legislator of Ireland.
The fall of the Virginia company had excited the less con
cern, and the arbitrary proceedings of the king the less odium
in England, from the disappointments and calamities with
which the colonial plantation had been attended. More than
a hundred and fifty thousand pounds 2 were already expended
on this settlement, and upwards of nine thousand inhabitants
had been sent to it from the mother country. Yet at the dis
solution ofthe company, the gross value of the annual imports
from Virginia did not exceed twenty thousand pounds, and
the population of the province was reduced to about eighteen
hundred persons.3 The effect of this unprosperous issue in
facilitating the overthrow of the corporation, may be regarded
as a fortunate circumstance for Virginia ; for however unjust
and tyrannical were the views and measures of the king, they
were overruled to the production of a most important benefit to
the colony, in the removal of an institution which would have
dangerously loaded and cramped its infant prosperity and
freedom. It is an observation of the most eminent teacher of
political science, that of all the expedients that could possibly
' Leland's Hist, of Ireland. Hume's Hist, of England.
2 Smith. 3 Chalmers's Annals.

88 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK be contrived to stunt the natural growth of a new colony, the
*• institution of an exclusive company is the most effectual;1
1625. and the observation is confirmed by the experience of history.
In surveying the constitutions and tracing the progress of the
various colonial establishments which the nations of Europe
have successfully formed, we find a close and invariable con
nexion between the decline and the revival of their prosperity
and the ascendancy and overthrow of sovereign mercantile
corporations. A sovereign company of merchants must ever
consider their political power as an instrument of commercial
gain, and as deriving its chief value from the means it gives
them to repress competition, to buy cheaply the commodities
they obtain from their subject customers, and to sell as dearly
as possible the articles with which they supply them — that
is, to diminish the incitement and the reward of industry to
the colonists, by restricting their powers and opportunities of
acquiring what they need, and disposing of what they have.
Their mercantile habits prevail over their political interest, and
lead Ihem not only to prefer immediate profit to permanent
revenue, but to adapt their administration to this policy, and
to render government subservient to the purposes of monopoly.
They are almost necessarily led to devolve a large discretionary
power on their provincial officers, over whom they retain at
the same time but a feeble control. Whether we regard the
introduction of martial law into Virginia as the act of the com
pany, or (as it really seems to have been) the unauthorized act
of the treasurer and the provincial governors, the prevalence it
obtained displays, in either case, the unjust and arbitrary po
licy of an exclusive company, or the inability of such a sove
reign body to protect its subjects against the oppression of its
officers. How incapable a body of this description must be to
conduct a plan of civil policy on fixed and stable principles,
and how strongly its system of government must tend to per
petual fluctuation, is attested by the fact, that, in the course
of eighteen years, no fewer than ten successive governors had
been appointed to preside over the province. Even after the
vigorous spirit of liberty, which was so rapidly gaining ground
in that age, had enabled the colonists to extort from the com-
1 Smith's Wealth of Nations.

NORTH AMERICA. 89
pany the right of composing laws for the regulation of their chap.
own community, still, as the company's sanction was requisite IL
to give legal prevalence to the enactments of the provincial 1625.
legislature, the paramount authority resided with men who
had but a temporary interest in the fate of their subjects and
the resources of their territories. While, therefore, we sym
pathize with the generous indignation which the historians of
America have expressed at the tyrannical proceedings by
which the company was dissolved, we must regard with satis
faction an event which, by its concomitant circumstances, in
culcated an abhorrence of arbitrary power, and by its operation
overthrew a system under which no colony has ever grown up
to a vigorous maturity.
Charles the First inherited, with his father's throne all the March.
maxims that had latterly regulated his colonial policy. Of Charles I.
this he hastened to give assurance to his subjects, by a series ?uthsur^s hlf
of proclamations which he issued soon after his accession to bitrary po-
the crown, and which distinctly unfolded the arbitrary princi- licy<
pies he entertained, and the tyrannical administration he had
determined to pursue. He declared, that, after mature deli
beration, he had adopted his father's opinion, that the misfor
tunes of the colony were occasioned by the democratical
frame of its civil constitution, and the incapacity of a mer
cantile company to conduct even the most insignificant affairs
of state ; that he held himself in honour engaged to accom
plish the work that James had begun ; that he considered the
American colonies to be a part of the royal empire devolved
to him with the other dominions of the crown; that he was
fully resolved to establish a uniform course of government
through the whole British monarchy ; and that henceforward
the entire administration of the Virginian government should
be vested in a council nominated and directed by himself, and
responsible to him alone. This unlimited arrogation of power
has given rise to the common belief that Charles deemed the
provincial assembly already abolished ; and the arbitrary
manner in which the functions of this body was repeatedly su
perseded by exertions of royal prerogative in the earlier part
of this reign, has led the historians of Virginia erroneously to
suppose and declare that no assembly was actually convoked
in the province during that period. But in truth neither the

90 THE HISTORY OF
book king nor his father seems to have entertained the purpose of
L extirpating the popular branch of the constitution. Their
1625. purpose appears to have been to reduce it to what they con
ceived a due subordination to the supremacy of their own pre
rogative ; and to vindicate and develope the efficacy of royal
proclamations, both in suspending laws already made, and in
legislating for cases not yet regulated by statutory provision.
While Charles expressed the utmost scorn of the capacity of
a mercantile corporation, he did not disdain to embrace its
illiberal spirit, and copy its interested policy. As a specimen
of the extent of legislative authority which he intended to
exert, and of the purposes to which he meant to render it sub
servient, he prohibited the Virginians, under the most absurd
and frivolous pretences, from selling their tobacco to any
persons but certain commissioners appointed by himself to
purchase it on his own account.1 Thus the colonists found
themselves subjected to an administration that combined the
vices of both its predecessors — the unlimited prerogative of an
arbitrary prince, with the narrowest maxims of a mercantile
corporation ; and saw their legislatorial rights invaded, their
laws and usages rendered uncertain, all the profits of their in
dustry engrossed, and their only valuable commodity mono
polized, by the sovereign who pretended to have resumed the
government of the colony only in order to blend it more per
fectly with the general frame of the British empire.
Charles conferred the office of governor of Virginia on Sir
George Yeardley, and empowered him, in conjunction with a
council of twelve persons, to exercise the authority of an indefi
nite prerogative ; to make and execute laws ; to impose and levy
taxes ; lo seize the property of the late company, and apply it
to public uses; and to transport the colonists to England, to,
be tried there for offences committed in Virginia. The go
vernor and council were specially directed to exact the oaths
of allegiance and supremacy from every inhabitant of the
colony, and to conform their own conduct in every point to
the instructions which from time to time the king might
1627. transmit to them.2 Yeardley's early death prevented the full
weight of his authority from being experienced by the colonists
1 Rymer. Hazard. Burk. 2 Chalmers.

NORTH AMERICA. 91
during his short administration. He died in the beginning of C HA P
the year 1627, and, two years after, was succeeded by Sir  ; —
John Harvey. Meanwhile, and during a long subsequent 1629.
course of time, the king, who seems to have inherited his
father's prejudices respecting tobacco,1 continued to restrict
and encumber the importation and sale of it by a series of re
gulations so vexatious, oppressive, multifarious, and unsteady,
that it is impossible to undergo the fatigue of perusing them
without a mixture of contempt for the fluctuations and caprice
of his counsels, and of indignant pity for the wasted pros
perity and abused patience of his people. Notwithstanding
these disadvantages, however, the colonial population began
to increase with rapidity ; and in the year 1628 more than a
thousand persons emigrated from Europe to Virginia.2
Sir John Harvey, the new governor, proved a fit instrument Tyrannical
to carry the king's system of arbitrary rule into full execution. ^nTo'f sir
Haughty, rapacious, and cruel, he exercised an odious autho- John Har-
rity with the most offensive insolence, and by the rigour of his vey-
executive energy, aggravated the provocation inspired by his
legislative pretensions and injustice. His disposition was
perfectly congenial with the system which he conducted : and
so thoroughly did he personify, as well as administer, tyranny,
as not only to attract, but to engross, in his own person, the
odium of which a large share was properly due to the prince
who employed him. He added every decree of the Court of
High Commission in England to the ecclesiastical constitu
tions of Virginia ; and selected for especial enforcement every
regulation of English law which was unsuitable to the circum
stances of the colonists, and therefore likely to entail and mul
tiply legal penalties, all of which were commuted into fines
and forfeitures appropriated to the governor. 3 Of the length
to which he carried his arbitrary exactions and confiscations,
some notion may be formed from a letter of instructions by
which the royal committee of council for the colonies in
England at length thought proper to check his excesses. It July 1634.
1 That he inherited also his father's style of writing against the use of this com
modity, appears from a letter which he addressed to the Governor and Council of
Virginia in 1627, in which he declares that " It may well be said that the planta
tion is wholly built on smoke, which will easily turn into air, if either English to
bacco be permitted to be planted, or Spanish imported." Burk.
s Ryiner. Chalmers. Hazard. Campbell. 3 Beverley. Burk.

92 THE HISTORY OF
book signified that the king, in the plenitude of his bounty, and for
the encouragement of the planters, desired that the interests
1634. which had been acquired under tbe late corporation should be
exempted from forfeiture, and that the colonies, "for the pre
sent, might enjoy their estates with the same freedom and
privilege as they did before the recalling of the patent."1 We
might suppose this to be the mandate of an eastern sultan to
one of his bashaws ; and indeed the rapacious tyranny ofthe
governor seems hardly more odious than the cruel mercy of
the prince, who interposed to mitigate oppression only when
it had reached an extreme which is proverbially liable to in
flame the wise with madness, and drive the patient to despair.
The most significant comment on the letter is, that Harvey
was neither censured nor displaced for the excesses which it
commanded him to restrain. The effect, moreover, which it
was calculated to produce, in ascertaining the rights and
quieting the apprehensions of the colonists, was counter
balanced by large and vague grants of territory within the
province, which Charles inconsiderately bestowed on his
courtiers, and which gave rise to numerous encroachments on
established possession, and excited general distrust of the
validity of titles and the stability of property. The conse
quence of one of these grants was the formation of the state of
Maryland, by dismembering a large portion of territory that
had been previously annexed to Virginia. For many years
this event proved a source of much discontent and serious in
convenience to the Virginian colonists, who had endeavoured
to improve their trade by restricting themselves to the expor
tation only of tobacco of superior quality, and now found
themselves deprived of all the advantage of this sacrifice by
the transference ofa portion of their own territory to neigh
bours who refused to unite in their regulations.2
The restrictions prescribed by the letter of the royal com
mittee, left Harvey still in possession of ample scope to his
tyranny : and the colonial assembly respecting, or overawed
1635. by the authority, with which he was invested, for a long time
endured it without resistance, and practically restricted their
own functions to the degrading ceremonial of registering the
1 State Papers, ap. Chalmers. 3 Beverley.

NORTH AMERICA. 93
edicts and decrees of their tyrant. At length, after a spirited CHAP.
but ineffectual attempt to curb his excesses by enactments  '_
which he disregarded, the assembly yielding to the general 1635.
desire of their constituents, suspended him from his office, and
sent him a prisoner to England, along with two deputies from
their own body, who were charged with the duty of represent
ing the grievances of the colony and the misconduct of the
governor. But their reliance on the justice ofthe king proved
to be very ill founded. Charles was fated to teach his sub
jects, that if they meant to retain their liberties, they must
prepare to defend them ; that neither enduring patience nor
respectful remonstrance could avail to relax or divert his arbi
trary purposes; and that in order to obtain justice to them
selves, they must deprive him of the power of withholding it.
The inhabitants of Virginia endured extreme oppression (of
which he had already avowed his consciousness) with long
patience, and even when driven to despair, had shown that
they neither imputed their wrongs to him nor doubted his dis
position to redress them. Defenceless and oppressed, they
appealed to him as their protector ; and implored a relief to
which their claim was supported by every consideration that
could impress a just, or move a generous mind. Yet, instead 1636.
of commiserating their sufferings, or redressing their wrongs,
Charles regarded their conduct on this occasion as an act of
presumptuous audacity little short of rebellion ; and all the
applications of their deputies were rejected with calm injustice
and inflexible disdain. Harvey, released from his bonds, be
came in his turn the accuser ; and the calumnies of the dis
graced and banished tyrant were listened to with complacency
and attention, while the deputies of the brave and loyal
people, whom he had oppressed, were regarded as traitors, and
forbidden to appear in the presence of their sovereio-n. The
king refused to hear a single word from the deputies, either in
defence of their countrymen or in crimination of Harvey ; and
having reinstated this obnoxious governor in his office, sent 1637.
him back to Virginia, with a renovation of the powers which APril-
he had so grossly abused. There, elated with his triumph,
and inflamed with rage, Harvey resumed and aggravated a
tyrannical sway that has entailed infamy on himself and dis
grace on his sovereign, and provoked complaints so loud and

94 THE HISTORY OF
book vehement, that they began to penetrate into England, where
' they produced an impression which, mingling with the general
1637. irritation in the parent state, could not be safely disre
garded. x
If the administration of Sir John Harvey had been pro
tracted much longer, it must have ended in the revolt or the
ruin of the colony. So great was the distress it occasioned,
as to excite the attention of the Indians, and awaken their
slumbering hostility by suggesting the hope of revenge.
1638. Opechancanough, the ancient enemy of the colonists, was
now far advanced in years ; but age, though it had bent his
body and dimmed his eyes, had neither impaired his discern
ment, nor extinguished his animosity. Proud, subtle, sly,
and cruel, he watched, with enduring and considerate hate,
the opportunity of redeeming his glory and satiating his
revenge. Seizing the favourable occasion presented by the
distracted state of the province, he again led his warriors to
a sudden and furious attack, which the colonists did not repel
without the loss of five hundred men. A general war ensued
between them and all the Indian tribes under the influence of
Opechancanough.2
1639. But a great change was now to reward the patience of the
Virginians with a bloodless redress of their grievances. The
public discontents which had for many years been gathering
force and virulence in England, were advancing with rapid
strides to a full maturity, and threatened to convulse the
kingdom by some violent eruption. After a long intermission,
Charles was forced to contemplate the re-assembling ofa par
liament ; and, perfectly aware of the ill humour which his
government at home had excited, he had reason to apprehend
that the displeasure of the commons would be inflamed, and
their worst suspicions confirmed, by complaints and descrip
tions of the despotism that had been exercised in Virginia.
There was yet time to soothe the irritation, and even secure
the adherence ofa people, who, in spite of every wrong, retained
a generous attachment to the prince whose sovereignty was re
garded as the bond of political union between them and the
parent state: and, from the propagation of the complaints of
1 Chalmers. Oldmixon, Burk. 3 Beverley.

NORTH AMERICA. 95
colonial grievances in England, it was easy to foresee that CHAP.
the redress of them, if longer withheld by the king, would be '
granted, to the great detriment of his credit and influence, by 1639.
the parliament. To this assembly the Virginians had applied on
a former occasion, and the encouragement they had met with
increased the probability both ofa repetition of their applica
tion and of a successful issue to it. These considerations
alone seem to account for the entire and sudden alteration
which the colonial policy of the king underwent at this period.
Harvey was recalled, and the government of Virginia com
mitted first to Sir Francis Wyatt, and afterwards to Sir Sir Wil-
William Berkeley — a person not only of superior rank and Berkeley
abilities to any of his immediate predecessors, but distin- appointedffOV6rnor«
guished by every popular virtue of which Harvey was defi- 1641.
cient — of upright and honourable character, mild and prudent
temper, and manners at once dignified and engaging. A
change, not less gratifying, was introduced into the system of
government. The new governor was instructed to recognize
in the amplest manner the legislative privileges of theProvincial
Assembly, and to invite this body to enact a code of laws for
the province, and to improve the administration of justice by
introduction ofthe forms of English judicial procedure. Thus, The pro-
all at once, and when they least expected it, was restored to uncial li
the colonists the full enjoyment of those liberties which they stored.
had originally procured from the Virginian Company, and
which had been exposed to continual peril and violation from
the same authority by which the Company had been sub
verted. Universal joy and gratitude was excited throughout
the colony : and the king, who, amidst the hostility that
lowered upon him from every other quarter of his dominions,
was addressed in the language of grateful loyalty by this peo
ple, seems to have been somewhat struck and softened by the
generous sentiments which he had so little deserved ; and
which forcibly proved to him how cheap and easy were the
means by which princes may render their subjects attached
and happy. And yet so strong were the illusions of his self-
love, or so deliberate his artifice, that in his answer to an ad
dress of the colonists, he eagerly appropriated the praise for
which he was indebted to their generosity alone, and endea
voured to extend the application of their grateful expressions

1641.

96 THE HISTORY OF
B o^o k even to tne p0];Cy from which he had desisted in order to ob-
 ! — tain them.1
While Charles thus again introduced the principles of the
British constitution into the domestic government of Virginia,
he was not inattentive to the policy of preserving its depend
ence on the mother country, and securing to England an ex
clusive possession of the colonial trade. For this purpose
Sir William Berkeley was directed to prohibit all commerce
with other nations, and to require a bond from the master of
every vessel sailing from Virginia, obliging him to land his
cargo in some part of the King's dominions in Europe.2 Yet
the pressure of this restraint was more than counterbalanced
by the liberality of other contemporary instructions ; and with a
free and mild government, which offered a peaceful asylum, and
distributed ample tracts of land to all emigrants who sought
its protection, the colony advanced so rapidly in prosperity
and population, that at the beginning ofthe Civil War in the
parent state, it contained upwards of twenty thousand inhabi
tants.3 By the vigour and conduct of Sir William Berkeley,
the Indian war, after a few campaigns, was brought to a suc
cessful close: Opechancanough was taken prisoner4; and a
peace concluded with the savages, which endured for many
years. It was happy for Virginia that the restitution of her do
mestic liberties was accomplished in this manner, and not
deferred till a later period, when the boon would probably
have been attended with the re-establishment of the company
of patentees. To this consummation some of the members of
the suppressed company had been eagerly looking forward;
and notwithstanding the disappointment that their hopes had
sustained by the redress of those grievances whose existence
would have aided their pretensions, they endeavoured to turn
to their own advantage the jealous avidity with which every

' Beverley, Chalmers. Campbell. ! Chalmei-s. 3 Ibid.
i Beverley. It was the intention of Sir William Berkeley to have sent this re
markable personage to England ; but he was shot after being taken prisoner by a
soldier, in resentment of the calamities he had inflicted on the province. He lin
gered under the wound for several days, and died with the pride and firmness of an
old Roman. Indignant at the crowds who came to gaze at him on his death-bed,
he exclaimed, " If I had taken Sii William Berkeley prisoner, I would not haveex-
posed him as a show lo the people."

NORTH AMERICA. 97
complaint against the royal government was received by the CHAP.
Long Parliament, by presenting a petition in the name of the  ^j 
assembly of Virginia, praying for a restoration of the ancient 1641.
patents. This petition, though supported by some of the
colonists, who were justly dissatisfied with the discourage
ment which the puritan doctrines and certain preachers of
them, whom they had invited from Massachusetts,1 expe
rienced from the domestic government of Virginia, was, un
doubtedly, not the act of the assembly, nor the expression of
the prevailing sentiment in the colony. The assembly had
tasted the sweets of unrestricted freedom, and were not dis
posed to hazard or encumber their system of liberty, by re
attaching it to the mercantile corporation under which it had
been originally established. No sooner were they apprised
of the petition to the House of Commons than they trans
mitted an explicit disavowal of it; and at the same time
presented an address to the king, acknowledging his bounty
and favour to them, and desiring to continue under his imme
diate protection. In the fervour of their loyalty, they enacted 1642.
a declaration " that they were born under monarchy, and
would never degenerate from the condition of their births by
being subject to any other government."2 The only misfor
tune attending; the manner in which the Virginians had
regained their liberties, was that it allied their partial re
gards to an authority which was destined to be overthrown
in the approaching civil war, and which could no more
reward than it deserved their allegiance. During the whole Virginia
period of the struggle between the king and parliament in tuP°Jlses
England, they remained unalterably attached to the royal cause-
cause ; and after Charles the First had been beheaded, and
his son driven out of the kingdom, they acknowledged the
fugitive prince as their sovereign, and conducted the provincial
government under a commission which he despatched to Sir
William Berkeley from Breda.3 The royal family, though June,
they had little opportunity, during their exile, of cultivating 1650,
their interest in the colony, were not entirely regardless of it.
1 This transaction forms a part of the History of New England.
2 Chalmers. Gordon's Hist, of America. Burk.
3 Hume's England. Chalmers, This year a tract was published at London by
one Edward Williams, recommending the culture of silk in Virginia.
VOL. 1. H

98 THE HISTORY OF
book Henrietta Maria, the queen mother, obtained the assistance
' of the French government to the execution of a scheme pro-
1650. jected by Sir William Davenant, the poet, of emigrating in
company with a large body of artificers, whom he collected in
France, and founding with them a new plantation in Virginia.
The expedition was intercepted by the English fleet; and
Davenant, who was taken prisoner, owed the safety of his life
to the friendship of Milton.1
But the parliament having subdued all opposition in Eng
land, was not disposed to suffer its authority to be questioned
October, in Virginia. Incensed at the open defiance of its power in
this quarter, it issued an ordinance, declaring that tbe settle
ment of Virginia having originated from the wealth and the
population of England, and the authority of the state, ought
to be subordinate to and dependent upon the English com
monwealth, and subject to the legislation of parliament ; that
the colonists, instead of rendering this dutiful submission, had
audaciously disclaimed the supremacy of the parent state, and
rebelled against it ; and that they were now therefore to be
regarded as notorious robbers and traitors. Not only was all
connexion prohibited with these refractory colonists, and the
council of state empowered to send out a fleet and army to
reduce them to obedience, but all foreign nations were ex
pressly interdicted from trading with any of the English set
tlements in America.2 It might reasonably be supposed that
this latter restriction would have created a common feeling
throughout all the English colonies, of opposition to the go
vernment of the parent state. But the colonists of Massachu
setts were much more cordially united by similarity of political
sentiments and religious opinions with the leaders of the
English commonwealth, than by identity of commercial in-
1 Johnson's Life of Milton. Encyclopaedia Britannica, v. 688. Cowley, in a
poem addressed to Davenant, exclaims,
" Sure 'twas the noble boldness of the muse
Did thy desire to seek new worlds infuse."
But the motive of Davenant is, perhaps, better illustrated by the example than by
the genius of Cowley. Impatient of the tumultuous distractions of Europe, these
votaries of the peaceful pursuits of literature, sighed for a sojourn in the " safer
world" of America. In the preface to a volume of his poems, published in 1656,
Cowley declares that " his desire had been for some time past, and did still very
vehemently continue, to retire himself to some of the American plantations, and to
forsake this world for ever."
2 Scobell's Acts, 1650, cap. 28.

NORTH AMERICA. 99
terest with the inhabitants of Virginia. The religious views c H A P.
that had founded their colonial society, long regulated all its '
municipal policy, and prevailed over every other consideration. 1650.
And no sooner were the people of Massachusetts apprised of
the parliamentary ordinance, than they hastened to enforce its
prohibition of intercourse with Virginia, by a corresponding
enactment of their own domestic legislature.1
The efforts of the republican rulers of England were as
prompt and forcible as their declarations. They quickly
despatched Sir George Ayscue with an armament sufficient to
overpower the provincial royalists, and extinguish the last
traces of monarchical authority that still lingered in the ex
tremities ofthe empire. The commissioners who were appointed
to accompany this expedition, were furnished with instruc
tions more creditable to the vip-our than to the moderation and
humanity of the parliamentary councils. They were em
powered to try, in the first instance, the efficacy of pardons
and other conciliatory propositions in reducing the colonists
to obedience ; but if their pacific overtures should prove in
effectual, they were then to employ every species of hostile
operation, to set free the servants and slaves of all the
planters who continued refractory, and furnish them with
arms to assist in the subjugation of their masters.2 This bar
barous plan of hostility resembles less a war than a massacre,
and suggests the painful reflection that an assembly, possessed
of absolute power, and continually protesting that the glory
of God and the liberty of mankind were the chief ends for
which they assumed it, never once projected the liberation of
the negro slaves in their own dominions, except for the pur
pose of converting them into instruments of bloodshed, ravage,
and conquest.
The English squadron, after reducing the colonies in Bar- 1651.
badoes and other islands to the sway of the commonwealth,
entered the bay of Chesapeak. Berkeley, apprised of the
invasion, hastened to engage the assistance of a few Dutch
ships which were then trading to Virginia, contrary both to
the royal and the parliamentary injunctions, and with more
1 Hazard. 2 Thurloe's State Papers. Hazard.
H 2

100 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK courage than prudence prepared to oppose the invading
' armament ; but though he was cordially supported by the
1651. royalists who formed the great majority of the inhabitants, it
Subdued was evident that he had undertaken an unequal contest. Yet
bythe his gallant demonstration of resistance, though unavailing to
liament. repel the invaders, enabled him to procure favourable terms of
submission to the colony. By the articles of surrender, a
complete indemnity was stipulated for all past offences ; and
the colonists, recognising the authority, were admitted into
the bosom of the English commonwealth, and expressly
assured of an equal participation in all the privileges of the
free people of England. In particular it was provided that
the provincial assembly should retain its wonted functions;
and that " the people of Virginia shall have as free trade as
the people of England, to all places and with all nations,"
and " shall be free from all taxes, customs and impositions
whatsoever, without the consent of their own assembly.''
Berkeley disdained to make any stipulation for himself, with
those whom his principles of loyalty taught him to regard as
usurpers. Without leaving Virginia, he withdrew to a retired
situation, where he continued to reside as a private individual,
universally beloved and respected, till a new revolution was
to summon him once more to defy the republican forces of
England, and restore the ascendancy of royalty in the
colony. 1
But it was the dependence and not the mere adherence of
the colonies, that the rulers of the English commonwealth
were desirous to obtain ; and their shameless disregard of the
treaty concluded by their own commissioners, demonstrated in
a striking manner with how little equity absolute power is
exercised even by those who have shown themselves most
prompt to resent the infliction of its rigour upon themselves.
Having now obtained from the colonies a recognition of the
authority which they administered, they hastened to adopt
measures for promoting their dependence on England, and
Restraints securing the exclusive possession of their increasing commerce.
imposedon With this view, as well as for the purpose of provoking hos
tile trade
of the co
lony. 1 Beverley. Oldmixon. Chalmers. Burk.

NORTH AMERICA. 101
tilities with the Dutch, by aiming a blow at their carrying CHAP.
trade,1 the parliament not only forbore to repeal the ordinance
ofthe preceding year, which prohibited commercial intercourse 1652.
between the colonies and foreign states, but framed another
law which was to introduce a new asra of commercial juris
prudence, and to found the celebrated navigation system of
England. By this remarkable law, (of which the general
policy was strongly recommended in the parliamentary
speeches and political writings of the learned Selden) it was
enacted that no production of Asia, Africa, or America, should
be imported into the dominions of the commonwealth, except
in vessels belonoinp- to English owners or the inhabitants of
the English colonies, and navigated by crews of which the
captain and the majority of the sailors should be Englishmen.2
Willing at the same time to encourage the cultivation of the
staple commodity of Virginia, the parliament soon after
passed an act confirming all the royal proclamations against
planting tobacco in England.3
The unjust restriction of the colonial commerce, though by
no means rigorously enforced, tended tb keep alive in Virginia
the attachment to the royal cause, which was farther main
tained by the emigrations of the distressed cavaliers, who
resorted thither in such numbers that the population of the
colony amounted to thirty thousand persons at the epoch of
the restoration. But Cromwell had now prevailed over the
parliament, and held the reins of the commonwealth in his
vigorous hands; and though the flame of discontent was 1653.
secretly nourished in Virginia by the passions and intrigues of
so many cavalier exiles, yet the eruption of it was repressed
by the terror of his name, and the energy which he infused
into every department of his administration. Other causes
too, which have been long obscured by the misrepresentations
of partial or ignorant historians, contributed to the tranquillity

1 Hume's England.
* Scobel's Acts, 1651, cap. 22. The germ of this famous system of policy occurs
in English legislation so early as the year 1381, when it was enacted by the statute
of 5 Rich. II. cap. 3, " that to increase the navy of England, no goods or mer
chandizes shall be either exported or imported but only in ships belonging lo the
king's subjects." This enactment was premature, and soon fell into disuse. An
act to revive it to a limited extent in 1460, was rejected by Henry the Sixth.
3 Scobel's Acts, 1652, cap. 2.

102 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK and security of Cromwell's empire in Virginia. For a century
 '____ and a half it had been asserted, and repeated without contra-
1653. diction by successive generations of writers,1 that the govern
ment of the Protector in Virginia was illiberal and severe;
that he appointed governors whose dispositions rendered them
fit instruments of a harsh policy, and yet frequently displaced
them from distrust of their exclusive devotion to his interest;
and that while he indulged his favourite colonists of Massa
chusetts with a dispensation from the commercial laws of the
long parliament, he rigorously exacted the observance of them
from the Virginians. But the reputation of Cromwell's
colonial policy has been triumphantly vindicated by the in
dustry and research of a modern historian2 of this province,
who has proved beyond the possibility of further doubt or
denial, that the treatment which the Virginians experienced
under the protectorate was mild and humane; that their pri
vileges were rather enlarged than circumscribed ; and that
Cromwell dignified his usurped dominion over them by the
most liberal justice and fearless magnanimity. So far from
having regulated the appointment and dismission of governors
by tbe principles which have been imputed to him, he never
appointed or displaced a single governor of the province ; but
from the first, surrendered this branch of the sovereign's
prerogative to the legislative assembly of a state which he
knew to be the resort of his own most implacable enemies:
and though he appears not to have granted to the Virginians
an express exemption from the commercial ordinances of the
long parliament, he permitted them, in practice, to evince a
total disregard of these oppressive restrictions. Though his
government was not fitted to inspire attachment, it seems to
have gained the esteem and approbation of impartial and con
siderate men in Virginia, and to have trained their minds to
freer reflection than they had ever before indulged on the
objects and purposes for which human governments were in-

1 Among whom occur the respectable names of Beverley, Oldmixon, Chalmers,
Robertson, and Gordon.
3 Burk. The history of Virginia has derived the most valuable and important
illustration from the industry and genius of the writer. His style is too florid and
figurative.

NORTH AMERICA. 103
stituted. But from a numerous and increasing party of the CHAP.
inhabitants of Virginia, neither dispassionate reflection nor IL
impartial judgment could reasonably be expected. To many 1653.
of them, the name of Cromwell was associated with recollec
tions of personal disappointment and humiliation ; and to all
of them it recalled the ruin of their friends, and the death and
exile of their kings. Hatred and hope combined to unite their
hearts to the downfall ofthe protectorate and commonwealth:
and, as passionate are much more contagious than merely
reasonable sentiments, the public mind in Virginia, notwith
standing the liberality of Cromwell's administration, began to
be extensively leavened with the wish and expectation of
change. The Puritan colonists of New England had always
been the objects of suspicion and dislike to the great bulk of
the inhabitants of Virginia : and the manifest partiality which
Cromwell entertained for them, now increased the aversion
with which they had been heretofore regarded. New England
was generally considered by the cavaliers as the centre and
focus of puritan sentiment and republican principle: and,
actuated partly by religious, and partly by political feelings,
the Virginian cavaliers conceived a violent antipathy against
all the doctrines, sentiments, and practices that were reckoned
peculiar to the puritans; and rejected all communication of
the knowledge that flourished in New England, from hatred
ofthe authority under whose shelter it grew, and of the prin
ciples to whose support it seemed to administer.1 At length Revolt of
the disgust and impatience of the royalist party in Virginia y"
could no longer be restrained. Matthews, the last governor 1658.
appointed during the supremacy of Cromwell, died nearly at
the same period with the protector; and before an assembly
could be convened to nominate his successor, a numerous body
of the inhabitants, though yet unapprised of Cromwell's
death, assembled in a tumultuous manner, and having forced
1 The prejudices of an old cavalier against popular education, are strikingly dis
played by Sir William Berkeley in a letter descriptive of the state of Virginia, some
years after the Restoration. " I thank God," he says, " there are no free schools
nor printing ; and I hope we shall not have them these hundred years. For learn
ing has brought heresy and disobedience and sects into the world, and printing has
divulged them, and libels against the best government: God keep us from both !" —
Chalmers.

] 04 THE HISTORY OF
book Sir William Berkeley from his retirement, declared him the
 L_ only governor whom they would acknowledge in the colony.1
1658. Berkeley refusing to act under usurped authority, the insur-
liam l gents venturously erected the royal standard, and proclaimed
Berkeley Charles the Second to be their lawful sovereign; a proceeding
thegovern- wn'cn apparently involved a contest with the arms of Crom-
ment. well and the whole resources of the parent state. Happily for
the colony, the distractions that ensued in England deferred
the vengeance which the ruling powers had equal ability and
1660 inclination to inflict upon it, till the sudden and unexpected
Restoia- restoration of Charles to the throne of his ancestors, converted
imprudent temerity into meritorious service, and enabled the
Virginians safely to exult in the singularity which they long
and proudly commemorated, that they had been the last of
the British subjects who had renounced, and the first who had
resumed their allegiance to the crown.2
1 That Cromwell had meditated some important changes in Virginia, which death
prevented him from attempting to realize, may be inferred from the publication of a
small treatise at London, in the year 1657, entitled " Public good without private
interest," written by Dr. Gatford and dedicated to the Protector. In this little
work the Protector is advised to reform the numerous abuses extant in Virginia —
the disregard of religion — the neglect of education — and the fraudulent dealings of
the planters with the Indians ; on all which topics the author descants very forcibly.
Of this treatise, as well as of the tracts by Hamer, and Williams, and some others,
which I have had occasion to notice elsewhere, I found copies in the library of the
late George Chalmers.
2 Oldmixon. Beverley. Chalmers. Bulk. Campbell.

tion of
Charles II.

NORTH AMERICA. \Q^

CHAPTER III.

The Navigation Act — its Impolicy. — Discontent and Distress of the Colonists. —
Naturalization of Aliens. — Progress of the provincial Discontent. — Indian Hostili
ties. — Bacon's Rebellion. — Death of Bacon — and Restoration of Tranquillity. —
Bill of Attainder passed by the Colonial Assembly. — Sir William Berkeley super
seded by Colonel Jeffreys. — Partiality of the new Governor — Dispute with the
Assembly. — Renewal of Discontents. — Lord Culpeper appointed Governor —
Severity and Rapacity of his Administration. — An Insurrection — Punishment of
the Insurgents. — Arbitrary Measures of the Crown. — James the Second — aug
ments the Burdens of the Colonists. — Corrupt and oppressive Government of
Lord Effingham. — Revolution in Britain. — Complaints of the Colonies against the
former Governors discouraged by King William. — Effect of the English Revolu
tion on the American Colonies. — State of Virginia at this Period — Population —
Laws — Manners.

The intelligence of the restoration of the House of Stewart to c H A p.
the throne of Britain soon reached America, and excited in m'
the various British colonies which were now established in 1660.
that region, very different emotions. In Virginia, whose his
tory we must still separately pursue, it was received by a great
majority of the people like the surprising fulfilment of an
agreeable dream, and hailed with acclamations of unfeigned
and unbounded joy. Even that class of the inhabitants which
had recently expressed esteem and approbation of the pro-
tectoral government, evinced a new-born zeal for royalty hardly
inferior to the more consistent ardour of the genuine cavaliers.
These sentiments, confirmed by the gracious expressions of
esteem and good-will J which the king very readily vouch-

1 Sir William Berkeley, who made a journey to England to congratulate the king
on his restoration, was received at court with distinguished regard ; and Charles, in
honour of his loyal Virginians, wore at his coronation a robe manufactured of Vir
ginian silk. — Oldmixon.
This was not the first royal robe that America supplied. Queen Elizabeth wore a
gown made of the silk grass, of which Raleigh's colonists sent a quantity to England.
— Coxe's Description of Carolana. There is a copy of this curious work in the li
brary of the Royal Institution of Great Britain.

10G THE HISTORY OF

o o K safed, excited hopes of substantial favour and recompense
which it was not easy to gratify, and which were fated to

1660. undergo a speedy and severe disappointment. Sir William
Berkeley having received a new commission from the crown
to exercise the oflice of governor, proceeded to convoke the
provincial assembly, which, after zealous declarations of
loyalty and satisfaction, undertook a general revision of the
laws and institutions of Virginia. Trial by jury, which had
been discontinued for some years, was now again restored ;
judicial proceedings were disencumbered of various abuses;
and a provision, of essential importance to the interests of
liberty, was made for enlarging the number of representatives
in the Assembly in proportion to the increase of the province
in peopled and cultivated territory. The supremacy of the
Church of England was recognized and established by law ;
stipends were allotted to its ministers ; and no preachers but
those who had received their ordination from a bishop in Eng
land, and who should subscribe an engagement of conformity
to the orders and constitutions ofthe established church, were
permitted to exercise their functions either publicly or pri
vately within the colony.1 A law was shortly after passed
against the importation of quakers into Virginia, under the
penalty of five thousand pounds of tobacco inflicted on the
importers ; but with a special exception of such quakers as
might be judicially transported from England for breach of
the laws.2
The same principles of government which prevailed in Eng
land after the restoration, uniformly extended their influence,
whether salutary or baneful, across the Atlantic ; and the co
lonies, no longer deemed the mere property of the prince, were
considered as extensions of the British territory, and subject
to parliamentary legislation. The explicit declaration by the
Long Parliament of the dependence of the colonies on the
parent state, introduced maxims which received the sanction
of the courts of Westminster Hall, and were thus interwoven
with the fabric of English law. In a variety of cases which
involved this great constitutional point, the judges pronounced
1 Chalmers. Buik.
» Chalmers. In 1663, the assembly entertained a complaint against one of its
own members, of " being loving to tho Quakers."— Burk,

NORTH AMERICA. 107
that by virtue of those principles of the common law which CHAP.
bind the territories to the state, the American plantations were

included within the pale of British dominion and legislation, 1660.
and affected by acts of parliament, either when specially
named, or when reasonably supposable within the contempla
tion ofthe legislature.1 In conformity with the adjudications
of the courts of law, was the uniform tenor of the parlia
mentary proceedings ; and the colonists soon perceived that
although the Long Parliament was no more, it had be
queathed to its successors the spirit which influenced its com
mercial councils. The House of Commons determined not
only to retain the system of colonial policy which the Long
Parliament had introduced, but to mature and extend it; to
render the trade of the colonies completely subject to parlia
mentary governance, and exclusively subservient to the inter
ests of English commerce and navigation. No sooner was
Charles seated on the throne, than a duty of five per cent, was
imposed by the parliament on all merchandize exported from,
or imported into, any of the dominions belonging to the crown ;2
and the same session, in producing tbe celebrated Navigation
Act, originated the most memorable and important branch of
the commercial code of England. By this statute (in addition The Navi-
to many other important provisions which are foreign to our Aac'^
present consideration), it was enacted that no commodities
should be imported into any British settlement in Asia, Africa,
or America, or exported from thence, but in vessels built in
England or her colonial plantations, and navigated by crews of
which the masters and three-fourths of the mariners should be
English subjects, under the penalty of forfeiture of ship and
cargo; that none but natural-born subjects of theEnglish crown,
or persons legally naturalised, should exercise the occupation
of merchant or factor in any English colonial settlement,
under the penalty of forfeiture of goods and chattels ; that no
sugar, tobacco, cotton, wool, indigo, ginger, or woods used in
dyeing, produced, or manufactured in the colonies, should be
shipped from them to any other country than England; and
1 Freeman's Reports, 175. Modern Reports, iii. 159, 160. iv. 225. Vaudian's
Reports, 170. 400. Salkeld's Reports, ii. 6.
¦> 12 Car. II. cap. 4.

] 08 THE HISTORY OF
B 0 o K to secure the observance of this regulation, ship owners were
 '__ required, at the port of lading, to give bonds with surety for
1660. sums proportioned to the tonnage of their vessels.1 The com
mercial wares thus restricted, were termed enumerated com
modities: and when new articles of colonial produce, as the
rice of Carolina, and the copper ore of the northern provinces,
were raised into importance and brought into commerce by
the increasing industry ofthe colonists, they were successively
added to the original list which we have noted, and subjected
to the same regulations. As some compensation to the colo
nies for these commercial restraints, the parliament at the
same time conferred on them the exclusive supply of tobacco,
by prohibiting its cultivation in England, Ireland, Guernsey,
or Jersey.2 The navigation act was soon after enlarged, and
1663. additional restraints imposed by a new law, which prohibited
the importation of European commodities into the colonies,
except in vessels laden in England, and navigated and manned
in conformity with the requisitions of the original statute.
More rigorous and effectual provisions were likewise enacted
for securing the infliction of the penalties attached to the
transgression of the navigation act : and the principles of com
mercial policy on which the whole system was founded were
openly avowed in a declaration that, as it was the usage of
other nations to keep the trade of their plantations to them
selves, so the colonies that were founded and peopled by
English subjects ought to be retained in firm dependence
upon England, and obliged to contribute to her advantage in
the employment of English shipping, the vent of English com
modities and manufactures, and the conversion of England
into a settled mart or emporium, not only of the productions
of her colonies, but also of such commodities of other coun
tries as the colonies themselves might require to be supplied
with.3 Advancing a step farther in the prosecution of its do
mineering policy, the parliament proceeded to tax the trade
of the several colonies with each other; and as the act of
navigation had left all the colonists at liberty to export the
enumerated commodities from one settlement to another with
out paying any duty, this exemption was subsequently with-
1 12 Car. II. cap. 18. 2 Ibid. cap. 34. 3 15 Car. II. cap. 7.

NORTH AMERICA. 109
drawn, and they were subjected, in trading with each other, CHAP.
to a tax equivalent to what was levied on the consumption of n"
their peculiar commodities in England.1 1663.
The system pursued by these regulations, of securing lo
England a monopoly ofthe trade of her colonies, by shutting
up every other channel which competition might have formed
for it, and into which the interest of the colonists might have
caused it preferably to flow, excited in their minds the utmost
disgust and indignation. In England, it was long applauded
as a masterpiece of political sagacity ; retained and cherished
as a main source of opulence and power ; and defended on
the plea of expediency deduced from its supposed advantages.
The philosophy of political science, however, has amply re
futed these illiberal principles, and would long ago have
corrected the views and amended the institutions which they
sanctioned or introduced, but that, from the general pre
valence of narrow jealousies, and of those obstinate and pas
sionate prepossessions that constitute wilful ignorance, the
cultivation of political science has much more frequently ter
minated in knowledge merely speculative, than visibly ope
rated to improve human conduct, or increase human hap
piness. Nations, biassed by passionate enmities as well as
mean partialities, have suffered an illiberal jealousy of other
states to contract the views they have formed of their own
interests, and to induce a line of policy of which the operation
is to procure a smaller amount of exclusive gain, in preference
to a larger contingent in the participation of general advan
tage. Too passionate or gross-sighted to discern the bonds
that connect the interests of all the members of the great
family of mankind, they have accounted the detriment and
exclusion of their rivals, equivalent to an extension of be
nefit to themselves. The prevalence of this mistaken policy
has commonly been aided by the interested representa
tions of the few who contrive to extract a temporary and
partial advantage from every abuse, however generally per
nicious : and when, in spite of the defects of its commercial
policy, the prosperity of a state has been augmented by the
force of its natural advantages, this effect has been eagerly
> 25 Car. II. cap.7. Anno 1672.

1 | 0 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK ascribed to the very causes which really impeded and abridged,
L without being able entirely to intercept it. But the disco-
1663. veries which the cultivation of political science has yielded,
have in this respect coincided with the dictates of christian
morality, and demonstrated that, in every transaction between
nations and individuals, the intercourse most solidly and last
ingly beneficial to both and each of the parties, is that which
is founded on the principles of a fair reciprocity and mutual
subservience; that all policy suggested by jealous or malevo
lent regard of the advantage of others, implies a narrow and
perverted view of our own ; and that to do as we would be
done by, is not less the maxim of prudence than the precept
of piety. So coherent must true philosophy ever be with the
prescriptions of Divine wisdom. But unfortunately this co
herence has not always been recognised even by those phi
losophers whose speculations have tended to its illustration :
and, confining themselves to reasonings, sufficiently clear and
convincing, no doubt, to persons contemplating human affairs
in the simplicity and disinterested abstraction of theoretical
survey, they have neglected to promote the acceptance of im
portant truths by reference to those principles that derive them
from infallible wisdom, and connect them with the strongest
sanctions of human duty.
Its im- They have demonstrated x that a parent state by restraining
po icy. ^ne commerce 0f ner colonies with other nations, depresses
the industry and productiveness both of the colonies and of-
foreign nations ; and hence, by enfeebling the demand of
foreign purchasers, which must be proportioned to their
ability, and lessening the quantity of colonial commodities
actually produced, which must be proportioned to the demand
for them, enhances the price of the colonial produce to herself
as well as to the rest of the world, and so far diminishes its
power to increase the enjoyments and animate the industry of
her own citizens as well as of other states. Besides, — the
monopoly of the colonial trade produces so high a rate of
profit to the merchants who carry it on, as to attract into this
channel a great deal of the capital that would, in the natural
course of things, be directed to other branches of trade : and
1 Smith's Wealth of Nations.

NORTH AMERICA. HI
in these branches, the profits must consequently be augmented CHAP.
in proportion to the diminished competition of the capitals 
employed in them. But whenever the ordinary rate of profit 1663.
in any country is raised by artificial means to a higher pitch
than it would naturally attain, that country is necessarily sub
jected to great disadvantage in every branch of trade of which
she does not command a monopoly. Her merchants cannot
obtain that higher profit without selling dearer than they
otherwise would do, both the commodities of foreign countries
which they import into their own, and the goods of their own
country which they carry abroad. The country thus finds
herself frequently undersold at foreign markets in many
branches of trade ; — a disadvantage to which she is the more
exposed, that in foreign states much capital has been forced
into those branches by her exclusion of foreigners from par
taking her colonial trade, which would have absorbed a part
of it. Thus, by the operation of a monopoly of the colonial
trade, the parent state obtains an overgrowth of one branch of
distant traffic, at the expense of diminishing the advantages
which her own citizens might derive from the produce of the
colonies, and of impairing all those other branches of nearer
trade, which, by the greater frequency of their returns, afford
the most constant and beneficial excitement to the industry of
the country. Her commerce, instead of flowing in a variety of
moderate channels, is taught to run principally in one great
conduit ; and hence the whole system of her trade and in
dustry is rendered peculiarly liable to obstruction and derange
ment. But the injurious consequences of this exclusive policy are
not confined to its immediate operation upon trade. The pro
gress of our history will demonstrate that the connexion which
a parent state seeks to maintain with her colonies by the aid
of such a system, carries within itself the principles of its
own dissolution. During the infancy of the colonies, a per
petual and vexatious exertion is required from the parent
state to execute and extend her restraining laws ; while a cor
responding diligence is exerted by the colonies to obstruct or
elude their operation. Every rising branch of trade which is
left for a time, or for ever, free to the colonists, serves by the

112 THE HISTORY OF
book effect of contrast, to render more striking and sensible the disad-
vantages of their situation in the regulated branches ; and every

1663. extension of the restrictions provokes additional discontent.
As the colonies increase their internal strength, and make ad
vances in the possession and appreciation of national conse
quence, the disposition of their inhabitants to emancipate
themselves from such restraints, is combined with ability to
accomplish their deliverance, — by the very circumstances, and
at the very period, which will involve the trade of the parent
state in the greatest loss and disorder. And the advantages
which the commerce of other nations must expect from the
destruction of the monopoly, unites the wishes of the whole
world with the revolt of the colonies, and gives assurance
of the most powerful assistance to promote their emanci
pation. A better apology for the system which England adopted
towards her colonies, than the boasted expediency of her
measures would thus appear to supply, may be derived from
the admitted fact, that her colonial policy, on the whole, was
much less illiberal and oppressive than that which any other
nation of Europe has ever been known to pursue. While the
foreign trade of the colonies was restrained, for the supposed
advantage of England, whose prosperity they partook, and by
whose power they were, or were supposed to be, defended,
their internal liberty was suffered to flourish and mature
itself under the shelter of wise and liberal institutions ; and
even the commercial restrictions imposed on them were much
less rigorous and injurious than those which the colonies of
France, Spain, Portugal, and Denmark endured from their
respective parent states. The trade of the British settlements
was not committed, according to the practice of some of those
states, to exclusive companies, nor restricted, according to the
practice of others, to a particular port ; but, being left free to
all the people, and admitted to all the harbours of England,
employed a body of British traders too numerous and dis
persed to admit of their superseding mutual competition and
uniting in a general confederacy to oppress the colonists and
extort exorbitant profits to themselves. This apology is ob
viously very unsatisfactory, as every attempt to palliate injus-

NORTH AMERICA. 113
tice must necessarily be. It was urged with a very bad grace CHAP.
by the people of England, and totally disregarded by the in- m-
habitants of America. 1663.
In none of the American colonies did this oppressive Discontent
system excite greater indignation than in Virginia, where the and dl^"
larger commerce of the people, their pre-eminent loyalty, colonists.
and the recent experience of the lenient and liberal policy of
Cromwell, rendered the pressure of the burden more severe,
and the infliction of it more exasperating. 1 No sooner was
the navigation act promulgated in Virginia, and its effects ex
perienced, than the colonists warmly remonstrated against it
as a grievance, and petitioned earnestly for relief. But,
although the English monarchs were accustomed at this pe
riod to exercise a dispensing power over the laws — insomuch
that when the court at a later period ventured openly to pur
sue a system of arbitrary government, even the act of naviga
tion itself, so great a favourite with the nation, was suspended
for a while by an exertion of this stretch of prerogative, — yet,
during the early period of his reign, Charles, unassured of
the stability of his throne, and surrounded by ministers of
constitutional principles, was compelled to observe the limits
of a legal administration, and to aid with his authority the
execution even of those laws that were most repuguant to his
principles and wishes. So far from lending a favourable ear
to the petition of Virginia, Charles and his ministers adopted
measures for carrying the act into strict execution. Intelli
gence having been received that its provisions were almost as
generally violated as they were detested, and that the pro
vincial authorities were reluctant to promote the efficacy of a
system which they perceived was so disagreeable to the per
sons over whom they presided,— a royal mandate was issued to
the governors of the settlements, reprimanding them for the
1 It was to Virginia alone that Montesquieu's justificatory principle of the
system of restricted trade could be considered as in any degree applicablef " It has
been established " says this writer, " that the mother country alone shall trade in
the colonies, and that from very good reason, because the design of the settlement
was the extension of commerce, and not the foundation of a city, or of a new em-
pire. Spirit of Laws, B. xxi. cap. 17. This was in some measure true in regard
to Virginia, though her first charter professes more enlarged designs; but it was not
applicable to New England, Maryland, or the other pcteriof MtttanentTrf the
VOL. I. r

114 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK " neglects or rather contempts," which the law had sustained,
L and enjoining their future attention to its rigid enforcement ; x
1663. and in Virginia, more especially, demonstration was made of
the determined purpose ofthe English goverment to overcome
all resistance, by the erection of forts on the banks of the prin
cipal rivers, and the appointment of vessels to cruise on the
coasts. But, notwithstanding the threatening measures em
ployed to overawe them, and the vigilance of the British
cruisers, the Virginians contrived to evade the law, and to
obtain some vent to the accumulating stores of their depre
ciated produce, by a clandestine trade with the settlement of
the Dutch on Hudson's River. The relief, however, was in
considerable ; and the discontent of the planters, inflamed by
the hostilities which the frontier Indians now resumed, began
to spread so widely as to inspire some veteran soldiers of
Cromwell, who had been banished to Virginia, with the hope
of rendering themselves masters of the colony, and delivering
it entirely from the yoke of England. A conspiracy, which
has received the name of Birkinhead's Plot, was formed for
this purpose ; but the design having been seasonably disclosed
by the fear or remorse of one of the persons engaged in it, was
easily defeated by the prudence and vigour of Sir William
Berkeley, and with no farther bloodshed than the execution of
four of the conspirators. 2
The distress of the colony continuing to increase with the
increasing depreciation of tobacco, now confined almost en
tirely to one market, and the augmentation ofthe price of all
foreign commodities, now derivable only from the supplies
which one country could furnish, — various efforts were made
from time to time by the provincial assembly for the relief of
their constituents. Retaliating, in some degree, the injustice
with which they were treated, they passed a law enacting,
that in the payment of debts, foreign creditors should be
postponed to Virginian claimants, and that the provincial tribu
nals should give precedence in judgment to engagements con
tracted within the colony. Acts were passed for restraining the
culture of tobacco; and attempts were made to introduce a
new staple, by encouraging the plantation of mulberry trees
1 Chalmers. Slate Papers, ibid. ? Oldmixon. Beverley. Burk.

NORTH AMERICA. H5
and the manufacture of silk ; but neither of these projects was chap.
successful. Numerous French protestant refugees being at-  ^_
traded to Maryland by a naturalization act in their favour, 1671.
which was passed there in the year 1666, the Virginian as
sembly endeavoured to recruit the wealth and population of
its territories from the same source, by framing, in like man
ner, a series of laws which empowered the governor to confer
on aliens taking the oath of allegiance all the privileges of
naturalization ; 1 but it was provisionally subjoined, that this Natural-
concession should not be construed to vest aliens with the ^jg°° °
power of exercising any function which they were disabled
from performing by the acts of the English parliament relative
to the colonies. This prudent reference to a restriction which
the provincial patents of naturalization must inevitably have
received from the common law, was intended to guard against
the disputes and confiscations which might ensue from the
attempts of naturalized aliens to infringe the navigation act.
But the precaution was unavailing ; and at an after period
many forfeitures of property were incurred, and much judicial
controversy occasioned, by the traffic which aliens in the
colonies carried on under the authority of general patents of
denization granted to them by the ignorance or inattention of
the royal governors. Their pretensions, though quite repug
nant to the navigation laws, were supported by the American
courts of justice, but uniformly disallowed by the English
privy council, which, after repeated decisions in conformity
with the principle that the enactments ofa provincial legisla
ture cannot derogate from the general jurisprudence of the
1 It was not till after the Revolution of 1688 that the population of Virginia re
ceived any accession from the influx of these or other foreigners. In 1671, Sir
William Berkeley thus describes the state of its population: — " There are in Vir
ginia above 40,000 persons, men, women, and children : of which there are 2,000
black slaves, 6,000 christian servants for a short time, and the rest have been born
in the country, or have come in to settle, or serve, in hope of bettering their condition
in a growing country. Yearly, we suppose, there come in of servants about 1,500,
of which most are English, few Scotch, and fewer Irish; and not above two or three
ships of Negroes in seven years." — Answers to the Lords of the Committee of Colo
nies, apud Chalmers. The numerous importations of Servants mentioned by Sir
William Berkeley were probably checked by the troubles that preceded and attended
Bacon's Rebellion. The later importations were more available than the earlier
ones ; the diseases ofthe country having diminished in frequency and violence as the
woods were progressively cut down. The mortality among the new comers, we learn
from Sir William Berkeley, was at first enormous, but had become very trifling prior

116

THE HISTORY OF

book empire, at length prohibited altogether the granting of farther
L denizations by the provincial governors or assemblies. x
1671. The discontents in Virginia, far from being mitigated by
Progress of tne ]apse 0f time, were exasperated by the increasing pressure
theprovin- r . . . ' J ,. - i .ir
cial dis- of the commercial restrictions, corresponding with the succes-
content. g;ve exert|ons 0f the English government to promote their
more effectual operation. Various additional causes contri
buted to inflame the displeasure of the colonists ; and a con
siderable native population having now grown up in Virginia,
the resentment of these persons was no way abated by the
habitual regard and fond remembrance which emigrants re
tain for the parent state which is also the land of their indivi
dual nativity. The defectiveness of their instruction, pre
vented the influence of education from acting in this respect
as a substitute to experience ; and they knew little of England
beyond the wrongs which they heard daily imputed to her in
justice. It was natural that all the political leaders and rea-
soners who either sincerely undertook to indicate or factiously
endeavoured to aggravate these wrongs, should contrast the
oppression that had followed restored royalty in England with
the liberality which the colony had experienced from Oliver
Cromwell : and the inevitable effect of this suggestion was to
associate national prosperity and democratical ideas in the
minds of a numerous and increasing party of the Virginian
Indian planters.2 The Indian hostilities, after infesting the frontiers,
hostilities, began now to penetrate into the interior of the province ; and
while the colonists were thus reduced to defend their property
at the hazard of their lives, they found it additionally endan-
1673. gered by the large and improvident grants of land which the
king, after the example of his father, yielded with lavish pro
fusion and facility to the solicitations of his favourites. The
fate of that parent had warned him to avoid, in general,
rather the arrogance that provoked, than the injustice that
deserved it; and, in granting those applications, without
fatiguing himself by any inquiry into their merits, he at once
' Chalmers.
i The partial and contradictory accounts that have been transmitted ofthe subse
quent events, bear unhappy testimony to the influence of the distinction that now
began to prevail in Virginia between a royalist and a democratical party. The mis
representations of faction remain to darken truth, after its passions have ceased to
disturb happiness.

NORTH AMERICA. 1 17

indulged the indolence of his disposition, and exerted a CHAP.
liberality that cost him nothing that he cared for. Many of .

the royal grants not only were of such exorbitant extent as to 1673.
be unfavourable to the progress of cultivation, but, from igno
rance or inaccuracy in the definition of their boundaries, were
made to include tracts of land that had already been planted
and appropriated. Such a complication of exasperating cir
cumstances brought the discontents of the colony to a crisis.
In the beginning of the year 1675, two slight insurrections, 1675.
which were rather the hasty explosions of popular irritation
than the fruits of matured design, were easily suppressed by
the governor, but gave significant intimation of the state and
the tendency of public feeling in Virginia. In the hope of
averting the crisis, and obtaining redress of the more recent
grievances which were provoking it, the assembly despatched April.
deputies to England, who, after a tedious negotiation with the
king and his ministers, had brought matters to the point of a
happy adjustment, and obtained the promise of a royal charter,
defining both the constitution and the territory of Virginia,
when their expectations were frustrated and the proceedings
suspended by intelligence of a formidable rebellion in the
colony. A tax imposed by the assembly to defray the expense 1676.
of the deputation, had increased the discontent which the de
putation was intended to remove ; and when the dilatory pro
ceedings ofthe English ministers, who disdained to allow the
intelligence of past, or the apprehensions of future insurrec
tion, to quicken their diligence, seemed to confirm the assu
rances of the factious leaders of the colonists, that even their
last sacrifice had been thrown away, the tide of rage and dis
affection began again to swell to the point of rebellion. It
did not long wait for additional provocation to excite, or an
able leader to impel its fury. For, to crown the provincial
distress, the Indian warfare, which had continued to prevail
notwithstanding all the governor's attempts to suppress it,
now burst forth with redoubled rage, and threatened a formi
dable addition of danger, hardship, and expense. The Indians
had been provoked and alarmed by a series of enterprises
which the governor promoted for exploring the large and
yet unvisited districts adjoining the colonial occupation ; and
which the savages regarded as a preparatory step to farther

118

THE HISTORY OF

BOOK encroachments on their domains. Even the popularity of the
long-tried and magnanimous friend of Virginia, Sir William
1676. Berkeley, was overcast by the blackness of this cloud of cala
mities. The spirit and fidelity with which he had adhered to
the colony through every variety of fortune, his earnest remon
strances with the English government against the commercial
restraints, his generosity in devoting a considerable part of his
own private fortune to the improvement and embellishment of
the province, and the disinterestedness he had shown in de
clining, during the unprosperous state of the provincial
finances, to accept an addition which the assembly had made
to his official emoluments, were disregarded, denied, or for
gotten. To his age and incapacity were now attributed the
burdens of the people, and the distractions of the time ; and
he was loudly accused of wanting alike honesty to resist the
tyrannical policy of the mother country, and courage to repel
the hostility of the savages.1 Such ungrateful injustice is
rarely, if ever, committed by a people, except when the insi
dious suggestions of factious leaders have imposed on their
credulity and fanned their passions into fury. The populace
of Holland, when, a few years before this period, they tore in
pieces their benefactor John De Witt, were not only terrified
by the progress of their national calamities, but deluded by
the profligate artifices of the retainers of the house of Orange.
To similar influence (exerted in similar circumstances) were
the maddened and misguided Virginians now exposed from
the artifice and ambition of Nathaniel Bacon.
Bacon's This man had been trained to the profession of a lawyer in
rebellion. England ; and, only three years had elapsed since, for some
unexplained reason, he had emigrated to Virginia. Short as
this interval was, it sufficed to advance him to a conspicuous
station in the colony, and to illustrate the disposition and
talents of a popular leader. The consideration he derived
from his legal attainments, and the esteem he acquired by an
insinuating address, had procured him already a seat in the
council, and the rank of colonel in the provincial militia.
But his temper was not accommodated to subordinate office ;
and, unfortunately, the distractions of the colony presented
1 Beverley. Chalmers. Oldmixon. (2nd edit.) Campbell. Burk.

NORTH AMERICA. 119
to him a sphere of action more congenial to his character and C HA. P.
capacity. Young, sanguine, eloquent, and daring, yet artful '
and ambitious, he presented himself in the assemblies of the 1676.
discontented planters, and, by his spirited harangues on the
grievances under which they laboured, he promoted their ex
asperation and attracted their favour. He was implicated in
the abortive insurrection of the preceding year, and had been
imprisoned, and subsequently pardoned by the governor:
but less affected by the clemency, than encouraged by the
impunity which he had experienced, and sensible that the
avenue to legitimate promotion was for ever closed against
him, he determined to unite his lot with the fortune of the
malcontent party ; and, taking advantage of their present
excitation, he now again came forward, and addressed them
with artifice which their uncultivated understandings were
unable to detect, and with eloquence which their untamed
passions rendered quite irresistible. Finding that the senti
ments most prevalent with his auditory were the alarm and
indignation excited by the Indian ravages, he boldly charged
the governor with neglect or incapacity to exert the vigour
that was requisite for the general safety ; and, having expa
tiated on the facility with which the whole Indian race might
be exterminated, he exhorted his fellow colonists to take arms
in their own defence, and achieve the deliverance they must
no longer expect from any other quarter. So acceptable was
this address and the speaker to the temper of the popular
mind, that his exhortation was instantly obeyed, and his main
object no less successfully accomplished. A great multitude
hastened to embody themselves for an expedition against the
Indians ; and, electing Bacon to be their general, committed
themselves to his direction. He assured them, in return, that
he would never lay down his arms, till he had avenged their
sufferings and redressed their wrongs. To give some colour
of legitimacy to the pre-eminence he had acquired, and, per
haps, expecting to precipitate matters to the extremity which
his interest required that they should speedily reach, he
applied to the governor for an official confirmation of the
popular election, and offered instantly to march against the
common enemy. Berkeley, suspecting his real designs,
thought it prudent to temporise, and try the effect of nego-

120 THE HISTORY OF
book tiation : but he had to deal with a much more practised adept
' in dissimulation than himself; and encountered in Bacon a
1676. man guarded by his own artifice and insincerity from the
craft of others, and conscious that promptitude and resolute
perseverance alone could extricate him with safety or credit
from the dangers of his situation. Pressed for an answer, and
finding that the applicants were not to be soothed by his con
ciliating demeanour, Berkeley issued a proclamation, com
manding the multitude to disperse immediately under pain of
incurring the guilt of rebellion.
Bacon, no more disconcerted by this display of vigour than
he had been duped by the negotiation that preceded it, in
stantly marched to James-Town, at the head of six hundred
of his followers, and surrounding the house where the governor
and assembly were engaged in deliberation, he demanded the
commission which his proceedings and retinue showed how
little he either needed or regarded. Berkeley, undismayed
by the dangers that environed him, was sensible of his in
ability to repel the force of the insurgents, and yet disdained
to bend his authority before their menacing attitude, or yield
to their imperious demands. Confronting with invincible
courage the men who had charged him with defect of this
virtue, he peremptorily commanded them to depart ; — and,
when they refused, he presented his breast to their weapons,
and calmly defied their rage. But the council, more consi
derate of their own safety, and fearful of driving the multi
tude to some fatal act of fury, hastily prepared a commission,
by which Bacon was appointed captain-general of all the forces
of Virginia, — and, by dint of earnest entreaty, prevailed with the
governor to subscribe it. The insurgents, thus far successful,
retired in triumph ; and the council no sooner felt them
selves delivered from the immediate presence of danger, than,
passing from the extreme of timidity to the height of pre
sumption, they voted a resolution annulling the commission
they had granted, as having been extorted by force, pro
claiming Bacon a rebel, commanding his followers to deliver
him up, and summoning the militia to arm in defence ofthe
constitution. They found too little difficulty in persuading
the governor to confirm, by his sanction, this indiscreet as
sumption of an attitude of authority which they were totally

NORTH AMERICA. 121
incapable of supporting. The consequences might have been chap.
easily foreseen. Bacon and his associates, flushed with their

recent triumph, and incensed at the impotent menace, which 1676.
they denounced as a base and treacherous breach of com
pact, returned immediately to James-Town ; and the governor,
unsupported by any force sufficient to cope with the insur
gents, retired across the bay to Acomack, on the eastern
shore. Some of the councillors accompanied him thither ; the
rest retired to their estates ; the frame of the provincial ad
ministration seemed to be dissolved, and Bacon took unre
sisted possession of the vacant government.
The pre-eminence which he had thus attained by his vigor
ous conduct, Bacon employed with great address to add
strength and reputation to his party. To invest his usurped
jurisdiction with the semblance of a legal establishment, he
summoned a convention of the principal planters of the pro
vince, and prevailed with a numerous body of them to pledge
themselves by oath to support his authority and resist his
enemies. A declaration or manifesto was published, in the
name of this body, setting forth that Sir Wijliam Berkeley
had wickedly fomented a civil war among the people, and
that, after thus violating his trust, he had abdicated the go
vernment, to the surprise and confusion of the country ; that
General Bacon had raised an army for the public service, and
with the public approbation ; that the late governor having,
as was reported, falsely informed the king that the general
and his followers were rebels, and advised his majesty to send
forces to subdue them, the welfare of the colony and their true
allegiance to his most sacred majesty equally required that they
should oppose and suppress all forces whatsoever, expect those
commanded by the general, till the king be fully informed of
the true state of the case by such persons as should be sent
to him by Bacon, to whom, in the interim, all the inhabitants
were required to take an oath of allegiance. It was remarked
by the wise, that this manifesto, which might have been ex
pected to display the genuine cause of the revolt, mentioned
none of the original sources of quarrel ; and, hence, they
justly suspected that the leader of the insurgents entertained
personal and ambitious designs, to which he purposed to ren
der the discontents of his followers subservient, — which ex-

122

THE HISTORY OF

BOOK tended beyond the temporary proceedings in relation to the
I- Indians, and which had already suggested to him a specious
1676. pretence for exposing the colony to a war with the forces of
the mother country. Yet, such was the spirit of the times,
and so prompt the sympathy with resistance to every branch
of an administration which Charles was daily rendering more
odious and suspected, that, when the rebel manifesto was pro
mulgated in England, it found admirers among the people,
and even within the walls of that parliament whose injustice
formed the only real grievance that Virginia had at present
to complain of. Though Bacon had purposely omitted to
remind his adherents that the conduct of the Indian war was
the object for which they had originally entrusted him with
the command, it was to this measure that his first exertions
were actually directed. To redeem his promise, and to exer
cise his troops, he marched at the head of an expedition
against the hostile savages, who, rashly awaiting a general
engagement, were defeated with a loss which they were never
able to repair.
Sir William Berkeley, in the mean time, having collected a
force from levies among the planters who remained well
affected to him, and from the crews of the English shipping
on the coasts, commenced a series of attacks on the forces of
the usurper; and several sharp encounters ensued between the
parties with various success. All the horrors of civil war
descended on the colony. James-Town, which already con
tained several elegant buildings, erected at great expense by
the governor and the more opulent planters, was reduced to
ashes by the insurgents, at the command of Bacon, who
judged it a station which he could not safely retain: the
estates of the loyalists were pillaged, their friends and relatives
seized as hostages, and the richest plantations in the province
laid waste. The governor was prompted by his indignation,
as well as by the rage of his partizans, to retaliate these
extremities, and even to execute some of the insuro-ents by
martial law; and the animosity of both parties was rapidly
mounting to a pitch that threatened a war of mutual exter
mination. The superiority of the insurgent force had hitherto
confined the efforts of the loyalists in the field to mere skir
mishing engagements; but the tidings of an approaching ar-

NORTH AMERICA. 123
mament, which the king had despatched from England under chap.
Sir John Berry, to the assistance of the governor, gave pro- ' ! ''

mise of a wider range of carnage and desolation. Charles 1676.
had issued a proclamation, declaring Bacon a traitor and the October.
sole promoter of the insurrection ; tendering pardon to all his
followers who should forsake him, and freedom to all slaves
who would assist in suppressing the revolt. However elated
the loyalists might be with the intelligence of the approaching
succour, the leader of the insurgents was no way dismayed by
it; and his influence over his followers was unbounded.
Conscious now that his power and his life were indissolubly
connected, he determined to encounter whatever force might
be sent against him. He was aware, at the same time, of the
importance of striking a decisive blow while the advantage of
numbers remained with him ; and with this view, having
enlarged his resources by proclaiming a general forfeiture of
the property of all who either opposed his pretensions or even
affected neutrality, he was preparing to take the field, when
his career was arrested by that Power which can wither in an
instant the sinews of abused strength, and arrest the uplifted
arm of the most formidable destroyer. Happily fpr his Death of
country, and to the manifest advantage not less of his fol- ?ae<m™
lowers than his adversaries, Bacon unexpectedly sickened and
died. The ascendancy with which this remarkable person had
predominated, as the master-spirit of his party, was illustrated
by the effect of his death on their sentiments and conduct.
The bands of their confederacy seemed to be cut asunder by
the loss of their general, nor did any successor even attempt
to re-unite them : and their sanguine hopes and resolute
adherence to Bacon, were succeeded by mutual distrust and
universal despondency. Ingram, who had been lieutenant-
general, and Walklate, who had been major-general of the
insurgent forces, showed some disposition to prolong the
struggle by maintaining possession of a strong-hold which had
been occupied by their party : but after a short treaty with
Sir William Berkeley they consented to surrender it, on con
dition of receiving a pardon for their offences. The other
detachments ofthe rebel army finding themselves broken and

124 THE HISTORY OF
book disunited, afraid to protract a desperate enterprise, and hoping
, perhaps to be included in the indemnity granted to Walklate

16?7. and Ingram, or at least to experience equal lenity, laid down
nation of their arms and submitted to the governor. Thus suddenly
tranquil- atlfj providentially was dissipated a tempest that seemed to
portend the entire ruin of Virginia. From the man whose
evil genius excited and directed its fury, this insurrection has
been distinguished by the name of Bacon's Rebellion. It
placed the colony for seven months in the power of that daring
usurper, involved the inhabitants during all that period in
bloodshed and confusion, and was productive of a devastation
of property to the extent of at least a hundred thousand
pounds.1 To the mother country it conveyed a lesson which
she appears never to have understood till the loss of her
colonies illustrated its meaning, and the consequence of dis
regarding it. For, after every allowance for the ability and
artifice of Bacon, it was manifest that his influence had been
originally derived from the general discontent and irritation
occasioned by the commercial restrictions; and it required
little sagacity to foresee that these sentiments would be ren
dered more inveterate and more formidable by the growth of
the province, and by the increased connexion and sympathy
with the other colonial settlements, which the lapse of time
and the habitual consciousness of common interests and grie
vances would infallibly promote. Had Bacon been a more
honest and disinterested leader, this lesson would perhaps
have been more distinctly unfolded, and the rebellion, it is
probable, would not have ended with himself. But, instead
of sincerely embracing the cause of his associates, he contrived
to render their passions instrumental to his own ambitious
views. The assertors of the interests of Virginia were thus
converted into the partizans of an individual; and when his
presence and influence were withdrawn, they perceived at
1 Beverley. Oldmixon. Modern Universal History, xli. Sir William Keith's
History of Virginia. Chalmers. Burk. Campbell. Mrs. Afra Behn celebrated
this rebellion in a tragi- comedy, entitled " The Widow Ranter, or the History of
Bacon in Virginia," to which Dryden wrote a prologue. The play was acted un
successfully, and afterwards published in 1690. There is a copy of it in the British
Museum. It sets historical truth entirely and avowedly at defiance. It is replete
with coarse humour and indelicate wit.

NORTH AMERICA. 125
once that they were embarked in a contest which to them- CHAP.
selves had neither interest nor object. '
No sooner were the insurgents disbanded, and the legiti- 1677.
mate government restored, than Sir William Berkeley pro
ceeded to assert the vindictive powers of the law with a rigour
more proportioned to the guilt of the rebels and the provoca
tion he had received from them, than akin to the general
humanity of his character and the lenity which he had ex
tended to the promoters of former insurrections. But the
recent rebellion had produced a scene of outrage and blood
shed to which nothing similar had occurred in the preceding
commotions, and which he probably regarded as the reproach
and requital of his lenity on those occasions. Refusing to
publish the royal proclamation which he now received from
England, offering pardon to all who would lay down their
arms, he caused several of the rebels who were not included
in his treaty with Walklate and Ingram to be brought to trial
for treason. All of these who confessed their guilt and im
plored mercy seem to have been exempted from the extremity
of legal rigour ; but of others who abided the issue of a trial,
ten were convicted and executed. The number ofthe guilty,
which at first had seemed to betoken their security, served
now to aggravate and diffuse the terror of these proceedings,
which were at length interrupted by an address from the pro
vincial assembly beseeching the governor to forbear from the
farther infliction of capital punishment. By this assembly
a few of the surviving ringleaders of the insurrection were
subjected to fines and disabilities, and Bacon, together with
certain of his officers who had perished in the contest, were
attainted. An attainder of the dead seems an arrogant at- Bill of at
tempt of human power to extend its arm beyond the scene of tainder
human life, to invade with its vengeance the inviolable sane- thecolo-
tuary of the grave, and to reclaim to the jurisdiction of ?jal
transient authority and fallible judgment the defenceless
being and supposed offender, who has already been removed
by the act of Sovereign Power to abide the decree of its
eternal and unerring justice. In England this measure
was regarded as an act of sovereignty beyond the competence
of a subordinate legislature, and held to be void from defect
of power ; but this objection was obviated, and the attainder

assem
bly.

12(3 THE HISTORY OF
book subsequently re-enacted, by passing a bill to the same effect,
Ij which had been framed in England, and transmitted under
1677. the great seal to the colonial assembly.1
The tardy aid which had been despatched from England to
the defence of the provincial government, did not reach Vir
ginia till after the rebellion had been suppressed. With the
April, fleet, arrived Colonel Jefferys, appointed by the king to
signify the recall and succeed to the office of Sir William
Sir Wil- Berkeley, who now closed in peace an administration of nearly
ham Ber- forty years : anfj shortly after, closing his life, may be said to
perseded have died in the service of Virginia. This gallant and honour-
by Colonel ^jg man wag jnug Spare(i tb.e mortification of beholding the
injustice and impolicy with which the royal authority was
soon after employed to blacken his fame, and to weaken all
those sentiments of loyalty in the colony which it had been
the great object of his wishes to cultivate and cherish. En
tertaining all the principles of an old cavalier ; endowed with
a character well formed to recommend his principles; and
presiding in a colony where the prevailing sentiments of the
people were for a long time entirely congenial with his own,
he had hoped to render Virginia a scene where the loyalty
that was languishing in Europe might be renovated by trans
migration into a young and growing body politic, and expand
to a new and more vigorous maturity. But this was not the
destination of the provinces of America. The naked repub
lican principle that substitutes the respect and approbation of
citizens toward their magistrate, in place ofthe reverence and
1 Abridgment of the Laws of Virginia. Oldmixon. Keith. Chalmers. Burk.
Campbell. The account which I have given of the penal proceedings which fol
lowed the suppression of the rebellion, is derived from a strict examination and com
parison of the statements of these and other writers, and coincides entirely with none
of them. Except Burk, and Campbell (who merely repeats without vouching for
the statements of Burk) every other writer has declaied that Sir William Berkeley
punished none of the rebels capitally, and ascribed this forbearance to his having
procured their surrender by a promise of general pardon. Burk expressly asserts
thatBeikeley gave such assurance to the rebels, and charges him with having vio
lated it both by the executions which I have related, and by others inflicted by the
more summary process of martial-law. But an attentive examination of the docu
ments to which he refers, has satisfied me that there is no credible evidence of any
person having been put to death by martial-law, except during the subsistence ofthe
rebellion, or of any promise of pardon having been made to those who were tried and
convicted after its suppression. Neither the colonial assembly, in their address
against further capital punishments, nor the royal commissioners in their charges
against the governor, have given any countenance to the suppositions adopted by

NORTH AMERICA- 127
attachment of subjects to their sovereign, was held by all the CHAP.
cavaliers in utter abhorrence ; and a more favourable specimen II1-
of the opposite principle which they embraced, and of that 1677.
mixed system of opinion and sentiment which it tended to
produce, will not easily be found than in the character and
conduct of Sir William Berkeley. The courageous regard he
demonstrated for the people, not only excited their grateful
admiration, but recommended to their esteem the generous
devotion to his king with which it was in his language and
demeanour inseparably blended. When the hopes of the
royalists were extinguished in every other quarter of the
empire, this governor of an infant province boldly arrayed his
scanty forces on the banks of James River, in defence of his
people and his principles, against the victorious arms of the
most formidable power in Europe : and afterwards emerging
from retirement, and seconding the popular impulse, he again
braved the same unequal contest, and, disowning the au
thority, defied the forces of the protectoral government. For
many years his influence in Virginia was unbounded, and his
virtues seemed to expand with the growth and the enjoyment
of his popularity. But in the close of his administration,
when he saw the efficacy of these virtues impaired, his long
labours defeated, and the scene of all his loyal and disinte
rested services gradually pervaded by discontent and demo
cratical sentiment, and finally defaced and convulsed by
rebellion, — his disposition seemed to derive a tincture from
the bitterness of disappointment, and his conduct, both
during the continuance and after the suppression of Bacon's
rebellion, has been reproached with splenetic impatience and
vindictive severity. In happier times, he had approved himself
a wise legislator, as well as a benevolent and upright magis
trate; and we are informed by the editor of the Laws of
Virginia, that the most judicious and most popular of them
were suggested by Sir William Berkeley. When his death
was known, and he was no longer an object of flattery
or of fear, the assembly recorded the sentiments which the
colony entertained of his conduct in the grateful declaration,
" that he had been an excellent and well deserving governor;"
and earnestly recommended his widow to the justice and ge-

128

THE HISTORY OF

BOOK nerosity of the king.1 The bosom of the king, however, was
*¦ totally inaccessible to such sentiments ; and his reign was
1677. calculated to dispel instead of confirming the impressions of
cavalier loyalty.
The most remarkable event that distinguished the govern
ment of Colonel Jefferys was the conclusion of the Indian war,
which had raged so long, and contributed, with other causes,
to the production of the late rebellion, by a treaty which gave
universal satisfaction. This too was the only act of his ad
ministration that was attended with consequences so agree
able. Jefferys, together with Sir John Berry and Colonel
Moryson, had been appointed commissioners to investigate,
Partiality and report, the causes of Bacon's rebellion. They commenced
Bovernm6" (;ne'r in(luiries Wltn an avowed prepossession in favour of the
insurgents, and conducted them with the most indecent parti
ality. The temptation which their office presented to magnify
the importance of their labours, by new and unexpected dis
coveries, and to prove, by arraignment of the late administra
tion, that they had not been appointed its censors in vain, co
operated, no doubt, to produce the malevolence and injustice
which they displayed in a degree that would otherwise seem
quite unaccountable. Instead of indemnifying, or even ap
plauding, they discountenanced the loyalists who had rallied
in the time of danger around the provincial government ; and,
having invited all persons who had been engaged in the insur
rection to come forward and state their grievances without
fear, and unequivocally demonstrated the favourable accept
ance which such representations might expect, they suc
ceeded in collecting a mass of confused and passionate
complaints, which they digested into a report fraught with
crimination of Sir William Berkeley and his council, and
with insinuations against the honesty and the courage of all
the planters who had united with the governor in withstand
ing the rebels.2 While their folly or malignity thus tended to
1 Chalmers. Preface to Moryson's Edition of the Laws of Virginia. Life of Sir
William Berkeley.
2 The memory of Sir William Berkeley was defended against the misrepresenta
tions of the commissioners, by his brother Lord Berkeley (Chalmers), and his fame
suffered no diminution from their report. Burk, who has evidently conceived a
strong prejudice against Berkeley, expresses a different opinion. He asserts

NORTH AMERICA. 129
rekindle the dissensions of the colonists, their intemperance CHAP.
involved them in a dispute that united all parties against  ;__
themselves. Finding that the Assembly hesitated to comply 1677.
with a requisition they addressed to it, that all its books and wj'tsf "hg
journals should be submitted to their inspection, they seized assembly.
these records by force, and withdrew them from the clerk who
was entrusted with their custody. Incensed at this insult,
the assembly demanded satisfaction from Jefferys ; and when
he appealed to the authority of the great seal of England,
under which the commissioners acted, they declared to him,
in language worthy of the descendants of Englishmen and the
parents of Americans, " that such a breach of privilege could October.
not be commanded under the great seal, because they could
not find that any king of England had ever done so in former
times." The spirit thus displayed by the assembly appears the
more deserving of applause, when we consider that a body of
regular troops, the first that had ever been sent to Virginia,
were now stationed in the colony under the command of Sir
John Berry. Informed of this proceeding, the king, in strains
that rival the arrogance of his father and grandfather, com
manded the' governor " to signify his Majesty's indignation at
language so seditious, and to give the leaders marks of the
royal displeasure." Berry and Moryson soon after returned to
England, leaving the colony in a state of ferment, and all
parties disgusted, and disappointed.
To the other causes of discontent, was added the burden of Renewal
supporting the soldiery, who, receiving no remittances of pay
from England, indemnified themselves by their extortions
from the planters. The impatience created by this treatment,
however, was mitigated by the mild and prudent demeanour
that Berkeley, on his return to England, found that his conduct was disapproved by
the king. But Oldmixon, whose authority on a point like this, is entitled to the
highest respect, declares that Berkeley before his death received an assurance of
the esteem and approbation of his sovereign.
During the disputes that preceded the war of independence, it was common for the
writers who espoused the cause of America to aggravate the blame of the British
government by exaggerating the previous loyally ofthe Americans. But this repre
sentation has ceased to please in America : and some of her late writers have prefer
ably devoted their labour and ingenuity to the illustration of the antiquity of her re
publican spirit. Burk, in particular, has magnified beyond their due importance the
first manifestations of discontent and democratical feeling in Virginia ; and for the
credit both of his representations and of his countrymen, has eagerly adopted every
factious charge and injurious supposition with respect to Sir William Berkeley.
VOL. t. K

of discon
tents.

130 THE HISTORY OF
bo 0 K of an aged officer and venerable man, Sir Henry Chicheley, to
__^  whom, as lieutenant-governor, the administration devolved on
1678. the death of Jefferys : and as, during his presidency, some of
the large and improvident donations of land by the crown that
had been so much complained of were revoked, and certain
other grievances corrected, a short gleam of prosperity was
shed on the colony, and an interval of comparative repose gave
the people time to breathe before the resumption of tyranny
with a violence which was to endure till the British revo
lution.1
Lord Cul- It was not to the intentions of the king that the colonists
pepper ap- were infjeDted for the lenient administration of Sir Henry
pointed , J
governor— Chicheley. Charles had some time before conferred the go
vernment on Lord Culpepper, who, though very willing to
accept the important office, showed so little readiness to per
form the duties of it, that it was not till he had been repri
manded by the king for his neglect, that he made his voyage
May, to Virginia. His administration was conducted with the same
1680severity arbitrary spirit that the royal government had now begun to
and rapa- indulge without control in the mother country. Having
adminis- wrested from the assembly the nomination of its own most
tration. confidential officer, the secretary who kept its journals ; having
abolished the power it had hitherto exercised of entertaining
appeals from the decisions of the provincial judicatories;
having accumulated a considerable sum of money by official
pillage; and having guarded his tyranny from complaint by a
law that prohibited, under the severest penalties, all disre
spectful speeches against the governor or his administration, —
August, he returned, after a very short stay in Virginia, to dissipate
the spoils of the province in the luxuries of England. Yet on
this ignoble lord did the king confer the commission of go
vernor for life, and a salary twice as large as the emoluments
of Sir William Berkeley. The irritation which his proceedings
had created, sharpened the sense of the hardships which the
colonists were now enduring from the depressed price of to-
May, bacco; and at length the public impatience exploded in a
An ?nsur- tumuituary attempt to destroy all the new tobacco planta-
rection— tions that threatened to increase the depression of price by
1 Chalmers.

NORTH AMERICA. 131
multiplying still farther the quantities of produce. The in- c H A P.
surrection might have proceeded to very serious extremities, if •
the prudence and vigour of Sir Henry Chicheley had not again 1682.
been exerted to compose the public discontent, and restore the
peace of the colony. To any mind influenced by liberal
justice, or susceptible of humane impressions, this slight and
short-lived insurrection was strongly recommended to an in
dulgent consideration. It was but a momentary expression of
popular impatience created by undoubted suffering: and the
earnest, though ineffectual addresses by which the assembly
had recently solicited from the king a prohibition of the in
crease of tobacco plantations, had both suggested and seemed
to sanction the object to which the violence of the rioters was
directed. But to the king it appeared in the light of an out
rage to his dignity, which imperiously demanded a severe vin
dictive retribution ; and Lord Culpepper, again obeying the
royal mandate to proceed to Virginia, caused a number of the
insurgents to be tried for high treason ; and by a series of punish-
bloody executions diffused that mute terror which tyrants de- m™rgents,
nominate tranquillity. Having thus enforced a submission,
not more propitious to the colony than the ferment which had
attended his former departure, Lord Culpepper again set sail
for England, where he was immediately ordered into confine
ment for returning without leave; and on a charge of mis
appropriating the provincial revenues, was shortly after
arraigned before a jury, and in consequence of their verdict
deprived of his commission.1
In displacing this nobleman, it was tbe injury done to him- Arbitrary
self, and not the wrongs of the colony, that Charles intended measures
to redress. The last exertion of his royal authority, which crown.
Virginia experienced, was the appointment of a successor to
Culpepper, in Lord Effingham, whose character was very little, August,
if at all superior, and whom, among other instructions, the 1683"
king expressly commanded to suffer no person within the
colony to make use of a printing press on any occasion or
pretence whatsoever. Along with the new governor was sent
a frigate, which was appointed to be stationed on the coast
with the view of compelling a stricter execution of thenaviga-
1 Beverley. Chalmers.
k2

132 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK tion act than this obnoxious measure had yet been able to.
obtain.1
Feb. 1685. On the death of Charles the Second, his successor, James,
James the was proclaimed in Virginia with demonstrations of joy, indi-
— eating less the attachment of the colonists to the person of
their new sovereign, than that impatient hope with which
men, under the pressure of extreme hardship and annoyance,
are ready to hail any change in their prospects or situation.
Acclamation far more warmly expressive of hope and joy had
attended the commencement of the preceding reign ; and if
the hopes that were entertained on the present occasion were
more moderate, they were not on that account the less fal-
auo-ments lacious. The colonists soon learned with regret, that in his
the bur- nrst parliament, James had procured the imposition of a tax
colonists, on the consumption of tobacco in England ; and in imploring
the suspension of this tax, which threatened still farther to
obstruct the sale of the only vendible production of their soil,
they descended to an abjectness of entreaty which produced
no other effect than to embitter their disappointment with the
consciousness of unavailing degradation. Though the as
sembly judged it expedient to present an address of felicita
tion lo the king on the defeat of Monmouth's invasion of
England, the colonists found an opportunity of indulging very
different sentiments on that occasion in the kindness with
which they treated some of the insurgents whom James, from
a satiety of bloodshed, which he termed the plenitude of royal
mercy, appointed to be transported to the American planta
tions ; and even the assembly paid no regard to the significa
tion of the royal desire that they should frame a law to
prevent these unfortunate persons from redeeming themselves
from the servitude to which they had been consigned. This
conduct, however, of the colonists and their assembly, in so
far as it was not prompted by simple humanity, expressed
merely their dissatisfaction with the king's treatment of them
selves, and denoted no participation of their wishes or views
in the designs of Monmouth. The general discontent was in
creased by the personal character of the governor, through
whom the rays of royal influence were transmitted. Lord
1 Chalmers.

NORTH AMERICA. 133
Effingham, like his predecessor, engrafted the baseness of a C HA P
sordid disposition on the severity of an arbitrary and tyran

nical administration. He refused to convoke the provincial 1685—8.
assembly. He instituted a court of chancery, in which he any"£.
himself presided as judge; and, besides multiplying and en- pressive
hancing the fees attached to his own peculiar functions, he ^["f
condescended to share with clerks the meaner perquisites of Lord
1 -a xi_ Effingham.
subordinate office. For some time he contrived to stitte the
remonstrances which his extortions produced, bythe infliction
of arbitrary imprisonment and other tyrannical severities : but,
at length, the public displeasure became so general and un
controllable, that he found it impossible to prevent the com
plaints of the colony from being carried to England, — for
which country he in consequence resolved himself to embark,
in order to be present at his own arraignment. He was ac- 1688.
companied by Colonel Ludwell, whom the assembly had
appointed their agent to advocate the complaints of his
conduct and urge his removal from office.1
But before the governor and his accuser arrived in England, Revolution
the revolution which the tyranny of James provoked in that™
country, had transferred the allegiance of all parties to new
sovereigns. The Virginians, though they readily acquiesced
in the change, appear to have surveyed with very little emo
tion, an event which coincided with none of their anticipa
tions, and to the production of which their concurrence had
never been demanded. Whatever might be its remoter conse
quences, its immediate effect was forcibly to remind them of
their own insignificance, as the appendage of a distant em
pire, whose political changes they were fated to follow, but
unable • to control. The most deep-seated and lasting griev
ances under which they laboured, having proceeded from the
English nation and parliament, were such as the present event
gave no promise of alleviating. Their immediate complaints
were to be submitted to sovereigns of whom they knew abso
lutely nothing ; and their late experience had diminished their
trust in princes, and discouraged hopes of advantage from
changes of royalty. The coolness, then, with which the Vir
ginians are said to have regarded the great event of the
1 Beverley. Oldmixon. Chalmers.

134 THE HISTORY OF
book English revolution, so far from implying that their minds
*• were not touched with a concern for freedom, may, with much

1688. greater probability, be referred to the ardour with which they
cherished this generous principle, and the deliberate reflection
which they combined with it. l In some respects, too the
policy of the new government that had arisen in the parent
state was but ill formed to convey to them more satisfactory im
pressions of the change that had taken place, or to induce
their sympathy with the feelings of that portion of their fellow-
Com. subjects by whose exertions it had been accomplished. Not-
piaints of withstanding the representations of Colonel Ludwell (who
nies himself was gratified with the appointment of governor of
against the Carolina), King William, disinclined, and perhaps unable to
governors dismiss those officers of his predecessor, who were willing to
discou- transfer their personal adherence and official service to him-
TflP'Pn. nv
King self, continued Lord Effingham in the government of Vir-
Wiiham. ginia. This nobleman, however, did not again return to the
province, and as long as his commission was suffered to en
dure, the administration was conducted by a deputy governor.
1692. He was removed in the year 1692, and replaced by a successor
still more obnoxious to the colonists, Sir Edmund Andros, whose
tyrannical conduct, prior to the revolution, in the government
of other American provinces, more justly merited the brand of
legal punishment and disgrace than continuance of official
trust and dignity. If such appointments remind us that the
English ministry was still composed of many of the persons
who had dispensed patronage in the preceding reigns, they
may also in part be accounted for by other considerations.
Of the officers who were thus undeservedly retained, some
pretended to great local experience and official ability. This
was, particularly, the case of Sir Edmund Andros, whose ad
ministration eventually proved highly beneficial to Virginia.
And they excused the arbitrary proceedings which they had
conducted in the former reigns, by pleading the authority of
the sovereign whose commands they had obeyed — a plea
which always finds favour with a king, when not opposed to

1 Colonel Quarry's Memorial to the Lords of Trade in the year 1703, on the state
of the American provinces, represents the Virginian planters as a numerous and
wealthy race, strongly cmbued with "republican notions and principles."

NORTH AMERICA. 135
wrongs which he deems personal to himself. Besides^ the CHAP.
complaints of the colonists were not always accurate: for  '___
anger is a more copious than discriminating accuser. Justice 1692.
suffered, as usual, from the defect of temper and moderation
with which it was invoked ; and the guilty artfully availed
themselves of the inconsiderate passion by which their ac
cusers were transported, in order to defeat or discredit the
charges which they preferred. The insolence and severity,
for example, that had pervaded the whole of Lord Effingham's
government, had elicited many complaints, in which the ac
cusers either neglected or were unable to discriminate between
the legality of official acts, and the tyrannical demeanour or
malignant motives of the party by whom they had been per
formed. Accordingly, while some of the remonstrances which
the Virginians transmitted to England by Colonel Ludwell
were favourably received and approved by the British govern
ment, there were others that produced only explanations, by
which the Assembly was given to understand that it had mis
taken certain points of English constitutional law. 1 In the
infancy of a free state, collisions and disputes not unfrej
quently arise from conflicting pretensions of different but co
ordinate branches of its municipal constitution, before time
has given consistence to the whole structure, and those rela
tive limits which reason finds it difficult to assign to the re
spective parts, have been determined by the convenience of
practice and the authority of precedent.
The revolution of the British government, both in its Effect of
immediate and its remote operation, was attended with con- Ushre'voiu-
sequences highly beneficial to Virginia, in common with all tion °.n tne
the existing states of America. Under the patronage, and by coiomes.
the pecuniary aid, of William and Mary, the college which
had been projected in the reign of James the First was estab
lished.2 The political institutions under which the manly
1 Beverley. Chalmers. One of the grievances complained of by the assembly
of Virginia was, that Lord Effingham having, by a proclamation, declared the royal
dissent to an act of assembly which repealed a former law, gave notice that this law was
now in force. This was erroneously deemed by the assembly an act pf legislation.
2 Beverley. Seymour, the English Attorney-General, having received the royal
commands to prepare the charter of the college, which was to be accompanied with
a grant of 2,O0OJ., remonstrated against this liberality, urging that the nation was
engaged in an expensive war, that the money was wanted for better purposes, and
that he did not see the slightest occasion for a college in Virginia. Blair (the com
missary for the Bishop of London in Virginia) represented to him that its intention

136

THE HISTORY OF

BOOK character of Englishmen is formed, had already been planted
I- in the soil to which so large a portion of their race had mi-
1692. grated : the literary and religious institutions, by which that
character is refined and elevated, were now, in like manner,
transported to Virginia ; and a fountain opened within her
own territory, which promised to dispense to her children
the streams of science, physical, moral, and religious.
But the most important and decisive influence which the
British revolution exercised on the condition of the colonies,
consisted in the abridgment and almost entire abolition of
their dependence on the personal character of the king. A
conservative principle was infused by that great event into
the main trunk of the British constitution in England, and
into all the filial shoots that had issued from the parent stem,
and sprung up in the settlements abroad. The continuity of ex
istence and supremacy of power which the parliament acquired
in Britain, extended tbe constitutional superintendence of this
national assembly to every subordinate organ of popular rights ;
and if it oppressed the trade, it protected the chartered liberties
ofthe provinces of America. The king still continued to ap
point the governors of Virginia and of some of the other settle
ments; and men of sordid dispositions and of feeble or pro
fligate character were frequently the objects of this branch of
the royal patronage. But the powers of these officers were
contracted and defined ; and the authority of the provincial
assemblies was able to restrain, and even overawe, the most
vigorous administration ofthe executive functionaries. What
ever evil influence a wicked or artful governor mio-ht exert on
the domestic harmony of the people, or on their opinions of
the royal prerogative which he administered, he could commit
no serious inroad on the constitution of the province over
which he presided. From this period a tolerably equal and
impartial policy distinguished the British dominion over the
American provinces : the diminution ofthe personal. influence
of the sovereign effaced in a great degree the inequalities of
treatment previously occasioned by the different degrees of
was to educate and qualify young men to be ministers of the Gospel, and be-ged
Mr. Attorney would consider that the people of Virginia had souls to be saved as Veil
as the people of England. " Souls ! (said he) damn your souls ! make tobacco."—
Franklin's Correspondence.

NORTH AMERICA. 137
favour with which he might happen to regard the religious CHAP.

HI.

or political sentiments of the inhabitants of the respective
states; and consequently extinguished, or at least greatly 1692.
abated, the jealousies which the several colonial communities
had hitherto entertained of each other. A farther abatement
of these mutual jealousies was produced by the religious tole
ration which the provincial governments were henceforward
compelled to observe. Even when intolerant statutes were
permitted to subsist, their execution was generally disallowed ;
and the principles cherished in one province could no longer
be persecuted in another.
We must now transfer our inquiry to the rise of the other
colonies in North America which were founded antecedently
to the British Revolution, and trace their separate progress
till that era. But before our undivided attention be with
drawn from this, the earliest of the settlements, it seems pro
per to subjoin a few particulars of its civil and domestic con
dition at the period at which we have now arrived.
Notwithstanding the unfavourable circumstances to which St_ateof
the colony had been exposed in a greater or less degree ever at t h is
since the Restoration, the number of its inhabitants had con- period—
tinued to increase. The deputies that were sent to Charles _iaWs—
the Second in 1675, represented the population as amounting, manners-
at that time, to 50,000 persons.1 If their statement were not
exaggerated (as it probably was) we must suppose that
Bacon's rebellion, and the subsequent tyranny, gave a very
severe check to this rapid increase; for there is no reason to
suppose that the colony contained a much greater number
than 50,000 at the Revolution of 1688. From a table ap
pended to the first edition of Beverley's History, it appears,
that, in 1703, the population of Virginia (exclusive of 800
French refugees conveyed thither by King William) amounted
to 60,606 souls. Of this number, 20,023 were titheables (a
denomination implying liability to a poll tax, and embracing
all white men above the age of sixteen, and all negro slaves,
male and female, above that age), and 35,583 children of both
races, and white women. The most intelligent and accom
plished of the modern historians of Virginia has conjectured
1 Chalmers.

138

THE HISTORY OF

BOOK, that at the period of the British Revolution, one half of the
L  population of the province consisted of slaves.1 Many circum
stances contributed to give free scope to the increase ofthe
provincial population, and to counterbalace the influence of
commercial restraint and despotic government. The health-
fulness of the settlement had greatly improved ; and the
diminution of disease not only closed a drain from which the
population had severely suffered, but rendered the general
strength more available to the general support. The use of to
bacco now prevailed extensively in Europe ; and the diminution
of its price was in some degree compensated by the increased
demand for the commodity. In 1671, it was computed, that,
on an average, 80 vessels came annually from England and
Ireland to Virginia for tobacco. In 1675 there were exported
from Virginia above 23,000 hogsheads of tobacco, and in the
following year upwards of 25,000. Tn this latter year the
customs on tobacco from Virginia and Maryland, collected in
England, amounted to 135.000Z.2 Sir William Berkeley rates
the number of the militia, in the year 1671, at nearly 8000,
and adds, that the people were too poor to afford the equip
ment of cavalry. In the year 1680 the militia amounted to
8568, of whom 1300 served as cavalry.3 Our estimate,
however, of the increased wealth which the cavalry establish^
ment seems to indicate, must be abated by the consideration
ofthe increased exertions which the Indian war and Bacon's
rebellion had rendered necessary. In the year 1703, we
learn from Beverley, that the militia amounted to 9522, of
whom 2363 were light horse, and the remainder foot and dra
goons ; and that, as few of the planters were then destitute of
horses, it was considered that the greater part of them might,
if necessary, be converted into dragoons.4 Every freeman (a
denomination embracing all the inhabitants except the slaves
and the indented servants) from sixteen to sixty years of age,
was enrolled in the militia ; and as the people were much
accustomed to shoot in the woods, they were universally
expert in the use of fire-arms.5 The militia was commanded
1 Beverley. Burk.
2 Chalmeis. Tn the year 1604 the whole customs of England amounted only to
127,000/., of which 110,000/. was collected in the port of London. — Hume.
3 Chalmers. * Beverley. s Beverley, (edit. 1722.)

NORTH AMERICA. 139
by the governor, whose salary was 1000/. a-year, till the ap- c H A P.
pointment of Lord Culpepper, who, on the plea of peerage, IIL
procured it to be doubled.1
The twelve provincial councillors, as well as the governor,
were appointed by the king ; and a salary of 350/., assigned to
the council, was divided in proportion to the public services
which the members respectively performed. In all matters of
importance, the concurrence of the council with the governor
was indispensably requisite. The provincial Assembly was
composed of the councillors, who termed themselves the Upper
House, and exercised the privileges of the English House of
Lords ; and the burgesses, who were elected by the freemen of
the respective counties, and performed the functions of the
House of Commons, receiving wages proportioned to their ser
vices, and derived, like all the other provincial salaries, from
provincial taxation. A poll tax long continued to be the only
domestic tribute imposed on the Virginians : and the payment
of this tax conferred the qualification of a freeman. The
poorer classes were reconciled to the poll tax by this identifi
cation of its burden with the enjoyment of the political fran
chise, and by the specious application of a maxim which
became current in the colony, that the lives and industry of the
citizens were objects of greater value than lands and houses.
Until the year 1680, the several branches of the assembly had
collectively formed one deliberative body ; but in that year the
councillors separated themselves from the burgesses, and as
sumed a distinct political existence. In conjunction with the
governor, the councillors formed the supreme tribunal of the
province ; from whose judgments, however, in all cases involv
ing more than 300/., an appeal was permitted to the king and
privy council of England. In 1681, the province contained
twenty counties ; in 1703 it contained twenty-five. A quit
rent of two shillings for every hundred acres of land was paid
by the planters to the crown.2
In the year 1688, the province contained forty-eight pa
rishes, embracing upwards of 200,000 acres of appropriated
land. A church was built in every parish, and a house and
glebe assigned to the clergyman, along with a stipend, which
1 Beverley. - Ibid. Chalmers. Burk.

140 THE HISTORY OF
book was fixed by law at 16,000 pounds of tobacco. This mode of
remuneration obviously tends to give a secular cast to the life
and character of the ministers, and to entangle them with con
cerns remote from their spiritual duties. The equalization
which it proposes is quite fallacious ; the different degrees of
fertility of different parishes rendering the burden unequal to
the people, and the very different quality of the tobacco pro
duced in different soils, making the remuneration unequal to
the clergy. The presentation to the livings, prior to the Bri
tish Revolution, belonged to the governor, but was generally
usurped or controlled by the parishioners. After the revolu
tion it devolved into the hands of parochial vestries, which,
though originally elected by the people, came, in process of
time, to exercise the power of supplying vacancies in their
numbers by their own appointment. The bishop of London
was accounted the diocesan of the province ; and a resident
commissary (generally a member of the council) appointed by
that prelate, presided over the clergy, with the power of con
voking, censuring, and even suspending them from the exer
cise of their ministry. The doctrines and rites of the church
of England were established by law ; attendance of divine wor
ship at the parochial churches, and the celebration of the
sacraments of the church, were enjoined under heavy penal
ties ; the preaching of dissenters, and participation in the
rites and worship of dissenting congregations, were prohibited,
and subjected to various degrees of punishment. There was
one bloody law, which menaced quakers returning from ba
nishment with the punishment of death ; but no execution
ever took place in consequence of this enactment; and it was
repealed soon after the Revolution of 1688. The other into
lerant laws were not then repealed, but they were no longer
strictly or uniformly executed ; and though the statute-book
continued to prohibit the preaching and practices of dissen
ters, the prohibition was little regarded, and liberty of consci
ence considerably realized. In 1688, a great majority of the
people belonged to the established church. Other opinions
and practices, however, began to arise, and were doubtless
promoted by the influence of the free schools, of which a great
many were founded and endowed soon after that period ; and
the provincial government being restrained from executing the

NORTH AMERICA. 141
intolerant laws against dissenters, endeavoured to cherish the chap,
state ecclesiastical establishment by heaping temporal advan- IIL
tages upon its ministers. This policy produced its usual
fruits, and generated so much indolence, vice, and incapacity
among the state clergy, that at the era of the American revo
lution two-thirds of the inhabitants of Virginia had become
dissenters, and were obnoxious, on that account, to the ban of
their own municipal law.1
Of every just and humane system of laws, one main object
should be to protect the weak against the strong, and to
correct instead of confirming and perpetuating the inequalities
of condition created from time to time by inequalities of
strength, skill, success, or industry. This wise and benevo
lent principle must be sacrificed, to a considerable extent, in
the code of every country where slavery is admitted. By the
laws of Virginia, all persons brought into the colony by sea or
land, not having been christians in their native country, were
subjected to slavery, even though they might be converted to
Christianity after their arrival. A slave committing a capital
crime was appointed to be tried by commissioners named by
the governor, without the intervention of a jury ; and if the
punishment of death were inflicted, indemnification to the
extent of the pecuniary value of the slave was awarded from
the provincial treasury to the master. This last regulation
has prevailed in every state where negro slavery has been
admitted; notwithstanding its manifest tendency to injure
the public by relaxing the domestic vigilance of masters, and
its injustice to the slaves in weakening the slight but sole
security of humane treatment which they derive from the
pecuniary interest of their masters in the preservation of their
lives. In the year 1669, it was enacted that the death of a
slave occasioned by the correction of a master should not be
accounted felony; "since it cannot be presumed," says the
act, "that prepensed malice, which alone makes murder
• Abridgment of the Laws of Virginia. Beverley. Burnaby's Travels through
the Middle Settlements of America. Chalmers. Jefferson's Notes on Virginia.
From the journal of Thomas Chalkley, the Quaker, it appears that a good many of
his fellow sectaries were peaceably and happily established in Virginia before the end
of the seventeenth century. Among these, he mentions one Porter, who (in the
year 1698), at the age of 92, had a daughter two years old. Porter died at the age
of 107, full of clays, wisdom and piety, leaving seventy descendants in the province.

142 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK felony, should induce any man to destroy his own estate."
' But reason and experience alike refute this pernicious so
phistry, which ascribes to absolute power a tendency to
repress human irascibility, and accounts avarice and selfish
ness sufficient motives and pledges of justice, humanity, and
liberality. Neither infidels nor negroes, mulattoes nor Indians,
were allowed to purchase christian white servants; and if
any person having christian white servants, should marry an
infidel, or a negro, mulatto, or Indian, all such servants were
made free. Any free white person intermarrying with a negro
or mulatto, and any minister celebrating such marriage, was
punished with fine and imprisonment. It will excite the
merriment of a satirist, the disgust of a philosopher, and the
indignant concern of a christian, to find, combined with such
inhuman and tyrannical laws, the strictest injunctions of the
worship of that great Teacher of charity and humility who
commanded his worshippers to honour all men; together with
many solemn denunciations and penal enactments against
travelling on Sunday, profane cursing, and profanely getting
drunk. Justices of the peace were commanded to hear and
determine the complaints of all servants except slaves, against
their masters. Various regulations were established for se
curing mild and equitable treatment to indented servants : at
the close of their indentures they received from their masters
each a musket, a small sum of money, and a quantity of corn ;
but if during the currency of their term of service they pre
sumed to marry without consent of their master or mistress,
they were punished with an additional year of servitude. To
discourage the planters from employing female indented
servants in agricultural labour, it was enacted that all white
women exempted from such labour should be also exempted
from poll tax, but that any of them who might be employed
in rustic toil should forthwith be enrolled in the list of tithe-
ables. All persons riotously assembling to the number of
eight or more, for the purpose of destroying tobacco, incurred
the guilt of treason. Every person, not being a servant or
slave, committing adultery or fornication, was, for the greater
offence, fined 1000, for the lesser 500 pounds of tobacco.
Women convicted of slander were adjudged to be ducked, in
default of their husbands' consenting to redeem them from

NORTH AMERICA. 143
the penal immersion at the cost of a pecuniary mulct. There c H A P.
being no inns in the country, strangers were entertained at nI-
the houses of the inhabitants, and were frequently involved in
law-suits by the exorbitant claims of their hosts for indemni
fication of the expenses of their mercenary hospitality : for
remedy whereof, it was enacted, that an inhabitant neglecting
in such circumstances to forewarn his guest, and to make an
express paction with him, should be reputed to have enter
tained him from mere courtesy and benevolence.1 All the
foregoing laws continued in force long after the British Re
volution. It appears from the first of these statutes, that Indians vi
siting the territories of the state were liable to be made slaves
by the colonists : and in Jefferson's statistical account of
Virginia it is related that the practice of enslaving those
savages did at one time actually prevail.2 But with the
Indian tribes situated in their immediate vicinity, and com
prehended in the pacification negotiated by Colonel Jefferys,
the colonists maintained relations more approaching to friend
ship and equality. The Indians paid, indeed, in conformity
with the treaty of peace, an annual tribute of beaver skins to
the provincial government.3 But their territories were ascer
tained by the treaty, and guaranteed to them securely by law;
and every wrong they might sustain at the hands of any of
the colonists was punished in the same manner as if it had
been done to an Englishman.4 By the aid of a donation from
that distinguished religious philosopher, Robert Boyle, an
attempt was made to render the institution, which, from its
founders, has been called William and Mary College, subser
vient to the instruction of the Indians. Some young persons
belonging to the friendly tribes, received at this seminary the
elements of civil and religious education; and the colonists,
sensible of the advantages they derived from possessing in
' • Abridgment of the laws of Virginia. Beverley, Burk.
2 Notes on Virginia. 3 Beverley.
* Abridg. Laws of Virg. " That the lands of this country were taken from the
Indians by conquest, is not so general a truth as is supposed. I find in our histo
rians and records, repeated proofs of purchases which cover a considerable part of the
lower country ; and many more would doubtless be found on farther search. The
upper country, we know, has been acquired altogether by purchases made in the most
unexceptionable form." — Notes on Virginia.

144 THE HISTORY OF
B OO K the persons of such pupils the most valuable hostages of the
 '__ pacific demeanour of their parents, prevailed with some of the
more remote nations of the Indians to send a few of their
children to drink of the same fountain of knowledge. But as
the pupils were restored to their respective tribes when they
attained the age that fitted them for hunting and warlike
exercises, it is not likely that this institution produced any
wide or permanent impression on the character of the Indians,
or made any adequate compensation for the destructive vices
and diseases which the Europeans were unhappily much more
successful in imparting.1 Attempts to convert barbarians
very frequently disappoint their promoters; and not those
only who have assisted the undertaking from merely secular
ends, but those also who, truly regarding the Divine glory in
the end, disregard, at least in some measure, the Divine
agency in the means. As an instrument of temporal im
provement merely, and civilization, the preaching of the
gospel will ever be found to disappoint all those who have no
higher or ulterior views. In a civilized and christian laud,
the great bulk of the people are christians merely in name :
reputation, convenience, and habit, are the sources of their
profession : vices are so disguised, that the testimonies of
christian preachers against them often miss their aim ; and a
professed devotedness to the service of piety and the pursuit
of spiritual good is easily reconciled with, and esteemed a
decent livery of, the more real and substantial devotion to all
that is worldly, selfish, and sensual. But among heathens
and savages, a convert to Christianity must change his way of
life, overcome his habits, and forfeit his reputation ; and none,
or at least very few, become professors except from the in
fluence of real conviction, more or less lasting and profound.
Those who remain unconverted, if they be honestly addressed
by the missionary preachers, are incensed at the testimony
against their evil deeds and sullied nature ; and the conduct
of many professing christians among their civilized neigh
bours too often contributes to mislead and confirm them in
error. But this topic will derive an ampler illustration from
i Beverley. (Edit. 1722.) In citing this author, it is the edition of 1705 that I
refer to, when the other is not expressly named.

NORTH AMERICA. 145
occurrences that relate to others of the North American CHAP.
States, than the early history of Virginia is fitted to supply. '
Literature was not much cultivated in Virginia. There was
not at this period, nor for many years after, a single book
seller's shop in the colony.1 Yet a history of Virginia was
written some years after by Beverley, a native of the province,
who had taken an active part in public affairs prior to the
Revolution of 1688. The first edition of this work in 1705,
and a later edition in 1722, were published in England.
Beverley is a brief and rather agreeable annalist, and has
appended to his narrative of events an account of the insti
tutions of the province, and of the manners of the colonial
and aboriginal inhabitants. He is chargeable with great ig
norance and incorrectness in those parts of his narrative that
embrace events occurring in England or elsewhere beyond the
immediate precincts of Virginia. Only the initial letters of
his name appear on the title-page of his book, whence Old
mixon was led into the mistake of supposing his name to have
been Bullock; and in some of the critical catalogues of Ger
many he has received the erroneous appellation of Bird.2 A
much more enlarged and elaborate history of Virginia (but
unfortunately carried no further down than the year 1624)
was written at a later period by Stith, also a native of the
province, and one of the governors of William and Mary Col
lege. Stith is a candid, accurate historian, and accomplished
writer; tediously minute in relating the debates in the Court
of Proprietors of the Virginia Company, and their disputes
with the king; but generally impressive and interesting. A
manly and liberal spirit pervades every page of his work,
which was first published at Williamsburgh in 1747.
Beverley warmly extols the hospitality of his countrymen ;
1 The literature of North America was at this time monopolized almost entirely
by New England. In the beginning of the eighteenth century, when Boston con
tained five printing-offices, and many booksellers' shops, there was but one bookseller's
shop in New York, and not one in Virginia, Maryland, or Carolina. Neal's History
of New England. Even in the provincial towns of the parent state, booksellers'
shops were very iare at this period. — -Boswell's Life of Johnson.
2 Warden, a late American writer, has repeated this error, and described as the
production of Bird, what in reality was the first edition of Beverley's work. There
really was a history of Virginia written and published by a Colonel Bird, in the
beginning of the 18th century ; but I have never been able to meet with it. Old
mixon (in his Preface) gives some account of the author, and enumerates the work
among the materials which he himself had made use of.
VOL. I. L

146 THE HISTORY OF
B 0 o K a commendation which the peculiarity of their condition ren-
' ders very generally credible, though the preamble of one of
their laws, which we have already noticed, demonstrates that
its application was by no means universal. He reproaches
them with indolence, which he ascribes to their residence in
scattered dwellings, and their destitution of that collected life
which promotes mutual co-operation and competition, invi
gorates industry, and nourishes the spirit of adventurous enter
prise. It may be ascribed also to the influence of slavery in
fostering pride and degrading labour. A life like that of the
first Virginian colonists, remote from crowded haunt, unoc
cupied by a multitude and variety of objects and purposes,
and sequestered from the intelligence of passing events, is the
life of those to whom the company of strangers is peculiarly
acceptable. All the other circumstances of such a lot contri
bute to the promotion of hospitable habits. As, for many of
their hours the inhabitants can find no more interesting occu
pation, so, of much of their superfluous produce they can
find no more profitable use than the entertainment of
visitors.1 It was the remarkable and advantageous peculiarity of their
local situation, that prevented a people so early devoted to
commerce as the Virginians, from congregating in large
towns, and forming marts of trade. The same peculiarity
characterized that portion of their original territory which was
subsequently formed into the separate province of Maryland ;
and there too, it was attended with similar effects. The
whole of that vast region is pervaded by numerous streams,
that impart fertility to the land, and carry the produce they
have promoted to the great highway of nations. From the
bay of Chesapeak, where all those streams unite, the greater
number of them afford an extensive navigation into the inte
rior of the country : and the colonists perceiving that in order
to embark the produce of their land, they needed not to quit
their plantations, but might load the merchant ships at the
doors of their country warehouses, dispersed themselves along
1 " Mr. Jefferson told me, that in his father's time it was no uncommon thing for
gentlemen to post their servants on the main road for the purpose of amicably way
laying and bringing to their houses any travellers who might chance topass." — Hali's
Travels in Canada and the United States.

NORTH AMERICA. 147
the banks of the rivers, and united the healthful felicity of c H A P.
rural life with the advantages of commerce. Except the 1IL
small towns of Williamsburgh, which succeeded James-Town
as the capital of Virginia, and Annapolis, the capital of Mary
land, no cities grew up for a very long period in either of
these settlements. This social condition proved highly favour
able to those two great sources of national happiness, — good
morals, and the facility of gaining by industry a moderate
competence and a respectable station in society. The con
victs who were transported to the colony, finding none of the
opportunities of confederacy, pillage, and concealment, that
large towns afford, either returned to Europe at the expiration
of their periods of service, — or, impressed with the advantages
which the country so liberally tendered to industry and
morality, they melted into the mass of humble and respectable
free labourers. To this important class of society, the virtues
of industry and economy were recommended by prizes both
greater and nearer than any other social community ever be
fore presented. Labour was so valuable, and land so cheap,
that a very few years of diligent exertion could promote the
labourer to the condition of a landowner -,1 no one needed to
despair of a competence ; and none found it practicable to
amass enormous wealth. Toil, no longer the badge of hopeless
poverty, was respected as the certain passport to independ
ence ; nor was there among the free population any distinction
of rank which industry and virtue were unable to surmount.
A constant and general progression, effected without scramble
or peril, gave a quiet alacrity to life ; and fellow-feeling was
not obstructed, nor insolence and servility engendered, by nu
merous instances of a wide inequality of condition. They
were and are, undoubtedly, a happy people.
Two causes, however, have contributed in this and others
of the American provinces, to impede the operation and
abridge the influence of circumstances so favourable to hap
piness and virtue. Of these, by far the most important is
{he institution of domestic slavery; an institution fraught with
1 " I remember the time when five pounds were left by a charitable testator to the
poor of the parish he lived in ; and it lay nine years before the executors could find
one poor enough to be entitled to any part of this legacy ; ' and at last it was all given
to one old woman. So that this may in truth be termed the best poor man's country
in the world." — Beverley. l2

148 THE HISTORY OF
book incalculable evil to the morals, manners, and felicity of every
i country into which it has gained admission. The slaves are
reduced to a state of misery and degradation; — to a state
which experience has pronounced so destructive to virtue,
that in many languages the condition of a slave and the cha
racter of a thief are expressed by the same word. The masters
are justly loaded with the guilt of all the wretchedness and
worthlessness which that state inevitably infers : every mind
is tainted with the evil which it engenders and displays, and
sustains an abatement either of happiness or virtue. Every
master of a slave, whether he term himself citizen or subject,
is a monarch endowed with more uncontrolled authority than
any sovereign in Europe enjoys; and every country where
slavery is admitted, whether it call itself kingdom or republic,
is a country subject to the dominion of tyrants. Nay, the
more liberal its political constitution, the more severe in
general is its system of domestic tyranny; and the experience
of every age has verified the Grecian proverb, that none are
so completely enslaved as the slaves of the free. Human
character is as much corrupted and depraved by the arrogance
of dominion as by the depression of servitude; and slavery is
a state wherein one man ruleth over another to his own hurt.
The same wisdom which assigned to man his duties, adapted
them to the development of his understanding and the
refinement of his sensibility. This adaptation is particularly
visible in the duties that regulate the mutual intercourse of
men. To violate therein the law of kindness and the prin
ciples of equity, is to warp the understanding1 as well as to
corrupt the heart; to lower the dignity of rational, and the
1 An illustration of this remark may, perhaps, be derived from the apologetic
theory which philosophical slave-owners have introduced into the world, — that the
negroes are a separate and inferior race of men — a notion by which the degradation
that human beings inflict on their fellows in reducing them to the level of the brute
creation, is charged upon GoJ, whose word assures us that he created man after his
own image, and that he fashioned all souls alike. Interest and pride harden the
heart ; the deceitfulness of the heart perverts the understanding ; and men are easily
persuaded to consider those as brutes whom they think it convenient to treat as such.
The best refutation of this theory that I have ever seen is the production of an Ame
rican writer. It occurs in Dr. S. Smith's interesting " Essay on the causes of the
variety of figure and complexion in the human species.''
In his Notes on Virginia, Mr. Jefferson has contended for the natural inferiority
of negroes to white men. But I was assured by the Abbe Gregoire (formerly
Bishop of Blois) that Jefferson, in a private letter to him, confessed that he had seen
cause to alter this opinion.

NORTH AMERICA. 149
happiness of sensible being. There is a perpetual reciproca- chap.
tion of evil between a master and his slaves. His injustice  ;_
consigns them lo their servile state ; and the evil qualities
that this state engenders in them tend continually to provoke
his irascibility. His power inflicts their degradation ; and
their degradation at once provokes and facilitates the excesses
of his power. Hence the commerce between master and
slave tends to stimulate and exhibit all that is odious and
revolting in human passion and conduct. The delicate sus
ceptibility of women is exposed to the impression of this
spectacle, and the imitative disposition of children exercised
amidst its continual display. The female slaves regarding
the freemen as a superior race of beings, lose alike the virtues
and the rights of women in their intercourse with them, and
introduce into rural life vices even more degrading to human
character than those which are generated by the temptations
of profligate cities. The freemen, habituated to consider the
great majority of the females with whom they associate as an
inferior race, are consequently exposed to an influence hostile
to those sentiments and manners which constitute the moral
grace and symbol of civilized life; and proportionally descend
to the level of that barbarous state in which women are re
garded merely as instruments of drudgery or ministers of
voluptuousness. Every description of work that is com
mitted to the slaves is performed with as much neglect and
indolence as they dare to indulge, and is so degraded in com
mon estimation, that the poorest freeman disdains to under
take it except when he is working for himself. As the
numbers of the slaves are multiplied, the industry of the free
is thus repressed bythe extension of slave labour; and the
safety of the state is endangered by the strength of a body of
internal enemies ready to conspire against its tranquillity or
to join its first invader.1 The number of the slaves and gla-
1 " I tremble for njy country," says Jefferson, in his observations on the slave
population of this province, ' ' when I reflect that God is just ; that his j ustice cannot
sleep for ever ; that considering numbers, nature, and natural means only, a revo
lution ofthe wheel of fortune, an exchange of situation, is among possible events;
that it may become probable by supernatural interference! The Almighty has no
attribute which can take side with us in such a contest." Notes on Virginia. So
early as the year 1687, we are told that " A plan of insurrection of the blacks was
at this time discovered in the Northern neck, just in time to prevent its explosion."
Burk. Seneca relates that it was once proposed at Rome to discriminate the slaves

150 THE HISTORY OF
book diators contributed to the downfall of Rome : and indeed
 '__ every body politic, compounded of parts so heterogeneous as
freemen and slaves, plainly contains within itself a principle
of disease and corruption. Such a mixture tends also to
pervert and confound the moral sentiments of all mankind,
and to degrade the value of those free institutions which are
seen to form a canopy for the shelter of domestic tyranny,1
to mock one portion of the people with such liberty and
dignity as jailors enjoy, and to load all the rest with such
fetters as only felons should wear.
Such long consequences have guilt and injustice ! The first
introduction of slavery into a country plants an evil of which
the full mischief is not perceived till in an after age, when it has
attained an extent that renders its extirpation almost impos
sible. This consideration, without tending to mitigate our
abhorrence of a system so fraught with evil and danger,
mitigates the severity of our censure on those to whom the
system already matured by long continuance, has unhappily
descended. And even with regard to the race who first in-
troduced it, we shall not fulfil the duty of fellow-men, if we
omit to consider the apologies which may reasonably be sup
posed to have deluded their conscience and understanding,
and veiled from their view the wickedness they committed and
the misery they prepared. The negroes that were first brought
to Virginia were enslaved before they came there, and by the
purchase of the colonists were delivered from the hold ofa
slave ship and the peculiar and notorious cruelty of the Dutch.
Some little good might seem thus at first to result from the
commission of evil. When slaves were neither numerous nor
formidable, they appear to have been kindly treated ;2 and
by a peculiar dress ; but it was justly apprehended that there might be some danger
in acquainting them with their own numbers. This information is conveyed to the
negroes by their colour ; and this colour being always a mark of contempt, even
those negroes who become free in countries where their race is generally enslaved,
continue allied both by the most irritating feelings and by the sympathy they must
entertain for men of the same complexion, with all those who remain in a state of
bondage. 1 To dream of freedom in his slave's embrace, — is represented with bitter satire and
melancholy truth by an Irish bard, as the felicity of many an American planter.
2 The treatment of slaves at Rome, latterly distinguished by the most enormous
cruelty, was originally kind and humane. Plutarch, Life of Coriolanus. In the
reign of the Emperor Claudius, it was found necessary to pass a law forbidding
masters to kill their slaves on account of age or infirmity.

NORTH AMERICA. 151
their masters perhaps intended to emancipate them at that CHAP.
convenient season for adjusting the accounts of interest and  ;_
conscience, which every added year and every addition to
their numbers tended still farther to postpone.
Negro slavery lingered long in the settlements of the puri
tans in New England, and of the quakers in Pennsylvania.
Las Cases, so distinguished by the warmth of his philanthropy,
first suggested its introduction into Mexico and Peru ; George
Fox, the most intrepid and enthusiastic of reformers, de
manded no more of his followers than a mitigation of its rigour
in Barbadoes; and tbe illustrious philosopher, John Locke,
renowned also as the champion of religious and political free
dom, introduced an express sanction of it into the Funda
mental Constitutions of Carolina. Georgia is the only one of
the North American states in which slavery was expressly dis
allowed by the fundamental laws ; but these laws were soon re
pealed ; and in none of the other states has slavery proved a
more rigorous and oppressive yoke than in Georgia. Considera
tions such as these are calculated to increase at once our indul
gence for mankind, and our abhorrence of that insidious and
formidable evil which has so signally baffled the penetration of
the wise, and triumphed over the beneficence of the humane.
It is in those colonial plantations where the residence of the
free inhabitants is merely temporary, and the slaves generally
entrusted to the management of hired overseers, that slavery
exhibits its worst • features, and produces its most debasing
effects. Wherever a respectable stationary population of free
men exists, a restraining principle arises to control and qualify
these evil consequences. The harsher slave laws have been
long since repealed in Virginia; and the treatment of the
slaves in this province has latterly been noted for comparative
mildness.1 An Englishman who should suppose that huma
nity and delicacy could not exist in a commonwealth where
slavery prevailed, would commit as great a practical error as
an American who should maintain the incompatibility of those
moral qualities with the spectacles of vice and misery exhi
bited in the great towns and public places of England. In
both countries, doubtless, human character derives a taint
1 Warden's United States.

152 THE HISTORY OF NORTH AMERICA.
BOOK from the familiar contemplation of evil : but in both, the taint
is obstructed by delusions that disguise, by sensibility that
deplores, or by virtue that labours to diminish and finally era
dicate the evil.
The other cause which has been alluded to as operating un
favourably on the prosperity of Virginia, is the inordinate
cultivation of tobacco. As long as Virginia and Maryland
were the only provinces of North America where this commo
dity was produced, their inhabitants devoted themselves
almost exclusively to a culture which is attended with much
inconvenience to those engaged in it, and no small disadvan
tage to their country even when moderately pursued. It re
quires extremely fatiguing labour from the cultivators, and
exhausts the fertility of the soil : and, as little food of any kind
is raised on the tobacco plantations, the men and cattle em
ployed on them are badly fed, and the soil progressively im
poverished. x This disadvantage was long experienced in
Virginia ; but has been diminished by the introduction into
the markets of Europe, of the tobacco produce of territories
more recently subjected to cultivation.2
1 Jefferson's Notes on Virginia. 2 Priest's Travels in America. Warden.

BOOK II.

FOUNDATION AND PROGRESS
OF THE
NEW ENGLAND STATES,
TILL THE YEAR 1698.

BOOK II.
THE NEW ENGLAND STATES.
CHAPTER I.
Attempts of the Plymouth Company to colonize the Northern Coasts of America. —
Popham establishes a Colony at Fort Saint George. — Sufferings and Return of
the Colonists. — Captain Smith's Voyage and Survey of the Country — which is
named New England. — His ineffectual Attempt to conduct a Colony thither. —
The Company relinquish the Design of colonizing New England. — History and
Character of the Puritans. — Rise of the Brownists or Independents. — A Congre
gation of Independents retire to Holland — they resolve to settle in America — their
Negotiation with King James — they arrive in Massachusetts — and found New
Plymouth. — Hardships — and Virtue of the Colonists. — Their civil Institutions. —
Community of Property. — Increase of civil and ecclesiastical Tyranny in Eng
land. — Project of a new Colony in Massachusetts. — Salem built, — Charter of
Massachusetts Bay obtained from Charles the First by an Association of Puritans.
— Embarkation of the Emigrants — Arrival at Salem. — Their ecclesiastical Institu
tions.— Two persons banished from the Colony for Schism. — Intolerance of some
of the Puritans.
When James the First of England gave his sanction to the CHAP.
project of colonizing the vast district of North America which *
was comprehended at that time under the name of Virginia, 1606.
he made a partition of the territory between two trading
companies, and established the residence of the one at Lon
don, and ofthe other at Plymouth. If the object of this par
tition was to diminish the inconvenience of monopoly, and dif
fuse the benefit of colonial relations more extensively in
England, the means were ill adapted to the end ; and even
tually the operation of this act of policy was far from corres
ponding with its design. The resources of the adventurers
who had already prepared to undertake the enterprise of co
lonization, were divided so unequally, and yet so much to the
disadvantage of all parties, that even the more powerful com-

156

THE HISTORY OF

book pany was barely enabled to maintain a feeble and precarious
II' settlement in Virginia ; while the weaker, without ability to
1606. accomplish the purpose of its institution, obtained little more
than the privilege of debarring the rest of the world from at
tempting it. We have seen that the southern colony, though
promoted by a corporation which reckoned among its mem
bers some of the richest and most considerable persons in the
state, and enjoyed the advantage of being situated in a town
which then engrossed almost all the commercial wealth of
England, even with the aid of these favourable circumstances,
made but slow and laborious advances to a secure establish
ment. The Plymouth company possessing much narrower re
sources, and a less advantageous situation, its efforts were
proportionally feeble and inadequate.
Attempts The most conspicuous members of the Plymouth company
Pi mouth were ^'r J°nn P°pham, Chief Justice of England, Sir Ferdi-
company nando Gorges, Governor of Plymouth fort, and Sir John Gil-
the north- Dert' nePnew of that distinguished adventurer, who has already
em coasts engaged our notice as the first patentee of queen Elizabeth,
°ica me" and the earliest leader of emigrants to America. Animated
by the zeal of these men, and especially of Popham, who as
sumed the principal direction of their measures, the Ply
mouth company, shortly after their association, despatched a
small vessel to inspect their territories ; but soon received the
mortifying intelligence that it had been attacked and captured
by the Spaniards, who still pretended a right to exclude every
other people from the navigation of the American seas. The
chief justice and his friends, however, were too much bent on
the prosecution of their purpose to be deterred by this disaster.
At his own expense, Popham equipped and despatched another
vessel to resume the survey ; and having received a favourable
report of the appearance of the country, he availed himself of
the impression produced by the tidings to raise a sufficient
May, suPply °f men a"d money for the formation of a colony.
1607. Under the command of his brother, Henry Popham, and of
rstab-am Raleigb Gilbert, brother of Sir John, a hundred emigrants, em-
lishes a balking in two vessels, repaired to the territory of what was
FortSt.3' sti11 called Northern Virginia ; and, landing in autumn, took
George— possession of a piece of ground near the river Sagahadoc, where
they built a strong hold called Fort Saint George. The dis-

NORTH AMERICA. 157
trict where they established themselves was rocky and barren, chap.
and their provisions so scanty, that they were obliged, soon *•
after their arrival, to send back all but forty-five of their num- 1607.
ber. The winter proved extremely severe, and confined this
small remnant to their miserable dwelling, and a helpless con
templation of the dreary waste that surrounded them. Disease,
the offspring of scarcity and hardship, augmented the general sufferings
gloom ; and before the return of spring, several of the adven- 0f tne Co-
turers, and among others their president, Henry Popham, had lonists.
sunk into the grave. With the spring, arrived a vessel laden
with supplies from England ; but the intelligence that accom
panied these supplies more than counterbalanced the satisfac
tion they afforded ; for the colonists were now informed of the
deaths of Chief Justice Popham and Sir John Gilbert, the
most powerful of their patrons, and most active of their bene
factors. Their resolution was completely subdued by so
many misfortunes : and, unanimously exclaiming against
longer continuance in those dismal scenes, they forsook the
settlement and returned to England, which they filled with 1608.
the most disheartening accounts of the soil and climate of
Northern Virginia. l The American historians have been care
ful to note that this disastrous expedition originated with the
judge, who (odious and despicable in every part of his profes
sional career) had, three years before, presided, with the most
scandalous injustice, at the trial of Raleigh, and condemned
to the death of a traitor, the man to whom both England and
America had been so greatly beholden.
The miscarriage of this colonial adventure, and the evil re
port that was raised against the land, deterred the Plymouth
company for some time from any farther attempt to plant a
settlement in Northern Virginia, and produced an impression
on the minds of the people of England very unfavourable to
emigration to that territory. For several years, the operations
of the company were confined to a few fishing voyages to Cape
Cod, and a traffic in peltry and oil with the natives. At length
their prospects were cheered by a gleam of better fortune ; and
the introduction of Captain Smith into their service seemed to
1 Smith's History of Virginia, New England, &c. Stith's Hist, of Vireinia
JMeals Hist, of New England. Hutchinson's Hist, of Massachusetts. '

158 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK betoken more vigorous and successful enterprise. Sir Ferdi-
' nando Gorges, and some other leading members of the Ply
mouth Company, justly appreciating the merit of this eminent
man, were fain to engage his valuable services, which the
1614. London Company had so unworthily neglected. Six years
after the abandonment of the settlement of Sagahadoc, two
Captain vessels were despatched, under the command of Captain Smith
vo"atheand anc^ Captain Hunt, on a voyage of trade and discovery to the
survey of Plymouth company's territories. Smith, having concluded
thejxiun- n}s traffic with the natives, left his crew engaged in fishing,
and, accompanied by only eight men, travelled into the interior
of the country, surveyed its condition, explored with care and
diligence the whole coast, from Cape Cod to Penobscot, and
composed a map, in which its features were accurately deli
neated. On his return to England, he presented his map,
with an account of his travels and observations, to Prince
which is Charles, who was so much pleased with the description of the
^ameg country, that he bestowed on it the name of New England,
land. ' which it has ever since retained.
The successful voyage of Captain Smith, and the favour
able account that he gave of the territory, though they contri
buted not a little to stimulate the vigour of commercial
adventure, could not overcome the general aversion to a per
manent settlement in this region, which the misfortunes of the
first colonists had created in England. The impediments to a
colonial establishment in this quarter of America, besides,
were greatly increased by the conduct of Hunt, who had been
associated with Smith in the late voyage. That sordid and
profligate man, unwilling that the benefit of the existing nar
row traffic with the company's territories, which was exclu
sively shared by himself and a few others who were aware of
its advantages, should be more generally diffused by the for
mation of a colony, resolved to defeat the design by embroil
ing his countrymen with the natives ; and for this purpose,
having enticed a number of these people on board his ship, he
set sail with them for Malaga, where he had been ordered to
touch on his homeward voyage, and sold them for slaves to the
Spaniards. The company, indignant at his wickedness, in
stantly dismissed him from their service: but his mischievous
purpose was accomplished ; and the next vessel that returned

NORTH AMERICA. 159
from New England brought intelligence of the vindictive hos- CHAP.
tilities of the savages. Undismayed by all these difficulties L
and dangers, Smith determined to make an effort for the colo
nization of the northern territory ; and having communicated a
portion of his own resolute hope and spirit to some of the lead
ing patentees, he was enabled, by their assistance, to equip a 1615.
small squadron, and set sail at the head of a body of emigrants
for New England. Thus far could energy prevail : but in a His ih-
struggle with fate, farther advancement was impracticable ; ^^'^
and Smith, who had now accomplished all that man could do, conduct a
was destined to experience that all was unavailing. The ^j^
voyage was one uninterrupted scene of disaster. After en
countering a violent tempest, by which the vessels, had nearly
perished, and escaping more than once from the attacks of
pirates, Smith was made prisoner by the commander of a
French fleet, who mistook or pretended to mistake him for
Captain Argal, and charged him with the guilt of the piratical
enterprise which Argal had conducted in the preceding year
against Port Royal.1 On this unjust charge, Smith was sepa
rated from his crew, and detained long in captivity. It was
happy for himself and for mankind that he lived to return to
his country, and write the history of his travels, instead of
reaching New England; where his blood would probably have
stained the land which his genius and virtue had contributed
to illustrate. Several years afterwards, the Plymouth com- 1619.
pany having discovered that an Indian named Squanto, one of
the persons kidnapped by Hunt, had escaped from the Spa
niards, and found his way to Britain, acquitted themselves to
his satisfaction of the injury he had suffered, loaded him with
kindness, and sent him back to New England, along with a
small expedition commanded by one Dormer, who was in
structed to avail himself of Squanto's assistance in regaining
the friendship of the Indians. But although Squanto ear
nestly laboured to mollify his abused countrymen, and assured
them that Hunt's treachery had been condemned and pu
nished in England, they refused to be pacified, and watching
a favourable opportunity, attacked and dangerously wounded
Dormer and several of his party, who, escaping with difficulty
1 B. i. chap. ii. ante.

160 THE HISTORY OF
book from the hostile region, left Squanto behind to urge at more
leisure and with better success his topics of apology and con-

1619. ciliation. Disgusted by so many disappointments, the com-
panVreim- PanY ^i^ aside all thoughts of establishing colonies in New
quish the England. An insignificant traffic bounded their own adven-
coiomzino- tures j an<l tney exercised no farther their dominion over the
New Eng- territory than by disposing of small portions of the northern
quarter of it to private adventurers, who occupied them in
summer as mercantile factories or victualling stations for the
use of vessels resorting thither for trade.1
We have sufficient assurance that the course of this world
is not governed by chance ; and that the series of events
which it exhibits is regulated by divine ordinance, and adapted
to purposes which from their transcendent wisdom and infi
nite range, often elude the grasp of created capacity. As it
could not, then, be without design, so it seems to have been
for no common object that discomfiture was thus entailed on
the counsels of princes, the schemes of the wise, and the
efforts of the brave. It was for no ordinary people that the
land was reserved, and of no common qualities or vulgar su
periority that it was ordained to be the prize. New England
was the destined asylum of oppressed piety and virtue ; and
its colonization, denied to the pretensions of greatness and the
efforts of might, was reserved for men whom the great and
mighty despised for their insignificance, and persecuted for
their integrity. The recent growth of the Virginian colony,
and the repeated attempts to form a settlement in New
England, naturally attracted to this quarter the eyes of men
who felt little reluctance to forsake a country where, for con
science's sake, they had already incurred the loss of temporal
ease and enjoyment ; whom persecution had fortified to the
endurance of hardship, and piety had taught to despise it. It
was at this juncture accordingly, that the project of colonizing
New England was undertaken bythe Puritans; a body of
men of whose rise, sentiments, and previous history, it is
proper that we here subjoin some account.
History Of all the national churches of Europe, which at the era of
and cha- tne Reformation renounced the doctrine and revolted from the
racter ot
the puri-
lans- ¦ ' Smith. Neal.

NORTH AMERICA. 161
dominion of the see of Rome, there was none in which the CHAP.
origin of the separation had been so discreditable, or the im- I-
mediate proceedings to which it gave rise so unreasonable and
inequitable, as the church of England. This arose partly
from the circumstance of the alteration in this church having
mainly originated with the temporal magistrate, and partly
from the character of the individual by whom this interposition
of magisterial authority was exerted. In the Palatinate, in
Brandenburgh, Holland, Geneva, and Scotland, where the
reform proceeded from the general conviction, the doctrine
and constitution of the national church corresponded with the
religious sentiments of the people. The biblical Christianity
taught by Calvin and Luther (with varieties occasioned by
variety of human sentiment, attainment, and capacity) super
seded the traditional dogmas of the church of Rome ; and the
primitive simplicity of the presbyterian administration (with
similar varieties of similar origin) superseded the pageantry of
her ceremonial and the pomp of her constitution. In England,
the reformation originating from a very different source, its
institutions received a tincture from qualities proportionally
different. The same haughty and imperious disposition that
had prompted Henry the Eighth to abolish the authority of
the church of Rome in his dominions, regulated all his views
and proceedings in constructing a substitute for the abrogated
system. Abetted by a crew of servile dependants and sordid
nobles, whom he enriched with the spoils of the plundered
monasteries, and by a compliant House of Commons, whose
profession of faith veered about with every variation of the
royal creed, he paid no respect whatever, in the ecclesiastical
institutions which he successively established, to the senti
ments of the body of the people — a portion of his subjects to
whose petitions he once answered, by a public proclamation,
that they were " but brutes and inexpert folk," and as unfit to
advise him as blind men were to judge of colours.1 His
object was to substitute himself and his successors as heads
of the church in place of the pope ; and for the maintenance
of this usurped dominion, he retained, both in the ceremonies
of worship and the constitution of the clerical order, a great
'Lord Herbert's Life of Henry VIII.
VOL. I. M

162 THE HISTORY OF
book deal of the machinery which his predecessor in the supremacy
' had found useful. The unbridled vehemence of his temper
detracted somewhat from the policy of his devices; and greatly
disguised their aspect as a politic system, by that show of
good faith and sincerity which accompanied all his actions,
and which was but the natural result of sincere and impetuous
selfishness, and ofa presumptuous and undoubting conviction
of the superiority of his own understanding and the infalli
bility of its dictates.1 While he rigidly denied the right of
private judgment to his subjects, his own incessant and im
perious exercise of this fight continually tempted them to
partake the satisfaction it seemed to afford him; and the fre
quent variations of the creeds he promulgated, at once excited
a spirit of speculation akin to his own, and practically refuted
the only pretence that could recommend or entitle his judg
ment to the implicit assent of fallible men. The pope, ex
pressly maintaining that he could never be in the wrong, was
disabled from correcting either his own errors or those be
queathed to him by his predecessors. Henry, merely pre
tending to the privilege of being always in the right, defeated
this pretension by the variety and inconsistency of the systems
to which he applied it. While he insisted on retaining much
ofthe peculiar doctrine of the church of Rome, he attacked,
in its infallibility, a tenet not only important in itself, but the
sole sanction and foundation of a great many others. Not-
Withstanding all his exertions, nay, promoted indeed by some
part of his own conduct, a spirit of religious inquiry began to
arise among the multitude of professors who blindly or in
terestedly had followed the fortunes and the variations of the
royal creed : and the knowledge of divine truth, combined
with a growing regard for simplicity of divine worship, arising
first in the higher classes, spread downwards through the suc
cessive grades of society in this and the following reigns.
The administration of inquisitorial oaths, and the infliction in
various instances of decapitation, torture, and burning, for the
1 The public disputation which he held with one of his subjects, the noble-
minded and unfortunate Lambert, who denied the doctrine of the real presence, was,
perhaps, regarded at the time as an act of admirable zeal and most generous con
descension. It might have merited this praise, if the horrid death by which he re
venged the impotence of his logic, did not prove it to have been an overflowing of
arrogance and vain glory.

NORTH AMERICA. 163
crime of heresy during Henry's reign, demonstrate how fully CHAP.
he had embraced the character as well as the pretensions of  '
the haughtiest pontiffs that had ever filled the Romish see,1
and how ineffectually he had laboured to impose his own
heterogeneous system of opinions on the understandings of his
subjects. Even in his lifetime, the protestant doctrines had
spread far beyond the limits of any of the peculiar creeds
which he had adopted and promulgated ; and in their illegiti
mate extent had made numerous proselytes in his court and
kingdom. The propagation of them was aided by the trans
lation and diffusion of the Scriptures, which he vainly endea
voured to prevent, and which enabled his people to draw
truth for themselves unstinted and unadulterated from its
everlasting wells. The open profession of those illicit opinions
was in many instances repressed by the terror of his inflexible
cruelty, and by the influence over his measures which his lay
and clerical courtiers found it easy to obtain by feigning im
plicit submission to his capricious and impetuous temper.2
The temptations which these men were exposed to, proved
fatal in some instances to their integrity ; and several of them
(even the virtuous Cranmer) concurred, though reluctantly,
in punishing by a cruel death, the open profession of senti
ments which they secretly cherished in their own breasts.
They were afterwards compelled themselves to drink of the
same cup of martyrdom ; and enabled to make some atone
ment to the cause of truth by the heroism with which, in
Mary's bloody reign, they suffered for the uprightness which
they had persecuted before.
Bythe death of Henry the Eighth, his protestant subjects
were exempted from the necessity of farther dissimulation.
In the reign of Edward the Sixth, the catholic doctrines were
wholly expunged from the national creed, and the fundamental
articles of the protestant faith recognised and established by
law. As among other practices of the preceding reign, the
absurd and tyrannical device of promoting uniformity of faith
'One of his laws (31 Henry VIII. cap. 14.) bears the presumptuous title of
" An act for abolishing diversity of opinions in certain articles concerning the chris
tian religion."
a Lord Herbert.
M 2

164 THE HISTORY OF
book and worship by persecution was still pursued,1 the influence
' of temporal fear and favour contributed, no doubt, to encumber
the protestant church with many reluctant and hypocritical
professors. In the hope of reconciling the English nation as
extensively as possible to the system which they had esta
blished, the ministers of Edward preserved not only the
ecclesiastical constitution which Henry had retained, but as
much of the ancient ceremonial of worship as they judged
likely to gratify the taste and predilections of minds that still
hankered after catholic pageantry. They rather yielded in
this respect to tbe necessity of the times, than indulged their
own sentiments or followed out their principles; and plainly
insinuated their opinion, that whenever the public mind was
sufficiently prepared for it, a farther reformation should be
introduced into the establishment, — by inserting a prayer to
this purpose in the Liturgy.2 But in the prosecution of this
temporizing policy, the rulers of the English reformed church
encountered a spirit of resistance, originating in the protestant
body itself. During the late reign the disaffection that had
been cherished in secret towards the national church had not
confined itself to the doctrines savouring of popery, which she
retained, and which many protestants connected in their opinion
and esteem with the ceremonial rites and clerical habits that
had for ages been their inveterate associate and distinctive
livery. With their enmity to the doctrines of the catholic
church, they combined an aversion to those ceremonies which
her ministers had too often rendered subservient to imposture;
which seemed to owe their survivance in the national system
to the same error that had long retained so much doctrinal
heresy; and which diverted the mind from that spiritual wor
ship expressly claimed for the Most High in the Scriptures of
truth. These sentiments, which were subsequently matured
into the doctrines of the puritans, had already taken possession
of the minds of some of the English protestants: but their
operation was as yet neither very powerful nor extensive.
One of the most remarkable manifestations of their influence

• 2 & 3 Edward VI. cap. i. Burnet's History ofthe Reformation. Rymer.
= Neal.

NORTH AMERICA. 165
that has been transmitted to us, proceeded from Bishop CHAP.
Hooper, who, in the reign of Edward, refused to be consecrated '
to his oflice in the superstitious habits (as he deemed them)
appropriated by the church to the episcopal order. His
protestant opinions had rendered him an exile from England
during the latter part of the preceding reign, and his puritan
sentiments had been confirmed by the conversation of the
presbyterian teachers, with whom he associated during his
residence abroad. Cranmer and Ridley, who were afterwards
his fellow martyrs under the persecution of Mary, resorted to
arguments, threats, entreaties, and imprisonment, to overcome
Hooper's objections; and it was not without great difficulty
and reluctance that his rigid spirit condescended to terminate
the dispute by a compromise.1 ' The sentiments which had
thus received the sanction of a man distinguished no less by
the purity and elevation of his character than by the eminence
of his station in the church, continued to manifest themselves
throughout the short reign of Edward; and there was scarcely
a rite of the established worship, or an article of ecclesiastical
apparel, that escaped objection and contentious discussion.2
The defenders of the practices that were thus assailed, (or at
least the more enlightened of this party,) did not contend that
they were of divine appointment, or in themselves of essential
importance. They maintained that they were in themselves
inoffensive, and that by long establishment and inveterate
association they had taken possession of the reverence of the
people, and contributed to attach their affections to the na
tional worship. They admitted that, as useless appendages, it
was desirable that time and reason should gradually obliterate
such practices; but insisted that it would be both unwise and
illiberal to abolish them abruptly, and at the risk of unhingino-
the important sentiments with which they had accidentally
connected themselves. This reasoning was very unsatisfactory
to the puritans, who rejected such temporizing policy as the
counsel of lukewarm piety and worldly wisdom, and regarded
with abhorrence the mixture of superstitious attractions with
the motives to that which should be entirely a reasonable

Burnet, Heylin's History of the Reformation." 2 Strype.

166 THE HISTORY OF
book service: 1 and whatever weight the arguments of the prevailing
* party may be considered to possess, they certainly cannot be
allowed to justify their violent imposition of observances,
which at best they regarded as indifferent, on persons who
deemed them sinful and pernicious. But the sentiments of
the puritans, whether supported or not by superior weight of
reason, were overborne by the weight of superior numbers;
and might perhaps have gradually died away, if the reign of
Edward had been much farther prolonged, or his sceptre been
transmitted to a protestant successor. But the reign of Mary
was appointed not only to purify the protestant body, by
separating the true from the false or formal professors, but to
radicate every protestant sentiment by exposing it to the fiery
test of tyrannical rage and persecution.
The administration of this Queen was productive of events
that tended to revive and disseminate the puritan sentiments,
and at the same time to confirm the opposition of some of
their adversaries. During the heat of her bloody persecution,
many of the English protestants forsook their country, and
took refuge in the Protestant states of Germany and Switzer
land. There, in regulating for themselves the forms and
ordinances of divine worship, their ancient disputes naturally
recurred, and were animated by the approach of the two
parties to an equality of numbers that had never before sub
sisted between them, and protracted by the utter want of a
spirit of mutual forbearance, and the absence of any tribunal
from which an authoritative decision could be obtained. The
puritans beheld with pleasure in the continental churches the
establishment of a constitution and ritual which had been the
object of their own warm approbation and earnest desire; and
they either composed for themselves a formula of religious as
sociation on a similar model, or entered into communion with
the churches established in the places where they resided.
Their opponents, on the other hand, clung more firmly than
ever to their ancient practices : they refused to surrender any
one of the institutions of the faith, for the sake of which they
had forsaken their country ; and they plumed themselves on
reproducing, amidst the desolation of their church at home,
1 Slrype.

NORTH AMERICA. 167
an entire and accurate model of her ordinances in the scene CHAP.
of their exile. Both parties were willing to have united in L
church fellowship with each other, if either could have yielded
in the dispute concerning forms of office, habits, and cere
monies. But though each considered itself strongest in faith,
neither felt disposed on that account to succumb beneath
what it deemed the infirmities of the other; and though
united in the great fundamental points of christian belief, and
associated by the common calamity that rendered them fellow
exiles in a foreign land, their fruitless controversies separated
them more widely than they had ever been before, and in
flamed them with mutual dislike and animosity.1 On the
death of Mary both parties returned to England : the one
joyfully expecting to see their ancient style of worship re
stored ; the other more firmly wedded to their puritan senti
ments by the opportunity they had obtained of freely in
dulging them, and entertaining (in common with many who
had remained at home) an increased antipathy to the habits
and ceremonies which the recent ascendancy and measures
of catholic bigots had strongly associated with the odious
features of superstitious delusion and tyrannic cruelty.
The views which the puritans indulged on the accession of
Elizabeth to the throne, were seconded by the disposition of
not a few even of their opponents among the leading protest
ant churchmen who had weathered the storm at home. Se
veral of the most distinguished persons of this class expressed
the strongest reluctance, in restoring the protestant consti
tution, to interweave with its fundamental canons, any subor
dinate or merely ceremonial regulations that might be
offensive to men endeared to them by their common calamity,
and so recently associated with them as confessors not for the
forms but for the substance of religion. Some of the puritans,
no doubt, were bent on reducing the model of the church to a
strict conformity with their own peculiar sentiments and
standard of propriety ; and some of their opponents were as
eager to prohibit and suppress every trace of puritan practice.2
The majority, however, as well as the leading members of
both parties, were sincerely desirous to promote an accommo-
1 Neal. "- Ibid.

168 TH£ HISTORY OF
BOOK dation on the principle of mutual forbearance ; and willingly
• agreed that the disputed habits and ceremonies should be
retained in the church, as observances of a discretionary and
indifferent nature, not to be controverted by the one party nor
enforced by the other, but left to be confirmed or abolished
by the silent progress of sentiment and opinion.1 But these
wise and candid concessions were frustrated by the views and
temper of the queen ; whose authority soon defaced the fair
prospect that had arisen of concord and happiness, and in
volved the people committed to her care in a long and widen
ing scene of strife, malignity, and misery. Elizabeth inhe
rited the headstrong and arrogant disposition of her father,
and his taste for splendid pageantry. And though she had
been educated with her brother Edward, and her understand
ing had received a strong tincture of protestant opinion, her
sentiments inclined her, with manifest bias, in favour of the
rites, discipline, and even doctrine of the catholics — of every
thing, in short, that could lend an imposing aspect to the
establishment of which she was the supreme head, and extend
the dominion which she was resolved to maintain over the
clergy. She publicly thanked one of her chaplains for preach
ing in defence of the real presence, and rebuked another for
mentioning with little reverence the catholic notion of an in
herent virtue in the symbol of the cross." She desired to
make the clergy priests, and not preachers ; discouraged their
sermons ; and would have interdicted them from marriage
had she not been restrained by the remonstrances of her mi
nister Lord Burleigh.3 Disregarding the wishes and entreaties
both of churchmen and puritans, she restored King Edward's
constitutions with no other alteration than the omission of a
few passages in the liturgy which were offensive to tbe
catholics ; and caused a law to be framed, commanding,
under the penalties of fine, imprisonment, and deprivation of
ministerial office, a strict uniformity of religious worship.4
This was the first step in a line of policy which the church of
England has had deep and lasting cause to deplore, and
which, by compelling thousands of her best and ablest mi
nisters reluctantly to forsake her communion, afflicted her
1 Strype's Life of Parker. i\eal. 'Heylin. > Strype. * Neale.

NORTH AMERICA. 169
with a decay of internal piety, of which the traces continued c H A P.
to be visible after the lapse of many generations. Ij
But this law was for some time neither strictly nor gene
rally executed. The queen could not at once find a sufficient
number of persons fitted to sustain the dignity of episcopal
elevation, and yet willing to become the instruments of her
arbitrary designs ; nor could all her efforts for a while excite
general strife and ill-will among men, of whom so many,
though differing from each other on subordinate points, had
but lately been united by community of sentiment and suffer
ing in the noblest cause that could interest human hearts.
Her first bench of bishops were not only eager to clear them
selves of the reproach of having composed or approved the
existing laws,1 but by a general forbearance to enforce them,
enabled the puritan ministers and the practices of puritanism
to obtain a considerable footing in the church. And though
she reprimanded the primate Parker for his negligence, and
at length stimulated him to the exertion of some rigour in the
execution of the act of uniformity, it was far from receiving
general prevalence ; and by various acts of connivance on the
one side, and prudent reserve on the other, the puritans were
enabled to enjoy the semblance of toleration. Their tranquil
lity was promoted by the succession of Grindall to the primacy.
The liberal principles and humane disposition of this man
revolted against the tyrannical injustice which he was required
to administer ; and at the expense of his own imprisonment,
and the disfavour of his temporal sovereign, he prolonged the
duration of lenient policy, and the peace of the church.2
At length, on the death of Grindall, the primacy was
bestowed on Whitgift, a man of severe temper, a rigid
votary of the established system of ecclesiastical discipline
and policy, and an implacable adversary of the puritans,
against whom he had repeatedly directed the hostility of his
pen, and now gladly wielded a more formidable weapon.
From this period all the force ofthe law was spent in uninter-

1 In their letters to their friends at home and abroad, they not only reprobate the
obnoxious institutions, but promise to withstand them " till they be sent back to
hell, from whence they came, to sow discord, confusion, and vain formality in the
church." Burnet. Neal.
3 Strype's Life of Grindall. Neal.

170 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK rupted efforts to harass the persons, or violate the consciences
 J  ofthe puritans. A numerous body of puritan ministers were
deprived of their livings; and many of their parishioners were
punished by fine and imprisonment for following their ministry
into the fields and woods, where they continued to exercise it.
Vainly were the exertions of wise and good men employed to
move the queen, ere yet it was too late, to recede from her
fatal policy, and stay the flame of discord which she was pre
paring to kindle among her people. Burleigh and Walsing-
ham earnestly interceded for the suspended ministers; urging
the indulgence due to their conscientious scruples, the humane
concern to which their families were entitled, and the respect
which sound policy demanded for the sentiments of that nu
merous body of the people by whom they were revered and
beloved. The House of Commons, too, showed a desire to pro
cure some relief for the oppressed puritans. But Whitgift
flung himself on his knees before the queen and implored her
to uphold the sinking church, and to admit no alteration of its
ritual that would give men leave to say that she had maintained
an error. His humiliation, most probably, was prompted
rather by flattery than fear ; for Elizabeth had shown no incli
nation whatever to mitigate an imperious policy so congenial
to her own character. The enforcement of implicit deference
to her judgment, and of rigid conformity to the model she had
enacted, was the result of her early and stubborn choice, and
pursued with her usual firmness and vigour of determination.
She overbore all opposition ; and the primate and his asso
ciates being encouraged to proceed in the course which they
had commenced, their zeal, enlarging as it flowed, soon trans
ported them beyond all bounds of decency and humanity.
They were allowed to establish a court of commissioners for
the detection of non-conformity, which even the privy council
remonstrated against as a copy of the detested tribunal ofthe
inquisition. By the assistance of this tyrannical engine, they
made freer course for the severities of the law ; and having
rendered integrity hazardous, they made prudence unavailing
to the puritans. In vain were they reminded of the maxim
of the first christian council, which recommended the impo
sition of no greater burden on the people than the observa
tion of duties undeniably necessary and of primary import-

NORTH AMERICA. 171
ance. For the purpose of imposing a load of ceremonies, CHAP.
which they could not pretend to characterize as requisitions  |__
essential to salvation, they committed such oppression as ren
dered the ceremonies themselves ten-fold more obnoxious to
those persons to whom even indulgent treatment would have
failed to recommend them ; and roused the opposition of
others who would willingly have complied with the ceremonial
ordinances if they had been proposed to them merely as mat
ters of convenient observance, but revolted from them, as
fraught with danger and mischief, when it was attempted to
bind them on the conscience, and place them on a level with
the most sacred obligations. The chief fruits of this increased
severity were the enkindling of great additional zeal and fer
vour in the minds of the puritans ; the multiplication of their
numbers by the powerful influence of sympathy with their cou
rage, and compassion for their sufferings; and a growing
abhorrence in their body to the order of bishops and the
whole frame of a church which to them was an organ of injus
tice and tyranny. It is certain that the puritans of those
times were at first exceedingly averse to separate from the
church of England ; and their ministers were still more re
luctant to abet a schism and renounce their preferments.
They willingly allowed her to be a true christian church, and
merely claimed indulgence with regard to a few ceremonies
which did not affect the substance of her constitution. But
the injurious treatment which they received, held out a pre
mium to very different considerations, and at once aroused
their passions, stimulated their inquiries, and extended their
objections. Expelled from the national church, they were
forced to inquire if they could not do without that which they
found they could not have ; and were easily led to question if
the genuine features of a christian church could be recognised
in that society which not only rejected but persecuted them
for a conscientious adherence, in a matter of ceremonial ob
servance, to what they believed to be the will of God. As
the puritan principles spread through the mass of society, and
encountered in their progress a greater variety of character in
their votaries, and of treatment from their adversaries, consi
derable differences and inequalities of sentiment and conduct
appeared in different portions of the puritan body. Some of

] 72 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK them caught the spirit of their oppressors, and, in words at
 !__ least, retaliated the unchristian usage they underwent. They
combined the doctrines of the New with the practices of the
Old Testament, in a manner which will not excite the wonder
of those who recollect that the very first assembly of Christians
who were collected in the world committed the same error,
and so far forgot the meekness they had been commanded to
evince, as even in the presence of their Divine Master to pro
pose the invocation of fire from heaven on the men who had
insulted them. But the instances of this spirit were at first
exceedingly rare ; and it was not till the following reigns that
it prevailed either strongly or widely. In general, the op
pressed puritans conducted themselves with the fortitude of
heroes and the patience of saints ; and, what is surprising,
they made more zealous and successful efforts to maintain their
loyalty, than the queen and the bishops did to extinguish it.
Many, in defiance of every danger, followed the preaching of
their ministers into the highways and fields, or assembled pri
vately in conventicles, which the general sympathy, or the
connivance of their secret partisans within the church, some-
- times preserved from detection. Others reluctantly tarried
within the pale of the national church, unweariedly pursuing
their ineffectual attempts to promote parliamentary inter
ference in behalf of the puritan cause, and casting a wistful
eye on the presumptive succession of a prince who had been
educated in a presbyterian society. Some at length openly
disclaimed the national establishment, and were led, by the
cruel excesses of magisterial power to the conviction, that
magisterial power ought to be banished entirely from the ad
ministration ofthe kingdom of Christ.1
The proceedings of the queen were, doubtless, cordially
abetted by the angry zeal of those churchmen who had fled
from England in the preceding reign, and had partaken the
controversy that arose with the puritans during their common
exile. But the whole civil and ecclesiastical policy of the
present reign was mainly and essentially the offspring of
Elizabeth's own character. The puritan writers, bestowing
an undue proportion of their resentment on the persons whose
' Strype's Life of Whitgift. Fuller's Church History. Neal.

NORTH AMERICA. 173
functions rendered them the instruments as well as the apolo- CHAP.
gists ofthe queen's ecclesiastical system, have been disposed '
to impute the tyrannical features of this system exclusively to
the bishops, and particularly to Whitgift, whose influence
with Elizabeth they ascribe to his constant habit of address
ing her on his knees.1 But Whitgift, in seconding her enmity
to the puritans, did no more than coincide with her favourite
and declared policy : with zeal half courtly, half ecclesiastical,
he flattered a disposition which she had already unequivocally
manifested, and swam with the stream of that resolute deter
mination which, he saw, would have its course. The ab
ject homage which he paid her was nothing more than
she was accustomed generally to receive ; and the obser
vation which it has attracted from the puritans, denotes
rather a peculiarity in their own sentiments or manners, than
any thing remarkable in the conduct of their adversary.
Not one of her subjects was permitted to address the queen
without kneeling ; wherever she turned her eye, every one
was expected to fall on his knees ; and even in her absence,
the nobility, who were alone deemed worthy to cover her
table, made three genuflexions every time they approached or
retired from it in the performance of their menial duty.2 This
was an exact counterpart of the homage rendered by the
catholics to the Real Presence, which they believed to reside
in the Host ; and the sentiments which it tended to implant
both in the prince who received, and the subjects who ren
dered it, were confirmed by the language of parliament, in
which the queen was continually flattered with attributes
and praise befitting the homage of creatures to their Creator.
Nor was this servile system of manners peculiar to the reign
of Elizabeth. On the contrary, it had been carried even to a
greater extent under the government of her predecessors;
and her ministers frequently noted and deplored the decay of
that fearfulness and reverence of their superiors which had for
merly characterised the inferior estates of the realm.3 Sense
and reason shared the ignominy and degradation of manners ;
1 Neal.
» Hentzner's Journey into England in 1598. This abject ceremonial was abolished
by King James, who, though highly pleased with adulation, found himself em
barrassed by a mode of displaying it so ill suited to his awkward manners and un
gainly appearance. 3 Hayne's Collection of State Papers.

174 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK arrogance disordered the understanding of the prince, while
' servility deformed the sentiments of the people ; and if Henry
the Eighth, by a royal proclamation, assured the populace
that they were brutes, — the same populace, in their petitions
against his measures, represented the promotion of low-born
persons to public trust and honour, as one of the most
serious and intolerable grievances that they had to com
plain of.1
The sentiments which such practices and manners tended
to form in the mind of the queen, enhanced the displeasure
with which she regarded the puritans, who were fated to offend
her by their political conduct, as well as their religious opi
nions. Many persons of consideration among them obtained
seats in parliament, where they endeavoured to nourish a
spirit of liberty, and direct its energy to the protection of their
persecuted brethren. Impelled by the severity of the re
straints they experienced, to investigate the boundaries of that
authority by which such restraints were imposed, — and regulat
ing their sentiments rather by the consequences they foresaw
than by the precedents they remembered, — they questioned the
most inveterate abuses, and obtained the confidence of the
people by showing themselves the indefatigable and fearless
defenders of the oppressed. In the annals of those times, we
find them continually supporting petitions in parliament
against monopolies, and advocating motions for reformation
of ecclesiastical abuses. Attracting popular favour, and will
ing to undergo the burden of parliamentary attendance, they
gradually multiplied their numbers in the House of Commons,
and acquired an ascendant over its deliberations. The queen,
observing that the puritans were the sole abettors of measures
calculated to restrict her prerogative, was easily led to ascribe
the peculiarity of their religious and political opinions to the
same source — a malignant aversion to dignities, and mutinous
impatience of subordination. Their reluctance to render to the
Deity that ceremonious homage which the most illustrious
persons in the Ian drendered to herself, — and their inclination
to curtail her authority, — which from no other quarter expe
rienced resistance, — seemed to her the manifest proofs of an
1 Laid Herbert.

NORTH AMERICA. 175
insolent disregard, no less of the Supreme Being than of her- chap.
self, His acknowledged vicegerent and representative ; a pre-  ;__
sumptuous insurrection of spirit against the reverence due to
God, and the loyalty due to the prince.1 Nothing could be
more unjust and fallacious than this royal reasoning. The
religion, as well as the loyalty, of the puritans, was the less
ceremonious, only because it was the more reflective, pro
found, and substantial. To preserve an unstained conscience,
they encountered the extremities of ecclesiastical rigour. Not
withstanding the most oppressive and tyrannical treatment,
they exhibited a resolute constancy of regard to their sove
reign. And neither intimidated by danger nor dispirited by
defeat, they maintained a continual effort to check the ex
cesses of despotic authority, and to rear and cherish the
infant liberties of their country. They have been charged
with a sour and caustic spirit, by those who forced them to
eat their bread in bitterness and carry their lives in their
hands; of a neglect of general literature, and an exclusive
study of the Bible, by those who destroyed their writings,
committed the press to episcopal licensers, and deprived them
of every source of comfort and direction but what the Bible
could supply; of an exaggerated estimate of little matters, by
those who rendered such matters the occasion of cruel suffer
ing and enormous wrong to them ; of a stern jealousy of civil
power, by those who made it continually their interest to
question and abridge the authority by which they were op
pressed. A great philosopher and historian, who will not be
suspected of any undue partiality for these people, has been
constrained to acknowledge that the puritans were the pre
servers of civil and religious liberty in England.2 It was a
1 In a speech from the throne, she informed the Commons (after a candid confes
sion, that she knew nobody who had read or reflected as much as herself) that
whoever attacked the constitutions ofthe chureh, slandered her as its supreme head,
divinely appointed ; and that, if the papists were inveterate enemies to her person,
the modern sectaries were no less formidable to all regal government. She added,
that she was determined to suppress their overboldness in presumptuously scanning
the will of God Almighty. JJ'Ewes' Account of Queen Elizabeth's Parliaments.
The cruel law that was passed in the thirty fifth year of the queen's reign, against
all ecclesiastical recusants, is entitled " An act to retain her majesty's subjects in
their due obedience," and was intended, as the preamble declares, to repress the evil
practices of " seditious sectaries and disloyal persons," — synonymous descriptions of
guilt in the estimation of Elizabeth.
J " So absolute indeed was the authority of the crown, that the precious spark of
liberty had been kindled and was preserved by the puritans alone ; and it was to this

176 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK scion of the same stock that was destined to propagate these
' blessings in America.
Rise of the The minds of a considerable party among the puritans had
Mlnde-1* Deen gradually prepared to disclaim the authority of the na-
pendents. tional church, and to deny the lawfulness of holding com
munion with it; insomuch that when these sentiments were
first publicly proclaimed by Robert Brown in 1586, they rea
dily gained the assent and open profession of multitudes.
Brown, who obtained the distinction of bestowing his name on
a sect, which derived very little credit from the appellation, was
a young clergyman, of good family, endowed with a restless,
intrepid disposition, a fiery temper, and an insatiable thirst for
controversy. Encountering the wrath of the ecclesiastics with
fiercer wrath, and trampling on their arrogance with more than
clerical pride, he roamed about the country, inveighing against
bishops, ecclesiastical courts, ceremonies, and episcopal ordina
tion of ministers, and exulting, above all, in the boast that he
had been committed to thirty-two prisons, in some of which he
could not see his hand at noon-day. His impetuous and illi
beral spirit accelerated the publication of opinions which were
not yet matured in the puritan body, and which, but for his
unseasonable interposition and perverting influence, might
sooner have been ripened into the system of the Independents.
The queen and the bishops applied the usual remedy of perse
cution to this innovation, with even more than the usual evi
dence of the unfitness of such instrumentality to accomplish
their design. Supported by powerful arguments, maintained
with zeal and courage, and opposed by cruelties that disgraced
the name of religion, the principles of the Brownists spread
widely through the land. Brown himself, and a congregation
more immediately attached to him, expatriated to Middle-
burgh, in Zealand, where they were permitted to cultivate
their opinions without molestation. But Brown had collected
around him spirits too congenial to his own, to preserve their
union when the strong band of oppression was withdrawn.

sect, whose principles appear so frivolous and habits so ridiculous, that the English
owe the whole freedom of their constitution." Hume's England. Again, " It was
only during the next generation that the noble principles of liberty took root, and,
spreading themselves under the shelter of puritanical absurdities, became fashionable
among the people." Ibid,

NORTH AMERICA. j~y
The congregation crumbled into parties, and was soon dis- chap
solved : and Brown, returning to England, rejoined the *¦
national church, and, contracting dissolute habits, ended his
days in indolence and contempt. But the doctrines which he
had been the means of introducing to public notice had firmly
rooted themselves in the puritan body, and received daily ac
cessions to the numbers and respectability of their votaries. 1
The Brownistsdid not dissent from the church of England in
any of her articles of faith, but they accounted herritualand dis
cipline unscriptural and superstitious, and all her sacraments
and ordinances invalid ; and they renounced communion, not
only with her, but with every other protestant church that was
not constructed on the same model as their own. Their model
was derived from the closest imitation of the apostolical institu
tions delineated in scripture. When a church or congregation
was to be formed, all who desired to be members of it, pro
fessed the particulars of their faith in each others presence,
and signed a covenant by which they obliged themselves to
make the bible and its ordinances the guide of their conduct.
Each congregation formed an independent church, and the
admission or exclusion of members resided with the brethren
composing it. Their ecclesiastical officers were elected from
among themselves, and invested with their several charges of
preaching the gospel, administering the sacramental ordi
nances, and relieving the poor, after fasting and prayer, by
the imposition of the hands of some of the brethren. They
did not account the priesthood a distinct order, nor the minis
terial character indelible, but deemed that as the appointment
ofthe church conferred on a minister his function (which in its
exercise, too, was limited to the special body to which he was
attached), so the same authority was sufficient to deprive him
of it. It was permitted to any one ofthe brethren to exercise
the liberty of prophesying, which meant the addressing of occa
sional exhortation to the people ; and it was usual for some of
them, after sermon, to promulgate questions and considera
tions, and reason upon the doctrines that had been preached.2
The condition to which the puritans were reduced by their
oppressors, favoured the acceptance of all that was separating
1 Fuller. Neal. ' Neal,
VOL. I. N

178 THE HISTORY OF
book and unsocial in the principles ofthe Brownist teachers ; for as
II- they could assemble only by stealth, it was impossible to pre
serve a regular intercourse between their churches, or to ascer
tain how far they mutually agreed in doctrine and discipline.
Against these men, in whose characters were united more
piety, virtue, courage, and loyalty than any other portion of
her people displayed, did Elizabeth and her ecclesiastical
counsellors direct the whole fury of the law. John Udall, one
of their ministers, was tried in the year 1591, for having pub
lished a defence of their tenets, which he entitled A Demon
stration of the Discipline which Christ hath prescribed in his
Word for the Government of the Church in all Times and
Places until the World's End. This performance, consistently
with Elizabeth's maxim that whoever attacked the established
church slandered the queen, was regarded as a political libel,
and Udall was arraigned for a capital felony. In conformity
with the barbarous jurisprudence which then prevailed in
England, the witnesses against the prisoner were not con
fronted with him ; his proposition to adduce exculpatory evi
dence was disallowed, as an affront to tbe majesty of the
crown ; and because he refused at the bar to swear that he
was not the author of the book, his refusal was urged against
him as the strongest proof of his guilt. When he was told by
one of thejudges thatabook replete with sentiments so incon
sistent with the established institutions, tended to the over
throw of the state by the provocation of rebellion, he replied,
" My lords, that be far from me ; for we teach that, reform
ing things amiss, if the prince will not consent, the weapons
that subjects are to fight withall, are repentance and prayers,
patience and tears." The judge offered him his life if he
would recant ; and added, that he was now ready to pro
nounce sentence of death. " And I am ready to receive it,"
exclaimed this magnanimous man ; " for I protest before God,
(not knowing that I am to live an hour) that the cause is
good, and I am contented to receive sentence, so that I may
leave it to posterity how I have suffered for the cause." 1 He
1 Howel's State Trials. It is remarkable, that although one devoted victim of
royal vengeance and persecution (Sir Nicholas Throgmorton) was enabled to escape
during the reign of Mary, not one of the objects of Elizabeth's hostility was equally
fortunate. A great addition to the power, as well as the pretensions of the first pro-

NORTH AMERICA. ] 79
was condemned to die; and being still urged to submit to the chap.
queen, he willingly expressed his regret that any of his I-
writings should have given her offence, and disclaimed any
such wish or intention, but firmly refused to disown what he
believed to be truth, or to renounce liberty of conscience.
By the interest of some powerful friends, a conditional pardon
was obtained for him ; but before the terms of it could be ad
justed, or the queen prevailed on to sign it, he died in prison.
Penry, Greenwood, Barrow, and Dennis, of whom the first two
were clergymen, and the others laymen, were soon after tried
on similar charges, and perished by the hands of the execu
tioner. A pardon was offered to them if they would retract
their profession ; but, inspired by a courage which no earthly
motive could overcome, they clung to their principles, and left
the care of their lives to Heaven. Some more were hanged for
dispersing the writings, and several for attending the dis
courses of the Brownists. Many others endured the torture
of severe imprisonment, and numerous families were reduced
to indigence by heavy fines. l As the most virtuous and
honourable are ever, on such occasions, most exposed to
danger, every stroke of the oppressor's arm is aimed at those
very qualities in his adversaries that constitute his own de
fence and security ; and, hence, severities so odious to man
kind, and so calculated to unite by a strong sympathy the
minds of the spectators and the sufferers, are more likely to
diminish the virtue than the numbers of a party. By dint of
long continuance, and of the exertion of their influence on a
greater variety of human character, they finally divested a great
many of the puritans of the spirit of meekness and non-resist
ance for which the fathers of the party had been so highly dis
tinguished. But this fruit was not gathered till a subsequent
reign ; and their first effect was not only to multiply the num
bers, but to confirm the virtue of the puritans. When perse
cution had as yet but invigorated their fortitude without in
spiring ferocity, a portion of this people was happily con
ducted to the retreat of America, there to plant and extend

testant sovereigns of England, was derived from their assumption of the ecclesiastical
supremacy previously ascribed to the Roman Pontiff.
' Strype s Life of Whitgift. Fuller. Neal.
N 2

180 THE HISTORY OF
book the principles of their cause, — while their brethren in England
remained behind to revenge its accumulated wrongs.
When the queen was informed, by Dr. Reynolds, of the
calm piety which the martyrs of her cruelty had displayed,—.
how they had blessed their persecuting sovereign, and turned
the scaffold to which she had consigned them, into an altar
whence they had prayed for her long and happy reign, — her
heart was touched with a sentiment of remorse, and she ex
pressed regret for having taken their lives away. But re
pentance with all mankind is too often but a fruitless anguish ;
and princes have been known to bewail, even with tears, the
mortality of multitudes whom they were conducting to
slaughter, and the shortness of that life which their own
selfish and sanguinary ambition was contributing still farther
to abridge. Elizabeth, so far from alleviating, increased the
legislative severities whose effects she had deplored ; and was
fated never to see her errors till it was too late to repair them.
In the year 1593, a few months after the executions which
we have alluded to, a new and severer law was enacted
against the puritans. These sectaries were not only increasing
their numbers every day, but furnishing so many votaries of
the Brownist or independent doctrines, that, in the debate
which took place in the House of Commons on the introduc
tion of this measure, Sir Walter Raleigh stated, that the
numbers of professed Brownists alone then amounted to
twenty thousand. The humane arguments, however, which
he derived from this consideration were unavailing to prevent
the passing of a law,1 which enacted, that any person above
sixteen years of age who obstinately refused, during the space
of a month, to attend public worship in a legitimate parochial
church, should be committed to prison ; that, if he persisted
three months in his refusal, he must abjure the realm ; and
that, if he either refused this condition, or returned after
banishment, he should suffer death as a felon. If this act
was not more fortunate than its predecessors in accomplishing
the main object of checking the growth of puritan principles,
it promoted at least the subordinate purpose of driving a
> 35 Eliz. cap. 1. Raleigh was not the only favourite of Elizabeth who was op
posed to her ecclesiastical policy. One of the causes of her displeasure at Lord
Essex was the countenance he gave to the puritans.

NORTH AMERICA. 181
great many of the professors of ecclesiastical independency chap.
out of England. A numerous society of these fugitives was I-
collected about the close of the sixteenth century, at Amster
dam, where they flourished in peace and piety for upwards of
a hundred years. Others retired to various protestant states
on the continent, whence with fond delusive hope, they ex
pected to be recalled to their native land on the accession of
Elizabeth's successor. The remainder continued in England
to fluctuate between the evasion and the violation ofthe law, —
cherishing with their principles a stern impatience, generated
by the galling restraints that impeded the free expression
of them ; and yet retained in submission by the hope which,
in common with the exiles, they indulged of a mitigation of
their sufferings on the demise of the queen.1 Some historians
have expressed surprise at the close concurrence of that gene
ral and impatient desire of a new reign which was manifested in
the close of Elizabeth's life, with the strong and sudden
disgust which the government of her successor experienced ;
and hence have taken occasion, with censorious but inappli
cable wisdom, to deplore the ingratitude and fickleness of
mankind. The seeming inconsistency, however, admits of
an explanation more honourable to human nature, though
less creditable to royal wisdom and virtue. Elizabeth had
exhausted the patience and loyalty of a great portion of her
subjects : and tbe adherence to her policy which her successor
so unexpectedly manifested, disappointed all the hopes by
which those virtues had been sustained.
The hopes of the puritans were derived from the education
of the Scottish king, and supported by many of his declara
tions, which were eagerly cited and circulated in England.
James had been bred a presbyterian : he had publicly declared
that the church of Scotland was the best ecclesiastical con
stitution in the world, and that the English Liturgy re
sembled, to his apprehension, an ill-chanted mass. On his
accession to the English crown, he was solicited by numerous
petitions to interpose his authority for the protection and
relief of the puritans ; and at first he showed himself so far dis
posed to comply with their wishes as to appoint a solemn con-
1 Strype's Life of Whitgift. D'Ewes. Neal.

182 THE HISTORY OF
book ference between their leaders and the heads of the church
• party at Hampton Court. But the hopes inspired by the pro
position of this conference were disappointed by its result.1
If James had ever sincerely preferred a presbyterian to an
episcopal establishment, his opinion was entirely reversed by
the opportunity he now enjoyed of comparing them with each
other, and by the very different treatment he experienced
from their respective ministers. In Scotland he had been
engaged in perpetual contentions with the clergy, who did not
recognise in his regal office any supremacy over their church,
and who differed from him exceedingly in their estimate of
his piety, capacity, and attainments. Precluded by his
poverty from a display of royal pomp that might have dazzled
their eyes and hid the weakness of the man behind the
grandeur of the king, he stood plainly revealed to their keen
glance, a clumsy personification of conceit and pedantry, ob
stinate but unsteady, filled with the rubbish and subtlety of
scholastic learning, void of manly sense and useful knowledge.
They have been accused of disturbing his government by
exercising a censorial power over it ; but it was himself that
first taught, or at least encouraged, them thus to overstep
their functions. Extending his administration into their pe
culiar province, where it had no right to penetrate, he seemed
to sanction as well as provoke their censorial strictures on his
intrusion. Mingling religious notions with his political views,
he attempted to remodel the church ; and the clergy, mingling
political doctrines with their theological sentiments, com
plained of his interference, and censured the whole strain of
his goverment. In an appeal to the public opinion and will,
they easily triumphed over the unpopular pretensions of their
feeble sovereign, and gained a victory which they used with
little moderation, and which he resented no less as a theolo
gical than as a political affront. One of the ministers of the
church of Scotland had so far transgressed the limits of
decency and propriety as openly to declare that " all kings
were the devil's children;"2 and James retorted the dis
courtesy, when he found himself safe from their spleen and
turbulence in England, by vehemently protesting that "a
i January, 1604. » Spoltiswoode.

NORTH AMERICA. 183
Scottish presbytery agrees as well with monarchy as God and CHAP.
the devil." * The sentiments that naturally resulted from of- I-
fended arrogance and mortified presumption, were expanded
to their amplest plenitude by the blaze of flattery and adula
tion with which the dignitaries of the English church received
him. By them he was readily hailed the supreme head of
their establishment, the protector of its privileges, the centre
of its splendour, the fountain of its dignities ; and Whitgift
did not scruple to declare, in the conference at Hampton
Court, that undoubtedly his majesty spake by the special assistance
of God's spirit.2 This was the last impulse that the deluded
ecclesiastic was destined to impart to royal pride and folly.
Confounded at the wide and spreading explosion of puritan
sentiment, which he had flattered himself with the hope of
having almost entirely extinguished, his grief and concern so
violently affected his aged frame as to cause his death very
shortly after.3 But he had already contributed to instil the
ecclesiastical spirit of Elizabeth into the mind of her suc
cessor ; and James, inflamed with admiration of a church
which, like a faithful mirror (he thought) so justly reflected
and illustrated his royal perfections, became henceforward the
determined patron of the church of England, and the perse
cutor of all who opposed her institutions. His natural conceit,
fortified by the testimony ofthe English prelates, soared to a
height of surpassing arrogance and presumption ; and he who
in Scotland had found himself curbed in every attempt to
interfere with the religious institutions of his own narrow
realm, now reckoned himself qualified and entitled to dictate
the ecclesiastical policy of foreign nations. Engaging in a
dispute with Vorstius, professor of theology in a Dutch uni
versity, and finding his adversary insensible to the weight of
his arguments, he resolved to make him feel at least the
weight and the stretch of his power; and, roused, on this
occasion, to a degree of energy and haughtiness to which no
other foreign concernment was ever able to excite him, he
remonstrated so vigorously with the states of Holland, that
to put an end to his clamour, they stooped to the mean in
justice of deposing and banishing the professor. With this
1 Fuller. » Kennet. 3 February, 1604.

184 THE HISTORY OF
book sacrifice to his insulted logic, James was forced to be con-
' tented, though he had endeavoured to bespeak from his allies
a more sanguinary vindication, by informing them " that as
to the burning of Vorstius for his blasphemies and atheism,
he left them to their own christian wisdom; though surely
never heretic better deserved the flames." He did not fail to
reinforce this charitable counsel by his own example ; and in
the course of his reign burned at the stake two persons who
were, so unhappy as to entertain the Arian heresy,1 and an un
fortunate lunatic who mistook himself for the Deity, and
whose frenzy was thus cruelly treated by a much more dan
gerous and deliberate invader of the divine attributes. If
James had not been restrained by the growing political ascen
dancy of the puritans, there would probably have been more
of such executions in England. He did, however, as much
as he dared ; and finding in Bancroft a fit successor to Whit
gift, he made with his assistance so vigorous a commence
ment, that in the second year of his reign three hundred puritan
ministers were deprived, imprisoned, or banished. To pre
clude the communication of light from abroad, the importa
tion of any books hostile to the restraints imposed by the
laws of the realm or the king's proclamations, was forbidden
under the severest penalties: to prevent its rise and repress
its spread at home, no books were suffered to be printed in
England without the licence of a committee of bishops or their
deputies; and arbitrary jurisdictions for the trial of ecclesi
astical offences were multiplied and extended. Persons sus
pected of entertaining puritan sentiments, even though they
adhered to the church, were subjected to fine and imprison
ment for barely repeating to their families, in the evening, the
substance of the discourses they had heard at church during
the day, under the pretence that this constituted the crime of
irregular preaching. Some of the puritans having conceived
the design of withdrawing to Virginia, where they hoped that
distance would at least mitigate the violence of oppression, a
small number of them proceeded to carry their purpose into
1 One of these victims is termed by Fuller, in his Church History, " Our English
Vorstius." The king, in imitation of Henry the Eighth's generosity to Lambert,
held a personal dispute with him, and concluded it by delivering him into the hands
ofthe executioner.

NORTH AMERICA. 185
effect; and a larger body were preparing to follow, when c H A P.
Bancroft, apprised of their intention, obtained a proclamation

from the king, commanding that none of his subjects should 1620.
settle in Virginia without an express licence under the great
seal. Thus harassed and oppressed in England, and deprived -
of a refuge in Virginia, the puritans began to retire in consi
derable numbers to the protestant states of the continent of
Europe ; and the hopes of the still greater and increasing
numbers who remained at home were fixed on the House of
Commons. In this assembly the puritan ascendancy at
length became so manifest, that in spite of the king's procla
mations for encouraging- mirthful games on Sunday, a bill
was introduced for compelling a more strict and solemn ob
servance of the day, to which it gave the denomination of the
Sabbath; and when one member objected to this as a puritan
appellation, and ventured to justify dancing by a jocose mis
application of some passages of scripture, he was, on the
suggestion of Pym, expelled from the House for his profanity.1
But we have now reached the period at which we forsake the
main stream of the history of the puritans, to follow the for
tunes of that illustrious branch which was destined to visit
and ennoble the deserts of America. In reviewing the strange
succession of events which we have beheld, and the various
impressions they have produced on our minds, it may perhaps
occur to some as a humiliating consideration, that the crimes
and follies, the cruelties and weaknesses which would excite
no other sentiments but those of horror, grief, or pity, in an
angelic beholder, are capable of presenting themselves in
such an aspect to less purified eyes, as to excite the splenetic
mirth even of those whose nature is reproached or disgraced
by the odious or absurd display.
In the year 1610, a congregation of Brownists, expelled by Acongre-
royal and ecclesiastical tyranny from their native land, had f„jJ!ne]J_
removed to Leyden, where they were permitted to establish dents retue
themselves in peace under the ministry of their pastor, John toHolland-
Robinson.2 This excellent person may be justly regarded as
1 K. James' Works, p. 355. Journals of the House of Commons, 15, 16
February, 1620. 28 May, 1621. Rymer. Neal. Stith's Virginia.
2 Cardinal Bentivoglio, in his Account of the United Provinces, describes these
exiles as. a body of English heretics called puritans, wlw had resorted to Holland for
purposes of commerce.

1 86 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK the founder of the sect of Independents, — having been the first
1X< teacher who steered a middle course between the path of

1620. Brownism and the Presbyterian system; to one or other of
which the views and inclinations of the Puritans were now
generally tending. The sentiments which he entertained when
he first quitted his country, bore the impress ofthe persecution
under which they had been formed; and when he commenced
his ministry at Leyden he was a rigid Brownist: but after he
had seen more of the world, and enjoyed opportunities of
familiar converse with learned and good men of different ec
clesiastical denominations, he began to entertain a more
charitable opinion of those minor differences, which he plainly
perceived might subsist, without injury to the essentials of
religion, and without violating charity, or generating discord.
Though he always maintained the legitimacy and expediency
of separating from the established protestant churches in the
country where he lived, he willingly allowed them the cha
racter of churches substantially christian; esteemed it lawful
to unite with them in preaching and prayer, though not in
the sacraments and discipline; and freely admitted their mem
bers to partake the sacrament with his own congregation. He
considered that each particular church or society of chris
tians possessed the power of electing its officers, administering
the gospel ordinances, and exercising over its own members
every necessary act of discipline and authority; and, conse
quently, that it was independent of all classes, synods, con
vocations, and councils. He admitted the expediency of
synods and councils for composition of emergent differences
between particular churches, by the communication of friendly
advice to them ; but denied their competence to exercise any
act of jurisdiction, or authoritatively to impose any articles or
canons of doctrine. These sentiments Robinson recommended
to esteem, by exemplifying, in his life and demeanour, the
best fruits of that divine spirit by whose tuition they were
imparted; by a character and behaviour, in which the most
eminent faculties and the highest attainments, were leavened
and controlled by the predominating power of a solemn, af
fectionate piety.1
1 Mather's Ecclesiastical Hist, of New England. Neal. Robinson's Apology
for the Brownisls.

NORTH AMERICA. 187
Enjoying the counsel and direction of such a pastor, and chap.
cherishing an adequate sense of his value, the English exiles I'
composing this congregation remained for ten years at Leyden, 1620.
in harmony with each other, and in peace with their neigh
bours. But, at the end of that period, the same pious views
that had prompted their original departure from England
incited them to undertake a more distant migration. They
beheld with deep concern the prevalence around them of
manners which they esteemed loose and profane; more par
ticularly, the general neglect among the Dutch of a reverential
observance of Sunday: and they reflected with apprehension
on the danger to which their children were exposed from the
natural contagion of habits so remote from serious piety.
Their country, too, still retained a hold on their affections ;
and they were loth to behold their posterity commingled and
identified with the Dutch population. The smallness of their
numbers, and the difference of language, discouraged them
from attempting to propagate in Holland the principles
which, with so much suffering and hazard, they had hitherto
maintained; and the conduct of the English government
extinguished every hope of toleration in their native land.
The famous Arminian Controversy, moreover, which was now
raging in Holland with a fury that produced the barbarous
execution of the Grand Pensionary Barneveldt, and the im
prisonment of Grotius, probably contributed to alienate the
desires of the English exiles from farther residence in a land
where the Calvinistic tenets which they cherished were thus
disgraced by cruelty and intolerance. In these circumstances
it occurred to them that they might combine the indulgence
of their patriotic attachment with the propagation of their
religious principles, by establishing themselves in some distant
quarter of the British dominions ; and, after many days of
earnest supplication for the counsel and direction of Heaven,
they unanimously determined to transport themselves and
their families to the territory of America. It was resolved that They re-
a part of the congregation should proceed thither before the S0J)'1e ,0
rest, to prepare a settlement for the whole; and that the main America.
body, meanwhile, should continue at Leyden with their
pastor. In choosing the particular scene of their establish
ment, they hesitated, for some time, between the territory of

188 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK Guiana, of which Sir Walter Raleigh had published a most
II- dazzling and attractive description, (mainly engendered by
1620. the pregnancy of his own imagination,) and the province of
Virginia, to which they finally gave the preference: but
Providence had ordained that their residence should be
established in New England.
Negotla- By the intervention of agents, whom they deputed to solicit
thTkln'". tne sanction of the English government to their enterprise,
they represented to the king, " that they were well weaned
from the delicate milk of their mother country, and inured to
the difficulties of a strange land: that they were knit toge
ther in a strict and sacred bond, by virtue of which they held
themselves bound to take care of the good of each other, and
of the whole : that it was not with them as with other men,
whom small things could discourage, or small discontent
cause to wish themselves at home again." The king, waver
ing between his desire to promote the colonization of America,
and his reluctance to suffer the consciences of any portion of
his subjects to be emancipated from his control, refused to
grant them a charter assuring the full enjoyment of ecclesi
astical liberty, but promised to connive at their practices,
and to refrain from molesting them. They were forced to
accept this precarious security, and would hardly have ob
tained it but for the friendly interposition of Sir Robert
Nanton, one of the secretaries of state, and a favourer ofthe
puritans : but they relied with more reason on their distance
from the ecclesiastical tribunals of England, and from the eye
and arm of their persecuting sovereign. Having procured
from the Plymouth Company a grant of a tract of land, lying,
as was supposed, within the limits of its patent, several of
the congregation sold their estates, and expended the pur
chase money in the equipment of two vessels, in which a hun
dred and twenty of their number were appointed to embark
from an English port for America.1
All things being prepared for the departure of this detach-
1 Mather. Neal. Hutchinson. Hazard. Oldmixon. If the Puritans would
have stooped to intrigue and duplicity, they might have had more powerful partizans
at court than Sir Robert Nanton. The Duke of Buckingham, in imitation of Lord
Essex's policy in the preceding reign, vainly attempted to obtain an ascendancy
over the Puritans by caressing their leaders.

NORTH AMERICA. 189
ment of the congregation from Delft haven, where they took chap.
leave of their friends, for the English port of embarkation, l

.Robinson and his people devoted their last meeting in Europe 1620.
to an act of solemn and social worship, intended to implore a
blessing from Heaven upon the hazardous enterprise. He
preached a sermon to them from Ezra vn>- 21 : — I proclaimed
a fast there at the river Ahava, that we might afflict ourselves
before our God, to seek of him a right way for us, and for our
little ones, and for all our substance. He concluded his dis
course with the following exhortation, to which, with the
fullest perception of its intrinsic merits, our sentiments will
fail to do justice, unless we remember, that such a spirit of
Christian candour and liberality as it breathes was then hardly
known in the world. " Brethren," said he, " we are now
quickly to part from one another, and whether I may ever live
to see your faces on earth any more, the God of heaven only
knows ; but whether the Lord has appointed that or no, I
charge you, before God and his blessed angels, that you
follow me no farther than you have seen me follow the Lord
Jesus Christ.
" If God reveal any thing to you, by any other instrument
of his, be as ready to receive it as ever you were to receive
any truth by my ministry ; for I am verily persuaded, I am
very confident, the Lord has more truth yet to break forth out
of his holy word. For my part, I cannot sufficiently bewail
the condition of the reformed churches, who are come to a
period in religion, and will go at present no farther than the
instruments of their reformation. The Lutherans cannot be
drawn to go beyond what Luther saw ; whatever part of his
will our good God has revealed to Calvin, they will rather die
than embrace it ; and the Calvinists, you see, stick fast where
they were left by that great man of God, who yet saw not all
things. " This is a misery much to be lamented ; for though they
were burning and shining lights in their times, yet they pene
trated not into the whole counsel of God ; but, were they now
living, would be as willing to embrace farther light, as that
which they first received. I beseech you remember it, 'tis an
article of your church covenant, that you be ready to receive
whatever truth shall be made known to you from the written

1 90 THE HISTORY OF
book word of God. Remember that, and every other article of your
1 sacred covenant. But I must herewithal exhort you to take

1620. heed what you receive as truth. Examine it, consider it, and
compare it with other scriptures of truth before you receive it;
for 'tis not possible the christian world should come so lately
out of antichristian darkness, and that perfection of know
ledge should break forth at once.
" I must also advise you to abandon, avoid, and shake off
the name of Brownist ; 'tis a mere nickname, and a brand for
the making religion, and the professors of it, odious to the
christian world." Having said thus much, he exchanged
with them embraces and affectionate farewells ; and kneeling
down with them all on the sea shore, commended them, in a
fervent prayer, to the blessing and protection of Heaven.1
Such were the men whom the English monarch cast out of
his dominions; and such the scenes of wisdom and piety,
which the control of Divine Providence elicited from the folly,
arrogance, and bigotry, of a tyrant.
Theyarrive The emigrants were at first driven back by a storm which
chusetts— destroyed one of their vessels ; but finally re-embarking in the
other at Plymouth, on the 6th of September, they succeeded
after a long and dangerous voyage, in reaching the coast of
9th Nov. America. Hudson's river was the place where they had pro
posed to disembark, and its banks the scene of their intended
settlement : but the Dutch, who conceived that a preferrable
right to this territory accrued to them from its discovery by
Captain Hudson, had maintained there, for some years, a
small commercial establishment, and were actually projecting
a scheme of more extensive occupation, which they were nei
ther disposed to forego, nor yet prepared to defend. In order
to defeat the design of the English, they bribed the captain of
the vessel in which the emigrants sailed, who was a Dutch
man, to carry his passengers so far towards the north, that
the first land which they reached was Cape Cod, a region, not
only beyond the precincts of their grant, but beyond the ter
ritories of the company from which the grant was derived.
The advanced period of the year, and the sickliness occasioned
by the hardships of a long voyage, compelled the adventurers
1 Mather. Hazard.

NORTH AMERICA. 191
to settle on the soil to which their destiny had thus conducted CHAP.
them, and which seemed to have been expressly prepared and '
evacuated for their reception by a pestilential disease, which, 1620.
in the preceding year, had swept away nine-tenths of its
savage and idolatrous population. After exploring the coast,
they chose for their station a place afterwards included within
the province of Massachusetts, to which they gave the name
of New Plymouth, in commemoration of the city with which And found
their last recollections of England were associated. To sup- ^".^
ply, in some measure, the absence of a more formal title, they
composed and subscribed an instrument declaratory of the
purpose with which they had come to America, recognising
the authority of the English crown, and expressing their own
combination into a body politic, and their determination to
enact all just and necessary laws, and to honour them by a
due obedience.1 Here, then, remote from the scenes and circum
stances of human grandeur, these men embarked on a career
of life, which, if the true dignity of human actions be derived
from the motives that prompt them, the principles they express,
and the ends they contemplate, must be allowed to claim no
common measure of honour and elevation.
The speedy approach and intense severity of their first win- jjard-
ter in America painfully convinced the settlers that a more ships-
unfavourable season of the year could not have been selected
for the plantation of their colony ; and that the slender stores
with which they were provided fell greatly short of what was
requisite to comfortable subsistence, and formed a very inade
quate preparation to meet the rigour of the climate. Their
exertions to provide themselves with suitable dwellings were
obstructed, for a time, by the hostile attacks of some of the
neighbouring Indians, who had not forgotten the provocation
they received from Captain Hunt; and the colonists had
scarcely succeeded in repulsing them, when sickness, occa
sioned by scarcity of provisions and the increasing horrors of
the season, afflicted them with a calamity, perhaps less dan
gerous to their virtue, but more fatal to their strength and
1 Mather. Neal. Oldmixon. Hutchinson. The fraud, by which the Dutch
had contrived to divert these emigrants from Hudson's river, was discovered and
stated in a memorial, which was published in England before the close of this year.
Prince's New England Chronology.

192 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK security, than the perils of war. More than one-half of their
n' number, including John Carver, their first governor, perished
by hunger or disease before the return of spring ; and, during
the whole of the winter, only a few were capable of providing
for themselves, or rendering assistance to the rest. But hope
audviitue and virtue survived ; and, rising in vigour beneath the pres-
^]th<? sure of accumulated suffering, surmounted and ennobled every
1621. circumstance of distress. Those who retained their strength
became the servants of the weak, the afflicted, and the dying ;
and none distinguished himself more in this humane employ
ment than Carver the governor. He was a man of large estate,
but more enlarged benevolence ; he had spent his whole for
tune on the colonial project; and now, willingly contributing
his life to its accomplishment, he exhausted a feeble body in
laboriously discharging the humblest offices of kindness and
service to the sick. He was succeeded by William Bradford,
who, inheriting the merit and the popularity of his predeces
sor, was re-elected to the same office for many successive
years, — notwithstanding his own earnest remonstrance that
if this office were an honour, it "should be shared by his fellow
citizens, and if it were a burden, the weight of it should not
always be imposed upon him. When the distress of the colony
was at its height, the approach of a powerful Indian chief with
his followers seemed to portend the utter destruction ofthe
colonists ; but, happily, in the train of this personage, was the
ancient guest and friend of the English, Squanto, who eagerly
and successfully laboured to mediate a good understanding
between them and his countrymen. He afterwards cancelled
the merit of this' useful service, and endeavoured to magnify
his own importance by fabricating charges of plots and con
spiracies against some of the neighbouring tribes, while at the
same time he maintained an empire of terror over these tribes
by secretly assuring them that the English were in possession
of a cask filled with the plague, which only his influence pre
vented them from setting abroach for the destruction of the
Indians. But, before he resorted to this mischievous policy,
the colonists had become independent of his services. His
friendship with the English was never entirely dissolved ; and
on his death-bed, soon after, be desired Governor Bradford to
pray for him, that he might go to the Englishman's God in

NORTH AMERICA. 193

heaven. Some of the neighbouring tribes, from time to time, CHAP.
made alarming demonstrations of hostility ; but they were at  1

length completely overawed by the courage and resolution of 1621.
Captain Miles Standish, a gallant and skilful officer, who, with
a handful of men, was always ready to encounter their strongest
force, and anticipate their most rapid movements.1
On the arrival of summer, the health of the colonists was
restored ; and their numbers continued to be recruited from
time to time, by successive emigrations of oppressed puritans
from Europe. But these additions fell far short of their ex
pectations : and of the main reinforcement which they had
looked for from the accession of the remainder of the congre
gation at Leyden, they were unhappily disappointed. The
unexpected death of Robinson, their pastor, deprived his people
of the only leader whose animating counsels could have over
come the timidity inspired by the accounts of the distresses
sustained by their friends in New England ; and, accordingly,
upon that event, the greater part of those who had remained
behind at Leyden now retired to join the other English exiles
at Amsterdam, and very few had the courage to proceed to
New Plymouth. This small colony, however, had displayed
a hardy virtue that showed it was formed for endurance; and,
having surmounted its first misfortunes, continued to prosper
in the cultivation of piety, and the enjoyment of liberty of
conscience and political freedom. A generous attachment was
formed to the soil which had been so worthily earned, and to
the society whose continuance attested so manly a contest with
and so signal a victory over every variety of ill. While the colo
nists demonstrated a proper respect for the claims of the ori
ginal inhabitants ofthe country, by purchasing from them the
territory over which their settlement extended, they neglected
no preparation to defend by force what they had acquired with
justice ; and, alarmed by the tidings of the massacre of their
countrymen in Virginia, they erected a timber fort, and
adopted other prudent precautions for their security. This

1 Mather. Neal. Oldmixon. Belknap's American Biography. Peter Martyr
declares that the hardships endured by the Spaniards in South America were such as
none but Spaniards could have supported. But the hardships sustained by the first
colonists of New Plymouth appear to have exceeded them both in duration and inten
sity. See Hutchinson, ii. Append.
VOL. T. O

194 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK purchase from savages, who rather occasionally traversed than
' permanently occupied the territory, is perhaps the first in-
1621—4. stance on record of the entire prevalence of the principles of
justice in a treaty between a civilized and a barbarous people.
Their civil The constitution of the church which the emigrants estab-
tions— lished was the same with that which had prevailed among
them at Leyden ; and their system of civil government was
founded on those ideas of the natural equality of men to which
their ecclesiastical policy, so long the main object of their
concern, had habituated their minds. The supreme legisla
tive body was composed at first of all the freemen who were
members of the church ; and it was not until the year 1639,
that they established a house of representatives. The execu
tive power was committed to a governor and council annually
elected by the members of the legislative assembly. Their
jurisprudence was founded on the laws of England, with some
diversity, however, in the appreciation and punishment of
crimes, wherein they approximated more nearly to the Mosaic
institutions. Considering the protection of morals more im
portant than the preservation of wealth, they punished forni
cation with flogging, and adultery with death, — while on forgery
they inflicted only a moderate fine. The clearing and culti
vation of the ground, fishing, and the curing of fish for expor-
community tation, formed the temporal occupations of the colonists. The
ofF°- peculiarity of their situation naturally led them, like the
Virginians, for some time, to throw all their property into
a common stock, and, like members of one family, to carry on
every work of industry by their joint labour for the public be
hoof. But the religious zeal which promoted this self-denying
policy was unable to overcome the difficulties which must
always attend it, and which are peculiarly aggravated in a
society deriving its principle of increment not so much from
internal growth as from the confluence of strangers. About
three years after the foundation of New Plymouth, it was
judged prpper to introduce separation of possessions, though
the full right of separate property was not admitted till a
much later period : and even that change is represented as
having produced a great and manifest improvement of the in-.
dustry of the people.1 The slow increase which, for a consi-
' Blather. Neal. Chalmers.

NORTH AMERICA. 195
derable period of time, the population of the colony exhibited, chap.
has been ascribed to the prolonged operation of this system of
equality : but it seems more likely that the slowness of the 1621 — 4.
increase (occasioned by the poverty of the soil and the report
of the hardships attending a settlement in New England) was
itself the reason why the complete ascertainment of the rights
of separate property was so long retarded. In the first society
of men collected by the bond of Christianity, and additionally
united by persecution, we find an attempt made to abolish in
dividual property ; and, from the apostolic direction, that he
who would not work should not eat, we may conclude that the
disadvantage which the operation of this principle is exposed
to in a society mainly deriving its increase from the accession
of strangers of dissimilar characters, was pretty early experi
enced. In Paraguay, the Jesuits formed a settlement where
this peculiar disadvantage was not experienced, and which
affords the only authenticated instance of the introduction and
long endurance of a state of equality in a numerous society.
But there, the great fundamental difficulty was rather evaded
than encountered by a system of tuition adapted, with ex
quisite skill, to confound all diversities of talent and disposi
tion among the natives, in an unbounded and degrading
dependence on their Jesuit instructors.
After having continued for some years without a patent for 1624.
their territorial occupation, the colonists, whose numbers now
amounted to a hundred and eighty, employed one Pierce as
their agent in England, to solicit a grant of this nature from
the English government, and the grand council of Plymouth —
a new corporation by which Jamesr in the year 1620, had
superseded the original Plymouth company, and to which he
had granted all the American territory lying within the
fortieth and forty-eighth degrees of northern latitude. This
corporate body continued to subsist for a considerable time,
notwithstanding a vote of the House of Commons, in the year
after its creation, declaring its privileges a grievance, and its
patent void. Pierce procured a charter from the council, and
caused it to be framed in his own name, with the appropria
tion of large territories and privileges to himself and his
family : but, having embarked with a numerous body of asso-
o2

196 THE HISTORY OF
book, ciates, whom he had collected in England, and induced to
accompany him, and assist in the prosecution of his ambitious
1624—6. views, his vessel was shipwrecked, and Pierce himself so dis
mayed with the disastrous issue of his enterprise, that he
made an open declaration of remorse, and resigned his unjust
acquisition. The colonists, informed of their agent's treachery,
despatched Winslow, one of their own number, to resume the
solicitation for a charter. Winslow seems not to have been
able to procure a patent from the crown, but he obtained, after
a long delay, a grant of land and a charter of privileges from
the council. It was directed * to William Bradford, the ex
isting governor ; and the immunities it conferred were appro
priated to him, his heirs, associates, and assignees ; but Brad
ford willingly surrendered all that was personal in the char
ter and grant, and associated the general court of the freemen
to the privileges it conferred.2 By this charter of the grand
council of Plymouth, the colonists were authorised to choose
a governor, council, and general court for the enactment and
execution of laws instrumental to the public good. Some
American historians have mistaken this charter for a patent
from the crown. But no such patent was ever issued ; and
the social community of New Plymouth was never incorpo
rated with legal formality into a body politic, but remained a
subordinate and voluntary municipal association, until it was
united to its more powerful neighbour the colony of Massa
chusetts. Both before and after the reception of their charter,
the colonists were aware of the doubts that might be enter
tained of the validity of the acts of government which their
magistrates exercised. This circumstance, perhaps, was not
altogether unfavourable to the interests of the settlers, and
may have contributed to the liberal principles and concilia
tory strain by which the administration of their domestic
government was honourably distinguished from that which
afterwards unhappily prevailed among their neighbours in
New England. But the soil around New Plymouth was so
meagre, and the supplies they received from Europe so scanty
and infrequent, that in the tenth year of their colonial exis-

• January, 1630.
2 Hazard. Chalmers. Trumbull's History of Connecticut.

NORTH AMERICA. 197
tence their numbers did not exceed three hundred.1 Their CHAP.
exertions, nevertheless, were productive of consequences the •
most happy and interesting. They held up to the view ofthe 1624—6.
oppressed puritans in the parent state, a retreat to which per
secuted virtue might retire, and where only the enduring
virtue which persecution had failed to conquer, seemed capable
of obtaining a permanent establishment. At the expense of
the noblest sacrifices and most undaunted efforts, this handful
of men laid the foundation of civilized and Christian society
in New England. A few years after their first establishment at
New Plymouth, a messenger arrived at this settlement from the
governor of the Dutch plantation on Hudson's river, with
letters congratulating the English on their prosperous and
commendable enterprise, tendering the good will and friendly
services of the Dutch, and proposing a commercial intercourse
between the two settlements. The governor and council of
Plymouth returned a courteous answer, expressing their grate
ful remembrance ofthe hospitality which they had received in
the native country of the Dutch, and a willing acceptance of
the proffered friendship.2 Nothing farther seems to have
ensued from this overture than a series of small commercial
dealings, and an occasional interchange of similar civilities,
which, but a few years after, gave place to the most invete
rate jealousy, and a continual reciprocation of complaint and
menace between the Dutch and the English colonists.
Various attempts had latterly been made to emulate the
successful establishment of New Plymouth ; but they had all
failed, in consequence of the neglect or inability of their pro
moters to emulate the virtues from which the success of this
colonial enterprise was derived. In the year 1622, a rival
colony was planted in New England by one Weston and a
troop of disorderly adventurers, who, in spite of the friendly
assistance of the settlers at New Plymouth, speedily sunk
into a state of such misery and degradation, that several of
them were reduced to become servants to the Indians ; some
perished by hunger; others betook themselves to robbery, and
by their depredations involved both themselves and the colo-

1 Neal. Chalmers. See Note IV. at the end of the volume.
2 Collections of the Massachusetts' Historical Society. Neal.

198 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK nists of New Plymouth in hostilities with the natives ; and
-11'— the rest were glad to find their way back to Europe. In the
1624—6 following year an attempt was made on a larger scale under
the patronage of the grand council of Plymouth, which be
stowed on Captain Gorges, the leader of the expedition, the
title of governor-general of New England, with an ample en
dowment of arbitrary power, 'and on a clergyman who accom
panied him, the office of bishop and superintendent of all
churches in this quarter of America. But the condition of
New England was very ill fitted for the introduction of such
institutions; and the governor and bishop, deserting their
charge, made haste to return to a region more adapted to the
cultivation of civil and ecclesiastical dignity. Of their fol
lowers, some retired to Virginia, and others returned to
1626. England.1 At a later period a similar undertaking, con
ducted by Captain Wollaston, was attended with a repetition
of the same disastrous issue. The followers of Wollaston first
taught the savage inhabitants of this quarter of America the
use of fire-arms — a lesson which ere long the colonists of New
England had abundant reason to deplore.2 All these unsuc
cessful plantations were attempted on land more fertile, and
in situations more commodious, than the settlers at New
Plymouth enjoyed. The scene of their brief and unpros-
perous existence was the coast of Massachusetts Bay, where,
a few years later, a colony, which was formed after the model
and principles of New Plymouth, and whose origin now
1 The most important act of Captain Gorges' administration that has been trans
mitted to us, is one which affords an explanation of a passage in Hudibras, where the
New Englanders are accused of hanging an innocent, but bed-rid, weaver, instead
of a guilty, but useful, cobbler. —
" That sinners may supply the place
Of suffering saints, is a plain case.
Our brethren of New England use
Choice malefactors to excuse,
And hang the guiltless in their stead,
Of whom the churches have less need —
As lately happened. In a town
There lived a cobbler," &c. Hudibras.
Some of Gorges' people had committed depredations on the Indians, who insisted
that the ringleader should be put to death. Gorges satisfied and deceived them by
hanging up either a dying man or a dead body. Hutchinson. Butler's witty
malice, studious to defame the puritans, has rescued from oblivion an act of which
the whole merit or demerit is exclusively due to his own party. Morrell, the clergy
man, who had accompanied Gorges, notwithstanding his disappointment, conceived
a very favourable opinion of New England, wliich he expressed in an elegant Latin
poem descriptive of the country. — Coll. Mass. Hist. Soc.
2 Neal. Oldmixon. (2nd edit.)

NORTH AMERICA. 199
claims our attention, afforded the second example of a sue- CHAP.
cessful establishment in New England. '
The reign of Charles the First was destined to produce the 1626.
consummation and the retribution of royal and ecclesiastical ci°j[eaa^0
tyranny. Charles committed the government of the church ecciesiasti-
to men who openly professed the most arbitrary principles, l^agUnd.
and whose inclinations directed them much more strongly
to promote an approximation to the rites and practices of the
church of Rome, than to mediate an agreement among the
professors of the protestant faith. Abbot, the archbishop of
Canterbury, being restrained by the liberality of his principles
and the mildness of his temper from lending his instrumen
tality to the views of the court, was treated with harshness,
and, at length, suspended from his office, of which the func- 1627.
tions were committed to a board of prelates, of whom the
most eminent was Laud, who afterwards succeeded to the
primacy. From this period, both in the civil and ecclesias
tical administration of the realm, a system of deliberate and
insolent invasion of every right most valued by freemen, and
most revered by protestants, was pursued with a stubborn
pride, folly, and cruelty, that at length exhausted the patience
of the English people. To the historian of England the poli
tical abuses that distinguished this period will probably ap
pear the most interesting features in its history : and, doubt
less, they contributed at least as powerfully as any other
cause to the production of the ensuing scene of civil warfare
and convulsion. But, as it was the ecclesiastical administra
tion that mainly conduced to the peopling of America, it is
this branch of the English history that chiefly merits our at
tention, in investigating the sources of the colonization of
New England.
Not only were the ancient ceremonial observances which
long oppression had rendered so obnoxious, exacted with ad
ditional rigour from the increasing numbers of the puritans,
but new and more offensive rites were added to the ecclesias
tical canons. A design seems to have been formed of enabling
the church of England to vie with the Romish see in splendid
pageantry, elaborate ceremonial, and temporal power. Laud,
indeed, boasted that he had refused the offer of a cardinal's hat
from Rome ; but the offer was justly considered a more sig-

200 TH£ HISTORY OF
book nificant circumstance than the refusal : and, having already
 ' assumed to himself the papal title of His Holiness, which he
1627. substituted in place of His Grace, his titular style would have
been lowered instead of elevated by the Romish promotion
which he rejected. The communion table was converted into
an altar, and all persons were commanded to bow to it on
entering the church. All the week-day lectures, and all af-
ternoon sermons on Sunday, were abolished ; and, instead of
them, games and sports were permitted to all the people, " ex
cepting known recusants," who were thus, with matchless
absurdity, penally debarred from practices which they re
garded with the utmost detestation. Every minister was
commanded to read from the pulpit the royal proclamation
recommendatory of games and sports on Sunday, under the
pain of deprivation. This ordinance, like all the other novel
ties, was productive of the greater dissatisfaction, from the
extent to which puritan sentiments had penetrated into the
church, and the number of puritan ministers within the esta
blishment whom habit had taught to fluctuate between the
observance and the evasion of the ancient obnoxious canons,
and trained to submit, without at all reconciling to the burden.
Nothing could be more ill timed than an aggravation of the
load under which these men were labouring : it reduced many
to despair, inflamed others with vindictive resentment, and
deprived the church of a numerous body of her most zealous
and most popular ministers. Nor were these the only mea
sures that were calculated to excite discontents within as well
as without the establishment. Three-fourths of the English
clergy were Calvinists ; but Laud and the ruling prelates,
who were Arminians, caused a royal proclamation to be issued
against the preaching of the Calvinistic tenets : and while the
Arminian pulpits resounded with the sharpest invectives
against these tenets, a single sentence that could be construed
into their defence exposed the preacher to the pains of con
tempt of the king's authority.
In the reign of Elizabeth, the churchmen had been eager
to shift from themselves upon the courts of common law as
great a portion as they could of the odium of administering
the ecclesiastical statutes. But Laud and his associates, in
accessible to fear, remorse, or shame, courted a monopoly of

NORTH AMERICA. 201
the function and repute of persecution ; and in the court of C H A P.
high commission exercised such arbitrary power, and com- '
mitted such enormous cruelty, as procured to that odious 1627.
tribunal the name of the protestant inquisition. Fines, impri
sonment, banishment, the pillory, were the most lenient of the
punishments inflicted by this tribunal. Its victims were fre
quently condemned to have their flesh torn from their bodies
by the lash of the executioner, their nostrils slit, and their
ears cut off; and in this condition were exhibited to the
people as monuments of what was termed the righteous justice
of their sovereign and the holy zeal of the prelates. Of the
extent to which this tyrannical policy was carried, some
notion may be formed from the accounts that have been
transmitted to us of the proceedings within the diocese of
Norwich alone. In the articles of impeachment subsequently
exhibited against Bishop Wren, it is alleged, that during his
possession of that diocese, which lasted only for two years
and a half, fifty ministers were expelled from their pulpits for
not complying with the prescribed innovations, and three
thousand of the laity were compelled to abandon the king
dom.1 Consonant with the ecclesiastical, was the civil policy
of Charles's government. Parliamentary taxation was super
seded by royal imposts : the tenure of judicial office was al
tered from the good behaviour of the judges to the arbitrary
pleasure of the king ; every organ of liberty was suspended
or perverted ; and the kingdom at length subjected to the
exclusive dominion of a stern and uncontrolled prerogative.
Insult was employed, as if purposely to stimulate the sensi
bility which injuries might not have sufficiently awakened. A
clergyman having alleged in a sermon which he preached
before the king that his majesty's simple requisition of money
from his subjects, obliged them to comply with it " under
pain of eternal damnation," Charles at first coldly remarked
that he owed the man no thanks for giving him his due : but
a censure of the House of Commons having followed the dis
course, the preacher was forthwith accounted a proper object
of royal favour, and promoted, first to a valuable living, and
afterwards to a bishoprick.2 A system of such diffusive and
1 Neal.
' Sanderson's Life of Charles the First. Rush worth's Hist. Collect.

chu setts.

202 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK exasperating hostility employed by the government against
..' the people, needed only sufficient duration lo provoke from
1627. universal rage a vindictive retribution, the more to be dreaded
from the patience with which the heavy arrear of injury had
been endured and permitted to accumulate. But before this
tyrannical system had time to mature the growing discontents,
and to produce extremities so perilous to the moderation and
humanity of all who were to be involved in them, it was des
tined to inspire efforts of nobler energy and purer virtue :
much good was to be educed from a scene of evil and
disorder ; and great and happy consequences were yet to be
elicited by the steady and beneficent dominion of Providence
over the malevolent and irregular passions of men.
Projector The severities exercised on the puritans in England, and
a new co- tne gra(juai extinction of their fondly cherished hopes of a
lony in . . . . . J . r
Massa- mitigation of ecclesiastical rigour, had for some time directed
their thoughts to that distant territory in which their brethren
at New Plymouth had achieved a secure establishment, and
attained the enjoyment of civil and religious liberty. In the
last year of James's reign, a few non-conformist families re
moved to New Engla,nd and took possession of a corner of
Massachusetts Bay; but being disappointed in the hope they
had entertained of the accession of a sufficient number of
associates to secure the formation of a permanent settlement,
they were on the point of returning to England, when they
received the agreeable intelligence of the approach of a nume
rous and powerful reinforcement. White, a non-conformist
minister at Dorchester, had projected a new settlement on the
shore of Massachusetts Bay ; and by his zeal and activity he
succeeded in forming an association of a number of the gentry
in his neighbourhood who bad imbibed the puritan opinions,
for the purpose of conducting a colony to that region. The
views and sentiments that actuated the leaders of this enter
prise were committed to writing, and circulated among their
friends under the title of General Considerations for the Plan
tation of New England. The authors of this remarkable pro
clamation began by adverting to the progress of the Jesuit
establishments in South America ; and expatiated on the duty
and advantage of counteracting the influence of these institu
tions by the introduction of a purer edition of the gospel into

NORTH AMERICA. 203
that quarter of the world. They observed that all the other CHAP,
churches of Europe had been brought under desolation ; that *•
the same fate seemed to impend over the church of England ; 1627.
and that it might reasonably be supposed that the Deity had
provided the unoccupied territory of America as a land of re
fuge for those of his people yet inhabiting the scene of ap
proaching convulsion, whom he purposed to snatch from its
dangerous vortex. England, they remarked, grew weary of
her inhabitants ; insomuch that man, the most precious of all
creatures, was there reckoned more vile and base than the
earth he trod on ; and children and friends (if ttnwealthy)
were accounted a burdensome incumbrance, instead of being
cherished as the choicest of earthly blessings. A taste for ex^
pensive living, they added, prevailed so strongly among their
countrymen, and the means of indulging it had become so ex
clusively the object of men's desires, that all arts and trades
were tainted by sordid maxims and dishonest practices : and
the English seminaries of learning abounded with so many
spectacles and temptations of dissolute irregularity, that vice
was there more effectually communicated by example, than
knowledge and virtue were imparted by precept. " The whole
earth," they declared, " is the Lord's garden, and he hath
given it to the sons of Adam to be tilled and improved by
them : Why, then, should any stand starving here for places
of habitation, and, in the meantime, suffer whole countries,
as profitable for the use of man, to lie waste, without any im
provement?" They concluded by adverting to the situation
of the colony of New Plymouth, and strongly urged the duty
of supporting the infant church which had there been so hap
pily planted. Actuated by such views, these magnanimous
projectors purchased from the council of Plymouth all the ter
ritory extending in length from three miles north of the river
Merrimack to three miles south of Charles river, and, in
breadth, from the Atlantic to the Southern Ocean. Their mea
sures were as vigorous as their designs were elevated. As
the precursors of the main body of emigrants whom it was in
tended to transport, a small troop of planters and servants
were despatched under John Endicot, one of the leading pro- 1628.
jectors ; who, arriving safely in Massachusetts, were cordially
greeted and kindly assisted by the colonists of New Plymouth,

204 THE HISTORY OF
book and laid the foundations of a town, which they denominated
Salem, from a Hebrew word that signifies Peace. 1
1628 But the ardour and enthusiasm of these adventurers could
j*1!®"1 not disguise the obvious and important consideration of their
inability to maintain effectual possession of the extensive ter
ritory that had been ceded to them, without the aid of more
opulent coadjutors ; of whom, chiefly by the influence and
activity of White, they were enabled to procure a sufficient
number in London, among the commercial men who openly
professed, or secretly favoured, the tenets of the puritans.
These auxiliaries brought an accession of prudent precaution,
as well as of pecuniary resources, to the conduct of the de
sign ; and, justly doubting the expediency of founding a
colony on the basis of a grant from a company of patentees,
who might convey a right of property in the soil, but could
not confer municipal jurisdiction, or the privilege of governing
the society which it was proposed to establish, they persuaded
their associates to unite with them in an application to the
4th March, crown for a royal charter. The readiness with which this ap-
Charter of plication was granted, and the liberal tenor of the charter
setts Bay which was obtained, are perfectly unaccountable, except on the
fromm6d supposition that the king and his ecclesiastical counsellors were
Charles the willing, at this season, to disencumber the church, in which
anas'socia- they were preparing to introduce the innovations to which we
tion of pu- have already adverted, ofa body of men, from whom the most
unbending opposition to their measures might be expected: a
politic design which appears sufficiently credible ; although,
at a subsequent period, Charles and his ministers endeavoured
to counteract it, when they were sensible of the reflective in
fluence exercised on the puritan body in England by the
spread and predominance of their tenets in America. It seems
impossible, on any other supposition, to account for the re
markable facts that, at the very time when this monarch was
sanctioning the exercise of despotic authority in Virginia, he
extended to a colony of puritans a constitution containing all
the immunities of which the Virginians were divested ; and
' Mather. Neal. An earlier writer than these has described Endicot as " a fit
instrument to begin this wilderness work : of courage bold, undaunted, yet sociable,
and of a cheerful spirit, loving, or austere, as occasion served." — Johnson's Wonder
working Providence in New England. (London, 1654.)

NORTH AMERICA. 205
that, well aware of the purpose of the applicants to escape c H A P.
from the constitutions of the church of England, he granted L
them a charter containing ample commendation of the reli- 1629.
gious ends they had in view, without the imposition of a single
ordinance respecting the system of their church government,
or the forms and ceremonies of their worship. Nay, so com
pletely, in this instance, did he surrender the maxims of his
colonial policy to the demands of the projectors of a puritan
settlement, that, although he had recently declared, in a public
proclamation, that a mercantile company was utterly unfit to
administer the affairs of a remote colony ; yet, on the present
occasion, he scrupled not, in compliance with the wishes of the
mercantile portion of the adventurers, to commit the supreme
direction of the colony which was to be planted in the province
of Massachusetts Bay, to a corporation consisting chiefly of
merchants resident in London. The new adventurers were
incorporated as a body politic ; and, their right to the territory
which they had purchased from the council of Plymouth being
confirmed by the king, they were empowered to dispose of the
soil, and to govern the people who should settle upon it.
Among other patentees specially named in this charter, were
Sir Henry Rosewell, one of the earliest promoters of the design ;
Sir Richard Saltonstall, the descendant of an ancient family in
Northamptonshire ; Isaac Johnson, son-in-law of the Earl
of Lincoln ; John Ven, a distinguished citizen of London, and
commemorated by Clarendon, as leading the city after him in
seditious remonstrances; and Samuel Vassal,1 who was afterwards
member of Parliament for London, and had already signalized
himself by a strenuous opposition to the arbitrary collection of
tonnage and poundage. The first governor of the company
and his council were named by the king : the right of elect
ing their successors was vested in the freemen of the corpo-
i From the monument erected to the memory of this man by his great-grandson
at Boston, it appears that he was the son of the gallant John Vassal, who, in 1588,
at his own expense, equipped and commanded two ships of war against the Spanish
Armada. The son exerting himself as strenuously against domestic tyranny as the
father had done against foreign invasion, was deprived of his liberty and of the
greater part of his fortune by the Court of Star Chamber. The Long Parliament
voted him upwards of 10,0000. as a compensation for his losses, and resolved that
his personal sufferings should be furlher considered — "but the rage of the times,"
says his epitaph, " and the neglect of proper application since, have left to his
family only the honour of that vote and resolution." Dodsley's Annual Register,
1766.

200 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK ration. The executive power was committed to the governor
' and a council of assistants : the legislative, to the body of free-
1629. men, who were empowered to enact statutes and ordinances
for the good of the community, not inconsistent with the
laws of England. The adventurers obtained the same tempo
rary exemption that had been granted to the Virginian com
pany from duties on goods exported or imported ; and, it was
declared that, notwithstanding their migration to America,
they and their descendants should be entitled to all the rights
of home-born subjects of England.1
The meaning of this charter, with respect to the ecclesiasti
cal rights of the colonists of Massachusetts, has been made the
subject of much controversial discussion. By the puritans,
and the puritan writers of that age, it was sincerely believed,
and confidently maintained, that the intendment ofthe charter
was to bestow on the colonists unrestricted liberty to regulate
their ecclesiastical constitution by the dictates of their own
judgments and consciences.2 The granters were fully aware,
and the grantees had neither the wish nor the power to con
ceal, that their object was to make a peaceable secession from
a church which they could no longer conscientiously adhere
to, and to establish for themselves, at Massachusetts Bay, an
ecclesiastical constitution similar to that which was already
created and supported without objection at New Plymouth.
A silent acquiescence in such designs was all that could rea
sonably be expected from the king and his ministers; and
when this emphatic silence on a point which could not but
be intimately present to the thoughts of both parties, is cou
pled with the ready departure evinced by the king on the
same occasion, from all the arbitrary principles which he was
preparing to enforce in every other branch of his domestic
and colonial administration, it seems to follow by inevitable
inference that Charles was at this time not unwilling to make
a temporary sacrifice of authority, in order to rid himself of
those puritan petitioners; and that the interpretation which
they gave to their charter was perfectly correct. And yet
writers have not been wanting, whom enmity to the puritans
1 Mather. Neal. Hutchinson's Collection of Massachusetts Papers. Hazard.
Oldmixon. (2nd edit.)
2 Mather. Neal. Neal's History of the Puritans.

NORTH AMERICA- 207
has induced to explain this charter in a manner totally repug- CHAP.
nant to every rule of legal or equitable construction. It is a _ '
maxim of English law, and the dictate of common sense and 1629.
universal equity, that, in all cases where the import of a
compact is doubtful, the bias of presumptive construc
tion ought to incline against the pretensions of that
party whose office it was to speak, and who had the power
to clear every ambiguity away. In defiance of this rule,
those writers have insisted that the silence of the charter
respecting the ecclesiastical state of the colony, implied the
imposition on the colonists of every particular ordinance and
institution of the church of England. The most eminent
writer of this party has taken occasion from hence to reproach
the colonists of Massachusetts Bay with having laid the
foundations of their church establishment in fraud. " With
out regard," says this distinguished author, " to the senti
ments of that monarch, under the sanction of whose authority
they settled in America, and from whom they derived right
to act as a body politic, and in contempt of the laws of Eng
land, with which the charter required that none of their acts
or ordinances should be inconsistent, they adopted in their
infant church that form of policy which has since been dis
tinguished by the name of independent." He accounts for
the silence of the charter on a point which was unquestionably
uppermost in the minds of both parties, by remarking, that
" the king seems not to have foreseen, nor to have suspected,
the secret intentions of those who projected the measure ;"
and he explains the conduct of the colonists, by pronouncing
that they were " animated with a spirit of innovation in civil
policy as well as in religion."1 But surely no impartial
inquirer will ever esteem it a reproach to the puritans, driven
by persecution from their native land, that they did not cross
tbe Atlantic and settle in a desert for the purpose of culti
vating a more perfect conformity with the principles and
policy of their oppressor. The provision in their charter, that
the laws to be enacted by them should not be repugnant to
the jurisprudence of England, could never be understood to
enjoin any thing farther than a general conformity to the
1 Robeitsou's History of America, B. a.

208 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK common law of England, suitable to the acknowledged de-
* pendence of the colony on the main trunk of the British
1629. dominions. The unsuspecting ignorance, too, that is imputed
to the king and his counsellors, appears quite incredible,
when we consider that the example of New Plymouth, where
a bare exemption from express restrictions had been followed
by the establishment of an independent church, was fresh in
their recollection ; that it was avowed and notorious puritans
who now applied for permission to repair to the land where
that constitution was established ; and, above all, that, in
their application to the king, they expressly desired leave to
withdraw in peace from the bosom of a church to whose
ordinances they confessed that they could not conscientiously
conform.1 Whether the king and Laud were, or were not,
aware ofthe intentions of the puritans, they must surely be
regarded as the best judges of the extent of concession which
they themselves had intended to convey ; and by their acqui
escence in the constitution which the planters of Massa
chusetts Bay forthwith established, they ratified a prac
tical interpretation of the charter in conformity with the
views of the puritans, and confessed that this proceeding im
ported no violation either of general law or particular paction.
When they afterwards became sensible that the progress of
puritan establishments in New England increased the ferment
which their own measures were creating in the parent state,
they interposed to check the intercourse between the two
countries; but yet tacitly acknowledged that the intolerant
system which they pursued in England was excluded by
positive agreement from the colonial territory.
1st May. Soon after the power of the adventurers to establish a colony
had been rendered complete by the royal charter, they equip-
Embarka- ped and despatched five ships for New England, containing
uon of the three hundred and fifty emigrants, chiefly zealous puritans,
grants— accompanied by some eminent non-conformist ministers. The
regrets which an eternal farewell to their native land was cal
culated to inspire, — the distressing inconvenience of a long
voyage to persons unaccustomed to the sea, — and the formid
able scene of toil and danger that confronted them in the bar-
i Mather.

NORTH AMERICA. 209
barous land where so many preceding emigrants had found an C H A P.
untimely grave, seem to have vanished entirely from the minds L
of these men, supported by the worth and dignity of the de- 1629.
sign which they had combined to accomplish. Their hearts
were knit to each other by community of generous purpose ;
and they experienced none of those jealousies which inevitably
spring up in confederacies for ends merely selfish, among men
unequally qualified to promote the object of their association.
Behind them, indeed, was the land of their fathers : 1 but it had
long ceased to wear a benign or paternal countenance towards
themselves ; and, in forsaking it, they fled from the prisons
and scaffolds to which christians and patriots were daily con
signed. Before them lay a vast and dreary wilderness ; but
they hoped to irradiate its gloom by kindling and preserving-
there the sacred fire of religion and liberty, which regal and
pontifical tyranny was striving to extinguish in the shrines of
England, whence they carried its embers. They confidently
believed that the religious and political tenets which had lan
guished under a protracted persecution in Europe would now,
at length, shine forth in their full lustre in America. Estab
lishing an asylum where the professors of these doctrines
might at all times find shelter, they justly expected to derive
continual accessions to the vigour of their own principles from
the fresh arrival of succeeding emigrants, willing, like them, to
transplant their uprooted patriotic affection to a soil where it
might flourish in alliance with the cultivation and enjoyment
of truth and liberty. They did not postpone the practice of
piety till the conclusion of their voyage; but, occupied conti
nually with the exercises of devotion, they caused the ocean
which they traversed to resound with unwonted acclaim of
praise and thanksgiving to its Creator. The seamen, partak
ing their spirit, readily joined in all their religious exercises
and ordinances, and expressed their belief that they had prac-
1 Francis Higginson, one of the most able, devout, and popular ministers in Eng
land, was a passenger in this fleet. When he perceived that he was taking his last
look of the English coast, he summoned his children and the other passengers to the
deck of the vessel, and said to them, '* We will not say, as the separatists were wont
to say at their leaving of England, ' Farewell, Babylon! Farewell, Rome!' But
we will say, Farewell, dear England ! Farewell, the church of God in England, and
all christian friends there ! We separate not from the church of England, but from
its corruptions. We go to practise the positive part of church reformation, and pro
pagate the gospel in America."
VOL. I. P

210 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK tised the first sea-fasts that had ever been kept in the world.
IIj After a prosperous voyage, the emigrants had the happiness
1629. of re-uniting themselves to their friends already established at
Salem' *' Salem, under John Endicpt, who had been appointed deputy-
June 24. governor of the colony.1
Their ec- To the community of men thus assembled, the formation of
Stii-10'1' a church appeared the most interesting of all their concerns,
tions. and it occupied, accordingly, their earliest and earnest delibe
ration. They had been advised to discuss and settle before
their departure from England, the form of church government
which was to be established in the colony ; but, neglecting
this advice, they had proceeded no farther than to express
their general assent to the principle that the reformation of the
church was to be attempted according to the written word of God-
They now applied to their brethren at New Plymouth, and desired
to be acquainted with the grounds of the constitution which
had there been adopted ; and, having heard these fully ex
plained, and devoted some time to a diligent comparison
of the model with the warrants of scripture which were cited
in its vindication, and earnestly besought the enlightening aid
of that Being who alone can teach his creatures how to wor
ship him in an acceptable manner, they declared their entire
August 6. approbation of the sister church, and enacted a perfect copy of
her structure in the composition of their own. They united
together in religious society by a covenant, in which, after a
solemn dedication of themselves to live in the fear of God, and
practise an entire conformity to his will, so far as he should be
pleased to reveal it to them, they engaged to each other to
cultivate watchfulness and tenderness in their mutual inter-*
course ; to repress jealousies, suspicions, and secret emotions
of spleen ; and, in all cases of offence, to suffer, forbear, and
forgive, after the example of their Divine pattern. They pro
mised, in the congregation, to restrain the indulgence of
a vain-glorious forwardness to display their gifts; and, in
their intercourse, whether with sister churches or with the
mass of mankind, to study a conversation remote from every
appearance of evil. They engaged, by a dutiful obedience to
all who should be set over them in church or commonwealth,
1 Mather. Neal. Eliot's New England Biography.

NORTH AMERICA. 2 1 1
to encourage them to a faithful discharge of their functions : CHAP.
and they expressed their resolution to approve themselves, in Ij
their particular callings, the stewards and servants of God ; 1629.
shunning idleness as the bane of every community, and deal
ing hardly or oppressively with none of the human race. The
system of ecclesiastical policy and discipline which they
adopted was that which distinguished the churches of the in
dependents, and which' we have already had occasion to con
sider. The form of public worship which they instituted,
rejected a liturgy and every superfluous ceremony, and was
adapted to the strictest standard of Calvinistic simplicity.
They elected a pastor, a teacher, and an elder, whom they
consecrated to their respective offices by imposition of the
hands ofthe brethren. All who were on that occasion admit
ted members of the church signified their assent to a confes
sion of faith digested by their teachers, and gave an account
of the foundation of their own hopes as christians ; and it was
declared that no person should thereafter be permitted to sub
scribe the covenant, or be received into communion with the
church, until he had satisfied the elders with respect to the
soundness of his faith and the purity of his conduct.1
The constitution of which we have now beheld an abstract,
and especially the covenant or social engagement so fraught
with sentiments of exalted piety and genuine benevolence, has
excited the derision of some writers, who refuse to regard the
speculative liberality which it indicates in any other point of
view than as contrasted with the practical intolerance which
the framers of it soon after displayed. But however agreeable
this aspect may be to eyes that watch for the follies and
frailties ofthe wise and good, it is not the only light in which
the transaction we have now considered will present itself to
humane and liberal minds. Philosophy admits that the soul
is enlarged by the mere purpose of excellence ; and religion
has pronounced that even those designs which men are not
able or worthy to accomplish, may beneficially affect the minds
that have sincerely entertained them. The error of the
inhabitants of Salem was the universal error of their age :
the virtues they demonstrated were peculiar to them-
1 Mather. Neal.
p2

212 THE HISTORY OF
book selves and their puritan brethren. In the ecclesiastical.
' constitution which they established, and the sentiments and
1629. purposes which they declaratively interwove with it, they ren
dered a sincere and laudable homage to the rights of con
science and the requirements of piety ; and these principles,
no doubt, exercised a beneficial influence on the practice
which, unhappily, they did not entirely control. The in
fluence of principles that tend to the restraint of human
ferocity and intolerance is frequently invisible to mortal eyes,
because it is productive chiefly of negative consequences:
and when great provocation or alarm has prompted the pro
fessors of those principles to violate the restraints en
joined by them, they will be judged with little can
dour, if charity neglect to supply the imperfection of that
knowledge to which we are limited by the narrow and
partial range of our view, and to suggest the secret
and difficult forbearance which may have preceded the
visible action which we condemn or deplore. In the very
first instance of intolerant proceeding with which the adver
saries of the puritans have reproached this American commu
nity, the influence of genuine piety in mitigating human
impatience was strikingly apparent. It is a notable fact that,
although these emigrants were collected from a body of men
embracing such diversity of opinion respecting church go
vernment and the rites of worship as then prevailed among
the puritans of England, and though they had landed in
America without having previously ascertained how far they
were likely to agree on this very point, for the sake of which
they had incurred banishment from their native country, the
constitution which was copied from the church of New
Plymouth gave satisfaction to almost every individual among
Two per- them. Two brothers, however, of the name of Browne, one
?ons! , , a lawyer, and the other a merchant, both of them men of
banished J . . . .
from the note and among the number of the original patentees, dissented
colony for from tmg constitution, and arsruins: with great absurdity that
schism. , , ,i i • i •
all who adhered to it would infallibly become anabaptists,
endeavoured to procure converts to their opinion, and to
establish a separate congregation on a model more approxi
mated to the forms of the church of England. The defective
ness of their argument was supplied by the vehemence of their

NORTH AMERICA. 213
clamour; and they obtained a favourable audience from a few chap.
persons who regarded with unfriendly eye the discipline which

the provincial church was disposed to exercise upon offenders 1629.
against the rules of morality. Endicot, the governor, called
those men, together with the ministers, before a general as
sembly of the people, who, after hearing both parties, repeated
their approbation of the system that had been established :
and, as the two brothers still persisted in their attempts to
create a schism in the church, and even endeavoured to ex
cite a mutiny against the government, they were declared
unfit to remain in the colony, and compelled to re-embark and
depart in the vessels in which they had accompanied the
other emigrants in the voyage from England.1 Their de
parture restored harmony to the colonists, who were endeavour
ing to complete their settlement and extend their occupation
of the country, when they were interrupted by the approach
of winter, and the ravages of disease, which quickly deprived
them of nearly one-half of their number, but produced no
other change on their minds than to cause the sentiments of
hope and fear to converge more steadily to the Author of their
existence. Notwithstanding the censure with which some writers have
commented on the banishment of the two individuals whose
case we have considered, the justice of the proceeding
must surely commend itself to the sentiments of all impartial
men: nor would it have been necessary to advert to the
charge of intolerance to which the colonists have been ex
posed, if their conduct had never given juster occasion to it.
But, unfortunately, a great proportion of the puritans at this Tntoier_
period were deeply infected with the prevalent error of their ance of
age,2 and regarded the peaceable co-existence of different sects puritans.
in the same community as nearly impossible — a notion strongly
1 Mather. Neal. On their return to England they preferred a complaint against
the colonists of oppressive demeanour to themselves and enmity to the church of
England. The total disregard which their complaint experienced (Chalmers)
strongly confirms the opinion I have expressed of the understanding of all parties
with regard to the real import of the charter.
s The richest endowment of reason could not exempt the most distinguished of
modern philosophers from intolerance; nor could the experience of persecution
always demonstrate its injustice even to its own victims. Lord Bacon thought that
uniformity in religious sentiment and worship was essential to the support of.govern-
ment, and that no toleration could with safety be granted to sectaries. Bacon, De
imitate ecclesia. During the administration of Cromwell, a presbyterian minister,

2 J 4 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK confirmed, if not originally suggested to them by the treat-
*• ment which they continually received from their adversaries.
1629. If it was reasonably incumbent on men who had themselves
been the victims of persecution, to abstain from what their
own experience had feelingly shown them to be hateful and
odious, it was natural that these men, flying to deserts for the
sake of particular practices and opinions, should expect to see
the objects of their painful sacrifice flourish unmolested and
undisputed in the scene of their retirement. The sufferings
they had endured from their adversaries, they considered as
the legitimate consequence of the pernicious errors that these
adversaries had imbibed; and they customarily regarded their
opponents as the enemies of their persons as well as perse
cutors of their tenets. The activity of government in support
of a system of religious doctrines, they were far from con
demning in the abstract. They admitted the propriety of such
interposition, and condemned it only when it seemed to them
erroneously directed. Even when oppressed themselves, they
exclaimed against indiscriminate toleration. They contradicted
so far their own principles; and maintained that human beings
might and ought to punish what God alone could correct and
alter. Some of them, no doubt, had already anticipated the
sentiments by which at a later period the independents were
generally characterized, and which induced them to reject
all connexion between church and state, and disallow the
competence of interposing magisterial authority to sustain
one church or to suppress or discourage another. But very .
opposite sentiments prevailed among the bulk of the colonists
of Massachusetts, who came to America fresh from the in
fluence of persecution, and had not, like their brethren at
New Plymouth, the advantage of an intermediate residence

who had himself felt the hand of persecution, published a treatise against what he
was pleased to term " this cursed intolerable toleration." Orme's Life of Owen.
To the objection that persecution tends to make men hypocrites, an eminent
minister in New England answered, " Better tolerate hypocrites and tares, than
briars and thorns." Another, in a work published in 1645, thus expresses himself:
'* It is said that men ought to have liberty of conscience, and that it is pei-secution
to debar them of it. I can rather stand amazed than reply to this. It is an
astonishment that the brains of men should be parboiled in such impious ignorance."
—Belknap's History of New Hampshire.

NORTH AMERICA. 215
in a land where (to a certain extent at least1) a peaceful co- C H A p.
existence of different sects was demonstrated to be not merely *'
practicable, but signally promotive of the most excellent 1629.
graces of christian character. Much might be urged and
will doubtless suggest itself to every liberal mind, in extenua
tion of their error, of which the bitter leaven Continued long
to disturb their peace and felicity. But indulgence must not
be confounded with praise: and the considerations which may
be allowed to mitigate our censure of the intolerant spirit
which these people displayed, can never entitle this spirit to
be regarded as a virtue. It was sharpened by the copious
infusions which the colony received of the feelings excited
in England by the increased severity of persecution, from
which the victims began to fly in increasing numbers to
America. The British empire in America underwent, about this
period, some vicissitudes, which in after years affected mate
rially the prosperity both of New England and of the other
colonial establishments in the same quarter of the world. The
war which the king so wantonly declared against France in
1627, and which produced only disgrace and disaster to the
British arms in Europe, was attended with events of a very
different complexion in America. Sir David Kirk having ob
tained a commission to attack the American dominions of
France, invaded Canada in the summer of 1628 ; and so suc
cessful was the enterprise, that in July, 1629, Quebec was
reduced to surrender to the arms of England. Thus was the
capital of New France subdued by the English, about one
hundred and thirty years before they achieved its final con
quest by the sword of Wolfe. But the important tidings had
not been received in Europe when peace was re-established
between France and England ; and Charles, by the subse
quent treaty of St. Germain, not only restored this valuable
acquisition to France, but expressed the cession in terms of
such extensive application, as undeniably inferred a recogni
tion of the French, and a surrender of the British claims to
1 It was not till the year 161 9 (the year preceding the departure of the Plymouth
settlers from Leyden) that the sanguinary persecution of the Arminians, to which
I have already alluded, occurred in Holland.

216 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK the province of Nova Scotia. 1 This arrangement portended
vexation and injury to the settlements of the English: and the
1629, sequel of our narrative will demonstrate how fully the evil por
tent was accomplished.
1 Champlain's Voyage. Oldmixon. Chalmers. " It is remarkable," says
Professor Kalm, " that the French were doubtful whether they should reclaim Ca
nada from the English, or leave it to them. Many were of opinion that it was better
to keep the people in France, and employ them in all sorts of manufactures, which
would oblige the other European powers who had colonies in America to bring their
raw goods to French ports, and take French manufactures in return." But the
prevalent opinion was, that the reclamation and retention of Canada would promote
the naval power of France, and was necessary to counterbalance the rising colonial
empire of England. — Kalm's Travels in North America.

NORTH AMERICA. 217

1629.

CHAPTER H.
The Charter Government transferred from England to Massachusetts. — Numerous
Emigration. — Foundation of Boston. — Hardships of the new Settlers. — Disfran
chisement of Dissenters in the Colony. — Influence of the provincial Clergy. — ¦
— John Cotton and his Colleagues and Successors. — Williams' Schism — he
founds Providence — Representative Assembly established in Massachusetts. —
Arrival of Hugh Peters — and Henry Vane, who is elected Governor. — Founda.
tion of Connecticut — and Newhaven. — War with the Pequod Indians. — Severities
exercised by the victorious Colonists. — Disturbances created by Mrs. Hutchinson.
Colonization of Rhode Island — and of New Hampshire and Maine. — Jealousy,
and fluctuating Conduct of the King. — Measures adopted against the Liberties of
Massachusetts — interrupted by the Civil Wars. — State of New England — Popula
tion — Laws — Manners.
The directors of the Massachusetts or New England com-
pany in Britain, meanwhile exerted the utmost diligence to n.
reinforce the colony they had founded with a numerous body "
of additional settlers. Their designs were promoted by the
rigour and intolerance of Laud's administration, which pro
gressively multiplying the hardships imposed on all English
men who scrupled entire conformity to the ecclesiastical ordi
nances, proportionably diminished, in their estimation, the
danger and hardships attending a removal to America. Many
people began to treat with the company for a settlement in
New England ; and several of those new adventurers were
persons of distinguished family and opulent estate. But fore
seeing the misrule inseparable from the residence ofthe legis
lative functions in Britain, they demanded, as a previous con
dition of their emigration, that the chartered rights and all the
powers of government should be transferred to New England,
and exercised within the territory of the colony. The direc
tors of the company who had incurred a considerable expense,
with little prospect of speedy remuneration, were very willing
to secure the settlement of so many wealthy and respectable
colonists in their territory, even at the expense of the sur
render that was demanded from them : but doubting its legality,

2J8 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK they thought proper to consult lawyers of eminence on the
II- subject. Unaccountable as it must appear to every person in

1629. the slightest degree conversant with legal considerations, they
received an opinion favourable to the wishes of the emigrants ;
29 Aug. and accordingly it was determined, by general consent, " that
The char- the charter should be transferred, and the government be
ter govern- settled jn TSTevv England." To the existing members of the
transferred corporation who should still remain in Britain, was reserved a
fr° d f"5 snare m the trade, stock, and profits of the company, for the
Massachu- term of seven years. 1 By this transaction, — one of the most
setts. lingular that is recorded in the history of a civilized people,
were the municipal rights and liberties of the inhabitants of
New England established on a firm and respectable basis.
When we consider the means by which this was accom
plished, we find ourselves beset with doubts and difficulties,
of which the only rational solution that presents itself is the
supposition we have already adopted, that the king was at
this time exceedingly desirous to rid the realm of the puri
tans, and had unequivocally signified to them, that if they
would bestow their presence on some other part of his domi
nions, and employ their energies in subduing the deserts of Ame
rica, instead of disturbing his operations on the church and civil
constitution of England, they should have permission to ar
range the structure, civil and ecclesiastical, of their provincial
commonwealth, according to their own discretion. An English
corporation, appointed by its charter to reside in London, re
solved itself, by its own act, into an American corporation, and
transferred its residence to Massachusetts : and this was
openly transacted by men whose principles rendered them pe
culiarly obnoxious to their rulers, and under the eyes of a
prince no less vigilant to mark, than prompt to repress every
encroachment on the limits of his prerogative. So far was
Charles from entertaining the slightest dissatisfaction at this
proceeding, or from desiring, at the present period of his reign,
to obstruct the removal of the puritans to New England, that
about two years after this signal change had been carried into
effect, when a complaint of arbitrary and illegal measures was
preferred against the colony by a Roriian catholic who had
1 Mather. Hutchinson.

NORTH AMERICA. 219
been banished from it, and who was supported by Sir Ferdi- c H A P.
nando Gorges, — the king, after an ample discussion of the case n.
in the privy council, issued a proclamation not only justifying 162g.
but commending the whole conduct of the provincial govern
ment, reprobating the prevalent reports that he " had no good
opinion of that plantation," and engaging not only to main
tain the privileges of its inhabitants, but to supply whatever
else might contribute to their farther comfort and prosperity.1
From the terms of this document (of which no notice is taken
by the writers inimical to the puritans), and from the whole
complexion of the king's conduct towards the founders of this
settlement, it would appear that, whatever designs he might
secretly cherish of adding the subjugation of New England, at
a future period, to that of his British and Virginian dominions,
his policy at the present time was to persuade the leaders of
the puritans, that if they would peaceably abandon the con
test for their principles in England, they were at liberty to em
body and enjoy them in whatever institutions they might
think fit to establish in America. And yet some writers,2
whom it is impossible to tax with ignorance, as they had ac
cess to all the existing materials of information, — whom it
would justly be held presumptuous to charge with defect of
discernment, — and whom it may, perhaps, appear uncharitable
to reproach with malignity towards the puritans, — have not
scrupled to accuse the founders of this colony of pursuing their
purposes by a policy not less impudent than fraudful, and by
acts of disobedience little short of rebellion. The colonists
themselves, notwithstanding all the facilities which the king
presented to them, and the unwonted liberality and considera
tion with which he showed himself willing to grace their de
parture from Britain, were so fully aware of his rooted enmity
to their principles, and so little able to reconcile his present
demeanour with his favourite policy, that they openly de
clared 0iey had been conducted by Providence to a land of
rest, through ways which they were contented to admire with
out comprehending ; and that they could ascribe the blessings
they obtained to nothing else than the special interposition of
that Being who orders all the steps of his people, and holds
1 Neal. '' Chalmers. Robertson.

220 THE HISTORY OF
book the hearts of kings, as of all men, in his hands. It is indeed a
n- strange coincidence, that this arbitrary prince, at tbe very
1629. time when he was oppressing the royalists in Virginia, should
have been cherishing the principles of liberty among the puri
tans in New England.
Having achieved this important innovation in the structure
of their political system, the adventurers proceeded with equal
prudence and vigour to execute the ulterior designs which
they had undertaken. By a general court or assembly, John
Winthrop was appointed governor, and Thomas Dudley, de
puty-governor ; eighteen councillors or assistants were also
chosen ; and in these functionaries, together with the body of
freemen who might settle in New England, were vested all
the corporate rights ofthe company. So active was the spirit
1630. of emigration, that, in the course of the ensuing year, above
Numerous fifteen hundred settlers, among whom were several wealthy
tiorf™" anc' high-born persons, both men and women, who expressed
their determination to follow truth and liberty into a desert,
rather than to enjoy all the pleasures of the world under the
dominion of superstition and slavery, set sail aboard a fleet of
July 6. seventeen ships for New England. On their arrival at Salem,
many of them were so displeased with its local circumstances,
that they explored the country in quest of more agreeable
stations; and settling in different places around the adjacent
bay, according to their particular predilections, laid the foun-
Founda- dation of Boston, Chaiiestown, Dorchester, Roxbury, and
Boston other societies, which have since expanded into considerable
towns. In each of these settlements, a church was established
on the same model with that of Salem. This concernment, to
gether with the care of providing for their subsistence during
winter, afforded ample occupation to the emigrants for several
months after their arrival. The approach of winter was at-
Hardships tended with a repetition of those trials and distresses through
ofthe new f-]]e ordeal of which every body of European settlers in New
England was long fated to pass. Afflicted with severe scar
city, which all the generous contributions of the other settle
ments in the province could but slightly alleviate, — attacked
with various distempers, the consequence of hunger, cold, and
the peculiarities ofa soil and climate uncongenial to constitu
tions formed in Europe, — and lodged for the most part in

NORTH AMERICA. 221
booths and tents that afforded but imperfect protection from c H A P.
the weather, — great numbers of the new colonists were n-
speedily carried to the grave. But the noble determination of 1630.
spirit which had impelled them to emigrate, preserved all its
force : the survivors endured their calamities with unshaken
fortitude ; and the dying expressed a grateful exultation in
the consciousness of having promoted and beheld the founda
tion ofa church of Christ in those desolate ends ofthe earth.
The continuance of the pestilence enforced the devout suppli
cations of the colonists ; and its cessation, which they recog
nised as the answer to their prayers, excited their devotional
gratitude. This calamity was hardly removed when they were
alarmed by the tidings of a universal conspiracy of the neigh
bouring Indians for their destruction. The colonists, instead
of relying on their patent from the British crown, had, on their
first arrival, fairly purchased from the Indians all the tracts of
land which they proposed to occupy ; and in the hour of their
peril, both they and the faithless vendors who menaced them,
reaped the fruit of their concurrence or collision with the de
signs of Eternal Justice. The hostility of the savages was
interrupted by a pestilential disorder that broke out among
themselves, and with rapid desolation swept whole tribes of
them away. This disorder was the small-pox, which has
always proved a much more formidable malady to Indian than
to European constitutions. In spite of the most charitable
exertions on the part of the colonists to arrest the progress of
the distemper by their superior medical skill, nine-tenths of
the neighbouring Indians were cut off; and many ofthe sur
vivors, flying from the infection, removed their habitations to
more distant regions. 1
When the departure of winter and the arrival of supplies 1631
from England, permitted the colonists to resume their assem-
1 Mather. Neal. Hutchinson. " The first planters, far from using the barbar
ous methods practised by the Spaniards on the southern continent, whit h have made
them detestable to the whole christian world, sought to gain the natives by strict
justice in their dealings with them, as well as by all the endearments of kindness
and humanity. To lay an early foundation for a firm and lasting friendship, they
assured the Americans that they did not come among them as invaders but pur
chasers, and therefore called an assembly of them together to inquire who had the
right to dispose of their lands ; and being told it was their sachems or princes, they
thereupon agreed with them for what districts they bought, publicly, and in open
market. — Dummer's Defence of the New England Charters.

222

THE HISTORY OF

book blies for the transaction of public business, their very first pro-
 ^*  ceedings demonstrated that a great majority of them were
1631. strongly leavened with a spirit of intolerance, and were deter
mined that their commonwealth should exemplify a thorough
intertexture and mutual dependence of church and state. A
Disfran- law was passed, enacting that no persons should hereafter be
o^Dissen- admitted freemen, or be entitled to any share in the govern-
ters in the ment, or be capable of being chosen magistrates, or even of
colony. serving as jurymen, but such as had been or should hereafter
be received members of one or other of the congregations of
the established church of the province. This law at once di
vested every person who did not hold the prevailing opinions,
not only on the fundamental points of christian doctrine, but
with respect to ecclesiastical discipline and the ceremonies
of worship, of all the privileges of a citizen. An uncontrolled
power of approving or rejecting the claims of those who ap
plied for admission into communion with the church, being
vested in the ministers and leading members of each congre
gation, the most valuable civil rights were made to depend on
their decision with respect to qualifications purely ecclesiastical.
Even at a later period, when the colonists were compelled, by
the remonstrances and menaces of Charles the Second, to
make some alteration of this law, they altered it more in ap
pearance than in reality, and still required that every candi
date for the rank of a freeman, should produce a certifi
cate from some minister ofthe established church, that he was
a person of orthodox principles and of honest life and conver
sation — a certificate which dissenters from the established
Influence church solicited with great disadvantage. The consequence
ofthe pro- of such laws was to elevate the clergy to a very high degree of
clergy. influence and authority ; x and, happily, the colony was
long blessed with a succession of ministers whose disinterested
virtue and superior sense served not merely to counteract the

• Many instances of their influence in matters of importance will occur in the
further progress of our narrative. An instance of their control over public opinion
on a point which, being quite beyond the province of reason, was the more likely to
interest the most obstinate and unassailable prejudices, is mentioned by Hutchinson.
Tobacco was at first prohibited under a penalty ; and in some writings that were
popular in the colony, the smoke of it was compared to the fumes of the bottomless
pit. But some ofthe clergy having fallen into the practice of smoking, tobacco was
instantly, by an act of government, " set at liberty."

NORTH AMERICA. 223
mischief of this inordinate influence, but even to convert it CHAP.
into an instrument of good. Though dissenters from the pro- IT'
vincial church were thus deprived of political privileges, it 1631.
does not appear that they were exposed to any positive mo
lestation, except where their tenets were considered as blasphe
mous, or when they endeavoured by the propagation of them
to detach other persons from the established system, or to dis
turb the public peace. The exclusion from political fran
chises to which they were subjected, seems not at first to have
given them any annoyance, but to have been recognised as a
necessary consequence of that system of policy in conformity
with which the preservation of the church estate was ac
counted the great end of political institutions ; and the chief
value of political rights was supposed to consist in their
subservience to that object. Various persons resided in peace
within the colony, though excluded from political franchises ;
and one episcopal minister in particular, excited more mirth
than displeasure, when, signifying his refusal to join any ofthe
provincial congregations, he declared that as he had left
England because he did not like the lord bishops, so they might
rest assured that he had not come to America to live under the
lord brethren.1
The diminution of their original numbers, which the colo- 163'2-
nists had suffered from hardship and disease, was much more
than compensated by the ample reinforcements which they
continually received from their persecuted brethren in Eng
land. Among the new settlers who arrived not long after the
transference of the seat of government to Massachusetts, were
some eminent puritan ministers, of whom the most remarkable
were Elliott and Mayhew, the first protestant missionaries to
the Indians, and John Cotton, a man whose singular worth John Cot-
procured, and long preserved, to him a patriarchal repute and '°n> and
authority in the colony. After ministering for twenty years in leagues
England to a congregation by whom he was highly respected and suc"
and beloved, Cotton had been summoned before the Court of
High Commission on a charge of neglecting to kneel at the sa
crament. Lord Dorset and other persons of distinction, by whom
he was known and esteemed, employed the strongest inter-
1 Neal. Hutchinson. Chalmers.

224 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK cession in his behalf with Laud : but their exertions were
IL unavailing ; and Dorset was constrained to inform his friend,
1633. " that if it had been only drunkenness or adultery that he
had committed, he might have found favour ; but the sin of
puritanism was unpardonable." Cotton, in consequence, re
tired to New England, where he soon found an ample solace
of exile in an enlarged sphere of usefulness and virtue. To
an earnest concern for the spread of religion he united a deep
and constant personal sense of it ; and habitually seeking to
illustrate and adorn by his life the doctrine which he taught,
he promoted its acceptance by the weight of his character
and the animating influence of his example. The kindness
of his disposition, and the courteous benevolence of his
manners, enabled him, in all his intercourse with others, to
diffuse the influence of his piety no less sensibly than agree
ably through the veins of his conversation. The loftiness of
the standard which he had constantly in his view, and the
assimilating influence of that strong admiration which he en
tertained for it, communicated to his character an elevation
that commanded respect; while the continual sense of his
dependence on divine aid, and of his inferiority to the great
object of his imitation, graced his manners with a humility
that attracted love, and disarmed the contentious opposition
of petulance and envy. It is recorded of him, that having
been once followed from the church where he had been
preaching, by a sour factious fanatic, who told him with a
frown that his ministry had become dark and flat, he replied,
" Both, brother, it may be both ; let me have your prayers that
it may be otherwise." On another occasion, being accosted in
the street by a pragmatical disputer, who insolently told him
that he was an old fool, Cotton, with a mildness that showed
he forgave the rudeness, and a solemnity that evinced him
incapable of contemning the opinion of his neighbour, an
swered, " I confess I am so ; the Lord make thee and me wiser
than we are, even ivise unto salvation."1 The character, at once so
venerable and so amiable, of this excellent clergyman, and of
many of his colleagues, seems to have been formed by Provi
dence for the express purpose of counteracting, by a happy
' Neal.

NORTH AMERICA. 225
influence, the violent, divisive, and contentious spirit that CHAP.
long continued to ferment in a community of men whom per-  '___
secution had rendered rigid and inflexible in opinion, — whose 1633.
sentiments had not been harmonised by previous habits of
union, — who were daily receiving into their body a fresh in
fusion of dissimilar characters and exasperated spirits, — and
among whom each naturally considered the notions and
practices for which he had individually suffered, as the most
important features in the common cause. When we recollect
the presence of such elements of discord, and the severe and
protracted operation that had been given to that influence
which tends to drive even the wise to frenzy, we shall be less
disposed to marvel at the vehement heats and acrimonious
contentions which in some instances broke forth to disturb
the peace of the colony, than that in the midst of such threat
ening symptoms so much coherence and stability was pre
served, and so much virtue, happiness, and prosperity attained.
Among the instruments which the Divine Being adapted and
employed to compose and unite the spirits of his people, were
this eminent individual John Cotton ; Thomas Hooker, a man
very little inferior to him in worth and influence ; and, at a
later period, Dr. Increase Mather, who succeeded to the esti
mation which Cotton had enjoyed, and whose family supplied
no fewer than ten of the most popular ministers of the age
which they adorned, to the churches of Massachusetts, and
produced the celebrated author of the ecclesiastical history of
New England. If all the provincial churches had been guided
by such spirits as these, the agitated minds of the inhabitants
would doubtless have sooner attained a settled composure;
but, unfortunately, the intolerant and contentious disposition
which many of the people had contracted did not long wait
for ministerial leaders lo excite and develope its activity.
The first theological dissension that arose in the colony was Williams'
promoted by Roger Williams, who had emigrated to New Scig^—
England in 1630, and officiated for some time as pastor of
New Plymouth; but not finding there an audience of con
genial spirits, he obtained leave to resign his functions at that
place, and had recently been appointed minister of Salem.
This man was a rigorous Brownist, keen, unpliant, illiberal,
unforbearing, and passionate: he began to vent from the
VOL. I. Q

226 THE HISTORY OF
book pulpit which he had gained by his substantial /piety and
fervid zeal, a singular medley of notions, some wildly specu-
1634. lative, some boldly opposed to the constitutions of civil
society, and some which, if unexceptionable in the abstract,
were highly unsuitable to the place where they were pro
mulgated, and the exercises and sentiments with which he
endeavoured to combine them. He maintained that it was
not lawful for an unregenerate man to pray, nor for christians
to join in family prayer with those whom they judged unre
generate : that it was not lawful to take an oath to the civil
magistrate, — not even the oath of allegiance, which he had
declined himself to take, and advised his congregation equally
to reject: that King Charles had unjustly usurped the power
of disposing of the territory of the Indians, and hence the
colonial patent was utterly invalid: that the civil magistrate
had no right to restrain or direct the consciences of men; and
that any thing short of unlimited toleration for all religious
systems was detestable persecution. These liberal principles
of toleration he combined with a spirit so rigid and separating,
that he not only refused all communion with persons who did
not profess every one of the foregoing opinions, but forbade
the members of the church at Salem to communicate with any
of the other churches in the colony; and, when they refused
to obey this prohibition, he forsook his ministerial office
among them and established a separate meeting in a private
house. He even withdrew from the society of his wife be
cause she continued to attend the church of Salem, and from
that of his children, because he accounted them unregenerate.
In his retirement, he was attended by a select assembly of
zealous admirers, consisting of men, in whose minds an im
petuous temper, inflamed by persecution, had greatly im
paired the sense of moral perspective; who entertained
disproportioned ideas of those branches of the trunk of god
liness, for the sake of which they had endured severe affliction,
and had seen worth and piety foully wronged; and who
abhorred every symbol, badge, and practice, that was asso
ciated with the remembrance, and spotted, as they conceived,
with the iniquity of their idolatrous oppressors. One of these
individuals, Endicot, a magistrate of the place, and formerly

NORTH AMERICA. 227
deputy-governor of the colony, in a transport of devouring c n A P.
zeal against superstition, was instigated by Williams to cut the n-
red cross out of the royal standard; and many of the trained j.634.
bands, who had hitherto followed this standard without ob
jection, caught the contagion of Endicot's fervour, and
protested that they would no longer follow a flag on which
the popish emblem ofa crucifix was painted. The intemperate
and disorderly conduct of Endicot was generally disapproved,
and the provincial authorities punished his misdemeanour by
reprimand and disability of holding office for a year ; but they
were obliged to compromise the dispute with the protesters
among the trained bands, and comply, to a certain extent,
with their remonstrances. They were preparing to call
Williams to a judicial reckoning, when Cotton and other
ministers interposed and desired to be allowed to reason with
him; alleging that his vehemence and breach of order be
tokened rather a misguided conscience, than seditious prin
ciples; and that there was hope that they might gain, instead
of losing, their brother. You are deceived in that man, if you
think he will condescend to learn of any of you, was the pre
diction of the governor; and the result of the conference
proving the justice of it,1 sentence of banishment from the
colony was forthwith pronounced upon Williams. This
sentence excited a great uproar in Salem, and was so success
fully denounced as persecution by the adherents of Williams,
that the bulk of the inhabitants of the place were preparing
to follow him into exile ; when an earnest and pious admo
nition, addressed to them by Cotton and the other ministers
of Boston, induced them to relinquish their purpose, to
acknowledge the justice of the proceeding, and abandon
Williams to his fate. He was not, however, abandoned by
his more select admirers, whose esteem and affection he had
1 Though he would not retract his dogmas, it seems that some of the arguments
that were employed with him sank into his mind, and at least reduced him to si
lence. Hooker, one of the ministers who was sent to deal with him, urged, among
other reasonings, — " If it be unlawful for an unregenerate person to pray, it is un
lawful for your unregenerate child to ask a blessing on his meat ; and if so, it is
unlawful for him to eat, since food is sanctified by prayer, and without prayer un-
sanctified (1 Tim. iv. 4, 5.) ; and it must be equally unlawful for you to invite him
to eat, since you ought not to tempt him to sin." To this he declined making any
answer. — Mather.
q2

228 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK gained to such a degree, that they resolved to brave every
' hardship, in order to live and die with hitn. Accompanying
1634. him in his exile, they directed their march towards the south;
and settling at a place beyond the jurisdiction of Massachusetts,
they purchased a considerable tract of land from the Indians,
He founds and bestowed on their plantation the name of Providence.
dence. ^a(* Williams encountered the severities to which the pub
lication of his peculiar opinions would have exposed him
in England, he would probably have lost his senses: the
wiser and kinder treatment he experienced from the Massa
chusetts authorities was productive of happier effects; and
Cotton and his colleagues were not wholly mistaken, in sup
posing that they would gain their brother. They gained
him, indeed, in a manner less flattering to themselves than a
controversial victory would have been, but much more bene
ficial to the interests of America. He contributed, as we
shall see, at a later period, to found the state of Rhode Island,
and was one of its most eminent benefactors. He lived to an
advanced age; and soon throwing off the impetuous and yet
punctilious spirit with which his doctrinal sentiments had
been leavened, he regained the friendship and esteem of his
ancient fellow colonists, and preserved a friendly correspon
dence with Cotton and others of them till his death. The
principles of toleration, which he had formerly discredited, by
the rigidness with which he disallowed the slightest difference
of opinion between the members of his own communion, — he
now recommended by the exercise of meekness, charity, and
forbearance. The great fundamental principles of Christianity
progressively acquiring a more exclusive and absorbing in
fluence on his mind, he began to labour for the conversion of
the Indians; and, in addition to the benefits of which his
ministry among them was productive to this race of people,
he acquired over them an influence which he rendered highly
advantageous to his old associates in Massachusetts, whom
he was enabled frequently to apprise of conspiracies formed
against them by the savages in their vicinity, and revealed to
him by the tribes with whom he maintained relations of
friendship.1 Endicot's vehemence was not less mellowed by
1 Mather, Neale. Hutchinson.

NORTH AMERICA. 229
time and the ascendancy of sound wisdom and piety. He CHAP.
remained in Massachusetts ; and, at a later period, held for IL
many years the chief office in its government with great 1634.
public advantage and general esteem.1
The colony of Massachusetts had continued meanwhile to
advance in the attainment of stability and prosperity, and to
extend its settlements : and this year an important and bene
ficial change took place in its municipal constitution. The
mortality that had prevailed among the Indians, had vacated
a great many stations formerly occupied by their tribes;
and as most of these were advantageously situated, the co*
lonists took possession of them with an eagerness that dis
persed their settlements widely over the face of the country.
This necessarily led to the introduction of representative Represen-
government ; and, accordingly, at the period of convoking ass^biy
the general court, the freemen, instead of personally attending established
it, which was the literal prescription ofthe provincial charter, ^us eas^a"
elected representatives in their several districts, whom they
authorised to appear in their name and act in their behalf.
The representatives were admitted, and henceforward consi
dered themselves, in conjunction with the governor and
council of assistants, as the supreme legislative assembly of
the province. The abstract wisdom of this innovation could
not admit of doubt ; and, in defence of its legitimacy, it was
forcibly urged that the colonists were only making an improved
and necessary access to the enjoyment of an advantage al
ready bestowed on them, and preventing their assemblies
from becoming either too numerous to transact business, or
inadequate to represent the general interest and administer
the general will. The number of freemen had greatly in
creased since the charter was granted ; many resided at a
distance from the places where the general courts or assem
blies of the freemen were held ; personal attendance had be
come inconvenient; and, in such circumstances, little if any
blame can attach to the colonists for making with their own
hands the improvement that was necessary to preserve their
existing rights, instead of applying to the government of
England, which was steadily pursuing the plan of subverting
1 Mather.

230 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK the organs of liberty in the mother country, and had already
begun to exhibit an altered countenance towards the colonial
1634. community. In consequence of this important measure the
colony advanced beyond the state of a mercantile society or
corporation, and acquired by its own act the condition of a
commonwealth endowed with political liberty. The repre
sentatives of the people having established themselves in their
office, asserted its inherent rights, by enacting that no legal
ordinance should be framed within the province, no tax im
posed, and no public officer appointed, in future, except by
the provincial legislature.1
The increasing violence and injustice of the royal govern
ment in England co-operated so forcibly with the tidings that
were circulated of the prosperity of Massachusetts, — and the
simple frame of ecclesiastical policy that had been established
in the colony, presented a prospect so desirable, and (by the
comparison which it invited) exposed the gorgeous hierarchy
and recent superstitious innovations in the ceremonies of the
English church to so much additional odium, — that the flow
of emigration seemed rather to enlarge than subside, and
1635. crowds of new settlers continued to flock to New England.
Among the passengers, in a fleet of twenty vessels that ar
rived in the following year, were two persons who afterwards
made a distinguished figure in a more conspicuous scene.
Arrival of One of these was Hugh Peters, the celebrated chaplain and
p tg counsellor of Oliver Cromwell, and the Other was Vane, whose
father, Sir Henry Vane the elder, enjoyed the dignity of
a privy councillor at the English court. Peters, who united
an active and enterprising genius with the warmest devotion
to the interests of religion and liberty, became minister of Sa
lem, where he not only discharged his sacred functions with
zeal and advantage, but roused the planters to new courses of
useful industry, and encouraged them by his own successful
example. His labours were blessed with a produce not less
honourable than enduring. The spirit which he fostered has
continued to prevail with unabated vigour ; and nearly two
centuries after bis death, the piety, good morals, and industry
by which Salem has always been characterized, have been as-
1 Hutchinson. Chalmers.

NORTH AMERICA. 231
cribed with just and grateful commemoration to the effects of c H A P.
Peters' residence there. He remained in New England till the  n-
year 1641, when, at the request of the colonists, he went to 1635.
transact some business for them in the mother country, from
which he was fated never to return. But his race remained in
the land which had been thus highly indebted to his virtue ;
and the name of Winthrop, one of the most honoured in New
England, was acquired and transmitted by his daughter.
Vane, afterwards Sir Henry Vane the younger, had been for and Hen-
some time restrained from indulging his wish to proceed to ry Vane—
New England by the prohibition of his father, who was at
length induced to wave his objections by the interference of
the king. A young man of patrician family, animated with
such ardent devotion to the cause of pure religion and liberty,
that, relinquishing all his prospects in Britain, he chose to
settle in an infant colony which as yet afforded little more
than a bare subsistence to its inhabitants, was received in New
England with the fondest regard and admiration. He was
then little more than twenty-four years of age. His youth,
which seemed to magnify the sacrifice he had made, increased
no less the impression which his manners and appearance
were calculated to produce. The deep thoughtful composure
of his aspect and demeanour stamped a serious grace and
somewhat (according to our conceptions) of angelic gran
deur on the bloom of manhood ; his countenance disclosed
the surface of a character not less resolute than profound,
and of which the energy was not extinguished, but con
centrated into a sublime and solemn calm. He possessed
a prompt and clear discernment of the spirits of other
men, and a wonderful mastery over his own. He has been
charged with a wild enthusiasm x by some who have re
marked the intensity with which he pursued purposes which
to them have appeared worthless and ignoble ; and with hypo
crisy by others, who have contrasted the vigour of his resolu-

1 One ingenious writer speaks more respectfully of Vane's enthusiasm ; declaring
that " it seems never to have precipitated him into injudicious measures, but to have
added new powers to his natural sagacity." " He mistook," continues the writer,
' ' his deep penetration for a prophetic spirit, and the light of his genius for divine
irradiation." I see no proof that he entertained the first of these notions, and no
mistake in the second.

232 THE HISTORY, OF
BOOK tion with the calmness of his manners. But a juster considera-
II •
' tion, perhaps, may suggest that it was the habitual energy of
1635. his determination that repressed every symptom of vehement
impetuosity, and induced an equality of manner that scarcely
appeared to exceed the pitch of a grave deliberate constancy.
So much did his mind predominate over his senses, that,
though constitutionally timid,1 and keenly susceptible of im
pressions of pain, yet his whole life was one continued course
of great and daring enterprise ; and when amidst the wreck of
his fortunes and the treachery of his associates, death was
presented to himself in the appalling form of a bloody execu
tion, he prepared for it with a heroic and smiling intrepidity,
and encountered it with tranquil and dignified resignation.
The man who could so command himself, was formed to ac
quire a powerful ascendancy over the minds of others. He
was instantly admitted a freeman of Massachusetts ; and ex
tending his claims to respect, by the address and ability which
1636. he displayed in conducting business, he was elected governor
who is in the year subsequent to his arrival, by unanimous choice,
elected an(i wjtn tne highest expectations of a happy and advantage
ous administration. These hopes, however, were disappointed.
Vane, not finding in the political affairs of the colonists a wide
enough field for the excursion of his active spirit, embarked
its energy in their theological discussions; and, unfortunately,
connecting himself with a party who had conceived singularly
just and profound views of christian doctrine, but associated
them with some dangerous errors, and discredited them bya wild
extravagance of behaviour, he very soon witnessed the abridg
ment of his usefulness and the decline of his popularity.8
Founda- The incessant flow of emigration to Massachusetts,
Connec- causing the inhabitants of some of the towns to feel them-
ticut — selves straitened for room, suggested the formation of addi
tional establishments. A project of founding a new settle-
1636. ment on the banks of the river Connecticut was now em-

1 See note V. at the end of the volume.
2 America Painted to the Life, by Ferdinando Gorges. There is a copy of this
work in the Redcross-street Library of London. Neal. Hutchinson. Dwight's
Travels in New England and New York. Vane was accompanied to America by
Lord Leigh, son of the Earl of Marlborough, who had conceived a curiosity to behold
the New F.ngland settlements.

NORTH AMERICA. 233
braced by Hooker, one of the ministers of Boston, and a CHAP.
hundred of the members of his congregation. After enduring II-
extreme hardship, and encountering the usual difficulties that 1636.
attended the foundation of civilised society in this quarter of
America, with the usual display of puritan fortitude and reso
lution, they at length succeeded in establishing a plantation,
which gradually enlarged into the flourishing state of Con
necticut. Some Dutch settlers from New York, who had
previously occupied a post in this country, were compelled to
surrender it to the British colonists, who, moreover, obtained
shortly after from Lord Brooke and Lord Say and Sele, an
assignation to a district which these noblemen had acquired
in the same quarter, with the intention of flying from the
royal tyranny to America.1 Hooker and his comrades at
first carried with them a commission from the government of
Massachusetts, for the administration of justice in their new
settlement ; but, subsequently ascertaining that their terri
tory was beyond the jurisdiction of the authorities from
whom the commission was derived, they combined them
selves by a voluntary association into a body politic, con
structed on the model of the colonial society from which they
had separated. They continued in this condition till the
Restoration, when they obtained a charter for themselves
from King Charles the Second. That this secession from the
colony of Massachusetts, was occasioned by lack of room in
a province yet imperfectly peopled, has appeared so impro
bable to some writers, that they have thought it necessary to
assign another cause, and have found none so probable or
satisfactory as the jealousy which they conclude that Hooker
must inevitably have entertained towards Cotton, whose
patriarchal authority had attained such a height in Massa
chusetts that even a formidable political dissension was
1 Lord Brooke and Lord Say and Sele had proceeded so far in their design as to
send an agent to take possession of their territory, and build a fort. Happily for
America, the sentiments and habits that rendered them unfit members of a society
where complete civil liberty and perfect simplicity of manners were esteemed requisite
to the general happiness, prevented these noblemen from carrying their project into
execution. They proposed to establish an order of nobility and hereditary magis
tracy in America ; and consumed so much time in arguing this important point with
the other settlers who were to be associated with them, that at length their ardour
for emigration subsided, and nearer and more interesting prospects opened to their
activity in England. Chalmers.

234 THE HISTORY OF
book quelled by one of his pacific discourses. But envy was not
' a passion congenial to the breast of Hooker, or likely to be
1636. generated by the character or influence of Cotton. The notion
of a redundant population was the more readily entertained
at this period from the unwillingness of the settlers to pene
trate far into the interior of the country and deprive them
selves of an easy communication with the coast. Another
reason, indeed, appears to have suggested the formation of the
new settlement ; but it was a reason that argued not dissen
sion, but community of feeling and design between the planters
who remained in Massachusetts and those who removed to
Connecticut. By the establishment of this advanced station,
a barrier, it was hoped, would be erected against the trouble
some incursions of the Pequod Indians.1 Nor is it utterly
improbable that some of the seceders to the new settlement
were actuated by a restless spirit which had hoped too much
from external change, and which vainly urged a farther pur
suit of that spring of contentment which must rise up in the
minds of those who would enjoy it.
And New- In the immediate neighbourhood of this new settlement,
haven. another plantation was formed about two years after, by a nu
merous body of emigrants who arrived from England, under
the guidance of Theophilus Eaton, a man of large fortune, and
John Davenport, an eminent puritan minister. Averse to
erect the social institutions which they projected upon founda
tions previously laid by other hands, these adventurers de
clined to settle in Massachusetts, which already presented the
scene ofa thriving and well-compacted community: and smit
with the attractions of a vacant territory skirting the large
and commodious bay to the south-west of Connecticut river,
they purchased from its Indian owners all the land that lies
between that stream and Hudson's river, which divides the
southern parts of New England from New York. Repairing

1 Mather. Hutchinson. Trumbull. It appears from Mather's Lives, that
Cotton and Hooker were knit together in the firmest bonds of christian friendship
and cordial esteem. Yet these men who forsook houses, lands, and country for the
sake of the gospel, are described hy Dr. Robertson as " rival competitors in the con
test for fame and power !" This is the only light in which many eminent and even
reverend writers are capable of regarding the labours of the patriot, the saint, and the
sage. It is not uncommon for men, in attempting to paint the character of others,
unconsciously to copy their own.

NORTH AMERICA. 235
to the shol-es of this bay, they built, first the town of New- chap.
haven, which has given its name to the whole colony, and n-
then the towns of Guilford, Milford, Stamford, and Brainford. i636.
After some time they crossed the bay, and planted various
settlements in Long Island ; in all places where they came,
erectino- churches on the model of the independents. When
we observe the injustice and cruelty exercised by the govern
ment of Britain, thus contributing to cover the earth with
cities and to plant religion and liberty in the savage deserts of
America, we recognize the overruling providence of that Being
who can render even the insolence of tyrants who usurp his
attributes conducive to his honour. Having no royal patent,
nor any other title to their lands than the vendition of the
natives, and not being included within the boundaries of any
provincial jurisdiction established by British authority, these
settlers entered into a voluntary association of the same nature
and for the same ends with that which the founders of Con
necticut had embraced : and in this condition they remained
till the Restoration, when Newhaven and Connecticut were
united together by a charter of King Charles the Second.1
When the settlement of Connecticut was first projected, War with
hopes were entertained that it might conduce to overawe the ^jj^.
hostility of the Indians; but it produced a perfectly opposite
effect. The tribes of Indians in the immediate vicinity of
Massachusetts Bay were comparatively feeble and unwarlike ;
but the colonies of Providence and Connecticut were planted
in the midst of powerful and martial hordes. Among these,
the most considerable were the Naragansets, who inhabited the
shores of the bay which bears their name ; and the Pequods,
who occupied the territory which stretches from the river
Pequod to the banks of the Connecticut. The Pequods were
1 Neal. The colonists of Massachusetts were very desirous that Davenport and
his associates should settle among them. But " it had been an observation of Mr.
Davenport's, that whenever a reformation had been effected in any part ofthe world,
it had rested where it had been left by the reformers. It could not be advanced
another step. He was now embarked in a design of forming a civil and religious
constitution as near as possible to scripture precept and example. The principal
gentlemen who had followed him to America had the same views. In laying the
foundation of a new colony, there was a fair probability that they might accommodate
all matters of church and commonwealth to their own feelings and sentiments. But
in Massachusetts the principal men were fixed in the chief seats of government, which
they were likely to keep, and their civil and religious polity was already formed." —
Trumbull.

236 THE HISTORY OF
B O 0 K a numerous tribe, and renowned for their prowess and ferocity;
' They had early entertained a jealous hatred of the European
1636. colonists, and for some time past had harassed them with un
provoked attacks, and excited their abhorrence and indigna
tion by the monstrous outrages to which they subjected their
captives. Unoffending men, women, and children, who had
the misfortune to fall into their hands, were scalped and sent
back to their friends, or put to death with every circumstance
of torture and indignity, — while the assassins, with diabolical
glee and derision, challenged them to invoke the God of the
christians, and put to the proof his power to save them. The
extension of the English settlements excited anew the fury of
the savages, and produced a repetition of injuries, which
Vane, the governor of Massachusetts, determined at length to
retaliate and punish by offensive operations. Receiving intel
ligence ofa serious attack that had been made bythe Pequods
j637< on the Connecticut settlers, he summoned all the New
England communities to assemble and dispatch the strongest
force they could contribute to the defence of their country
men and of the common cause of European colonization.
The Pequods, aware of the impending danger, were not neg
ligent of prudent precautions as well as active endeavours to
repel it. To this end, they sought a reconciliation with the
Naragansets, their hereditary enemies and rivals in power;
proposing that on both sides the remembrance of ancient
quarrels and animosities should be buried ; and urging the
Naragansets for once to co-operate cordially with them against
a common foe, whose progressive encroachments threatened to
confound them both in one common destruction. But the
Naragansets had long cherished a fierce and deep-rooted
hatred against the Pequods; and, less moved by a distant
prospect of danger to themselves, than by the hope of an
instant gratification of their implacable revenge, they rejected
the proposals of accommodation, and determined to assist the
English in the prosecution of the war.1
The Pequods incensed, but not dismayed, by this disap
pointment, hastened by the vigour of their operations to
anticipate the junction ofthe allied provincial forces; and the
1 Mather. Neal, Trumbull.

NORTH AMERICA.

237

Connecticut troops, while as yet they had received but aCHA*Pi
small part of the succours with which their friends had un- II."
dertaken to reinforce them, found it necessary to advance 1637#
against the enemy. The Pequod warriors amounting in num
ber to more than fifteen hundred, command by Sassacus,
their principal sachem, occupied two fortified stations, against
one of which Captain Mason and the Connecticut militia,
consisting only of ninety men, attended by a body of Indian
allies, directed their attack. The approach of Mason was
quickened by the information he obtained, that the enemy,
deceived by a seeming retrogade movement of the provincial
troops, had abandoned themselves to the conviction that the
English dared not encounter them, and were celebrating in
premature triumph the supposed evacuation of their country.
About daybreak, while in deep slumber and supine security,
they were approached by the colonists ; and the surprise
would have been complete, if an alarm had not been com
municated by the barking of a dog. The war-whoop was
immediately sounded, and they flew to their arms. The co
lonial troops rushed on to the attack ; and while some of them
fired on the Indians through the palisades, others forced their
way by the entrances into the fort, and setting fire to the huts
which were covered with reeds, involved their enemies in the
confusion and horror ofa general conflagration. The Pequods,
notwithstanding the disadvantage of their predicament, be
haved with great intrepidity : but after a prolonged and
furious resistance, they were totally defeated with the slaugh
ter of at least five hundred of their tribe. Many of the women
and children perished in the flames ; and the warriors, in
endeavouring to escape, were slain by the colonists, or fallino-
into the hands of the Indian allies of the English, who sur
rounded the fort at a distance, were reserved for a more cruel
fate. Soon after this action, Captain Stoughton having
arrived with the auxiliary troops from Massachusetts, it was
resolved to pursue the victory. Several engagements took
place which terminated unfavourably for the Pequods ; and in
a short time they sustained another general defeat which put
an end to the war. A few only of this once powerful nation
survived, who, abandoning their country to the victorious
Europeans, dispersed themselves among the neighbouring

238 THE HISTORY OF
book tribes, and lost their existence as a separate people. Sassacus
' had been an object of superstitious terror to the Naragansets,
1637. who had endeavoured to dissuade the colonists from risking a
personal encounter with him, by the assurance that his life
was charmed and his person invulnerable. After the destruc
tion of his people, when he fled for refuge to a distant tribe,
the Naragansets, exchanging their terror for cruelty, solicited
and prevailed with his hosts to cut off his head.1 Thus ter
minated a struggle more important in its consequences, than
from the numbers of the combatants, or the celebrity of
their names. On its issue there had been staked no less
than the question, whether Christianity and civilization, or
paganism and barbarity should prevail in New England.
This first military enterprise ofthe colonists was conducted
with vigour and ability, and impressed the Indian race with a
high opinion of their stedfast courage and superior skill.
Their victory, however, it must be confessed, was sullied by
Severities cruelties which it is easy to account for and extenuate, but
exercised^ pa;nfui to recollect. The Massachusetts militia had been
torious exceedingly diligent before their march in purging their ranks
colonists- of all persons whose religious sentiments did not fully corre
spond with the general standard of faith and orthodoxy.2 It
had been happy if they could have purged their own bosoms
of the vindictive feelings which the outrages of their savage
foes were but too well fitted, to inspire. Some of the prisoners
were tortured by the Indian allies, whose cruelties we can
hardly doubt that the English might have prevented : a con
siderable number were sold as slaves in Bermudas,3 and the
rest were reduced to servitude in the New England settle
ments. In aggravation of the reproach which these proceed-
1 Mather. Neal. Hutchinson. Trumbull. The destruction of the brave
Pequods, though provoked by their own aggressive hostility, was lamented about 150
years after by an American divine and poet : —
" Indulge, my native land ! indulge the tear
That steals, impassioned, o'er a nation's doom ;
To me each twig from Adam's stock is near,
And sorrows fall upon an Indian's tomb." — Dwight.
a Regimental chaplains accompanied the New England forces in their campaigns;
and in circumstances of doubt or danger, the chaplain was invited to pray for divine
direction and assistance. Trumbull. When a commander-in-chief was appointed,
his truncheon was delivered to him by one of the clergy. Ib.
3 A similar punishment was inflicted some years after in England on a number of
the royalists who had been implicated in Penruddock's insurrection.— Hume.

NORTH AMERICA. 239
ings undoubtedly merit, it has been urged, but with very little CHAP.
reason, that the Pequods were entitled to the treatment of an 1L
independent people gallantly striving to defend their property, 1620.
their rights, and their freedom. But in truth, the Pequods
were the aggressors in an unjust quarrel, and were fighting
all along in support of unprovoked and ferocious purposes of
extermination. The colonists had conducted themselves with
undeviating justice, civility, and christian benevolence towards
the Indians. They had treated fairly with them for the ceded
territories ; assisted them by counsel and help in their diseases
and their agriculture ; and laboured to communicate to them
the blessings of religion. They disallowed all acquisitions of
territory from the Indians but such as underwent the scrutiny
and received the sanction of the general court ; and they
offered a participation of all the rights and privileges of their
commonwealth to every Indian who would adopt the faith of
a christian and the manners of a civilized human being. In
return for these demonstrations of goodwill, they experienced
the most exasperating outrage and barbarity, directed against
all that they reverenced or loved ; and were forcibly im
pressed with the conviction that they must either ex
tirpate those sanguinary idolaters, or leave themselves
and their own wives, children, and christian kindred ex
posed to a far more horrid extermination.1 Even in the
course of the war, they made propositions of lenity to
the savages on the condition of their delivering up the mur
derers of the English ; but their offers were uniformly re
jected ; and the people who thus avouched the murders as
national acts, invited the avengers of blood to visit them with
national punishments. The mutual hostilities of civilized
nations, conducted by dispassionate mercenaries, and directed
by leaders more eager for fame than prompted by animosity
or personal apprehension, may be administered on the prin
ciples of a splendid game. But such hostilities as those which
1 The colonists considered themselves in some degree accessary to the crimes
which they failed to prevent by neglect of any of the means warranted by strict jus
tice. Belknap cites the following entry in a MS. Journal of events in New Eng
land, some years posterior to this period, " The house of John Keniston was burned
and he killed at Greenland. The Indians are Simon, Andrew, and Peter. Those
three we had in prison and should have killed. The good Lord pardon us." — His
tory of New Hampshire.

240 THE HISTORY OF
book the New England colonists were compelled to wage with the
' hordes of savage assassins who attacked them, will always
1637. display human passions in their naked horror and ferocity.
The permission (for we must suppose that they could have
prevented it) of the barbarity of their savage allies, appears
the least excusable feature in their conduct. And yet in con
sidering it, we must add to our allowance for passion inflamed
by enormous provocation, the recollection of the danger and
inexpediency of checking that mutual hostility of the savages
which prevented a combination that might have proved fatal
to all the European settlements. The reduction of their cap
tives to servitude was unquestionably a great evil ; but one
for which it would not have been easy to suggest a substitute
to men too justly alarmed to permit the enemies whom, over
coming by force, they had but half subdued, to go free, and
too poor to support them in idle captivity. The captive
Pequods were treated with all possible kindness, and re
garded rather as indented servants than slaves. It must be
acknowledged at least that the colonists observed a magnani
mous consistency in their international policy, and gave the
Indians the protection of the same stern principles of justice
of which they had taught them to feel the vindictive energy.
They not only tendered a participation of their own privileges
and territory to all civilized and converted Indians; but
having ascertained the stations which the savages most
highly valued, and the range of territory that seemed neces
sary to their comfort and happiness, they prohibited and an
nulled every transaction by which these domains might be
added to the European acquisitions. A short time after the
termination of the Pequod war, an Indian having been wan
tonly killed by some vagabond Englishmen, the murderers
were solemnly tried and executed for the crime ; and the In
dians beheld with astonishment the blood of three men deli
berately shed by their own countrymen for the slaughter of
one stranger. The sense of justice co-operating with the re
pute of valour, secured a long tranquillity to the English
settlements.1 While the military force of Massachusetts was thus em-
' Mather. Neal. Hutchinson.

NORTH AMERICA. 24 I
ployed in the field, the provincial commonwealth was shaken CHAP.
by intestine dissension, which had been excited by theological '
controversy, and inflamed by the gall and bitterness of unruly 1637.
tongues. It was the custom at that time in Boston, that the an'^or '
members of every congregation should assemble in weekly created by
meetings to reconsider the sermons ofthe preceding Sunday ; to cnm'son" '
discuss the doctrinal instructions they had heard ; to revive the
impressions that had been produced by their Sabbatical exer
cises; and extend the sacred influence ofthe Sabbath through
out the week. Mrs. Hutchinson, the wife of one of the most
respectable inhabitants of the colony, a lady of masculine
spirit, subtle, ambitious, and enthusiastic, submitted with im
patience to the restriction by which women at these meetings
were debarred from the privilege of joining in the debates :
and at length conceiving that she was authorised to exercise
her didactic powers by the precept of Scripture, which en
joins the elder women to teach the younger, she established se
parate meetings of the christians of her own sex, where her
zeal and talent soon procured her a numerous and admiring
audience. These women who had partaken the struggles and
perils of the male colonists, had also caught no small portion
of the various hues of their spirit ; and as many of them had
been accustomed to a life more replete with external elegance
and variety of interest and employment than the state of the
colony could supply, they experienced a listless craving for
something to animate and engage their faculties, and judged
nothing fitter for this purpose than an imitation of those exer
cises for the promotion of the great common cause which
seemed to minister such comfort and supportment to the spirits
of the men. Mrs. Hutchinson, their leader, had by her de
vout behaviour, gained the cordial esteem of John Cotton,
whose charity never failed to recognise in every human being
the slightest trace of those graces which he continually and
ardently longed to behold ; and towards him she entertained
and professed for some time a very high veneration. The
friendship of Vane and some others had a less favourable in
fluence on her mind ; and their admiring praise of the depth
and vigour of her genius, seems to have elevated in her esti
mation, the gifts of intellect above the graces of character.
She acquired the title of The Nonsuch, which the ingenuity of
VOL. I. R

242 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK her admirers derived from an anagrammatical transposition of
' the letters of her name ; and gave to her female assemblies
1637. the title of gossipings, — a term at that time of respectable im
port, but which the scandalous repute of female conventions
and debates has since consigned to contempt and ridicule.
Doing amiss what the scriptures plainly forbade her to do at
all, she constituted herself not only a dictator of orthodoxy,
but a censor of the spiritual estate and value of all the minis-
, ters and inhabitants of the province. Her canons of doctrine
were received by her" associates as the unerring standard of
truth ; and a defamatory persecution was industriously waged
against all who rejected them as unsound, uncertain, or unin
telligible. A scrutiny was instituted into the characters of
all the provincial clergy and laity ; and of those who refused
to receive the doctrinal testimony of the conclave, few found
it easy to stand the test of a censorious inquisition stimulated
by female petulance and controversial rancour. In the assem
blies which were held by the followers of Mrs. Hutchinson,
there was nourished and trained a keen, pugnacious spirit,
and unbridled license of tongue, of which the influence was
speedily felt in the serious disturbance, first of domestic hap
piness, and then of the public peace. The matrons of Boston
were transformed into a synod of slanderous praters, whose in
quisitorial deliberations and audacious decrees instilled their
venom into the innermost recesses of society : and the spirits
of a great majority of the citizens being in that combustible
state in which a feeble spark will suffice to kindle a formidable
conflagration, the whole colony was inflamed and distracted
by the incontinence of female spleen and presumption.1
The tenets adopted and inculcated by the faction of which
Mrs. Hutchinson was the leader, were denounced by their ad
versaries as constituting the heresy of antinomianism,— a
charge which, when preferred by the world at large, indicates
no more than the reproach which the gospel, from its first pro
mulgation, has been fated to sustain, — and when advanced by
christians against each other, generally implies nothing else

1 " When the minds of men are full of reforming spirit, and predisposed to the
distempers which are engendered by such fulness, a little matter sometimes occasions
rather than causes dangerous symptoms to appear." — Sir James Mackintosh.

NORTH AMERICA. 243
than the conclusion which the accusers logically deduce from CHAP.
certain articles of doctrine, but which the holders of these  ^\_
articles utterly reject and. disallow. Nothing can be more 1637.
perfectly free and gratuitous than the tender of heavenly grace
in the gospel ; nor any thing more powerfully operative than
the influence which the faithful acceptance of this grace is
calculated to exercise. Mrs. Hutchinson and her adherents
contended more earnestly for the freedom, than for the con
straining influence of divine grace ; and with female eagerness
and polemical impetuosity, were not slow to brand with terms
of heretical aud contemptuous designation every inhabitant of
the colony, and particularly every minister, whose views did
not entirely coincide with their own. The doctrines which
they taught, and the censures which they pronounced, were
received with avidity and delight by a considerable party ; and
proportionally provoking the displeasure of others, excited the
most violent dissensions throughout the whole colony. Cot
ton endeavoured to moderate the heats that arose, by repre
senting to the parties that their strife was prejudicial to the
great purpose in which he firmly believed the minds of both
were united, — the exalting and honouring of divine grace ;
the one (said he) seeking to advance the grace of God within us in
the work of sanctification, the other seeking to advance the grace
of God without us in the work of justification. But the strife
was not to be stayed : his endeavours to pacify and reconcile,
only attracted upon himself the fulmination of a censure of
timorous and purblind incapacity from the assembly of the
women ; and, as even this insult was not able to induce him to
declare himself entirely opposed to them, he incurred a tempo
rary abatement of his popularity with the majority of the
colonists. Some of the tenets promulgated by the sectaries
he reverenced as the legitimate fruit of profound and perspi
cuous meditation of the scriptures ; but he viewed with grief
and amazement the fierce and arrogant spirit with which
they were maintained, and the wild and dangerous errors with
which they very soon came to be associated. The contro
versy raged with a violence very unfavourable to the discern
ment and recognition of truth. Mrs. Hutchinson and her
adherents, both male and female, firmly persuaded of the
superior soundness and purity of their system of doctrines,
e 2

244 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK forgot to consider how far the opposition which it encoun-
 !  tered might be traced to the obscurity and imperfection
1637. with which they themselves received and showed it forth,
— a consideration which no human being is entitled
to disregard, and which is peculiarly fitted to embel
lish superior attainments, and promote their efficacy by
uniting them with the amiable graces of candour and humi
lity. The principles they discarded from their creed laid hold
upon their spirits ; and while they contended for the sove
reignty of divine grace in communicating truth, they assailed
their adversaries with an acrimony and invective that might
well seem to imply that truth was easily and exclusively
attainable by the mere will and endeavour of men. The most
enlightened and consistent christian will ever be the most
ready to acknowledge that he knows nothing yet as he ought to
know, and may have more cause than in this life he can ever
discover, to blush for the defectiveness of a testimony, which,
exhibited with more clearness and consistency, might have
found a fuller acceptance with mankind. But no such con
siderations suggested themselves to mitigate the vehemence,
or soften the asperity, of those busy, bold, and presumptuous
spirits; nor did it ever occur to them that the truths they pro
claimed would be discredited by association with the venom
of untamed licentious tongues. It is asserted that the heat of
their tempers gradually communicated itself to the under
standings of Mrs. Hutchinson and her party; and that in
addition to their original tenets, that believers are personally
united with the spirit of God, that commands to work out
salvation with fear and trembling, belong only to those who
are under a covenant of works, and that sanctification is not
the proper evidence of christian condition, — they adopted that
dangerous and erroneous notion of the Quakers, that the spirit
of God communicates with the minds of believers indepen
dently of the written word ; and, in consistency with this,
received many revelations of future events announced to them
by Mrs. Hutchinson, as equally infallible with the prophecies
of scripture. But the accounts that are transmitted to us of
such theological dissensions are always obscured by the cloud
of contemporary passion, prejudice, and error: hasty effusions

NORTH AMERICA. 245
of irritated zeal are mistaken for deliberate sentiments ; and C HA P.
the excesses ofthe zealots of a party held up as the standard  ; —
by which the whole body may fairly be measured.1 1637.
Some ministers who had embraced Mrs. Hutchinson's opi
nions, began to proclaim them from the pulpit with such
opprobrious invectives against all by whom they were rejected,
as at length brought the dissensions to a crisis ; and Vane
being considered the confederate and protector of Mrs. Hut
chinson, his continuance in office, or privation of it at the
approaching annual election, was the first test by which the
parties were to try with which of them resided the power of
imposing silence on the other. So much ill humour and
mutual jealousy had now been instilled into the minds ofthe
people, that the utmost efforts ofthe sober and humane barely
sufficed to prevent the day of election from being disgraced by
a general riot. All the exertions of Vane's partizans failed to
obtain his re-appointment ; and, by a great majority of votes,
the government was conferred on Winthrop. Vane, never
theless, still remained in the colony, professing his willingness
to undertake even the humblest function in the service of a
commonwealth of the people of God : and the followers of
Mrs. Hutchinson, regarding his deprivation of office as a dan
gerous blow to themselves, ceased not to labour for his rein
statement with as much warmth as they had exerted in the
propagation of their religious tenets. The government was
loudly reproached, and Winthrop openly slighted and af
fronted. At length the prevailing party resolved to cut up
this source of contention by the roots ; and a general synod
of the churches of the colony having been assembled, the
doctrines recently broached were condemned as erroneous and
1 That to a certain extent, however, this error had crept in among them, seems
undeniably manifest ; and it is remarkable that the notion which united them with
the fundamental tenet of the Quakers should have issued from a society which, with
farther resemblance to the Quakers, admitted the anti-scriptural irregularity of female
teaching. Captain Underbill, one of Mrs. Hutchinson's followers, carried this error
to a monstrous length, and combined with it the grossest immorality of conduct.
Much scandal was occasioned by his publicly maintaining that he had received a
special communication of his everlasting safety while he was smoking a pipe. He
was banished along with his patroness ; and, a few years after, returned to Boston,
where he made a public confession of hypocrisy, adultery, and delusion. Belknap's
Hist, of New Hampshire. Another of Mrs. Hutchinson's followers was a woman
named Mary Dyer, who retired to Rhode Island, where she subsequently became a
Quaker. Winthrop's Journal (Savage's edition).

246 THE HISTORY OJ
B OO K heretical. As this proceeding served only to provoke the pro-
 L_ fessors of these doctrines to assert them with increased warmth
•637. and pertinacity, the leaders of the party were summoned before
the general court. Mrs. Hutchinson rebuked her judges for
their wicked persecution of truth, compared herself to the
prophet Daniel cast into the den of lions, and attempted to
complete the similitude by exercising what she believed to be
the gift of prophecy, and predicting that her exile would be
attended with the ruin of her adversaries and all their posterity.1
To this punishment, nevertheless, she was condemned, together
with her brother Wheelwright, who was a clergyman, and had
been the great pulpit champion of her doctrines: and some of
the inferior members of the faction, partly on account of the
violence with which they still proclaimed their theological
tenets, and partly for the seditious insolence with which they
had treated the new governor, were fined and disfranchised.
In consequence of these proceedings, Vane quitted the colony
and returned to England, " leaving a caveat," says Cotton
Mather, ¦• that all good men are not fit for government."2
From the unpleasing contemplation of these religious dis
sensions, we turn to the more agreeable survey of some ofthe
consequences which attended their issue. A considerable
number of persons, dissatisfied with the proceedings of the
synod and the general court of Massachusetts, voluntarily
forsook the colony : some of these united themselves with
1 Her presumption was signally punished. The ruin she predicted as the conse
quence of ber exile fell on herself and her family. She went to Rhode Island ; but
not liking that situation, removed to one of the Dutch settlements, where she and all
her family were murdered by the Indians. Before she quitted Massachusetts, she
signed a disclamation of some of the erroneous tenets which she had propounded ;
but maintained (in the face of the clearest evidence to the contrary) that she had
never entertained them. This was considered a proof of dissimulation. Perhaps it
might rather have warranted the inference that the visionary and violent spirit which
had laid hold of her had departed or subsided, and that she no longer recognized the
opinions wliich through its medium had formerly presented themselves to her
imagination. 2 Mather. Neal. Hutchinson. Milton differed from Mather in his estimate of
Vane's capacity. His fine sonnet to him begins thus: —
" Vane, young in years, but in sage counsels old,
Than whom a better senator ne'er held
The helm of Rome."
And ends thus: —
" Therefore on thy right hand Religion leans,
And reckons thee in chief her eldest son."

NORTH AMERICA. 247
Roger Williams and his friends at Providence; and, being CHAP.
soon after abandoned by Mrs. Hutchinson, they fell under the n-
guidance of that meliorated spirit which Williams had now 1637.
begun to display. By a transaction with the Indians, these £0°n°Df'za"
associated exiles obtained right to a fertile island in Naraganset Rhode
Bay, which acquired the name of Rhode Island.1 Williams Is,and—
remained among them upwards of forty years, respected as the
father and director of the colony, of which he was several times
elected governor. In the year 1643, he made a journey to
England, and, by the interest of Sir Henry Vane, obtained and
brought back to his fellow colonists a parliamentary charter,
by which Providence and Rhode Island were politically united
till the Restoration. Others of the exiles, under the guidance and of
of Wheelwright, betook themselves to the north-east parts of ^ hire
New England ; and, being joined by associates who were and
allured by the prospects of rich^fisheries and an advantageous aine'
beaver trade, they gradually formed and peopled the provinces
of New Hampshire and Maine. These provinces had been
respectively purchased from the council of Plymouth by Mason
and Gorges, who made many ineffectual attempts to colonise
their acquisitions with advantage to themselves. Mason and
Gorges were actuated by views widely different from those
which prevailed in general among the colonists of New Eng
land : they wished to become the proprietaries or hereditary
chiefs of vast manors and seigniories, and to establish in
America the very institutions which emigrants to America
were generally seeking to escape from. They found it totally
impracticable to obtain a revenue from the settlers in New
Hampshire and Maine, or to establish among them a form of
government suited to their own views. These settlers, com
posed partly of adventurers from England, and partly of exiles
1 The price paid to the Indians was fifty fathoms of white beads, ten coats, ahd
twenty shoes. Chalmers. " When a fourth part of a township of the common size
was sold by one Englishman to another for a wheelbarrow, it will be easily believed
that it was of still less value to the aborigines. To the Indians, without an English
purchaser, the land was often worth nothing ; and to the colonist, its value was
created by his labour." Dwight's Travels. " At Rhode Island, the settlers, in
March, 1638, subscribed the following civil compact : — ' We, whose names are under
written, do hereby solemnly, in the presence of Jehovah, incorporate ourselves into
a body politic ; and, as He shall help, will submit our persons, lives, and estates, to
our Lord Jesus Christ, the King of kings and Lord of lords, and to all the perfect
and absolute laws given in his holy word.' " — Pitkin's Hist, of America.

248 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK and voluntary emigrants from Massachusetts, framed for them-
I' selves separate governments, to which for a few years they
1637. yielded a precarious obedience ; till, wearied with internal dis
putes and divisions, they besought the protection of the general
court of Massachusetts, and obtained leave to be included
within the pale of its jurisdiction.1
A schism, similar to that which Mrs. Hutchinson had
created in Massachusetts, was fomented at Plymouth by one
Samuel Gorton ; but his career in this place was cut short by
a conviction for swindling. He removed from Plymouth to
Rhode Island, where he excited such disturbance, that even
in this community, where unlimited toleration was professed,
he was sentenced to be flogged and banished. Repairing to the
plantation of Providence, he had nearly involved the people of
this settlement in a war with the Indians ; till, at length, in
compliance with the entreaty of RogerWilliams, the government
1638. of Massachusetts sent a party to apprehend him and some of
his adherents, and after subjecting them to a temporary im
prisonment, obliged them to depart the country.2
The population of Massachusetts, impaired by the various
drains from this territory which we have noticed, was re
cruited in the following year by the arrival of a fleet of twenty
ships, with three thousand emigrants from England. The
same year witnessed the foundation of an establishment cal
culated to improve the moral condition of the people. This
was Harvard college, at Cambridge, in Massachusetts, the
first seminary of learning erected in North America. So
highly prized were the advantages of knowledge and the in
fluence of education by these generous parents of American
society, that in the year 1636, while the colony, in addition to
the feebleness and suffering of its infant condition, was
struggling with the calamity of tbe Pequod war, the general
court at Boston had appropriated four hundred pounds to the

1 Neal. Hutchinson. Sullivan's History of Maine. Belknap. The province
of Maine was thus denominated in honour of the Queen, with whom Charles the
First received as a dowry the revenues of a French province of the same name.
Sullivan. Sullivan has been represented to me as an intelligent man ; but he is
certainly not a perspicuous historian.
3 Gorges' America painted to the Life. Neal. Gorton went to England, and,
during the civil wars, occasioned some trouble lo the colony by his complaints of the
treatment which he had undergone.

NORTH AMERICA. 249
erection of a college or academy. The bequest of an emigrant CHAP.
clergyman, who appointed his whole fortune to be applied to  ; 
the same design, enabled them in the present year to enrich 1638.
their country with an establishment whose operation has
proved as beneficial to their posterity, as its institution, at
this early period of their history, is honourable to themselves.'
The national growth of the New England communities was Jealousy,
now to be left to depend on their own resources ; and the au"dti^c"
impulse which had been communicated to it by the stream of conduct of
emigration from the parent state was for a while to cease. the kmg-
For some time past, the policy of the English government
towards these colonies had savoured of fear, aversion, and in
decision : various demonstrations had been made of arbitrary
purpose and tyrannical encroachment ; but, not being steadily
prosecuted, they had served merely to keep the colonists
united by a sense of common danger, and to endear the insti
tutions of liberty by the destruction with which they were
ineffectually menaced. The king, in reviewing his first pro
ceedings towards the emigrants, seems to have doubted
pretty early the soundness of that policy which had prompted
so wide a departure from the general principles of his admi
nistration : the experience of every year had confirmed his
doubts ; and he had wavered in irresolute perplexity between
his original wish to evacuate England of the puritans, and
his apprehensions of the dangerous and increasing influence
which their triumphant establishment in America was visibly
exerting. The success of his politic devices had appeared
for a short time to answer all his expectations ; and he seemed

1 Mather. Neal. Hutchinson. Winthrop's Journal (Savage's edition). For
some time the college possessed but a scanty collection of books. The efforts of the
managers to accumulate a library, were aided by considerable donations of books
made to them by that great and pious ecclesiastic Archbishop Usher ; the celebrated
non-conformist minister Richard Baxter; the great Whig lawyer and partizan
Sergeant Maynard, and that distinguished warrior and philosopher Sir Kenelm
Digby. This last mentioned benefactor to a puritan library was himself a Roman
Catholic. It is an interesting fact, and which serves to dignify and embellish the
relationship between the two countries, that many of the most illustrious men that
England has ever produced, contributed to lay the foundation of civilized society in
America. The enumeration of the patentees in the Virginian charters, includes
almost every distinguished individual in England at the time. The people of New
England have always retained that generous zeal for the cultivation of knowledge
which their fathers thus early displayed. In the year 1780, and in the midst of the
Revolutionary War, an Academy of Arts and Sciences was established at Boston.

250 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK likely to prevail over the puritans by the demonstration of a
' hollow good-will or'lenity, suspended on the condition of their
1638. abandoning the realm. A considerable portion of the embers
of puritan and patriotic feeling had been removed from Eng
land, and cast away in deserts, where as yet no colony had
been able to survive : but they had neither languished nor
perished ; and, on the contrary, had kindled in America a
flame so powerful and diffusive that even distant England
was warmed and enlightened by the blaze. The jealous at
tention of Laud was soon awakened to the disastrous issue of
this experiment ; and while he revolved the means by which
its farther effects might be counteracted, he maintained spies
in New England, whose intelligence increased his misgivings,
and who courted his favour by traducing the objects of his
dislike. The detection of this correspondence served to ani
mate the resentment and promote the caution and the union
of the colonists.
So early as the year 1633, the English government,
yielding to its alarm, made a hasty and ill-considered
attempt to repair its error, by issuing a proclamation re
probating the designs that prompted emigration to New
England, and ordering all ships that were about to proceed
thither with passengers to be detained. It was soon per
ceived that this measure was premature, and that the only
or at least the most probable consequence of it would be to
irritate the patience of the puritans to obtain either at home
or abroad the institutions which they had made preparation
to establish and enjoy. Not only was the proclamation suf
fered to remain unexecuted, but even, at a later period,
Charles reverted so far to his original policy as to promote,
by his own interposition, the expatriation of young Vane, of
whose political and religious sentiments he was perfectly well
informed. After an interval of hesitation, measures more
deliberate were adopted for subverting the provincial liberties.
In the year 1635, a commission was granted to the great
officers of state and some of the nobility, for the regulation
and government of the American plantations. By this com
mission the archbishop of Canterbury (Laud), and a few
other distinguished associates were authorised to make laws
and constitutions for the colonists of New England ; to

NORTH AMERICA. 251
establish an order of clergy, and assign them a maintenance ; chap.
and to punish capitally, or otherwise, all who should violate IL
their ordinances. The same persons, in conjunction with a 1638.
more numerous body of commissioners, were directed to ex
amine all existing colonial patents and charters, and if they
found that any had been unduly obtained, or that the liberties they
conferred were hurtful to the prerogative royal, to cause them
to be revoked and quashed. The English grand council of
New Plymouth were easily persuaded to give the first example
of submission to this arbitrary authority ; and, in the same
year, accordingly, they surrendered their useless patent to the
king, under reservation of their claims as private individuals
to the property of the soil. These reserved claims gave occa
sion at an after period to much dispute, perplexity, and incon
venience. The only proceeding, however, which immediately
ensued against the New England colonists, was the institu
tion of a process of quo warranto against their charter in the
Court of King's Bench, of which no intimation was given to
the parties interested, and which was never prosecuted to a
judicial issue. It is vain to speculate on all the fluctuating
motives and purposes that from time to time guided and varied
the policy of the king. He was formed to hate and dread
alike the growth of religious and political freedom ; but fated
to render the highest service to the objects of his enmity by an
unavailing and ill-directed hostility. In the year 1637, he
granted a commission to Sir Ferdinando Gorges, appointing
him governor-general of New England, and issued a procla
mation prohibiting all persons from transporting themselves,
or others, to that country without a special permission under
the Great Seal, — which, it was added, would be granted to
none who could not produce credible certificates of their
having taken the oaths of supremacy and allegiance, and of
their having fully conformed to the ritual and ordinances of
the church of England. But the critical state of affairs in
Britain prevented the adoption of measures requisite to give
effect to Gorges' commission ; and the irresistible impatience
of the oppressed puritans and friends of liberty to escape
from the increasing heat of persecution or the approach of
civil war, rendered the restrictions imposed on their emigra
tion completely unavailing. We have seen that, in the year

252 THE HISTORY OF
book 1638, a numerous transportation of additional emigrants took
IIj place. But, before the close of that year, the king gave way
1638. to a singleness and obstinate directness of purpose wliich now
alone was wanting to assure and accelerate his ruin ; and,
after this long course of wavering policy, and unsuccessful ex
periment, he adopted a measure which, unfortunately for
himself, was effectual. Learning that another fleet was pre
paring to sail for New England with a body of emigrants,
among whom were some of the most eminent leaders of the
patriots and puritans, he caused an order of council to be
issued for its detention; and, the injunction being promptly
enforced, the voyage was prevented. On board this fleet
there appear to have been, among other distinguished indi
viduals, Hazlerig, Hampden, Pym, and Oliver Cromwell1 —
men to whom, but a few years after, Charles was fain to
tender the highest offices in his realm, and whom his blind
injustice now detained to avenge the tyranny by which so
many of their brethren had been driven away. Various pro
clamations were issued the same year for the prevention of
emigration to New England, which, from this time, accord
ingly, appears to have been discontinued.2 These measures
1 That Hampden and Cromwell were on board this fleet, or that they even intended
to proceed to America, has been doubted, but I think without any reason. Hume
(contrary to his own intention) has rather confirmed than removed the doubt, by the
manner in which he has referred to a passage in Hutchinson, the meaning of which he
has evidently misunderstood. But Dr. Mather, who preceded Hutchinson, expressly
names all the individuals mentioned in the text as having prepared for their voyage,
and been arrested by the order of council. Oldmixon recites the grant of land
in America in favour of Hampden and others, which the emigrants were proceed
ing to occupy. Mather's statement is confirmed by Neal, Clarendon, Bates, and
Dugdale. The strong mind of Cromwell appears long to have retained the bias
it had once received towards emigration, and the favourable opinion of the set
tlers of New England, from which that bias had been partly derived. After the
Remonstrance was voted in the Long Parliament, he told Lord Falkland that if
the debate had been attended with a different result ; he was prepared next day to
have converted his effects into ready money and quitted the kingdom. When he
was invested with the Protectorate he treated Massachusetts with distinguished par
tiality. Hume considered himself as levelling a most sarcastic reflection against
Hampden and Cromwell, when he described them as willing to cross the Atlantic
ocean for the sake of saying their prayers. Other writers who partake the political,
but not the religious, sentiments of these eminent persons, have been very willing to
defend them from this imputation.
Some historians have asserted that Hampden did actually, at one time, visit North
America : and, doubtless, in the year 1623, there was at New Plymouth an English
man named John Hampden, whom Winslow describes as " a gentleman of Lon
don, who then winteied with us, and desired much to see the countiy."  Belknap's
American Biography.
5 Mather. Neal. Hutchinson. Oldmixon. Chalmers. Hazard.

NORTH AMERICA. 253
naturally inflamed the public mind to the highest pitch of CHAP.
discontent. Even the hospitality of rude deserts, it was de- IL
dared, was denied to the oppressed inhabitants of England : 1638.
and men were constrained to inquire if the evils which could
not be evaded might not be repelled ; and since retreat was
impracticable, if resistance might not be availing. By pro
moting emigration at first, the king had Opened a vein which
it was impossible to close without incurring considerable
danger ; and the increased severity of his administration aug
mented the flow of evil humours at the very time when he
thus imprudently deprived them of their accustomed vent.
The previous emigration had already drained the puritan body
of a great number of those of its members whose milder
tempers and meeker strain of piety rendered them more desi
rous than the generality of their brethren to decline a contest
with their sovereign : the present restrictions forcibly retained
in the realm men of more daring spirit and trained in long
habits of enmity to his person and opposition to his measures.1
He had now at last succeeded in stripping his subjects of
every protection that the law could extend to their rights;
and was destined soon to experience how completely he had
divested them of every restraint that the law could impose on
the vindictive retribution of their wrongs. From this period
till the assembling ofthe long parliament, he pursued a short
and headlong career of disgrace and disaster ; while a gross
infatuation veiled from his eyes the gulf of destruction to
which his steps were tending.
In pursuance of the policy which the king at length deter- Measures
mined openly and vigorously to pursue, a requisition was against the
transmitted by the privy council to the governor and general liberties of IVTllSSA"
court of Massachusetts, commanding them to deliver up their chusetts—
patent, to be conveyed by the first ship that should sail for
England, in order that it might abide the issue of the process
of quo warranto that was depending against the colony. To September.
1 The commencement of resistance in Scotland originated with some individuals
of that country who had purchased a tract of territory in New England, and
made preparation to transport themselves thither, but were prevented (it does not
appear how) from carrying their design into execution. They had obtained from the
assembly of Massachusetts, an assurance of the free exercise of their presbyterian
form of church government. — Mather.

254 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK this requisition the general court returned for answer, a humble
_____ and earnest petition that the colonists might be heard before
1638. they were condemned. They declared that they had trans
ported their families to America, and embarked their fortunes
in the colony, in reliance on his majesty's licence and en
couragement; that they had never willingly or knowingly
offended him, and now humbly deprecated his wrath, and soli
cited to be heard with their patent in their hands. If it were
forcibly withdrawn from them, they protested that they must
either return to England or seek the hospitality of more
distant regions. But they prayed that they might " be suf
fered to live in the wilderness," where they had till now found
a resting place; and might experience in their exile some of
that favour from the ruler of their native land which they had
largely experienced from the Lord and Judge of all the earth.
They retained possession of their patent while they waited an
answer to this petition, which, happily for their liberties, they
Interrupt- were destined never to receive. The insurrections which soon
edbythe after Dro_e out in Scotland, directed the entire attention of
civil wars. the king to matters which more nearly concerned him ; and
tbe long gathering storm which was now visibly preparing to
burst upon him from every corner of his dominions, engaged
him to contract as far as possible the sphere of hostility in
which he found himself involved.1 The benefit of his altered
views was experienced by the Virginians, in the abolition of
the despotism to which he had previously subjected them;
and by the inhabitants of New England, in the cessation of
his attempts to supersede by a similar despotism the liberal
institutions which they had hitherto enjoyed. He would
doubtless now have readily consented to disencumber himself
of some of his domestic adversaries by promoting the emigra
tion which of late he had so imprudently obstructed : but
such a revolution of sentiment had taken place in Eng
land, and such interesting prospects began to open to the
patriots and puritans at home, that the motives which had for-
1 Hutchinson. Chalmers. This year (1638) was distinguished by an earth
quake in New England, which extended through all the settlements, and shook the
ships in Boston harbour and the neighbouring islands. The sound of it reminded
some ofthe colonists ofthe rattling of coaches in the streets of London. — Winthrop's
Journal. Tiumbull.

NORTH AMERICA. 255
merly induced them to migrate to the new world ceased any chap.
longer to prevail. 1L
When the intercourse which for twenty years had subsisted 1640.
between New England and the parent state was thus inter- ^tate °fn
rupted, the number of the colonists appears to have amounted land— po-
to about twenty thousand persons,1 or four thousand families, fauWg__n~
including about a hundred ministers. The expenditure that manners.
had already been incurred in equipping vessels and transporting
emigrants, amounted to nearly two hundred thousand pounds
— a prodigious sum in that age, and which nothing but the
grand and unconquerable principle which animated the
puritans could have persuaded men to expend on the prospect
of forming an establishment in a remote uncultivated desert,
offering to its inhabitants merely a plain unadorned freedom
and difficult subsistence. When the civil war broke forth in
the parent state, the colonists had already founded fifty towns
and villages; they had erected upwards of thirty churches
and ministers' houses; and combining with their preponderating
regard to the concerns of religion, a diligent and judicious
conduct of their temporal affairs, they had improved their
estates to a high degree of cultivation. During the first
seven years of the infancy of the settlement that was founded
in 1630, even subsistence was procured with difficulty, and
trade was not generally attempted:2 but soon after that
period, the people began to extend their fishery and to open
a trade in lumber, which subsequently proved the staple article
of New England commerce. In the year 1637, there were but
thirty ploughs in the whole province of Massachusetts, and
less than the third of that number in Connecticut. The cul
ture ofthe earth was generally performed with hoes, and was
consequently slow and laborious. Every commodity bore a
high price. Though money was extremely scarce, the price
of a good cow was thirty pounds ; Indian corn cost five shil
lings a bushel; labour and every other article of use was
1 Josselyn's Voyage to New England. Hutchinson. Josselyn, who visited
New England more than once, was intrusted by Quarles, the poet, with some of his
metrical versions of Scripture to be submitted to the perusal and consideration of John
Cotton. 3 Yet in theyear 1636, a ship of 120 tons was built at Marblehead by the people
of Salem. — Collections of the Massachusetts' Hist. Soc.

25G THE HISTORY OF
book proportionably dear. Necessity at first introduced what the
1]t- jurisprudence of the colonists afterwards confirmed: and, de-
1640. siring to perpetuate the habits that had proved so conducive
to piety and virtue, they endeavoured by legislative enact
ments to exclude luxury and promote industry. When the
assembling of the long parliament opened a prospect of safety,
and even of triumph and supremacy to the puritans in
England, many persons who had taken refuge in America
returned to their native country: but a great majority of the
emigrants had experienced so much of the substance and
happiness of religious life in the societies which had been
formed within the colony, that they felt themselves united to
New England by stronger and nobler ties than any that
patriotic recollections could supply; and resolved to abide in
the region which their virtue had converted from a wilderness
into a garden. In these infant communities of men, devoted
to godliness and liberty, all hearts were strongly united by
community of feeling on subjects the most interesting and
important; the inhabitants were in general very nearly on a
level in point of temporal condition ; the connexions of neigh
bourhood operated as extended family ties; and the minds of
all were warmed and invigorated by a primitive friendliness,
freedom, and simplicity of mutual communication.1 And yet
some indications of an aristocratical disposition, arising, not
unnaturally, from peculiar circumstances that had occurred in
the formation of the colonial settlements, did occasionally
manifest themselves. Several of the first planters, particu
larly Dudley,Winthrop, Bradford, Bellingham, and Bradstreet,
were persons of ample fortune; and besides the transportation
of their own families, they had borne the charge of transporting
many poor families who must otherwise have remained in
England. Others were members of the original body of
patentees, and had incurred expenses in the procurement of
1 The following passage in a sermon of Robert Cushman, one of the earliest mi-
nisteis of New Plymouth, is characteristic of this state of society : — " Remember
brethren that ye have given your names and promises to one another, here to cleave
together. You must then seek the wealth of one another, and inquire, as David,
How liveth such a man 1 how is he clad 1 how is he fed 1 He is my brother, my
associate, and we ventured our lives together. Is his labour harder than mine t
surely I will ease him. Hath he no bed to lie on 1 I have two ; I'll lend him one.
He is as good a man as I, and we are bound each to other ; so that his wants must
be my wants, and his welfare my welfare." — Belknap's American Biography.

NORTH AMERICA.

257

the charter, the formation of the company, the equipment of c H A P.
the first body of adventurers, and the purchase of the soil IL
from the natives, of which they had now no prospect of ob- 1640.
taining reimbursement. On this class of planters the chief
offices of government naturally devolved during the infancy
of the settlements, and long continued to be discharged by
them with no other pecuniary recompense than presents,
which were occasionally voted to them by the gratitude of
their fellow citizens. It was probably owing to the prevalence
of the peculiar sentiments inspired by the services of these
persons, that in the first general court which was assembled in
Massachusetts, the election of the governor, the appointment
of all the other officers, and even the power of legislation, were
withdrawn from the freemen, and vested in the council of
assistants; and although the freemen reclaimed and resumed
their rights in the following year, yet the exercise of legislation
was confined almost entirely to the council of assistants, till
the introduction of the representative system in the year 1634.
From this time the council and the freemen, assembled to
gether, formed the general court, — till the year 1644, — when it
was arranged that the governor and assistants should sit
apart: and thence commenced the separate existence of the
democratic branch of the legislature, or house of representa
tives. Elections were conducted by ballot, in which the balls
or tickets tendered by the electors consisted of Indian beans.1
Some notice of the peculiarities of jurisprudence that already
prevailed in the various communities of New England, will
serve to illustrate the state of society and manners that sprung
up at first among this singular people. By a fundamental
law of Massachusetts it was enacted, " that all strangers
professing the christian religion, who shall flee to this country
from the tyranny of their persecutors, shall be succoured at
the public charge till some provision can be made for them."
Jesuits and other Romish priests, however, were subjected to
banishment, and in case of their return, to death. This cruel
ordinance was afterwards extended to the quakers ; and all
persons were forbidden, under the severest penalties, to import
1 Winthrop's Journal. Neal. Hutchinson. Chalmers. Trumbull. Holmes's
American Annals. (This is, perhaps, the most excellent chronological digest of its
history that any nation has ever possessed.) Belknap's American Biography,
VOL. J. S

258 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK any of " that cursed sect," or of their writings, into the co

il

lony. By what proceedings the quakers of that age provoked
.1640. so much aversion, and such rigorous treatment, we shall have
an opportunity of considering hereafter. These persecuting
edicts had no place in Rhode Island, where nobody was ex
posed to active molestation for religious opinions, and all pro
fessors of Christianity, except Roman catholics, were admitted
to the full rights of citizenship. All persons were forbidden
to run, or even walk, *' except reverently to and from
church" on Sunday, or to profane the day by sweeping their
houses, cooking their victuals, or shaving their beards.
Mothers were even commanded not to kiss their children on
that sacred day. The usual punishments of great crimes were
disfranchisement, banishment, and temporary servitude : but
perpetual slavery was not permitted to be inflicted upon anyper-
sons except captives lawfully taken in the wars: and these were to
be treated with the gentleness of christian manners, and to be
entitled to all the mitigations of their lot enjoined by the law
of Moses. Disclaiming all but defensive war, the colonists
considered themselves entitled and constrained in self-defence
to deprive their assailants of a liberty which they had abused
and rendered inconsistent with the safety of their neighbours.
The practice, notwithstanding, was impolitic, — to say no
worse, — and served to pave the way, at a later period, for the
introduction of negro slavery into New England.
Adultery was punished by death ; and fornication by com
pelling the offending parties to marry (an absurd device, which
degrades the institution of marriage), or by fiue and imprison
ment. Burglary and robbery were punished, for the first of
fence, by branding, for the second by branding and flogging ; for
the third by death : but if either of these crimes, while yet not
inferring a capital punishment, were committed on Sunday, an
ear was to be cut off in addition to the other inflictions. We
must beware of supposing that these penal enactments indi
cate the frequency or even the actual occurrence of the crimes
to which they refer. In those communities where civilization
has been a gradual attainment, penal laws denote the preva
lence of the actions they condemn. But in communities at
once infant and civilized, many of the laws must be regarded
merely as the expression of the opinion of the legislators, and

NORTH AMERICA. 259
by no means as indicating the actual condition of society. CHAP
Blasphemy and idolatry were punishable with death ; and '
though it was acknowledged in the preamble to one of the 1640.
laws, " that no human power is lord over the faith and con
sciences of men," yet heresy, by this very law, was punished
with banishment from the province. Pecuniary mulcts were im
posed on every person " observing any such day as Christmas."
Witchcraft and perjury directed against human life, were
capitally punished. No capital charge was deemed capable
of being proved by evidence less weighty than the oaths of two
witnesses — a principle that deserves to be universally esta
blished, as well on account of its own intrinsic rectitude, as of
the sanction it received from divine legislation. By a singular
law, which, both from its peculiar terms, and from its never
having been carried into effect, is more discreditable to the
wisdom of its framers than to the humanity of the people at
large, it was enacted, that although torture should not be or
dinarily inflicted, yet a convicted criminal, known to have had
accomplices, and refusing to disclose them, might be subjected
to torture, — '* yet not to such tortures as are barbarous and
inhuman." All gaming was prohibited ; cards and dice were forbidden
to be imported ; and assemblies for dancing were proscribed.
By a law enacted in 1646, kissing a woman in the street, even
in the way of honest salute, was punished by flogging. This
was not considered an infamous punishment by the people of
Massachusetts ; and even so late as the middle of the eigh
teenth century, there were instances of persons who after under
going its severity, have associated with the most respectable
circles of society in Boston. This doubtless arose from the
peculiar character ofthe government, which, seeming to hold
a patriarchal relation to the people, could never be supposed
in correcting an offender, to divest itself entirely of hope and
good will towards him. The economy of inns was regulated
with a strictness which deserves to be noted as explanatory of
a circumstance that has frequently excited the surprise of
European travellers in America. The intemperance and im
morality to which these places are so often made subservient,
was punished with the utmost rigour ; and all innkeepers were
required, under the severest penalties, to restrain the excesses
s2

2g() THE HISTORY OF
BOOK of their guests, or to acquaint the magistrate with their per-
IL petration. To secure a stricter execution of this law, it was
1640. judged expedient that innkeepers should be divested of the
temptation that poverty presents to its infraction, and enjoy
such personal consideration as would facilitate the exercise of
their difficult duty ; and, accordingly, none were permitted to
follow this calling but persons of approved character and com
petent estate. One of the consequences of this policy has
been, than an employment very little respected in other coun
tries, has ever been creditable in the highest degree in New
England, and not unfrequently embraced by men who have
retired from the most honourable stations in the civil or mili
tary service of the state.
Persons wearing apparel which the grand jury should
account unsuitable to their estate, were to be admonished in
the first instance, and if contumacious, fined. A fine was im
posed on every woman cutting her hair like a man's, or suffer
ing it to hang loosely upon ber face. Idleness, lying, swear
ing, and drunkenness, were subjected to various penalties and
marks of disgrace.1 The select men assessed in every family,
the quantity of spinning which the young women were es
teemed capable of producing, and enforced by fines the pro-

1 That these laws were not permitted to be a dead letter, appears from the follow
ing extracts from the earliest records of the court of Massachusetts. " John Wedge-
wood, for being in the company of drunkards, to be set in the stocks. Catharine, the
wife of Richard Cornish, was found suspicions of incontinence, and seriously admo
nished to take heed. Thomas Petit, for suspic'wn of slander, idleness, and stubborn
ness, is censured to be severely whipped. Captain Lovel admonished to take heed
of light carriage. Josias Plaistowe, for stealing four baskets of corn from the
Indians, is ordered to return them eight baskets, to be fined five pounds, and here
after to be called by the name of Josias, and not Mr., as formerly he used to be."
Hutchinson. Few obtained the title of Bir. in the colony : still fewer that of
Esquire. Goodman and goodwife were the common appellations. It was by merit
and services, rather than wealth, that the distinctive appellations were gained. Ibid.
The strictness and scrupulosity of manners affected by many of the inhabitants
exceeded the standard of the laws : and associations appear to have been formed for
suppressing the drinking of healths, and the wearing of long hair and of periwigs.
Ibid. In some instances, the purposes of these associations were afterwards sanc
tioned and enforced by the laws. " They thought the magistrates, being God's
ministers, were bound to punish all offences in their courls in the same proportion
as the supreme Judge would punish them in the court of heaven." Ibid. This no
tion frequently involved the magistrates in most absurd and indecent inquisitions ;
some of which, to the disgrace of puritan jurisprudence, have been preserved in Win
throp's Journal. It is related of some of the earlier settlers, that with an outrageous
exaggeration of rigidity, they refrained from brewing on Saturday, because the beer
would work upon Sunday. — Douglas, Summary of the British Settlements in
America.

NORTH AMERICA. 261
duction ofthe requisite quantities. Usury was forbidden; CHAP.
and the prohibition was not confined to the interest of money, n-
but extended to the hire of labouring cattle and implements 1640.
of husbandry. Persons deserting the English settlements,
and living in heathen licence and profanity, were punished by
fine and imprisonment. A male child above sixteen years of
age, accused by his parents of rebellion against them and
general misconduct, incurred (conformably with the Mosaic
code) the doom of capital punishment ; and any person court
ing a maid without the sanction of her parents, was fined and
imprisoned. Yet the parental authority was not left unre
gulated. All parents were commanded to instruct and cate
chise their children and servants, whom the select men or
overseers were directed to remove from their authority and
commit to fitter hands, if they were found deficient in this
duty ; and children were allowed to seek redress from the
magistrate if they were arbitrarily restrained from marriage.
The celebration of the nuptial ceremony was confined to the
magistrate or such other persons as the general court might
authorize. The provincial law of tenures was exceedingly
simple and concise. The charter had conveyed tbe territory
to the company and its assigns : and by an early law of the
province, it was provided, " that five years' quiet possession
shall be deemed a sufficient title." Instead of enacting or
intending that the deficiencies of the provincial code should be
supplied by the common or statute law of England, it was de
clared, that in cases where redress of wrongs or remedy of
inconvenience was not ascertained by the ordinances or cus
toms of the province, recourse should be had to the word of
God.1 Like the tribes of Israel, the colonists of New England had
1 Abridgment of the Ordinances of New England, apud Neal. Trumbull. Josse-
lyn. Burnaby's Travels in America. Chalmers. Winthrop's Journal. Account
of the Blue Laws of Connecticut, in the Rhode Island Farmers' and Manufacturers'
Journal. The primitive rigidity discernible in some of these laws was tempered by
a patriarchal mildness of administration. Many instances of this occur in Mather's
Lives of the Governors of New England. One I may be permitted to notice as a
specimen. Governor Winthrop being urged to prosecute and punish a man who
pillaged his magazine of firewood in winter, declared he would soon cure him of that
malpractice : and, accordingly, sending for the delinquent, he told him, " You
have a large family, and I have a large magazine of wood ; come as often to it as
you please, and take as much of it as you need to make your dwelling comfortable." —
" And now," he added, turning to his friends, " I defy him to steal my firewood again."

262 THE HISTORY OF
book forsaken their native land after a long and severe persecution,
' and journeyed into a wilderness for the sake of religion. They
1640. endeavoured to cherish a resemblance of condition, so honour
able and so fraught with incitements to piety, by cultivating
a conformity between their laws and customs and those which
had distinguished the ancient people of God. Hence arose
some of the peculiarities which we have observed in their le
gislative code ; and hence arose also the practice of com
mencing their sabbatical observances on Saturday eveningj
and of accounting every evening the commencement of the
ensuing day. The same predilection for Jewish customs be
got, or at least promoted, among them the habit of bestowing
significant names on children, of whom the first three that
were baptised in Boston church received the names of Joy,
Recompense, and Pity. This custom seems to have prevailed
with the greatest force in the town of Dorchester, which long
continued to be remarkable for such names as Faith, Hope,
Charity, Deliverance, Dependence, Preserved, Content, Pru
dent, Patience, Thankful, Hate-evil, Holdfast, and others of a
similar character.1 1 History of the British Dominions in America.

NORTH AMERICA. 263.

CHAPTER III.
New England embraces the Cause of the Parliament. — Federal Union between the
New England States. — Provincial Coinage of Money. — Disputes occasioned by
the Disfranchisement of Dissenters in Massachusetts. — Impeachment and Trial of
Governor Winthrop. — Arbitrary Proceedings against the Dissenters. — Attempts
to convert and civilize the Indians. — Character and Labours of Elliot and Mayhew.
— Indian Bible printed in Massachusetts. — Effects of the Missionary Labour. — ¦
A Synod of the New England Churches. — Dispute between Massachusetts and
the Long Parliament. — The Colony foils the Parliament — and is favoured by
Cromwell. — The Protector's Administration beneficial to New England. — He
conquers Acadie. — His Propositions to the Inhabitants of Massachusetts — declined
by them. — Persecution of the Anabaptists in Massachusetts. — Conduct and Suffer
ings of the Quakers. — The Restoration. — Address of Massachusetts to Charles the
Second. — Alarm of the Colonists — their Declaration of Rights. — The King's
Message to Massachusetts — how far complied with. — Royal Charter of Incorpora
tion to Rhode Island and Providence — and to Connecticut and Newhaven.
The coincidence between the principles of the New England ch AP.
colonists, and those of the prevailing party in the Long Par- HI.
liament, was cemented by the consciousness, that with the 1641.
success of this party was identified the security of the Ne^ EnS"
provincial institutions from the dangers that had so re- braces the
cently menaced them. As soon as the colonists were in- caus.eofthe
formed of the convocation of that famous assembly, they de- ment.
spatched Hugh Peters and two other persons to promote their
interests in the parent state. The mission proved more fortu
nate for New England than for her ambassadors. By a vote
ofthe House of Commons1 in the following year, the inhabi
tants of all the various plantations of New England were ex
empted from payment of any duties, either upon goods ex
ported thither, or upon those which they imported into the
mother country, " until the House shall make further order
1 The reasons assigned by the House for this resolution are, that the plantations
of New England are likely to conduce to the propagation of the gospel, and already
" have, by the blessing of the Almighty, had good and prosperous success without
any public charge to the state."

264 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK therein to the contrary." The colonists, in return, cordially
n' embraced the cause of their benefactors ; and when the civil
1642. wars broke out in England, they passed an ordinance expres
sive of their approbation of the measures of parliament, and
denouncing capital punishment against any who should dis
turb the peace of the commonwealth by endeavouring to raise
a party for the king of England, or by discriminating between
the king and the parliament, who maintained (it was declared)
the true interests of the king as well as their own. Happily
for themselves, the colonists were unable to signalize their
predilection by more active interference in the contest: and,
with a prudent regard to their commercial interests, they gave
free ingress into their harbours to trading vessels from the
ports in possession of the royalists. They had likewise the good
sense to decline an invitation they received, to depute John
Cotton, and others of their ministers, to attend, on their be
half, the celebrated Assembly of Divines that was convoked
at Westminster. Encouraged by the privileges that had been
conferred on them, they pursued the cultivation of their soil with
unremitting ardour ; and their wealth and population rapidly
increased. From the continent, they began to extend their
occupation to the adjacent islands; and one planter, in parti
cular, having obtained a grant of Martha's Vineyard, Nan
tucket, and Elizabeth Isles, laid the foundation there of set
tlements that afterwards proved highly serviceable to the con
version and civilization of the Indians. But an attempt which
they made at the same time to extend, if not their settlements,
at least their principles, in another quarter of the continent,
proved quite unsuccessful. The colonists of Virginia were in
general staunch royalists ; and, with little concern for the
substance of religion, professed a strong attachment to the
forms and institutions of the church of England. Yet, as we
have seen, they had received, even as early as the reign of
James, an accession to their numbers, composed of persons
who had imbibed puritan sentiments, and were fugitives from
ecclesiastical persecution in Britain. A deputation from this
class of the Virginian planters had been lately sent to Boston
to represent their destitution of proper ministers, and solicit a
supply of pastors from the New England churches. In com
pliance with this request, three clergymen were selected to

NORTH AMERICA. 265
proceed to Virginia, and furnished with recommendatory c H A P.
letters from the governor of Massachusetts to Sir William '
Berkeley. On their arrival in Virginia, they began to preach 1642.
in various parts of the country, and the people flocked to hear
them with an eagerness that might have been productive of
important consequences. But the puritan principles, as well
as the political sentiments of the colonists of New England,
were too much the objects of aversion to Sir William Berkeley,
to admit of his encouragement being afforded to proceedings
intended and adapted to propagate their influence among his
own people. So far from complying with the desire of his
brother governor, he issued a proclamation, by which all per
sons who would not conform to the ceremonial of the church
of England were commanded forthwith to depart from Vir
ginia. The preachers, accordingly, returned to New Eng
land ; and thus was laid the foundation of a jealousy which
long subsisted between the two oldest provinces of North
America.1 1643<
The disappointment occasioned by this fruitless attempt to
establish a friendly connexion with the sister colony of Vir
ginia, was counterbalanced in the following year by an im
portant event in the history of the New England settlements ;
— the formation of a league by which they were knit together
in a federal union that greatly augmented their security and
power. The Naraganset Indians had by this time reflected at
leisure on the policy of their conduct towards the Pequods;
and the hatred which they had formerly cherished against *
this tribe being extinguished in the destruction of its objects,
was succeeded by an angry jealousy of those strangers who
had obviously derived the chief and only lasting advantage
which the conflict had yielded. They saw the territories of
their ancient rivals occupied by a much more formidable
neighbour ; and, mistaking their own inability to improve
their advantages, for the effect of fraud and injustice on the
part of the colonists, who were so rapidly surpassing them in
number, wealth, and power, they began to complain that the
plunder of the Pequods had not been fairly divided, and pro
ceeded to concert measures with the neighbouring tribes for an
1 Hutchinson. Neal. Hazard.

266 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK universal insurrection of the Indians against the English.
1 '' Their designs had advanced but a little way towards maturity,

1643. when they were detected in consequence of an emergent quar
rel with another tribe, which they pursued with an imprudent
indulgence of that inordinate appetite for immediate revenge
which seemed fated to disconcert and defeat their political
views. The colonists, from the groundless murmurs they
found themselves exposed to, and which proved only the
rooted dislike of the savages, were sensible of their own
danger without yet being aware of its extent, or feeling them
selves entitled to anticipate by defensive hostility some more
certain indication of it ; when, fortunately, they were invited
to act as mediators between two contending tribes. The
Naragansets having conceived some disgust against a neigh
bouring chief, employed an assassin to kill him ; and failing
in this attempt, plunged into a war, with the declared inten
tion of exterminating the whole of his tribe. This tribe, who
were at peace with the English, implored the protec
tion of the Massachusetts government, which agreed to
interpose in their behalf. The Naragansets, apprised of this
transaction, recollecting the terrible punishment inflicted on
the Pequods, and conscious that they themselves had justly
merited a similar visitation, were struck with dismay, and,
throwing down their arms, concluded a peace dictated to them
by the English. When their immediate apprehensions sub
sided, they paid so little attention to the performance of their
paction, that it was not till the colonists had made a demon
stration of readiness to employ force that they sullenly ful
filled it. Alarmed by such indications of fickleness, dislike,
and furious passion, and ascertaining by dint of inquiry the
design that had been recently proposed and entertained of a
general conspiracy of the Indians, — the authorities of Massa
chusetts conceived the defensive project of providing, by
a mutual concert of the colonies, for the common danger
which they might expect to encounter at no distant day,
when the savages, instructed by experience, would sacrifice
their private feuds to combined hostility against a race of
strangers whose progressive advancement seemed to minister
occasion of increasing and incurable jealousy to the whole In
dian race. Having composed, for this purpose, a plan which

NORTH AMERICA. 267
was framed in imitation of the bond of union between the CHAP.
Dutch provinces, and which readily suggested itself to some

leading personages among the colonists who had resided with 1643.
the Brownist congregation in Holland, they communicated it^6™^
to the neighbouring settlements of New Plymouth, Connect^ tween the
cut, and Newhaven, by which it was cordially embraced. lamY ng"
These four colonies, accordingly, entered into a league of per- States.
petual confederacy, offensive and defensive. The instrument ay
of confederation between them declared that their respective
inhabitants had all come into these parts of America with the
same errand and aim, to advance the christian religion, and enjoy
the liberty of their consciences with purity and peace. It was
stipulated that the confederates should thenceforth be distin
guished by the title of the United Colonies of New England ;
that each colony should remain a separate and distinct muni
cipal association, and retain exclusive jurisdiction within its
own territory ; that in every war, offensive or defensive, each
of the confederates should furnish its quota of men, money,
and provisions, at a rate to be fixed from time to time in pro
portion to the population of the respective communities ; that
a council, composed of two commissioners from each colony,
should be annually convoked and empowered to deliberate and
decide on all points of common concern to the confederacy ; and
that every determination sanctioned by the concurrence of six
of their number, should be binding on the whole. Every state
renounced the right of protecting fugitive debtors or criminals
from the legal process of the particular community which they
had wronged and deserted. The state of Rhode Island, which
was not included in this confederacy, petitioned a few years
after to be admitted into it ; but her request was refused, ex
cept on the condition, which she declined, of merging her
separate existence in an incorporation with the colony of New
Plymouth. Thus excluded from the benefit of the federal
union, the inhabitants of Rhode Island and Providence endea
voured to provide for their separate security by conciliating
the friendship of the Indians ; and the humane and courteous
policy which they pursued, proved remarkably successful.1

1 Increase Mather's New England Troubles. Neal. Hutchinson. Pitkin's Hist.

268 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK The colonists have been reproached with arrogating the
 ^  rights of sovereignty in this transaction, — which, doubtless,
1643. bears all the features of a direct advance to independence.
Yet it was a measure that could hardly be avoided by a people
surrounded with enemies, and abandoned to their own
guidance and resources, in a territory many thousand miles
removed from the seat of the government that claimed sove
reign dominion over them. Of a people so situated, every
progressive step in social advancement, whether it consisted
in the enlargement of their numbers or the concentration of
their resources, or otherwise tended to increase their power
or promote their security, was a step towards national inde
pendence. Nothing but some politic system, or a series of
events that might have kept the various settlements conti
nually disunited in mutual jealousy and weakness, could have
secured their perpetual existence as a dependent progeny of
England. But whatever effects the transaction which we
have considered may have secretly produced on the course of
American sentiment and opinion, and however likely it may
now appear to have planted the seminal idea of independence
in the minds of the colonists, it was regarded neither by
themselves nor by their English rulers as indicating pretensions
unsuitable to their condition. Even after the Restoration,
the commissioners of the federal union were repeatedly noticed
and recognised in the letters and official instruments of Charles
the Second ; and the league itself, with some alterations, sub
sisted till very near the sera of the British Revolution. A
few years after its establishment, the principal object to which
its deliberations and exertions were devoted, was the religious
instruction of the Indians, — an object which was pursued in
co-operation with the society instituted by parliament in Bri
tain for propagating the gospel in New England.1
While the colonists were thus employed in measures calcu
lated to protect and confirm their institutions, the parliament
passed an ordinance of which the principle menaced those in
stitutions with an entire overthrow. It appointed tbe Earl of
Warwick governor-in-chief, and lord high admiral of all the
British colonies, with a council of five peers and twelve com-
1 Hutchinson.

NORTH AMERICA. 269
moners to assist him : it empowered him, in conjunction with CHAP.
his associates, to investigate the actual condition of the co- TIL
lonies ; to require the production of their patents and records, 1643.
and the personal attendance and testimony of any of their in
habitants ; to remove governors and other provincial magis
trates ; to replace them by proper successors ; and to delegate
to these new functionaries as much of the power granted to
himself by the ordinance as he should think proper. This
appointment, which created an authority that might have
new-modelled all the provincial governments, and abrogated
all their charters, was not suffered to remain wholly inopera
tive. To some of the settlements the parliamentary council
extended protection, and even granted new patents.1 Hap
pily for Massachusetts, either the peculiar favour and indulgence
which she was thought to deserve, or the absorbing interest
of the great struggle with which England was shaken, pre
vented any interference with her institutions until a period
when her provincial assembly was able, as we shall see, to
employ defensive measures that eluded the undesirable inter
position without disputing the formidable authority of the
parliamentary council.
Various disputes had arisen of late years between the in
habitants of New England and the French settlers in Acadie
or Nova Scotia. These differences were now adjusted by a 1644.
treaty between a commissioner for the king of France on the
one part, and John Endicot, governor of New England, and
the rest of the magistrates there, on the other.2 The colonists
had already debarred themselves from recognising the king
as a distinct authority from the parliament ; and they pro
bably found it difficult to explain to the other contracting
parties to what denomination of sovereign power they pro
fessed to yield allegiance. This state of things, as it led to
practices, so it may have secretly fostered sentiments, that
savoured of independence. A practice strongly fraught with Provincial
the character of sovereign authority was adopted a few years coinage of
after,3 when the increasing trade of the colonists with the

1 Journals of the House of Lords. Chalmers. The people of Maine appear to
have solicited the protection of the council in 1651. Hazard.
2 Hutchinson. * In 1652.

270 THE HISTORY OF
book West Indies, and the quantity of Spanish bullion that was
" brought through this channel into New England, induced

1644. the provincial authorities to erect a mint for the coinage of
silver money at Boston. The coin was stamped with the
name of New England on the one side ; of Massachusetts, as
the principal settlement, on the other ; and with a tree as the
symbol of national vigour and increase. Maryland was the
only other colony that ever presumed to coin money : and
indeed this prerogative has been always regarded as the pe
culiar attribute of sovereignty. " But it must be considered,"
says one of the New England historians, " that at this time
there was no king in Israel." In the distracted state of Eng
land it might well be judged unsafe to send bullion there to
be coined ; and from the uncertainty respecting the form of
government which would finally arise out of the civil wars, it
might reasonably be apprehended that an impress received
during their continuance would not long retain its currency.
The practice gave no umbrage whatever to the English go
vernment. It received the tacit allowance of the parliament,
of Cromwell, and even of Charles the Second during twenty
years of his reign.1
The separation of the two branches of the legislature of
Massachusetts naturally gave rise to some disputes respecting
the boundaries of jurisdiction in a constitution not yet matured
by practice. But what precedent could not supply, the in-
1645. fluence of the provincial clergy was able to accomplish. By
common consent, all the ministers were summoned to attend
the session of the assembly, and the points at issue being
submitted to them, their judgment was honoured with im
mediate and universal acquiescence.2 But in the following
1646. year, a dissension much more violent in its nature, and
much less creditable and satisfactory in its issue, was occa
sioned in this commonwealth by the intolerance which we
have already noted in its original institutions. With the
growing prosperity and importance of the settlements, the
value of its political franchises was felt to be proportionably
augmented ; and the increasing opulence and respectability
of the dissenters seemed to aggravate the hardship of the dis-
1 Hutchinson. 2 Ibid.

NORTH AMERICA. 271
franchisement to which they were subjected. Some of these CHAP.
persons having proceeded with violence to assume the pri- ¦
vileges from which they were excluded by law, and disturbed 1646,
an election by their interference, were punished by Winthrop, Disputes
the deputy governor, who vigorously resisted and defeated tyThe°dis-
their pretensions. They complained of this treatment to the franchise-
general court by a petition couched in very strong language, disinters
demanding leave to impeach the deputy governor before the in Massa-
whole body of his fellow-citizens, and to submit to the same c use s*
tribunal the consideration of their general sufferings, as well
as of the particular severities they had experienced from
Winthrop. The grievances under which they laboured were
enumerated in the petition, which contained a forcible re
monstrance against the injustice of depriving them of the
rights of freemen, because they could not unite with the con
gregational churches, or when they solicited admission into
them were arbitrarily rejected by the ministers. They con
tended that, either the full rights of citizenship should be
communicated to them, or that they should no longer be re
quired to obey laws to which they had not given assent, — to
contribute to the maintenance of ministers from whose labours
they derived no advantage, or to pay taxes imposed by an
assembly in which they were not represented. The court was
so far moved by the petition, or by the respectability of its
promoters, that Winthrop was commanded to defend himself
publicly from the charges which it advanced against him.
On the day appointed for his trial he descended from his Impeach-
official seat on the bench of the general court, and placing m.ent and
himself at the bar in presence of a numerous assemblage of Governor
the inhabitants, he addressed himself to explain and vindicate Wintl)roP-
his conduct. Having clearly proved that the proceedings for
which he was impeached had been warranted by law, and
that the sole object of them had been to maintain the ex
isting institutions, by the exercise of the authority confided to
him for this purpose, he concluded an excellent harangue1 in
1 Equal in dignity to Winthrop's vindication, and superior to it in elegance, is the
protest by which that illustrious American President, Jackson, in April, 1834, de
fended himself against the charges wherewith he was arraigned by the Senate of the
United States. But this admirable composition must adorn the pages of some later
historian of America.

272 THE HISTORY OF
B 0 o K the following manner: — "Though I be justified before men,
yet it may be, the Lord hath seen so much amiss in my ad-
1646. ministration as calls me to be humbled: and indeed for me to
have been thus charged by men is a matter of humiliation,
whereof I desire to make a right use before the Lord. If
Miriam's father spit in her face, she is to be ashamed." Then
desiring leave to propose some considerations by which he
hoped to rectify the opinions of the people on the nature of
government: "The questions," he observed, "that have
troubled the country have been about the authority of the
magistracy and the liberty of the people. It is you who have
called us unto this oflice ; but being thus called we have our
authority from God. Magistracy is the ordinance of God,
and it hath the image of God stamped upon it; and the con
tempt of it has been vindicated by God with terrible examples
of his vengeance. I entreat you to consider that when you
choose magistrates, you take them from among yourselves,
men subject unto like passions with yourselves. If you see our
infirmities, reflect on your own, and you will not be so severe
censurers of ours. The covenant between us and you is the
oath you have exacted of us, which is to this purpose, ' That
we shall govern you and judge your causes according to God's
laws and the particular statutes of the land, according to our best
skill." As for our skill, you must run the hazard of it ; and if
there be an error only therein, and not in the will, it becomes
you to bear it. Nor would I have you to mistake in the point
of your own liberty. There is a liberty of corrupt nature,
which is affected both by men and beasts, to do what they
list. This liberty is inconsistent with authority; impatient of
all restraint (by this liberty sumus omnes deteriores) : 'tis the
grand enemy of truth and peace, and all the ordinances of
God are bent against it. But there is a civil, a moral, a
federal liberty, which is the proper end and object of authority :
it is a liberty for that only which is just and good. For this
liberty you are to stand with the hazard of your very lives ;
and whatsoever crosses it, is not authority but a distemper
thereof. This liberty is maintained in a way of subjection to
authority ; and the authority set over you will, in all admi
nistrations for your good, be quietly submitted unto by all
but such as have a disposition to shake off the yoke, and lose

NORTH AMERICA. 273
their true liberty by their murmuring at the honour and power c h A P.
of authority." HI.
The circumstances in which this address was delivered, 1646>
recall the most interesting scenes of Greek and Roman history;
while in the wisdom, piety, and dignity that it breathes, it
resembles the magnanimous vindication of a judge of Israel.
Winthrop was not only acquitted by the sentence of the court
and the voice of the public, but recommended so prevailingly
to the esteem of his fellow-citizens by this and all the other
indications of his character, that he was chosen governor of
Massachusetts every year after as long as he lived.1 His ac
cusers incurred a proportional degree of public displeasure :
their petition was rejected, and several of the chief promoters
of it severely reprimanded, and adjudged to make open ac
knowledgment of their fault in seeking to subvert the funda
mental laws of the colony. Refusing to acknowledge that
they had done wrong, and still persisting in their clamour for
an alteration of the law, with very indiscreet threats of com
plaining to the parliament, they were punished with fine or
imprisonment. Most of them were known or believed to in
cline to the ecclesiastical form of presbytery ; and as this
peculiar constitution was also affected by the prevailing party
in the English House of Commons, the menace of a com
plaint to parliament excited general rage and alarm. A de
putation of the malcontents having made preparation to sail Arb;t
for England, and given significant hints of the changes they proceed-
hoped to procure by their machinations in the parent state, aD|;nst th
some of them were placed under arrest, and their papers were dissenters.
seized and examined. Among these papers were found peti
tions to Lord Warwick, urging a forfeiture of the provincial
charter, the introduction of a presbyterian establishment, and
1 This excellent magistrate (says Cotton Mather) continually exemplified the
maxim of Theodosius, that If any man speak evil of the ruler, if it be through light
ness, 'tis to be contemned ; if it be through madness, 'tis to be pitied; if through
malice, 'tis to be forgiven. One of the colonists who had long manifested much ill
will towards his person, at length wrote to him. " Sir, your overcoming of yourself
hath overcome me." At his third election to the office of governor he declared, in a
speech to his fellow citizens, that he had hitherto accepted with a trembling hand the
presents by which they had acknowledged his services, and could no longer consent
to a repetition of them. In the close of his life he is said to have expressed regret for
the sanction he had given to intolerance. His death, in 1649, was deeply and
universally bewailed ; and all declared that he had been the father of the colony,
and the first no less in virtue than in place.
VOL. I. T

274 THE HISTORY OF
BO o K of the whole code of English jurisprudence, into the provincial
 J  institutions, together with various other innovations, which
1646. were represented as at once accordant with legislatorial wis
dom and justice, and conducive to the important object of se
curing and fortifying the supreme dominion of the parliament
over the colony. The discovery ofthe intolerance contemplated
by these persons served to exasperate the intolerance which
they themselves were experiencing from the society of which
they formed but an insignificant fraction. The contents of
their papers excited so much resentment, that not a voice was
raised against the iniquity of the process by which the docu
ments had been intercepted ; and the alarm was increased by
tbe manifest impossibility of preventing designs so dangerous
from being still pursued. The ardour of the public sentiment,
as well as the peculiar nature of the subject that had excited
it, introduced this all-prevalent topic into the pulpit; and
even John Cotton was so far heated and transported by the
contagion of passionate zeal, as to declare, in a sermon,
" That if any one should carry writings or complaints against
the people of God in this country to England, he would,
doubtless, find himself in the predicament of Jonah in the
vessel." This was a prediction to which a long voyage was
not unlikely to give at least a seeming fulfilment. In effect,
a short time after, certain deputies from the petitioners having
embarked for England, were overtaken by a violent storm ;
whereupon, the sailors recollecting tbe prediction that had
gone abroad, and, happily, considering the papers, and not
the bearers of them, as the offending part of the shipment,
insisted so vehemently on casting all obnoxious writings over
board, that the deputies were obliged to commit their creden
tials to the waves. When they arrived in England, however,
they did not fail to prosecute their mission ; but the attention
of the parliamentary leaders at that time being deeply engaged
with more important matters, and Winslow and Hugh Peters,
on behalf of the colony, actively labouring to traverse the de
signs of the applicants, — they obtained little attention and no
redress.1
Attempts From the painful survey of intolerance and contentious zeal
anddvUize *°r tne f°ttas of religion, it is pleasing to turn to the substan
tia in- tial fruits of christian sentiment evinced by those memorable
dians. 1 Mather. Neal. Hutchinson. Chalmers.

NORTH AMERICA. 275
exertions for the conversion of the Indians that originated in CHAP.
the same year which had witnessed so much dispute and ani- '
mosity. The circumstances that promoted the emigrations to 1646.
New England, had operated with particular force on the
ministers of the puritans; and so many of these spiritual
directors had accompanied the other settlers, that among a
people who derived less enjoyment from the exercises of piety,
the numbers of the clergy would have been reckoned exceed
ingly burdensome and very much disproportioned to the wants
ofthe laity. This circumstance was highly favourable to the
promotion of religious habits among the colonists, as well as
to the extension of their settlements, in the plantation of which
the co-operation of a minister was considered indispensable.
It contributed also to suggest and facilitate missionary labour
among the neighbouring heathens, to whom the colonists had
associated themselves by superadding the ties of a common
country to those of a common nature. While the people at
large were progressively extending their industry, and over
coming by culture the rudeness of desert nature, the ministers
of religion with earnest zeal aspired to an extension of their
peculiar sphere of usefulness ; and at a very early period en
tertained designs of redeeming to the dominion of piety and
civility, the neglected wastes of human character that lay
stretched in savage ignorance and idolatry around them.
John Elliot, one of the ministers of Roxbury, a man whose
large soul glowed with the intensest flame of holy charity,
was strongly penetrated with a sense of this duty, and for Character
some time had been diligently labouring to overcome the pre- of EUioT^
liminary difficulty by which its performance was obstructed. and May-
He had now by diligent study attained such acquaintance hew-
with the Indian language as enabled him not only himself to
speak it with fluency, but to facilitate the acquisition of it to
others, by the construction and publication of a system of
Indian grammar.1 Having completed his preparatory in
quiries, he began, in the close of this year, a scene of labour
which has been traced with great interest and accuracy by the October.
ecclesiastical historians of New England, and still more
minutely, we may believe, in that eternal record where alone
1 This performance closes with the expression of his experimental conviction,
that " prayers and pains, through faith in Christ Jesus, can do any thing."
T 2

276 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK the actions of men obtain their iust, their final, and eveiiast^
ii *
 '__ ing proportions. It is a remarkable feature in his long and
1646. arduous career, that the energy by which he was actuated
never sustained the slightest abatement, but, on the contrary,
manifested a steady and continual increase. He appears
never himself to have doubted its endurance ; but, confidently
referring it to Divine impartment, he felt assured of its derivation
from a source incapable of being wasted by the most liberal
communication. Every thing he saw or knew occurred to
him in a religious aspect : every faculty, and every acquisition
that he derived from the employment of his faculties, was re
ceived by him as a ray imparted to his soul from that
everlasting source of sentiment and intelligence, which was
the object of his earnest contemplation and continual de
sire. As he was one ofthe holiest, so was he also one of the
happiest and most beloved of men. When he felt himself dis
abled from preaching by the infirmities of old age, he pro
posed to his parishioners of Roxbury to resign his ministerial
salary : but these good people unanimously declared that they
would willingly pay the stipend for the happiness of having him
reside among them. His example indeed was the most valuable
part of his ministry among christians : his life during many
years being a continual effusion of soul in devotion to God
and charity to mankind.1
The mild persuasive address of Elliot soon gained him a
favourable audience from many of the Indians ;2 and having
successfully represented to them the expediency of an entire de
parture from their savage habits of life, he obtained from the ge
neral court a suitable tract of land adjoining to the settlement
of Concord in Massachusetts, upon which a number of Indian
families began, under his counsel, to erect fixed habitations
for themselves, and where they eagerly received his instruc
tions both spiritual and secular. It was not long before a
1 He died in the year 1690. As his bodily strength decayed, the energy of his
being seemed to retreat into the heart, and at length all his faculties (he said) were
absorbed in holy love. Being asked, shortly before his departure, how he felt, he
replied, " I have lost every thing: my understanding leaves me, my memory fails
me, my utterance fails me ; but I thank God my charity holds out still ; I find that
rather grows than fails." Richard Baxter declared that these words had given him
inexpressible comfort, and that the account of Elliot's life, which he read when he
himself was labouring under a dangerous illness, had recalled him from the brink of
the grave. Mather. Neal.
3 See Note VI. althe end ofthe volume.

NORTH AMERICA. 277
violent opposition to these innovations was excited by the CHAP.
powaws, or Indian priests, who threatened death and other m"
inflictions of the vengeance of their idols on all who should 1646.
embrace Christianity. The menaces and artifices of these
persons caused several of the seeming converts to draw back,
but induced others to separate themselves entirely from the
society and converse of the main body of their countrymen,
and court the advantage of a closer association with that
superior race of men who showed themselves so generously
willing to diffuse and communicate the capacity and benefits
of their own improved condition. A considerable number of
Indians resorted to the land allotted them by the provincial
government, and exchanged their wild and barbarous habits
for the modes of civilized living and industry. Elliot was
continually among them, instructing, animating, and direct
ing them. They felt his superior wisdom, and saw him
continually and serenely happy ; and there was nothing
in his exterior condition that indicated sources of enjoy
ment from which they were debarred. On the contrary, it
was obvious that of every article of merely selfish comfort he
was willing to divest himself in order to communicate to them
a share of what he esteemed the only true riches of an im
mortal being. The women in the new settlement learned to
spin ; the men to dig and till the ground ; and the children
were instructed in the English language, and taught to read
and write. As the numbers of domesticated Indians in
creased, they built a town by the side of Charles River, which
they called Natick ; and they desired Elliot to frame a system
of municipal government for them. He directed their atten
tion to the counsel that Jethro gave to Moses ; and, in con
formity with it, they elected for themselves rulers of hun
dreds, of fifties, and of tens. The provincial government also
appointed a court, which, without assuming jurisdiction over
them, tendered the assistance of its judicial mediation to all
who might be willing to refer to it the adjustment of their
more difficult or important controversies. In endeavouring to
extend their missionary influence among the surrounding tribes,
Elliot and his associates encountered a variety of success cor
responding to the visible varieties of human character, and the
invisible predeterminations of the Divine will. Many persons

278 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK expressed the utmost abhorrence and contempt of Christianity :
' some made a hollow profession of willingness to hear, and
1646. even of conviction, — with the view, as it afterwards appeared,
of obtaining the tools and other articles of value that were
furnished to every Indian who proposed to embrace the
habits of civilized life. In spite of great discouragement the
missionaries persisted ; and the difficulties that at first
mocked their efforts seeming at length to vanish under an
invisible influence, their labours were attended with astonishing
success. The character and habits of the lay colonists pro
moted the efficacy of these pious endeavours, in a manner
which will be forcibly appreciated by all who have examined
the history and progress of missions. Simple in their man
ners, devout, moral, and industrious in their lives, — they en
forced the lessons of the missionaries by demonstrating their
practicability and beneficial effects, and presented a model
which, in point of refinement, was not too elevated for Indian
imitation. While Elliot and an increasing body of associates were thus
employed in the province of Massachusetts, Thomas Mayhew,
a man who combined the gentlest manners with the most
ardent and enthusiastic spirit, together with a few coadjutors,
diligently prosecuted the same design in Martha's Vineyard,
Nantucket, and Elizabeth Isles, and the territory compre
hended in the Plymouth patent. Abasing themselves that
they might elevate their species and promote the Divine
glory, they wrought with their own hands among those
Indians whom they persuaded to forsake savage habits ; and
zealously employing all the influence they acquired to the
communication of moral and spiritual improvement, they be-
1617. held their exertions crowned with the most signal success.
The character and manners of Mayhew appear to have been
singularly calculated to excite the tenderness no less than the
veneration of the objects of his benevolence. His address de
rived a penetrating interest from that earnest concern, and
high and holy value, which he manifestly entertained for
every member of the family of mankind. Many years after
his death, the Indians could not hear his name mentioned
without shedding tears and betraying transports of grateful
emotion. Both Elliott and Mayhew found great advantage in

NORTH AMERICA. 279
the practice of selecting the most docile and ingenious of their C H^A P.
Indian pupils, and by especial attention to their instruction, qua- _  '__
lifying them to act as schoolmasters among their countrymen. 1647.
To a zeal that seemed to increase by exercise, they added insur
mountable patience and admirable prudence ; and, steadily fix
ing their view on the glory ofthe Most High,and declaring that,
whether outwardly successful or not in promoting it, they felt
themselves blessed and happy in pursuing it ; they found its in
fluence sufficient to light them through the darkness of every
perplexity and peril, and finally conduct them to a degree of
success and victory unparalleled, perhaps, since that era when
the miraculous endowments of the apostolic ministry caused
multitudes to be converted in a day. They were not hasty in
urging the Indians to embrace improved institutions : they
desired rather to lead them insensibly forward, — more espe
cially in the establishment of religious ordinances. Those prac
tices, indeed, which they accounted likely to commend them
selves by their obviously beneficial effects to the natural under
standing of men, they were not restrained from recommending
to their early adoption ; and trial by jury very soon superseded
the savage modes of determining right or ascertaining guilt,
and contributed to improve and refine the sense of equity.
In the dress and mode of cohabitation of the savages, they
also introduced, at an early period, alterations calculated to
form and develope a sentiment of modesty, of which the In
dians were found to be grossly and universally deficient. But
all those practices which are, or ought to be, exclusively the
fruits of renewed nature and Divine light, they desired to
teach entirely by example, and by diligently radicating and
cultivating in the minds of their flocks the principles out of
which alone such visible fruits of piety can lastingly and be
neficially grow. It was not till the year 1660, that the first
Indian church was founded by Elliot and his fellow-labourers
in Massachusetts. There were at that time no fewer than ten
settlements within the province, occupied by Indians compa
ratively civilized.
Elliot had occasionally translated and printed various ap- Indian
proved theological dissertations for the use of the Indians : Bl.Ue , .
. , . printed m
and, at length, in the year 1664, the Bible was printed, for Massa-
the first time, in the native language of the new world, at cllusett5.

280

THE HISTORY OF

BOOK Cambridge in Massachusetts.1 This, indeed, was not accom-
. plished without the assistance of pecuniary contributions from
1647. the mother country. The colonists had zealously and cheer
fully co-operated with their ministers, and assisted to defray
the cost of their charitable enterprises ; but the increasing ex
penses threatened at last to exceed what their narrow means
were competent to afford. Happily, the tidings of this great
work excited a kindred spirit in the parent state, where, in the
year 1649, there was formed, by act of parliament, a Society
for Propagating the Gospel in New England, whose co-opera
tion proved of essential service to the missionary cause. This
society, having been dissolved at the Restoration, was after
wards re-erected by a charter from Charles the Second,
obtained by the exertions of the pious Richard Baxter and the
influence of the illustrious Robert Boyle, who thus approved
himself the benefactor of New England as well as of Virginia.
Effects of Supported by its ample endowments, and the liberal contribu-
sionary tions of their own fellow-colonists, the American missionaries
labour. exerted themselves with such energy and success in the work
of converting and civilizing the savages, that, before the close
of the seventeenth century, there were collected in the pro
vince of Massachusetts more than thirty congregations of
Indians, comprising upwards of three thousand persons, re
claimed from a gross barbarism and degrading superstition,
and advanced to the comfort and respectability of civilized
life, and the dignity and happiness of worshippers of the true
God. There were nearly as many converts to religion and
civility in the islands of Massachusetts Bay : there were
several Indian congregations in the Plymouth territories ; and
among some of the tribes that still pursued their wonted style
of roving life, there was introduced a considerable improve
ment in civil and moral habits.
Among the various difficulties that obstructed the improve
ments which the missionaries attempted to introduce into the
temporal condition of the Indians, it was found that the

1 1 have seen a copy of this edition of the Bible in the library of the late George
Chalmers. It is a beautiful piece of typography.
Many earlier publications had already issued from the fertile press of New Eng
land. One of the first was a new metrical translation of the Psalms— very literal,
and very unpnctical. To this last imputation the NewEnglanders answered, "that
God's allars need not our polishings.*' — Oldmixon. v

NORTH AMERICA. 281
human constitution had been greatly deteriorated by ages of c H A P.
savage life. Habits of alternate sloth and activity, indulged _____'__
from generation to generation, seemed to have gradually im- 1547.
parted a character or bias to the animal faculties, scarcely less
fixed and. inveterate than the depraved hue of the negro body,
and to have deeply impaired the capacity of continuous exer
tion. In every employment that demanded steady labour, the
Indians were found decidedly inferior to the Europeans. The
first missionaries, and their immediate successors, sustained
this discouragement without shrinking, and animated their
converts to resist or endure it. But, at a later period, when it
was found that the taint which the Indian constitution had
received, continued to be propagated among descendants edu
cated in habits widely different from those of their forefathers,
many persons began too hastily to apprehend that the imper
fection was incurable ; and missionary ardour was abated by
the very circumstance that most strongly solicited its revival
and enlargement. In concurrence with this cause of decline
in the progress of the great work which we have contemplated, —
the ardent gratitude of the first converts from darkness to light
had subsided ; and the consequence unhappily was, that a con
siderable abatement ensued of the piety, morality, and industry
of the Indian communities that had been reclaimed from sa
vage life. But the work was never entirely abandoned, nor its
visible fruits suffered wholly to disappear: amidst occasional
decline and revival, the New England missions have been
always pursued; and converts to piety and civility have
continued to attest their beneficial efficacy upon the Indian
race.1 Having already overstepped very considerably the march of
time, in order to exhibit a brief but unbroken view of the
foregoing scene of missionary labour, we now return to
follow more leisurely the general stream of affairs in New
England. 1 Day-breaking of the Gospel in New England. Shepherd's Clear Sunshine of
the Gospel upon the Indians. Elliot's and Mayhew's Letters. Mayhew's Indian
Converts. Whitfield's Discovery of the present State of the Indians. Of these and
of various other works on the same subject, copies exist, partly in the Redcross-street
Library of London, and partly in the Advocate's Library of Edinburgh. Baxter's
Life. Mather. Neal. Hutchinson. The Indian tribes within the Connecticut
territory proved remarkably indocile. Some individuals were converted ; but no
Indian church was ever gathered in this state. Trumbull.

282 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK Shortly after the dissensions that had prevailed in the year-
1646, the general court of Massachusetts recommended the

1647. convocation of a general synod of the churches of New
ofdi^New England, in order to frame an uniform scheme of church
England discipline for all the provincial congregations. The proposal
c urc es. wag resjste(j DV severai 0f the churches, which expressed ap
prehension of the arbitrary purposes and superstitious devices
which might be promoted by the dangerous practice of con-
vocating synods. But, at length, the persuasion generally
prevailing that an assembly of this description possessed no
inherent authority, and that its functions were confined to
the tendering of counsel, the second synod of New England
1648. was convoked at Cambridge. The confession of faith that
had recently been published by the Assembly of Divines at
Westminster, was thoroughly examined and unanimously
approved. Three of the most eminent of the provincial mi
nisters, Cotton, Partridge, and Mather, were then appointed
to prepare a model of discipline for the New England
churches. The Platform of Church Discipline, which they
composed accordingly, and presented to the synod, after many
long debates, received the general approbation and universal
acquiescence.1
i649 A dispute had for some time subsisted between Massachu
setts and Connecticut respecting a tax imposed by the legis
lature of Connecticut, and which operated with very ques
tionable justice and most unquestionable disadvantage on the
inhabitants of Massachusetts. Having complained to the
commissioners of the confederated provinces, and not obtain
ing redress as speedily as they considered themselves entitled
to expect, the legislative authorities of Massachusetts passed
an act imposing a retaliatory duty not only on goods imported
from Connecticut, but on importations from all the other
states of the confederation. This unjust proceeding could be
defended only by superior power; an advantage which so
manifestly resided with Massachusetts, that the other confe
derates had nothing to oppose to it but an appeal to those
principles of equity which one of their own number had al
ready set the example of disregarding. Happily for them,
' Neal.

NORTH AMERICA. 283
and for herself, their ally, though liable to be betrayed into CHAP.
error by resentment and partiality, was not intoxicated with

conscious power. They presented a remonstrance to the 1649.
general court of Massachusetts, desiring it " seriously to con
sider whether such proceedings agree with the law of love,
and the tenor of the articles of confederation." On re
ceiving this remonstrance, the government of Massachusetts,
superior to the mean shame of acknowledging a fault, con
sented to suspend the obnoxious ordinance.1 1650.
But Massachusetts, in the following year, was engaged in 1651.
a dispute with a power still more formidable to her than she b^^
was to her confederates, and much less susceptible of senti- Massachu-
ments of moderation and forbearance. The Long Parliament ^eLong
having now established its authority in England, was deter- Parlia-
mined to exact an explicit recognition of it from all the foreign ment-
dependencies of the state, and even to introduce such recog
nition into the charters and official style and procedure
of subordinate communities. A mandate was accordingly
transmitted to the governor and assembly of Massachusetts,
requiring them to send their charter to London ; to accept a
new patent from the keepers of the liberties of England ; and
to express in all public writs and judicial proceedings the
* Hutchinson. Chalmers. Another dispute, which occurred about three years
after, between Massachusetts and the other confederated states, is related with great
minuteness, and I think with no small injustice and partiality, by the respectable
historian of Connecticut. In 1653, a discovery was supposed to have been made of
a conspiracy between Stuyvesant, the governor of the Dutch colony, afterwards called
New York, and the Indians, for the extermination of the English. The evidence of
this sanguinary project (which Stuyvesant indignantly disclaimed) was judged suffi
cient, and the resolution of a general war embraced, by all the commissioners of the
union except those of Massachusetts. The general court of this province reckoned
the proof inconclusive, and were fortified in this opinion by the judgment of their
clergy, which they consented to abide by. To all the remonstrances of their allies,
they answered, that no articles of confederation should induce them to undertake an
offensive war which they considered unjust, and in which they could not expect the
aid of Divine favour. The historian of Connecticut, not content with reprobating
this breach ofthe articles of union, indignantly maintains that the scruples of Mas
sachusetts were insincere. Trumbull. But, in truth, the evidence of the Dutch
plot laboured under very serious defects, which were much more coolly weighed by
the people of Massachusetts, than by the inhabitants of Connecticut and Newhaven,
exasperated by frequent disputes with the Dutch, and exposed by their local situa
tion to the greatest danger from Dutch hostilities. In the beginning of the following
century, the situation of the provinces was so far reversed, that Massachusetts was
compelled to solicit the aid of Connecticut in a general war with the Indians ; and,
on this occasion, Connecticut, remote from the scene of action, at first refused her aid
upon scruples (wliich she afterwards ascertained to be groundless) respecting the
lawfulness of the war.— Trumbull.

284 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK dependence of the provincial authorities on those existing de-
' positaries of supreme power in the parent state. This com-
1651. mand excited the utmost alarm in the colony : nor could all
the attachment of the people to the cause of the parliament1
reconcile them to a surrender of the title under which their
settlements and institutions had been formed, and which had
never obstructed their obedience to the authorities that now
proposed to revoke it. The parliament, indeed, had no
more right to supersede the original patent of the colony,
than to require the city of London, or any of the other corpo
rations of England, to submit their charters to similar disso
lution and renovation. But the colonists were aware that
the authorities which had issued this arbitrary mandate
had the power to enforce it; and, accordingly, declining a
direct collision, they reverted to the policy which they had
The colony once before successfully employed to counteract the tyrannical
parlia-6 intentions of the late king ; and succeeded in completely
ment— foiling the leaders of that parliamentary assembly, so re
nowned for its success, resolution, and capacity. The general
court, instead of surrendering the provincial patent, trans
mitted a petition to the parliament against the obnoxious
mandate, setting forth, that " these things not being done in
the late king's time or since, it was not able to discern the
need of such an injunction." It represented the condition
and authority on which the settlers had originally repaired
to New England, their steadfast adherence to the cause of the
parliament throughout the civil wars, and their present ex
plicit recognition of its supremacy ; and prayed that the
people might not now be worse dealt with than in the time of
the king, and instead of a governor and magistrates annually
chosen by themselves, be required to submit to others im
posed on them against their wills. The general court at the
same time addressed a letter to " the Lord General Cromwell,"
for the purpose of interesting his powerful mediation in their
behalf, as well as of dissuading him from the prosecution of
1 Though attached to the cause of the parliament, the people of New England
had so far forgotten their own wrongs, and escaped the contagion ofthe passions en
gendered in the civil war, that the tragical fate of the king appears to have excited
general grief and concern. The public expression of such settlements would have
been equally inexpedient and unavailing; but that they weie entertained is certain.
See Hutchinson.

NORTH AMERICA. 285
certain measures which he himself had projected for their C HA P.
advantage. The peculiar character which the New England

colonists hud displayed, the institutions they had established, 1651.
and their predilection for the independent model of church
government which he himself approved, had strongly recom- A^te^'
mended them to the esteem of this extraordinary man : and Cromwell.
his favourable regards were enhanced by the recollection of
the project he had conceived, and so nearly accomplished, of
uniting his destiny with theirs in America. Nor were they
at all abated by the compassion and benevolence with which
the colonists received a considerable body of unfortunate
Scots whom Cromwell had caused to be transported to Mas
sachusetts after the battle of Dunbar, and of which he was
informed by a letter from John Cotton. He seemed to con
sider that he had been detained in England for their interests
as well as his own ; and never ceased to desire that they
should be more nearly associated with his fortunes, and
cheered with the rays of his grandeur. He had conceived an
ardent desire to be the author of an enterprise so illustrious
as the revocation of these men to their native country ; and
as an act of honourable justice to themselves, as well as for
the advantage of Ireland, he had recently broached the pro
posal of transporting them from America, and establishing
them in a district of that island, which was to be evacuated
for their reception. In their letter to him, the general court,
alluding to this scheme, acknowledged, with grateful ex
pressions, the kind consideration which it indicated ; but
declined to comply with it, or abandon a land where they
had experienced so much of the favour of God, and were
blessed with a fair prospect of converting the heathen. They
recommended, at the same time, their petition against the
parliamentary measures to his friendly countenance, and be-
seeched " his Excellence to be pleased to show whatsoever
God shall direct him unto, on the behalf of the colony, to
the most honourable parliament." It is probable that Crom
well's mediation was successfully employed, as the requisition
that had been transmitted to the general court was not urged
any farther.1
1 Hutchinson. Hutchinson's Collection of Papers. Chalmers. The commis-

286 NORTH AMERICA.
B OO K The successes of the Long Parliament had begotten in its
' leading members a spirit of domination, to the exercise of
1652. which the colonies were peculiarly exposed. In the history
of Virginia we have remarked the laws by which the traffic of
all the colonies with foreign states was prohibited, and the
martial counsel and conduct by which the subjugation of that
refractory settlement was decreed and accomplished. The
province of Massachusetts, which was desirous, as far as pos
sible, to act in concurrence with the parliament, and was per
fectly sincere in recognising its supremacy, co-operated with
the ordinance against Virginia, by prohibiting all intercourse
with this colony till it had been reduced by the parliamentary
forces. But it was not over those settlements alone, which
opposed its supremacy, that the parliament was disposed to
indulge the spirit of domination; and though Massachusetts
was protected from its designs by the interference of Crom
well, Maryland, which had received its establishment from
Charles the First, was compelled to admit the alterations of its
official style which Massachusetts had evaded; and Rhode
Island beheld the very form of government which it had de
rived from the parliament itself in 1643, suspended by a war
rant of the council of state. What might have ensued upon
this warrant, and what similar or farther proceedings might

sioners for New England, who were sent thither by Charles the Second, asserted, in
their narrative, that the colony solicited Cromwell to declare it an independent state.
Hutchinson's Collection of Papers. This is a very improbable statement, and was
suggested perhaps by misrepresentation or misapprehension of the circumstances re
lated in the text. The publication of Governor Winthrop's Journal has now clearly
proved that the leading men in Massachusetts entertained from the beginning a con
siderable jealousy of parliamentary jurisdiction. " In 1641," says Winthrop,
" some of our friends in England wrote to us advice to send over some to solicit for
us in the parliament, — giving us hopes that we might obtain mueh ; but, consulting
about it, we declined the motion for this consideration — that if we should put our
selves under the protection of the parliament, we must then be subject to all such
laws as they should make, or, at least, such as they might impose upon us ; in which
course, though they should intend our good, yet it might prove very prejudicial to
us." Hence it is obvious that the people of New England, in acknowledging the
supremacy of parliament, had respect to it not as a legislative body, but as adminis
tering the functions of supreme executive power. They never willingly admitted
that the mother country possessed a legislative control over them ; or that, in for
saking her shores, they had left behind them an authority capable of obstructing or
defeating the objects of their emigration.
1 This year Massachusetts lost its eminent preacher and patriarch, John Cotton.
Finding himself dying, he sent for the magistrates and ministers of the colony, and,
.with much solemnity and tenderness, bade them farewell for a while.

NORTH AMERICA. 287
have been adopted by the parliament relative to the other c H A P.
colonies, were intercepted by its own dissolution, and the con- n •
vergence ofthe whole power of the English commonwealth in 1653.
the strong hands of Oliver Cromwell.1
The ascendancy of the protector proved highly beneficial to The pro-
all the American colonies, except Maryland, where unfortu- taed°m0irm?s.
nately it was rendered instrumental to much injustice, discord, tration
and confusion. Rhode Island, immediately after his eleva- J0e^ial
tion, resumed the form of government which the parliament England.
had recently suspended ; and, by the decisive vigour of his
interference, the people of Connecticut and Newhaven were
relieved from the apprehensions they had long entertained of
the hostile designs of the Dutch colonists of New York. All
the New England states were thenceforward exempted from
the operation of the parliamentary ordinance against trade
with foreign nations ; and both their commerce and their secu
rity were promoted by the conquest which the protector's
arms achieved, of the province of Acadie from the French. He con-
• QU61'S
But it was Massachusetts that occupied the highest place in Acadie.
his esteem ; and to the inhabitants of this settlement he ear
nestly longed to impart a dignity of civil condition corres
ponding to the elevation which he believed them to enjoy in
the favour of the great Sovereign of the universe. The
reasons for which they had declined his offer of a settlement
in Ireland, however likely to obtain his acquiescence, were
still more calculated to enlarge his regard for a people who
felt the force of such generous considerations. When his
arms had achieved the conquest of Jamaica, he conceived the
project of transplanting the colonists of Massachusetts to
that beautiful island ; and, with this view, he represented to 1655.
them, that, by establishing themselves and their principles in ^ propo-
the West Indies, they would carry the sword of the gospel the inhabi-
into the very heart of the territories of popery, and that con- ^Lnts of
sequently they ought to deem themselves as strongly invited to setts.
this ulterior removal, as they had been to their original mi
gration. He endeavoured to incite them to embrace this 1651.
project by assurances of the countenance and support which
he would extend to them, and of the amplest delegation of
1 Chalmers.

288 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK the powers of government in their new settlement, as well
' as by descanting on the rich productions of the torrid zone,
1655. with which their industry would be rewarded : and with
these considerations he blended an appeal to their con
science, in pressing them to fulfil, in their own favour, the
promise of the Almighty to make his people the head, and
not the tail.1 He not only urged these views upon the agents
and correspondents of the colonists in England, but de
spatched one of his own confidential officers to Massachu
setts to solicit their compliance with his proposal. But
the colonists were exceedingly averse to abandon a country
where they found themselves happy and in possession of
a sphere of increasing virtue and usefulness ; and the
proposal was the more unacceptable to them from the
unfavourable reports they had heard of the climate of Ja-
1656. niaica. The general court, accordingly, returned an address,
Declined declining, in the name of their fellow citizens, to embrace the
by them, protector's offer, and withal beseeching his highness not to
impute their refusal to indifference to his service, or an un
grateful disregard of his concern for their welfare.2 Thus
happily for themselves, were the colonists, on two several occa
sions, deterred from accepting the injudicious promotion which
Cromwell was eager to bestow. Had they removed to Ire
land, they would have incurred in the sequel a diminution
both of happiness and liberty : had they proceeded to Ja
maica, they would have been exposed, amidst the prevalence
of negro slavery, to circumstances highly unfavourable to
piety and virtue. In the mind of Cromwell, a vehement ar
dour was singularly combined with the most profound and
deliberate sagacity ; and enthusiastic sentiments were not un
frequently blended with politic considerations, in proportions
which it is little likely that he himself was aware of, or that
any remote spectator of his actions can hope to adjust. It is
1 He alluded, I suppose, to Deuteronomy xxviii. 13.
2 Hutchinson. Chalmers. Hazard. A similar answer was returned by New-
haven to a similar application from the protector. Trumbull. There were not
wanting some wild spirits among the colonists, who relished the protector's pro
posals. The notorious Venner, who headed the insurrection of the Fifth Monarchy
Men in England after the Restoration, was for some time an inhabitant of Salem,
and prevailed with a party of zealots there to unite in a scheme of emigration to the
West Indies. But the design was discouraged by the clergy, and intercepted by the
magistrates. — Oldmixon.

NORTH AMERICA. 289
obvious, on the one hand, that his propositions to the colonists, CHAP.
on both occasions, were connected with the securer establish-

ment of his own dominion in Ireland, and the preservation of 1656.
his conquest in the West Indies. But it is equally certain,
on the other, that the colonists incurred neither his displea
sure, nor even abatement of his cordial friendship by thus re
fusing to promote schemes on which he was strongly bent.
Nay, so powerfully had they captivated his steady heart, that
they were able to maintain his favour, even while their intole
rance discredited the independent principles which he and they
united in professing ; and none of the complaints against
them with which he was long assailed by the anabaptists
and quakers, whose conduct and treatment in the colony we
are now to consider, were ever able to deprive the people of
the place they had gained in the protector's esteem.
The colonists had been of late years involved occasionally
in hostilities with some of the Indian tribes, and in disputes
with the Dutch, by whose machinations they suspected that
the Indians were prompted to attack them. But these events
had been productive of greater alarm than injury : and by far
the most serious troubles with which the colonists were in
fested were those which arose from religious dissensions. Of ?erse™r
11 1 • n • tlon °' 'be
all the instances ot persecution that occur in the history of anabaptists
New England, the most censurable in its principle, though '°Massa-
happily also the least inhuman in the severities which it pro
duced, was the treatment inflicted on the anabaptists by the
government of Massachusetts. The first demonstration of the
peculiar doctrine of these sectaries in this province occurred
in the year 1651, when, to the great astonishment and con
cern of the community, seven or eight persons, of whom the
leader was one Obadiah Holmes, all at once professed the
baptist tenets, and separated from the congregation to which
they had previously belonged, — declaring that they could no
longer take counsel, or partake divine ordinances, with un-
baptized men, as they pronounced all the other inhabitants of
the province to be. The peculiar doctrine which thus unex
pectedly sprung up, was at this time regarded with ex
treme aversion and jealousy, on account of the horrible
enormities with which the first professors of it in Ger-
vol. i. u

290 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK many had associated its repute;1 and no sooner did Holmes
' and his friends establish a baptist conventicle in Massa-
1656. chusetts, than complaints of their proceedings, as a scan
dalous and intolerable nuisance, came pouring into the ge
neral court from all quarters of the colony. From the tenor
of these complaints, it is manifest that the minds of the co
lonists were strongly impressed with the recollection of the
licentious sentiments and infamous practices by which the
wretched Boccold and his insane followers at Munster had
sullied and discredited the baptist tenets ; and that the bare
profession of these tenets was calculated to awaken suspicions
of the grossest immorality of conduct. Holmes was accused
of having dishonoured the Almighty, not only by dividing
his people and resisting his ordinance, but by the commission
of profligate impurities, and the scandalous indecency with
which, it was alleged, that the rite distinctive of his sect was
administered. It is admitted by the provincial historians,
that the evidence that was adduced in support of these latter
charges was insufficient to establish them. The court refused
to hearken to the plea of liberty of conscience in behalf of
Holmes and his followers, but proceeded, in the first instance,
no farther against their persons, than to adjudge that they
should desist from their unchristian separation: and they were
permitted to retire, having first, however, publicly declared
that they were determined to pursue the dictates of conscience,
and to obey God rather than man. Some time after, they
were apprehended on a Sunday, while attending the preaching
of one Clark, a baptist, from Rhode Island, who had come to
propagate his tenets in Massachusetts. The constables who
took them into custody carried them to church, where Clark
put on his hat as soon as the minister began to pray. Clark,
Holmes, and another, were sentenced to pay small fines, or be
flogged : and thirty lashes were actually inflicted on Holmes,
who resolutely persisted in choosing a punishment that would
enable him to evince the constancy with which he could suffer
for the rights of conscience and the defence of truth. A law
was at the same time passed, subjecting to banishment from
1 See Robertson's Hist, of Charles the Fifth.

NORTH AMERICA. 291
the colony every person who should openly condemn or op- c H A P.
pose the baptism of infants, — who should attempt to seduce in-
others from the practice or approbation of infant baptism, — or 1656.
purposely depart from the congregation when that rite was
administered, — " or deny the ordinance of the magistracy, or
their lawful right or authority to make war." 1 From these last
words, it seems that the baptists (naturally, or at least na
turally accounted, inimical to the authority of their oppressors)
either held, or were reputed to hold, along with the proper
tenets from whence they have derived their denomination,
principles opposed to the acknowledgment of magisterial
power and authority. In addition to this, we are assured by
Cotton Mather, that it was the practice of the baptists, in
order to strengthen their party, and manifest their contempt
for the colonial congregations, to admit into their communion
all persons whom the established churches in New England had
suspended from ecclesiastical privileges for licentiousness of
conduct, and even to appoint those persons administrators of
the sacramental rites. Yet, even with these and other ex
tenuating considerations, it is impossible to acquit the govern
ment of Massachusetts of having violated in this instance the
rights of conscience, and unjustly troubled men for the fidelity
with which they adhered to what they firmly believed to be
the will of God, in relation to a matter purely ecclesiastical.2
The greediness with which every collateral charge against the
baptists was received in the colony, and the passionate im
patience with which their claim of toleration was rejected,
forcibly indicate the illiberality and delusion by which their
persecutors were governed; and may suggest to the christian
philosopher a train of reflections no less instructive than in
teresting on the self-deceit by which men so commonly infer
the honesty of their convictions, and the rectitude of their
proceedings, from that resentful perturbation which far more
1 Mather. Neal.
a The baptists who were exiled from Massachusetts were allowed to settle in the
colony of Plymouth (Hutchinson), — whence it may be inferred, that they did not in
reality profess (as they were supposed by the people of Massachusetts to do) prin
ciples adverse to civil subordination. This charge against them probably originated
in the extravagance of a few of their own number, and the impatience and injustice
of their adversaries.
u2

292 THE HISTOBY OF
BOOK truly indicates a latent consciousness of injustice and incon-
11 • sistency.

1656. It is mortifying to behold such tares spring up in a field al
ready so richly productive of missionary exertion and other
fruits of genuine and exalted piety. The severities that were
employed, proved in the sequel incompetent to restrain the
spread of the baptist tenets; though for the present the pro
fessors of these doctrines appear to have either desisted from
holding separate assemblies, or to have retired from Massa
chusetts. Some of them repaired to England, and complained
to Cromwell of the persecution they had undergone ; but he
rejected their complaint, and applauded the conduct of the
provincial authorities.1
Conduct The treatment which the quakers experienced in Massachu-
and suffer- set<.s wag mucn more severe but, at the same time, undoubt-
mgsofthe ., •
quakers. edly, much more justly provoked. It is difficult for us, in the
calm and rational deportment of the quakers of the present
age, to recognise the successors of those wild enthusiasts who
first appeared in the north of England, about the year 1644,
and received from the derision of the world the title which
they afterwards adopted as their sectarian denomination. In
the mind of George Fox, the collector of this sect, and the
founder of its system of faith, there existed a singular mixture
of christian sentiment and doctrinal truth, with a deep shade
of error and delusion. Profoundly pious and contemplative,
but constitutionally visionary and hypochondriacal, he ap
pears at first to have suspected that the peculiarities of his
mental impressions might have arisen from some malady
which human science or friendly advice could remove ; and an
old clergyman, to whom he applied for counsel, advised him
to attempt a cure of what was spiritual in his disorder by sing
ing psalms, and of what was bodily by smoking tobacco.2
Fox rejected both parts of the prescription, as unsuitable to his
condition, because disagreeable to his taste ; and being now
convinced that others were incapable of understanding his
case, he took it entirely into his own hands, and resolved to
study, cherish, and cultivate the vague mysterious motions of
' Hutchinson. • Fox's Journal.

NORTH AMERICA. 293
his spirit; in short, to follow the impulse of his restless fancy as C H A P.
far as it would carry him. Unsuspicious of morbid influence,

or of the deceitfulness of his own imagination, he yielded im- 1656.
plicit credence to every suggestion of his mind, and was given
up in an amazing degree to delusions which, by prayer to the
Almighty, he might have been enabled to overcome and dispel.
Yet the powerful hold which the scriptures had already taken
of his mind, and the strong determination towards solid and
genuine piety which his spirit had thence derived, prevented
him from personally-wandering into the same monstrous extra
vagance which the conduct of many of his associates and dis
ciples too soon disclosed. In his journal, (one of the most cu
rious and interesting productions of the human mind,) he has
faithfully related the influence which his tenets produced on
the sentiments and conduct both of himself and his followers.
This singular record displays, in many parts, a wonderful
depth of thought and keenness of penetration, together with
numberless examples of that delusion by which its author mis
took a strong perception of wrong and disorder in human
nature and civil society, for a supernatural vocation and
power to rectify whatever he deemed amiss. He relates with
deliberate approbation various instances of contempt of de
cency and order in his own conduct, and of insane and dis
gusting outrage in that of his followers ; and though he repro
bates the frenzy of some whom he denominates Ranters, it is
not easy to discriminate between the extravagance which he
sanctions and that which he condemns. Amidst much dark
ness, there glimmers a bright and beautiful ray of religious
truth : many passages of scripture are illustrated with happy
sagacity ; and labours of zeal and piety, of courage and inte
grity, are recorded, that would do honour to the ministry of
an inspired apostle. That his personal character was elevated
and excellent in an unusual degree, appears from the impres
sion it produced on the minds of all who approached him.
Penn and Barclay, in particular, who to the most eminent
virtue, added talents and accomplishments of the first order
regarded Fox with the warmest love and veneration.1
It was this man who first embraced and promulgated those
1 See Note VII. at the end of the volume.

294 THE HISTORY OF
book tenets which have subsisted ever since as the distinctive1
 '.  principles of quaker doctrine — that the Holy Spirit, instead of
1656. operating (as the generality of christians believe it in all or
dinary cases to do) by insensible control of the ordinary
motions ofthe mind, acts by direct and cognizable impulse on
the spirit of man ; that its influence, instead of being obtained
by prayer to that Being who has promised to bestow it in
requital of believing prayer, is procured by an introversion of
the intellectual eye upon the mind where it already resides,
and in the stillness and watchful attention of which, the
hidden spark will blaze into a clear inward light and sensible
flame; and that the Holy Spirit, instead of simply opening
the minds of men to understand the scriptures and receive
their testimony, can and does convey instruction indepen
dently of the written word, — and communicate knowled°e
which is not to be found in the pages of holy writ.1 These
dangerous errors have never been renounced by the quakers,
though their practical influence has long since abated, and
indeed had considerably declined before the end of that cen
tury, about the middle of which they arose. In proportion as
they have been cultivated and practically regarded, has been
the progress ofthe sect into heresy of opinion or wild delusion
of fancy and irregularity of conduct: in proportion as they
have subsided into mere theoretical speculation, has been the
ascendancy which real piety or rational and philosophical
principle has obtained over the minds of the quakers. Even
in the present day, we behold the evil influence of those erro
neous doctrines, in the frequently silent meetings of the
quakers, — in the licence which they give to women to assume
the oflice of teachers in their church, — and in the abolition of
the sacraments so distinctly instituted and enjoined in scrip
ture. But when the doctrines of quakerism were first pro
mulgated, the effects which they produced on many of their
votaries, far exceeded the influence to which modern history
restricts them, or which the experience of a rational and cal
culating age finds it easy to conceive. In England, at that
1 The quaker regulations with respect to plainness of speech and apparel, absti
nence from music and other amusements, and general simplicity of manners, are too
well known and too little pertinent to our purpose to require that they should be
particularized here.

NORTH AMERICA. 295
time, the minds of men were in a state of feverish agitation chap.
and excitement, inflamed with the rage of innovation, strongly IIL
imbued with religious sentiment, and yet strongly averse to 1656.
restraint. The bands that had so long repressed liberty of
speech being suddenly broken, many crude thoughts were
eagerly broached, and many fantastic notions that had
been vegetating in the unwholesome shade of locked bosoms,
were abruptly brought to light : and all these were presented
to the souls of men roused and whetted by civil war, kindled
by great alarms or by vast and indeterminate designs, and
latterly so accustomed to partake or contemplate the most
surprising changes, that the distinction between speculation
and certainty was considerably effaced. The presbyterians
alone, or nearly alone, appear to have been generally willing
to submit to, as well as to impose, restraint on the lawless
licence of speculation ; and to them the doctrines of quakerism,
from their earliest announcement, were the objects of unmixed
disapprobation and even abhorrence. But to many other
persons, this new scheme, opening a wide field of enthusiastic
speculation, and presenting itself without the restrictive ac
companiment of a creed, exhibited irresistible attractions, and
rapidly absorbed a great variety of human character and
feeling. Before many years had elapsed, the ranks of the
quakers were recruited, and their tenets, without being sub
stantially altered, were moulded into a more systematic shape,
by such an accession of philosophical votaries, as, in the early
ages of the church, Christianity itself derived from the pre
tended adoption and real adulteration of its doctrines, by the
disciples of the Platonic philosophy. But it was the wildest
and most enthusiastic visionaries in the country, whom qua
kerism counted among its earliest votaries, and to whom it
afforded a sanction and stimulus to the boldest excursions of
lawless and uncertain thought, and a principle that was ad
duced to consecrate the most irregular and disorderly conduct.
And accordingly, these sectarians, who have always professed
and inculcated the maxims of inviolable peace,— who not
many years after were accounted a class of philosophical
deists seeking to pave the way' to a scheme of natural religion,
by allegorizing the distinguishing articles of the christian
faith,— and who are now in general remarkable for a guarded

296 THE HISTORY OF
book composure of language, an elaborate stillness and precision of
' demeanour, and a peculiar remoteness from every active effort
1656. to make proselytes to their distinctive tenets, — were, in the
commencement of their sectarian history, the most impetuous
zealots and inveterate disputers ; and in their eagerness to
proselytize the world, and to bear witness from the fountain of
oracular testimony, which they supposed to reside within
their own bosoms, against a regular ministry which they called
a priesthood of Baal, and against the sacraments which they
termed carnal and idolatrous observances, many of them com
mitted the most revolting blasphemy, indecency, and dis
orderly outrage.1 The unfavourable impression which these
actions created, long survived the extinction of the frenzy and
folly that produced them.
While, in pursuance of their determination to proselytize
the whole world, some of the quakers travelled to Rome, in
order to convert the pope, and others to Constantinople, for the
purpose of instructing the Grand Turk, — a party of them em
barked for America and established themselves in Rhode Island,
where persons of every religious (protestant) denomination were
permitted to settle in peace, and no one gave heed to the sen
timents or practices of his neighbours. From hence they soon
made their way into the Plymouth territory, where they suc
ceeded in persuading some of its inhabitants to embrace the.
doctrine that a sensible experience of inward light and spi
ritual impression was the great end of Christianity, and the es
sential characteristic of its votaries, and to oppose all regulated
order, forms, and discipline, whether civil or ecclesiastical, as
a vain and judaizing substitution of the kingdom of the flesh
July, for the kingdom of the spirit. On their first appearance in
Massachusetts, where two male and six female quakers arrived
from Rhode Island and Barbadoes, they found that the re-

i The frenzy that possessed many of the quakers had reached its height in the year
1656, the very year in which the quakers first presented themselves in Massachu
setts. See the proceedings in the House of Commons against James IVaylor, a
quaker, for blasphemy. Howel's State Trials. This unhappy person represented
himself as the redeemer ofthe human race. Some particulars ot his frenzy are related
in jNole ATI. at the end ofthe volume. He lived to recant his errors, and even write
sensibly in defence of the quakers, who were by this time increasing in respectability,
and were vol magnanimous enough to acknowledge as a fuend and associate the man
who had done such disservice to their cause.

NORTH AMERICA. 297
proach which their sect had incurred bythe insane extrava- CHAP.
gance of some of its members in England, had preceded their
arrival, and that they were regarded with the utmost terror 1656.
and dislike by the great bulk of the people. They were in
stantly arrested by the magistrates, and diligently examined
for what were considered bodily marks of witchcraft. No
such indications having been found, they were sent back to
the places whence they came, by the same vessels that had
brought them, and prohibited with threats of severe punish
ment from ever again returning to the colony. A law was
passed at the same time, subjecting every ship-master import
ing quakers or quaker writings to a heavy fine ; adjudging all
quakers who should intrude into the colony to stripes and
labour in the house of correction, and all defenders of their
tenets to fine, imprisonment, or exile. The four associated
states adopted this law, and urged the authorities of Rhode
Island to co-operate with them in stemming the progress of
quaker opinions ; but the assembly of this settlement wisely re
plied, that they could not punish any man for declaring his
mind with regard to religion ; that they were much disturbed
by the quakers, and by the tendency of their doctrines to un
settle the relationsof mankind and dissolve the bonds of society;
but that they found that the quakers delighted to encounter
persecution, speedily sickened of a patient uncontradicting
audience, and had already begun to loathe Rhode Island as a
place where their talent of heroic endurance was ingloriously
buried.1 It is much to be lamented that the counsel insi-
1 Gordon and other writers have represented the letter from Rhode Island to Mas
sachusetts as conveying a dignified rebuke of intolerance, and have quoted a passage
to this effect, which they have found somewhere else than in the letter itself. We
shall find in the sequel, that the forbearance exerted by the government of this pro
vince towards the quakers did not last many years.
Roger Williams, who contributed to found the state of Rhode Island, endeavoured,
some years after this period, to extirpate the quaker heresy, by challenging certain
of the leaders of the sect, who had come from England on a mission to their brethren,
to hold a public disputation with him on their tenets. They eagerly accepted his
challenge; and their historians assure us that the disputation, which lasted for seve
ral days, ended " in a clear conviction of the envy and prejudice of the old man."
Gough and Sewell's History of the Quakers. It is more probable that, like other
public disputations, it ended as it began. Williams never doubted that it had issued
in his own favour ; and signalized his triumph by publishing a book bearing the in-
courteous title of George Fox digged out of his Burrow : to which Fox promptly
replied by a publication entitled A New England firebrand quenched, being an
answer to a lying slanderous book by one Roger Williams, confuting his blasphemous
assertions. — Eliot's New England Biography.

298 THE history of
book nuated in this good humoured reply was not embraced. The
______ penal enactments resorted to by the other settlements, served
1656. only to inflame the impatience of the quaker zealots to carry
their ministry into places that seemed to them to stand so
much in need of it : and the persons1 who had been disap
pointed in their first attempt, returned almost immediately to
Massachusetts, and dispersing themselves through the colony,
began to proclaim their mystical notions, and succeeded in
communicating them to some ofthe inhabitants of Salem. They
were soon joined by Mary Clarke, the wife of a tailor in Lon
don, who announced that she had forsaken her husband and six
children, in order to convey a message from heaven, which
she was commissioned to deliver to New England. Instead
of joining with the provincial missionaries in attempts to re
claim the neighbouring savages from their barbarous supersti
tion and profligate immoralities, or themselves prosecuting
separate missions of the same description, the apostles of
quakerism raised their voices against every thing that was
most highly approved and revered in the doctrine and practice
ofthe provincial churches. Seized, imprisoned, and flogged, —
they were again dismissed with severer threats from the
colony, and again they returned by the first vessels they could
procure. The government and a great majority of the colo
nists were incensed at their pertinacity, and shocked at the
impression they had already produced on some minds, and
which threatened to corrupt and subvert a system of piety
whose establishment and perpetuation supplied their fondest
recollections, their noblest enjoyment, and most energetic de
sires. New punishments were introduced into the legislative
enactments against the intrusion of quakers and the profes
sion of quakerism ; and, in particular, the abscission of an
' Except one of the women, Mary Fisher, who travelled to Adrianople, and had
an interview with the Grand Vizier, by whom she was received with courteous re
spect. Bishop, the quaker, in his " New England Judged," observes, that she fared
better among heathens than her associates did among professing Christians. He was
perhaps not aware that the Turks regard insane persons as inspired. But whether
insane or not, she was not altogether divested of a prudential concern for her own
safety ; for " when they asked her what she thought of their prophet Mahomet, she
made a cautious reply, that she knew him not." Kelsey, another quaker, displayed
less prudence and experienced less courtesy from the Turks. He preached in the
streets of Constantinople to crowds who understood not one word of his language j
and, by the advice of Lord Winchilsea, the English ambassador at the Porte, was
punished by the Turkish authorities with the bastinado.

1657.

NORTH AMERICA. 299
ear was added to the former ineffectual severities. Three CHAP.
male quaker preachers endured the rigour of this cruel law. '
But all the exertions of the provincial authorities proved 1658.
quite unavailing, and seemed rather to stimulate the zeal of
the obnoxious sectaries to brave the danger and court the
glory of persecution. Swarms of quakers descended upon the
colony: and, violent and impetuous in provoking persecu
tion,— calm, resolute, and inflexible in sustaining it, — they
opposed their powers of enduring cruelty to their adversaries'
power of inflicting it, — and not only multiplied their converts,
but excited a considerable degree of favour and pity in the
minds of men who, detesting the quaker tenets, yet derived
from their own experience a peculiar sympathy with the virtues
of heroic patience, constancy and contempt of danger. When
the quakers were committed to the house of correction, they
refused to work ; when they incurred pecuniary fines they re
fused to pay them. In the hope of enforcing compliance with
its milder requisitions, the court adjudged two of those con
tumacious persons to be sold as slaves in the West Indies ;
but as even this dismal prospect could not move their stub
born resolution, the court instead of executing its inhuman
threat, reverted to the unavailing device of banishing them
beyond its jurisdiction. It was by no slight provocations,
that the quakers attracted these and additional severities upon
themselves. Men trembled for the faith and morals of their
families and their friends, when they heard the blasphemous
denunciations that were uttered against the worship of " a
carnal Christ ;" and when they beheld the frantic and inde
cent outrages that were prompted by the mystical impressions
which the quakers inculcated and professed to be guided by.
In public assemblies, and in crowded streets, it was the prac
tice of some of the quakers to denounce the most tremendous
manifestations of divine wrath on the people, unless they for
sook their carnal system. One of them, named Faubord,
conceiving that he experienced a celestial encouragement to
rival the faith and imitate the sacrifice of Abraham, was pro
ceeding with his own hands to shed the blood of his son, 
when his neighbours, alarmed by the cries of the lad, broke
into the house and prevented the consummation of this blas
phemous atrocity. Others interrupted divine service in the

300 THE HISTORY OF
B OO K churches by loudly protesting that these were not the sacri-
 L_ fices that God would accept; and one of them illustrated this
1658. assurance by breaking two bottles in the face of the congre
gation, exclaiming, " Thus will the Lord break you° in
pieces." They declared that the scriptures were replete with
allegory, that the inward light was the only infallible guide
to religious truth, and that all were blind beasts and liars who
denied it. The female preachers far exceeded their male asso
ciates in folly, frenzy, and indecency. One of them presented
herself to a congregation with her face begrimed with coal
dust, announcing it as a pictorial illustration of the black pox,
which Heaven had commissioned her to predict as an approach
ing judgment on all carnal worshippers. Some of them in
rueful attire perambulated the streets, proclaiming the imme
diate coming of an angel with a drawn sword to plead with
the people : and some attempted feats that may seem to ve
rify the legend of Godiva of Coventry. One woman, in par
ticular, entered stark naked into a church in the middle of
divine service, and desired the people to take heed to her as a
sign of the times, and an emblem of the unclothed state of their
own souls; and her associates highly extolled her submission
to the inward light, that had revealed to her the duty of illus
trating the spiritual nakedness of her neighbours by the in
decent exhibition of her own person. Another quakeress was
arrested as she was making a similar display in the streets of
Salem. The horror that these insane enormities were fitted to
inspire, was inflamed into the most vehement indignation, by
the deliberate manner in which they were defended, and the
disgusting profanity with which scripture was linked in im
pure association with every thing that was odious, ridiculous,
and contemptible. Among their other singularities, the
quakers exemplified and inculcated the forbearance of even
the slightest demonstration of respect to courts and magis
trates : they declared that governors, judges, lawyers, and
constables were trees that cumbered the ground, and presently
must be cut down, in order that the true light might have
leave to shine, and space to rule alone ; and, forgetting to
what diabolical ends quotation of scripture has been made
subservient, they freely indulged every sally of distempered
fancy, which they could connect, however absurdly, with the

NORTH AMERICA. 301
language of the bible. A quaker woman who was summoned C HA P.
by themovincial court to answer for some extravagance, being 
desired to tell where she lived, refused to give any other answer 1658.
than that she lived in God, " for in him we live, and move,
and have our being." Letters replete with coarse and virulent
railing were addressed by other members of the sect to the
mao-istrates of Boston and Plymouth. Such was the inauspi
cious outset of the quakers in America— a country where a
few years after, under the guidance of sounder judgment and
wiser sentiment and purpose, they were destined to extend the
empire of piety and benevolence, and to found establish
ments that have been largely productive of happiness and
virtue. It has been asserted by some of the modern apologists ot
of the quakers, that these frantic excesses, which excited so
much indignation, and produced such tragical consequences,
were committed, not by genuine quakers, but by the ranters
or wild separatists from the quaker body. Of these ranters,
indeed, a very large proportion appear to have betaken them
selves to America : attracted chiefly by the glory of enduring
persecution,— but in some instances, perhaps, by the hope of
attaining among their brethren in that country a distinc
tion from which they were excluded in England by the
established pre-eminence of George Fox.1 It is certain, how
ever, that these persons assumed the name of quakers, and
traced all their frenzy to the peculiar quaker principle of
searching their own bosoms for sensible admonitions of the
Holy Spirit, independent ofthe scriptural revelation of Divine
will. And many scandalous outrages were committed by
persons whose profession of quaker principles was recognised
1 One of the most noted of these separatists was John Perrot, who, in order to
convert the Pope, had made a journey to Italy, where he was confined for some
time as a lunatic. This persecution greatly endeared him to the quakers, and ex
alted him so much in his own esteem that he began to consider himself more enlight
ened than George Fox. He prevailed with a considerable party among the quakers
to refrain from shaving their beards, and to reject the practice of uncovering their
heads in the act of prayer, as a vain formality. Fox having succeeded, by dint
of great exertions, in stemming these innovations, Perrot betook himself to America,
where he appears to have multiplied his absurdities, and yet propagated them among
the quakers to an amazing extent. Various missions were undertaken by George
Fox and other English quakers to reclaim their brethren in America from the errors
of Perrot, who finally abandoned every pretence to quakerism, and became a strenu
ous assertor of all the doctrines and observances against which he had formerly borne
testimony. Gough and Sewell.

1660

302 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK by the quaker body, and whose sufferings are related, and their
' frenzy applauded, by the pens of quaker writers.1
1658. Exasperated by the repetition and increase of these enor
mities, and the extent to which the contagion of their radical
principle was spreading in the colony, the magistrates of Mas
sachusetts, at length, in the close of this year, introduced into
the assembly a law, denouncing the punishment of death
upon all quakers returning from banishment. This legislative
proposition was opposed by a considerable party of the co
lonists ; and various individuals who would have hazarded
their own lives to extirpate the opinions of the quakers,
solemnly protested against the cruelty and iniquity of shed
ding their blood. It was at first rejected by the asssembly ;
1659. and finally adopted by the narrow majority of a single voice.
In the course of the two following years, this barbarous law
was carried into execution on three separate occasions, — when
four quakers, three men and a woman, were put to death at
Boston. It does not appear that any of these unfortunate
persons had been guilty of the outrages which the conduct
of their brethren in general had associated with the profession
of quakerism. Oppressed bythe prejudice which had been
created by the frantic conduct of others, they were adjudged
to die for returning from banishment and continuing to preach
the quaker doctrines. In vain the court entreated them to
accept a pardon on condition of abandoning for ever the colony
from which they had been repeatedly banished. They an
swered by reciting the heavenly call to continue there, which
on various occasions, they said, had sounded in their ears, in
the fields, and in their dwellings, distinctly syllabling their
names, and whispering their prophetic office and the scene
of its exercise.2 When they were conducted to the scaffold,
their demeanour evinced the most inflexible zeal and courage,
1 See Note VIII. at the end of the volume.
2 The first quakers, instead of following the injunction of our Saviour to his
apostles, that when persecuted in one city they should flee to another, seem to have
found strong attractions in the prospect of persecution. One of those who were put
to death declared, that as he was holding the plough in Yorkshire, he was di
rected by a heavenly voice to leave his wife and children, and proceed to Barbadoes :
but hearing of the banishment of the quakers from New England, and of the severe
punishments inflicted on persons returning there after banishment, he began to
ponder on the probability of his receiving a spiritual direction to proceed thither, and

NORTH AMERICA. 303
and their dying declarations breathed in general the most ele- chap.
vated and affecting piety. These executions excited much "'¦

clamour against the government : many persons were offended 1660.
by the representation of severities against which the establish
ment of the colony itself seemed intended to bear a perpetual
testimony ; and many were touched with an indignant com
passion for the sufferings of the quakers, that effaced all recol
lection of the indignant disgust which the principles of these
sectaries had heretofore inspired. The people began to flock
in crowds to the prisons, and load the unfortunate quakers
with demonstrations of kindness and pity. The magistrates
at first attempted to combat the censure they had provoked,
and published a vindication of their proceedings, for the satis
faction of their fellow-citizens and of their friends in other
countries, who united in blaming them ; but at length the
rising sentiments of humanity and justice attained such gene
ral and forcible prevalence as to overpower all opposition. On
the trial of Leddra, the last of the sufferers, another quaker
named Wenlock Christison, who had been banished with the
assurance of capital punishment in case of his return, came
boldly into court with his hat on, and reproached the magis
trates for shedding innocent blood. He was taken into cus
tody, and soon after brought to trial. Summoned to plead
to his indictment, he desired to know by what law the court
was authorized to put him on the defence of his life. When
the last enactment against the quakers was cited to him, he
asked, Who empowered the provincial authorities to make
that law, and whether it were not repugnant to the jurispru
dence of England 1 The governor very inappositely answered,
that an existing law in England appointed Jesuits to be
hanged. But Christison replied, that they did not even ac
cuse him of being a Jesuit, but acknowledged him to be a
quaker, and that there was no law in England that made
quakerism a capital offence. The court, however, overruled
his plea, and the jury found him guilty. When sentence of
very soon after received it accordingly. Tomkins' and Kendal's Lives, Services
and dying Sayings of the Quakers.
The woman who was executed was Mary Dyer, who, twenty years before, had
been a follower of Mrs. Hutchinson, and a disturber of New England.

304 THE HISTORY OF
book death was pronounced upon him, he desired his judges to con-
111 sider what they had gained by their cruel proceedings against
1660. the quakers. " For the last man that was put to death,"
said he, " here are five come in his room; and if you have
power to take my life from me, God can raise up the same
principle of life in ten of his servants, and send them among
you in my room, that you may have torment upon torment."
The magnanimous demeanour of this man, who seems to have
been greatly superior in understanding to the bulk of his
sectarian associates, produced an impression which could not
be withstood. The law now plainly appeared to be unsup
ported by public consent, and the magistrates hastened to in
terpose between the sentence and its execution. Christison,
and all the other quakers who were in custody, were forthwith
released and sent beyond the precincts of the colony ; and as
it was impossible to prevent them from returning, — only the
minor punishments of flogging and reiterated exile were em
ployed. Even these were gradually relaxed in proportion as
the demeanour of the quakers became more quiet and orderly;
and in the first year after the restoration of Charles the
Second, the infliction of flogging was suspended by a let
ter from the king to governor Endicot,1 and the other
magistrates of the New England settlements, requiring that
no quakers should thenceforward undergo any corporal pu
nishment in America, but if charged with offences that might
seem to deserve such severity, they should be remitted for
trial to England. Happily the moderation of the provincial
government was more steady and durable than the policy of
the king, who retracted his interposition in behalf of the
quakers in the course ofthe following year.
The persecution which was thus happily closed had not
been equally severe in all the New England states : the
quakers suffered most in Massachusetts and Plymouth, and
comparatively little in Connecticut and Newhaven. It was
only in Massachusetts that the inhuman law inflicting capital
1 Endicot was in an especial degree the object of dislike to Charles the Second,
Hutchinson relates that he had seen a letter from the Secretaiy of State some time
after this period, containing an intimation, that " the king would take it well if the
people would leave out Mr. Endicot from the place of governor." But the people
continued to elect him to this office as long as he lived. He died at the age of 77,
in the year 1665, leaving behind him the character of "a sincere puritan." — Holmes.

NORTH AMERICA. 305
punishment upon them was ever carried into effect.1 At a c H A P.
subsequent period, the laws relating to vagabond quakers were II1-
so far revived, that quakers disturbing religious assemblies, or 1660.
violating public decency, were subjected to corporal chastise
ment. But little occasion ever again occurred of executing
these severities; the wild excursions of the quaker spirit
having generally ceased, and the quakers gradually subsiding
into a decent and orderly submission to all the laws except
such as related to the militia and the support of the clergy;
in their scruples as to which, the provincial legislature, with
corresponding moderation, consented to indulge them.2
During the long period that had now elapsed since the
commencement of the civil war in Britain, the New England
provinces had continued to evince a steady and vigorous
growth, in respect both of the numbers of their inhabitants
and the extent of their territorial occupation. The colonists
were surrounded with abundance of cheap and fertile land,
and secured in the enjoyment of that ecclesiastical estate
which was the object of their supreme desire, and of civil and
political freedom. They were exempted from the payment of
all taxes except for the support of their internal government,
which was administered with great economy; and they en
joyed the extraordinary privilege of importing commodities
into England free from the duties which all other importers
were constrained to pay. By the favour of Cromwell, too,
the ordinances by which the Long Parliament had restricted
their commerce, were not put in force; and they continued to
1 This law, though never executed in Connecticut, was embraced by the Assembly
of this province, which also adjudged that " No food or lodging shall be afforded to
a Quaker, Adamite, or other heretic." — Blue Laws of Connecticut, Arts. 13 and 14.
2 Mather. Neal. Hutchinson. Chalmers. Hazaid. Oldmixon. Oldmixon,
who entertained no predilection for either of the parties, has pronounced this impartial
censure on the treatment which the Quakers experienced from the puritan magistrates
of New England. " If the Quakers ran about the streets crying out against the sins
of the people, there might have been a mad-house set apart for them. If Deborah
Wilson marched through Salem stark naked, the hangman might have flogged her
with the more advantage. I meet with some signs of frenzy and folly in the rants
and riots ofthe Quakers, but nothing for which they should have been hanged : and
these New England magistrates acted like the ignorant surgeon, that knew no way of
curing a bad limb but by cutting it off."
My venerated friend, that illustrious Quaker philanthropist William Allen of
London, in the doctrinal and historical Summary prefixed to his edition of Wool-
man's Journal, has related all the sufferings, without making any allusion to the
offences of either the Quakers or the Ranters. He has also erroneously ascribed the
first tolerating law in favour of the Quakers, to Massachusetts instead of Connecticut,
VOL. I. X

306 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK trade wherever they pleased. Almost all the peculiar circum-
______ stances which had thus combined to promote the prosperity
1660, of New England during the suspension of monarchy, con
tributed proportionally to overcast the prospects awakened by
the Restoration. There was the strongest reason to expect
an abridgment of commercial advantages, and to tremble for
the security of religious and political freedom. Various
other circumstances concurred to retard the recognition of the
royal authority in New England. On the death of Cromwell,
the colonists had been successively urged to recognise, first
his son Richard as protector, afterwards the Long Parliament,
which for a short time resumed its ascendancy, and subse
quently the Committee of Safety, as the legitimate organs of
sovereign authority in England. But, doubtful of the stability
of any of these forms of administration, they had prudently
declined to commit themselves by positive declaration. In the
month of July, a vessel, on board of which were Generals
Whaley and Goffe, two of the late king's judges, arrived with
The Res- intelligence of the restoration of Charles the Second; but no
toration. authoritative or official communication of this event was
received ; and England was represented as being in a very
unsettled and distracted condition. Massachusetts had no
inducement to imitate Virginia in a premature declaration for
the king: and while farther intelligence was anxiously ex
pected, Whaley and Goffe were permitted to travel through
the province, and to accept the friendly civilities which many
persons tendered to them, and with which Charles afterwards
bitterly reproached the colonists.1
December. At length authentic tidings were obtained that the royal
authority was firmly established in England, and that com
plaints against the colony of Massachusetts had been pre
sented by various royalists, quakers, and other enemies of its
policy or institutions, to the privy council and the houses of
Address parliament. The general court was immediately convened,
chu^tteto and an acldress voted t0 tne king, in which, with considerable
Chariesthe ability, and with that conformity which they studied to the
ec0" ' language of Scripture, the colonists justified their whole
conduct, professed a dutiful attachment to their sovereign,
1 Hutchinson. Chalmers.

NORTH AMERICA. 307
and entreated bis protection and favour, which they declared CHAP.
themselves the more willing to hope from one who, having In-
been himself a wanderer, was no stranger to the lot and the 1660.
feelings of exiles. Having vindicated their proceedings
against the quakers, by an exposition of the heretical doc
trines that had been introduced and of the seditious and
indecent excesses that had been committed by these sectaries,
they expressed their entire readiness and earnest desire to
defend themselves against every other charge that already
had been or in future might be preferred against them. "Let
not the king hear men's words," they said : " your servants
are true men, fearers of God and the king, and not given to
change, zealous of government and order, orthodox and
peaceable in Israel. We are not seditious as to the interest
of Caesar, nor schismatics as to matters of religion. We dis
tinguish between churches and their impurities ; between a
liviug man, though not without sickness and infirmity, and
no man. Irregularities either in ourselves or others we desire
may be amended. We could not live without the worship of
God : we were not permitted the use of public worship with
out such a yoke of subscription and conformity as we could
not consent unto without sin. That we might, therefore^
enjoy divine worship without human mixtures, without offence
either to God or man, or our consciences, we, with leave, but
not without tears, departed from our country, kindred, and
fathers' houses, into this Patmos." They assimilated their
secession from England to that of " the good old non-con
formist Jacob," from Syria ; but declared that " the provi
dential exception of us thereby from the late wars and
temptations of either party, we account as a favour from God."
They solicited the king to protect their ecclesiastical and
civil institutions, declaring that they considered the chief
value of the latter to consist in their subservience to the cul
tivation and enjoyment of religion. A similar address was
made to Parliament ; and letters were written to Lord Man
chester, Lord Say and Sele, and other persons of distinction,
who were known to be friends of the colony, soliciting their
interposition in its behalf. Leveret, the agent for the colony
at London, was instructed, at the same time, to use every
effort to procure a continuance of the exemption from customs
x 2

308 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK which the colonists had hitherto enjoyed. But before he had
* time to make any such vain attempt, the parliament had al-
1660. ready established the duties of tonnage and poundage over
every portion of the empire. This disappointment, however,
was softened by a gracious answer returned by the king to
1661. the provincial address, and wliich was accompanied by an
order for the apprehension of Whaley and Goffe. So prompt
a display of good will and confidence excited general satis
faction : and a day of thanksgiving was appointed, to ac
knowledge the favour of Heaven in moving the heart of the
king to incline to the desires of the people. With regard to
Whaley and Goffe, the provincial authorities were greatly
perplexed between the obligation of a duty which it was im
possible to decline, and their reluctance to betray to a horrible
fate two men who had lately been members of a government
acknowledged and obeyed by the whole British empire, who
had fled to New England as an inviolable sanctuary from
royal vengeance, and had been recommended to the kindness
of the colonists by letters from the most eminent ministers of
the independent persuasion in the parent state. It is gene
rally supposed, and is sufficiently probable, that intimation
was privately conveyed to the fugitive regicides of the orders
that had been received ; and, although warrants for their
apprehension were issued, and by the industry of the royalists
a diligent search for their persons was instituted, — they were
enabled, by the assistance of their friends, by dexterous
evasion from place to place, and by strict seclusion, to end
their days in New England.1
Alarm of But the apprehensions which the colonists had originally
entertained of danger to their civil and ecclesiastical institu-

the colo'
nists.

1 Mather. Neal. Hutchinson. Chalmers. Small as was the number of
royalists in Massachusetts, it was too great to enable the people to afford permanent
shelter to Goffe and Whaley. But in Newhaven there were no royalists at all ; and
even those who disapproved of the great action of the regicides regarded it (with
more of admiration than abhorrence) as the error of noble and generous minds. Leet,
the governor of Newhaven, and his council, when summoned by the pursuers of
Goffe and Whaley to assist in the apprehension of them, first consumed abundance
of time in deliberating on the extent of their powers, and then protested, that, in a
matter of such importance, they could not act without the orders of an assembly.
The royalist pursuers, incensed at this answer, desired the governor to declare at once
whether he owned and honoured the king; to which he replied, " We do honour
his majesty ; but we have tender consciences, and wish first to know whether he will
own us." Trumbull.

NORTH AMERICA. 30Q
tions, were speedily revived by intelligence that reached Chap.
them from England of the industrious malignity which was m'
exerted in circulating the most unfavourable representations 1661.
of their conduct, — of the countenance that these representa
tions visibly received from the king, — and ofthe vindictive and
tyrannical designs against them which the general opinion
ascribed to the court. It was reported that their commercial
intercourse with Virginia and the West India islands was to
be cut off; that three frigates were preparing to sail from
England, in order to facilitate the introduction of arbitrary
power ; and that this armament was to be accompanied by a
governor-general, whose jurisdiction was to extend over all
the North American plantations. Apprehensions of these
and other changes at length prevailed so strongly in Massa
chusetts, as to produce a public measure of very remarkable
character. The general court, having declared the necessity
of promoting unity of spirit and purpose among the colonists
for the vindication of their provincial liberties, in consistence
with a just recognition of the supreme authority of England,
— appointed a committee of eight of the most eminent persons
in the state to prepare a report, ascertaining the extent of
their rights and the limits of their obedience; and, shortly May.
after, the court, in conformity with the report of the com
mittee, framed and published a series of declaratory resolu- Their de-
tions expressive of their solemn and deliberate opinion onrightslon°
those important subjects. It was declared that the patent
(under God) is the original compact and main foundation of
the provincial commonwealth, and of its institutions and
policy : that the governor and company are, by the patent, a
body politic empowered to confer the rights of freemen ; and
that the freemen so constituted have authority to elect an
nually their governor, assistants, representatives, and all other
officers: that the magistracy, thus composed, hath all re
quisite power, both legislative and executive, for the govern
ment of all the people, whether inhabitants or strangers,
without appeal, except against laws repugnant to those of
England : that the provincial government is entitled by
every means, even by force of arms, to defend itself both by
land and sea against all who should attempt injury to the
province or its inhabitants ; and that any imposition injurious

310 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK to the provincial community, and contrary to its just laws,
II- would be an infringement of the fundamental rights of the
.1661. people of New England. This firm and distinct assertion of
provincial rights was accompanied with a recognition of the
duties to which the people were engaged by their allegiance,
and which were declared to consist in preserving the colony
as a dependency of the English crown, and preventing its
subjection to any foreign prince ; in defending, to the utmost
of their power, the king's person and dominions; and in
maintaining the dignity and prosperity of king and people,
by punishing crimes, and by propagating the gospel.1
These proceedings disclose unambiguously the alarming sus
picions which the colonists had conceived of the character and
policy of their new sovereign, and the firm determination with
which they clung to the dear-bought rights of which they an
ticipated an attempt to bereave them. How far they are to
be considered as indicating a settled purpose to resist tyran
nical aggression by force, is a matter of uncertain speculation.
It is not improbable, that the authors of them hoped, by
strongly proclaiming their rights, and suggesting the extre
mities which an attempt to violate them would legally warrant,
and might eventually provoke, to deter the king from awaken
ing, in the commencement of his reign, the recollection of a
contest which had proved fatal to his father, — and which, if
once rekindled, even to an extent so little formidable as a
controversy with an infant colony must appear, might soon
become less unequal, by presenting an occasion of revival and
exercise to passions hardly yet extinguished in England. If
such were the views of the provincial leaders, the soundness
of them was approved by the event. But, in the mean time,
the provincial authorities in order to manifest a dutiful subor
dination to the parent state, issued the strictest injunctions
for the pursuit and apprehension of Goffe and Whaley, and
intimated, by public resolutions, that no persons obnoxious to
1 Hutchinson. Chalmers. During the subsistence of the commonwealth in Eng
land, John Elliot, the missionary, on one occasion, so far overstepped his proper
functions as to publish a little treatise against monarchical government. The gene
ral court of Massachusetts now deemed it expedient to cite him before them to
answer for this impugnation of regal authority. Elliot acknowledged that he had
acted rashly and culpably ; and, desiring forgiveness, obtained it.

NORTH AMERICA. 31 {
the laws of England, and flying from her tribunals, would re- c H A p.
ceive shelter in a colony that recognised her sovereign autho- II1-
rity. Having now declared the terms on which they recog- 1661.
nised the dominion of the English crown, the general court
caused the king to be solemnly proclaimed as their undoubted August.
prince and sovereign lord. They published, at the same time,
an ordinance prohibiting all disorderly behaviour on the occa
sion, and in particular commanding that none should presume
to drink his majesty's health, " which," it was added, " he
hath, in an especial manner, forbidden," — an injunction the
most alien to the sentiments and habits of the king, and im
puted to him on no better grounds, than that drinking of
healths was prohibited by the statutes of Massachusetts.
This meaningless practice, on account of its heathen original,
had been offensive to the more scrupulous of the puritan
planters, who were desirous in all things to study a literal and
exclusive conformity to the revealed will of God, — and, account
ing nothing unworthy of human regard that afforded occasion
to exercise such conformity, had at length prevailed to have
the ceremonial of drinking healths interdicted by law. Though
many of the colonists entertained little favour or respect for
this regulation, yet almost all of them were desirous that the
restoration of royal authority should not be signalised by a
triumph over any, even the least important, of the provincial
constitutions. Intelligence having arrived soon after of the
progress of the complaints that were continually exhibited to
the privy council against the colony, and an order at the same
time being received from the king, that deputies should be
sent forthwith to England to make answer to those complaints, December.
the court committed this important duty to Simon Bradstreet,
one ofthe magistrates, and John Norton, one ofthe ministers,
of Boston. These agents were instructed to vindicate the
loyalty and justify the conduct ofthe colony; to discover, if
possible, what were the designs which the king meditated, or
the apprehensions that he entertained ; and neither to do nor
submit to any thing prejudicial to the provincial charter.
They undertook their thankless office with great reluctance,
and obtained before their departure a public assurance of
being indemnified by the general court for whatever damage

312 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK they might sustain by detention of their persons or otherwise
1Ij in England.1
1661. Whether from the vigour and resolution that the recent
conduct of the provincial government displayed, or from the
moderation of the wise counsellors by whom the king was
then surrounded, promoted by the influence which Lord Say
and some other eminent persons employed in behalf of the
colony, the agents were received with unexpected favour, and
1662. were soon enabled to return to Boston with a letter from the
The king's king, confirming the provincial charter, and promising to
Mass.36!/0 renew '* ""der the great seal whenever this formality should
setts— be desired. The royal letter likewise announced an amnesty
for whatever treasons had been committed during the late
troubles, to all persons but those who were attainted by act of
parliament, and who had fled, or might hereafter fly, to New
England. But it contained other matters by no means accept
able to the colonists : it required that the general court should
pronounce all the ordinances that had been enacted during
the abeyance of royalty, invalid ; and forthwith revise them,
and repeal every one that might seem repugnant to the royal
authority ; that the oath of allegiance should be duly admi
nistered to every person ; that justice should be distributed in
tbe king's name: that all who desired it should be permitted
to use the book of common prayer, and to perform their devo
tions according to the ceremonial of the church of England ;
that, in the choice of the governor and assistants, or coun
cillors, of the colony, the only qualifications to be regarded,
should be wisdom and integrity, without any reference to
peculiarities of religious faith and profession; and that all
freeholders of competent estates, and not immoral in their
lives, should be admitted to vote in the election of officers,
civil and military, whatever might be their opinions with
respect to church-government. " We cannot be understood,"
it was added, " hereby to direct or wish that any indulgence
should be granted to quakers, whose principles being incon
sistent with any kind of government, we have found it ne
cessary, with the advice of our parliament here, to make a
sharp law against them, and are well content you do the like
' Hutchinson. Chalmers.

NORTH AMERICA. 313
there."1 However reasonable some of the foregoing requisi- CHAP.
tions may now appear, the greater number of them were '
highly disagreeable to the persons to whom they were ad- 1662.
dressed. The colonists considered themselves entitled to
maintain the form of polity in church and state, which they
had fled to a desert in order to cultivate, without the intru
sion and commixture of different principles; and they regarded
with the utmost jealousy the precedent of an interference with
their fundamental constitutions, by a prince who, they were
firmly persuaded, was aiming at present to enfeeble the
system which he only waited a more convenient season to
destroy. To comply with the royal injunctions, they appre
hended, would be to introduce among their children the spec
tacles and corruptions which they had incurred such sacrifices
in order to withdraw from their eyes, — and to throw open every
office in the state to Roman Catholics, Socinians, and every
heretic and unbeliever who might think power worth the pur
chase of a general declaration, that he was (according to his
own unexamined interpretation of the term) a christian. The
king, never deserving, was never able to obtain credit with
his subjects for good faith or moderation: he was from the
beginning of his reign, suspected of a predilection for the
church of Rome ; and the various efforts which he made to
procure a relaxation of the penal laws against the protestant
dissenters in England, were jealously and censoriously regarded
by all these dissenters themselves, — with the solitary excep
tion of the quakers, who considered the other protestants and
the papists as nearly on a level with each other, and were
made completely the dupes of the artifices by which Charles
and his successor endeavoured to introduce the ascendancy of
the Catholic church under the preliminary disguise of uni
versal toleration.
Of all the requisitions in the royal letter, the only one that how far
was complied with was that which directed the judicial pro- w^m1plied
ceedings to be carried on in the king's name. The letter had

1 Hutchinson. Belknap. The royal invitation to persecute the quakers was dis
regarded by the government of Massachusetts. Whether from greater deference to
the king's pleasure or not, the government of Rhode Island, in the year 1665, passed
an act of outlawry against the quakers for refusing to bear arms. — Coll. Mass. Hist.
Soc.

314 THE HISTORY OF
B OO K commanded that its contents should be published in the co-
 L_ lony ; which was accordingly done, — with an intimation, how-
1662. ever, that the requisitions relative to church and state were
reserved for the deliberate consideration which would be ne
cessary to adjust them to the existing constitutions. The
treatment which the provincial agents experienced from their
countrymen, it is painful but necessary to relate. The ill
humour which some ofthe requisitions provoked was unjustly
extended to these men ; and their merits, though at first
gratefully acknowledged, were very soon forgotten. Strongly
impressed with the danger from which the colony had ob
tained a present deliverance, but which still impended over it
from the designs of a prince who visibly abetted every com
plaint of its enemies, the agents increased their unpopularity
by warmly urging, that all the requisitions should be instantly
complied with. Norton, who, on the first inofficial intelligence
that had been received of the king's restoration, had ineffectu
ally counselled his fellow-citizens to proclaim the royal autho
rity, — in now again pressing upon them a measure to which
they were still more averse, — went the length of declaring to
the general court, that if they complied not with the terms of
the king's letter, they must blame themselves for the blood
shed that would ensue. Such language was ill calculated to
soothe the popular disquiet, or recommend an ungracious
cause ; and the deputies, who had been actuated by the most
disinterested zeal to serve rather than flatter their fellow-citi
zens, now found themselves opprobriously identified with the
grievances of the colony, and heard the evils, which it was not
in their power to prevent, ascribed to their neglect or un
guarded concession. Bradstreet, who was endowed with a
robust philosophical temper, was the less stung by this ingra
titude, and entertained his lot without surprise or repining :
but Norton, who was a man of keen and delicate sensibility,
could not behold the altered eyes of his countrymen without
the most painful emotion. When he heard many say of him,
that " he had laid the foundation for the ruin of his country's
liberty," he expressed no resentment, but sunk into a profound
and consuming melancholy. Vainly struggling with his an
guish, and endeavouring to do his duty to the last, he died
soon after of a broken heart. His loss was forthwith regarded

NORTH AMERICA. 315
by the people as at once a signal misfortune and a cutting re- CHAP.
proach ; and the universal mourning that overspread the pro- II1-
vince expressed a late but lasting remembrance of his virtue, 1662.
and bewailed an ungrateful error, which only repentance was
now permitted to repair.1
The colony of Rhode Island had received the tidings of the
restoration with much real or apparent satisfaction. It was
hoped by the inhabitants that the suspension of their charter
by the Long Parliament would more than compensate the de
merit of having accepted a charter from such authority ; and
that their exclusion from the confederacy, of which Massachu
setts was the head, would operate as an additional recommen
dation to royal favour. The restored monarchical government
was proclaimed with eager haste in this colony; and one
Clarke was soon after despatched as deputy from the colonists
to England, in order to carry their dutiful respects to the foot
of the throne, and to solicit a new charter in their favour.
Clarke conducted his negotiation with a baseness that ren
dered the success of it dearly bought. He not only vaunted,
in courtly strains, the loyalty of the inhabitants of Rhode
Island, of which the sole proof he could give was, that they
had bestowed the name of King's Province on a territory ac
quired by them from the Indians; but meeting this year the
deputies of Massachusetts at the court, he publicly challenged
them to cite any one demonstration of duty or loyalty by their
constituents to the present king or his father, from the period
of their first establishment in New England. Yet the inha
bitants of Rhode Island had solicited and accepted a patent
¦from the Long Parliament in tbe commencement of its strug
gle with Charles the First ; while Massachusetts had declined
to make a similar recognition even when the parliament was
at the utmost height of its power and success.2 Clarke .suc
ceeded in obtaining this year3 a charter, which assured to the
inhabitants of Rhode Island and Providence the amplest en-
1 Mather. Hutchinson. See Note IX. at the end of the volume.
3 The Rhode Islanders had also presented an address to the rulers of England in
1659, beseeching favour to themselves, as "a poor colony, an outcast people, for
merly from our mother nation in the bishops' days, and since from the New English
.over-zealous colonies." Douglas' Summary.
a Although the charter was framed in 1662, yet, in consequence of a dispute be-
ween Connecticut and Rhode Island, it was not finally passed till July, 1J363. .

3 1 6 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK joyment of religious liberty, and most unlimited concession of
municipal jurisdiction. Certain of the leading colonists, to-
1662. gether with all other persons who should in future be admitted
charter of freemen of the society, were incorporated by the title of the
incorpora- Governor and Company of the English Colony of Rhode
Rhode Island and Providence. The supreme or legislative power was
Island and invested in an assembly consisting of the governor, assistants,
dence— ant^ representatives elected from their own number by the free
men. This assembly was empowered to enact ordinances and
forms of government and magistracy, with as much conformity
to the laws of England as the state of the country and condi
tion of the people would admit; to erect courts of justice; to
regulate the manner of appointment to places of trust; to in
flict all lawful punishments ; and to exercise the prerogative
of pardon. A governor, deputy-governor, and ten assistants
were appointed to be annually chosen by the assembly ; and
the first board of these officers, nominated by the charter, on
the suggestion of the provincial agent, were authorised to
commence the work of carrying its provisions into execution.
The governor and company were empowered to transport all
merchandise not prohibited by the statutes of the kingdom,
on payment of the usual duties; to exercise martial law when
necessary; and upon just causes, to invade and destroy the
native Indians or other enemies. The territory granted to the
governor and company, and their successors, was described as
that part of the dominions of the British crown in New Eng
land, which embraced the islands in Narraganset Bay, and the
countries and districts adjacent, — which were appointed to be
holden of the manor of East Greenwich in common soccage.
The inhabitants and their children were declared to be entitled
to the same immunities which would have accrued to them if
they had resided or been born within the realm. This is the
first instance of the creation, by a British patent, of an autho
rity of that peculiar description which was then established in
Rhode Island. Corporations had been formerly constituted
within the realm, for the government of colonial plantations:
but now a body politic was created with specific powers for
administering all the affairs of a colony within the colonial ter
ritory. The charter was received with great satisfaction by
the colonists, who entered immediately into possession of the

NORTH AMERICA. 317
democratical constitution which it appointed for them, and c H A P.
continued to pursue the same system of civil and ecclesiastical _______
policy that they had heretofore observed.1 1662.
Though the inhabitants of Connecticut neither felt nor and to
affected the same joy that Rhode Island had expressed at the J^'
restoration of the king, they did not fail to send a deputy to Newha-
England to express their recognition of the royal authority, v
and to solicit a new charter.2 They were fortunate in the
choice of the man to whom they committed this important
duty, John Winthrop, the son of the eminent person of the
same name who had presided with so much honour and virtue
over the province of Massachusetts. Winthrop, deriving ahere-
ditary claim on the kindness of the king, from a friendship
that had subsisted between his own grandfather and Charles
the First,3 employed it so successfully as to obtain for his
constituents a charter in almost every respect the same with
that which had been granted to Rhode Island. The most
considerable differences were, that by the Connecticut charter
the governor was directed to administer the oaths of allegiance
and supremacy to the inhabitants; a formality which was not
required by the charter of Rhode Island, where many of the
people scrupled to take an oath ; and that, by the last-men
tioned charter, liberty of conscience was expressly conceded
in its fullest extent, while the other made no express mention
of the concerns of religion, and no other allusion to them,
1 Chalmers. Hazard.
2 At Newhaven the republican spirit was so strong, that several of the principal
inhabitants declined to act as magistrates under the king. Trumbull. It was here
that Goffe and Whaley found the scurest asylum, and ended their days. When a
party of royal officers were coming in pursuit of them to Newhaven, Davenport, the
minister of the place, preached publicly in favour of the regicides, from the text
(Isaiah, xvi. 3, 4.) " Take counsel, execute judgment ; make thy shadow as the
night in the midst of the noonday ; hide the outcasts ; bewray not him that wan-
dereth. Let mine outcasts dwell with thee, Moab : be thou a covert to them from
the face of the spoiler." Holmes. It is remarkable that Salem and Newhaven, so
highly distinguished among the towns of New England, by the puritan and repub
lican zeal of their founders, have so long continued to be graced by the superior
piety, morality, industry, and prosperity of their inhabitants. Dwight's description
of Newhaven in the commencement of the nineteenth century, is one of the most
agreeable pictures that was ever delineated of a social congregation of mankind. —
Dwight's Travels.
» Mather relates, that when Winthrop presented the king with a ring which
Charles the First had given to his grandfather, " the king not only accepted his
present, but also declared that he accounted it one of his richest jewels, which indeed
was the opinion that New England had of the hand that carried it." See Note X.
at the end of the volume.

318 TIIE HISTORY OF
book than what might seem to be implied in the requisition of the
oath of supremacy. By this charter, Newhaven was united

1662. with Connecticut; an arrangement which for some time did
not obtain the unanimous approbation of the people of New
haven, although they afterwards heartily acquiesced in it; and
the description of the provincial territory was indefinite and
incorrect. But on the whole it gave so much satisfaction,
that Winthrop, on his return, was received with the grateful
approbation of his fellow citizens, and annually chosen go
vernor of the united colony as long as he lived.1
There was thus established by royal charter, both in Con
necticut and Rhode Island, a model of government the most
perfectly democratic, together with the additional singularity
of subordinate political corporations almost wholly discon
nected by any efficient tie or relation with the organ of
sovereign authority. All power, as well deliberative as active,
was invested in the freemen of the corporation or their de
legates; and the supreme executive magistrate of the empire
was excluded from every constitutional means of interposition
or control. A conformity to the laws of England, no doubt,
was enjoined on the provincial legislatures; and this con
formity was conditioned as the tenure by which their privileges
were enjoyed; but no method of ascertaining or enforcing its
observance was provided. At a later period, the crown
lawyers of England were sensible of the oversight which their
predecessors had committed ; and proposed that an act of
parliament should be obtained, requiring those colonies to
transmit the records of their domestic ordinances to Britain
for the inspection and consideration of the king. But this
suggestion was never carried into effect.2
1 Mather. Chalmers. Hazard. ! Chalmers.

NORTH AMERICA. 3 J 9

CHAPTER IV.
Emigration of ejected Ministers to New England. — Royal Commissioners sent
thither. — Petition of the Assembly of Massachusetts to the King — rejected. —
Policy pursued by the Commissioners. — Their Disputes with the Government of
Massachusetts — and Return to England. — Policy of the Colonists to conciliate
the King — Effects of it. — Cession of Acadie to the French. — Prosperous State of
New England. — Conspiracy of the Indians. — Philip's War. — The King resumes
his Designs against Massachusetts. — Controversy respecting the Right to Maine
and New Hampshire. — Progress of the Dispute between the King and the Colony*
— State of Parties in Massachusetts. — State of Religion and Morals in New
England. — Surrender of the Charter of Massachusetts demanded by the King — ¦
refused by the Colonists. — Writ of Quo Warranto issued against the Colony. —
Firmness of the People. — Their Charter adjudged to be forfeited.
Although New England now consisted ofa variety of distinct c ** A P-
and independent jurisdictions, a similar policy naturally esta- 
blished itself in communities founded by men acknowledging 1663-
the same national origin, conducted to America by the same
motives, and assimilated by religious tenets, manners, laws,
and municipal institutions. The commercial system which
the English parliament thought fit to pursue tended still
farther to unite these colonies by identity of views, in
terests, and purposes. The navigation acts which it framed,
and which we have considered at much length in the
history of Virginia, created for a time more discontent
than inconvenience, and served rather to disclose than to
effectuate the restrictions designed to be imposed on the
colonial trade. These restrictions were a copious and conti
nual source of displeasure and controversy between the two
countries. The colonies had been accustomed in their infancy
to a free trade; and its surrender was required with the more
injustice and yielded with the greater reluctance, because
England was not then a mart in which all the produce of the
colonies could be vended, or from which all the wants of their
inhabitants could be supplied. Even in the southern colonies,
where the governors were appointed either by the crown or by
proprietaries connected with the parent state, the act of naviga
tion was very imperfectly executed; and in New England,

320 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK where the governors were elected by the people, it appears,
' for a considerable time, to have been entirely disobeyed.1
1666. While the commercial policy of the English parliament thus
tended to unite the colonies by community of interest and op
position to the parent state, the ecclesiastical policy which now
prevailed in England was calculated to promote among the
colonists the remembrance of the original causes of secession
from her territory, and at once to revive their influence, and
recommend the virtue of toleration by sympathy with the vic
tims of an opposite policy. In consequence of the rigorous
execution of the act of uniformity in the close of the preceding
year, about two thousand of the English clergy, the most
eminent of their order for piety, virtue, and knowledge, were
ejected from the established church ; and, to the astonishment
ofthe prevailing party, sacrificed temporal interest to the dic
tates of conscience. They were afterwards banished to the
distance of five miles from every corporation in England : and
many of them died in prison for privately exercising their
ministry in contravention of the law. While the majority of
them remained in Britain to preserve by their instructions the
decaying piety of their native land, a considerable number
Emigra- were conducted to NewEngland, — there to invigorate American
ejected mi- virtue by a fresh example of conscientious sacrifice, and to
nisters to form a living and touching memorial of the cruelty and injus-
land— tice of religious intolerance. The merits and the sufferings
of these men strongly excited the admiration and sympathy of
the people of New England ; and this year an invitation was
despatched to the celebrated Dr. John Owen, one ofthe most
eminent scholars and divines that the world has ever pro
duced, to accept an ecclesiastical appointment in Massachu
setts. Owen declined to avail himself of this invitation, on
account of the cloud of royal displeasure which he perceived
to be gathering against Massachusetts, and the measures
which he had reason to believe would ere long be adopted for
the subjugation of its civil and religious liberties. Other
countries besides America contended for the honour of shelter-.
ing this illustrious man from the persecution of the church of
England, and for the happiness and advantage expected from
his sojourn. But he preferred suffering in a land where his
1 Chalmers.

NORTH AMERICA. 321
language was understood, to enjoyment and honour among a c H A P.
people with whom his communication must necessarily have _____
been more restricted. At a later period, when the presidency 1663.
of Harvard college was offered to him, he consented to embrace
this sphere of useful and important duty ; and having shipped
his effects for New England, was preparing to accompany
them, when his steps were arrested by an order from Charles,
expressly commanding him not to depart from the kingdom,1
The apprehension which the inhabitants of Massachusetts
had entertained ever since the Restoration, of hostile designs
ofthe English government, and which had been confirmed by
the reasons assigned by Dr. Owen for refusing the first invita
tion which they had tendered to him, was strengthened by all
the intelligence they derived from England. A great number
of the ejected non-conformist ministers who had made prepar
ation for emigrating to Massachusetts, now declined to settle
in a country on which the extremity of royal vengeance was
expected to descend : and at length the most positive informa
tion was received that the king had declared that, although
he was willing to preserve the provincial charter, he was deter
mined to institute an inquiry for the purpose of ascertaining
how far the provisions of this charter had been practically ob
served. It was reported soon after, that the king had asso
ciated this object with the design which he had embraced of
provoking a quarrel with Holland ; and that for this double
purpose he was preparing to despatch an expedition for the
reduction ofthe Dutch settlement of New York, and meant
to send along with it a body of commissioners empowered to
hear and determine (according to their own discretion) all
complaints and disputes that might exist within New Eng
land, and to take every step that they might judge necessary
for settling the peace and security of the country on a solid
foundation. In effect, a commission for these purposes, as E j
well as for the reduction of New York, had already been commis-
issued by the king to Sir Robert Carr, Colonel Nichols, George thither.56"'
Cartwright, and Samuel Maverick. This measure, conspiring
with the reports that had long prevailed of the projects har
boured by the court of England against the liberties of the
colonists, was calculated to strike them with dismay. They
1 Neal. Hutchinson.
VOL. I. Y

322 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK knew that plausible pretexts were not wanting to justify a
 '__ censorious representation of some parts of their conduct: and
1663. they were firmly persuaded that the dislike and suspicion
with which the king regarded them could never be satis
fied by any measure short of the entire abrogation of their
institutions. Various controversies had arisen between the
different settlements, concerning the boundaries of their
respective territories; and loud complaints were preferred
by the representatives of Mason, and by Gorges, and
other members of the old council of Plymouth, of the occu
pation of districts and the exercise of jurisdiction to which
these complainers pretended a preferable right. The claim of
Mason to New Hampshire, derived from the assignment ofthe
Plymouth council, had never been expressly surrendered ; and
Gorges' title to Maine had been confirmed and enlarged by
a grant from the late king in the year 1639. As Gorges
had adhered to the royal cause in the civil wars, the death
of the king proved the temporary demise of his patent:
and he as well as Mason's heirs had long abandoned their
projects, in despair of ever prosecuting them to a successful
issue. But now the restoration of royalty in England pre
sented them with an opportunity of vindicating their claims ;
and the establishment of inhabitants in the territories, pro
mised advantage from such vindication. They had as yet
reaped no benefit from the money they had expended on
their acquisitions : but they now embraced the prospect and
claimed the right of entering upon the labours of others, who
in ignorance of their pretensions had occupied and colonized a
vacant soil, and held it by the title of their purchase from its
native proprietors. In addition to this formidable contro
versy, — many complaints had been preferred by royalists,
quakers, and episcopalians, of abuses in the civil and ecclesi
astical administration of Massachusetts. The investigation
and adjustment of these complaints and controversies were
the principal reasons assigned for the commission. But,
doubtless, the main object of concern to the English court
was the suppression or essential modification of institutions
founded and administered on principles that had so long
¦waged war with monarchy, and so recently prevailed over
it. The colonists readily believed the accounts they received

NORTH AMERICA. 323
from their friends in England of this hostile disposition of c H A P.
their sovereign ; and the proclamation by which they had IV-
cautioned the enemies of his government not to expect shelter 1663.
in Massachusetts, had been intended to remove or appease
it. When intelligence was received of the visitation that
must soon be expected from England, the general court of
Massachusetts appointed a day of solemn fast and prayer
throughout its jurisdiction, in order to implore the mercy of
God under their many distractions and troubles : and deem
ing it a point of the highest importance that the patent
or charter should be kept " safe and secret," they ordered
their secretary to bring it into court, and to deliver it to
four of the members, who were directed to dispose of it in
such manner as they should judge most conducive to its
secure preservation. Aware of the profane licentious man
ners of European sailors and soldiers, and reflecting on the
peculiar strictness ofthe provincial laws, the court adopted at
the same time the most prudent precautions for preventing
the necessity of either a hazardous enforcement, or a pusil
lanimous relaxation of its municipal ordinances.1
On the arrival of the royal expedition at Boston in the 1664.
following year, the commissioners presented their credentials
to the governor and council, and demanded, in the first in
stance, that a troop of provincial militia should be embodied
to accompany the English forces in the invasion of New
York. Endicot, the governor, neither relishing the enterprise,
nor empowered by the forms of the provincial constitution to
levy forces without the consent ofthe general court, judged it
necessary to convoke this body ; but the commissioners, who
had not leisure to await its deliberations, proceeded with the
fleet against New York, desiring that the provincial auxiliaries
should follow as quickly as possible, and signifying to the
governor and council that they had much important business
to transact with them on their return from New York, and that
in the mean time the general court would do well to bestow
a fuller consideration than they seemed yet to have done on
the letter which the king had addressed to them two years be
fore. The vague mysterious terms of this communication
were certainly calculated, and would seem to have been deli-
1 Hutchinson. Belknap. Sullivan. Hazard.
y2

324 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK berately intended, to increase the disquiet and apprehensions
' of the colonists. That they produced this impression is
1664. manifest from the transactions that ensued in the general
court. On the assembling of this body, it was declared by
an immediate and unanimous vote that they were " resolved
to bear true allegiance to his majesty, and to adhere to a
patent so dearly obtained and so long enjoyed by undoubted
right." In compliance with the requisition of the commis
sioners, they equipped a regiment of two hundred men, who
were preparing to embark for New York, when intelligence
arrived that the place had already surrendered, and that the
junction of the English and provincial forces was no longer
necessary. The assembly then resumed consideration of the
king's letter, which had been so emphatically commended to
their attention ; and passed a law extending the elective
franchise to all the inhabitants of English or provincial
birth, paying public rates to a certain amount, and attested
by a minister as orthodox in their religious principles and not
immoral in their lives, whether within or without the pale of
Petition of the established church. They next proceeded to frame and
the as- transmit to the king a petition . strongly expressive of their
Massachu- present apprehensions and their habitual sentiments. They
setts to the represented at considerable length the dangers and difficulties
they had encountered in founding and rearing their settle
ment ; the explicit confirmation which their privileges had
received both from the present monarch and his predecessor;
and their own recognition of royal authority, and willingness
to testify their allegiance in any righteous way. They ex
pressed their concern at the appointment of four commis
sioners, one ot whom (Maverick) was their known and pro
fessed enemy, who were vested with an indefinite authority,
in the exercise of which they were to be guided, not bythe
known rules of law, but by their own discretion ; and they
declared, that even the scarify experience which already they
had obtained of the dispositions of these persons, was suffi
cient to assure them that the powers conferred by the com
mission would be employed to the complete subversion of tiie
provincial constitution. If any advantage was expected from
the imposition of new rules and the infringement of their
liberties, the design, they protested, would produce only dis-

NORTH AMERICA. 325
appointment to its promoters ; for the country was so poor, c H A P.
that it afforded little more than a bare subsistence to its in- '
habitants, and the people were so much attached to their 1664.
institutions that, if deprived of them in America, they would
seek them in new and more distant habitations ; and, if
they were driven out of their present territory, it would not
be easy to find another race of inhabitants who would be will
ing to sojourn in it. 1 They appealed to God, that they
came not into this wilderness to seek great things for them
selves, but for the sake of a quiet life ; and concluded in the
following strains of earnest anxiety : — " Let our government
live, our patent live, our magistrates live, our laws and
liberties live, our religious enjoyments live : so shall we all yet
have farther cause to say from our hearts, Let the king live
for ever." Letters suing for favour and friendly mediation
were addressed at the same time to several of the English
nobility, and particularly to the chancellor, Lord Clarendon.
But these applications were totally unsuccessful. Claren
don was no friend to puritan establishments : he had insti
gated the actually existing persecution against sectaries of
every denomination in England ; and he was at present too
painfully sensible of his declining credit with the king, to risk
the farther provocation of his displeasure by opposing a fa
vourite scheme of royal policy. In a letter to the governor,
he defended the commission as a constitutional exercise of
royal power and wisdom, and strongly indicative of his ma
jesty's grace and goodness; and recommended to the colo
nists, by a prompt submission, to deprecate the consequences
of that indignation which their ungrateful clamour must al
ready have excited in the breast of the king. The answer of
Charles, which was transmitted by Secretary Morrice, to the
petition of the general court, excited less surprise. It re- Rejected.
proached this assembly with making unreasonable and ground
less complaints; justified the commission as the only proper
method of rectifying the provincial disorders; and affected to
1 It is curious to observe the expression of a similar sentiment by the inhabitants
of the province of Arragon in the days of their freedom. It is declared in the pre
amble to one of the laws of Arragon, that such was the barrenness of the country,
that if it were not for the sake of the liberties by which they were distinguished from
other nations, the people would abandon it, and repair in quest of a settlement to
some more fruitful region. — Robertson's History of Charles the Fifth.

32G THE HISTORY OF
book consider the petition as " the contrivance of a few persons
 '_  . who infuse jealousies into their fellow-subjects as if their
1664. charter were in danger." x
No sooner was the conquest of New York completed,2 than
the commissioners addressed themselves to the discharge of
their civil functions in New England. One of the first offi-
1665. cial acts that they had occasion to perform, was the adjust
ment of a dispute respecting boundaries, that arose out of the
occupation of New York. A patent had been granted to the
Duke of York, of all the territory occupied or claimed by the
Dutch, including large districts that had been already com
prehended in the charter of Connecticut. A controversy con
cerning limits had thus been created by the act of the crown,
between the state of Connecticut and the new province desig
nated by the patent of the Duke of York. Their boundaries
were now adjusted by the commissioners in a manner which
appears to have been highly satisfactory to the people of
Connecticut, but which entailed a great deal of subsequent
dispute. Another controversy, in which Connecticut was in
volved, arose out of a claim to part of its territory preferred
by the Duke of Hamilton, and other persons, in virtue of
rights that had accrued to themselves or their ancestors as
members of the grand council of Plymouth. The commis
sioners, desirous of giving satisfaction to both parties, adjudged
the property of the disputed soil to these individual claimants,
butdeclared the power of government to pertain to Connecticut.
Policypur- It appears manifestly to have been their policy to detach the
sued by 0ther New England states from the obnoxious province of Mas-
the com- ° . r
missiouers. sachusetts, and to procure their co-operation (by the example or
implicit submission on their own part, and the accumulation of
complaints against this province,) in the design of abridging
her liberties and altering her institutions. In the prosecution of
this policy they were but partially successful. The people of
Connecticut received the commissioners with frigid respect,
and plainly showed that they disliked their mission, and re
garded the cause of Massachusetts as their own. Nay, so
strongly were they impressed with the danger to their liberties
from the interposition of such arbitrary power, that some dis-
' Hutchinson. Chalmers. ! See Book V. chap. i. post.

NORTH AMERICA. 327
agreements, which had subsisted between Connecticut and chap.
Newhaven, and which had hitherto prevented their union in IV-
conformity with the recent charter, were entirely composed by 1665.
the very tidings of the approach of the commissioners. At
Plymouth the commissioners met with little opposition ; the
inhabitants being deterred from the expression of their senti
ments by a consciousness of their weakness, and being ex
empted from the apprehensions that prevailed in the provinces
of greater consideration by a sense of their insignificance. In
Rhode Island alone was their insidious policy attended with
success. There, the people received them with studious de
ference and submission ; their inquiries were answered, and
their mandates obeyed or assented to without any demur to
the authority from which they emanated : and during their
stay in this settlement they were enabled to amplify their
reports with numberless complaints against the injustice and
misgovernment alleged to have been committed in Massa
chusetts. The inhabitants of Rhode Island, as we have seen,
had gained their late charter by a display of subservience and
devotion to the crown ; and the liberal institutions which it
introduced had not yet had time to form a spirit that dis
dained to hold the enjoyment of liberty by so ignoble a
tenure. The freedom thus spuriously begotten was tainted in
its birth by principles that long rendered its existence pre
carious ; and we shall find these colonists, a few years after,
abjectly proposing to strip themselves of the rights which
they had gained so ill, and of which they now showed them
selves unworthy, by their willingness to co-operate in attack
ing the liberties of Massachusetts. We must not, however,
discard from our recollection that Rhode Island was yet but
a feeble community, and that the unfavourable sentiments
with which many of its inhabitants regarded Massachusetts,
arose from the persecution which their religious tenets had
experienced in this province. Their conduct to the commis
sioners received the warmest approbation from Charles, who
assured them that he would never be unmindful of the claims
they had acquired on his goodness by a demeanour so replete
with duty and humility.1 Injustice to the king, whose word
1 Hutchinson. Chalmers.

328 THE HISTORY OF
book was proverbially the object of very little reliance, we may
' observe that he does not appear ever after to have withdrawn
1665. his favour from Rhode Island ; and in justice to a moral lesson
that would be otherwise incomplete, we may here so far trans
gress the pace of time as to remark, that when Charles's
successor extended to Rhode Island the same tyrannical
system which he introduced into the other New England
provinces, and when the people endeavoured to avert the
blow by a repetition of the abjectness that had formerly
availed them, their prostration was disregarded, and their com
plete subjugation pursued and accomplished with an insolence
that forcibly taught them to detest oppression and despise
servility. It was in Massachusetts that the commission was expected
to produce its most important effects; and from the difference
between the views and opinions entertained by the English
government and the provincial authorities, it was undoubtedly
foreseen that the proceedings of the commissioners would
provoke the most resolute opposition. Among other commu
nications which the commissioners were charged to convey to
the colonists, was, that the king considered them to stand
in precisely the same relation to him as the inhabitants of
Kent or Yorkshire in England. Very different was the
opinion which the colonists themselves entertained. They
considered that, having been forced by persecution to depart
from the realm of England, and having established themselves
by their own unassisted efforts in territories which they had
purchased from the original proprietors, they retained no
other political connexion with their sovereign than what was
created by their charter, which they regarded as the sole
existing compact between the English crown and themselves,
and as defining all the particulars and limits of their obe
dience. The acknowledged difference of sentiment in religion
and politics between themselves and their ancient rulers, in
which their settlement had originated, and the habits of self-
government that they had long been enabled to indulge,
confirmed these prepossessions, and had tended generally and
deeply to impress the conviction that their primitive allegiance
as natives of England and subjects of the British crown was
entirely dissolved, and superseded by the stipulations which

NORTH AMERICA. 329
they had voluntarily contracted by accepting their charter, chap.
Such opinions, though strongly cherished, it was not prudent ' '

distinctly to profess ; but their prevalence is attested by a 1665.
respectable provincial historian, on the authority of certain
manuscript compositions of the leading persons in Massa
chusetts at this period, which he had an opportunity of
perusing. The colonists were not the less attached to these
notions, from the apprehension that they would find as little
favour in the eyes of the English government as the tenets
which had led to the persecution and emigration of their an
cestors: they were indeed quite repugnant to the principles
of the English law, which holds the allegiance of subjects to
their sovereign, not as a local or provincial, but as a perpetual
and indissoluble tie, which distance of place does not sunder,
nor lapse of time relax. Forcibly aware of these differences
of opinion, of the dangerous collisions which might result from
them, and of the disadvantage with which they must conduct
a discussion with persons who sought nothing so much as to
find or make them offenders, the colonists awaited, with much
anxiety, the return of the commissioners to Boston.1
The character and disposition of these commissioners in
creased the probability of an unfriendly issue to their discus
sions with the provincial authorities. If conciliation was, as
the king professed, the object which he had in view in in
stituting the commission, he was singularly unfortunate in
the selection of the instruments to whom the discharge of its
important duties was confided. Nichols, indeed, was a man
of honour, good sense, and ability ; but it was mainly for the
reduction and subsequent governance of New York, that he
had been appointed to accompany the expedition: he remained
at that place after its capitulation; and when he afterwards
rejoined his colleagues, he found himself unable to control
their conduct, or repair the breach which they had already
occasioned. The other commissioners appear to have been
utterly destitute of the temper,2 sense, and address wliich
1 Hutchinson.
2 The senselessness of their conduct is strongly illustrated by a case related at con
siderable length by the provincial historians. They had been drinking one Saturday
night in a tavern after the hours when, by the provincial laws, all taverns weie
ordered to be shut. A constable, who warned them not to infringe the law, was

330 THE HISTORY OF
B OO K their office demanded ; and Maverick added to these defects
' an inveterate hostility to the colony which had induced him
1665. for years to solicit the functions which he now hastened to
p"' execute with malignant satisfaction. On their return to
putewith '^oston' tne very first communication which they addressed
the govern- to the governor demonstrated the slight respect they enter-
MMsachu- tainecl for tne provincial authorities ; for they required that all
setts— the inhabitants ofthe province should be assembled to receive
and reply to their communication; and when the governor
desired to know the cause of this requisition, they answered,
" that the motion was so reasonable, that he who would not
attend to it was a traitor." Perceiving, however, that this
violent language served rather to confirm the suspicions than
to shake the resolution of the provincial magistrates, they
condescended for a while to adopt a more conciliating tone,
and informed the general court that they had favourably re
presented to the king the promptness with which his com
mands had been obeyed in the equipment of a provincial
regiment : but it was soon ascertained that they had actually
transmitted a representation of perfectly opposite import.
The suspicions which the commissioners and the general
court reciprocally entertained of each other, prevented, from
the very first, any cordial co-operation between them. The
communications of the commissioners display the most lofty
ideas of their own authority as representatives of the crown,
with a preconceived opinion that there was an indisposition on
the part of the general court to pay due respect to that au
thority, as well as to the source from which it was derived.
The answers of the general court manifest an anxious desire to
avoid a quarrel with the king, and to gratify his Majesty by
professions of loyalty and submission, and by every municipal
change that seemed likely to meet his wishes, without com
promising the fundamental principles of their peculiar polity.

beaten by them. Hearing that Mason, another constable, had declared that he
would not have been deterred by their violence from doing his duty, they sent for
him, and extorted from him an admission that he would have arrested the king him
self if he had found him drinking in a public-house after lawful hours. They in
sisted that he should be tried for high treason, and actually prevailed to have this in
justice committed. The jury returned a special verdict; and the court, considering
the words offensive and insolent, but not treasonable, inflicted only a slight punish
ment. Hutchinson.

NORTH AMERICA. 331
They expressed, at the same time, a deliberate conviction of C HA P.
having done nothing that merited displeasure or required apo- .

logy, and a steady determination to abide by the charter. The 1665.
correspondence gradually degenerated into an altercation. At
lenath, the commissioners demanded from the court an ex-
plicit answer to the question, if they acknowledged the au
thority of his Majesty's commission ? but the court desired to
be excused from giving any other answer, than that they ac
knowledged the authority of his Majesty's charter, with which
they were much better acquainted. Finding that their object
was not to be gained by threats or expostulations, the com
missioners attempted a practical assertion of their pretensions :
they granted letters of protection to persons who were prose
cuted before the provincial tribunals; and in a civil suit,
which had been already determined by the provincial judges,
they promoted an appeal to themselves from the unsuccessful
party, and summoned him and his adversary to plead their
cause before them. The general court, apprised of this step,
perceived that they must now or never make a stand in de
fence of their authority ; and, with a decision which showed the
high value they entertained for their privileges, and the vigour
with which they were prepared to guard them, they publicly
proclaimed their disapprobation of this measure, and declared
that, in discharge of their duty to God and the king, and in
faithfulness to the trust reposed in them by the king's good
subjects in the colony, they must protest against the proceed
ings of the commissioners, and disclaim friendship with all
who would countenance or abet them. They accompanied
this vigorous demonstration with an offer to compromise the
dispute by hearing the cause themselves in presence of the
commissioners ; but this proposition was scornfully rejected,
and every effort to establish harmony between these conflicting
authorities proved unavailing.
Suspending for a time their operations at Boston, the
commissioners repaired to New Hampshire and Maine ; and
instantly pronouncing sentence in favour of the claims of
Mason and Gorges against the jurisdiction of Massachusetts,
they suppressed the existing authorities, and erected a new
system of government in each of those provinces. On their
return to Boston, the general court declared that these mea-

332 THE HISTORY OF
book sures tended to the disturbance of the public peace, and de-
manded a conference with the commissioners, which was re-
1665. fused with an asperity of reproach that put an end to all
farther communication. Sir Robert Carr even went the
length of assuring the general court that the king's pardon
for their manifold treasons during the civil war had been
merely conditional, and was now forfeited by their evil beha
viour ; and that the contrivers of their late measures would
speedily endure the same punishment which their associates
in rebellion had recently experienced in England,
The king having been apprised of these transactions, and
assured by the commissioners that it was fruitless for them lo
prolong a discussion with persons who were determined to
misconstrue all their words and actions, issued letters, recalling
1666. these functionaries to England, expressing his satisfaction with
and return the conduct of all the colonies except Massachusetts, and com-
land"S" manding the general court of this province to send deputies to
answer in his presence the charges preferred against their coun
trymen. But the inhabitants of Massachusetts were aware
that in such a controversy they had not the most remote chance
of success, and that it was not by resonable pleas, or the
cogency of argument that they could hope to pacify the dis
pleasure of their sovereign. Instead of complying with his
injunction, the general court addressed a letter to the secretary
of state, in which they hinted real or pretended doubts of the
authenticity of the royal mandate, and declared thattheircause
had already been so plainly and minutely unfolded, that the
ablest among them would be utterly unable to render it any
Policy of clearer. At the same time they endeavoured to appease his
the colo- majesty by humble addresses expressive of their loyalty; and
conciliate in order to demonstrate the sense they attached to these pro-
the king— fessjonSj they purchased a ship-load of masts, which they
presented to the king ; and learning that his fleet in the West
Indies was distressed by want of provisions, they promoted a
contribution among themselves, and victualled it at their own
cffectsofit. expense. Charles accepted their presents very graciously;
and a letter under the sign manual having been transmitted
to the general court, declaring that their zeal for the royal ser
vice was " taken well by his majesty," the cloud that had
gathered over the colony in this quarter seemed for the pre-

NORTtf AMERICA. 333
sent to be dispersed.1 Nevertheless, the design that had c H A P.
been so far pursued, of remodelling the institutions of New IV-
England, was by no means abandoned. The report of the com- 1666.
missioners had furnished Charles with the very pretexts that
were wanting to the accomplishment of his plans : and the
measures which he embraced at a later period, demonstrated
that it was not the dutiful professions or liberalities of the co
lonists that would deter him from availing himself of the ad
vantages which he had made such efforts to obtain. But the
dreadful affliction of the plague which broke out with such
violence as in one year to destroy ninety thousand of the in
habitants of London, and to banish for a time the seat of
government to Oxford — the great fire of London 2 — the wars
and intrigues on the continent of Europe, — and the rising
discontents of the people of Britain, so forcibly engaged the
attention of the king, as to suspend, for a while, the execu
tion of his designs against the institutions of New England.
After the departure of the royal commissioners, the pro
vinces of New England enjoyed for some years a quiet and
prosperous condition. The only disturbance which their in
ternal tranquillity sustained, arose from the persecutions which
in all the states, except Rhode Island, continued to be waged
against the anabaptists, as these sectaries, from time to time,
attracted attention by attempting to propagate their tenets.
Letters were written in their behalf to the provincial magis
trates by the most eminent dissenting ministers in England :
but though it was strongly urged by the writers of these let-
1 Hutchinson. Chalmers.
2 A liberal contribution was made by the people of Massachusetts, and transmitted
to London for relief of the sufferers by the fire. Hutchinson. The people of New
Englani have always been honourably distinguished by their charitable participation
of the misfortunes of other communities. In the year 1703, they contributed 2,000/.
for the relief of the inhabitants of Nevis and St. Christophers, which had been
ravaged by the French. Holmes. In the same year they had an opportunity of
showing that their hands were as ready to repel the danger as to relieve the calami
ties of their friends. The planters of Jamaica having besought the assistance of
New England to repel an invasion that was apprehended from the French, two regi
ments were promptly embodied and despatched for this purpose to Jamaica, where
they remained two years. Oldmixon (2d edit.) Military aid was not the only
benefit which the West India planters derived from New England, which appears
frequently to have supplied them, at their request, with ministers of religion.
Holmes. Of the generous exertions of the New Englanders, both for the instruction
and defence of the colonists of Carolina, some notice will be found in Book IV.
chap. ii. and Book VIII. chap. ii. post.

334 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK ters, that the severe persecution which the anabaptists were
' then enduring in the parent state should recommend them to
1666. the sympathy of the colonists, and that their conversion was
more likely to be accomplished by exemplifying to them the
peaceable fruits of righteousness than by attacking their doc
trinal errors with penal inflictions, which could have no other
effect than to render them martyrs or hypocrites ; the inter
cession, though respectfully received, was completely unavail
ing. The provincial authorities persisted in believing that
they were doing God service by employing the civil power
with which they were invested, to guard their territories from
the intrusion of heresy, and to maintain the purity of those re
ligious principles for the culture and preservation of which
their settlements had been originally founded. A considera
ble number of anabaptists were fined, imprisoned, and
banished : and persecution produced its usual effect of con
firming the sentiments and propagating the tenets which it
sought to extirpate, by causing their professors to connect
them in their own minds, and to exhibit them to others in
connection with suffering for conscience sake. These pro
ceedings, however, contributed more to stain the character of
the colonists than to disturb their tranquillity. Much greater
lg67 disquiet was created by the intelligence ofthe cession of Aca-
Cession of die, or, as it was now generally termed, Nova Scotia, to the
the French. French bY tbe treatv of Breda. Nothing had contributed
more to promote the commerce and security of New England
than the conquest of that province by Cromwell ; and the
inhabitants of Massachusetts, apprised of the extreme soli
citude of the French to regain it, and justly regarding such an
issue as pregnant with mischief and danger to themselves, sent
agents to England to remonstrate against it. But the in
fluence of France prevailed with the British monarch, over the
interest of his people ; and the conduct of Charles on this
occasion, betrayed as much indifference for the external secu
rity of the colonies, as his previous measures had disclosed for
their domestic liberties. The French regained possession of
their ancient settlement : and both New England and the
mother country had afterwards abundant cause to regret the
admission of a restless and ambitious neighbour, who for a
long course of time exerted her peculiar arts of intrigue to

NORTH AMERICA. 335
interrupt the pursuits and disturb the repose of the British C HA P.
colonists. 1 ' 

The system of government that prevailed in Massachusetts 1667.
coincided with the sentiments of a great majority of the people ;
and even those acts of municipal administration that imposed
restraints on civil liberty were reverenced on account of their
manifest design, and their supposed efficiency to promote an
object which the people held dearer than civil liberty itself.
A printing-press had been established at Cambridge for up
wards of twenty years ; and the general court had recently
appointed two persons to be licensers of the press, and pro
hibited the publication of any book or other composition that
had not received their censorial approbation. The licensers
having sanctioned the publication of Thomas a Kempis' ad- 1668,
mirable treatise De fmitatione Christi, the court interposed, and,
declaring that " the book was written by a popish minister,
and contained some things less safe to be infused among the
people," recommended a more diligent revisal to the licensers,
and in the meantime suspended the publication. In a consti
tution less popular, a measure of this nature would have been
regarded as an outrage upon liberty. But the government of
Massachusetts expressed, and was supported by, the sen
timents and opinions of the people; and so generally respected
was its administration, that the inhabitants of New Hamp
shire and Maine, rejecting the constitution which they had
received from the royal commissioners, again solicited and
were received into the rank of dependencies on its jurisdic
tion. All traces of the visitation of these commissioners hav- Prosperous
ing been thus effaced, and the apprehensions that their ^ate ^
measures had excited, forgotten, the affairs of the New Eng- land.
land colonies continued for several years to glide on in a
course of silent but cheerful prosperity.2 The navigation act
1 Neal. Chalmers.
2 In the year 1672, the laws of Connecticut (till then preserved in manuscript,
and promulgated by oral proclamation) were collected into a code, printed, and pub
lished. The preface, written with great solemnity, commences in this manner : 
" To our beloved brethren and neighbours, the inhabitants of Connecticut, the gene
ral court of that colony wish grace and peace in our Lord Jesus." It was ordered
that every householder should have a copy of the code, and should read it weekly to
his family. Trumbull. The legislators of Connecticut seem to have thought, like
Agesilaus, that the duties of a citizen should form part of the earliest education of a
child. In Connecticut, by a law of 1667 (still subsisting), three years' voluntary separa-

33G THE HISTORY OF
BOOK not being aided by the establishment of an efficient custom-
 house, and depending for its execution upon officers annually
1668— elected by their own fellow-citizens, was completely disregarded.
The people enjoyed a commerce practically unrestricted: a
consequent increase of wealth was visible among the mer
chants and farmers ; and habits of industry and economy
continuing to prevail with unabated force, the plantations
underwent a progressive improvement, and many new settle
ments arose. From a document preserved in the archives
of the colonial office of London, and published by Chalmers,
1673. it appears, that in the year 1673, New England was esti
mated to contain one hundred and twenty thousand souls, of
whom about sixteen thousand were able to bear arms; and of
the merchants and planters there were no fewer than five thou
sand persons, each of whom was worth 3000/. 1 Three-fourths
of the wealth and population of the country centred in the ter
ritory of Massachusetts and its dependencies. The town of
Boston alone contained fifteen hundred families. Theft was
rare, and beggary unknown in New England. Josselyn, who
returned about two years before this period from his second
visit to America, commends highly the beauty and agreeable-
ness of the towns and villages of Massachusetts and Connec
ticut, and the substantial structure and interior comfort of
all the private dwellings.2 During this interval of tranquil
prosperity, many of the more aged inhabitants of New Eng
land closed the career of a long and eventful life ; and
the original race of settlers was now almost entirely ex
tinguished. The annals of this period are filled with
accounts of their deaths, — of the virtues by which they
had contributed to the foundation of the new commonwealth ;
and of the fondness with which their closing eyes lingered
upon its flourishing estate. To our retrospective view, en-

tion of married persons is held to dissolve their matrimonial engagement. It is
stianoe that a law departing so widely from the injunctions of scripture, should have
gained admission into the codes of Scotland and of New England,— two countries
long distinguished above all others by the general and zealous desire of their people to
harmonize their municipal institutions with the canons of scripture.
1 John Dunton, who visited New England about twelve years after this period,
mentions a merchant in Salem worth 30,000/. — Dunton's Life and Errors.
'* Josselyn's Second Voyage. Even at this early period Josselyn has remarked
the pievalence of that inveterate but unexplained peculiarity, ofthe premature decay
of the teeth of white persons, and especially women, in North America.

NORTH AMERICA. 337
larged by the knowledge which history supplies of the im- CHAP.
pending calamities from which these persons were thus sea- _

sonably removed, not the least enviable circumstance of their 1673.
lot appears to have been that they died in scenes so fraught
with serene enjoyment and agreeable promise, and bequeathed
to their descendants at once the bright example of their virtue,
and the substantial fruits of it, in a singularly happy and
prosperous condition. Yet, so short-sighted and fallacious
are the prospects of men, — so strongly are they led by an in
stinctive and unquenchable propensity to figure and desire
something better than they behold, — and so apt to restrict to
the present fleeting and disordered scene the suggestions of
this secret longing after original and immortal perfection, — .
that many of the fathers of the colony, even when, full of
days and honour, they beheld their latter end crowned with
peace, could not refrain from lamenting that they had been
born too soon to see more than the first faint dawn of New
England's glory. Others, with greater enlargement of wisdom
and piety, remembered the scriptural declaration that the eye
is not satisfied with seeing ; acknowledged that the conceptions
of an immortal spirit are incapable of being adequately filled
by any thing short of the vision of its Divine Author, for
whose contemplation it was created ; and were contented to
drop like leaves into the bosom of their adopted country, and
resign to a succeeding race the enjoyment and promotion of
her glory, in the confidence of renovated existence in scenes
of more elevated and durable felicity.1
The state of prosperous repose which New England had 1674.
enjoyed for several years was interrupted by a general con- Conspi-
spiracy of the Indian tribes, that produced a war so bloody racy of the
and formidable as to threaten for some time the utter destruc- n ians"
tion of all the settlements. This hostile combination was
promoted by a young chief whose history reminds us of the
exploits of Opechancanough in Virginia. He was the second
son of Massassoiet, a prince who had ruled a powerful tribe
inhabiting territories adjacent to the settlement of Plymouth
at the time when the English first occupied the country. The
father had entered into an alliance with the colonists, and,
after his death, his two sons expressed an earnest desire to
' Hutchinson. Chalmers. Neal.
VOL. I. Z

338 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK to retain and cultivate their friendship. They even requested
. of the magistrates of Plymouth, as a mark of identification
1674. with their allies, that English names might be given them ;
and, in compliance with their desire, the elder had received the
name of Alexander, and the younger of Philip. But these ex
pressions of good will had been prompted entirely by the arti
fice that regulated their schemes of hostility ; and they were
both shortly after detected and disappointed in a treacherous
attempt to involve the Naragansets in hostilities with the colo
nists. The haughty spirit of the elder brother was overwhelmed
by this disgrace. Unable to brook the detection and discom
fiture of his perfidy, and perhaps resenting the generous
clemency of the colonists as an aggravation of his infamy, he
abandoned himself to despair, and died of the corrosion of
rage and mortification. Philip, after the death of his brother,
renewed the alliance between his tribe and the English; but
intended nothing less than the fulfilment of his engagements.
Subtle, yet fierce, artful and dissembling, yet stern in adven
turous purpose and relentless cruelty, he meditated a universal
conspiracy of the Indians for the extirpation of the colonists,
and for several years pursued this design as secretly and suc
cessfully as the numerous difficulties that surrounded him
would permit. Next to the growing power of the European
settlers, nothing seemed to excite his indignation more
strongly than the progress of their missionary labours ; and,
in reality, it was to these labours, and some of the conse
quences they had produced, that the colonists were indebted for
their preservation from the ruin that would have attended the
success of Philip's machinations. Some of the tribes to whom
he applied, revealed his propositions to the missionaries ; and
several Indians who had embraced his schemes were per
suaded by their converted brethren to renounce them. The
magistrates of Plymouth had frequently remonstrated with
him on the dishonour he incurred and the danger he provoked
by the perfidious machinations of which from time to time
they obtained information ; and by renewed and more
solemn engagements than before, he had endeavoured to
disarm their vigilance and allay their apprehension. For two
or three years before the present period, he had pursued his
hostile projects with such successful duplicity as to elude

NORTH AMERICA. 339
discovery and even suspicion; and had now succeeded in CHAP.
uniting some of the fiercest and most powerful of the Indian

tribes in a confederacy to make war on the colonists to the 1674.
point of extermination.
A converted Indian, who was labouring as a missionary
among tbe tribes of his countrymen, having discovered the
plot, revealed it to the governor of Plymouth, and was soon
after found dead in a field, with appearances that strongly
betokened assassination. Some neighbouring Indians, sus
pected of being the perpetrators of this crime, were appre
hended, and solemnly tried before a jury consisting half of
English and half of Indians, who returned a verdict of guilty.
At their execution one of the convicts confessed the murder, —
declaring, withall, that its commission had been planned and
instigated by Philip : and this crafty chief, alarmed at the
dangerous disclosure, now threw off the mask, and summoned
his confederates to his aid. The states of Massachusetts,
Plymouth, and Connecticut took arms for their common de
fence, — having first employed every means to induce Philip to
accommodate the quarrel by a friendly treaty. But a blood
less issue was not what Philip desired ; and being now fully
assured that the season of secret conspiracy was over, he
rejected all negotiation, and commenced a general war, which 1675.
was carried on with great vigour and various success. JjJllp s
Though Philip's own tribe supplied no more than five hundred
warriors, he had so increased his force by alliances that he
was able to bring three thousand men into the field. This
formidable body, conducted by a chief who was persuaded
that the war must terminate in the total ruin of one or other
of the conflicting parties, made exertions of which the In
dians had been hitherto supposed incapable. Several battles
were fought, and all the fury, havoc, and cruelty which dis
tinguish Indian warfare were experienced in their fullest ex
tent. Wherever the enemy marched, their route was marked
with slaughter, fire, and desolation. Massachusetts and Ply
mouth were the states that suffered principally from the con
test. There, especially, the Indians were so mingled with
the European colonists that there was scarcely a part of the
country which was not exposed to danger, or a family which
had not to bewail the loss of a relative or friend. It is a
z2

340 THE HISTORY OF
book truth that has not been sufficiently adverted to, that in all
' the Indian wars of this period, the savages, from the condi-
1675. tion of the country, their own superior acquaintance with it,
and their peculiar habits of life, and qualities of body and
mind, enjoyed advantages which well nigh counterbalanced
the superiority of European skill. They seemed to unite the
instinct and ferocity of the brutal creation, with the art and
sagacity of rational beings. Changing their own encamp
ments with facility, and advancing upon those ofthe colonists
with the dexterous secrecy of beasts of prey, -with them
there was almost always the spirit and audacity of attack, and
with their adversaries the disadvantages of defence and the
consternation produced by surprise ; nor could the colonists
obtain the means of attacking in their turn without following
the savages into forests and swamps, where the benefit of
their higher martial qualities was lost, and the system of
European warfare rendered impracticable. The savages had
long been acquainted with fire-arms, and were remarkably
expert in the use of them.
For some time the incursions of the enemy could not be re
strained ; and every enterprise or skirmish in which they reaped
the slightest credit or advantage, increased the number of
their allies. The savage artifice, however, which Philip em
ployed in one instance for the purpose of recruiting his
forces, recoiled with merited injury on himself. Resorting
with some of his adherents to the territority of a neutral
tribe, he caused certain of the people who belonged to it to be
surprised and assassinated ; and then repairing to the head
quarters of the tribe, he declared that he had seen the murder
committed by a party of the Plymouth soldiers. The tribe in
a flame of rage declared war on the colonists: but their vin
dictive sentiments soon took another direction ; for one of
the wounded men having recovered his senses, made a shift
to crawl to the habitations of his countrymen, and, though
mortally injured, was able to disclose the real author of the
tragedy before he died. Revoking their former purpose, the
tribe thereupon declared war on Philip, and espoused the
cause of his enemies. Hostilities were protracted till near
the close of the following year, when, at length, the steady
efforts and invincible courage of the colonists prevailed; and

NORTH AMERICA. 341
after a series of defeats, and the loss of all Iris family and c H A P.
chief counsellors, Philip himself was killed by one of his own 1V"
tribe whom he had offended. Deprived of its chief abettor, i676.
the war was soon terminated by the submission ofthe enemy. August.
From certain of the tribes, however, the colonists refused to
accept any submissions, and warned them before their sur
render that their treachery had been so gross and unprovoked,
and their outrages so atrocious and unpardonable, that they
must abide the award of criminal justice. In pursuance of
these declarations, some of the chiefs were tried and executed
for murder ; and a number of their followers were transported
to the West Indies, and sold for slaves. Never before had
the people of New England been engaged in a warfare so
fierce, so bloody, or so desolating. Many houses and flourish
ing villages were reduced to ashes ; and in the course ofthe war
six hundred persons of European birth or descent, composing
the flower and strength of several of the districts, either fell in
battle, were massacred in their dwellings, or expired beneath the
tortures inflicted by the savages on their captives. The military
efforts ofthe colonists in these campaigns were thought, and
justly, perhaps, to disclose less of tactical skill than had been
displayed in the Pequod war. They were indeed no longer
commanded by the experienced officers who had accompanied
their ancestors from Europe ; and they were opposed to an
enemy much more formidable than the Pequods. But the
calm determined courage that they manifested, was worthy of
men whose characters were formed under institutions no less
favourable to freedom than virtue, and who fought in defence
of all they held dear and valuable. Among other officers,
Captain Church of Massachusetts, and Captain Denison of
Connecticut have been particularly celebrated by the pro
vincial historians for their heroic ardour and fortitude. In
the commencement of the war, the surprising treachery
practised by the hostile Indians, excited strong apprehensions
of the defection of the Indian congregations which the mis
sionaries had collected and partly civilized. But not one of
these people proved unfaithful to their benefactors.1
The Indian warfare by which New England had been deso-
i Mather. Neal. Hutchinson. See Note XI. at the end of the volume,

342 THE HISTORY OF
book lated during this period, was not bounded by the hostilities of
. Philip and his confederates. An attack was made at the same
1676. time on New Hampshire and Maine, by the tribes that were
situated in the vicinity of these settlements. The Indians
complained that they had been defrauded and insulted by
some of the English traders in that quarter:1 but strong sus
picions were entertained that their hostilities were promoted
by the French government, now re-established in Acadie.
The invasion of those territories was distinguished by the
usual guile, ferocity, and cruelty of the savages. Many of
the inhabitants were massacred, and others carried into capti
vity. Prompt assistance was rendered to her allies by Massa
chusetts; and after a variety of severe engagements, the
Indians sustained a considerable defeat. They were, however,
still able and willing to continue the war; and both their
numbers and their animosity were increased by a measure
which the provincial government adopted against them. It
was proposed to the general court of Massachusetts to invite
the Mohawk tribe, who, from time immemorial, had been the
enemies of the eastern Indians, to make a descent on their ter
ritories at this juncture. The lawfulness of using such auxili
aries was questioned by some ; but it was thought a satisfac
tory answer to the objection, that Abraham had confederated
with the Amorites for the recovery of his kinsman Lot from the
hands ofa common enemy; and messengers were accordingly
despatched to solicit the co-operation of the Mohawks. Little
entreaty was necessary to induce tbem to comply with the in
vitation : and a body of Mohawk warriors quickly marched
against their hereditary foes. The expedition, however, so far
from producing the slightest benefit, was attended with serious
1 One of these complaints was occasioned by the brutal act of some English sailors
in overturning an Indian canoe in which they observed an infant child, in order to
ascertain the truth of a story they had heard, that swimming was as natural to a young
Indian as to a young duck. The child died in consequence of the immersion; and
its father, who was highly respected as a necromancer by the Indians, became the
inveterate enemy of the English. Belknap. An action that excited still greater
resentment was committed by Major Waldron, of New Hampshire, during the war.
He had made a treaty of friendship with a body of 400 Indians : but on discovering
that some of them had served in Philip's army, he laid hold of these by a stratagem
and sent them as prisoners to Boston. Their associates never forgave this breach of
compact ; and thii teen years after, a party of them having surprised the major in his
house by a stratagem still more artful than his own, put him to death by the most
horrible inflictions ofcruclty. Ibid.

NORTH AMERICA. 343
disadvantage to the cause of the colonists. The Indians, who CHAP.
were their proper enemies, suffered very Tittle from the Mohawk

invasion ; and some powerful tribes, who had been hitherto at 1676.
peace with the colonists, exasperated by injuries or affronts
which they received from those invaders, now declared war
both against thern and their English allies. At length, the
intelligence of the defeat of Philip, and the probability of
stronger forces being thus enabled to march against them, in
clined the eastern Indians to hearken to proposals of peace.
The war in this quarter was terminated by a treaty highly fa
vourable to the Indians, to whom the colonists became bound
to pay a certain quantity of corn yearly as a quit-rent for their
lands.1 Although the neighbouring province of New York was now
a British settlement, no assistance was obtained from it by the
New England states in this long and obstinate conflict with
the Indians. On the contrary, a hostile demonstration from
that quarter had been added to the dangers of the Indian war.
Andros, who was then governor of the newly acquired pro
vince, having claimed for the Duke of York a considerable.
tract of land really forming part ofthe Connecticut territory,
asserted the denied pretension of his master by advancing
with an armament against the town and fort of Saybrook,
which he summoned to surrender. The inhabitants, though at
first alarmed to behold the English flag unfurled against
them, quickly recovered from their surprise ; and hoisting the
same flag on their walls, prepared to defend themselves against
the assailants. Andros, who had not anticipated such reso
lute opposition, hesitated to fire upon the English flag; and,
learning that Captain Bull, an officer of distinguished bravery
and determination, had marched with a party of the Connec
ticut militia for the defence of the place, judged it expedient
to abandon his enterprise and return to New York.2
The suspension of the Indian hostilities was not attended
1 Neal. Hutchinson. Belknap. Hutchinson's History of Massachusetts, and
Belknap's History of New Hampshire, are the best of the modern historical produc
tions of North America. Trumbull's History of Connecticut is a more elaborate
performance than either of them : but this author unfortunately has encumbered his
woik with a chronicle of parochial settlements and petty details, and bestowed a most
disproportioned attention on the biography of the clergy and the transactions of ec
clesiastical synods.
a Trumbull.

344 THE HISTORY OF
B o o K with a restoration of the happiness and tranquillity which they
 !  had interrupted. The king had now matured the scheme of
1676. arbitrary government, which he steadily pursued during the
resume"5 remainder of his inglorious reign ; and the colonists, while yet
ins designs afflicted with the smart of their recent calamities, were sum-
Massachu- moned to abide a repetition of their ancient controversies
setts. with the crown, which they had vainly hoped were forgotten
or abandoned by the English government.1 Instead of appro
bation for the bravery and the manly reliance on their own
resources with which they had conducted their military opera
tions, and repelled hostilities partly occasioned by the dis
regard which the mother country had shown for their interests
in restoring Acadie to the French, — they found themselves
overwhelmed with reproaches for a seditious obstinacy in re
fusing to solicit assistance from the king, and a sordid parsi
mony in the equipment of their levies, which (the British
court declared) had caused the war to be so greatly protracted,
and rendered them utterly unfit to be longer intrusted with
the government of a country in which their sovereign pos
sessed so large a stake. Indications of the revival of royal
dislike and of the resumption of the king's former designs had
occurred before the conclusion ofthe war with Philip. While
hostilities were still raging in the province, the government of
Massachusetts found it necessary to direct a part of its atten
tion to the claims of Mason and Gorges with respect to New
Hampshire and Maine. In the summer of 1676, Randolph, a
messenger despatched by the king, announced to the general
court that a judgment would be pronounced by his majesty in
council against the pretensions of the province, unless, within
six months, deputies were sent to plead in its favour; and as
letters were received at the same time from the friends of the
colonists in England, giving assurance that the king was de
termined to fulfil his threat, and that any instance of contu
macy on the part ofthe provincial government would but acce
lerate the execution of more formidable designs on which the
English court was deliberating, the royal message received
immediate attention, and Stoughton and Bulkeley were de-
' See Note Xlf . at the end of the volume.

NORTH AMERICA. 345
spatched as deputies to represent and support the interests of c Ii A P.
Massachusetts.1 '
The respective titles and claims of the parties having been 1677-
submitted to the consideration of the two chief justices ofve°°yro'
England, the legal merits of the question were soon extracted respecting
by their experienced eyes from the confused mass of incon- toejjj^iae
sistent grants in which they had been involved. It was and New
adjudged that municipal jurisdiction in New Hampshire was s^f~
incapable of being validly conveyed by the council of
Plymouth, and had therefore reverted to the crown on the
dissolution of the council, with reservation, however, of
Mason's claims upon the property of the soil, — a reservation
which for many years rendered all the property in New
Hampshire insecure, and involved the inhabitants in con
tinual inquietude, dispute, and litigation. As Gorges, in
addition to his original grant from the Plymouth council, had
procured a royal patent for the province of Maine, the entire
property both seignorial and territorial of this province was
adjudged to be vested in him. In consequence of this de
cision, the jurisdiction of Massachusetts over New Hampshire
ceased ; but it was preserved in the province of Maine by an
arrangement with the successful claimant. The king had
been for some time in treaty for the purchase of Maine,
which he designed to unite with New Hampshire, and to
bestow on his natural son the Duke of Monmouth; but,
straitened for money, and expecting no competitor in the
purchase, he had deferred the completion of the contract.
The government of Massachusetts, aware of this, and urgently
solicited by the inhabitants of Maine to prevent their terri
tories from being dismembered from its jurisdiction, directed
its agent to purchase the title of Gorges, which he very wil
lingly agreed to sell for twelve hundred pounds. This
transaction gave great offence to the king, who peremptorily
insisted that the authorities of Massachusetts should wave
their title and relinquish the acquisition to him: but they
firmly declined to gratify him by such compliance, and main
tained that their conduct needed no other justification than
1 Hutchinson.

346 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK its conformity to the wishes of the people of Maine. The
' inhabitants of New Hampshire were no less reluctant to be
1677. separated from Massachusetts; but they were compelled to
submit, and to recieve a royal governor.1 One of the first
acts of their legislature was to vote a grateful address to
Massachusetts, acknowledging the former kindness of this co
lony, and protesting that only the commands of the king had
now interrupted a connexion which it was their anxious desire to
have preserved. The government that had been thrust upon
them proved incapable of preserving tranquillity or command
ing respect. The attempts that were made to enforce Mason's
title to the property of the soil, and to render the inhabitants
tributary to him for the possessions which they had purchased
from others and improved by their own labour, excited the
most violent ferments, and resulted in a train of vexatious but
indecisive legal warfare.2 Cranfield, the governor, after in
volving himself in controversies and altercations with the
planters and their legislative assembly, in which he was con
tinually foiled, transmitted an assurance to the British govern
ment, " that while the clergy were allowed to preach, no
true allegiance could be found in those parts." He wreaked
his vengeance upon some nonconformist ministers, to whose
eloquence he imputed the resolute spirit of the people, and
whose general denunciations against vice he construed into
personal reflections on himself and his favourites, — by arbi
trarily commanding them to administer the sacrament to him
according to the liturgy of the church of England, and com
mitting them to prison on receiving the refusal which he ex
pected. His misgovernment at length provoked a few rash
individuals hastily, and without concert, to revolt against his
' In the first commission that was issued for the government of this province, the
king engaged lo continue to the people their ancient privilege of an assembly " un
less by inconvenience arising therefrom, he or his heirs should see cause to alter the
same." Belknap.
2 The people were sometimes provoked to oppose what they termed swamp law to
parchment law. An irregular j udgment having been pronounced in favour of Mason,
against some persons who refused to submit to it, the governor sent a party of
sheriff's officers to serve a writ on them while they were in church. The congrega
tion was incensed at this proceeding ; a young woman knocked down a sheriffs
officer with her bible ; and the attack becoming general, the whole legal army was
routed. It was found necessary to abandon the judgment. — Belknap.

NORTH AMERICA. 347
authority. The insurrection was suppressed without the CHAP.
slightest difficulty ; and the insurgents having been arraigned  •__
of high treason, were convicted and condemned to die. But 1677.
Cranfield, conscious of the unpopularity of his government,
had exercised an unfair and illegal control in the selection of
the jury, which excited universal indignation: and afraid to
carry his sentence into effect within the colony, he adopted
the strange and unwarrantable proceeding of sending the
prisoners to be executed in England. The English govern
ment actually sanctioned this irregularity, and were preparing
to execute the sentence of a provincial magistrate, and to ex
hibit to the people of England the tragical issue ofa trial, with
the merits of which they were totally unacquainted, when a
pardon was obtained for the unfortunate persons, by the soli
citation of Cranfield himself, who, finding it impracticable to
maintain order in the province, or to withstand the numerous
complaints of his injustice and oppression, had solicited his
own recall. Shortly after his departure, New Hampshire
spontaneously reverted to the government of Massachusetts,
and shared her fortunes till the period of the British revolu
tion. x
Although the troubles of the Popish Plot began now to en- 1678.
gage and perplex the mind of the king, he was no longer to pr0gressof
be diverted from his purpose of attempting the subjugation of bhe^Pute
Massachusetts; and though the concern of the Duke of the king
Monmouth with that celebrated imposture and the connexions "£ *e
he had formed with the profligate Shaftesbury and its other
promoters, might diminish the king's regret for the privation
of the appanage which he had meant to bestow on him, yet
the presumptuous interference of Massachusetts to defeat this
transaction had highly inflamed his displeasure and fortified
his tyrannical resolution. That additional pretexts might not
be wanting to justify his measures, every complaint that could
be collected against the colony was promoted and encouraged.
The quakers who had refused, during the Indian war, either
1 Hutchinson. Chalmers. Belknap. These events, and the particular history
of New Hampshire at this period, are related in considerable detail, with every ap
pearance of accuracy, and with much spirit, good sense, and liberality, by Dr. Belk
nap. It is to this author's History of New Hampshire that I refer, wherever his
" American Biography" (the very inappropriate title of a valuable work) is not ex
pressly mentioned.

348 THE HISTORY OF
B o 0 K to perform military service or to pay the fines imposed on de-
 1  faulters, complained bitterly of the persecution they had in-
1678. curred by the exaction of those fines, as well as of the law
which obliged them to contribute to the maintenance of the
provincial clergy. When the dangers ofthe Indian war were
at their height, some of the colonists apprehending that these
calamities were a judgment of Heaven upon the land for har
bouring such heretics as the quakers within its bosom, pro
cured the re-enactment of an old law, prohibiting assemblies
for quaker worship; and though it does not appear that this
law was executed, its promulgation was justly regarded as per
secution, and alienated the regards of many persons who had
hitherto been friends of the colony. The agents who had been
deputed to defend the interests of Massachusetts in the con
troversies respecting New Hampshire and Maine, were de
tained to answer the complaints of the quakers, — gravely pre
ferred by these sectaries to a government which was itself
administering with far greater rigour upon them the very
policy which it now encouraged them to impute to one of its
own provincial dependencies as the most scandalous cruelty
and injustice. Other and more serious imputations contri
buted to detain the agents and increase their perplexity.
Randolph, who was distinguished by a staunch and sagacious
activity in support of the views and interests of arbitrary
power, and whom the people of New England described as
" going up and down seeking whom he might devour," had
ably and diligently fulfilled his instructions to collect as much
matter of complaint as he could obtain within the colony;
and loaded with tbe hatred ofthe people, which he cordially re
ciprocated, he now returned to England and opened his
budget of arraignment and vituperation. The most just and
most formidable of his charges was, that the navigation
act was entirely disregarded, and a free trade pursued by
the colonists with all parts of the world. This was a
charge which the agents could neither deny nor extenuate;
and they anxiously pressed their constituents to put an
end to the occasion of it. Any measures which the
king might adopt, either for promoting the future efficacy of
the navigation acts, or punishing the past neglect which they
had experienced, were the more likely to coincide with the

NORTH AMERICA. 349
sentiments of the English people, from the interest which a c H A P.
considerable portion of the mercantile class of their country

men enjoyed in the monopoly which it was the object of those 1678.
laws to secure. A petition had been presented to the king
and privy council by a number of English merchants and
manufacturers, complaining of the disregard of the navigation
acts in New England, and praying that they might hereafter
be vigorously executed, for the sake of promoting the trade of
the parent state, as well as of preserving her dominion over
her colonies. That a stronger impression might be made on
the public mind, the petitioners were solemnly heard in pre
sence of the privy council, and suffered to plead at great
length in support of their commercial complaints and political
views. The general court of Massachusetts, alarmed by these 1679.
proceedings, at length intimated, by letter to their agents,
that "they apprehended the navigation acts to be an invasion
of the rights, liberties, and properties of the subjects of his
majesty in the colony ; — they not being represented in parlia
ment ; and, according to the usual sayings of the learned in
the law, the laws of England being bounded within the
four seas, and not reaching to America." They added,
however, that, " as his majesty had signified his pleasure
that those acts should be observed in Massachusetts, they
had made provision, by a law of the colony, that they
should be strictly attended to from time to time, althouo-h
it greatly discouraged trade, and was a great damage to
his majesty's plantation." These expressions, and the re
cent provincial law to which they refer, demonstrate the
peculiar views which were entertained by the people of
Massachusetts of the connexion that subsisted between
themselves and the parent state. Their pretensions were the
same with those which a few years after were advanced by
the people of Ireland; — that, although dependent on the
crown, and obliged to conform their jurisprudence, as far as
possible, to the law of England, the statutes of the English
parliament did not operate within their territory, till re-
enacted, or otherwise recognised, by their own domestic
legislature. So fully did this notion possess the minds of the
people of New England, and so obstinately did their interests
resist the execution of the commercial regulations, that t

even

350 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK the submissive province of Rhode Island, although, about
' this time, in imitation of Massachusetts, it took some steps
1679. towards a conformity with these regulations, never expressly
recognised them till the year 1700, when its legislature em
powered tbe governor "to put the acts of navigation in
execution."1 The provincial agents, aware of the strong interests that
prompted their countrymen still to overstep the boundaries of
their regulated trade, furnished them with correct information
of the threatening aspect of their affairs in England, and
assured them that only an entire compliance with the navi
gation acts could shelter them from the impending storm of
royal tyranny and vengeance. These honest representations
produced the too frequent effect of unwelcome truths : they
diminished the popularity of the agents, and excited sus
picions in Boston that they had not advocated the interests
of the colony with sufficient zeal. The people were always
too apt to suspect that their deputies in England were over
awed by the state, and infected with the subservience that
prevailed at the royal court ; and they neglected to make due
allowance for the different aspect which a dispute with Eng
land presented to men who beheld face to face her vast estab
lishments and superior power, and to those who speculated
on the probability of such dispute at the opposite extremity of
the Atlantic ocean. The agents at length obtained leave to
return ; and though some impatience and ill humour had
been excited by their fidelity in the discharge of a disagreeable
duty, the deliberate sentiments of their countrymen were so
little perverted, that when the king again intimated his desire
of the re-appointment of agents in England, the colonists
twice again elected the same individuals to their former office,
— which, however, these persons could never again be per
suaded to undertake. They carried back with them to Ame
rica a letter containing the requisitions of the king, of which
the most material were, that the formula of the oath of alle
giance should be rendered more explicit, and should be sub
scribed .by every person holding an office of trust in New
1 Neal. Hutchinson. Chalmers.

NORTH AMERICA. 351
England ; that all civil and military commissions should be c H A P.
issued in the king's name ; and all laws repugnant to the

English commercial statutes abolished. The general court, 1679.
eagerly indulging the hope that, by a compliance with these
moderate demands, they could appease their sovereign and
avert his displeasure, proceeded instantly to enact laws in
conformity with his requisitions. They trusted that he had
now abandoned the designs which they had been taught to
apprehend ; and which, in reality, were merely suspended by
the influence of the proceedings connected with the popish
plot, and with the parliamentary bill that was in agitation for
excluding the Duke of York from the throne. Although the
requisitions which the king had transmitted by the hands of
Stoughton and Bulkeley were obeyed, he continued to inti
mate, from time to time, his desire that new agents might be
appointed to represent the colony in London : but partly from
the apprehensive jealousy with which the colonists regarded
such a measure, and partly from the reluctance that prevailed
among their political leaders to undertake so arduous and
delicate an employment, the king's desires on this point were
not complied with. The short interval of independence which
the colonists were yet permitted to enjoy was very remote
from a state of tranquillity. Randolph, who had commended
himself to the king and his ministers by the diligence and
activity with which he co-operated with their views, was ap
pointed collector of the customs at Boston ; and a custom
house establishment, which some years before had been erected
without opposition in Virginia and Maryland, was now ex
tended to New England.1 But it was in Massachusetts that
this measure was intended to produce the effects which it was
easily foreseen would result from its own nature, as well as
from the temper and the unpopularity of the person who was
appointed to conduct it. The navigation acts were evaded in
Rhode Island, and openly contemned and violated in Con-
1 As a measure, partly of tenor, and partly of punishment, it was determined by
the English privy council, about this time, " that no Mediterranean passes shall be
granted to New England, to protect its vessels against the Turks, till it is seen what
dependence it will acknowledge on his majesty, or whether his custom-house officers
are received as in other colonies." — Chalmers.

352 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK necticut : yet these states were permitted to practise such
' irregularities without reprehension. It seems to have been
1679. less the execution of the commercial statutes themselves that
the king desired, than the advantage which would accrue
from an attempt to enforce them after such long neglect in the
obnoxious province of Massachusetts. To this province he
confined his attention ; and justly considered that the issue of
a contest with it, would necessarily involve the fate of all the
other settlements in New England. Randolph now exercised
his functions with the most offensive rigour, and very soon
complained that the stubbornness of the people defeated all
his efforts, and presented insuperable obstacles to the execu
tion ofthe laws. Almost every suit that he instituted for the
recovery of penalties or forfeitures issued in a judicial sen
tence against himself. He repaired to England in order to
1680. lay his complaints before his employers, and returned invested
with more extensive powers, in the exercise of which he was
not more successful. He reproached the provincial autho
rities with injustice and partiality : and they denied the
charge and accused him of unnecessary and vexatious litiga
tion. The requisitions and remonstrances which the king
continued to address to the general court from time to
time, were answered by professions of loyalty, and by partial
compliances : but on one point, the colonists seemed to have
determined either entirely, or as long as possible, to evade the
royal will : and, though repeatedly directed, they still delayed,
State of to send deputies to England. The general court was at this
Massachu- t'me divided between two parties, who cordially agreed in the
setts. esteem and attachment by which they were wedded to their
chartered privileges, but differed in opinion as to the extent to
which it was expedient to contend for them. Bradstreet, the
governor, at the head of the moderate party, promoted every
compliance with the will of the parent state short of a total
surrender of the civil and ecclesiastical constitution of Massa
chusetts. Danforth, the deputy-governor, at the head of
another party, obstructed the appointment of deputies, and
opposed all submission to the acts of trade; maintaining that
the colonists should adhere to the strict construction of their
charter, resist every abridgment of it as a dangerous prece
dent, no less than an injurious aggression, and standing firm

NOHTH AMERICA. 353
in defence of their utmost right, commit the event to Divine c H A P.
Providence. These parties conducted their debates with '
warmth, but without acrimony; and as the sentiments of one 1680.
or other alternately prevailed, a greater or lesser degree of
compliance with the demands of the king was infused into the
undecided policy of the general court.1
The scene of trouble and misfortune in which the New
England communities had for a series of years been involved,
could not fail to produce a grave and earnest impression on
the minds of men habituated to regard all the events of life in
a religious aspect; and contributed to revive among the
descendants of the original planters, the piety for which New
England had been at first so highly distinguished. A short
time before the commencement of their troubles, a natural
phenomenon2 that excited much awe and tribulation at the
time, and was long pondered with earnest and solemn remem
brance, was visible for several nights successively in the hea
vens. It was a bright meteor in the form of a spear, of which
the point was directed towards the setting sun, — and which,
with slow majestic motion, descended through the upper re
gions ofthe air, and gradually disappeared beneath the horizon.
This splendid phenomenon produced a deep and general im
pression on the minds of the people : and the magistrates,
without expressly alluding to it, acknowledged and endea
voured to improve its influence by taking the opportunity to
promote a general reformation of manners. Circular letters
were transmitted to all the clergy, urging them to increased
diligence in exemplifying and inculcating the precepts of reli
gion, especially on the young, and instructing their parishioners
from house to house. The dupes of science, falsely so called,
may deride these impressions, and ascribe to ignorant wonder
the piety which they enkindled : but enlightened philosophy
will confess the worth and dignity of that principle which re
cognises in every display of the great phenomena of nature,
an additional call to worship and glorify its Almighty Creator,
1 Hutchinson. Chalmers. From a report presented this year (1680) to the
lords of trade, it appears that Connecticut then contained twenty-one churches, each
of which had its minister; a militia of 2500 men ; a very few indented servants, and
thirty slaves. Holmes.
a In the Journal of John Evelyn there are descriptions of the occurrence of simi
lar phenomena in England, in the years 1643 and 1680.
VOL. I. A A

354 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK and which elevates and refines human faculties by placing
' every object that forcibly strikes them in a noble and graceful
1680. light derived from connexion with the interests of morality
reiiritm an(^ tne honour of God. The events of the Indian war, the
and morals agricultural losses that were occasioned by the severity of the
England, ensuing season, and, latterly, the disquiet excited by the con
tentions with the English government, served, in like manner,
to humble the people beneath the hand of that Sovereign
Power which controls the passions of men as well as the ele
ments of nature ; and were equally productive of increased
diligence in the cultivation of piety and the reformation of
manners. Deeply lamenting the moral imperfections and
deficiencies which they experienced in themselves and re
marked in those around them, many of the ministers, magis
trates, and principal inhabitants of Massachusetts and Con
necticut urgently besought their countrymen to consider if the
interruption of Divine favour did not betoken neglect of the
Divine will ; and by precept and example laboured to eradi
cate every evil habit or licentious practice that a state of war
and an influx of commercial wealth were supposed to have
produced. Men were strongly exhorted to carry a continual
respect to the Divine will into the minutest ramifications of
their affairs, and to refine and sanctify whatever they did by
doing it to the Lord. The general court published a catalogue
ofthe epidemical vices ofthe times, in which we find enume
rated, neglect of the education of children, pride displayed in
the manner of cutting and curling hair, excess of finery, im
modesty of apparel, negligent carriage at church, failure in
due respect to parents, a sordid eagerness of shopkeepers to
obtain high prices, profane swearing, idleness, and frequenting
of taverns. Grand juries were directed to make presentment
of offenders in these respects : but either the happier influ
ence of example and remonstrance was sufficient to control
the obnoxious practices, or they never attained such extent
of prevalence as to justify the infliction of legal severities.1
In many instances the scrupulous piety of the provincial ma
gistrates has reprobated existing vices, and the extent to
which they prevailed, in language which is apt to beget mis-
1 Neal. Hutchinson. Trumbull.

NORTH AMERICA. 355
apprehension, if it be interpreted in conformity with the gene- CHAP'
ral notions and tone ofthe world : and, hence, a writer no less '
acute than Chalmers has fallen into the gross mistake of de- 1680.
riving a charge of extraordinary immorality against the inha
bitants of Massachusetts from the very circumstances that
prove the strength of their piety, the purity of their moral
habits, and the still higher purity of their moral aspirations.
The strong sense that true religion awakens of the depraved
propensities inherent in human nature, causes the expression
of the moral sentiments of truly religious men to appear to
the world as the ravings of hypocritical cant or fanatical
delusion.1 The king had never lost sight of his purpose of remodelling
the constitution of Massachusetts: but on this point, some
moderation had been latterly enforced upon him by the more
personal and pressing concern of resisting the attempts of
Shaftesbury to re-enact the deep and daring policy of the
Duke of Guise, and control his sovereign by the formation
and supremacy of a protestant league in England. While
Shaftesbury and his party were able to retain their influence
on the public mind by the artifice of the popish plot, and to
attack the monarchy by the device of the exclusion bill, it
was probably deemed unsafe to signalize the royal administra
tion by any public act of extraordinary tyranny in a province
so eminent for zeal in the protestant cause as Massachusetts.
But Charles had now obtained a complete victory over his 1681.
domestic adversaries ; and, among other excesses of retaliatory
violence and arbitrary power by wliich he hastened to improve
his success, be instituted writs of quo warranto against the
principal corporations in England, and easily obtained judg
ments from the courts of law that declared all their liberties
and franchises forfeited to the crown. About two years before
this period, he had deliberated on the possibility of superseding
entirely the constitution of Massachusetts without the inter-
1 After this manner the New England ministers were accustomed to address their
hearers. " It concemeth New England always to remember that they are originally
a plantation religious, not a plantation of trade. Let merchants, and such as are in
creasing cent, per cent., remember this, that worldly gain was not the end and
design of the people of New England, but religion. And if any man among us
make religion as twelve, and the world as thirteen, such an one hath not the spirit of
a true New Englandman." — Higginson's Election Sermon, 1663, apud Belknap.
A A 2

356 THE HISTORY OF
B oo K mediate recourse of any legal solemnity ; but, on consulting
 ' Jones and Winnington, the attorney and solicitor general, he
1681. learned that his object could not be securely or effectually
attained except by the instrumentality of a writ of quo war
ranto, which at that time it was not deemed expedient to
employ. But now every impediment to the gratification of
his wishes was removed ; and the colonists received such in
telligence from their friends in England as permitted them no
longer to doubt that the abrogation of their charter was finally
resolved on, and was to be instantly attempted. Randolph,
who made numerous voyages between England and America,
and had lately affixed a protest on the exchange of Boston
against the legitimacy ofthe provincial government and its offi
cial acts, now brought from London a letter from the king, dated
the 26th of October, 1681, recapitulating all the complaints
against the colony, and commanding that deputies should
instantly be sent to him, not only to answer these complaints,
but " with powers to submit to such regulations of government
as his majesty should think fit;" which, if the colonists should
fail to do, it was intimated that a writ of quo warranto would
be directed against their charter. A new criminatory charge,
suggested by the inquisitive hostility of Randolph, was at the
same time preferred against them, — that they coined money
within the province in contempt of the king's prerogative.
The general court, in answer te this sudden arraignment of a
practice which had been permitted so long to prevail without
objection, explained in what manner and at what time it had
originated, and appealed to these circumstances as decisively
proving that no contempt of royal authority had been de
signed ; but, withal, declared that if it were regarded as a
trespass on his majesty's prerogative, they humbly entreated
pardon for the offence, and indulgence for the ignorance under
which it had been committed. Among the other complaints
that were urged by the king, — were the presumptuous purchase
of the province of Maine, which the colonists were again com
manded to surrender, and the disallowance of religious worship
except on the model of the congregational churches within the
colony. To the first of these they answered by repeating their
former apology, and still declining what was required of them;
and to the second, that liberty of worship was now granted to

NORTH AMERICA. 357
all denominations of christians in Massachusetts. The royal CH A i».
letter contained many other charges ; but they were all an- ' ^

swered by solemn protestations that either the commands they 1681.
imported had been already fulfilled, or the disobedience they
imputed had not been committed. An assembly of the gene- Feb. 1682.
ral court having been held for the purpose of electing deputies
to represent the province in England, and Stoughton again
declining to accept this office, it was conferred on Dudley and
Richards, two of the wealthiest and most respectable citizens
of Massachusetts. But as the powers which the royal letter
required that they should be invested with, of submitting to
whatever regulations of government the king should think fit
to propose, were nothing else than powers to surrender all the
rights of their countrymen, the court was careful to grant no
such authority, and, on the contrary, plainly expressed in their
instructions that the deputies were not to do or consent to any
thing that should infringe the liberties bestowed by the char
ter, or infer the slightest alteration of the existing form of go
vernment. The deputies set sail for England, whither they
were soon followed by Randolph, eager to confront them and
counteract their exertions.1 A public fast was appointed to
be observed throughout the province ; and prayers were ad
dressed to Heaven for the preservation of the charter and the
success of the deputation. Means less pure, though certainly
not unjustifiable, were adopted, or at least sanctioned, by the
provincial council or board of assistants, for promoting at the
English court, the wishes and interests of their countrymen.
Cranfield, the late royal governor of New Hampshire, being
on a visit at Boston, suggested to those authorities that the
provincial deputies should be directed to wait on Lord Hyde,
and tender the sum of two thousand guineas for the private
service of the king, which he assured them, from the notorious
poverty and venality of the court, would infallibly procure a
suspension of all hostile proceedings. They fell headlong into
1 To such a degree had Randolph excited the jealousy and abhorrence ofthe colo
nists, that a great fire happening on one occasion to break out in Boston, soon after
his arrival in the city, he was generally believed by the populace to have been the
author of it, (Hutchinson) : and so conscious was he ofthe provocation he had given
to popular vengeance, that he expressed his apprehensions to the British ministry that
the people of Massachusetts would account him guilty of treason and punish him
with death for attempting to subvert their political constitution. — Holmes.

358

THE HISTORY OF

BOOK II.
1682.

Surrender
ofthecharter of
Massachu setts de
manded by
the king —

1683.
refused by
the co
lonists.

the snare ; and having written letters to this effect to the de
puties, Cranfield despatched letters at the same time to the
king, which he assured them contained the strongest recom
mendations of the colonists to royal favour. But though these
men were willing, in a cause where no interests but their own
were involved, to sacrifice their money for their liberty, and to
buy their country out of the hands of a sordid and dissolute
tyrant, — it was not the will of Providence that the liberties of
Massachusetts should be bought with gold, or that the prayers
which had been associated with such exertions should prevail.
Letters soon arrived from the deputies, informing their consti
tuents that Cranfield had written a ludicrous account of the
affair to the king, and vaunted his dexterity in outwitting the
people of Boston, whom he described as a crew of miscreants
and rebels ; and that the publication of the story had exposed
them to the derision of the whole court.1
The American deputies found their sovereign intoxicated
with the triumph of his victorious prerogative, and incensed
to the highest degree against a province that had so long
presumed to withstand his will. Their credentials, which
were exhibited to Sir Lionel Jenkins, the secretary of state,
were at once declared to be insufficient ; and they were in
formed, that unless a commission more ample and satisfactory
were immediately produced, it was his majesty's pleasure
that a writ of quo warranto against their country's charter
should issue without delay. The deputies communicated this
peremptory injunction to their constituents; assuring them,
at the same time, that the predicament of the colony was des
perate ; and leaving them to determine whether it was most
advisable to submit themselves unreservedly to his majesty's
pleasure, or to abide the issue of a process which would cer
tainly be fatal. This important question, the determination
of which was to be the last exercise of their highly prized
liberty, was solemnly discussed both in the general court,
and, as was meet, by the inhabitants ofthe province at large;
and the prevailing sentiment was declared to be, " that it
was better to die by other hands than their own." An
earnest address to the king was framed by the general court;

1 Hutchinson. Chalmers.

NORTH AMERICA. 359
a corresponding one was signed by the inhabitants at large ; c H A P.
and the agents were directed to present or suppress these ad- n

dresses according to their own discretion. They were, like- 1683.
wise, authorised to resign the titles ofthe province of Maine,
if, by so doing, they could preserve the charter of Massachu
setts, — and they were finally assured of the irrevocable deter
mination of their constituents to adhere to the charter and
never to show themselves unworthy of liberty by making a
voluntary surrender of it. The communication of this mag
nanimous answer put an end to the functions ofthe deputies;
and a writ of quo warranto having been issued forthwith Writ of
against the colony, they desired leave to retire from the scene ^°t^aT'
of this procedure, and were permitted to return to Boston, issued
They were instantly followed by Randolph, who had pre- j^,^ the
sented to the committee of plantations a catalogue of crimes
and misdemeanours which he imputed to the provincial go
vernment, and was now selected to carry the fatal writ across
the Atlantic. The communication was highly agreeable to October.
the messenger who conveyed it ; and Randolph performed
his office with a triumphant eagerness that added insult to
injury, and increased the detestation with which he was uni
versally regarded. The king at the same time made a last
attempt to induce the colonists to spare him the tedious
formalities of legal process. He declared, that if before
judgment they would unreservedly submit and resign them
selves to his pleasure, he would consider their interest as well
as his own in composing the new charter, and make no farther
innovation on the original constitution of the province than
should be necessary for the due support of his authority.
To add weight to this suggestion, the colonists were apprised,
that all the corporations in England except the city of Lon
don, had surrendered their privileges to the king; and copies
of the proceedings which had proved fatal to the charter of
London were dispersed through the province, — that all might
learn the hopelessness of a contest with royal authority.
But the people of Massachusetts were not to be moved from Firmness
their purpose by the threats of despotic power or the example ofthe
of general servility. They had acted well, and had now to suffer pe°p e"
well ; and disdainfully refused to diminish the infamy of their
oppressor by sharing it with him. A majority ofthe council,

3G0 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK overwhelmed by their calamities, voted an address of sub-
IT" mission to the king ; but the house of delegates, animated
1683. with the general feeling ofthe people, and supported by the
approbation of the clergy, rejected the address, and adhered
to their former resolutions. The process of quo warranto was
in consequence urged forward with all the expedition that
was compatible with forensic formality. Among other in
stances of tyrannical contempt of justice, the summons which
required the colony to defend itself was transmitted so tardily,
that before compliance with it was possible, the space as-
1684. signed for such compliance had elapsed. At length, in
Theirchar- Trinity Term of the following year, judgment was pronounced
¦uYed to by the Engnsh Court of King's Bench against the governor
he for- and company of Massachusetts, " That their letters patent
feo-ed^ ancj tjje enrolment thereof be cancelled ;" and in the year
1685.' after, an official copy of this judgment was received by the
secretary of the general court.1
Thus was the system of liberty that had flourished in
Massachusetts overthrown by the descendant of the princes
whose tyranny had led to its establishment; after being de
fended by the children of the original settlers with the same
resolute unbending virtue that their fathers had exerted in
founding and rearing it. The venerable Bradstreet, who had
accompanied the first emigrants to Massachusetts in 1630,
was still alive, and was governor of the colony at the period
of the subversion of those institutions which he had contri
buted originally to plant in the desert, and had so long con
tinued to adorn and enjoy. Perhaps he now discerned the
vanity of those sentiments that had prompted so many of the
co-evals whom he had survived, to lament their deaths as
premature. But the aged eyes that beheld this eclipse of
New England's prosperity, were not yet to close till they
had seen the return of better days.
That the measures of the king were in the highest degree
unjust and tyrannical, appears manifest beyond all decent
denial ; and that the legal adjudication by which he masked
his tyranny was never annulled by the English parliament, is
a circumstance very little creditable to English justice. The
1 Hutchinson. Chalmers.

NORTH AMERICA. 361
House of Commons, indeed, shortly after the Revolution, C H A P.
inflamed with indignation at the first recital of the transac- IV"
tions which we have now witnessed, passed a resolution de- 1685.
daring " that those quo warrantos against the charters of New
England were illegal and void ;" and followed up this resolu
tion by a bill for restoring the charter of Massachusetts. But
the progress ofthe bill was arrested in the House of Lords by
a sudden prorogation of parliament : and the Commons were
afterwards prevailed with to depart from their purpose by the
arguments of Treby, Somers, and Holt,1 whose eminent fa
culties and constitutional principles could not exempt them
from the influence of a superstitious prejudice, generated by
their professional habits, in favour of the sacredness of legal
formalities. 1 Chalmers. Hutchinson.

362 TIIE HISTORY OF

CHAPTER V.

Designs — and Death of Charles the Second. — Government of Massachusetts under
a temporary Commission from James the Second. — Andros appointed Governor of
New England. — Submission of Rhode Island. — Effort to preserve the Charter of
Connecticut. — Oppressive Government of Andros. — Colonial Policy of the King.
— Sir William Phipps.— Indian Hostilities renewed by the Intrigues ofthe French.
— Insurrection at Boston. — Andros deposed — and the ancient Government re
stored. — Connecticut and Rhode Island resume their Charters. — William and
Mary proclaimed. — War with the French and Indians. — Sir William Phipps
conquers Acadie. — Ineffectual Expedition against Quebec. — Impeachment of
Andros by the Colony , discouraged by the English Ministers — and dismissed. —
The King refuses to restore the ancient Constitution of Massachusetts. — Tenor of
the new Charter. — Sir William Phipps Governor. — The New England Witch
craft. — Death of Phipps. — War with the French and Indians. — Loss of Acadie. — ¦
Peace of Ryswick. — Moral and political State of New England.
BOOK So eager was Charles to complete the execution of his long
cherished designs on Massachusetts, that in November 1684,

1685. immediately after the judgment of the Court of King's Bench
against its charter was pronounced, he began to make
arrangements for the new government of the colony. Though
not even a complaint had been pretended against New Ply
mouth, he scrupled not to involve this settlement in the same
fate ; and as if he purposed to consummate his tyranny and
vengeance by a measure that should surpass the darkest an
ticipations entertained in New England, he selected as the
delegate of his prerogative, a man than whom it would
be difficult in the whole records of human cruelty and wick
edness to find one who has excited to a greater degree the
abhorrence and indignation of his fellow-creatures. The
notorious Colonel Kirke, whose brutal and sanguinary excesses
have secured him an immortality of infamy in the history of
England, was appointed governor of Massachusetts, New

NORTH AMERICA. 363
Hampshire, Maine, and New Plymouth ; and it was deter- CHAP.
mined that no representative assembly ofthe colonists should 
be permitted to exist, but that the legislative and executive 1685.
powers should be invested in the governor and a council ap- Des,gns_
pointed during the royal pleasure. This arbitrary policy was
approved by all the ministers of Charles, except the Marquis
of Halifax, who espoused the cause of the colonists with a
generous zeal, and warmly but vainly urged that they were
entitled to enjoy the same laws and institutions that were
established in England.1 Though Kirke had not yet com
mitted the enormities by which he was destined to illustrate
his name in the west of England, he had already given such
indications of his disposition in the government of Tangier,
that the tidings of his appointment filled the inhabitants of
the colony with horror and dismay. But before the royal
commission and instructions to this ruffian were completed,
the career of the monarch himself was interrupted by death; and death
and Kirke was reserved to contribute by his atrocities in theSec0nd.
England to bring hatred and exile on Charles's successor.
This successor, James the Second, from whose stern inflexible
temper and lofty ideas of royal prerogative, the most gloomy
presages of tyranny had been drawn, was proclaimed in
Boston with melancholy solemnity.2
These presages were verified by the conduct of the new
sovereign. Soon after his accession to the throne, he ap
pointed, by special commission, a provincial government of
Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maine, and New Plymouth,
to be administered by a president and council selected from
the inhabitants of Massachusetts, whose functions were merely Govem-
executive, and were to endure till the establishment of a fixed ?,entof.
, Massachu-
and permanent system. The functionaries thus appointed setts under
were directed to concede liberty of conscience to all persons, atemP°"
but to bestow peculiar encouragement on the votaries of the mission
church of England ; to determine all suits originating within [he'secon?
1 The French court and the Duke of York remonstrated with Charles on the im
policy of retaining in office a man who had professed such sentiments. Barillon's
Correspondence in the Appendix to Fox's History of James the Second. " Even at
this early period," says Mr. Fox, " a question relative to North American liberty,
and even to North American taxation, was considered as the test of principles
friendly or adverse to arbitrary power at home."
2 Hutchinson. Chalmers.

364 THE HISTORY OF
book the colony, but to admit appeals from their sentences to the
' king; and to defray the expenses of their government by
1685. levying the taxes previously imposed. This commission was
appointed to be laid before the general court at Boston, not
as still considered a body administering legal authority, but
as a convocation of individuals of the greatest influence and
May, consideration in the province. In answer to the communi-
1686. cation 0f its contents, the court voted a unanimous resolution
in which they protested that the inhabitants of Massachusetts
were deprived of the rights of freemen by the system of
government which had been announced to them; and that it
deeply concerned both those who introduced and those who
were subjected to the operation of this system, to reflect how
far it was safe to pursue it. For themselves, they declared
that if the newly appointed officers should think proper to
exercise their functions, though they could never regard them
as invested with constitutional power, they would demean
themselves, notwithstanding, as loyal subjects, and humbly
make their addresses to God, and in due time to their prince
for relief. The president named in the commission was
Dudley, who had lately been one of the deputies of the
province to England, and whose conduct had justified, in some
degree, the jealousy with which the colonists ever regarded
the persons to whom they were constrained to intrust that im
portant office. The patriotic virtue of this man, without being
utterly dissolved, was relaxed by the beams of regal splendour;
and he had not been able to look on the pomp and show of aris-
tocratical institutions with philosophic composure or unde-
siring eyes. Despairing of his ability at once to serve and gra
tify his country, he applied himself with more success to culti
vate his own interest at the English court : and in pursuing this
crooked policy, he seems to have flattered himself with the hope
that the interest of his fellow-citizens might be more effec
tually promoted by his own advancement to official pre-emi
nence among them, than by the exclusion which he would in
cur, in common with themselves, by a stricter adherence to the
line of integrity. Though he accepted the commission, and
persuaded the other persons who were associated with him to
imitate his example, he continued to demonstrate a friendly
regard to the rights of the people, and to the municipal insti-

NORTH AMERICA. 365
tutions which they so highly valued. Not only was imme- CHAP.
diate change in the provincial magistracy avoided, — but the '
commissioners, in deference to the public feeling, transmitted 1686.
a memorial to the English court, stating that a well regulated
assembly ofthe representatives of the people was urgently ne
cessary, and ought in their opinion to be established without
delay. This moderate conduct, however, gave little satisfac
tion to any of the parties whom they desired to please. The
people were indignant to behold a system which was erected
on the ruins of their liberty, administered by their own fellow-
citizens, and above all by the man whom they had lately ap
pointed to resist its introduction among them ; and nothing
but the apprehension of seeing him replaced by Kirke, whose
massacres in England seemed gloomily to foretell the treatment
of America, prevented an open expression of their displeasure.
The conduct of the commissioners was no less unsatisfactory
both to the abettors of arbitrary government in England, and
to the creatures and associates of Randolph within the pro
vince, who were eager to pay court to the king by prostrating
beneath his power every obstacle to the execution of his will.
Complaints were soon transmitted by these persons to the
English ministers, charging the commissioners with conniving
at wonted practices by which the trade laws were evaded,
countenancing ancient principles of civil and ecclesiastical
policy, and evincing, in general, but a lukewarm affection to
the king's service.1
In addition to these causes of dissatisfaction with the com
missioners, the king was now compelled to undertake the com
pletion of his plans, by the imperfection of the temporary ar
rangement to which he had resorted. It was found that the
provincial acts of taxation were about to expire ; and the com
missioners being devoid of legislative authority, had no power to
renew them. They had employed this consideration to sup
port their suggestion ofa representative assembly : but it de
termined the king to enlarge the arbitrary authority of his
provincial officers, and at the same time to establish a perma
nent administration for NewEngland. He had consulted the
crown lawyers, and in particular Sir William Jones, the at-
1 Neal. Hutchinson. Chalmers.

366 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK torney-general, respecting the extent of his powers ; and they
___' _ had given as their official opinion " that notwithstanding the
1686. forfeiture of the charter of Massachusetts, its inhabitants con
tinued English subjects, invested with English liberties, and
consequently that the king could no more grant a commission
to levy money on them, without their conse'nt in an assembly,
than they could discharge themselves from their allegiance ;"
a truth of which the discovery implies no extraordinary legal
knowledge or acuteness, but of which this open declaration
bespeaks more honesty than we might be prepared to expect
from persons selected by the monarch from a society of
lawyers which, in that age, could supply such instruments as
Jeffries and Scroggs. We must recollect, however, that
lawyers, though professionally partial to the authority which
nominally and theoretically constitutes the source and funda
mental principle of the system which they administer, cherish
also in their strong predilection for those forms and prece
dents that practically constitute their own influence and the
peculiar mystery of their science, a principle that frequently
protects liberty and befriends substantial justice. But James
was too much enamoured of arbitrary power, to be deterred
from the indulgence of it by any obstacle inferior to invincible
necessity : and accordingly, without paying the slightest re
gard to an opinion supported only by the pens of lawyers,
he determined to establish a complete tyranny in New Eng
land, by combining the whole legislative and executive
authority in the persons of a governor and council to be
named by himself. Kirke had been found too useful as an
instrument of terror in England, to be spared to America.
Androsap- But Sir Edmund Andros, who had signalized his devotion to
vernorof°" arbitrary power in the government of New York, was now
New Eng- appointed captain-general and vice-admiral of Massachusetts,
New Hampshire, Maine, New Plymouth, and certain depen
dent territories, during the pleasure of the king. He was em
powered, with consent of a board of councillors, to make or
dinances for the colonies, not inconsistent with the laws of
England, and which were to be submitted to the king for his
approbation or dissent, and to impose taxes for the support of
government. He was directed to govern the people, according
to the tenor of his commission, ofa separate letter of instruc-

NORTH AMERICA. 367
tions with which he was at the same time furnished, and of C H A P.
the laws which were then in force or might be afterwards '
enacted. The governor and council were also constituted a 1686.
court of record ; and from their decisions an appeal was to
be admitted to the king. The greater part of the instruc
tions that were communicated to Andros are of a nature
that would do honour to the patriotism of the king, if
the praise of this virtue were due to a barren desire to pro
mote the welfare of the people, accompanied with the most
effectual exertions to strip them of every security by which
their welfare might be guarded. Andros was directed to
promote no persons to offices of trust, but colonists of fair
character and competent estate, and to displace none without
sufficient cause; to respect and administer the existing laws of
the country, in so far as they were not inconsistent with his
commission or instructions; to dispose of the crown lands at
moderate quit-rents ; " to take away or to harm no man's life,
member, freehold, or goods, but by established laws of the
country, not repugnant to those of, the realm;" to discipline
and arm the inhabitants for the defence of the country, but
not to obstruct their attention to their own private business
and necessary affairs ; to encourage freedom of commerce by
restraining ingrossers ; to check the excessive severity of
masters to their servants, and to punish with death the
slayers of Indians or negroes ; to allow no printing press to
exist; and to grant universal toleration in religion, but special
encouragement to the church of England. Except the re
straint of printing, (which, though enjoined, appears not to
have been carried into effect,) there is none of these instruc
tions that expresses a spirit of despotism : and yet the whole
system was silently pervaded by that spirit: for as there
were no securities provided for the accomplishment of the
king's benevolent directions, so there were no checks esta
blished to restrain the abuse of the powers with which the
governor was entrusted. The king was willing that his sub
jects should be happy, but not that they should be free,
or enabled to pursue a scheme of happiness independent of
his agency and control: and this conjunction of a desire to
promote human welfare, with an aversion to the means most
likely to secure it, suggests the explanation, perhaps the apo-

368 THE HISTORY OF
book logy, of an error to which despotic sovereigns are inveterately
n' liable. Trained in habits of indulgence of their own will, and
1686. in sentiments of respect for its force and efficacy, they learn
to consider it as what not only ought to be, but must be irre
sistible ; and feel no less secure of ability to make men happy
without their own concurrence, than of the right to balk the
natural desire of mankind to be the providers and guardians
of their own welfare. The possession of absolute power renders
self-denial the highest effort of virtue : and the absolute
monarch who should demonstrate a just regard to the rights
of his fellow-creatures, would deserve to be honoured as one
of the most magnanimous of human beings. Furnished with
the instructions which we have seen for the mitigation of his
arbitrary power, and attended with a few companies of
December, soldiers for its support, Andros arrived in Boston ; and pre
senting himself as the substitute for the dreaded and detested
Kirke, — and commencing his administration with many gra
cious expressions of good will, — he was at first received more
favourably than might have been expected. But his popu
larity was short-lived. Instead of conforming to his instruc
tions, he copied and even exceeded the arbitrary conduct of
his master in England, and committed the most tyrannical
violence and oppressive exactions.1 Dudley, the late president,
and several of his colleagues, were associated as councillors of
the new administration, — which was thus loaded in the begin
ning Of its career, with the weight of their unpopularity, and in
the end, involved themselves in deeper odium and disgrace.
It was the purpose of James to consolidate the strength of
all the British colonies in one united government; and Rhode
Island and Connecticut were now to experience that their
destiny was involved in the fate of Massachusetts. The in
habitants of Rhode Island, on learning the accession of the
king, immediately transmitted an address congratulating him
on his elevation, acknowledging themselves his loyal subjects,
and begging his protection of their chartered rights. Yet the
humility of their supplications could not protect them from
the consequences of the plans he had embraced for the gene
ral government of New England. Articles of high misde-
1 Hutchinson. Chalmers.

NORTH AMERICA. 369
meanour were exhibited against them before the lords of the CHAP.
committee of colonies, charging them with breaches of their V-

charter, and with opposition to the acts of navigation ; and 1686.
before the close of the year 1685, they received notice of the
institution of a process of quo warranto against their patent.
Without hesitation they resolved that they would not contend Submis-
with their sovereign, and passed an act, in full assembly, for- ^,nf
mally surrendering the charter and all the powers it contained, island.
By a fresh address they " humbly prostrated themselves,
their privileges, their all, at the gracious feet of his majesty,
with an entire resolution to serve him with faithful hearts."
These servile expressions dishonoured, but did not avail them ;
and the king, accounting legal solemnities a superfluous cere
mony with persons so devoted to his will, proceeded, without
farther delay, to impose the yoke which the people sought to
evade by deserving it. His eagerness, however, to accomplish
his object with rapidity, though it probably inflicted a salu
tary disappointment on this community at the time, proved
ultimately beneficial to their political interests by preserving
their charter from a legal extinction : and this benefit, which
a similar improvidence afforded to the people of Connecticut,
was ascertained at the era of the British Revolution. In
consequence of the last address that had proceeded from
Rhode Island, Andros had been charged to extend his admi
nistration to this province : and in the same month that wit
nessed his arrival at Boston, he visited Rhode Island, where he
dissolved the provincial corporation, broke its seal, and ad
mitting five of the inhabitants into his legislative council
assumed the exercise of all the functions of government.1
Connecticut had also transmitted an address to the king on
his accession, and vainly solicited the preservation of her pri
vileges. When the articles of misdemeanour were exhibited
against Rhode Island, a measure of similar import was em
ployed against the governor and assembly of Connecticut
who were reproached with making laws contrary in tenor
to those of England ; of extorting unreasonable fines ; of ad
ministering an oath of fidelity to their own corporation, in con
tradistinction to the oath of allegiance ; of intolerance in ecclesi-
' Hutchinson. Chalmers.
VOL, I. B B

370 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK astical polity ; and of denial of justice. These charges, which
1 were supposed to infer a forfeiture of the charter, were remitted
1686. to Sawyer, the attorney-general, with directions to expedite a
writ of quo warranto against the colony. The writ was issued,
and Randolph, the general enemy of American liberty, offered
his services to carry it across the Atlantic. The governor and
the assembly of Connecticut had for some time beheld the
storm approaching, and knowing that resistance was vain,
they endeavoured, with considerable address, to elude what
they were unable to repel. After delaying as long as possible
to make any signification of their intentions, the arrival of Sir
Edmund Andros at Boston, and his conduct in Rhode Island,
convinced them that the designs of the king were to be vigor
ously pursued, and that they could not hope to be allowed to
Jaim*Tv' deliberate any longer. They wrote, accordingly, to the secre
tary of state, expressing a strong desire to retain their present
constitution ; but requesting, if it were the irrevocable pur
pose of their sovereign to dispose otherwise of them, that they
might be incorporated with Massachusetts, and share the for
tunes of a people with whom they had always maintained a
friendly correspondence, and whose principles and manners
they understood and approved. This was hastily construed
by the British government into a surrender of the provincial
constitution : and Andros was commanded to annex this pro
vince also to his jurisdiction. Randolph, who seems to have
been qualified not less by genius than inclination to promote
the execution of tyrannical designs, advised the English mi
nisters to prosecute the quo warranto to a judicial issue;
assuring them that the government of Connecticut would
never consent to do, nor acknowledge that they had done,
what was equivalent to an express surrender of the rights of
the people. It was matter of regret to the ministers and crown
lawyers of a later age, that this politic suggestion was not
adopted. But the king was too eager to snatch the boon that
seemed within his reach, to wait the tedious formalities of the
law; and no farther judicial proceedings ensued on the quo
October, warranto. In conformity with his orders, Andros marched at
the head of a body of troops to Hartford, the seat of the pro
vincial government, where he demanded that the charter
should be delivered into his hands. The people had been ex-

of Connec
ticut.

NORTH AMERICA. 37 |
tremely desirous to preserve at least the document of rights, CHAP.
which the return of better times might enable them to assert 
with advantage. The charter was laid on the table of the as- 1687.
sembly, and some of the principal inhabitants of the colony p,.^'^
addressed Andros at considerable length, relating the exer- the charter
tions that had been made, and the hardships that had been "
incurred, in order to found the institutions which he was come
to destroy ; entreating him yet to spare them, or at least to
leave the people in possession of the patent, as a testimonial
of the favour and happiness they had hitherto enjoyed. The
debate was earnest, but orderly, and protracted to a late hour
in the evening. As the day declined, lights were introduced
into the hall, which was gradually surrounded by a numerous
concourse of the bravest and most determined men in the pro
vince, prepared to defend their representatives against the
apprehended violence of Andros and his armed followers. At
length, finding that their arguments were ineffectual, a mea
sure, supposed to have been previously concerted by the
inhabitants, was coolly, resolutely, and successfully con
ducted. The lights were extinguished, as if by accident ; and
Captain Wadsworth laying hold of the charter, disappeared
with it before they could be rekindled. He conveyed it
securely through the crowd, who opened to let him pass, and
closed their ranks as he proceeded, — and deposited it in the
hollow of an ancient elm tree, which retained the precious de
posit till the era of the English revolution, and was long
regarded with veneration by the people, as the memorial and
associate of a transaction so interesting to their liberties.
Andros, finding all his efforts ineffectual to recover the char
ter, or ascertain the person by whom it had been secreted,
contented himself with declaring that its institutions were
dissolved ; and assuming to himself the exercise of supreme
authority, he created two of the principal inhabitants mem
bers of his general legislative council.1
Having thus united all the New England states under
one comprehensive system of arbitrary government, Andros,
with the assistance of his grand legislative council selected
from the inhabitants of the several provinces, addressed him-
1 Hutchinson. Chalmers. Dwight's Travels. Trumbull.
B B 2

372 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK self to the task of enacting laws and regulations calculated
' to fortify his authority. An act restoring the former taxes
1687. obtained the assent of the council ; and yet, even this indis
pensable provision was obstructed by the reluctance with
which the councillors, though selected by Andros himself,
consented to become the instrument of rivetting the shackles
of their country. The only farther opposition which he expe
rienced, proceeded from the inhabitants of the county of
Essex in Massachusetts, who, insisting that they were free
men, refused to pay the contingent assessed upon them of a
taxation which they deemed unconstitutional. But their
resistance was easily overpowered, and many of them were
severely punished. Andros soon discovered that the revenues
ofthe ancient government were inadequate to the support of
his more costly administration ; and while he signified this de
falcation to the king, he declared, at the same time, with
real or affected humanity, that the country was so much im
poverished by the effects of the Indian war, by recent losses
at sea, and by scanty harvests, that an increase of taxation
could hardly be endured. But James, who had exhausted
his lenity in the letter of instructions, answered this commu
nication by a peremptory mandate to raise the taxes to a
level with the charges of administration ; and Andros, there
upon, either stifling his tenderness for the people, or discard
ing his superfluous respect to the moderation of the king,
Oppressive proceeded to exercise his power with a rigour and injustice
govern- ^nat rendered his government universally odious. The weight
Andres, of taxation was oppressively augmented, and the fees of all
public functionaries screwed up to an enormous height.
The ceremonial of marriage was altered, and the celebration
of that rite, which had been hitherto committed to the magis
trates, was confined to the ministers of the church of Eng
land, of whom there was only one in the province of Massa
chusetts. The fasts and thanksgivings appointed by the con
gregational churches were arbitrarily suppressed by the
governor, who maintained that the regulation of such matters
belonged entirely to the civil power. He took occasion re
peatedly, and with the most offensive insolence, to remark in
presence of the council, that the colonists would find them
selves greatly mistaken if they supposed that the privileges

NORTH AMERICA. 373
of Englishmen followed them to the extremity of the earth ; c H A P.
and that the only difference between their condition and that '
of slaves, was that they were neither bought nor sold. It was 1687.
declared unlawful for the colonists to assemble in public
meetings, or for any one to quit the province without a pass
port from the governor ; and Randolph, now at the summit
of his wishes, was not ashamed to boast in letters to his
friends that the rulers of New England were " as arbitrary
as the great Turk." While Andros mocked the people with
the semblance of trial by jury, he contrived by intrigue and
partiality in the selection of jurymen, to convict and wreak
his vengeance on every person who offended him, as well as
to screen the misdeeds of his own dependents from the pu
nishment they deserved. And, as if to heighten the discon
tent excited by such tyrannical insolence, he took occasion
to question the validity of the existing titles to landed pro
perty, pretending that the rights acquired under the sanction
of the ancient government were tainted with its vices and
obnoxious to its fate.1 New grants or patents from the go
vernor, it was announced, were requisite to mend the defec
tive titles to land ; and writs of intrusion were issued against
all who refused to apply for such patents and to pay the
large fees that were charged for them. Most of the landed
proprietors were compelled to submit to this extortion in
order to save their estates from confiscation, — an extre
mity which, however, was braved by one individual, Colonel
Shrimpton, who preferred the loss of his property to the recog
nition of a principle which he deemed both oppressive and dis
honourable to his country. The king, indeed, had now en
couraged Andros to consider the people whom he governed
as a society of felons or rebels; for he transmitted to him
express directions to grant his majesty's most gracious pardon
to as many of the colonists as should apply for it. But none
had the meanness to solicit a grace that exclusively be
fitted the guilty. The only act of the king that was favour
ably regarded by the inhabitants of the colony, was his decla
ration of indulgence, which excited so much discontent in
1 The titles of many of the proprietors of estates in New England depended upon
conveyances executed by the Indians : but Andros declared that Indian deeds were
no better than " the scratch of a bear's paw." Belknap.

374 THE HISTORY OF
B oo K Britain, even among the protestant dissenters who shared its

II

benefit. Notwithstanding the intolerance that has been im-
1687. puted to New England, this declaration produced general
satisfaction there ; though some of the inhabitants had dis
cernment enough to perceive that the sole object of the king
was the gradual introduction of the catholic church into
Britain.1 After many ineffectual remonstrances against his violence
and injustice had been addressed by the colonists to Andros
himself, two deputies, one of whom was Increase Mather, the
most eminent theologian and most popular minister in Massa-
Apnl, chusetts, were sent to England, to submit the grievances of
the colony to the humane consideration of the king. Ran
dolph, whose subservience to the royal policy had been
rewarded with the offices of postmaster-general and licenser
of the press in New England, exerted himself to defeat the
success of the deputation by writing to the English court that
Mather was a seditious and profligate incendiary, and that
his object was to pave the way to the overthrow of regal
government. Yet the petitions which the colonists transmitted
by Mather were remarkably moderate. Whatever they might
desire, all that they demanded was that their freeholds might
be respected, and that a representative assembly might be es
tablished for the purpose, at least, of adjusting their taxation.
The first of these points was conceded by the king ; but as to
the other, he was inexorable. When Sir William Phipps,
who had gained his esteem by his spirit and gallantry, pressed
him to grant the colonists an assembly, he replied, " Any
thing but that, Sir William ;" and even the opinion of Powis,
the attorney-general, to whom the application of the deputies
had been remitted, and who reported that it was just and rea
sonable, produced no change in his determination. James
had now enlarged and completed his system of colonial policy.
n , ¦ , He had determined to reduce all the American constitutions,
Colonial '
policy of as well those which were denominated proprietary as the others,
t ie king. to an imme_iate dependence on the crown ; for the double
purpose of effacing the examples that might diminish the re-
1 Life of Phipps, apud Mather. Neal. Dnmmer's Defence of the New Eng
land Chatters. Hutchinson. Chahneis. Tutmbull.

NORTH AMERICA. 375
signation of the people of New England, and of combining c H A P.
the force of all the colonies from the banks of the Delaware
to the shores of Nova Scotia, into a compact system capable 1688.
of presenting a barrier to the formidable encroachments of
France. A general dislike of liberal establishments, no doubt
conspired with these views ; and the declamations that re
sounded from his oppressed subjects in Britain on the hap
piness and liberty which America was reputed to enjoy, con
tributed, at this period, to increase his aversion to American
institutions.1 In prosecution of his politic design, he had
recently commanded writs of quo warranto to be issued for the
purpose of cancelling all the colonial patents that still re
mained in force ; and, shortly before the arrival of the depu
tation from Massachusetts, a new commission had extended
the jurisdiction of Andros to New York and New Jersey, and
conferred the appointment of lieutenant-governor on Colonel
Francis Nicholson. Andros, with his usual promptitude, ac
complished this enlargement of his authority ; and, having
appointed his deputy to reside at New York, he conducted his
wide dominion with a vigour that rendered him formidable to
the French, but, unhappily, still more formidable and odious
to the people whom he governed.2
Sir William Phipps, whose fruitless interposition we have Sir Wil-
remarked in behalf of the deputation from Massachusetts, was phjppS.
himself a native of this province, and, notwithstanding a
mean education and the depression of the humblest circum
stances, had ascended by the mere force of superior genius to
a conspicuous rank, and gained a high reputation for spirit,
capacity, and success. He followed the employment of a
1 Dryden, whose servile muse faithfully re-echoed the sentiments of the court,
thus expresses himself in a dramatic prologue written in the year 1686. 
" Since faction ebbs, and rogues grow out of fashion,
Their penny scribes take care to inform the nation
How well men thrive in this or that plantation :
How Pennsylvania's air agrees with quakers,
And Carolina's with associators :
Both e'en too good for madmen and for traitors.
Truth is, our land with saints is so run o'er,
And every age produces such a store,
That now there's need of two New Englands more."
3 Neal. Hutchinson. Chalmers.

376 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK shepherd at his native place till he was eighteen years of
' age, and was afterwards apprenticed to a ship carpenter.
1688. When he was freed from his indentures, he pursued a sea
faring life, and attained the station of captain of a merchant
vessel. An account which he happened to peruse of the
wreck ofa Spanish ship, loaded with bullion, near the Bahama
islands, about fifty years before, inspired him with the bold
design of extricating the buried treasure from the bowels of
the deep ; and, transporting himself to England, he stated his
scheme so plausibly that the king was struck with it, and in
1683 sent him with a vessel to make the attempt. It proved
unsuccessful; and all his urgency could not induce James
to engage in a repetition of it. But the Duke of Albemarle,
resuming the project, equipped a vessel for the purpose, and
gave the command of it to Phipps, who now succeeded in
accomplishing his project, and achieved the recovery of specie
to the value of at least 300,000/., from the bottom of the
ocean. Of this treasure, he obtained a portion sufficient for
his own enrichment, with a still larger meed of general con
sideration and applause. The king was exhorted by some of
his courtiers to confiscate the whole of the specie thus re
covered, on pretence that he had not received a fair represen
tation of the project; but he declared that the representation
had been perfectly fair, and that nothing but his own mis
givings, and the timorous counsels and mean suspicions of
those courtiers themselves,had deprived him of the riches which
this honest man had sought to procure for him. He conceived
a high regard for Phipps, and conferred on him the rank of
knighthood. Sir William employed his influence at court for
the benefit of his country ; and his patriotism seems never to
have harmed him in the opinion of the king. Finding that
he could not prevail to obtain the restoration of the chartered
privileges, he solicited and received the appointment of high
sheriff of New England ; in the hope that by remedying the
abuses that were committed in the impannelling of juries, he
might create a barrier against the tyranny of Andros. But
the governor and his creatures, incensed at this interference,
hired ruffians to attack his person, and soon compelled him
to quit the province and take shelter in Britain. James,
shortly before his own abdication, among the other attempts

NORTH AMERICA. 377
he made to conciliate his subjects, offered Phipps the govern- CHAP.
ment of New England ; but Phipps refused to accept this ap-
pointment from a falling tyrant, and under a system which, 1688.
instead of seeking any longer to mitigate, he hoped speedily
to behold entirely overthrown.1
The discontent of the people of New England continued
meanwhile to increase, in so much that every act of the govern
ment, however innocent or even laudable, was viewed through
the perverting medium of a fixed and inveterate jealousy. In
order to discredit the former provincial authorities, Andros
and Randolph had sedulously inculcated the notion that the
Indians had hitherto been treated with a cruelty and injustice,
to which all the hostilities of these savages ought reasonably
to be imputed ; and had vaunted their own ability to pacify
and propitiate them by gentleness and equity.2 But this
year their theory and their policy were alike disgraced by the
furious hostilities of the Indians on the eastern frontiers of
New England. The movements of these savages were excited Indian
on this, as on former occasions, by the insidious artifices of hostlllt'es
t-i pi renewed
the French, whose suppleness of character and demeanour, by the in-
contrasted with the grave unbending spirit of the English, th'fues of
gave them in general a great advantage in the competition for French.
the favour of the Indians ; and who found it easier to direct
and employ than to check or eradicate the treachery and fero
city of their savage neighbours. The English colonists offered
to the Indians terms of accommodation, which at first they
seemed willing to accept; but the encouragement of their
French allies soon prevailed with them to reject all friendly
overtures, and their native ferocity prompted them to sig
nalise this declaration by a series of unprovoked and un
expected massacres. Andros published a proclamation re
quiring that the murderers should be delivered up to him;
but the Indians treated him and his proclamation with
contempt. In the depth of winter he found himself obliged
to march with a considerable force against these enemies ¦

1 Life of Phipps, apud Mather. Neal. Hutchinson.
a It appears that Randolph cultivated the good opinion of William Penn, by
writing to him in this strain, as well as by condemning the former persecution of the
quakers in Massachusetts. — Hutchinson. Chalmers.

378 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK and though he succeeded in occupying and fortifying posi-
' tions which enabled him somewhat to restrain their future
1688. incursions, he inflicted but little injury upon them, and lost a
great many of his own men, who perished in vain attempts to
follow the Indians into their fastnesses, in the most rigorous
season of the year. So strong and so undiscriminating was
the dislike he had excited among the people of New England,
that this expedition was unjustly ascribed to a deliberate
purpose to destroy the troops whom he conducted, by cold
and famine.1 Every reproach, however groundless, stuck
fast to the hated characters of Andros and Randolph.
1689. At length the smothered rage of the people broke forth.
In the spring some vague intelligence was received, by letters
from Virginia, of the proceedings of the Prince of Orange in
England. The ancient magistrates and principal inhabitants
of the province, though they ardently wished and secretly
prayed that success might attend the Prince's enterprise, yet
determined in so great a cause to incur no unnecessary hazard,
and quietly to await a revolution which they believed that no
movement of theirs could either promote or retard. But New
England was destined to accomplish by her own efforts, her
own liberation; and the inhabitants of Massachusetts were
now to exercise the gallant privilege which nearly a century
after, and in a conflict still more arduous, their children again
were ready to assert, of being the foremost in resisting op
pression and vindicating the rights and honour of their
country. The cautious policy and prudential dissuasions
from violence that were employed by the wealthier and more
aged colonists, were contemned by the great body of the
people, whose spirit and courage prompted them to achieve
the deliverance which they were less qualified by foresight
and patience to await. Stung with the recollection of past
injuries, their patriotic ardour, on the first prospect of relief,
could not be restrained. In seasons of revolution, the wealthy
and eminent mingle with their public spirit a less generous
concern for their valuable private stakes, and their prospect
of sharing in official dignities. The poor have no rich private

Neal. Hutchinson.

NORTH AMERICA. 379
stakes in their possession; no dazzling preferments within CHAP.
their reach ; and consequently less restraint on the full flow

of their social affections. All at once, and apparently without 1689.
any preconcerted plan, an insurrection broke forth in the town t.°n at
of Boston ; the drums beat to arms, the people flocked together; Boston.
and in a few hours the revolt became universal, and the energy
of the people so overpowering, that every purpose of resisting
their will was abandoned by the government. The scruples
of the more wealthy and cautious inhabitants were completely
overcome by the obvious necessity of interfering to calm
and regulate the fervour of the populace. Andros, Dudley, Andros de-
and others to the number of fifty of the most obnoxious Posed~
characters were seized and imprisoned. On the first in
telligence of the tumult, Andros had sent a party of soldiers
to apprehend Simon Bradstreet ; a measure that served only
to suggest to the people who their chief ought to be, and to
anticipate the unanimous choice by which this venerable man
was reinstated in the office he had held when his country was
deprived of her liberties. Though now bending under the
weight of ninety years, his intellectual powers had undergone
but little decay : he retained (says Cotton Mather) a vigour
and wisdom that would have recommended a younger man to
the government of a greater colony. As the tidings of the
revolt spread through the province, the people eagerly flew to
arms, and hurried to Boston to co-operate with their insur
gent countrymen. To the assembled crowds a proclamation
was read from the balcony of the Court House, detailing the
grievances of the colony, and imputing the whole to the ty
rannical abrogation of the charter. A committee of safety
was appointed by general consent ; and an assembly of re
presentatives being convened soon after, this body, by an
unanimous vote, and with the hearty concurrence of the whole
province, declared their ancient charter and its constitutions and the
to be resumed ; re-appointed Bradstreet and all the other ancieutg°-
liii • /v. • vernment
magistrates who had been in office in the year 1686 ; and restored.
directed these persons in all things to conform to the pro
visions of the charter, " that this method of government may
be found among us when order shall come from the higher
powers in England." They announced that Andros, and the
councillors who had been imprisoned along with him were

380 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK detained in custody to abide the directions that might be
' received concerning them from his highness the Prince of
1689. Orange and the English parliament.1 What would be the
extent of the revolution that was in progress in the parent
state, and to what settlement of affairs it would finally con
duct, was yet unknown in the colonies.
Connecti- The example of Massachusetts was followed by the
Rhode other provinces of New England. When the tidings of the
Island re- revolution at Boston reached Connecticut, the inhabitants
charters?" determined no longer to acknowledge a governor who, from
the command of one-half of the English colonies, was now
reduced to the situation of an imprisoned delinquent. Their
charter re-appeared from its concealment ; and their demo
cratical constitution, which had not been either expressly
surrendered or legally dissolved, was instantly restored with
universal satisfaction. The people of Rhode Island had never
been required to give up the charter whose privileges they had
so formally and unequivocally resigned ; and now without
a moment's scruple or hesitation they protested that it was
still in force, and removed as well as they could the only ob
struction to this plea, by retracting every prior declaration of
a contrary tenor. New Plymouth, in like manner, resumed
instantaneously its ancient form of government. In New
Hampshire, there assembled a general convention of the in
habitants, who promptly and unanimously determined to
reannex their territory to Massachusetts. In pursuance of
this purpose, they elected deputies to represent them in the
general court at Boston : but King William refused to comply
with their wishes, and in the sequel appointed a separate
governor for New Hampshire.2
Although the people of Massachusetts had at first dis
tinctly intimated their intention to re-establish by their own
act their ancient charter, the cool consideration that succeeded
the ferment during which this purpose had been broached,
1 Lives of Bradstreet and Phipps, apud Mather. Neal. Hutchinson. The pro
visional government at Boston would willingly have released Andros after they had
deprived him of power ; but the people vehemently insisted that he should be de
tained in prison. " I am deeply sensible that we have a wolf by the ears," says
Danforth, in a letter written on this occasion to Mather, the provincial agent in
England. — Hutchinson's Massachusetts Papers.
8 Hutchinson. Chalmeis.

NORTH AMERICA. 381
convinced them that its accomplishment was impracticable, CHAP.

v.

and that the restoration of a charter so formally vacated by .
the existing authorities of the parent state could proceed only 1689.
from the crown or legislature of England. Informed of the
convention of estates that had been convoked by the Prince
of Orange in England, the revolutionary government of Mas
sachusetts assembled a similar convention ofthe counties and
towns of the province ; and it was the opinion of the majority
of this assembly that although the charter might be restored,
it could not be resumed. Intelligence having arrived of the May 26.
settlement of England and of the investiture of William and William
Mary with the crown, these sovereigns were proclaimed in the proclaimed
colony with sincere gratulation and extraordinary solemnity. May 29.
A letter was soon after addressed, by the king and queen, To August 12.
the Colony of Massachusetts, expressing the royal sanction and
ratification of the late transactions of the people, and autho
rising the present magistrates to retain provisionally the ad
ministration of the government, till their majesties, with the
assistance of the privy council, should establish it on a basis
more permanent and satisfactory. An order was communi
cated, at the same time, to send Andros and the other pri
soners to England, that they might answer the charges pre
ferred against them. Additional agents were deputed by the
colony to join Mather, who still continued in England, and, in
concurrence with him, to prosecute the charges against
Andros, — and, above all, to solicit the restoration of the
charter.1 But before the colonists were able to ascertain if their fa
vourite desire was to be promoted by the English revolution,
they felt the evil effects of this great event, in the conse
quences of the war that had already broken out between Eng
land and France. The rupture between the two parent states
quickly extended itself to their possessions in America ; and
the colonies of New England and New York were now in
volved in bloody and desolating warfare with the forces of the War with
French in Canada, and their Indian auxiliaries and allies. the French
The hostilities that were directed against New York belono- to Indians
another branch of this history. In concert with them, various
1 Neal. Hutchinson.

382 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK attacks were made by considerable bodies of the Indians in the
' conclusion of the present year on the settlements and forts in
1689. New Hampshire and Maine; and proving successful in some
instances, they were productive of the most horrid extremities
of savage cruelty. Aware that these depredations originated
in Canada and Acadie, the general court of Massachusetts
prepared, during the winter, an expedition against both Port
Royal and Quebec. The command of it was intrusted to Sir
William Phipps, who, on the dissolution of the late arbitrary
government, had returned to New England in the hope of
being able to render some service to his countrymen. Eight
small vessels, with seven or eight hundred men, sailed under
April, his command in the following spring, and, almost without oppo-
16 °* sition, took possession of Port Royal and of the whole pro-
Sir Wil- vince of Acadie : and, within a month after its departure, the
Phipps fleet returned loaded with plunder enough to defray the whole
conquers eXpense 0f the expedition. But Count Frontignac, the go
vernor of Canada, retorted by sharp and harassing attacks on
the remote settlements of New England ; and, stimulating the
activity of-his Indian allies, kept the frontiers in a state of in
cessant alarm by their predatory incursions. Letters had been
written by the general court of Massachusetts to King Wil
liam, urging the importance of the conquest of Canada, and
soliciting his aid in an expedition for that purpose : but he
was too much occupied in Europe to extend his exertions to
America ; and the general court determined to prosecute the
enterprise without his assistance. New York and Connecticut
engaged to furnish a body of men who were to march over
land to attack Montreal, while the troops of Massachusetts
Ineffectual should repair by sea to Quebec. The fleet destined for this
expedition expedition consisted of nearly forty vessels, the largest of
Quebec, which carried forty-four guns ; and the number of troops on
board amounted to two thousand. The command of this
August9. armament was entrusted to Sir William Phipps, who, in the
conduct of the enterprise, demonstrated his usual courage,
and every military qualification except that which experience
alone can confer, and without which, in warfare with a civi
lized enemy, all others commonly prove unavailing. The
troops of Connecticut and New York, retarded by defective
arrangements, and disappointed ofthe assistance ofthe friendly

NORTH AMERICA. 383
Indians who had engaged to furnish them with canoes for CHAP.
crossing the rivers they had to pass, were compelled to retire

without attacking Montreal ; and, in consequence, the whole 1690.
force of Canada was concentrated to resist the attack of
Phipps. His armament arrived before Quebec so late in the October.
season, that only an immediate assault could have enabled
him to carry the place ; but by unskilful delay, the time for
such an attempt was irretrievably lost. The English were
worsted in various sharp encounters, and compelled at length
to make a precipitate retreat ; and the fleet, after sustaining
great damage in the voyage homeward, returned to Boston. November
Such was the unfortunate issue of an enterprise which involved * •
Massachusetts in an enormous expense, and cost the lives of
at least a thousand of her people. The French had so
strongly foreboded its success, that they scrupled not to
ascribe its discomfiture to the immediate interposition of
Heaven, in confounding the devices of the enemy, and de
priving them of common sense ; and, under this impression,
the citizens of Quebec established an annual procession in
commemoration of their deliverance. That the conduct of
Phipps, however, had been no way obnoxious to censure,
may be safely inferred from the fact that a result so disastrous
brought no blame upon him, and deprived him in no degree
of the favour of his countrymen. And yet the disappoint
ment, in addition to the mortification which it inflicted was
attended with very injurious consequences. The general
court of Massachusetts had not even anticipated the possi
bility of miscarriage, and had expected to derive, from the
success of the expedition, the same reimbursement of ex
penses, of which their former enterprise had been productive.
" During the absence of the forces," says Cotton Mather,
with an expression too whimsical for a matter of so much
solemnity, " the wheel of prayer for them in New England had
been kept continually going round:" and this attempt to rein
force the expedition by spiritual co-operation had been pursued
in combination with an entire neglectof provisions applicable to
the possibility of an unsuccessful result. The returning army,
finding the government unprepared to satisfy their claims,
were on the point of mutinying for their pay; and it was
found necessary to issue bills of credit, which the troops con-

384

BOOK

THE HISTORY OF

1690.

: sented to accept in place of money. The colony was now irt
. a very depressed and suffering state. Hoping to improve the
calamities which they were unable to avoid, the government
endeavoured to promote the increase of piety and the reform
ation of manners ; and pressed upon the ministers and the
people the duty of strongly resisting that worldliness of mind,
which the necessity of contending violently for temporal
things is apt to engender. The attacks of the Indians on the
eastern frontiers were attended with a degree of success and
barbarity that diffused general terror ; and the colonists were
expecting in this quarter to be driven from their settlements,
when, all at once, those savages, of their own accord, pro
posed a peace of six months, which was accepted by the pro-
- vincial government with great willingness and devout grati
tude. As it was clearly ascertained that the hostile proceed
ings of the Indians were continually fostered by the intrigues,
and rendered the more formidable by the counsel and assist
ance of the French authorities in Canada, the conquest of
this province began to be considered by the people of New
England indispensable to their safety and tranquillity. In
the hope of prevailing with the king to sanction and embrace
this enterprise, as well as for the purpose of aiding the other
deputies in the no less interesting application for the restora
tion of the provincial charter, Sir William Phipps, soon after
his return from Quebec, by desire of his countrymen, repaired
to England.1
1691. In the discharge of the duties of their mission, the deputies
appear to have employed every effort that patriotic zeal could
prompt, and honourable policy admit, to obtain satisfaction
to their constituents by the punishment of their oppressors,
and the restitution of their charter. But in both these objects
their endeavours were unsuccessful ; and the failure (whether
justly or not) was generally ascribed to the unbending inte
grity with which Mather and Phipps rejected every art and
intrigue that seemed inconsistent with the honour of their
country. It was soon discovered that the king and his minis
ters were extremely averse to an inquiry into the conduct of
Andros and Randolph, and not less so to the restoration of
1 Neal. Hutchinson. Colden's History of the Five Indian Nations of Canada.

NORTH AMERICA. 385
theancientcharter of the colony. The conduct of the British CHAP.
court on this occasion presents a confused and disgusting pic- '
ture of intrigue and duplicity. The deputies were beset by amul- 1691.
titude of importunate councillors and real or pretended parti- ^™P® *cf '
zans ; — some doubtless indiscreet, and some probably insincere. Andros by
They were persuaded, by certain of their advisers, to present ^gC™.ony
to the privy council the charges against Andros unsigned, — and raged by
assured by others, that in so doing they had cut the throat o/{_h ,„_,_.
their country. When they attended to present their charges, ters —
they were anticipated by Andros and Randolph, who came
prepared with a charge against the colonists of resistance to
the authority of the parent state, and rebellious deposition of
their legitimate governor. Sir John Somers, the pleader
employed by the deputies, consented that they should abandon
the situation of accusers and stand on the defensive; and he
tendered the unsigned charges as an answer to the accusations
of Andros and Randolph. The council hesitated to receive a
plea presented in the name of a whole people, and required
that some individuals should appear and personally avouch it.
"Who was it," said the Lord President, "that imprisoned
Sir Edmund and the rest? you say it was the country, and
that they rose as one man. But that is nobody. Let us
see the persons who will make it their own case." The
deputies thereupon offered to sign the charges, and to
undertake the amplest personal responsibility for the acts
of their countrymen. But they were deterred from this
proceeding by the remonstrances of Sir John Somers, who
insisted (for reasons that have never been satisfactorily
explained) on persisting in the course in which they had
begun. Some of the councillors too, protested against the
injustice and chicanery of encountering the complaint of
a whole nation with objections of such a technical description.
" Is not it plain," they urged, " that the revolution in Massa
chusetts was carried on exactly in the same manner as the
revolution in England ? Who seized and imprisoned Chan
cellor Jeffries? Who secured the garrison of Hull? These
were the acts of the people, and not of private individuals."
This difference of opinion on a point of form seems to have
been the object which the ministry had studied to promote.
Without determining the point, the council interrupted the
vol. i. c c

386 THE HISTORY OF
B oo k discussion by a resolution, that the whole matter should be
 ; — referred to the king; and his majesty soon after signified his
and as1- Pleasure that the complaints of both parties should be dis
missed! missed.1 Thus terminated the impeachment of Andros, in a
manner very ill calculated to impress the people of Massa
chusetts with respect for the justice of the British government.
They had soon after the mortification of seeing him add
reward to impunity, and honoured with the appointment of
governor of Virginia and Maryland. They had previously
seen Dudley, whom they had imprisoned and sent to England
with Andros, appointed chief justice of New York, where he
condemned to death the unfortunate Leisler, who had excited
the first revolutionary movement in that colony in favour of
King William.2
The deputies finding that the House of Commons, though
at first disposed to annul the judicial decree against the
charter of Massachusetts, had been persuaded by the argu
ments of Somers and other lawyers who had seats in the house
to depart from this purpose, — and that the king was resolved
not to restore the old charter, — employed every effort to obtain
at least a restitution of the privileges it had contained. But
The king William and his ministers, though restrained from imitating
ref"ses ll? the tyrannical proceedings of the former reign, were eager and
ancient determined to avail themselves of whatever acquisitions these
uorfof11" proceedings might have gained to the royal prerogative ; and
Massachu- finding that the crown had acquired a legal pretext to exercise
setts" much greater authority over the colony than had been reserved
in its original constitution ; they scrupled not to lake advan
tage of this pretext without regard to the tyrannical nature of
the measures by which it had been obtained. The restoration
of their ancient privilege of electing their own municipal
officers was ardently desired by the colonists, and demanded
by the deputies with a warmth which the king would proba-

' Neal. Hutchinson.
5 Randolph was not sent back to America. He received, however, an appoint
ment in the West Indies, where he died, retaining, it is said, his dislike of the people
of New England to the last. Eliot's Biographical Dictionary of New England.
Cranfield, the tyrant of New Hampshire, was appointed collector of customs atBar-
badoes. He repented of his conduct in New England, and endeavoured to atone for
it by showingall the kindness in his power to the New England traders who resorted
to Barbadoes. — Belknap.

NORTH AMERICA. 387
bly have resented as disrespectful to himself, if he had not C HA P.
felt himself bound to excuse the irritation provoked by his own  ; —
injustice. He adhered inflexibly to his determination of re- 1691.
taining, as far as possible, every advantage, however surrepti
tious, that fortune had put into his hands, and at length a new
charter was framed on principles that widely departed from
the primaeval constitution of the colony, and transferred to
the crown many valuable privileges that had originally be
longed to the people. By this charter the territories of Mas- October 7.
sachusetts, Plymouth, and Maine, together with the con- Tenor of
~ . ., i . the new
quered province of Acadie or Nova Scotia, were united to- charter.
gether under one jurisdiction — an arrangement that was by no
means satisfactory to the parties included in it ; for Plymouth,
which had earnestly solicited a separate establishment, was
forcibly annexed to Massachusetts; and New Hampshire,
which had as earnestly petitioned to be included in this annexa
tion was made a separate province.1 The appointment of the
governor, deputy governor, secretary, and all the officers ofthe
admiralty, was reserved to the crown. Twenty-eight coun
cillors were directed to be chosen by the House of Assembly,
and presented to the governor for his approbation. The
governor was empowered to convoke, adjourn, prorogue, and
dissolve the assembly at pleasure; to nominate, exclusively,
all military officers, and (with the consent of his council) all
the judges and other officers of the law. To the governor was
reserved a negative on the laws and acts of the general as
sembly and council ; and all laws enacted by these bodies and
approved by the governor were appointed to be transmitted to
England for the royal approbation ; and if disallowed within
the space of three years, they were to become absolutely void.
Liberty of conscience and divine worship, which had not been
mentioned in the old charter, was, by the present one, ex
pressly granted to all persons except Roman catholics. 2

1 The union, so much desired by the people of Massachusetts and New Hamp
shire, was overruled by the interest, and for the convenience, of Samuel Allen, a
merchant in London, to whom Mason's heirs had sold their claim to the soil of New
Hampshire. He was appointed the first governor of the province ; and employing
his authority in vexatious but unsuccessful attempts to extract pecuniary profit from
his purchased claim, rendered himself extremely odious to the people. Belknap,
He was superseded by Lord Bellamont in 1698.
s Mather. Life of Sir Wx Phipps. Neal. Hutchinson. Belknap,
c c2

388 THE HISTORY OF
The innovations that were thus introduced into their ancient
constitution, excited much discontent in the minds of the
1691. people of Massachusetts ; the more especially because the en
largement of royal authority was not attended with a proporr
tional communication of the royal protection. At the very
time when the king thus extended the limits of his prerogative
at the expense of popular liberty, he found himself constrained,
by the urgency of his affairs in Europe, to refuse the assis
tance which the people had besought from him to repel the
hostilities of the Indians and of the French government in
Canada. The situation of the provinces of Connecticut and
Rhode Island, which were permitted to reassume all their an
cient privileges, rendered the injustice with which Massa
chusetts was treated more flagrant and irritating. Though
legal technicalities might be thought by lawyers and special
pleaders to warrant the advantageous distinction which those
states enjoyed, — a conclusion so illiberal was utterly repugnant
to the enlarged views of justice and equity which ought to re
gulate the policy of a legislator. Only mistake on the one
hand, or artifice on the other, could be supposed to have pro*
cured to Connecticut and Rhode Island an advantage that
made the treatment of Massachusetts more invidious : and a
dangerous lesson was taught to the colonial communities when
they were thus given to understand that it was their own vigi
lant dexterity and successful intrigue, or the blunders of the
parent state, that they were to rely on as the safeguards of
their rights. The injustice of the policy now applied to Mas
sachusetts was rendered still more glaringly apparent by the
very different treatment obtained by the powerful corporation
of the city of London, whose charter, though annulled with
the same solemnity, and on grounds as plausible, as the an
cient charter of Massachusetts, was restored by a legislative
act immediately after the revolution. Nor was any real po
litical advantage acquired by the English government from its
violation of just and equitable principles. The power that was
wrested from the colonists and appropriated by the crown, was
quite inadequate to the formation of an efficient royal party in
the province. The appointmentof the governor and other officers
was regarded as a badge of dependence, instead of forming a
bond of union. The popular assemblies retained sufficient in-

NORTH AMERICA. 389
fluence over the governors to curb them in the execution of ob- C H A P.
noxious measures, and sufficient power to restrain them from '
making any serious inroad on the constitution. It is a re- 1691.
markable fact that the dissensions between the two countries,
which afterwards terminated in the dissolution of the British
empire in America, were not a little promoted by the perni
cious counsels and erroneous information transmitted to the
English ministry by the governors of those provinces, in which
the appointment to that office was exercised by the king.
Aware of the dissatisfaction with which the new charter was
regarded, the ministers of William judged it prudent to wave
in the outset the full exercise of the invidious prerogative, and
desired the provincial deputies to name the person whom they
considered most likely to be acceptable to their countrymen
as governor of Massachusetts : . and the deputies having
united in the nomination of Sir William Phipps, the appoint- Sir Wil

liam

ipps

1692.

ment to this office was bestowed on him accordingly. This act p"
of courtesy was attended with a degree of success, in mollify- governor.
ing the ill humour of the people, that attests the high estima
tion in which Phipps was held by his countrymen : for on his
arrival at Boston, though some discontent was betrayed, and May.
several of the members of the general court warmly insisted
that the new charter should be absolutely rejected,1 yet the
great body of the people received him with acclamations ; and
a majority ofthe general court resolved that the charter should
be heartily accepted, and appointed a day of thanksgivino- for
the safe arrival of their worthy governor and of Increase Ma
ther, whose services they acknowledged with grateful comme
moration. The new governor hastened to approve himself
worthy ofthe favourable regard thus expressed for him. Hav
ing convoked the general court of the province, he addressed
the members in a short but characteristic speech, recommend-
' Mather and the other deputies, when they found it impossible to obtain an
alteration of the new charter, proposed at first to reject it altogether, and to institute
a process for trying the validity of the judgment pronounced on the quo warranto
They were deterred from this proceeding by the solemn assurance of Treby Somers
and the two chief justices of England (Holt and Pollexfen), that if the judgment
were reversed, a new quo warranto would be issued, and undoubtedly followed by a
sentence exempt from all ground of challenge. These learned persons assured the
deputies that the colonists, by erecting judicatories, constituting a house of repre
sentatives, and incorporating colleges, had forfeited their charter, which eave no
sanction to such acts of authority. Hutchinson. 6

390 THE HISTORY OF
book ing to them the composition of a code of good laws with all the
n" expedition they could exert. " Gentlemen," said he, " you
1692. may make yourselves as easy as you will for ever. Consider
what may have a tendency to your welfare ; and you may be
sure that whatever bills you offer to me, consistent with the
honour and interest of the crown, I'll pass them readily. I do
but seek opportunities to serve you. Had it not been for the
sake of this thing, I had never accepted of this oflice. And
whenever you have settled such a body of good laws, that
no person coming after me may make you uneasy, I shall de
sire not one day longer to continue in the government." His
conduct seems in general to have corresponded with these
professions.1 And yet, the administration of Sir William Phipps was nei
ther long nor prosperous. Though he might give his sanction
as governor to popular laws, it was not in his power to guard
them from being rescinded by the crown : and this fate soon
befel a law that was passed by the provincial assembly, de
claring the colonists exempt from all taxes but such as should
be imposed by their own representatives, and asserting their
right to share all the privileges of Magna Charta. He found
the province involved in a distressing war with the French and
Indians, and in the still more formidable calamity of that de
lusion which has been termed the New England witchcraft.
When the Indians were informed of the elevation of Sir
William Phipps to the office of governor of Massachusetts,
they were struck with amazement at the fortunes of the man
whose humble origin they perfectly well knew, and with whom
they had familiarly associated but a few years before in the
obscurity of his primitive condition. Impressed with a high
opinion of his courage and resolution, and a superstitious
dread of that fortune that seemed destined to surmount every
obstacle and prevail over every disadvantage, they would will
ingly have made peace with him and his countrymen, but were
induced to continue the war by the artifices and intrigues of
the French. A few months after his arrival, the governor, at
the head of a small army, marched to Pemmaquid, on the Mer
rimack river, and there caused to be erected a fort of consider-
1 Mather. Life of Phipps. Neal. Hutchinson.

NORTH AMERICA. 391
able strength, and calculated by its situation to form a powerful CHAP.
barrier to the province, and to overawe the neighbouring tribes '
of Indians, and interrupt their mutual communication. The
beneficial effect of this operation was experienced in the follow
ing year, when the Indians sent ambassadors to the fort at 1693.
Pemmaquid, and there at length concluded with English com
missioners a treaty of peace, by which they renounced for
ever the interests of the French, and pledged themselves to
perpetual amity with the inhabitants of New England.1 The
colonists, who had suffered severely from the recent depreda
tions of these savages, z and were still labouring under the
burdens entailed on them by former wars, were not slow to em
brace the first overtures of peace : and yet they murmured with
great discontent and ill humour at the measure to which they
were principally indebted for the deliverance they had so ar
dently desired. The expense of building the fort and of main
taining its garrison and stores, occasioned an addition to the ex
isting taxes, which provoked their impatience. The party who
had opposed submission to the new charter, eagerly promoted
every complaint against the conduct of a system which they
regarded with rooted aversion ; and laboured so successfully
on this occasion to vilify the person and government of Sir
William Phipps in the eyes of his countrymen, that his po
pularity sustained a shock from which it never afterwards en
tirely recovered. The people were easily induced to regard
the increase of taxation as the effect of the recent abridgment
of their political privileges, and to believe that if they had re-

' Neal. Hutchinson.
a The situation of the people of New Hampshire, in particular, had become so
irksome and dangerous, that at one time they appear to have entertained the purpose
of abandoning the province. Belknap. When Adam Smith declared that " No
thing can be more contemptible than an Indian war in North America," he alluded
to a period much later than this, and in which the proportions between the numbers
of the savage and civilized races had undergone a great alteration. Even then, the
observation was just only in so far as respected apprehensions of conquest : for no
hostilities were ever more fraught with cruelty, misery, and horror, than those of the
North American Indians. When Chalmers pronounced the Indians " a foe that
has never proved dangerous except to the effeminate, the factious, and the cowardly,"
he was transported into this injustice by the desire of lowering the reputation of the
people of New Hampshire — a portion of the American population who seem to have
excited in a peculiar degree his malevolence and spleen. New Hampshire has been
more justly characterized by an American historian as " a nursery of stem heroism ;
producing men of firmness and valour, who can traverse mountains and deserts, en
counter hardships, and face an enemy without terror." — Belknap.

392 THE HISTORY OF
B °IL K tained tneir ancient control over the officers of govern-
.  ! — ment, the administration of their affairs might have been more
1693. economically conducted. But another cause, which we have
already cursorily remarked, and must now more attentively
consider, rendered the minds of the colonists, at this time, un
usually susceptible of gloomy impressions, and of suspicions
equally irritating and unreasonable.
England™ ^'le Deue^ °f witchcraft was at this period almost universal
witchcraft, in christian countries ; and the existence and criminality of
the practice were recognised in the penal code of every
civilized state. Persons suspected of being witches and
wizards were frequently tried, condemned, and put to death
by the authority of the most enlightened tribunals in Europe ;
and, in particular, but a few years before the present period,
Sir Matthew Hale, a man highly and justly renowned for the
strength of his understanding, the variety of his knowledge,
and the eminent christian graces that adorned his character,had,
after a long and anxious investigation, adjudged a number of
men and women to die for this offence, at an assize in Suffolk.1
The reality of witchcraft had never yet been questioned ; nor
were there any individuals to whom that reality appeared
unimportant or incredible, except those who regarded the
spiritual world altogether as a mere speculation, vague, vision
ary, and delusive. Among other believers in the practice,
were some of the unfortunate beings themselves who were
put to death as witches. Instigated by fraud, folly, or
cruelty, or possessed by demoniacal frenzy, some of these
unhappy persons professed more or less openly to hold com
munication with the powers of darkness ; and, by the admini
stration of subtle poisons, — by disturbing the imagination of
their victims, — or by an actual appropriation of that unhallowed
agency which scripture assures us did once operate in the
world, and which no equal authority has ever proved to be
1 Howell's State Trials. Even so late as the middle of the eighteenth century,
the conviction ofthe witches of Warbois, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, was still
commemorated in an annual sermon at Huntingdon. Johnson's Works, Observa
tions on the Tragedy of Macbeth. The seceders in Scotland published an act of
their associate presbytery at Edinburgh in 1743 (reprinted at Glasgow in 1766)
denouncing the repeal of the penal lav>s against witchcraft as a national sin. —
Arnot's Criminal Trials in Scotland.
The last executions for witchcraft in the British dominions were at Huntingdon in
1716, and in Sutherlandshire in 1722,- — Arnot.

NORTH AMERICA. 393
extinguished, they committed crimes and inflicted injuries CHAP.
which were punished, sometimes, doubtless, frequently per- v-
haps, under an erroneous name. The colonists of New 1693.
England, participating in the general belief of this practice,
regarded it with a degree of abhorrence and indignation
corresponding to the piety for which they were so remarkably
distinguished. Their experience in America had tended to
strengthen the sentiments on this subject which they brought
with them from Europe ; for they found the belief of witch
craft firmly rooted among the Indian tribes, and the practice
(or what was so termed and esteemed) prevailing extensively,
and with perfect impunity, among those people whom, as
heathens, they regarded as the worshippers of demons. Their
conviction of the reality of witchcraft was, not unreasonably,
confirmed by such evidence of the universal assent of man
kind; and their resentment of its enormity proportionally
increased by the honour and acceptance which they saw it
enjoy under the shelter of superstitions that denied and dis
honoured the true God. The first trials for witchcraft in New
England occurred in the year 1645, when four persons charged
with this crime were put to death in Massachusetts. Goffe,
the regicide, in his diary, records the conviction of three
others at Hartford, in Connecticut, in 1662, and remarks,
that, after one of them was hanged, a young woman who had
been bewitched was restored to health. For more than
twenty years after, few instances occurred, and little notice
has been preserved of similar prosecutions. But, in the year
1688, a woman was executed for witchcraft at Boston, after
an investigation conducted with a degree of solemnity that
made a deep impression on the minds of the people. An
account of the whole transaction was published; and so
generally were the wise and good persuaded of the justice of
the proceeding, that Richard Baxter, the celebrated non
conformist divine, wrote a preface to the narrative, in which
he scrupled not to declare every one who refused to believe it
an obdurate Sadducee. The attention of the people being
thus strongly excited, and their suspicions awakened and
attracted into this dangerous channel, the charges of witch
craft became gradually more frequent, till, at length, there
commenced at Salem that dreadful tragedy which rendered

3i)4 THE HISTORY OF
boo K New England for many months a scene of bloodshed, terror,
' and madness.

1693. In the beginning of the year 1692, Massachusetts was
visited with an epidemical complaint resembling epilepsy,
which, the physicians, unable to explain or cure, readily im
puted to supernatural operation. Some young women, and
among others the daughter and niece of Paris, the minister of
Salem, were first attacked by this distemper, and induced by
the suggestions of their medical attendants to ascribe it to
witchcraft. The delusion was encouraged by a perverted ap
plication of the means best fitted to strengthen and enlighten
the understanding. Solemn fasts were observed, and assem
blies convoked for extraordinary prayer ; and the supposition of
witchcraft, which in reality had been previously assumed, was
thus confirmed and consecrated in the apprehension of the
public. The imaginations of the patients, disturbed by morbid
sensation, and inflamed by the contagious terror which their
supposed malady excited, readily prompted accusations against
particular individuals as the authors of the calamity. The
flame was now kindled, and finding ample nourishment in all
the strongest passions and most inveterate weaknesses of
human nature, carried havoc and destruction through the
community. The bodily symptoms ofthe prevailing epidemic,
frequently pondered by timorous and susceptible persons, were
propagated with amazing rapidity ; and having been once re
garded as symptoms of witchcraft, were ever after referred to
the same diabolical origin. The usual and well known con
tagion of nervous disorders was quickened by the dread of the
mysterious agency from which they were now supposed to
arise ; and this appalling dread, enfeebling the reason of its
victims, led them to confound the visions of their disturbed
apprehension with the realities of sound experience. To think
earnestly upon any thing, is to give it power over in the mind :
and to dread it, is partly to realize and still farther to invite
its dominion. Symptoms before unheard of, and unusually
terrific,1 attended the cases of the sufferers, and were sup-

1 Swelling of the throat, in particular, now well known as a hysterical symptom,
was considered at this time a horrible prodigy. Medical science was still depraved
by an admixture of gross superstition. The touch of a king was believed to be
capable of curing some diseases ; and astrology formed a part of the course of medi-

NORTH AMERICA. 395
posed to prove beyond a doubt that the disorder was no C HA P.
natural ailment ; while, in truth, they denoted nothing else  •__
than the extraordinary terror of the unhappy patients, who 1693.
augmented the malignity of their disease by the darkness
and horror of the source to which they traced it. Every case
of nervous derangement was now referred to this source, and
every morbid affection of the spirits and fancy diverted into
this dangerous channel. Accusations of particular individuals
easily suggested themselves to the disordered minds of the
sufferers, and were eagerly preferred by themselves and their
relatives, in the hope of obtaining deliverance from the cala
mity, by the punishment of its guilty authors. These charges,
however unsupported by proof, and however remote from
probability, alighted with fatal influence wherever they fell.
The supernatural intimation by which they were supposed to
be communicated, supplied and excluded all ordinary proof;
and when a patient, under the dominion of nervous affections,
or in the intervals of epileptic paroxysms, declared that he
had seen the apparition of a particular individual occasioning
his sufferings, no consideration of previous character could
screen the accused from a trial, which, if the patient persisted
in the charge, invariably terminated in a conviction. The
charges were frequently admitted without any other proof, for
the very reason for which they should have been absolutely
rejected by human tribunals — that their truth was judged in
capable of ordinary proof, or of being known to any but the
accuser and the accused. So general and inveterate was the
belief in the reality of the supposed witchcraft, that none
dared, even if they had been disposed, openly to deny it ; and
even the innocent victims of the charges were constrained
to argue on the assumption that the apparitions of them
selves, described by their accusers, had really been seen, — and
reduced to plead that their semblance had been assumed by
an evil spirit that sought to screen his proper instruments
and divert the public indignation upon unoffending persons.
cal study, — because the efficacy of drugs was believed to be promoted or impeded by
planetary influeuce. " In consequence of the greater nervous irritability of women "
saysDugald Stewart, " their muscular system seems to possess a greater degree of
that mobility by which the principle of sympathetic imitation operates." The first
and the most numerous ofthe supposed victims of witchciaft in New England were
young women.

396 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK It was maintained, however, by Stoughton, the deputy go-
 !  vernor of Massachusetts, most gratuitously, but, unhappily to
1693. the conviction of the public, that an evil spirit could assume
only the appearance of such persons as had given up their
bodies to him, and devoted themselves to his service. The
semblance of legal proof, besides, was very soon added to the
force of those charges; and seeming to establish them in some
cases, was thought to confirm them in all. Some of the
accused, terrified by their danger, sought safety in avowing
their guilt; recanting their supposed impiety, and denouncing
others as their tempters and associates. In order to beget
favour and verify their recantation, they now declared them
selves the victims of the witchcraft they had formerly prac
tised, counterfeited the nervous affections of their own
accusers, and imputed their sufferings to the vengeance of
their ancient accomplices. These artifices and the general
delusion were promoted by the conduct of the magistrates,
who, with a monstrous inversion of equity and sound sense,
offered impunity to all who would confess the crime and
betray their associates, while they inflexibly doomed to death
every accused person who maintained his innocence. Thus,
one accusation produced a multitude of others, — the accused
becoming accusers and witnesses, and hastening to escape
from the danger by involving other persons in it. From Salem,
where its main fury was exerted, the evil spread over the
province of Massachusetts ; and wherever it was able to pe
netrate, it effectually subverted the happiness and security of
life. The sword of the law was wrested from the hand of
dispassionate justice, and committed to the grasp of the
wildest fear and fury. Alarm and terror pervaded all ranks
of society. The first and the favourite objects of accusation
had been ill-favoured old women, whose dismal aspect, excit
ing horror and aversion instead of tenderness and compassion,
was reckoned a proof of their guilt, and seemed to designate
the appropriate agents of mysterious and unearthly wicked
ness. But the sphere of accusation was progressively en
larged to such a degree, that at length neither age nor sex,
neither ignorance nor innocence, neither learning nor piety,
neither reputation nor office, could afford the slightest safe
guard against a charge of witchcraft. Even irrational crea-

NORTH AMERICA. 397
tures were involved in this fatal charge ; and a dog belonging C HA P.
to a gentleman accused of witchcraft, was hanged as an ac-  '_ — .
complice of its master. Under the dominion of terror, all 1693.
mutual confidence seemed to be destroyed, and the kindest
feelings of human nature trampled under foot. The nearest
relations became each other's accusers; and one unhappy
man, in particular, was condemned and executed on the tes
timony of his wife and daughter, who appear to have im
peached him merely, with the view of preserving themselves.
Many respectable persons fled from the colony: others,
maintaining their innocence, were capitally convicted, and
died with a serene courage and piety that affected, but could
not disabuse, the spectators. The accounts that have been
preserved of the trials of these unfortunate persons, present
a most revolting and humiliating picture of frenzy, folly,
and injustice. There were received in evidence against
the prisoners, accounts of losses and mishaps that had
befallen the accusers or their cattle (in some cases, as long
as twenty years before the trial) after some meeting or
some disagreement with the prisoners. Against others, it
was deposed that they had performed greater feats of
strength, and walked from one place to another in a
shorter space of time than the accusers judged possible
without diabolical assistance. But the main article of
proof was the spectral apparitions of the persons of the
supposed witches to the eyes of their accusers during the
paroxysms of their malady. The accusers sometimes declared
that they could not see the prisoners at the bar of the court ;
which was construed into a proof of the immediate exertion
of Satanic influence in rendering their persons invisible to
the eyes of those who were to testify against them. The
bodies of the prisoners were commonly examined for the
discovery of what were termed witch-marks; and as the
examiners did not know what they were seeking for, and yet
earnestly desired to find it, every little puncture or disco
loration of the skin was easily believed to be the impress of
diabolical touch. In general the accusers fell into fits, or
complained of violent uneasiness at the sight of the prisoners.
On the trial of Burroughs, a clergyman of the highest re
spectability, some of the witnesses being affected in this

398 THE HISTORY OF
B oo K manner, the judges replied to his protestations of innocence,
 L_ by asking if he would venture to deny that these persons,
1693. were then labouring under the malignant influence of the
powers of hell. He answered that he did not deny it, but
that he denied having any concern with it. " If you were
not a friend of the devil," replied the presiding judge, " he
would not exert himself in this manner to prevent these
persons from speaking against you." When a prisoner in his
defence uttered any thing that seemed to move the audience
in his favour, some of the accusers were ready to exclaim that
they saw the devil standing by and putting the words in his
mouth; and every feeling of humanity was chased away by
such absurd and frantic exclamations. While one of the
convicts, at the foot of the gallows, was addressing a last
assurance of his innocence to the spectators, the executioner
sat by him smoking tobacco ; and some of the smoke having
been wafted by the wind into the eyes of the dying man, the
accusers thereupon set up a shout of brutal triumph, and
exclaimed, "see how the devil wraps him in smoke." Some
fraud and malignity undoubtedly mixed with sincere misap
prehension in stimulating these prosecutions. The principle
that was practically avowed in the courts of justice, that in
cases of witchcraft, accusation was equivalent to conviction,
presented the most subtle and powerful excitements to the
indulgence of natural ferocity, and the gratification of fan
tastic terror and suspicion : and there is but too much reason
to believe that rapacity, malice, and revenge, were not vainly
invited to seize this opportunity of satiating their appetites
in confiscation and bloodshed. So strong meanwhile was the
popular delusion, that even the detection of manifest perjury
on one of the trials proved insufficient to weaken the credit
of the most unsupported accusation. Sir William Phipps,
the governor; Stoughton, the lieutenant-governor; and
the most learned and eminent persons both among the
clergy and laity of the province, partook and promoted the
general infatuation. Nothing but an outrageous zeal against
witchcraft seemed capable of assuring any individual of the
safety of his life; and temptations that but too frequently
overpowered human courage and virtue, arose from the con
viction impressed on every person that he must make choice

NORTH AMERICA. 399
of the situation of the oppressed or the oppressor. The chap.
afflicted (as the accusers were termed) and their witnesses and _ v
partizans, began to form a numerous and united party in 1693.
every community, wliich none dared to oppose, and which
none who once joined or supported could forsake with im
punity. A magistrate who had for some time taken an
active part in examining and committing the supposed de
linquents beginning to suspect that these proceedings ori
ginated in some fatal mistake, showed an inclination to
discourage them ; and was instantly assailed with a charge
of witchcraft against himself. A constable, who had appre
hended many of the accused, was smitten with a similar
suspicion, and hastily declared that he would meddle in this
matter no farther. Instantly aware of the danger he had pro
voked, he attempted to fly the country, but was overtaken in
his flight by the vengeance of the accusers ; and, having been
brought back to Salem, was tried for witchcraft, convicted,
and executed. Some persons, whom the instinct of self-pre
servation had induced to accuse their friends or relations, being
touched with remorse, proclaimed the wrong they had done,
and retracted their testimony. They were convicted of relapse
into witchcraft, and died the victims of their returning virtue.
The evil at length enforced its own cure, by the intolerable
height to which it mounted. About fifteen months had
elapsed since it first broke forth ; and so far from being extin
guished or abated, it was growing every day more formidable.
Of twenty-eight persons who had been capitally convicted,
nineteen had been hanged ; and one, for refusing to plead, had
been pressed to death: — the only instance in which this Eng
lish legal barbarity was ever inflicted in North America. The
number of the accusers and pardoned witnesses multiplied
with alarming rapidity. The sons of Governor Bradstreet,
and other individuals of eminent station and character, had'
fled from a charge belied by the whole tenor of their lives.
An hundred and fifty persons were in prison on the same
charge, and impeachments of no less than two hundred
others had been presented to the magistrate. Men began
to ask Where this would end ? The constancy and piety
with which the unfortunate victims had died, produced an
: ipression on the minds of the people which, though counter-

lmr

400 THE HISTORY OF
book balanced at the time by the testimony of the pardoned wit-
* nesses, gained strength from the reflection that these witnesses
1693. had purchased their lives by their testimony, while the per
sons against whom they had borne evidence had sealed their
own testimony with their blood. It was happy, perhaps, for
the country, that while the minds of the people were awaken
ing to a strain of reflection thus reasonable and humane, some
of the accusers carried the audacity of their arraignment to
such a pitch, as to prefer charges of witchcraft against Lady
Phipps, the governor's wife, and against certain of the nearest
relatives of Dr. Increase Mather, the most pious minister and
popular citizen of Massachusetts. This circumstance at once
opened the eyes of Sir William Phipps and Dr. Mather; so far,
at least, as to induce a strong suspicion that many of the late
proceedings had been rash and indefensible. They felt that
they had dealt with others in a manner very different from that
in which they were now reduced to desire that others should
deal with them. A kindred sentiment beginning also to pre
vail in the public mind, encouraged the resolute exertion by
which a citizen of Boston succeeded in stemming the fury of
these terrible proscriptions. Having been charged with witch
craft by some persons at Andover, he anticipated an arrest, by
promptly arresting his accusers for defamation, and swearing
against them a claim of damages to the amount of a thousand
pounds. The effect of this vigorous proceeding surpassed his
most sanguine expectations. It seemed as if a spell that
had been cast over the people of Andover was dissolved
by one bold touch ; the frenzy subsided in a moment, and
witchcraft was heard of in that town no more. The im
pression was quickly diffused throughout the province; and
the influence of it appeared at the very next assize that was
held for the trial of witchcraft, when, of fifty prisoners who
were tried on such evidence as had been formerly deemed
sufficient, the accusers could obtain the conviction of no more
than three, who were immediately reprieved by the governor.
These acquittals were doubtless in part produced by a change
which the public opinion underwent as to the sufficiency of
what was denominated spectral evidence of witchcraft. An
assembly of the most eminent divines of the province, con-
june 15. voked for the purpose by the governor, had, after due consi-

NORTH AMERICA.

401

deration, pronounced and promulgated as their deliberate C H^A P.
judgment, " That the apparitions of persons afflicting others,  \ —
was no proof of their being witches," and that it was by no 1693.
means inconsistent with scripture or reason that the devil
should assume the shape of a good man, or even cause the
real aspect of that man to produce impressions of pain on the
bodies of persons bewitched. The ministers, nevertheless,
united in strongly recommending to the government therigorous
prosecution of all persons still accused of witchcraft. But the
judgment they had pronounced respecting the validity of the
customary evidence, rendered it almost impossible to procure
a judicial conviction; and produced, at the same time, so
complete a revolution in the public mind respecting the late
executions, that charges of witchcraft were found to excite no
other sentiments than disgust and horror against the parties
who preferred them. The dark cloud that had overcast the
peace and happiness of the colony vanished entirely away,
and universal shame and remorse succeeded to the frenzy
that had previously prevailed. Even those who continued to
believe in the reality of the diabolical influence of which the
accusers had complained, were satisfied that most, if not all,'
of the unfortunate convicts had been unjustly condemned,
and that their accusers, in charging them, had been deluded
by the same infernal agency by which their sufferings were
occasioned. Many of the witnesses now came forward and
published the most solemn recantations of the testimony they
had formerly given, both against themselves and others ; apo
logising for their perjury by a protestation, of which all were
constrained to admit the force, that no other means of saving
their lives had been left to them. These testimonies were not
able to shake the opinion which was still retained by a con
siderable party both among the late accusers and the public
at large, that much genuine witchcraft had mixed with the
recent malady, whether the real culprits had yet been de
tected or not. This opinion was supported in treatises written
at the time by Dr. Mather and other eminent divines. But
it was found impossible ever after to reiterate prosecutions
that excited such painful remembrances, and had been ren
dered instrumental to so much barbarity and injustice. Sir
William Phipps, soon' after he had reprieved the three persons
vol, i. do

402 THE HISTORY OF
book last convicted, — ordered all who were in custody on charges of
 ^_  witchcraft to be released ; and, in, order to prevent the dis-
1693. sensions that might arise from the retributory proceedings
against the accusers and their witnesses, he proclaimed a
general pardon to all persons for any participation they might
have had in the recent prosecutions. The surviving victims
of the delusion, however, and the relatives of those who had
perished, were enabled to enjoy whatever consolation they
could derive from the sympathy of their countrymen and the
earnest regret of their persecutors. The house of assembly
appointed a general fast and supplication, " that God would
pardon all the errors of his servants and people in a late tragedy
raised among us by Satan and his instruments." Sewell, one
of the judges who had presided on the trials at Salem, stood
up in his place in church on this occasion,1 and implored the
prayers of the people that the errors which he had committed,
might not be visited by the judgments of an avenging God on
his country, his family, or himself. Many of the jurymen
subscribed and published a declaration lamenting and con
demning the delusion to which they had yielded, and acknow
ledging that they had brought the reproach of wrongful blood
shed on their native land. Paris, the clergyman who had in
stituted the first prosecutions, and promoted all the rest, found
himself exposed to a resentment not loud or violent, but fixed
and deep; and was at length generally shunned by his fellow-
citizens, and entirely forsaken by his congregation. He ap
pears, throughout the whole proceedings, to have acted with
perfect sincerity, but to have been transported, by a violent
temper, and a strong conviction of the rightfulness of the ends
he pursued, into the adoption of means for their attainment^
inconsistent with honour, justice, or humanity. While the
delusion lasted, his violence was applauded as zeal in a
righteous cause, and little heed was given to accusations of
artifice and partiality in conducting what was believed to be
a controversy with the devil. But when it appeared that all

1 When Stoughton, the deputy-governor and chief justice, was informed of this,
he " observed for himself that when he sat in judgment he had the fear of God before
his eyes, and gave his opinion according to the best of his understanding ; and
although it might appear afterwards that he had been in error, yet he saw no neces
sity ofa public acknowledgment of it." — Hutchinson.

NORTH AMERICA. 403
these efforts had in reality been directed to the shedding of c H A P.
innocent blood, his popularity gave place to incurable odium '
and disgust. Perceiving, too late, how dreadfully erroneous 1694.
his conduct had been, he hastened to make a public profes
sion of repentance, and solemnly begged forgiveness of God
and man. But as the people declared their fixed resolution
never more to attend the ministry of an individual who had
been the instrument of misery and ruin to so many of their
countrymen, he was obliged to resign his charge and depart
from Salem.1
Thus terminated a scene of fury and delusion that justly
excited the astonishment of the civilized world, and exhibited
a fearful picture of the weakness of human nature in the sud
den transformation ofa people renowned over all the earth for
piety and virtue, into the slaves or associates, the terrified
dupes or helpless prey, ofa band of ferocious lunatics and as
sassins. Among the various evil consequences that resulted
from the preceding events, not the least important was the
effect they produced on the minds of the Indian tribes, who
began to conceive a very unfavourable opinion of the people
that could inflict such barbarities on their own countrymen, and
of the religion that seemed to instigate its professors to their
mutual destruction. This impression was the more disadvan
tageous to the colonists, as there had existed for some time a
competition between their missionaries and the priests of the
French settlements, for the instruction and conversion of the In
dians,2 who invariably embraced the political interests of that
' Mather. Life of Sir William Phipps. Increase Mather's Cases of Conscience
concerning Evil Spirits. Neal. Hutchinson. Calefs Wonders of the Invisible
World. Oldmixon. " I find these entries in the MS. Diary of Judge Sewell :
" Went to Salem, where, in the meeting-house, the persons accused of witchcraft
were examined ; a very great assembly. Twas awful to see how the afflicted per
sons were agitated." But in the margin is written, in a tremulous hand, probably on
a subsequent review, the lamenting Latin interjection, Vae, vae, vae!" Holmes;
•• It is likely," says Wynne, " that this frenzy contributed to work off the ill
humours of the New England people,— to dissipate their bigotry,— and to bring them
to a more free use of their reason."
a It was a corrupted edition of Christianity that was preached to the Indians by
the French priests— a system that harmonised too well with the passions and senti
ments which genuine Christianity most strongly condemns. By rites and devices
material and yet mysterious, it brought some portion of the spiritual doctrine of Chris
tianity within the range of the coarse capacity of the Indians, and facilitated the
transition from their ancient and especial system of witchcraft and idolatry • while
by stigmatizing their enemies as heretics, it afforded additional sanction and incite'
ment lo hatred, fury, and cruelty. The French priests who ministered amongst 'the
D D 2

404 THE HISTORY OF
B OO k nation whose religious instructors were most popular among
them. The French did not fail to improve to their own advan-

1694. tage, the odious spectacle that the late frenzy of the people of
NewEngland had exhibited ; and to this end they laboured with
such diligence and success, that in the following year, when Sir
William Phipps paid a visit to the tribes with whom he had
concluded the treaty of Pemmaquid, and endeavoured to
unite them in a solid and lasting friendship with the colonists,
he found them more firmly wedded than ever to the interests
of the French, and prepossessed with sentiments unfavour
able in the highest degree to the formation of friendly rela
tions with the English. To his proposition of renewing the
treaty of peace, they readily agreed ; but all the urgency
which he exerted to induce them to desist from their
correspondence with the French, proved unavailing. They
refused to listen to the missionaries who accompanied him;
having learned from the French priests to believe that the
Euglish were heretics, and enemies to the true religion of
Christ. Some of them openly remarked to Phipps, that
since they had received the instructions of the French, witch
craft had lost all perceptible existence among their tribes,
and that they had no desire to recall its presence by com
munication with a people among whom it was reputed to
prevail still more extensively than it had ever done with
themselves.1 Numerous symptoms, indeed, betokened the renewal of
war between the colonists and the Indians, which accordingly
broke out very soon after, — and was perhaps accelerated by
the departure of Sir William Phipps from New England.
The administration of this officer, though in the main highly
and justly popular, had not escaped some degree of reproach.
The discontents excited by the taxation imposed for the
support of the fortification at Pemmaquid, concurring with
the resentments and enmities which the prosecutions for
witchcraft gave rise to, produced a party in the province who
laboured on every occasion to thwart the measures and de-

Indians were Jesuits ; and their maxim, that it was unnecessary to keep faith with
heretics, proved but too congenial to the savage ethics of their pupils.
' Neal.

NORTH AMERICA. 405

preciate the character of the governor. Finding their CHAP.
exertions in Massachusetts insufficient to deprive him of the

esteem which a great majority of the people entertained for 1694.
him, these adversaries transmitted articles of impeachment
against him to England, and petitioned the king and council
for his recall and punishment. King William having declared
that he would hear the cause himself, an order was commu
nicated to the governor to meet his accusers in the royal
presence at Whitehall; in compliance with which, Phipps set November.
sail for England, carrying with him an address of the as
sembly expressive of the strongest attachment to his person,
and beseeching that the province might not be deprived of
the services of so able and meritorious an officer. On his
appearance at court, his accusers vanished, and their charges
were dismissed ; and having rendered a satisfactory account
of his administration, he was preparing to return to his go
vernment, when a malignant fever put an end to his life. Feb. 1695.
As a soldier, Phipps, if not pre-eminently skilful, was active Death of
and brave ; as a civil ruler, he was upright, magnanimous, and phlPPs-
disinterested. It was remarked of him, as of Aristides, that
he was never visibly elated by any mark of honour or confidence
that he received from his countrymen : nor could all his success
and advancement ever make him ashamed to revert to the
humility of the condition from which he had originally
sprung. In the midst of a fleet that was conveying an ar
mament which he commanded on a military expedition, he
called to him some young soldiers and sailors who were
standing on the deck of his vessel, and pointing to a parti
cular spot on the shore, said, " Young men, it was upon that
hill that I kept sheep a few years ago; — you see to what
advancement Almighty God has brought me: do you then
learn to fear God and be honest; and you also may rise as I
have done." His natural temper was somewhat hasty and
impetuous; and the occasional ebullitions of this infirmity,
which his distinguished rank rendered more conspicuous, con
tributed with the other causes which we have remarked, to
attaint the brightness of his reputation.1
On the departure of Sir William Phipps, the supreme
'Mather. Life of Sir W. Phipps. Neal.

406 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK authority in Massachusetts devolved on Stoughton, the
__^.  lieutenant-governor, who continued to exercise it during the
1695. three following years; the king being so much engrossed
with his wars and negotiations on the continent of Europe,
that it was not till after the peace of Ryswick that he found
leisure even to nominate a successor to Phipps. During this
period, the colony was much disturbed by internal dissension,
and harassed by the dangers and calamities of war. The
passions bequeathed by the prosecutions for witchcraft (which
Stoughton had zealously promoted) continued long to di
vide and agitate the people ; and the political factions which
had sprung up during the administration of Phipps, pre
vailed with increased virulence after his departure. The
mutual animosities of the colonists had attained such a height,
that they seemed to be on the point of kindling a civil war;
and the operations ofthe provincial government were cramped
and obstructed at the very time when the highest exertions of
vigour and unanimity were requisite to encounter the hostile
June, enterprises of the French and the Indians. Incited by their
War with French allies, the Indians recommenced the war with the
and In- usual suddenness and fury of their military operations.
dmns. Wherever surprise or superior numbers enabled them to pre
vail over parties of the colonists, or detached plantations,
their victory was signalised by the extremities of barbarous
Loss of cruelty.1 The colony of Acadie, or Nova Scotia, once more
Acadie. reverted to the dominion of France. It had been annexed, as

1 Numerous cases are related by the provincial historians of the torture and slavery
inflicted by the Indians on their captives, and of the desperate efforts of many of the
colonists to defend themselves and their families, or to escape from the hands of
their savage enemies. Wherever the Indians could penetrate, war was carried into
the bosom of every family. The case of a Mrs. Dunstan, of Haverhill, in Massa
chusetts, is remarkable. She was made prisoner by a party of twelve Indians, and,
with the infant of which she had been delivered but a week before, and the nurse
who attended her, forced to accompany them on foot into the woods. Her infant's
head was dashed to pieces on a tree before her eyes ; and she and the nurse, after
fatiguing marches in the depth of winter, found themselves at an Indian hut, a hun
dred and fifty miles from their home. Here they were informed that they were to be
made slaves for life, but were first to be conducted to a distant settlement, where they
would be stripped, scourged, and forced to run the gauntlet naked between two files
of the whole tribe to which their captors belonged . This intelligence determined
Mrs. Dunstan to make an attempt that would issue either in her liberation or her
death. Early in the morning, having awaked her nurse and a young man, who was
their fellow-prisoner, — she got possession of an axe, and, with the assistance of her
two companions, despatched no fewer than ten Indians in their sleep ; the other two
awoke and escaped. Mrs. Dunstan returned in safety with her companions to Haver-

NORTH AMERICA. 407
we have seen, to the jurisdiction of Massachusetts, and go- CHAP.
verned hitherto by officers deputed from the seat ofthe supe- ''"

rior authority at Boston. But Port Royal (or Annapolis, as 1695.
it was afterwards termed) having been now recaptured by a
French armament, the whole settlement revolted, and re-an
nexed itself to the French dominions — a change that was
ratified by the subsequent treaty of Ryswick. A much more
serious loss was sustained by Massachusetts in the following
year; when, in consequence of a combined assault by the
French and Indians, the fort erected by Sir William Phipps 1696.
at Pemmaquid was compelled to surrender to their arms, and
was levelled with the ground. Chubb, the commander of this
fort, had at first replied to the summons ofthe invaders, that
he would not surrender it even though the sea were covered with
French vessels, and the land with Indian allies of France : and
the capitulation to which he finally acceded, was forced upon
him by the terror of his garrison, to whom the French com
mander announced that, in case of an assault, they would be
abandoned to the fury of his Indian auxiliaries. This severe
and unexpected blow spread equal surprise and consterna
tion : and the alarming consciousness of the danger that was
menaced by the loss of a barrier of such importance, rebuked
in the strongest manner the factious discontent that had
murmured at the expense of maintaining it. These appre
hensions were but too well justified by the increased ravages
of Indian warfare, and the increased insolence and fury with
which a triumph so signal inspired the Indian tribes.
Stoughton and his council exerted the utmost promptitude
and vigour to repair or retaliate the disaster, and despatched
forces to attack the enemy both by land and sea ; but mis
carriage attended both these expeditions, and, at the close
of the year, the provincial troops had been unable, by the
slightest advantage, to check the assaults of the enemy, or to
cheer the drooping spirits of their countrymen. In the follow- 1697.
hill, and was rewarded for her intrepidity by the legislature of Massachusetts. —
Dwight's Travels.
Whatever other cruelties the Indians might exercise on the bodies of their captives,
it is observable that they never attempted to violate the chastity of women, and that
they respected modesty in so far as was consistent with the infliction of torture.
Belknap. They had a strong aversion to negroes, and generally killed them when
ever they fell into their hands. Ibid.

408 THE HISTORY OF
book ing year,1 the province, after being severely harassed by the
' inroads of the Indians, was alarmed by the intelligence of a
1697. formidable invasion which the French were preparing, with a
view to its entire subjugation. The commander of a French
squadron which was cruising on the northern coasts of Ame
rica had concerted with Count Frontignac, the governor of
Canada, a joint attack by sea and land, with the whole
united force of the French and Indians on the colony of
Massachusetts; and little doubt was entertained of the con
quest of this people, and the complete destruction of their set
tlements. On the first intelligence of this design, all the
dauntless and determined spirit of New England seemed
again to awake; and, factious animosities being swallowed
up by more generous passion, the people vied with each other
in zealous co-operation with the energetic measures by which
Stoughton prepared to repel the threatened assault. He
caused the forts around Boston to be repaired, the whole militia
of the province to be embodied and trained with the strictest
discipline, and every other precaution conducive to an effectual
defence to be promptly employed. In order to ascertain, and,
if possible, anticipate the operations of the enemy by land, he
despatched a considerable force to scour the eastern frontiers
of the province ; and these troops, encountering a detachment
of the Indians, who had assembled to join the French in
vaders, after a short engagement, gave them a complete
defeat. This check, though in itself of little importance, so
deranged the plans of the governor of Canada as to induce
him to defer the invasion of Massachusetts by land till the
following year ; and the French admiral finding his fleet
weakened by a storm, and apprised of the vigorous prepara
tions for his reception, judged it prudent, in like manner, to
abandon the projected naval invasion. During the whole of
this protracted contest, Connecticut and Rhode Island, though
exempted from territorial ravage, had borne a share in the

1 In the midst of these troubles died, this year, full of days and honour, the
venerable Simon Bradstreet, the last survivor of the origiual planters, — for many years
governor, — and termed by Ins countrymen the Nestor of New England. He died in
his ninety-fifth year ; earnestly desiring to be at rest, — insomuch (says Cotton Mather)
that it seemed as if death were conferred upon him, instead of life being taken from
him.

NORTH AMERICA. *" 409
burdens of war. Connecticut in particular was distinguished CHAP.
by the promptitude and liberality of the succours which she '
extended to the warfare of her friends, both in the eastern 169 7.
parts of New England, and on the frontiers of New York.1
In the commencement of the following year, intelligence 1698.
was received in America of the treaty of Ryswick, by which B,ySW,ck.
peace had been re-established between Britain and France.
By this treaty it was agreed that the two contracting powers
should mutually restore to each other all conquests that had
been made during the war, and that commissioners should be
appointed to investigate and determine the extent and limits of
the adjacent territories of both monarchs in America. The
evil consequences of thus leaving the boundaries of growing
settlements unascertained, were sensibly experienced at no
distant date.
Count Frontignac, on receiving intelligence of this treaty,
acquainted the chiefs of the Indian tribes, whose martial co
operation he had obtained, that he could no longer assist or
countenance their hostilities against the English, and advised
them to deliver up their captives, and make peace on the best
terms that they could obtain. The government of Massa
chusetts, to which their pacific overtures were addressed,
sent two commissioners to Penobscot to meet with their prin
cipal sachems, who endeavoured to apologise for their un
provoked hostilities by ascribing them to the artifice and in
stigation of the French Jesuits. They expressed, at the same
time, the highest esteem, and even a filial regard, for Count
Frontignac, and an earnest desire that, in case of any future
war between the French and English, the Indians might be
permitted to observe a neutrality between the belligerent
parties. After some conferences, a new treaty was concluded
with them, in which they were made to acknowledge a more
formal submission to the crown of England than they had
ever before expressed.
On the settlement of his affairs in Europe, the British king,
at length, found leisure to direct some portion of his attention
to America, and nominate a successor to the office that had

1 Mather. Neal. History of the British Dominions in North Ameriea. — Trum
bull. Holmes.

410 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK been vacant since the death of Sir William Phipps. The
' Earl of Bellamont was appointed governor of New York,
1698. Massachusetts, and New Hampshire. The office of deputy-
ay' governor of the two latter states was bestowed by this noble
man on Stoughton, whose recent services and disinterested
patriotism effaced the jealousy with which at one time he had
been regarded by his countrymen, for having accepted a seat
in the legislative council of New England during the arbi
trary sway of Sir Edmund Andros.1
Having pursued the separate history of the New England
states up to this period, we shall now leave these interesting
settlements in the enjoyment (unhappily, too short-lived) of
a peace, whereof a long train of previous warfare and dis
tresses had taught the inhabitants fully to appreciate the
value. They were now more united than ever among them
selves, and enriched with an ample stock of experience of both
good and evil. When Lord Bellamont visited Massachusetts
1699. in the following year, the recent heats and animosities had
entirely subsided : he found the inhabitants generally disposed
to harmony and tranquillity, and himself contributed to cherish
this disposition by a policy replete with wisdom, integrity,
and moderation. The virtue that had so signally distin
guished the original settlers of New England was now seen
to shine forth among their descendants with a lustre less
dazzling, but with an influence in some respects more ami
able, refined, and humane, than had attended its original
display.
Moral and One of the causes, perhaps, that conduced to the restora-
pohticai ^.jon 0f harmony, and the revival of piety among this people,
New Eng- was the publication of various histories2 of the New England
land. 1 Mather. Neal. Hutchinson. Belknap. Stoughton died in the year 1702.
As the colonial agent in England, he had tendered advice that proved unacceptable
to his countrymen ; as a member of the grand council of Andros, he had occupied
a post which they regarded with aversion ; and as lieutenant-governor, he had pro
moted the odious prosecutions for witchcraft. Yet his repute for honest and dis
interested patriotism finally prevailed over all the obstructions of these untoward cir
cumstances ; and a bright reversion of honour attended the close of his life. " In
stead of children," says Hutchinson, " he saw before his death a college reared at
his expense, which took the name of Stoughton-hall, and will transmit a grateful re
membrance of his name to succeeding ages."
2 Of these productions two of the earliest in point of composition were Governor
Bradford's History of the Colony of Plymouth, and Governor Winthrop's Journal of
Events in New England. But neither of these was published till more than a cen-

NORTH AMERICA. 411
settlements, written with a spirit and. fidelity well calculated CHAP.
to commend to the minds of the colonists the just results of- _.l *
their national experience. The subject was deeply interesting ;
and, happily, the treatment of it was undertaken by writers
whose principal object was to render this interest subservient
to the promotion of piety and virtue. Though New England
might be considered as yet in a state of political infancy, it
had passed through a great variety of fortune. It had been
the adopted country of many of the most excellent men of the
age in which its colonization began, and the native land of
others who had inherited the character of their ancestors,
and transmitted it in unimpaired vigour, and with added
renown. The history of man never exhibited an effort of
more resolute and enterprising virtue than the original migra
tion of the puritans to this distant and desolate region ;
nor have the annals of colonization ever supplied another
instance of the foundation of a commonwealth, and its
advancement through a period of weakness and danger, to
strength and security, in which the principal actors have left
behind them a reputation more illustrious and unsullied, with
fewer memorials calculated to pervert the moral sense or
awaken the regret of mankind. The relation of their achieve
ments had a powerful tendency to animate hope and perseve
rance in brave and virtuous enterprise. They could not in
deed boast, as the founders of the settlement of Pennsylvania
have done, that, openly professing non-resistance of injuries,
and faithfully adhering to that profession, they had so fully
merited and obtained the Divine protection by an exclusive
dependence on it, as to disarm the ferocity of barbarians, and
conduct the establishment of their commonwealth without

tury after. The conclusion of Winthrop's Journal was not published till the year
1826. A voluminous history of New England was composed by William Hubbard, a
puritan clergyman ; but never having been published, it is known only to scholars.
It is frequently referred to as an authority by other New England historians. The
author was rewarded for his labours by the following order of the general court of
Massachusetts, in the year 1682 : — " Whereas it has been thought necessary, and a
duty incumbent upon us, to take due notice of all occurrences and passages of God's
providence towards the people of this jurisdiction which may remain to posterity, and
that the Rev. Mr. William Hubbard hath taken pains to compile a history of this
nature, the court doth with thankfulness acknowledge his labour, and hereby orders
the treasurer to pay him fifty pounds ; he transcribing the work fairly into a book,
that it may be the more easily perused." — Eliot's New England Biography.

412 THE HISTORY OF
B 00 k violence and bloodshed. But if they were involved in nume-
 _._  . rous wars, it was the singular and honourable characteristic
of them all, that they were invariably the offspring of self-
defence against the unprovoked malevolence of their adversa
ries, and that not one of them was undertaken from motives of
conquest or plunder. Though they considered these wars as
necessary and justifiable, they sincerely deplored them; and,
more than once, the most distressing doubts were expressed,
at the close of their hostilities, if it were lawful for christians
to press even the right of self-defence to such fatal extremity.
They behaved to the Indian tribes with as much good faith
and justice as they could have shown to a powerful and civi
lized people,1 and were incited by the manifest inferiority of
those savage neighbours, to no other acts than a series of the
most magnanimous and laudable endeavours to instruct their
ignorance, and improve their condition. If they fell short of
the colonists of Pennsylvania in the exhibition of christian
meekness, — they unquestionably excelled them in extent and
activity of christian exertion. The quakers succeeded in con
ciliating the Indians ; the puritans endeavoured to civilize
them. The chief, if not the only fault, with which impartial
history must ever reproach the conduct of these people, is the
religious intolerance that they cherished, and the persecution
which, on too many occasions, it prompted them to inflict.
Happily for their own character, the provocation which in
some instances they received from the objects of their severity,
tended greatly to extenuate the blame ; and happily, no less,
for the legitimate influence of their character on the minds of
their posterity, the fault itself, notwithstanding every extenua
tion, stood so manifestly contrasted and inconsistent with the
1 Not only were all the lands occupied by the colonists fairly purchased from their
Indian owners, but, in some parts of the country, the lands were subject to quit-rents
to the Indians, " which," says Belknap, in 1784, " are annually paid to theirpos-
terity." A great English writer has represented an Indian chief as moralizing on
the policy and pretensions of the European colonists in the following strains : —
" Others pretend to have purchased a right of residence and tyranny : but surely the
insolence of such bargains is more offensive than the avowed and open dominion of
force." Idler. The Indians, indeed, were no strangers to such sentiments. Be
holding with ignorant wonder and helpless envy the augmented value which the lands
they had sold derived from the industry and skill of the purchasers, they very readily
admitted the belief that they had been defrauded in the original vendition. But
abundant evidence has been preserved by the New England historians, that the prices
paid by the colonists, so far from being lower, were in general much higher than the
real value of the land.

NORTH AMERICA. 413
very principles with which their own fame was for ever associ- CHAP.
ated, that it was impossible for a writer of common integrity, v'
not involved in the immediate heat of controversy, to render a
just tribute to their excellence, without finding himself ob
liged to remark and condemn this signal departure from it.
The histories that were now published were the compositions
of the friends, associates, and successors of the original colo
nists, — and written with an energy of just encomium that ele
vated every man's ideas of his ancestors and his country, and
of the duties which arose from these natural or patriotic rela
tions, and excited universally a generous sympathy with the
characters and sentiments of the fathers of New England. The
writers, nevertheless, were too conscientious, and too enlight
ened, to confound the virtues with the defects of the character
they described ; and while they dwelt apologetically on the
causes by which persecution had been provoked, they la
mented the infirmity that (under any degree of provocation) had
oetrayed good men into conduct so oppressive and unchristian.
Even Cotton Mather, the most encomiastic of the historians
of New England, and who cherished very strong prejudices
against the quakers and other persecuted sectaries, has
expressed still stronger disapprobation of the severities they
encountered from the objects of his encomium. These re
presentations could not fail to produce a beneficial effect on
the people of New England. They saw that the glory of
their native land was associated with principles that could
never coalesce with or sanction intolerance; and that every
instance of persecution with which their annals were stained,
was a dereliction of those principles, and an impeachment of
their country's claim to the admiration of mankind- Inspired
with the warmest attachment to the memory, and the highest
respect for the virtues of their ancestors, they were forcibly
admonished, by the errors into which they had fallen, to
suspect and repress in themselves those infirmities from which
even virtue of so high an order had been found to afford no
exemption. From this time, the religious zeal of the people
of New England was no longer perverted by intolerance, or
disgraced by persecution; and the influence of Christianity in
mitigating enmity, and promoting kindness and indulgence,
derived a freer scope from the growing conviction, that the

414

THE HISTORY OF

BOOK principles of the gospel were utterly irreconcilable with
**• violence and severity; and that, revealing to every man his
own infirmity much more clearly than that of any other
human being, they were equally adverse to confidence in
himself and to condemnation of others. Cotton Mather, who
recorded and reproved the errors of the first colonists, lived tb
witness the success of his monitory representations, in the cha
rity and liberality of their descendants.1
New England having been colonised by men, not less emi
nent for learning than piety, was distinguished at an early
period by the labours of her scholars, and the dedication of
her literature to the nurture of religious sentiment and prin
ciple. The theological works of John Cotton, Hooker, the
Mathers, and other New England divines, have always en
joyed a high degree of esteem and popularity, not only in
New England, but in every protestant country of Europe.
The annals of the various states, and the biography of their
founders, were written by cotemporary historians with a mi
nuteness which was very agreeable and interesting to the first
generation of their readers, and to which the writers were
prompted, in some measure at least, by the conviction they
entertained that their country had been honoured with the
signal favour and especial guidance and direction of divine
Providence. This conviction, while it naturally betrayed
these writers into the fault of prolixity, enforced by the
strongest sanctions the accuracy and fidelity of their nar
rations. Recording what they considered the peculiar deal
ings of God, with a people peculiarly his own, they presumed
not to disguise the infirmities of their countrymen ; nor did

1 A discourse which he published some years after this period, contains the follow
ing passage : — " In this capital city of Boston, there are ten assemblies of Christians
of different persuasions, who live so lovingly and peaceably together, doing all the
offices of neighbourhood for one another in such a manner, as may give a sensible
rebuke to all the bigots of uniformity, and show them how consistent a variety of
rites in religion may be with the tranquillity of human society ; and may demonstrate
to the world that persecution for conscientious dissents in religion is an abomination
of desolation, a thing whereof all wise and just men will say, ' Cursed be its anger,
for it is fierce ; and its wrath, for it is cruel.' " Neal's Preseut State of New Eng
land. The first episcopal society was formed in Massachusetts in 1686 (before the
arrival of Andros) ; and the first episcopal chapel erected at Boston in 1688. Col
lections of the Mass. Hist. Soc. A quaker meeting-house was built at Boston in
1710. Ibid.

NORTH AMERICA. 415
they desire to magnify the Divine grace in the infusion of hu- CHAP.
man virtue, above the Divine patience in enduring human '
frailty and imperfection. Nay, the errors and failings of the
illustrious men, whose lives they related, gave additional
weight to the impression which above all they desired to con
vey, that the colonization of New England was an extraordi
nary work of Heaven ; that the counsel and the virtue by
which it had been conducted and achieved were not of human
origin ; and that the glory of God had been displayed no less
in imparting the strength and wisdom, than in controlling the
weakness and perversity of the instruments which he con
descended to employ.1 The most considerable of these histo
rical works, and the most interesting performance that the
literature of New England has ever produced, is the Magnolia
Ckristi Americana, or History of New England, by Cotton
Mather. Of this work, the arrangement is exceedingly
faulty ; and its vast bulk must continue to render its exterior
increasingly repulsive to modern readers. The continuity of
the narrative is frequently broken by the introduction of long
discourses, epistles, and theological reflections and dissert
tations : biography is intermixed with history ; and events of
local or temporaiy interest related with tedious superfluity of
detail. It is not so properly a single or continuous historical
narration, as a collection of separate works illustrative of the
various scenes of New England history, under the heads of Re
markable Providences, Remarkable Trials, and numberless other
subdivisions. A plentiful intermixture of puns, anagrams, and
other barbarous conceits, exemplifies a peculiarity (the offspring
partly of bad taste, and partly of superstition) which was very
prevalentamong the prose writers, and especially the theologians
of that age. Notwithstanding these defects, the work will amply
repay the labour of every reader. The biographical portions,
in particular, possess the highest excellence, and are superior
in dignity and interest to the compositions of Plutarch.
1 " If we look on the dark side, the human side, of this work, there is much of
human weakness and imperfection hath appeared in all that hath been done by man,
as was acknowledged by our fathers before us. Neither was New England ever
without some fatherly chastisements from God ; showing that he is not fond of the
formalities of any people upon earth, but expects the realities of practical godliness
according to our profession and engagement unto him." — Higginson's Attestation,
prefixed to Cotton Mather's History.

416 THE HISTORY OF
BO o K Cotton Mather was the author of a great many other works,1
' some of which have been highly popular and eminently useful.
One of them bears the title of Essays to do Good, and contains
a lively and forcible representation (conveyed with more bre
vity than the author usually exemplifies) of the opportunities
which every rank and every relation of human life will present
to a devout mind, of promoting the glory of God and the good
of mankind. Dr. Franklin, in the latter years of his active
and useful life, declared that all the good he had ever done to
his country or his fellow-creatures, must be ascribed to the
impression produced on his mind by perusing that little work
in his youth.2 It is curious to find an infidel philosopher
thus ascribe his own practical wisdom to the lessons of a
christian divine, and trace the stream of his beneficence to the
fountain of the gospel. History and divinity were the chief,
but not the only subjects which exercised the labours of the
scholars of New England. John Sherman, an eminent pu
ritan divine who was one of the first emigrants from Britain
to Massachusetts, where he died in 1685, obtained a high
and just renown as a mathematician and astronomer. He
left at his death a large manuscript collection of astronomical
calculations ; and for several years published an almanack
which was interspersed with pious reflections and admo
nitions.3 A traveller who visited Boston in the year 1686, mentions
a number of booksellers there who had already made fortunes
by their trade. The learned and ingenious author of the His
tory of Printing in America has given a catalogue of the
works published by the first New England printers in the
seventeenth century. Considering the circumstances and
1 His biographers have given us a catalogue of his works, amounting to no fewer
than three hundred and eighty-tico — many, no doubt, of small dimensions, but others
of considerable bulk. He was a singular economist of time, and at once the most
voluminous and popular writer, and the most zealous and active minister of his age.
Among his manuscripts was a theological work which he had prepared for publica
tion, and which is reported to have been " enough constantly to employ a man, un
less he be a miracle of diligence, the half of the threescore years and ten allowed
us." Holmes. In conversation he is said to have particularly excelled : — " Here
it was seen how his wit and fancy, his invention, his quickness of thought, and ready
apprehension, were all consecrated to God, as well as his will and affections." Ibid.
Above his study door Was inscribed this impressive admonition to his visitors, " Be
short." He was the son of Dr. Increase Mather. Born in 1663, he died in 1727.
» Franklin's Works. 3 Eliot's New England Biography.

NORTH AMERICA. 4] 7
numbers of the people, the catalogue is amazingly copious. CHAP.
One of the printers of that age was an Indian, the son of one '
ofthe first Indian converts.1
The education and habits of the people of New England
prepared them to receive the full force of those impressions
which their national literature was fitted to produce. In no
country have the benefits of knowledge been ever more highly
prized or more generally diffused. Institutions for the
education of youth were coeval with the foundation of
the first provincial community, and were propagated with
every accession to the population and every extension of
the settlements. Education was facilitated in New England
by the peculiar manner in which its colonization was con
ducted. In many other parts of America, the planters dis
persed themselves over the face of the country; each residing
on his own farm, and, in choosing the spot where his house
was to be placed, guided merely by considerations of agri
cultural convenience. The advantages resulting from this
mode of inhabitation were gained at the expense of such
dispersion of dwellings as obstructed the erection of churches
and schools, and the enjoyment of social intercourse. But
the colonization of New England was conducted in a manner
much more favourable to the improvement of human cha
racter and manners. All the original townships were formed
in what is termed in America the village manner f the inha
bitants having originally planted themselves in small societies,
from regard to the ordinances of religion and the convenience
of education. Every town containing fifty householders was
obliged by law to provide a schoolmaster qualified to teach
reading and writing ; and every town containing a hundred
householders, to maintain a grammar school.3 But the ge
nerous ardour of the people continually outstripped the pro
visions of this law. We have seen Harvard College arise in
Massachusetts but a few years after the foundation of the
colony was laid. The other states, for some time after, were
destitute of the wealth and population necessary to support

1 Dunton's Life and Errors, Thomas's Hist, of Printing in America.
2 Dwight's Travels.
3 Abridgment of the Laws of NewEngland. Neal.
VOL. I. E E

4 1 8 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK similar establishments within their own territories ; but they
' frequently assessed themselves in the most liberal contribu
tions for the maintenance and enlargement of Harvard College.
The contributions, even at a very early period, of Connecticut,
Newhaven, and New Hampshire, have been particularly and
deservedly noted for their liberality.1 The close of the same
century was illustrated by tbe establishment of Yale College
in Connecticut. So high was the repute which this quarter
of North America long continued to enjoy for the excellence
and efficiency of its seminaries of education, that many re
spectable persons, not only in the other American states, but
even in Great Britain, sent their children to be educated in
New England.2
A general appetite for knowledge, and a universal familiarity
with letters, was thus maintained from the beginning among
the New England colonists. The rigid discouragement of
frivolous amusements, and of every recreation that bordered
upon vice, tended to devote their leisure hours tq reading;
and the sentiments and opinions derived through this avenue
of knowledge, sunk deeply into vigorous and undissipated
minds. The historical retrospections of this people were
peculiarly calculated to exercise a favourable influence on their
character and turn of thinking, by awakening a generous
emulation, and connecting them with a uniform and progres
sive course of manly, patient, and successful virtue.
Notwithstanding the general diffusion of knowledge among
the people of New England, the lower classes were not en
tirely exempt from the prevalent delusions of the age. In
particular, the notion then generally received in the parent
state, and consecrated by a special office long retained in her
church liturgy, of the efficacy of the royal touch for the cure
of the disorder called the king's evil, appears to have been im
ported into New England, to the great inconvenience of those
victims of the malady who were so unhappy as to entertain it.
Belknap has transcribed from the records of the town of
' Trumbull. Belknap.
a History of the British Dominions in America. In aid of the library of Yale
College, copies of their works were contributed by the most illustrious writers in
England ; and among others by Sir Isaac Newton, Sir Richard Blackmore, Sir
Richard Steele, Bishop Burnet, Dr. Woodward, Dr, Halley, Dr. Bentley, Calamy,
Henry, and Whiston. — Holmes,

NORTH AMERICA. 419
Portsmouth in New Hampshire, the petition of an inhabitant chap.
to the assembly of this province, in the year 1687, for assis- V.
tance to undertake a journey to England, that he might be-
cured of his disease by coming in contact with a king j1 a cir
cumstance which Heaven (it may be hoped) has decreed
should never be possible within the confines of North Ame
rica. The amount of the population of New England at the pre
sent era has been very differently estimated by different
writers. According to Sir William Petty, the number of in
habitants amounted, in the year 1691, to one hundred and
fifty thousand.2 A much lower computation is adopted by
Neal ; and a much higher by a later historian.3 The popu
lation, it is certain, had been considerably augmented, both
by the emigration of dissenters from various of the European
states, and by domestic propagation in circumstances so
favourable to increase. Yet no quarter of North America has
seen its own population so extensively drained by emigration
as New England, which, from a very early period of its his
tory, has continually furnished swarms of hardy, sober, and
educated men to recruit and improve every successive settle
ment that has offered its resources to industry and virtue.
The severe restraint of licentious intercourse ; the facility of
acquiring property and maintaining a family ; and the preva
lence of industrious and frugal habits among all classes of
people, combined with happy efficacy to render marriages both
frequent and prolific in New England. Boston, the capital of
Massachusetts, and during many years, the largest city in
North America, appears to have contained a population of
more than 10,000 persons at the close of this century. In the
year 1720, its inhabitants amounted to 20,000. Every inha
bitant ofthe province was required by law to keep a stock of
arms and ammunition in his house ; and all males above six
teen years of age were enrolled in the militia, which was as
sembled for exercise four times every year.*
The whole territory of New England was comprehended at
this period in four jurisdictions, — Massachusetts, New Hamp-
1 Belknap. Smollett's History of England. 2 Political Arithmetic.
3 Hist, of the British Dominions in North America. * Neal.
E E 2

420 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK shire, Connecticut and Rhode Island. To Massachusetts
' there had been annexed the settlements of New Plymouth and
Maine, and to Connecticut the settlement of Newhaven. The
territories of these governments were divided into constituted
districts called townships, each of which was represented by
one or two deputies (according to the number of the free
holders) in the assembly of the state to which it belonged.
Besides this elective franchise, the freeholders of each township
enjoyed the right of appointing the municipal officers denomi
nated select-men, by whom the domestic government of the
township was exercised. The qualification of a freeholder in
Massachusetts was declared by its charter to be an estate ofthe
value of forty shillings per annum, or the possession of per
sonal property to the amount of fifty pounds; communion
with the congregational churches having ceased for many
years to be requisite to the enjoyment of political privileges.
In the other states of New England, the qualification was
nearly the same as in Massachusetts. The expenses of
government had been defrayed originally by temporary assess
ments, to which every man was rated according to the value
of his whole property; but since the year 1645, excises, im
posts, and poll taxes had been in use. The judicial pro
cedure in all the provincial courts was conducted with
great expedition, cheapness, and simplicity. In all trials
by jury in New England, whether of civil or criminal
causes, the juries were not, as in Britain, nominated by
the sheriffs, but elected by the inhabitants ; and these elec
tions were conducted with the strictest precautions for pre
venting the intrusion of partiality or corruption.1
Massachusetts and New Hampshire, — the one enjoying a
chartered, the other an unchartered jurisdiction, — were the only
two provinces of New England in which the superior officers
of government were appointed by the crown, and from the
tribunals of which an appeal was admitted to the king in
council. As New Hampshire was too inconsiderable to sup
port the substance as well as the title of a separate govern
ment, it was the practice at this period, and for some time
1 Hist, of the British Dominions in North America. Wynne's Hist, of British
America.

NORTH AMERICA. 421
after, to appoint the same person to be governor of Massa- CHAP.
chusetts and New Hampshire. In Connecticut and Rhode v'
Island, all the officers of government (excepting the members
of the court of admiralty) were elected by the inhabitants ;
and so resolutely was this highly-valued privilege defended,
that when King William appointed Fletcher, the governor of
New York, to command the Connecticut militia, the province
refused to acknowledge his authority.1 The laws of these
states were not subject to the negative, nor the judgments of
their tribunals to the review of the king. But the validity of
their laws was declared to depend on a very uncertain crite
rion — a conformity, as close as circumstances would admit, to
the jurisprudence of England.2 So perfectly democratic were
the constitutions of Connecticut and Rhode Island, that in
neither of them was the governor suffered to exercise a nega
tive on the resolutions ofthe assembly. The spirit of liberty
was not suppressed in Massachusetts by the encroachments of
royal prerogative on the ancient privileges of the people, but
was vigorously exerted through the remaining and important
organ of the provincial assembly. All the patronage that was
vested in the royal governor, was never able to create more
than a very inconsiderable royalist party in this state. The
functionaries whom he, or whom the crown appointed, de
pended on the popular assembly for the emoluments of their
offices ; and although the most strenuous efforts and the
most formidable threats were employed by the British minis
ters to free the governor himself from the same dependence,
they were never able to prevail with the assembly to annex a
fixed salary to his office. The people and the popular autho
rities of Massachusetts were always ready to set an example
to the other colonies of a determined resistance to the en
croachments of royal prerogative.
In all the colonies of North America, and especially in the

' Wynne. Trumbull. Book V. chap. ii. past.
5 There were no regular means of ascertaining this conformity ; these states not
being obliged, like Massachusetts, to transmit their laws to England. On a com
plaint from an inhabitant of Connecticut, aggrieved by the operation of a parlicular
law, it was declared, by the king in council, " that their law concerning dividing
land-inheritance of an intestate was contrary to the law of England, and void ;" but
the colony paid no regard to this declaration. — Hist, of the British Dominions in
North America.

422 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK New England states, there existed at this period, and for a
' _ l°ng t'me afterwards, a mixture of very opposite sentiments
towards Great Britain. As the posterity of Englishmen, the
colonists cherished a strong attachment to a land which they
habitually termed the Mother Country or Home,1 and to a
people whom, though contemporaries with themselves, they
regarded as holding an ancestral relation to them. As Ame
ricans, their liberty and happiness, and even their national ex
istence, were associated with escape from royal persecution in
Britain ; and the jealous and unfriendly sentiments engen
dered by this consideration were preserved more particularly
in Massachusetts by the abridgment of the privileges which
she had originally enjoyed, and which still subsisted unim
paired in Connecticut and Rhode Island; and were main
tained in every one of the states by the oppressive commercial
policy which Great Britain pursued towards them, and of
which their increasing resources rendered them increasingly
sensible and proportionally impatient. The loyalty of Con
necticut and Rhode Island was in no degree promoted by the
preservation of their ancient charters — an advantage which
they well knew had been yielded to them with the utmost re
luctance by the British government, and of which numerous
attempts to divest them by act of parliament were made by
King William and his immediate successors. Even the new
charter of Massachusetts was not exempted from such
attacks: and the defensive spirit that was thus excited and
kept alive by the aggressive policy of Britain, contributed, no
doubt, to influence, in a material degree, the subsequent des
tinies of America.
In return for the articles which they required from Europe,
and of which the English merchants monopolised the supply,
the inhabitants of New England had no staple commodity
' They have left one indestructible mark of their origin, and their kindly remem
brance of it, in the British names which they extended to American places. When
New London in Connecticut was founded in the year 1648, the assembly of the pro
vince assigned its name by an act commencing with the following preamble : —
" Whereas it hath been the commendable practice of the inhabitants of all the colo
nies of these parts, that as this country hath its denomination from our dear native
country of England, and thence is called New England ; so the planters, in their first
settling of most new plantations, have given names to these plantations of some cities
and towns in England, thereby intending to keep up and leave to posterity the me
morial of several places of note there," &c, " this couit, considering that there hath
yet no place in any of the colonies been named in memory of the city of London,"
ike.-— 'lrumbull.

NORTH AMERICA. 423
which might not be obtained more cheaply in Europe by their c H A P.
customers. They possessed, indeed, good mines of iron and V-
copper, which might have been wrought with advantage ; but
the manufacture of these metals in the colonies was obstructed
by the dearness of labour; and till the year 1750, the export
of American iron, even to the mother country, was restrained
by heavy duties. The principal commodities exported from
New England were the produce and refuse of her forests, or,
as it was commonly termed, lumber, — and the produce of her
cod-fishery. In the beginning of the eighteenth century, the
annual imports into these provinces from England were esti
mated by Neal at 100,000/. The exports by the English
merchants consisted of a hundred thousand quintals (the
quintal weighing 112 pounds) of dried cod-fish, which were
sold in Europe for 80,000/., and of three thousand tons of
naval stores. To the other American plantations and to the
West Indies, New England sent lumber, fish and other pro
visions, valued at 50,000/. annually. An extensive manu
facture of linen cloth was established about this time in New
England ; — an advantage for which this country was indebted
to the migration of many thousands of Irish presbyterians to
her shores about the beginning of the eighteenth century.
Ship-building was from an early period carried on to a con
siderable extent at Boston and other sea-port towns. It was
the practice of some merchants to freight their vessels, as they
built them, with cargoes of colonial produce, and to sell the
vessels in the same ports in which the cargoes were disposed
of. The manufacture of tar was promoted for some time in
New Hampshire by a law enacted in the assembly of this
province in the beginning of the eighteenth century, which
allowed the inhabitants to pay their taxes in tar rated at twenty
shillings per barrel. A great part of the trade of the other
American colonies was conducted by the shipping of New
England. For many years both before and after the present
era, specie was so scarce in this quarter of America, that
paper money formed almost exclusively the circulating medium
in use among the inhabitants. Bills, or notes, were circulated
for sums as low as half-a-crown.1
1 Neal. Belknap. Wynne. Raynal. Douglas, Winterbotham.

424 THE HISTORY OF
book The progress of population in the district of Maine was remark-
' ably slow. For many years after its first colonization, the greater
number of the emigrants to this region were not husbandmen,
but traders and fishermen, — a description of persons qualified
neither by their views nor their habits to promote the culture
and population of a desert. The soil of a great part of Maine
was erroneously supposed, by the first European colonists, to
be ungrateful to culture, and incapable of yielding a sufficient
supply of bread to its inhabitants. This notion produced the
deficiency which it presupposed; and, injurious as it was to
the increase and prosperity of the inhabitants, it prevailed
even till the period ofthe American revolution. Prior to this
event, the greater part of the bread consumed in the district
of Maine, was imported from the middle colonies.1 All the
states of New England were long infested with wolves ; and,
at the close of the seventeenth century, laws were still enacted
by the provincial assemblies, offering bounties for the destruc
tion of those animals.2
Except in Rhode Island, the doctrine and form ofthe con
gregational church that was established by the first colonists,
prevailed generally in the NewEngland states. Every township
was required by law to choose a minister, and to fix his salary
by mutual agreement of the parties ; in default of which, a
salary proportioned to the ability ofthe township was decreed to
him by the justices of the peace. In case of the neglect of any
township to appoint a minister within a certain period of time
prescribed by law, the right of appointment for the occasion
devolved to the court of quarter sessions. By a special cus
tom of the town of Boston, the salaries of its ministers were
derived from the voluntary contributions of their respective
congregations, collected every Sunday on their assembling for
divine service; and it was remarked, that none ofthe minis
ters of New England were so liberally provided for as those
whose emoluments, undetermined by legal provision, thus
represented the success of their labours and the conscientious
regard of their people.3 In Rhode Island there was no legal

1 Sullivan's History of Maine. Dwight's Travels.
'' Trumbull. Oidinanccs of New England to the year 1700. Chalmers.
' Neal.

NORTH AMERICA. 425
provision for the celebration of divine worship, or the main- CHAP.
tenance of religious institutions. This colony was peopled by v'
a mixed multitude of sectarians, who, having separated them
selves from christian societies in other places, had continued
ever since in a broken and disunited state. In their political
capacity, the inhabitants of Rhode Island admitted unbounded
liberty of conscience, and disavowed all connexion between
church and state. In their christian relations, they made no
account of the virtue of mutual forbearance, and absolutely
disowned the duty of submitting to one another on any point,
whether essential or circumstantial. Few of them held regu
lar assemblies for public worship ; still fewer appear to have
had stated places for such assemblage ; and an aversion to
every thing that savoured of restraint or formality prevailed
among them all. Notwithstanding the unlimited toleration
that was professedly established in this settlement, it appears
that the government, in 1665, passed an ordinance to outlaw
quakers and confiscate their estates, because they would not
carry arms. But the people, in general, resisted this regu
lation, and would not suffer it to be executed. a Cotton
Mather declares, that, in 1655, " Rhode Island colony was a
colluvies of antinomians, famalists, anabaptists, anti-sabbata-
rians, Arminians, Socinians, quakers, ranters, and every thing
but Roman catholics and true Christians ; bonna terra, mala
gens." In the town of Providence, which was included in
this colony, and was inhabited by the descendants of those
schismatics who had accompanied Roger Williams and Mrs.
Hutchinson in their exile from Massachusetts, the antipathy
to legal establishments and every species of subordination was
carried to such an extreme that, at the present period, the in
habitants had neither magistrates nor ministers among them.
They entertained an invincible antipathy to all rates and
taxes, as devices invented for the benefit of hirelings, — by
which opprobrious term they designated all civil and ecclesi
astical functionaries who refused to serve them for nothing.
Yet they lived in great amity with their neighbours, and,
though every man did whatever seemed right in his own eyes,
it was rarely that any crime was committed among them ;
1 Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society.

426 THE HISTORY OF
BOOK "which may be attributed," says the historian from whom
n' this testimony is derived, " to their great veneration for the
Holy Scriptures, which they all read, from the least to the
greatest."1 Massachusetts and Connecticut, as they were
the most considerable of the New England states, in respect
of wealth and population, so were they the most distinguished
for piety, morality, and the cultivation and diffusion of
knowledge. At the close of the seventeenth century there
were an hundred religious assemblies in Massachusetts, ex
clusive of the numerous congregations of christian Indians.2
The censorial discipline exercised by these societies over their
members was highly conducive to the preservation of good
morals ; and the efficacy of this and of every other incitement
to virtue was enhanced by the thinly peopled state of the
country, where no person could screen his character or pur
suits from the observation ofthe public eye.
Perhaps no country in the world was ever more dis
tinguished than New England was at this time for the
general prevalence of those sentiments and habits that render
communities respectable and happy. Sobriety and industry
pervaded all classes of the inhabitants. The laws against
immoralities of every description were extremely strict, and
not less strictly executed ;3 and, being cordially supported by

' Neal. We have an account of the religious condition of Rhode Island, about
thirty years after thepresent period, from the pen of the great and good Bishop Berkeley,
who resided some years in this colony. A general indifference to religion, and a
great relaxation of morality, had then become the characteristics of the majority of the
people. Several churches, however, some on the congregational, and others on the
episcopal model, had been established; and through their instrumentality, the
blessings of religion were yet preserved in the colony. Berkeley's Works.
"So little," says awriter much esteemed in America, " has the civil authority to do
with religion in Rhode Island, that no contract betweenaministerandasociety(unless
incorporated for that purpose) is of any force. It is probably for these reasons that
so many sects have ever been found here ; and that the Sabbath and all religious
institutions, as well as good morals, have been less regarded in this than in any
other of the New England states." Jedidiah Morse.
So late as the beginning of the nineteenth century, the legislature of Rhode Is
land discouraged the project of a turnpike road, alleging that turnpike duties and
ecclesiastical establishments were English practices, and badges of slavery, — from
which their people were distinguished over all the other Americans by a happy ex
emption. It was not till the year 1805 that the advantages of turnpike roads pre
vailed over the imaginary dignity of this exemption . — Dwight.
* Neal.
3 Josselyn, who visited New England, for the first time in 1638, relates, that in
the village of Boston there were then two licensed inns. " An officer visits them,"
he adds, " whenever a stranger goes into them ; and if he calls for more drink than

V.

NORTH AMERICA. 427
public opinion, they were able to render every vicious and CHAP.
profligate excess alike dangerous and discreditable to the
perpetrator. We are assured by a well informed writer, that
at this period there was not a single beggar in the whole
province : and a gentleman of unquestioned veracity who
had resided in it for seven years, declared, that during all that
period, he had never heard a profane oath, nor witnessed an
instance of inebriety.1 Labour was so valuable, land so
cheap, and the elective franchise so widely extended, that
every industrious man might acquire a stake in the soil, and
a voice in the civil administration of his country. The general
diffusion of education caused the national advantages which
were vigorously improved, to be justly appreciated; and a
steady and ardent patriotism knit the hearts of the people to
each other and to their country.
The state of society in New England, the circumstances
and habits of the people, tended to form, among their leading-
men, a character more solid than brilliant: — not (as some
have imagined) to discourage the cultivation or exercise of
talent, but to repress its idle display, and train it to its legiti
mate and respectable end, of giving efficacy to wisdom,
prudence, and virtue. Yet this state of society was by no
means inconsistent either with politeness of manners or with
innocent hilarity. Lord Bellamont was agreeably surprised,
with the graceful and courteous demeanour of the gentlemen
and clergy of Connecticut, and confessed . that he found the
aspect and address which he had thought peculiar to no
bility, in a land where this aristocratical distinction was
unknown.2 From Dunton's account of his residence in
Boston in 1686, it appears that the inhabitants of Massa
chusetts were at that time distinguished in a very high degree
by their cheerful vivacity, their hospitality, and a courtesy
the officer thinks in his judgment he can soberly bear away, he countermands it, and
appoints the proportion, beyond which he cannot get one drop." Josselyn's Voyage.
In 1694, the select men of Massachusetts were ordered to hang up in every alehouse'
lists of all reputed tipplers and drunkards within their districts ; and alehouse keepers
were forbidden to supply liquor to any person whose name was thus posted. Holmes.
The magistrates of some of the towns of Scotland appear to have exercised similar
acts of authority. An instance occurred in the town of Rutherglen in 1668. — Ure's
Hist, of Rutherglen.
1 Neal. Trumbull.
a Trumbull. Dwight's Travels.

428 THE HISTORV OF
BOOK the more estimable that it was indicative of real benevolence.1
' From the circumstances of the country, it is impossible to
suppose that the manners of its inhabitants could exhibit that
perfection of exterior polish and factitious elegance, generated
in old societies by leisure, wealth, and the necessity of
refining the means of procuring social distinction. But while
the absence of unsuitable pretensions and competitions ba
nished the most copious source of vulgarity, the diffusion
of literary taste and of liberal piety supplied an influence
amply sufficient to soften and ennoble human manners.
Elegance may consist with great plainness of external cir
cumstances : nay, in proportion as it is unaided by exterior
trapping and decoration, its origin seems the more refined
and exalted, and its excellence the more genuine and durable.
It was a remark of the Great Prince of Conde, that the New
Testament displayed the most perfect model of a kind and
graceful politeness that he had ever met with. Good manners
consist in conducting ourselves towards every person with a
demeanour, graciously expressive of the relation which he
holds to ourselves and others. Christianity at once affords
the justest, the most endearing, and most enlarged view of
the relations of human beings to each other, and enforces by
the strongest sanctions the duties and courtesies which these
relations engender. Men devoted to the service of God, like
the first generations of the inhabitants of New England,
carried throughout their lives an elevated strain of sentiment
and purpose, which must have communicated some portion of
its own grace and dignity to their manners.
In the historical and statistical accounts of the various
states,2 we continually meet with instances of the beneficial
influence exercised by superior minds on the virtue, industry,
and happiness of particular districts and infant settlements.
In no country has the ascendancy of talent been greater,
or more advantageously exerted. The dangers of Indian
invasion were encountered and repelled ; the dejection and

1 Dunton's Life and Errors. Dunton, who had sat " at good men's feasts" in Lon
don, was yet struck with the plenty and elegance of the entertainments he witnessed
in Boston.
- Sec, in particular, the Histories of Trumbull and Belknap, and the Travels of
Dwight, passim.

NORTH AMERICA. 429
timidity produced by them, surmounted ; the feuds and con- CHAP.
tentions naturally arising among settlers of various countries, -'
habits, and opinions, composed ; the temptations to slothful
and degenerate modes of living, resisted ; the self-denial
requisite to the endowment of institutions for preaching the
gospel and the education of youth, resolutely practised. In
founding and conducting to maturity the new settlements
that progressively arose, men of talent and virtue enjoyed
a sphere of noble employment. They taught by action
and example. They distinguished themselves from the
rest of mankind by excelling them in their common pursuits,
and exercising a manifest superiority of understanding on the
ordinary subjects of reflection and consideration. They exem
plified a species of dignity at once the most substantial and the
most generally attainable ; which depends not on opportunities
of performing remarkable deeds, but consists in discharging the
ordinary duties of life with a religious elevation of sentiment.
They read their history in the approving eyes, and im
proving manners and condition of a free and happy people.
Mankind have a greater aptitude to copy characters than to
yield obedience to precepts ; and virtue is much more effec
tually recommended to their imitation and esteem by the exhi
bition of zeal than by the force of argument. Let the votaries of
glory remember that if a life thus spent, circumscribe the
diffusion of the patriot's name, it extends the influence of his
character and sentiments to distant generations; and that if
posthumous fame, be any thing more than a splendid illusion,
it is such distinction as this, from which the surest and most
lasting satisfaction will be derived.
The esteem of the community was considered so va
luable a part of the emoluments of public office, that
the salaries of all municipal officers, except those who
were appointed by the crown, were, if not scanty, yet
exceedingly moderate. In Connecticut, it was remarked, that
the whole annual expenses of its public institutions (about
800/.) did not amount to the salary of a royal governor.1 The
slender emoluments of public offices, and the tenure of po
pular pleasure by which they were held, tended very much
1 Trumbull.

430 THE HISTORY OF
B oo K to exempt the offices from the pretensions of unworthy can-
 ' didates, and the officers from calumny and envy. Virtue and
ability were fairly appreciated ; and we frequently find the
same individuals re-elected for a long series of years to the
same offices,1 and in some instances succeeded by their
sons, where inheritance of merit recommended inheritance
of place. In more than one of the settlements, the first
codes of law were the composition of single persons; the
people desiring an eminent citizen to compose for them
a body of laws, and then legislating unanimously in con
formity with his suggestions. The estimation and the dis
interestedness of public services were not unfrequently attested
by legislative appropriations of public money to defray the
funeral charges of men who for many years had enjoyed the *
highest official dignities. The public respect for distinguished
patriots, though not perpetuated by titles of nobility, was pre
served in the recollection of their actions, and stimulated
instead of relaxing the ardour of their descendants. The
virtue of remarkable benefactors of their country was more
diffusively beneficial from their never being separated from the
mass of the community by titular distinctions. Remaining
incorporated with the order of citizens, their merit more visi
bly reflected honour upon it, than if they had been advanced
to an imaginary eminence, tending to engender in themselves
or their descendants contempt for the bulk of their country
men. The most lasting, if not the most serious, evil with which
New England has ever been afflicted, was the institution of
slavery, which continued till a late period to pollute all its
provinces, and even now lingers, though to a very slight ex
tent, in the province of New Hampshire.2 The practice, as
we have seen, originated in the supposed necessity created by
1 In the year 1634, the people of Massachusetts having elected a particular indi
vidual to the office of governor, in place of Winthrop, who had previously enjoyed
this dignity, their conduct was censured by John Cotton, who, in a sermon preached
before the general court, maintained that a magistrate ought not to be remitted to the
condition of a private individual, without some cause of complaint publicly esta
blished against him. This curious proposition was discussed by the court, and
" referred for farther consideration." — Winthrop's Journal.
' The assemby of this province, as early as the reign of George the First, passed a
law, enacting, that " if any man smite out the eye or tooth of his man or maid
servant, or otherwise maim or disfigure them, he shall let him or her go free from his
service, and shall allow such farther recompense as the court of quarter sessions shall

NORTH AMERICA. 43 |
the Indian hostilities ; but, once introduced, it was banefully c H A P.
calculated to perpetuate itself, and to derive accessions from V-
various other sources. For some time, indeed, this was suc
cessfully resisted ; and instances have been recorded of judi
cial interposition to restrain the evil within its original limits.
In the year 1645, a negro fraudulently brought from Africa,
and enslaved within the New England territory, was liberated
by the magistrates and sent back to his native country.1 No
law expressly authorizing slavery was ever enacted by any of
the New England states ; and such was the influence of reli
gious and moral feeling in all these states, that, even while
there was no law prohibiting the continuance of slavery, it
never succeeded in gaining any considerable prevalence. By
the early laws of Connecticut, man-stealing was declared a
capital crime. In the year 1703, the assembly of Massa
chusetts imposed a duty of 4.1. on every negro imported into
the province ; and eight years after passed an act prohibiting
the importation of any more Indian servants or slaves.2 In
Massachusetts, the slaves never exceeded the fiftieth part of
the whole population ; in Connecticut and Rhode Island,
when slaves were most numerous (in the middle of the
eighteenth century), the proportion was nearly the same : and
in the territory that afterwards received the name of Vermont,
when the number of inhabitants amounted to nearly nine
thousand, there were only sixteen persons in a state of slavery.3
The cruelties and vices that slavery tends to produce were re
pressed at once by so great a preponderance of the sound over
the unhealthy part of the body politic, and by the circum
stances to which this preponderance was owing. The ma
jority of the inhabitants were decidedly hostile to slavery ; and
numerous remonstrances were addressed to the British govern-

adjudge ;" and that "if any person kill his Indian or negro servant, he shall be
punished with death." The slaves in this province are said to haveheen treated in
all respects like white servants. — Warden's United States.
1 Belknap.
« Blue Laws of Connecticut Holmes. " In the early part of the eighteenth cen-
tnry, Judge Sewell, of New England, came forward as a zealous advocate for the
negroes. He addressed a memorial to the legislature, which he entitled The Selling
of Joseph, and in which he pleaded their cause both as a lawyer and a christian.
This memorial produced an effect upon many, but particularly upon those of his own
religious persuasion." — Clarkson's Hist, of the Abolition of the Slave Trade.
' Warden. Winterbotham's America. Dwight.

432 THE HISTORY OF NORTH AMERICA.
BOOK ment against the encouragement she afforded to it by sup-
r porting the slave trade. When North America attained inde
pendence, the New England states (with the single exception
of New Hampshire) adopted measures which, in the course of
a few years, abolished every trace of this vile institution. In
New Hampshire, it seems to have been rather a preposterous
regard for liberty, and the sacred ness of existing possessions,
than a predilection for slavery, that prevented this practice
from being formally abolished by the principles by which it
has been essentially modified and substantially condemned.1
1 There is a strange, I hope not a disingenuous, indistinctness in the statements
of some writers respecting the negro slavery of New England. Winterbofham,
writing in 1795, asserts, that " there are no slaves in Massachusetts." If he meant
that a law had been passed which denounced, and was gradually extinguishing
slavery, he was right ; but the literal sense of his words is contradicted by Warden's
Tables, which demonstrate that fifteen years after (the law not yet having produced
its full effect) there were several thousand slaves in Massachusetts. Dwight relates
his travels, in the end of the eighteenth and beginning of the nineteenth century,
through every part of New England, without giving us the slightest reason to suppose
that such beings as slaves existed in any one of its states, except when he stops to
defend the legislature of Connecticut from an imputation on the manner in which
her share of the abolition had been conducted. Warden himself says, in one page,
that " slavery no longer exists in New England," even while, in another, he admits
and seeks to palliate the occurrence of its lingering traces in New Hampshire.

NOTES

THE FIRST VOLUME.

NOTE I. Page 20.
The important instruction, both moral and political, which
may be derived from a consideration of the origin of the Slave
Trade, is forcibly depicted by that distinguished philanthropist
(Thomas Clarkson,) whose virtue promoted, and whose genius
has recorded, the abolition of this detestable traffic. It is a
remarkable fact, that the pious and benevolent Las Casas,
actuated by an earnest desire to emancipate the feeble natives
of South America from the bondage of the Spanish colonists,
was the first person who proposed to the government of Spain
the importation of negroes from Africa to America. His proposi
tion was rejected by Cardinal Ximenes, who considered it un
lawful to consign innocent people to slavery at all, and was, more
over, struck with the moral inconsistency of delivering the inhabi
tants of one country from a state of misery, by transferring it to
the inhabitants of another. "After the death of Cardinal Xi
menes, the Emperor Charles the Fifth encouraged the slave trade.
In 1517, he granted a patent to one of his Flemish favourites,
containing an exclusive right of importing four thousand Africans
into America. But he lived long enough to repent of what he
had thus inconsiderately done^ For in the year 1542, he made
a code of laws for the better protection of the unfortunate Indians
in his foreign dominions ; and he stopped the progress of African
slavery by an order that all slaves in his American islands should
be made free." This order was subsequently defeated by his
own retirement into a monastery; but "it shows he had been
ignorant of what he was doing, when he gave his sanction to
this cruel trade. It shows, when legislators give one set of men
an undue power over another, how quickly they abuse it; or he
never would have found himself obliged, in the short space of
twenty-five years, to undo that which he had countenanced as a
VOL. I. F F

434

NOTES.
great state measure. And while it confirms the former lesson
to statesmen, of watching the beginnings or principles of things, in
their political movements, it should teach them never to persist
in the support of evils, through the false shame of being obliged
to confess that they had once given them their sanction ; nor to
delay the cure of them, because, politically speaking, neither this
nor that is the proper season ; but to do them away instantly,
as there can be only one fit or proper time in the eye of religion,
namely, on the conviction of their existence." Clarkson's History
of the Abolition of the Slave Trade.
Louis the Thirteenth of France was at first staggered by the
same scruples of conscience that prevailed with Charles, and
could not be persuaded to authorize the slave trade till he had
been made to believe that he would promote the religious con
version of the negroes by suffering them to be transported to the
colonies. — Ibid.

NOTE II. Page 56.
Captain Smith appears to have been so obnoxious to the lead
ing patentees, that, even if he had remained in the colony, it
is highly improbable that they would ever have intrusted him
with official authority. They neither rewarded nor re-employed
him after his return to England. They were bent on deriving
immediate supplies of gold or rich merchandize from Virginia ;
and ascribed their disappointment in a great measure to his having
restricted his views to the establishment of a solid and respectable
frame of provincial society. This is apparent from many passages
of his writings, and particularly from his letter to the patentees
while he held the presidency. An honester but absurder reason,
that appears to have prevailed with some of them to oppose his
pretensions to office, was, that certain fortune-tellers had predict
ed that he would be unlucky ; a prediction that sometimes
contributes to its own fulfilment.
In various parts of his history, Smith applies himself to refute
their unreasonable charges, and" account for the disappointment
of their expectations. For this purpose he has drawn a parallel
between the circumstances of the Spanish and the English colo
nists of America. " It was the Spaniards' good hap," he ob
serves, " to happen in those parts where were infinite numbers of
people, who had manured the ground with that providence it
afforded victuals at all times. And time had brought them to
that perfection, that they had the use of gold and silver, and the
most of such commodities as those countries afforded : so that
what the Spaniard got was chiefly the spoil and pillage of those
country people, and not the labours of their own hands. But
had these fruitful countries been as savage, as barbarous, as ill
peopled, as little planted, laboured, and manured, as Virginia,

NOTES. 435
their proper labours, it is likely, would have produced as small
profit as ours. And had Virginia been peopled, planted, ma
nured, and adorned with such store of precious jewels and rich
commodities as were the Indies; then, had we not gotten and
done as much as, by their examples, might be expected from us,
the world might then have traduced us and our merits, and have
made shame and infamy our recompense and reward."
Were we to confine our attention to the apparent import of
this isolated passage, it would be difficult not to suppose that this
excellent person was deterred less by want of inclination than by
lack of opportunity, from imitating the robberies and enormi
ties of the Spanish adventurers. But the general strain of his
book, as well as the more credible evidence supplied by the
whole scope and tenor of his life, would fully refute the unjust
supposition. That he was unacquainted with the enormities
committed by the Spaniards in Mexico and Peru, may be col
lected from the praises he bestows on their exploits, and from his
appealing to the glory of these exploits as an incentive that
should stimulate the ardour of the English in the exercise of
laborious virtue, and the prosecution of humble but honest
emolument in North America. Thus nobly we find him expres
sing the sentiments of a mind which the condition of humanity
did not exempt from being deceived, but which piety preserved
from gross depravation or perversion. — "Who can desire more
content that hath small means or but only his merit, to advance
his fortunes, than to tread and plant that ground he hath pur
chased by the hazard of his life ; if he have but the taste of
virtue and magnanimity, what to such a mind can be more plea
sant, than planting and building a foundation for his posterity,
got from the rude earth by God's blessing and his own industry,
without prejudice to any; if he have any grain of faith or zeal
in religion, what can he do less hurtful to any, or more
agreeable to God, than to seek to convert those poor savages
to know Christ and humanity, whose labours with discretion
will triple thy charge and pains ? What so truly suits with
honour and honesty as the discovering things unknown, erect
ing towns, peopling countries, informing the ignorant, reforming
things unjust, teaching virtue, and gaining to our mother
country a kingdom to attend her; finding employment for those
that are idle because they know not what to do ; so far from
wronging any, as to cause posterity to remember thee, and remem
bering thee, ever honour that remembrance with praise?" It is
probably such expressions as these that have led certain writers to
charge Smith with enthusiasm — a term by which some persons
denote every elevation of view and tone that religion imparts,—
and by which many others designate every quality and sentiment
that they feel to be above the pitch of their own nature.
Smith proceeds as follows: "Then who would live at home
idly, or think in himself any worth to live, only to eat, drink, and
f f 2

436

NOTES.
sleep, and so die; or consuming that carelessly his friends got
worthily, or using that miserably that maintained virtue honestly ;
or being descended nobly, pine with the vain vaunt of great
kindred in penury; or, to maintain a silly show of bravery, toil
out thy heart, soul, and time basely, by shifts, tricks, cards and
dice; or by relating news of other men's actions, shark here and
there for a dinner or supper," &c, " though thou . seest what
honours and rewards the world yet hath for them that will seek
them, and worthily deserve them." He adds shortly after, "It
would be a history of a large volume, to recite the adventures of
the Spaniards and Portugals, their affronts and defeats, their
dangers and miseries, which, with such incomparable honour and
constant resolution, so far beyond belief, they have attempted
and endured, in their discoveries and plantations, as may well
condemn us of too much imbecility, sloth, and negligence. Yet
the authors of these new inventions were held as ridiculous for a
long time, as now are others that but seek to imitate their un
paralleled virtues."
I should contend neither wisely nor honestly for the fame of
Captain Smith, were I to represent him as a faultless character,
perfectly unclothed of the imperfections of humanity. The suf
ferings of others were able to provoke him to an intemperance, at
least of language, which none of his own trials and provocations
ever elicited, and which none of his actions ever realized. Indig
nant at the dreadful massacre of the Virginian colonists in 1662,
long after he had left them, he pronounced in haste and anger that
the colony could not be preserved without subduing or expelling
the Indians, and punishing their perfidious cruelty as the Spani
ards had punished " the treacherous and rebellious infidels" in
South America. These expressions afford a farther proof of the
very imperfect acquaintance he had with the real circumstances
that attended the subjugation of South America by the Spaniards.
" Notwithstanding such a stern and invincible resolution as Captain
Smith displayed," says an intelligent historian of Virginia, " there
was seldom seen a milder and more tender heart than his was."
Stith. He expatiates at great length, and with much spirit and ability
on the advantages of colonial establishments in America; and
recounts a variety of inducements to embark in them, appropriate
to the various classes of society in England. Colonies, he charac
terizes as schools for perpetuating the hardy virtues on which the
safety of every state must depend. He ascribes the fall of Rome,
and the subjugation of Constantinople to the indolence and covet-
ousness of the rich, who not only passed their own lives in sloth
ful indulgence, but retained the poor in factious idleness, by ne
glecting to provide them with safe and useful employment ; and
strongly urges the wealthy capitalists of England to provide for
their own security, by facilitating every foreign vent to the enevgies
of active and indigent men. He enlarges on the pleasures incident

NOTES. ' . 437
to a planter's life, and illustrates his description by the testimony
of his own experience. " I have not been so ill-bred," he declares,
" but I have tasted of plenty and pleasure, as well as want and
misery. And lest any should think the toil might be insupport
able, I assure myself there are who delight extremely in vain
pleasure, that take much more pains in England to enjoy it, than
I should do there to gain wealth sufficient ; and yet I think they
should not have half such sweet content." To gentlemen he pro
poses, among other inducements, the pleasures of fishing, fowling,
and hunting, to an unbounded extent; and to labourers, the
blessings of a vacant soil, of unequalled cheapness and unsurpas
sed fertility. He promises no mines to tempt sordid avarice, nor
conquests to allure profligate ambition ; but the advantages of a
temperate clime, and of a secure and exhaustless subsistence ; the
wealth that agriculture may extract from the land, and fisheries
from the sea. "Therefore," he concludes, " honourable and worthy
country men, letnot the meanness of the word fish, distaste you;
for it will afford as good gold as the mines of Guiana or Potosi,
with less hazard and charge, and more certainty and facility."
I have given but a mere outline of Smith's exposition of this
subject. The details with which he has filled it up are highly
interesting, and well deserving of perusal. I think there can be
no doubt that he has treated the subject of colonization with more
both of the practical skill of a politician and the profound sagacity of
a philosopher, than Lord Bacon has shown in either or both of his
productions, the " Essay on Plantations," and the " Considerations
touching the Plantation in Ireland."
The name of Smith has not yet gathered all its fame. The
lustre it once possessed is somewhat obscured by time, and by
the circumstances that left America so long to depend on England
for the sentiments and opinions that literature preserves or pro
duces, and consequently led her to rate her eminent men rather
by the importance of their achievements in the scale of British
than of American history. But Smith's renown will break forth
again. It will grow with the growth of men and letters in America ;
and whole nations of its admirers have yet to be born. As the
stream becomes more illustrious, the springs will be reckoned more
interesting. Smith was born in the year 1579, and died on the 21st of
June, 1631.

NOTE III. Page 61.
Robertson's credit as a historian is not a liftle impeached by
the strange inaccuracy of his account of Sir Thomas Dale's ad
ministration. He not only imputes to the Company the enact
ment and introduction of the arbitrary code transmitted by Sir
Thomas Smith, but unfolds at length the (imaginary) reasons that

438 • NOTES.
prevailed with them to adopt a measure so harsh and sanguinary ;
though of this measure itself they are expressly acquitted by Stith,
the only authority on the subject that exists, and the very autho
rity to whom Robertson himself refers. Among the other reasons,
which he assigns, is the advice of Lord Bacon, which he unhesi
tatingly charges this eminent person with having communicated,
and the company with having approved. In support of an accusa
tion so distinct and so remarkable, he refers merely to a passage in
Lord Bacon's Essay on Plantations. It would be well for the
fame of Bacon if all the charges with which his character is load
ed were supported only by such evidence. For supposing (which
is doubtful) that this essay was published before the collec
tion of Sir Thomas Smith's system of martial law, — and supposing
it to have been read by the compiler of that system, it is surely
more than doubtful if the passage alluded to would yet sup
port Dr. Robertson's imputation. It merely recommends that
a provincial government should "have commission to exercise
martial laws, with some limitation:" a power inseparable from
such, and indeed from every system of government. The twenty-
fourth section of King James' second charter to the company
had already invested the provincial governors with "full power
and authority to use and exercise martial law, in cases of mutiny
or rebellion ;" and the preceding section of the same charter
authorizes them "in case of necessity," to rule, correct, and
punish, according to their own "good discretions." No blame
can attach to the bare authorization of an extraordinary power,
reserved in every society, for extraordinary occasions. What
alone seems deserving of blame is Sir Thomas Smith's violent and
illegal substitution of the most sanguinary code of martial law
that was ever framed, in the room of the original constitution,
and for the purposes of the ordinary government of the colony;
and Dr. Robertson's very hasty and unfounded imputation of
this proceeding to the act of the council and the advice of Lord
Bacon. It had been well if the council had paid more attention
to the maxim of this great man, that "Those who plant colonies
must be endued with great patience."

NOTE IV. Page 197.
Chalmers and Robertson have ascribed the slow increase of the
colonists of New Plymouth to "the unsocial character of their
religious confederacy." As the charge of entertaining anti-social
principles was preferred against the first Christians by men who
plumed themselves on exercising hospitality to the gods of all
nations, it is necessary to ascertain the precise meaning of this
imputation against the American colonists, if we would know
whether it be praise or blame that it involves. Whether, in a
truly blame-worthy acceptation, the charge of unsocial principles

NOTES. 439
most properly belongs to these people or to their adversaries, may
be collected from the statements they have respectively made
of the terms on which they were willing to hold a companion
able intercourse with their fellow men. Winslow, who was for
some time governor of New Plymouth, in his account of the co
lony, declares that the faith of the people was in all respects the
same with that ofthe reformed churches of Europe, from which they
differed only in their opinion of church government, wherein they
pursued a more thorough reformation. They disclaimed, however,
any uncharitable separation from those with whom they differed
on this point, and freely admitted the members of every reformed
church to communion with them. " We ever placed," he con
tinues, "a large difference between those that grounded their
practice on the word of God, though differing from us in the ex
position and understanding of it, and those that hated such
reformers and reformation, and went on in antichristian opposi
tion to it, and persecution of it. It is true we profess and desire
to practice a separation from the world and the works of the
world; and as the churches of Christ are all saints by calling,
so we desire to see the grace of God shining forth (at least
seemingly, leaving secret things to God) in all we admit into
church fellowship with us, and to keep off such as openly wal
low in the mire of their sins, that neither the holy things of God,
nor the communion of saints may be leavened or polluted thereby."
He adds, that none of the settlers who weire admitted into the
church of New Plymouth were encouraged, or even permitted,
to insert in the declaration of their faith a renunciation of the
church of England, or of any other reformed establishment (Ma
ther). It does not appear to me that these sentiments warrant the
charge of unsocial principles in any sense which a christian will
feel himself at all concerned to disclaim. Whether the adversa
ries of these men were distinguished for principles more honourably
social or more eminently charitable, may be gathered from a pass
age in Howel's Familiar Letters, where this defender of royalty and
episcopacy thus expresses the sentiments of his party respecting
religious differences between mankind. " I rather pity than hate
a Turk or infidel, for they are of the same metal and bear the same
stamp as I do, though the inscriptions differ. If I hate any, it is
those schismatics that puzzle the sweet peace ofour church; so
that I could be content to see an Anabaptist go to hell on a
Brownist's back." The policy of the ecclesiastia] administration of
England tendered a premium to the production of such senti
ments. Howel's fervour for the church party did not survive the
power of this party to reward him. After the fall of the English
church and monarchy he became the defender and panegyrist of
the administration of Cromwell; though, like Waller andDryden,
he returned in the train of fortune, when she returned to his
original friends.

440 NOTES.

NOTE V. Page 232.
The introduction of this feature into the portrait of Sir Henry
Vane rests entirely on the authority of Burnet and Kennet (fol
lowed by Hume), who speak from hearsay. Ludlow, who knew
Vane personally, bestows the highest praise on his imperturbable
serenity and presence of mind ; and, with the sympathy of a kin
dred spirit, describes the resolute magnanimity with which at his
trial he sealed his own fate by scorning to plead, like Lambert, for
his life, and gallantly pleading for the dying liberties of his coun
try. At his execution, when some of his friends expressed resent
ment ofthe injuries that were heaped upon him, "Alas!" said he,
" what ado they keep to make a poor creature like his Saviour. I
bless the Lord I am so far from being affrighted at death, that I
find it rather shrink from me than I from it. Ten thousand deaths
for me, before I will defile the chastity and purity of my con
science; nor would I for ten thousand worlds part with the peace
and satisfaction I have now in my heart." — 'Even Burnet admits
that the resolution he summoned up at the last prompted him " to
some very extraordinary acts, though they cannot be mentioned."
Oldmixon, less scrupulous, has satisfied the curiosity that Burnet
excited, by relating that " Lady Vane began her reckoning for
her son, the Lord Barnard, from the night before Sir Henry lost
his head on Tower Hill." Perhaps the deep piety and constant
negation of all merit in himself by which the heroism of Vane
was softened and ennobled, may have suggested to minds unac
quainted with these principles the imputation of constitutional
timidity. At all events this cloud, whether naturally attendant
on his character or artificially raised by the envious breath of his
detracters has, from the admirable vigour of his mind and the
"unquestioned courage of his demeanour, served rather to em
bellish than to obscure the lustre of his fame.
Hugh Peters, like Sir Henry Vane, has been charged with
defect of courage. Bishop Burnet, in particular, reproaches him
with cowardice at his execution. Yet in reality his death was
dignified by a courage that distinguished him even among the
regicides. After his fellow-sufferer Cook had been quartered
before his face, the executioner approached him, and rubbing
his bloody hands, said, " Come Mr. Peters, how do you like this
work?" Peters answered, " I thank God I am not terrified at it;
you may do your worst." Prefixed to a posthumous work of
Peters, entitled "A dying Father's last Legacy to his Daughter,"
is a poetical tribute to the author, thus concluding : —
" Yet his last breathings shall, like incense hurled
On sacred altars, so perfume the world,
That the next will admire, and out of doubt,
Revere that torch-light, which this age put out."

NOTES. 4^1

NOTE VI. Page 276.
The accounts of the first conversations which the missionaries
held with various tribes of these heathens, abound with curious
questions and observations that proceeded from the Indians in
relation to the tidings that were brought to their ears. One man
asked, Whether Englishmen were ever so ignorant of Jesus Christ
as the Indians? A second, Whether Jesus Christ could understand
prayers in the Indian language? A third proposed this question,
How there could be an image of God, since it was forbidden in
the second commandment? On another occasion, after Mr.
Elliot had done speaking, an aged Indian started up, and with
tears in his eyes asked, Whether it was not too late for such an
old man as he, who was near death, to repent and seek after God ?
A second asked, How the English came to differ so much from
the Indians in their knowledge of God and Jesus Christ, since
they had all at first but one father ? A third desired to be in
formed, How it came to pass that sea water was salt and river
water fresh? Several inquired, How Judas could deserve blame
for promoting the accomplishment of the purpose of God ? One
woman asked, Whether she was entitled to consider herself as hav
ing prayed, when she merely joined in her mind with her hus
band who prayed by her side ? Another, If her husband's prayer
signified anything while he continued to beat his wife ? Many
of the converts continued to believe that the gods whom they had
formerly served had in reality considerable power, but were spirits
subordinate to the true and only God; and when threatened with
witchcraft by the Powaws for their apostacy, they said, We do not
deny your power, but we serve a greater God, who is so much
above yours that he can defend us from them, and enable even us
to tread upon them all. " Surely there is no enchantment against
Jacob, neither is there any divination against Israel." One sachem
sent for an Indian convert, and desired to know how many gods
the English had ? When he heard they had but one, he replied
scornfully, "Is that all? I have thirty-seven ? Do they suppose I
would exchange so many for one?" Other sachems rejected the
instructions of the missionaries with angry disdain, saying, that
"the English had taken away their lands and were attempting
now to make them slaves." The efforts of missionaries among the
Indians have always been obstructed by the erroneous ideas of
liberty fondly cherished by these savages. "The Indians are
convinced," says Charlevoix, " that man is born free, that no
power on earth has aright to infringe his liberty, and that nothing
can compensate the loss of it ; and it has been found a very dif
ficult matter to undeceive even the christians among them, and to
make them understand how, by a natural consequence of the
corruption of our nature, which is the effect of sin, an unbridled

442 NOTES.
liberty of doing wrong differs very little from an obligation to com
mit it, because of the strength of the bias which draws us to it ;
and that the law which restrains us causes us to approach nearer
to our original state of liberty, whilst it appears to take it from
us." — Charlevoix's Travels.

NOTE VII. Page 293.
The character of George Fox is certainly neither justly nor
generally understood in the present day. His writings are so
voluminous, and there is such a mixture of good and evil in them,
that every reader finds it easy to justify his preconceived opinion,
and to fortify it by appropriate quotations. His works are read by
few, and wholly read by still fewer. Many form their opinions of
him from the passages which are cited from his writings by his ad
versaries : and of the quakers there are many who derive their opi
nions of him from the passages of a very different complexion
which are cited in the works of the modern writers of their own
sect. I shall here subjoin a few extracts from his Journal, which
will verify some of the remarks I have made in the text : premis
ing this observation, that the book itself was first put into my
hands by a zealous and intelligent quaker, for the purpose of
proving that it contained no such passages as some of those which
I am now to transcribe from it.
Fox relates, that in the year 1648 he found his nature so com
pletely new modelled, that "I knew nothing but pureness, inno-
cency, and righteousness, being renewed up into the image of
God by Christ Jesus: so that I was come up to the state of Adam
which he was in before he fell. The creation was opened to me ;
and it was showed me how all things had their names given them
according to their nature and virtue. I was at a stand in my
mind whether I should practise physic for the good of mankind,
seeing the nature and virtues of the creatures were so opened to
me by the Lord. But I was immediately taken up in spirit to see
another or more steadfast state than Adam's in innocency, even
into a state in Christ Jesus that should never fall. The Lord
showed me that such as were faithful to him in the power and
light of Christ should come up into that state in which Adam was
before he fell ; in which the admirable works of the creation and
the virtues thereof may be known through the openings of that
divine word of wisdom and power by which they were made." In
many of the disputes which he afterwards held with ministers and
doctors, he maintained that he was, and that every human being,
by cultivation of the spiritual principle within his breast, might
become, like him, perfectly pure and free from all dregs of sin.
He relates with complacency and approbation, that having one
day addressed a congregation of people at Beverley in Yorkshire,
the audience declared afterwards that it was an angel or spirit that

notes. 443
had suddenly appeared among them and spoken to them. He
conceived himself warranted by his endowments to trample on all
order and decency. One Sunday as he approached the town of
Nottingham, he tells, " I espied the great steeple-house ; and the
Lord said unto me, thou must go cry against yonder great idol,
and against the worshippers therein." He accordingly entered the
church, and hearing the minister announce the text, We have also
a more sure word of prophecy, and tell the people that by this was
meant the scriptures, whereby they were to try all doctrines, re
ligions, and opinions, Fox adds, " I could not hold, but was made
to cry out, ' Oh no ; it is not the scriptures : it is the Holy Spirit."
On another occasion having entered a church, and hearing the
preacher read for his text, Ho! every one that thirsteth, come ye to
the waters, &c, Fox called out to him, " Come down, thou de
ceiver! dost thou bid people come freely and take of the water of life
freely, and yet thou takest three hundred pounds a-year of them
" for preaching the scriptures to them?" Approaching the town of
Lichfield, he declares he found himself spiritually directed to cast
off his shoes, and in that condition walk through the streets,
exclaiming, "Woe to the bloody city of Lichfield!" which he ac
cordingly did. These examples are selected almost at random
from numberless instances of similar proceedings recorded in his
voluminous journal. Yet he strongly condemns the delirious
extravagance of the ranters, and relates various attempts he had
made to convince them of their delusion. (Journal.)
William Penn, in the beautiful Preface which he wrote for
this Journal, informs us that these ranters were persons who
for want of staying their minds in a humble dependence upon
Him that opened their understandings to see great things in his
law, ran out in their own imaginations, and mixing them with
these divine openings, brought forth a monstrous birth, to the
scandal of those that feared God." "Divers," he adds, "fell into
gross and enormous practices, pretending in excuse thereof that
they could without evil commit the same act which was sin in
another to do." "I say," he continues, " this ensnared divers,
and brought them to an utter and lamentable loss as to their
eternal state; and they grew very troublesome to the better sort
of people, and furnished the looser with an occasion to blaspheme."
Fox himself relates some horrid immoralities of the ranters,
and that he had found it necessary to publish addresses conveying
assurance to the world that these deluded persons were quakers
only in name (Journal). He applies the epithet of ranters to many
of those who called themselves quakers in America. Some of
Fox's chief associates and coadjutors appear to have become in
the end ranters, or something worse. Of these was James Naylor
long the fellow-labourer and fellow-sufferer of Fox, and whom
Fox still terms a quaker, at the time when he was in prison for
blasphemy and obscenity. Fox alludes vaguely and sorrowfully
to Naylor's errors and disobedience to himself. When he found

444

NOTES.
that Naylor would not give heed to his rebukes, Fox told him that
" the Lord moved me to slight him, and to set the power of God over
him." He adds, that it soon after happened to Naylor that "his
resisting the power of God in me, and the truth of God that was
declared to him by me, became one of his greatest burdens."
(Journal.) Naylor had ridden naked into Bristol with a crew of in
sane followers uttering blasphemous proclamations before him, and
had gloried in the commission ofthe mostscandalousimpurities. On
his trial he produced a woman, one Dorcas Earberry, who deposed
that she had been dead two days, and was recalled to life by
Naylor. It is not easy to discover what part of the extravagance of
Naylor was condemned by Fox and the proper body of the qua
kers. We find Fox relating with great approbation many wild and
absurd exhibitions by which quakers were moved, as they said, to
show themselves assigns of the times. "Some," he says, "have
been moved to go naked in the streets, and have declared amongst
them that God would strip them of their hypocritical professions,
and make them as bare and naked as they were. But instead of
considering it, they have frequently whipped, or otherwise abused
them." (Journal.) Many such instances he relates in the Journal,
with cordial approbation of the conduct of the quakers, and the
strongest reprobation of the persecutors who punished them for
walking naked.
Fox taught that God did not create the devil. Yet though the
reasoning by which he defends this gross heresy would plainly
seem to imply that the devil was a self-created being, there is
another passage from which we may perhaps conclude that Fox's
real opinion was, that the devil was created by God a good spirit,
but transformed himself by his own will into a wicked one. He
sets down every misfortune that happened to any of his adversaries
or persecutors as a judgment of Heaven upon them. He relates
various cures of sick and wounded persons that ensued on his
prayers, and on more ordinary means that he employed for their
relief. It may be doubted if he himself regarded these as the
exertions of miraculous power ; but from many passages it is
plain that they were (to his knowledge) so regarded by his follow
ers, and the quaker editor of his Journal refers to them in the in
dex under the head of " Miracles."
I think it not unreasonable to consider quakerism, the growth
of a protestant country, and quietism, which arose among Catho
lics, as branches of a system essentially the same ; and Madame
Guyon and Molinos as the counterparts of Fox and Barclay.
The moral resemblance is plainer than the historical connection :
but the propagation of sentiment and opinion may be effectually
accomplished when it is not visibly indicated. Quietism was first
engendered in Spain, by a sect called the Illuminati or Alambra-
dos, who sprang up about the year 1575. They rejected sacra
ments and other ordinances : and some of them became notorious

NOTES. 445
for indecent and immoral extravagances. This sect was revived
in France in the year 1634, but quickly disappeared under a hot
persecution. It re-appeared again with a system of doctrine con
siderably purified (yet still inculcating the distinctive principle
of exclusive teaching by an inward light and sensible impression)
towards the close of the seventeenth century, both at Rome in the
writings of Molinos, and in France under the auspices of Madame
Guyon and Fenelon.

NOTE VIII. Page 302.
Besse, in his voluminous "Collection of the Sufferings of the
People called Quakers," relates that Lydia Wardel of Newbury in
New England, a convert to quakerism, found herself inwardly
prompted to appear in a public assembly "in a very unusual
manner, and such as was exceeding hard and self denying to her
natural disposition, she being a woman of exemplary modesty in
all her behaviour. The duty and concern she lay under was that
of going into their church at Newbury naked, as a token of that
miserable condition which she esteemed them in." "But they,
instead of religiously reflecting on their own condition which she
came in that manner to represent to them, fell into a rage and
presently laid hands on her," &c. He also notices the case of
" Deborah Wilson, a young woman of very modest and retired life,
and of a sober conversation, having passed naked through the streets
as a sign against the cruelty and oppression of the rulers."
George Bishop, another quaker writer, thus relates the case of
Deborah Wilson. "She was a modest woman, of a retired life
and sober conversation; and bearing a great burden for the hard
ness and cruelty of the people, she went through the town of Sa
lem naked as a sign; which she having in part performed, was laid
hold on, and bound over to appear at the next court of Salem,
where the wicked rulers sentenced her to be whipt." — New England
Judged. The writings of Besse, Bishop, and some others, who were
foolish enough to defend the extravagance that they had too much
sense to commit, were the expiring sighs of quaker nonsense and
frenzy. They are still mentioned with respect by some modern
quakers, who praise instead of reading them ; as the sincere but
frantic zeal of Loyola, and Xavier is still commended by their
sly successors, who have inherited the name and the manners,
without the spirit that distinguished the original Jesuits.
Since the infancy of quakerism, various eruptions of the pri
mitive frenzy have occurred. But they have all been partial and
short lived. The most remarkable occurred in Connecticut in the
beginning ofthe eighteenth century. Even in the close of that cen
tury, as I was assured by a respectable person, who was a witness
of the fact, a quaker walked naked for several days successively
at Richmond in Virginia as a sign of the times. Nathaniel Prior,

446 NOTES.
a worthy quaker of London, informed me that at a meeting of his
fellow sectaries at which he was present in the beginning of the
ninteenth century, one member suddenly starting up, announced
that he was directed by the Spirit to walk in Lombard Street
without his breeches. He was instantly disowned and expelled
by the Quaker Society. The progressive diminution of quaker ex
travagance has been attended with a progressive increase of ac
knowledged insanity among the quakers — in whose society the
numbers of the insane bear a greater proportion to the whole mass
than in any other christian sect or association.
It had been well if the government of Massachusetts had inflict
ed punishment on the disgusting violations of decency avowed by
Besse and Bishop, without extending its severity to the bare pro
fession of quakerism. This injustice was occasioned by the con
viction that these outrages were the legitimate fruits of quaker
principles; a convietion which, it appears, the language even of
those quakers who were themselves guiltless of outrage, tended
strongly to confirm. It is only such language on the part of the
quakers that can acquit their adversaries of the ingenious inhuma
nity that pervades the reasoning of persecutors, and holds men re
sponsible for all the consequences that may be logically deduced
from their principles, though rejected and denied by themselves.
The apology of the magistrates of New England is thus expressed
by Cotton Mather : " 1 appeal to all the reasonable part of man
kind whether the infant colonies of New England had not cause
to guard themselves against these dangerous villains. It was also
thought that the very quakers themselves would say, that if they
had got into a corner of the world, and with immense toil and
•charge made a wilderness habitable, on purpose there to be undis
turbed in the exercises of their worship, they would never bear to
have New Englanders come among them and interrupt their public
worship, and endeavour to seduce their children from it; yea, and
repeat such endeavours after mild entreaties first, and then just
banishments to oblige their departure." Yet Mather deplores and
condemns the extreme severities which were ultimately inflicted
by his countrymen upon the quakers. It was one ofthe privileges
¦of Israel that the people shall dwell alone ; and the hope of enjoy
ing a similar privilege was one of the motives that led the puri
tans to exchange the pleasures of their native land for the labours
of a desolate wilderness.
A story is told by Whitelocke strongly illustrative of the singu
larity with which the quakers of those times pombined all that
was frantic in action with all that was dignified and affecting in
suffering. Some quakers at Hasington, in Northumberland, hav
ing interrupted a minister employed in divine service were severely
beaten by the people. Instead of resisting, they went out of the
church, and falling on their knees besought God to pardon their
persecutors, who knew not what they did, — and afterwards addres
sing the people, so convinced them of the cruelty of their violence,

notes. 447
that their auditors fell a quarrelling among themselves, and beat
one another more than they had formerly beaten the quakers.
The quakers have always delighted to exaggerate the persecu
tions they have encountered. An illustrious French traveller lias
been so far deceived by their vague declamations on this topic, as
to assert that quakers were at one time put to the torture in New
England. — Rochefoucault's Travels.

NOTE IX. Page 315.
Upon this occasion Cotton Mather observes — "Such has been
the jealous disposition of our New Englanders about their dearly
bought privileges, and such also has been the various understand
ing of the people about the extent of these privileges, that of all
the agents which they have sent over unto the court of England
for now forty years together, I know not any one who did not
at his return meet with some very fro ward entertainment among
his countrymen : and there may be the wisdom of the Holy and
Righteous God, as well as the malice of the evil one, acknow
ledged in the ordering of such temptations."
Norton before his departure for England expressed a strong
apprehension that the business he was required to undertake would
issue disastrously to himself. Mather adds, " In the spring before
his going for England, he preached an excellent sermon unto
the representatives of the whole colony assembled at the court of
election, wherein I take particular notice of this passage : —
Moses was the meekest man on earth, yet it went ill with Moses,
'tis said, for their sakes. How long did Moses live at Meribah?
Sure I am, it killed him in a short time! a man of as good a tem
per as could be expected from a mere man."
It might have been expected that Norton, whose death was thus
in a manner the fruit of his exertions to extend religious liberty in
the colony, would have escaped the reproach of persecution.
But he had given mortal offence to the quakers by promoting the
prosecutions against the quaker enthusiasts in New England.
And after his death, certain of that body published at London,
A Representation to King and Parliament, wherein, pretending to
report some Remarkable Judgments upon their Persecutors, they
inserted the following passage: "John Norton, chief priest at
Boston, by the immediate power of the Lord, was smitten, and as
he was sinking down by the fireside, being under just judgment,
he confessed the hand of the Lord was upon him, and so he died."
Mather. The popish fables respecting the deaths of Luther, Cal
vin, Bucer, and Beza, are hardly more replete with folly, untruth,
and presumption, than some of these quaker interpretations of
Providence. Their authors, like many other persons involved in
religious contentions, or exposed to persecution for religion's sake,
mistook an ardent zeal in behalf of what they esteemed divine

448 notes.
truth for a complete subjection of mind to the Divine will, and ah
entire identification of their views and purposes with it; practically
regardless of their own remaining infirmity, and forgetting that
while we continue to be clothed with humanity, we know only in
part, and can see but darkly. Enlargement of view is always at
tended with increase of charity; and the cultivation ofour charity
at once refines and enlarges our view.

NOTE X. Page 317.
Winthrop the younger was in the bloom of manhood, accom
plished by learning and travel, and the heir of a large estate, when,
he readily joined with his father in promoting and accompanying
an expedition of emigrants to New England. Cotton Mather has
preserved a letter written by Winthrop the elder to his son, while
the one was governor of Massachusetts, and the other of Connec
ticut. I shall be excused for transcribing some part of an Epistle
so beautiful in itself, and so strikingly characteristic of the fathers
of New England. " You are the chief of two families. I had by
your mother three sons, and three daughters; and I had with her a
large portion of outward estate. These are now all gone; mother
gone ; brethren and sisters gone : you only are left to see the va
nity of these temporal things, and learn wisdom thereby which may
be of more use to you, through the Lord's blessing, than all that
inheritance which might have befallen you : And for which, this
may stay and quiet your heart, that God is able to give you more
than this ; and that it being spent in the furtherance of his work,
which has here prospered so well through his power hitherto, you
and yours may certainly expect a liberal portion in the prosperity
and blessing thereof hereafter ; and the rather, because it was not
forced from you by a father's power, but freely resigned by your
self, out of a loving and filial respect unto me, and your own readi
ness unto the work itself. From whence, as I do often take occa
sion to bless the Lord for you, so do I also commend you and
yours to his fatherly blessing, for a plentiful reward to be rendered
unto you. And doubt not, my dear son, but let your faith be
built upon his promise and faithfulness, that as he hath carried
you hitherto through many perils, and provided liberally for you,
so he will do for the time to come, and will never fail you nor for
sake you. My son, the Lord knows how dear thou art to me, and
that my care has been more for thee than for myself. But I know
thy prosperity depends not on my care, nor on thine own, but on
the blessing of our heavenly Father : neither doth it on the tilings of
this world, but on the light of God's countenance through the
merit and mediation of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is that only
which can give us peace of conscience with contentation ; which
can as well make our lives happy and comfortable in a mean estate
as in a great abundance. But if you weigh things aright, and sum

notes. 449
up all the turnings of divine providence together, you shall find
great advantage. The Lord hath brought us to a good land, a land
where we enjoy outward peace and liberty, and above all the
blessings ofthe gospel, without the burden of impositions in matters
of religion. Many thousands there are who would give great
estates to enjoy our condition. Labour, therefore, my good son, to
increase our thankfulness to God for all his mercies to thee, espe
cially for that he hath revealed his everlasting good will to thee
in Jesus Christ, and joined thee to the visible body of his church,
in the fellowship of his people, and hath saved thee in all thy travels
abroad from being infected with the vices of those countries where
thou hast been, (a mercy vouchsafed but unto few young gentle
men travellers.) Let Him have the honour of it who kept thee.
He it was who gave thee favour in the eyes of all with whom
thou hadst to do, both by sea and land ; he it is who hath given
thee a gift in understanding and art; and he it is who hath
provided thee a blessing in marriage, a comfortable help, and many
sweet children. And therefore I would have you to love him again
and serve him, and trust him for the time to come."
The wife of the writer of the foregoing letter, and the mother of
the person to whom it was addressed, was a daughter of the cele
brated Hugh Peters. — Savage's Notes to Winthrop's Hist.
Winthrop the elder not only performed actions worthy to be
written, but produced writings worthy to be read. Yet his Journal,
or History, as it has been termed in the late edition by Mr. Savage,
is very inferior in spirit and interest to his Letters.

NOTE XL Page 341.
Among many interesting and romantic adventures and escapes re
lated by Mather, Neal, Hutchinson, Dwight, and other New Eng
land writers, as having occurred during the continuance of Philip's
War, there is one incident which excited much wonder and specu
lation at the time, and has since derived an increase of interest
from the explanation which it received after the death of the in
dividual principally concerned in it. In 1675, the town of Hadley
was alarmed by the sudden approach of a body of Indians in the
time of public worship, and the people were thrown into a confu
sion that betokened an unresisted massacre. Suddenly a grave
elderly person appeared in the midst of them. Whence he came
or who he was, nobody could tell. In his mien and dress he dif
fered from the rest of the people. He not only encouraged them
to defend themselves, but putting himself at their head, he rallied,
instructed, and led them on to encounter the enemy, who were
defeated and put to flight. As suddenly, the deliverer of Hadley
disappeared; and the people were left in a state of perplexity and
amazement, and utterly unable to account for this singular pheno
menon. After his death it was kinown to have been Goffe, the regi-
VOL. I. G G

450

NOTES.
cide, who dwelt somewhere in the neighbourhood, but in such deep
sequestration that none but those who were intrusted with the
secret were ever able to make the remotest approach to a discovery
of his retreat. Whaley resided with him; and they had some years
before been joined by another of the regicides, Colonel Dixwell.
They frequently changed their place of abode, and gave the name
of Ebenezer to every spot that afforded them shelter. They had
many friends both in England and in the New England states, with
some of whom they maintained a close correspondence. They had
constant and exact intelligence of everything that passed in Eng
land, and were unwilling to resign all hopes of deliverance.
Their expectations were suspended on the fulfilment of the
prophecies of scripture, which they had earnestly studied. They
had no doubt that the execution of the late king's judges was the
slaying of the witnesses, and were greatly disappointed when the
year 1666 had passed without any remarkable event; but still
flattered themselves with the hope of some error in the commonly
received chronology. The strict inquisition that was made for them
by the royal commissioners and others, renders their concealment
in a country so thinly peopled, and where every stranger was the
object of immediate and curious notice, truly surprising. It ap
pears that they were befriended and much esteemed for their piety
by persons who regarded the great action in which they had par
ticipated with unqualified disapprobation. — Hutchinson.

NOTE XII. Page 344.
That the jealousy and suspicion with which the New England
states were regarded by the English court had not slumbered in the
interim, may be inferred from the following passages extracted from
the Journal of John Evelyn, the author of "Sylva" who, in the reign
of Charles the Second was one of the commissioners of trade and
plantations. 26 May, 1671. "' What we the commissioners most
insisted on, was to know the condition of New England, which ap
pearing to be very independent as to their regard to Old England
or his majesty, rich and strong as they now were, there were great
debates in what style to write to them, for the condition of that
colony was such that they were able to contest with all other
plantations about them, and there was fear of their breaking from
all dependence on this nation; his majesty therefore commended
this affair more expressly." — " Some of our council were for
sending them a menacing letter, which those who better under
stood the peevish and touchy humour of that colony, were ut
terly against." 6th June. "We understood they were a people
almost on the brink of renouncing any dependence on the crown."
3d August. " The matter in debate was, whether we should send
a deputy to New England, requiring them of Massachusetts to

NOTES. 45J
restore such to their limits and respective possessions as had pe
titioned the council; this to be the open commission only, but in
truth with secret instructions to inform us of the condition of
those colonies, and whether they were of such power as to be able
to resist his majesty, and declare for themselves as independent
of the crown, which we were told, and which of late years made
them refractory." 12th February, 1672. " We also deliberated
on some fit person to go as commissioner to inspect their actions in
New England, and from time to time report how that people stood
affected."

END OF VOL. I.

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