Glass. 
 
 iook 
 
LIFE 
 
 OF 
 
 ROGER WILLIAMS, 
 
 THE 
 
 EARLIEST LEGISLATOR AND TRUE CHAMPION FOR A FULL 
 AND ABSOLUTE LIBERTY OF CONSCIENCE. 
 
 BY ROMEO ELTON, D.D.. F.R.P.S., 
 
 FELLOW OP THE ROYAL SOCIETY OP NORTHERN ANTIQUARIES, ETC., ETC. 
 
 ct HUMANI JURIS ET NATURALIS POTESTATIS EST UNICUIQUE QUOD PITTA VERIT 
 COLERE : NEC ALII OBEST AUT PRODEST ALTERIUS RELIGIO. SED NEC RELICIONIS 
 EST, COGERE RELIGIONEM, QU.E SPONTE SUSCIPI DEBEAT, NON VI." — Tertufflan. 
 
 PROVIDENCE : 
 GEORGE II. WHITNEY. 
 
 >H» .1 
 
~R 
 
 82 
 
 Entered according to act of Congress, in the year 1852, by Romeo Elton, 
 in the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Southern District of New 
 York. 
 
 KNOWLES, ANTHONY & CO., PRINTERS, PROVIDENCE. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 In New England, the name of Roger Williams is now a 
 
 lousehold word. As one of the earliest advocates, and the 
 
 rst legislator of religious liberty, his fame has recently been 
 
 lore widely diffused. An admirable poem, by Judge Dur- 
 
 e, entitled " Roger Williams in Banishment," was reprinted 
 
 England in 1840, and in 1848 Williams's "Bloudy Ten- 
 
 ent of Persecution Discussed" was published by the Hanserd 
 
 Knollys Society, with a biographical introduction by the able 
 
 editor, E. B. Underhill, Esq. 
 
 In describing the conduct of this extraordinary man, as 
 well as that of his persecutors, truth has compelled the au- 
 thor sometimes to censure where he would gladly praise, but 
 he has endeavored to maintain the strictest impartiality. 
 The spirit of Williams was eminently catholic ; and his name 
 and memory are the property, not of a single denomination, 
 but of the whole Christian world. 
 
 In preparing the present volume, the writer has spared no 
 pains to obtain information from every source, whether con- 
 tained in MSS. or printed works, and many facts relative to 
 Williams's early life are now for the first time presented to u 
 the public. He is happy here to offer his acknowledgements 
 to Lord H. Vane, and to several clergymen and literary gen- 
 tlemen, for courteous replies to his inquiries, and for some 
 valuable facts. 
 
IV PREFACE. 
 
 A memoir of Roger Williams was published in 1834, by 
 Professor Knowles. It is a work of great research, and very 
 useful for reference, but too much encumbered with docu- 
 ments, and too minute in its local details, to interest general 
 readers. To this volume the writer is largely indebted. 
 
 In the numerous extracts given from the manuscripts of 
 Williams, no alteration has been made, except to modernize 
 the orthography, and to correct the punctuation when ne- 
 cessary to render his meaning more perspicuous. 
 
 No portrait of Williams is known to exist. One, indeed, 
 has been published, purporting to be such, but is spurious, 
 being, with slight alterations, the likeness of Benjamin Frank- 
 lin, which appeared in an edition of his works printed in 
 Philadelphia about half a century ago. 
 
 At a crisis when the public mind is so strongly excited on 
 questions of civil and religious liberty, the great principle ad- 
 vocated by Roger Williams — that civil rulers have no au- 
 thority to prescribe, enjoin, or regulate religious belief — 
 demands the most serious consideration of every church and 
 of every government. 
 
 April, 1852. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 PREFACE iii. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Historical Notice of the First Settlements of New England- 
 Opinions of the Puritans on Ecclesiastical Affairs . 1 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 Early Life of Williams — Ilis Education at Salters' Hall — Studies 
 at Oxford — Is admitted to orders— Becomes a decided Nonconformist 9 
 
 CHAPTER HI. 
 
 Roger Williams embarks for America— He arrives in Boston— His 
 Opinions on Ecclesiastical Polity — He is invited to Salem — The Gen- 
 eral Court interfere— He removes to Plymouth 1± 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Williams returns to Salem — He disapproves of the Ministers' Meet- 
 ings — His Treatise against the King's Patent— Controversy about 
 the Cross in the Military Colors 22 
 
VI CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 Proceedings which led to the Banishment of Roger Williams — His 
 Opposition to the Freemen's Oath — various charges against him — 
 The Decree of Banishment — He leaves Salem 27 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Williams's Journey through the Wilderness to Narragansett Bay 
 —He visits Massassoit — Proceeds to Seekonk, and begins a settle- 
 ment — He crosses the River, and founds the Town of Providence . 34 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 The Indian Tribes in New England — Purchase of Lands from the 
 Indians — Settlement of the Colony at Providence — Freedom of the 
 Government 40 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 The Pequod War — AYilliams prevents the Indian League, and 
 saves the Colonies from Destruction — Services to Massachusetts — 
 Letter to Governor Winthrop— The Defeat and Ruin of the Pequods 47 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 Condition of Providence— Law to Protect Conscience— Mrs. 
 Hutchinson is banished from Massachusetts — Her adherents are wel- 
 comed at Providence— Settlement on Rhode Island commenced — 
 The Agency of Williams in its Purchase 55 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 League of the New England Colonies— The Settlements in Rhode- 
 Inland excluded— Williams's first risit to England— Publishes his 
 
CONTEXTS. vii 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 Key to the Indian Languages— Obtains a Charter— His Letter to 
 Cotton — The "Bloudy Tenent" — He returns to America— His Re- 
 ception at Boston and Providence 63 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 Williams's efforts in preventing a general Indian War — Form of 
 Government under the Charter — Spirit of the Laws — Dissensions — 
 Williams's Letter to the Town of Providence — Coddington*s Com- 
 mission — Oppressive Policy of the other New England Colonies — 
 Persecution of John Clarke and others in Massachusetts — Letter of 
 Sir Richard Saltonstall — Williams and Clarke appointed Agents to 
 the Mother Country 76 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 Williams and Clarke sail for England— Coddington's Commission 
 revoked, and the former Charter confirmed — Letter of the General 
 Assembly to Williams — Publishes his Experiments of Spritual Life 
 and Health, and their Preservatives— ' ; The Hireling Ministry" — Re- 
 joinder to Cotton— Correspondence 85 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 Williams's Correspondence with the Daughter of Sir Edward 
 Coke — His Intercourse with Sir Henry Vnne. ( 'romwell, and Milton 90 
 
 CHAPTER XIY. 
 
 Williams returns to America — His Letter to Governor Winthrop 
 — Reorganization of the Government— He is elected President of 
 the Colony— His Letter to the Government of Massachusetts— His 
 Letter on Civil and Religious Liberty Ill 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 Letter from Cromwell— Williams attempts to establish Friendly 
 
Viii CONTENTS. 
 
 I 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 Relations with Massachusetts— Severe Laws against the Quakers in 
 the other Colonies— Rhode Island refuses to join in the Persecution 
 —Letter to John Clarke— Williams retires from the Presidency . . 124 
 
 CHAPTER XYI. 
 
 The King grants a new Charter— Williams appointed an Assistant 
 Charges against Rhode Island refuted — Controversy with the Qua- 
 kers—Philip's War— Services of Williams 132 
 
 CHAPTER XVH. 
 
 Ecclesiastical Affairs of the Colony— Williams's Religious Opin- 
 ions—His Labors as a Minister— His Letter to Governor Bradstreet 
 —His Death 144 
 
 CHAPTER XVHI. 
 
 General Estimate of his Character— Spread of his great Principle 
 —Concluding Observations 150 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 1. Williams's Letter to Major Mason 157 
 
 II. Extract from Sir Henry Vane's Healing Question propound- 
 ed, &c , 1G9 
 
 III. Genealogy of the Cromwell Family 173 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS 
 
 " Like Israel's host, to exile driven, 
 Across the flood the pilgrims fled ; 
 
 Their hands bore up the ark ch. Heaven, 
 And Heaven their trusting footsteps led, 
 
 Till on these savage shores they trod, 
 And won the wilderness for God." 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 HISTORICAL NOTICE OF THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 01' 
 NEW ENGLAND — OPINIONS OF THE PURITANS ON EC- 
 CLESIASTICAL AFFAIRS. 
 
 In the days that are past, when men, who were in advance 
 of their age, discovered new truths in religion or philosophy, 
 they were usually called to suffer or die in their defence. 
 The seed fell on an ungrateful soil, was often watered with 
 blood, and remained buried for ages, until at length a genial 
 season caused it to spring up and bear abundant fruit. 
 
 Roger Williams was more favored. He suffered, indeed, 
 for the noble principle he was the first to proclaim in the 
 New World ; but he afterwards bore it in triumph to the 
 sanctuary he himself had provided, founded a state in accor- 
 dance with it, embodied it in his own laws, and thus acquired 
 immortal fame, as the earliest legislator and true champion 
 
 for a full and absolute liberty of conscience. 
 2 
 
 K 
 
2 LIFE OF EOGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 To enable the reader intelligently to peruse the life of 
 this eminent individual, it will be necessary to present a con- 
 cise narrative of the first settlement of New England, and to 
 consider the basis on which the colony of Massachusetts Bay 
 erected the fabric of their society. 
 
 In September 1620, a company of English Protestants, 
 exiles for religion, set sail for a new world ; and, after a long 
 and boisterous passage of sixty-three days, were safely moored 
 in the harbor of Cape Cod. In the cabin of the Mayflower, 
 before they landed, the}' formed themselves into a body poli- 
 tic, " to enact, constitute, and frame, such just and equal 
 laws" as should be thought most convenient for the general 
 good of the colony they had undertaken to plant, " for the 
 glory of God and advancement of the christian faith, and 
 honor of their king and country." This voluntary compact 
 was signed by the whole body of men, forty-one in number. 
 who, with their families, amounted to one hundred persons. 
 The spot where the company fixed a permanent settlement, 
 on the 11th of December, they named Plymouth, in remem- 
 brance of the hospitalities they received at the last English 
 port whence they embarked. 
 
 These colonists had left England, on account of the op- 
 pression they endured, so early as 1608, and settled at Ley- 
 den, in Holland, where they attained " a comfortable condi- 
 tion, grew in the gifts and grace of the Spirit of God, and 
 Kved together in peace, and love, and holiness." The mag- 
 istrates of the city said, " Never did we have any suit or ac- 
 cusation against any of them." But they felt as men in ex- 
 ile ; and a foreign language, and the lax morals prevalent in 
 that country, induced the pilgrims to change their abode, and 
 seek an asylum in the New World. The farewell address 
 delivered to them by their pastor, the Eev. John Robinson, 
 breathes a freedom of opinion greatly in advance of his age : 
 " I charge you, before God and his blessed angels, that you 
 follow m< no further than you have seen me follow the Lord 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. ; 
 
 Jesus Christ. The Lord has more truth yet to break forth 
 out of his holy word. I cannot sufficiently bewail the con- 
 dition of the reformed churches, who are come to a period in 
 religion, and will go at present no further than the instru- 
 ments of their reformation. Luther and Calvin were great 
 and shining lights in their times, yet they penetrated not into 
 the whole counsel of God. I beseech you remember it — 'tis 
 an article of your church covenant, that you be ready to re- 
 ceive whatever truth shall be made known to you from the 
 written word of God." 
 
 The settlements composing the colony of Massachusetts 
 Bay occurred a few years later. This magnificent enter- 
 prise was conducted under the direction of the Plymouth 
 Company, who obtained a patent, by which a number of the 
 nobility and gentry of England, their associates and succes- 
 sors, were constituted " the council established at Plymouth, 
 in the county of Devon, for the planting ruling, ordering, 
 and governing, of New England, in America." The coun- 
 cil for New England, in 1628, sold to several gentlemen, 
 among whom were John Humphrey and John Endicott, a 
 belt of land stretching across the whole breadth of the conti- 
 nent, extending three miles south of the river Charles and 
 the Massachusetts Bay, and three miles north of every part 
 of the river Merrimac. In June, of the same year, a com- 
 panv of emigrants, under the direction of the enterprising 
 and intrepid Endicott, sailed for Naumkeag, since called Sa- 
 lem, where they made a permanent settlement. The patent 
 from the council at Plymouth gave a right to the soil, but no 
 powers of government. A royal charter, which bears the 
 signature of Charles L, passed the seals March 4th, 1629, a 
 few days only before the king, in a public state-paper, avowed 
 his design of governing without a parliament. By this char- 
 ter, the associates were constituted a body politic and corpo- 
 rate, by the name of the Governor and Company of Massa- 
 chusetts Bay, in New England. They were empowered to 
 
4 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 elect, annually, forever, out of the freemen of said company, 
 a o-overnor, a deputy-governor, and eighteen assistants, and 
 to make laws not repugnant to the laws of England ; no pro- 
 vision requiring the assent of the king to render the acts of 
 the body valid. 
 
 A powerful impulse was thus given to the friends of colo- 
 nial enterprise ; and, immediately, an emigration, unparal- 
 lelled for its extent and the great respectability of the emi- 
 grants, was projected. 
 
 The Rev. Francis Higginson, an eminent nonconforming 
 minister, of a truly catholic spirit, received an invitation to 
 conduct another band of pilgrims to the shores of New Eng- 
 land. He was a graduate of the university of Cambridge, 
 and ranked among the most eloquent and pious in the realm. 
 Higginson, earnestly desiring to propagate the gospel among 
 the Indians, considered the invitation as a call from heaven. 
 On leaving the scene of his labors for London, people of all 
 ranks crowded the streets to bid him farewell. Three ad- 
 ditional ministers joined the company. When about to lose 
 sig ht of their native land — the home of their fathers, and the 
 dwelling place of their friends — Higginson took his children 
 and others to the stern of the ship, and said : — " We will not 
 say, as the Separatists were wont to say, ' Farewell Babylon ! 
 — farewell Rome !' but Farewell dear England! — farewell 
 the church of Christ in England ! though we cannot but sep- 
 arate from the corruptions in it." He then concluded with 
 a fervent and appropriate prayer for the king and the church 
 in England, and for themselves and the expedition. 
 
 In June 1629, this pious band of two hundred individuals 
 arrived at Salem, where they hoped to kindle the light of 
 the gospel amid the darkness of heathenism, and to plant a 
 church free from the corruptions of human superstition. 
 
 Many persons of. large fortune, and superior education, 
 resolved to remove with their families to Massachusetts, pro- 
 vided the power, conferred by the charter of the colony, and 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. f, 
 
 the seat of government, should be transferred to America. 
 This important measure was fully acceded to, and on the 
 28th of April, 1630, John Winthrop, who had been chosen 
 governor — a man whose mental endowments derived lustre 
 from the noblest moral qualities — sailed with his associates in 
 the Arabella from Yarmouth. The whole number of vessels 
 employed during the season was seventeen, and they carried 
 over more than fifteen hundred passengers. In June and 
 Jul)', the fleet which bore Winthrop and his companions ar- 
 rived at Salem. The first care of the colonists was to select 
 the most suitable places for the new plantations, and it was 
 not long before they were settled in Boston and the adjacent 
 villages. 
 
 Before leaving the land of their nativity, they published 
 to the world the reasons for their removal, and bade an af- 
 fectionate farewell to the church of England. " Our hearts," 
 say they, " shall be fountains of tears for your everlasting 
 welfare, when we shall be in our poor cottages in the wil- 
 derness." Their fervent piety, their unwavering faith in 
 Divine Providence, and their desire to form a pure church, 
 enabled them to encounter every hardship with undaunted 
 courage. Many of this band of emigrants were men of large 
 hereditary wealth, and hgh endowments ; scholars of varied 
 and profound learning; civilians, who had attained official 
 rank, power, and fame ; and divines, who had won the high- 
 est respect in their native land, and who were among the 
 holiest and most gifted men of the age. Nor must we forget 
 that there were many distinguished ladies who accompanied 
 their husbands — Christian women, accustomed to the indul- 
 gences and refinements of life, and whose sincere religious 
 faith gave them fortitude to endure the severest sufferings. 
 and rendered them patient in their deepest sorrows, 
 
 " What sought they thus afar? 
 Bright jewels of the mine ? 
 The wealth of seas, the spoils of war? — 
 They sought a faith's pure shrine ! ; ' 
 
6 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 In order clearly to understand the causes of the opposition 
 which Roger Williams encountered, in a colony planted by 
 such men, we must briefly advert to the opinions they held 
 on ecclesiastical affairs. 
 
 From the days of Elizabeth to the period we are now con- 
 sidering, there had existed in England a perpetual conflict 
 between the prelatical party and the puritans ; — the former 
 determined to enforce strict uniformity; and the latter, 
 strongly opposed to the popish ceremonies still retained in 
 the church. The puritans, as a body, at first desired reform, 
 and not schism ; but when they were driven out from the 
 communion of the church by cruel persecution, they united 
 in forming societies more in accordance with their views of 
 the New Testament model. Some approved of the presby- 
 terian form of government, others of the independent, and a 
 few preferred a modified episcopacy. Enlightened as these 
 confessors were on the great doctrines, and on many of the 
 minor points of church government, they still remained in 
 ignorance of one very important principle — the nature of 
 true religious liberty. Great as their sufferings had been, 
 from the persecutions of the established church, they had 
 failed to discover the malignant source of this evil. They 
 did not perceive, that whenever the state usurped power to 
 legislate for conscience, a principle was set up which must 
 inevitably lead to persecution and injustice — that to place 
 the sovereign in the room of the pope was another form of 
 antichrist, whose claims, if not so arrogant, were more incon- 
 sistent, than that of a pretended infallible head. They did 
 not perceive that this assumed power of the state to govern 
 the church was the great barrier to the carrying out of the 
 reformation, and to the further scriptural changes they so fer- 
 vently desired. If they had been so far tolerated that they 
 could have remained in their own land, they would, like the 
 English nonconformists, have found out, in' the progress of 
 rime, their mistake ; but when they became legislators them- 
 selves, in the colonies they so nobly founded, their error was 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 7 
 
 a fruitful source of strife and division. Misled by analogies 
 with the Mosaic institutions, they confounded the slate with 
 the Church, the citizen with the christian, and assumed them- 
 selves, though fallible men, the power exercised under the 
 Jewish theocracy, by a Divine King and Infallible Legislator. 
 
 The principles of the puritans, who sought the shores of 
 New England to establish religious liberty for themselves and \ 
 their posterity, have been greatly misunderstood. What * 
 they meant by religious freedom was not an unlimited free- 
 dom of conscience. Universal toleration they regarded as a 
 crime, and considered it a solemn duty to God to oppose er- 
 ror and suppress false doctrines, if necessary even by force. 
 While we lament and condemn their conduct, a candid mind 
 will remember that the true grounds of liberty of conscience 
 were not then embraced by any sect of christians. All par- 
 ties appeared to think themselves the sole depositories of 
 truth, and that every opposing doctrine must be suppressed. 
 
 At this period, it was not the church of England alone 
 that was intolerant; even later, the Scotch commissioners 
 in London remonstrated, in the name of their national church, 
 against a " sinful and ungodly toleration in matters of relig- 
 ion ;" whilst the whole body of the English presbyterian 
 clergy, in their official papers, protested against the schemes 
 of Cromwell's party, and solemnly declared, " that they de- 
 tested and abhorred toleration." The excellent Richard 
 Baxter, a man noted in his day for moderation, said, " I ab- 
 hor unlimited liberty or toleration for all." Edwards, ano- 
 ther celebrated divine, observed, " Toleration will make the 
 kingdom a chaos, a Babel, another Amsterdam, a Sodom, an 
 Egypt, a Babylon." 
 
 The first settlers of New England were not, therefore, sin- 
 gular in believing themselves bound in conscience to extir- 
 pate every noxious weed from the garden of the Lord, and 
 " to use the sword of the civil magistrate to open the under- 
 standings of heretics, or cut them off from the state, thatthi 
 
8 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 might not infect the church or injure the public peace."* 
 While, however, in forming a judgment of the pilgrim fath- 
 ers, we fully admit these extenuating circumstances, our ad- 
 miration must be increased for the founder of Rhode Island, 
 as the first legislator whose enlarged understanding and ex- 
 pansive charity led him to recognise the doctrine of entire 
 religious freedom ; and to renounce the almost universal 
 error of his age. 
 
 * Calieader, in R, I. Hist. Coll. iv. p. 71- 
 
CHAPTER IT. 
 
 EARLY LIFE OF WILLIAMS — HIS EDUCATION AT SAL- 
 TER'S HALL — STUDIES AT OXFORD — IS ADMITTED TO 
 ORDERS — BECOMES A DECIDED NONCONFORMIST. 
 
 The seventeenth century has been justly called, by Dr. 
 Chalmers, " the Augustan age of Christianity." It was the 
 age of Howe, Baxter, Owen, Goodwin, and other eminent 
 divines, who, by their preaching and writings, effected a sec- 
 ond reformation in the christian church. 
 
 At the commencement of this eventful period, when the 
 intellect had received a powerful impulse, manifested in every 
 form of inquiry, Roger Williams was born, in an obscure 
 country parish, amid the mountains of Wales. It is deeply 
 to be regretted that so few memorials exist of his early his- 
 tory. Until now, even the christian name of his father, the 
 place of his birth and education, and other incidents of his 
 youthful days, were unknown, or rested merely on tradition. 
 The present writer, for many years past, has spared no pains 
 in inquiries respecting that period of his life, and he has been 
 successful in obtaining several facts, which are now for the 
 first time published. 
 
 Roger Williams, the founder of the state of Rhode Island, 
 was the son of William Williams, of Conwyl Cayo, a parish 
 situated near Lampeter, in the county of Carmarthen, South 
 Wales. Here his ancestors had resided on their own small 
 estate for many generations, at a place called Maestroiddyn 
 faio\ in the hamlet of Maestroiddyn. In addition to other 
 documentary evidence now in the possession of the author, 
 
10 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 the following record is copied from the archives of the uni- 
 versity of Oxford : — " Rodericus Williams filius Gulielmi 
 Williams, de Conwelgaio, Pleb. an. nat. 18, entered at Jesus 
 college, April 30, 1624." It appears from this record tha 
 Williams was born in the year* 1608. Scarcely any of the 
 parochial registers of Wales are found to go farther back 
 than the times of the Commonwealth, and the earliest date 
 of those of his native parish is 1694. Other facts, however, 
 confirm the record preserved in the archives at Oxford. 
 There is now living at Conwyl Cayo — or as it is more fre- 
 quently called simply Cayo — a venerable patriarch, nearly 
 one hundred years old, who is apparently of the same family 
 with Roger Williams. The mental powers of this aged Nes- 
 tor are still vigorous, and his memory tenacious with respect 
 to circumstances which have long since transpired. He says 
 he has heard his grandfather mention " that the great Roger 
 Williams, who was educated at Oxford, was one of his fami- 
 ly, and that he went over the sea, after being a clergyman for 
 a few years in England." He asserts that his grandfather 
 lived to the age of ninety-eight ; and that his great grand- 
 father reached nearly the same advanced period. He says, 
 also, that at one time, there were two letters in the possess- 
 ion of his family which had been received by his great grand- 
 father from Roger Williams. 
 
 No allusion to his parents is found in the writings of Wil- 
 liams, but he has left us one fact respecting his early years, 
 which is of all others the most important. Near the close of 
 his life he says, " from my childhood, now about threescore 
 years, the Father of lights and mercies touched my soul with 
 a love to himself, to his only-begotten, the true Lord Jesus, 
 and to his holy scriptures." This remark justifies the belief 
 that his parents were pious, that he was educated with care, 
 and that religious principles had, at a very early period, a 
 decided influence upon his mind. 
 
 At what age, or for what object, he was removed from the 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 11 
 
 rural seclusion of his native hamlet to the busy scenes of 
 London we have no record, but we find him, when a mere 
 youth, in the metropolis. 
 
 The next authentic fact respecting his early history is 
 found in a note appended by* Mrs. Sadleir, the daughter of 
 Sir Edward Coke, to one of Williams's letters addressed to 
 herself: — " This Roger Williams, when he was a youth, 
 would, in a short-hand, take sermons and speeches in the 
 Star Chamber, and present them to my dear father. He, 
 seeing so hopeful a youth, took such liking to him that he 
 sent him in to Sutton's Hospital."* His age at that time 
 could not have been more than fifteen years. This incident 
 seems to indicate that his parents were in a respectable sta- 
 tion in life, since it is evident he had received a good ele- 
 mentary education ; and the circumstance that his short-hand 
 notes attracted the attention of the great lawyer is a proof of 
 his early mental superiority. 
 
 The records of Sutton's Hospital — now the Charter 
 House — furnish no other particulars than the following — 
 that Roger Williams was elected a scholar of that institution, 
 June 25, 1621, and that he obtained an exhibition, July 9, 
 1624. 
 
 It appears from the register of his matriculation, at Ox- 
 ford, to which we have already referred, that he entered at 
 Jesus college, April 30, 1624. Cayo, the place of his birth, 
 with Llansawell, is a consolidated parish, the great tithes of 
 which belong to the head of Jesus College. This may ac- 
 count for his being a member of that college, and, perhaps, 
 supported, in part, by the head. It may be added, that this 
 college was founded by Dr. Hugh Price, in 1571, to extend 
 the benefits of learning to the natives of Wales, and has al- 
 ways been a favorite resort of students from the Principality. 
 The records furnish no evidence how long he remained at 
 
 * MS. letter of Roger Williams to Mrs. Sadleir in the library of Trinity 
 College, Cambridge. 
 
12 LIFE OF ROGER WILLAMS. 
 
 the university, but his writings testify that he prosecuted his 
 studies with industry, and drank deeply at the fountains of 
 learning. At that period, logic and the classics formed the 
 chief subjects of study in the prescribed course ; but he de- 
 voted himself to other collateral branches. He was well 
 versed in the Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, and several of the 
 modern lano-uag;es. There is a tradition that, after the com- 
 pletion of his residence at Oxford, he commenced the study 
 of the law under the patronage of Sir Edward Coke ; but. 
 however this may be, the legal documents which proceeded 
 from his pen exhibit a knowledge of general principles of equi- 
 ty and jurisprudence, that would have been creditable to the 
 profession. This knowledge qualified him for his duties as 
 legislator of the colony he founded, and was of great value 
 to him in his subsequent course. It is quite evident, how- 
 ever, that the ministry of the gospel was his chosen pursuit ; 
 for he had been admitted to orders, in the church of Eng- 
 land, previous to his arrival in America. It is said, that he 
 assumed, while in England, the charge of a parish, and that 
 he was held in high repute as a preacher. In his rejoinder 
 to the Rev. John Cotton he speaks of riding together with 
 that gentleman and the Rev. Mr. Hooker to and from Sem- 
 pringham, Lincolnshire. Mr. Cotton was minister of Bos- 
 ton, in that county, for nearly twenty years before he settled 
 in Massachusetts. The excellent Dr. Williams was at that 
 time the bishop of Lincoln, who connived at the nonconform- 
 ists, and spoke with some keenness against the ceremonies of 
 the church. The subject of our narrative had already em- 
 braced the tenets of the persecuted puritans, and all these 
 circumstances render it very probable that his charge was iv 
 the diocese of Lincoln. 
 
 The intolerable oppressions of Laud, and the arrogant 
 demand of absolute submission to the ceremonies of the Ens- 
 lish Church, forced him to seek that religious liberty amid 
 the wilds of America that was denied to him in the mother 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 13 
 
 country. Higginson, Cotton, Hooker, and many other 
 learned and pious ministers, had been silenced, and Williams 
 could not expect that he would be suffered to preach, for his 
 refusal to conform appears to have been most decided. We 
 are not surprised, therefore, to find him among the early em- 
 igrants to New England, 
 
CHAPTER IH. 
 
 ROGER WILLIAMS EMBARKS FOR AMERICA— ARRIVES IK 
 BOSTON — HIS OPINIONS ON ECCLESIASTICAL POLITY — 
 HE IS INVITED TO SALEM — GENERAL COURT INTER- 
 FERES — REMOVES TO PLYMOUTH. 
 
 On the 5th of February, 1631, a ship from Bristol sailed into 
 Boston harbor, and, after a tempestuous voyage of sixty-six 
 days, the exiles with joy espied the heights of the three-hilled 
 city. It was the Lyon, Captain "William Pierce, Among 
 the passengers was a " young minister, godly and zealous, 
 having precious" gifts, whose mind was of a philosophic cast. 
 and whose opinions were marked by a strong individuality. 
 This minister was Roger "Williams. His arrival is recorded 
 by Governor Winthrop, in his Journal,* and appears to have 
 occasioned joy to the churches of the infant colony. He was 
 accompanied by his wife, Mrs. Mary "Williams, a lady who 
 appears to have been of a kindred spirit, and who lived to 
 share with her husband the vicissitudes of life for half a cen- 
 tury. 
 
 "When "Williams first became a resident of the new city of 
 the pilgrims, the land of hope and promise, 
 
 " The ark of freedom and of God." 
 
 nothino- less than a special revelation from heaven would 
 have led him to anticipate a second exile, and that exile to 
 be inflicted by the hands of brethren. But it is our painful 
 duty to record the mortifying fact, that he soon found the 
 civil and ecclesiastical authorities arrayed against him, and 
 
 ■ Vol.i, pp. 41, 42. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 15 
 
 that the lords brethren of Massachusetts were in some respects 
 as intolerant as the lords bishops of England. The grand 
 idea that " a most flourishing civil state may stand, and be 
 best maintained, with a full liberty in religious concern- 
 ments," had not yet found a place in the minds of men, and 
 received no echo in the hearts of the colonists. Liberty of 
 conscience had been held and asserted, in a modified form, 
 by the Waldenses, by Helwisse, by Luther and his associates, 
 and by others of a former age ; but to Roger Williams be- 
 longs the high honor of having introduced it into legislation. 
 The great doctrine he announced, when he first trod the 
 shores of NeAV England, and which he defended through life, 
 was, — that the civil magistrate should restrain crime, but had 
 no right interfere in matters of conscience, and to punish for 
 heresy or apostacy. He contended that "the doctrine of 
 persecution for cause of conscience is most evidently and la- 
 mentably contrary to the doctrine of Christ Jesus" — that the 
 power of the civil magistrate " extends only to the bodies, 
 and goods, and outward estate of men."* " The removal of 
 the yoke of soul oppression, as it will prove an act of mercy 
 and righteousness to the enslaved nations, so it is of binding 
 force to engage the whole and every interest and conscience 
 to preserve the common liberty and peace."f He maintained 
 that " the people were the origin of all free power in govern- 
 ment," but that they were " not invested by Christ Jesus 
 with power to ride in his church ; that they could give no 
 such power to the magistrate, and that to " introduce the civil 
 sword" into the kingdom of Christ was " to confound heaven 
 and earth, and lay all upon heaps of confusion." He main- 
 tained the novel doctrine, that the ecclestiastical should be 
 totally separated from the civil power ; and boldly demanded 
 that the church and the magistracy should each act within 
 its appropriate sphere. 
 
 * Cotton's Letter Examined and Answered* 
 t "Hireling Ministry." p. 29, 
 
16 Life of roger Williams. 
 
 A few weeks after his arrival, Mr. Williams was called by 
 the church at Salem to become an assistant to their pastor, 
 the Rev. Mr. Skelton, as teacher, in the place of the learned 
 and accomplished Higginson, who had died a few months 
 before. In the ecclesiastical polity of the New England 
 churches, the offices of pastor and teacher were considered 
 as distinct, and both deemed essential to the welfare of a 
 church. Mr. Williams accepted the invitation, and com- 
 menced his ministry at Salem ; but the civil authority imme- 
 diately interfered to prevent his settlement. The reasons 
 assigned by the magistrates for this interposition, in the let- 
 ter which they addressed to Mr. Endicott, are, first, that 
 Mr. Williams had refused to join with the congregation at 
 Boston, because they would not declare their repentance for 
 having held communion with the church of England while 
 they lived there ; secondly, that he " had declared his opin- 
 ion that the magistrate might not punish a breach of the Sab- 
 bath, nor any other offence that was a breach of the first 
 table," 
 
 The former of these charges is so very indefinite that it 
 is difficult to ascertain the degree of criminality which Mr. 
 Williams attributed to the conduct of the Boston church, and 
 to what extent he wished its members to declare their re- 
 pentance. Hooker, Higginson, and Cotton were all of them 
 ministers of the church of England, and not separatists, when 
 they landed in Massachusetts, and Governor Winthrop and 
 his associates acknowledged themselves members at the mo- 
 ment of their departure. Many good men considered this 
 conformity highly censurable, tending to sanction the corrup- 
 tions of the church and her cruelties and oppressions. It is 
 not surprising that Mr. Williams, having deeply felt the in- 
 tolerance of the hierarchy, was disinclined to join with those 
 who connived at her unscriptural requirements, and yielded 
 to her arrogant demand of absolute submission. " My own 
 voluntary withdrawing from all the churches resolved to con- 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 17 
 
 tinue in persecuting the witnesses of the Lord — presenting 
 light unto them — I confess it was my own voluntary act ; 
 yea, I hope the act of the Lord Jesus, sounding forth in me 
 the blast, which shall in his own holy season cast down the 
 strength and confidence of those inventions of men."* The 
 real offence of Williams was probably this, that having such 
 strong and conscientious objections to the church of England, 
 he would not consent to unite in membership with a congre- 
 gation that still professed to be connected with it. That he 
 was not guilty of the uncharitableness and bigotry with which 
 he was charged is evident from a circumstance recorded by 
 Winthrop, which shows that, a few months afterwards, when 
 Williams was a minister of the church at Plymouth, he re- 
 ceived Governor Winthrop and other gentlemen from Bos- 
 ton at the communion in his own church.f Williams did not 
 deny that multitudes of persons in national churches are to 
 be regarded true Christians, but he maintained that " every 
 national church is of a vicious constitution, and that a ma- 
 jority in such churches are unregenerate." 
 
 The other charge, that Williams denied the power of the 
 civil magistrate to punish men for the neglect, or the erro- 
 neous performance, of their duties to God, is one which, at 
 the present day, it is not necessary to discuss or to vindicate. 
 The great doctrine, that man is accountable to his Maker 
 alone for his religious belief and practice, has long been the 
 opinion in America, and is rapidly pervading every portion 
 of the civilized world. The religious relations, rights, and 
 obligations of all men are substantially the same, and experi- 
 ence, in all ages, demonstrates the manifold evils which spring 
 from the civil ruler being entrusted with power to regulate 
 the intercourse between man and the Supreme Potentate — 
 the Sovereign of minds — the Lord of conscience. 
 
 On the 12th of April, 1631, Mr. Williams was settled as 
 
 * Cotton's Letter Examined and Answered, p. 3. 
 t Winthrop, vol.L p. 91. 
 3 
 
'18 LIFE OF KOGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 a minister of the church at Salem, the same day on which 
 the magistrates were assembled at Boston to express their 
 disapprobation of the measure, and to desire the church to 
 forbear any further proceeding. This arbitrary interference 
 of the general court of the colony with the rights of the 
 Salem church will not now be justified by any man who be- 
 lieves that Christ is the only legislator in his kingdom. 
 
 To the civil government of the colony he was willing to 
 yield due submission, and on the 18th of the following May 
 he took the customary oath on his admission as a freeman. 
 This fact deserves notice because it refutes another charge 
 which has been brought against him, that he refused to take 
 an oath. It is worthy of notice, also, that on the very day 
 he was admitted a citizen of the colony, the general court 
 " ordered and agreed that, for the time to come, no man shall 
 be admitted to the freedom of this body politic but such as 
 are members of some of the churches within the limits of the 
 same." The ecclesiastical polity established was a sort of 
 theocracy. The government belonged solely to the " bretli- 
 Ten." "Not only was the door of calling to magistracy shut 
 against natural and unregenerate men, though excellently 
 fitted for civil offices, but also against the best and ablest 
 servants of God, except they be entered into church estate."* 
 This, according to Williams, was " to pluck up the roots and 
 foundations of all common society in the world, to turn the 
 garden and paradise of the church and saints into the field 
 of the civil state of the world, and to reduce the world to the 
 first chaos or confusion." This unjust law the colony was 
 afterwards forced to repeal. It was soon found to operate 
 as a bribe to hypocrisy, rendering church-membership sub- 
 servient to political objects, and in its subsequent results 
 destroyed the harmony of the colony. 
 
 The settlement of Mr. Williams at Salem was destined to 
 be of short continuance. Disregarding the wishes and ad- 
 
 * « Bloudy Tenants p. 287. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 19 
 
 vice of the authorities in calling him to be their minister, the 
 church had incurred the disapprobation of the magistrates, 
 and raised a storm of persecution, so that before the close of 
 summer he sought a residence in the colony of Plymouth. 
 That his removal from Salem was not his own choice, or the 
 desire of the church, is evident from the high place he held 
 in their affections during his whole life, and his return to 
 that town by their invitation, two years after, to resume 
 among them his ministerial labors. 
 
 Mr. Williams was received with much respect at Ply- 
 mouth, and was settled as assistant to the pastor, the Rev. 
 Ralph Smith. Governor Bradford says, " he was freely en- 
 tertained among us, according to our poor ability, exercised 
 his gifts among us, and after some time was admitted a mem- 
 ber of the church, and his teaching well approved ; for the 
 benefit whereof I shall bless God, and am thankful to him 
 ever for his sharpest admonitions and reproofs, so far as they 
 agree with truth."* 
 
 The puritans who settled at Plymouth were organized as 
 a church before they left Holland, and were separated en- 
 tirely from the church of England. They recognized one 
 important principle which manifested a more enlightened 
 and liberal spirit than their brethren of Massachusetts Bay, 
 which was, that ecclesiastical censures were wholly spiritual, 
 and not to be accompanied with temporal penalties. An ad- 
 herence to this principle greatly contributed to the peace and 
 prosperity of that colony. 
 
 During the residence of Mr. Williams at Plymouth, Gov- 
 ernor Winthrop. with the Rev. Mr. Wilson, pastor of the 
 Boston church, and other gentlemen, visited that town, and 
 communed with the church there : a circumstance to which 
 we have already adverted. An account of the visit is re- 
 corded in Winthrop's Journal, and is an interesting illustra- 
 tion of some of their primitive customs. 
 
 * Prince, p. 377. 
 
 3* 
 
20 LIFE OF JtOGEK WILLIAMS* 
 
 "1632; September 25. — The governor of Plymouth, Mr, 
 William Bradford (a very discreet and grave man), with Mr, 
 Brewster, the elder, and some others, came forth and met 
 them without the town, and conducted them to the gover- 
 nor's house, where they were very kindly entertained and 
 feasted every day at several houses. On the Lord's-day, 
 there was a sacrament, which they did partake in ; and in 
 the afternoon Mr. Roger Williams (according to their cus- 
 tom) propounded a question, to which the pastor, Mr. Smith, 
 spoke briefly ; then Mr. Williams prophesied ; and after, the 
 governor of Plymouth spoke to the question ; after him, the 
 elder ; then some two or three more of the congregation. 
 Then the elder desired the governor of Massachusetts and 
 Mr. Wilson to speak to it, which they did. When this was 
 ended, the deacon, Mr. Fuller, put the congregation in mind 
 of their duty of contribution ; whereupon the governor and 
 all the rest went down to the deacon's seat, and put into the 
 box, and then returned."* 
 
 In his residence at Plymouth, we trace the hand of that 
 Divine Being, who was soon to employ him as an honored 
 instrument in establishing a new colony, and also in preserv- 
 ing New England from the merciless fury of the Indians, 
 While here, he enjoyed frequent opportunities of friendly 
 intercourse with their most celebrated chiefs, and by acts of 
 kindness secured their confidence. At this period, also, he 
 made excursions among these stern chiefs and warriors to 
 learn their customs and language. In a letter written manv 
 years afterwards, he says : " God was pleased to give me a 
 painful, patient spirit, to lodge with them in their filthy, 
 smoky holes, even while I lived at Plymouth and Salem, to 
 gain their tongue." This friendly intimacy with the sa- 
 chems, and knowledge of their language, was of inestimable 
 advantage to him in his future career, in the purchase of 
 lands, and in gaining an influence among the Indians which 
 
 * Winthrop, vol. i. p. 91. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 21 
 
 no other person ever obtained. His sympathies, also, were 
 awakened for their spiritual condition : and he felt an ardent 
 desire that they might be converted to the christian faith. 
 In one of his letters, he says : " My soul's desire was to do 
 the native's good ;" and his subsequent course of life shows 
 how intensely his heart was fixed on their subjection to the 
 spiritual and peaceful reign of Christ. 
 
 Mr. Williams, after remaining about two years at Ply- 
 mouth, was invited to return to Salem to assist Mr. Skelton, 
 whose declining health unfitted him for the performance of 
 his ministerial duties.* Some of the members of the church 
 at Plymouth were so attached to his ministry, that, after in- 
 effectual efforts to detain him, they were induced to transfer 
 their residence to Salem. 
 
 * Backus, vol. i, p. 56. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 WILLIAMS RETURNS TO SALEM — DISAPPROVES OF THE 
 MINISTER'S MEETINGS — HIS TREATISE AGAINST THE 
 KING'S PATENT — CONTROVERSY ABOUT THE CROSS IN 
 THE MILITARY COLORS. 
 
 In August, 1633, Mr. Williams returned to Salem, and re- 
 sumed his ministerial labors in that place as an assistant to 
 the Rev. Mr. Skelton ; and about a year afterwards, on the 
 death of Mr. Skelton, he was elected to the office of teacher 
 of the church. 
 
 The experience of ecclesiastical usurpation in England 
 appears to have excited both the venerable Skelton and Mr. 
 Williams to express an apprehension that the tendency of a 
 ministers' meeting, recently established, was ominous of an 
 encroachment upon the independence of the churches and 
 Liberty of conscience. Winthrop says in his Journal, under 
 date November, 1633 : " The ministers in the Bay and Sau- 
 gus did meet once a fortnight, at one of their houses, by 
 course, where some question of moment was debated. Mr. 
 Skelton, the pastor of Salem, and Mr. Williams, who was 
 removed from Plymouth thither (but not in any office, 
 though he exercised by way of prophecy), took some excep- 
 on against it, as fearing it might grow in time to a presby- 
 tery or superintendency, to the prejudice of the church's 
 liberties. But this fear was without cause ; for they were 
 all clear in that point, that no church or person can have 
 power over another church ; neither did they, in their meet- 
 ings, exercise any such jurisdiction."* 
 
 * Tol. i, p. 116. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 23 
 
 This meeting was probably formed for the purpose of mu- 
 tual improvement and consultation respecting the interests 
 of religion ; but Messrs. Skelton and Williams undoubtedly 
 perceived something which they deemed incompatible with 
 their views of church government. 
 
 Other opportunities for hostility to Mr. Williams were 
 soon found by the magistrates and ministers. In December 
 27, 1633, "the governor and assistants met at Boston, and 
 took into consideration a treatise which Mr. Williams (then 
 of Salem) had sent to them, and which he had formerly 
 written to the governor and council of Plymouth, wherein, 
 among other things, he disputed their right to the lands they 
 possessed here, and concluded that, claiming by the king's 
 grant, they could have no title, nor otherwise except they 
 compounded with the natives."* 
 
 It is to be regretted that the treatise, which occasioned 
 these transactions, has not been preserved. In Coddington's 
 Letter against Williams, inserted at the close of Fox's Reply, 
 he is charged with having "written a quarto against the 
 king's patent and authority," and it was probably this book 
 to which Mr. Coddington alluded. Mr. Williams clearly 
 perceived the injustice of the claim to occupy the lands 
 which belonged to the natives merely on the ground of prior 
 discovery, and the character and habits of the Indians. They 
 were independent tribes ; in no sense the subjects of the 
 king of England, and his charter could not convey to the 
 colonists a title he did not himself possess. 
 
 The " sin of the patents" which lay so heavy upon his 
 mind was, that therein " christian-kings (so-called) are in- 
 vested with a right, by virtue of their Christianity, to take 
 and give away the lands and countries of other men." And 
 he says that " before his troubles and banishment, he drew 
 up a letter, not without the approbation of some of the chiefs 
 of New England, then tender also upon this point before 
 
 * Winthrop, toI. i, p. 122. 
 
24 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 God, directed unto the king himself, humbly acknowledging 
 the evil of that part of the patent which respects the do- 
 nation of lands," &c* The colonists themselves bought, al- 
 most invariably, the lands of the natives for such compensa- 
 tion as satisfied the Indians, thus acting on the very principle 
 Williams advocated. Cotton Mather asserts, that, " notwith- 
 standing the patent which they had for the country, they fairly 
 purchased of the natives the several tracts of land which 
 they afterwards possessed."! 
 
 President D wight observes that, " exclusively of the coun- 
 try of the Pequods, the inhabitants of Connecticut bought, un- 
 less I am deceived, every inch of ground contained within that 
 colony, of its native proprietors. The people of Rhode Island, 
 Plymouth, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire, proceeded 
 wholly in the same equitable manner. Until Philip's war, in 
 1675, not a single foot of ground was claimed or occupied by 
 the colonists on any other score but that of fair purchase/'^ 
 These facts are highly honorable to the pilgrims, and Roger 
 Williams is entitled to praise for his steady advocacy of this 
 policy from the beginning. The king, in his patent, styles 
 himself "the sovereign lord" of the whole continent, and 
 gives and grants to the Plymouth Company a large part of 
 it, from sea to sea, without intimating that any rights be- 
 longed to the natives. Williams, being a warm friend to 
 the Indians, and considering the patent a flagrant usurpa- 
 tion of their rights, ma}- have put upon its lofty royal style 
 too rigid a construction. 
 
 His treatise, it appears, discussed merely the abstract 
 question, and was a private communication to the governor 
 and other gentlemen of Plymouth. There is no evidence 
 that he questioned the authority of the charter, so far as it 
 could operate without infringing on the rights of the Indians, 
 and at a meeting of the governor and council, a month after- 
 
 * Reply to Cotton on the " Bloudy Tenet," pp. 276, 277. 
 
 t " Magnalia," book i. c. 5. t Dwight's Travel's toI. i. p. 167. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 25 
 
 wards, they acknowledged that they had taken unnecessary 
 offence.* The conduct of Williams on this occasion to the 
 magistrates and clergy was mild and conciliating ; and, al- 
 though he did not retract his opinions, he offered to burn 
 the offensive book, and furnished satisfactory evidence of 
 his " loyalty." 
 
 Williams was now permitted, for a short period, to exer- 
 cise his ministerial labors at Salem in peace. He was ac- 
 ceptable as a preacher ; and it is an evidence of the warm 
 attachment of the people, that, soon after the death of Mr. 
 Skelton, in August, 1634, they invited him to become their 
 teacher. The magistrates sent to the church, requesting 
 they would not appoint him ; but they persisted, and Will- 
 iams was regularly introduced to the office. This was pro- 
 nounced by the magistrates and ministers " great contempt 
 of authority ;" and we shall soon see how it was punished. 
 
 The inflexibility of Williams's principles, and his determi- 
 nation to exhibit them in practice, appear, occasionally, to 
 have led him to extreme views on some points. But, 
 whatever these defects may have been, they were less than 
 those of his contemporaries, and cast no real blemish on his 
 heroic character. His adversaries have brought two charges 
 against him, which, though trivial, may deserve a passing 
 remark. One is, that he preached upon the duty of females 
 to wear veils in religious assemblies. No record of his real 
 sentiments on this frivolous subject now exists, and Dr. 
 Bentley asserts, that Mr. Endicott had introduced it before 
 the arrival of Williams, and that the latter felt little interest 
 in the matter. The other charge is, that, in consequence of 
 Williams's preaching, Mr. Endicott cut the cross out of the 
 military colors, as a relic of popish superstition. This act 
 was, doubtless, unjustifiable, because the colors being estab- 
 lished by the king, ought to have been viewed as a mere 
 civil regulation. There is no evidence, however, that Will- 
 
 * Winthrop, vol. i. p. 123. 
 
26 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 iams advised the measure, and it appears rather to have been 
 the result of an inference drawn from the doctrine he main- 
 tained on the unlawfulness of using symbols which had been 
 desecrated in the service of popery.* 
 
 Mr. Endicott deemed it his duty, as a magistrate, to re- 
 move the cross from the colors, and as a punishment for this 
 act, he was not permitted to hold any office for one year. 
 The question about the lawfulness of the cross was warmly 
 agitated at the time, and the matter was finally settled by the 
 magistrates commanding that the cross be struck out of the 
 colors for the trained bands, but retained in the banners of 
 the castle, and of vessels in the harbor. That such trivial 
 controversies should have occupied so much of the attention 
 of grave men, may now excite our surprise. 
 
 * Knowles, pp. 61, 62. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 PROCEEDINGS WHICH LED TO THE BANISHMENT OF ROGER 
 WILLIAMS — HIS OPPOSITION TO THE FREEMAN'S OATH 
 — VARIOUS CHARGES AGAINST HIM — THE DECREE OF 
 BANISHMENT — HE LEAVES SALEM. 
 
 Of the true cause of the banishment of Williams, no account 
 can be relied on but that of Governor Winthrop. The other 
 early writers wertf so influenced by prejudice, that they ex- 
 hibit a lamentable want of impartiality. Hubbard remarks, 
 " They passed a sentence of banishment against him, as a 
 disturber of the peace, both of the church and common- 
 wealth." Cotton Mather says, " He had a windmill in his 
 head." All the ministers were convened at the trial of Wil- 
 liams, and they were all opposed to his sentiments. Hub- 
 bard and Mather gathered their reports from his opponents. 
 Winthrop, who wrote at the time, has recorded the proceed- 
 ings in his Journal. His account is as follows : — " In April, 
 1635, the court summoned Williams to appear at Boston. 
 The occasion was, that he had taught publicly that a magis- 
 trate ought not to tender an oath to an unregenerate man ; 
 for that we thereby have communion with a wicked man in 
 the worship of God, and cause him to take the name of God 
 in vain. He was heard before all the ministers and very clearly 
 confuted." Had Williams recorded the event, he would, no 
 doubt, have given a different version respecting the force of 
 the arguments. 
 
 It appears from a passage in the appendix to the " Hire- 
 ling Ministry none of Christ's," that he considered taking 
 an oath to be an act of worship ; " that a Christian might 
 
28 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 take one on proper occasions, though not for trivial causes— 
 that an irreligious man could not sincerely perform this act 
 of worship — and that no man ought to be forced to perform 
 this any more than any other act of worship." His singular 
 views of the nature of oaths, it appears, were formed before 
 he left England ; probably from having observed the light 
 manner in which they were administered indiscriminately to 
 the pious and profane. In his reply to George Fox, Mr. 
 Williams declares, that he has submitted to the loss of large 
 sums " in the chancery in England," rather than yield to the 
 offensive formality of kissing the Bible, holding up the hand, 
 &c, though he did not object to taking the oath without 
 them ; and the judges, he says, " told me they would rest in 
 my testimony and way of swearing, but tljey could not dis- 
 pense with me without an act of parliament." 
 
 There is reason to believe, however, that Williams's of- 
 fence respecting oaths consisted not so much in his abstract 
 objections to their use, as in his opposition to what is known 
 by the name of the " Freeman's Oath." " The magistrates 
 and other members of the general court," says Mr. Cotton, 
 " upon intelligence of some episcopal and malignant practi- 
 ces against the country, made an order of court to take trial 
 of the fidelity of the people, not by imposing upon them, but 
 by offering to them, an oath of fidelity, that in case any 
 should refuse to take it, they might not betrust them with 
 place of public charge and command."* This oath virtually 
 transferred the obligations of allegiance from the king to the 
 government of Massachusetts. Mr. Cotton says that the 
 oath was only offered, not imposed ; but it was, by a subse- 
 quent act of the court, enforced on every man of sixteen 
 years of age, and upwards, upon the penalty of his being 
 punished, in case of refusing to take it, at the discretion of 
 the court.f Mr. Williams opposed the oath, as contrary to 
 the charter, inconsistent with the duty of British subjects, 
 
 * " Tenent Washed," pp. 28, 29. t Backus, vol. i. p. 62. 
 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 29 
 
 and with his great principle of unfettered religious liberty. 
 His opposition was so determined, that "the court was forced 
 to desist from that proceeding." 
 
 The controversy between Mr. Williams and the civil and 
 ecclesiastical heads of the colony was becoming, every day, 
 more violent. The magistrates enacted a law, requiring 
 every man to attend public worship, and to contribute to 
 its support^ which was denounced by Williams as a violation 
 of natural rights. " No one," said he, " should be bound to 
 maintain a worship against his own consent." 
 
 In July, 1G35, he was again summoned to Boston, to 
 answer to the charges brought against him at the general 
 court which was then in session. He was accused of main- 
 taining the following dangerous opinions : — " First, That the 
 magistrate ought not to punish the breach of the first table, 
 otherwise than in such cases as did disturb the civil peace. 
 Secondly, That he ought not to tender an oath to an unre- 
 generate man. Thirdly, That a man ought not to pray with 
 such, though wife, child, &c. Fourthly, That a man ouo;ht 
 not to give thanks after sacrament, nor after meat, &c."* 
 The ministers were requested by the magistrates to be pre- 
 sent on this occasion, and to give their advice. They " pro- 
 fessedly declared," that Mr. Williams deserved to be ban- 
 ished from the colony for maintaining the doctrine, "that 
 the civil magistrate might not intermeddle even to stop a 
 church from heresy and apostasy ;" and that the churches 
 ought to request the magistrates to remove him. 
 
 The first two of the above charges we have already con- 
 sidered. The reader will observe that Governor Winthrop 
 has candidly acknnowledged that Roger Williams allowed it 
 to be right for the magistrate to punish breaches of the first 
 table, when they disturbed the civil peace — a fact which 
 abundantly proves that he fully admitted the just claims of 
 civil government. 
 
 * Wiuthrop,Tol.i. p. 162. 
 
30 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 The third charge — admitting it to be an accurate express- 
 ion of the views which he held — shows that he carried to 
 an extreme an objection arising from the practice in Eng- 
 land, where many who united in the petitions in the Book 
 of Common Prayer were notoriously profligate.* Williams's 
 own statement of the opinions he entertained on two of the 
 above charges was, " that it is not lawful to call a wicked per- 
 son to swear, or to pray, as being actions of God's worship."! 
 
 With respect to the fourth charge — " that a man ought not 
 to give thanks after sacrament, nor after meat" — it may be 
 remarked that Roger Williams, in this opinion, anticipated 
 the practice of many enlightened Christians of the present 
 day, who consider it the most scriptural. 
 
 It may now almost excite a smile that charges such as 
 these should be brought against a man as crimes, before a 
 civil tribunal. When Williams was summoned before the 
 general court, there is no evidence that there was any ex- 
 amination of witnesses, or any hearing of counsel. His 
 " opinions were adjudged by all, magistrates and ministers, 
 to be erroneous and very dangerous ;" and, after long de- 
 bate, " time was given to him, and the church at Salem, to 
 consider of these tilings till the next general court, and then 
 either to give satisfaction to the court, or else to expect the 
 sentence." Three days after the session of the court above- 
 mentioned, as Winthrop informs us, the " Salem men had 
 preferred a petition, at the last general court, for some land 
 in Marblehead Neck, which thev did challenge as belonging 
 to their town ; but because they had chosen Mr. Williams 
 their teacher, while he had stood under question of authori- 
 ty, and so offered contempt to the magistrates, &c, their pe- 
 tition was refused. . . . Upon this, the church at Salem 
 write to other churches to admonish the magistrates of this 
 as a heinous sin, and likewise the deputies ; for which, at the 
 
 * Knowles, p. 69. 
 
 t Cotton's Letter Examined and Answered, chap. 3. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER "WILLIAMS. 31 
 
 next general court, their deputies were not received until 
 they should give satisfaction about the letter."* Thus they 
 refused to Salem a civil right, as a mode of punishing the 
 church for adhering to their pastor. Such an act of flagrant 
 injustice forcibly illustrates the danger of a union between the 
 civil and ecclesiastical power ! After the banishment of 
 Williams, the land in question was granted to the people of 
 Salem, but the postponement was evidently designed to in- 
 duce them to consent to his removal. This attack upon 
 civil liberty induced Williams, in conjunction with his church, 
 to write " Letters of Admonition unto all the Churches 
 whereof any of the magistrates were members, that they 
 might admonish the magistrates of their injustice ;" and 
 when the churches, in consequence of the threatening of the 
 magistrates, recanted, he wrote a letter to his own church, 
 exhorting them to withdraw communion from these churches. 
 
 These proceedings of Williams and his church were fol- 
 lowed by another atrocious violation of their rights. The 
 deputies of Salem were deprived of their seats until apology 
 was made ; and the principal deputy, Mr. Endicott, was im- 
 prisoned, for justifying the letter of Williams. The records 
 of the court, also contain the following remarkable decree, 
 which illustrates the inquisitorial spirit of that tribunal : — 
 " Mr. Samuel Sharpe is enjoined to appear at the next par- 
 ticular court, to answer for the letter that came from the 
 church of Salem, as also to bring the names of those that tcill 
 justify the same ; or else to acknowledge his offence, under 
 his own hand for his own particular."! 
 
 The next general court was held in October, 1635, when 
 Kocer Williams was asain summoned for the last time, " all 
 the" ministers in the Bay being desired to be present ;" and 
 '• Mr. Hooker was chosen to dispute with him, but could not 
 reduce liini from any of his errors. So, the next morning, 
 
 * Winthrop, vol. i. p. 164. 
 t Savage's Winthrop, vol. i. p. 167, note. 
 
32 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 the court sentenced him to depart out of our jurisdiction 
 "within six weeks, all the ministers, save one, approving the 
 sentence."* The act of banishment, as it stands upon the 
 colonial records, is in these words : — " Whereas Mr. Roger 
 Williams, one of the elders of the church of Salem, hath 
 broached and divulged new and dangerous opinions against 
 the authority of magistrates ; as also writ letters of defama- 
 tion, both of the magistrates and churches here, and that 
 before any conviction, and yet maintaineth the same without 
 any retraction ; it is, therefore, ordered that the said Mr. 
 Williams shall depart out of this jurisdiction within six weeks 
 now next ensuing, which, if he neglect to perform, it shall 
 be lawful for the governor and two of the magistrates to send 
 him to some place out of this jurisdiction, not to return any 
 more without license from the court." , This cruel and un- 
 justifiable sentence was passed on the 3rd of November. 
 Neal, in his History of New England, acknowledges that on 
 the final passing of the act " the whole town of Salem was 
 in an uproar, for he was esteemed an honest, disinterested 
 man, and of popular talents in the pulpit." His most bitter 
 opponents confessed that, both at Plymouth and Salem, he 
 was respected and beloved as a pious man and an able min- 
 ister. 
 
 The health of Williams was greatly unpaired by his severe 
 trials and excessive labors, and he received permission to re- 
 main at Salem till Spring. But complaints were soon made 
 to the court that he would not refrain, in his own house, from 
 uttering his opinions — that many people, " taken with an ap- 
 prehension of his godliness," resorted there to listen to his 
 teachings — that he had drawn above twenty persons to his 
 opinion—and that he was preparing to form a plantation 
 about Narraganset Bay. 
 
 This information led the court to resolve to send him to 
 England, by a ship then lying in the harbor ready for sea. 
 
 * Winthropj vol.i. p. 171. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 33 
 
 On the 11 tli of January, he received another summons to 
 attend the court assembled at Boston, hut he refused to obey ; 
 his answer was conveyed to the magistrates by " divers of 
 the people of Salem." 
 
 The magistrates, determining not to be defeated, immedi- 
 ately sent a small sloop to Salem, with a commission to Cap- 
 tain Underhill to apprehend him and carry him on board the 
 ship about to sail to England ; but when the officers " came 
 to his house, they found he had gone three days before, but 
 whither they could not learn."* 
 
 In presenting an account of the proceedings which led to 
 the banishment of Roger Williams, the writer has aimed at 
 strict impartiality, and has, therefore, availed himself, as much 
 as possible, of the very language of his authorities. It must 
 be apparent to every candid person, that the true cause may 
 be found in the great doctrine which has immortalized his 
 name — that the civil power has no jurisdiction 
 over the conscience. The object of the government in 
 directing his immediate apprehension was, doubtless, to pre- 
 vent the establishment of a colony in which this great prin- 
 ciple should be embodied. But their design, by the interpo- 
 sition of Divine Providence, was happily frustrated ; and he 
 was afterwards the instrument of inconceivable good to that 
 very community which had driven him into exile. 
 
 * Winthrop, vol. I p. 175- 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Williams's journey through the wilderness to 
 narragansett bay — he visits massassoit — he 
 proceeds to seekonk, and begins a settlement — 
 he crosses the river, and founds the town of 
 providence. 
 
 About the middle of January, 1636, the coldest month of a. 
 New England winter, a solitary pilgrim might have been seen 
 wandering amidst primeval forests, inhabited only by sava- 
 ges and beasts of prey, in quest of a refuge from the hand 
 of ecclesiastical tyranny. He was forced to leave his wife 
 and young children, and to depart in secresy and haste, in 
 order to escape the warrant which would have compelled 
 him on board the ship waiting to convey him back to Eng- 
 land. 
 
 " Morn, came at last ; and by the dawning day 
 Our founder rose, his secret flight to take ; 
 His wife and infant still in slumber lay. 
 
 ' Mary !' (she woke) ' prepare the meet attire, 
 My pocket-compass, and my mantle strong ; 
 
 My flint and steel, to yield a needful fire ; 
 Food for a week if that be not too long ; 
 
 My hatchet, too — its service 1 require 
 To clip my fuel, desert wilds among. 
 
 With these I go to found, in forests drear, 
 
 A state where none shall persecution fear. ' 5; * 
 
 Roe;er Williams has left no detailed account of his adven- 
 turous journey, but occasional allusions in his writings show 
 
 * " What-cheer ; or, Roger Williams in Banisment." 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 how severe must have been his sufferings. The chief inci- 
 dents are found in a letter to his friend, Major Mason, of 
 Connecticut, written thirty-five years after, from which we 
 make the following extracts. It is dated Provident e, June 
 22, 16 70. 
 
 " When I was unkindly, and unchristianly, as I believe, 
 driven from my house, and land, and wife, and children, in 
 the midst of a New England winter, now about thirty-five 
 years past, at Salem, that ever-honored governor, Mr. Win- 
 throp, privately wrote to me to steer my course to the Nar- 
 ragansett Bay and Indians, for many high and heavenly and 
 public ends, encouraging me, from the freeness of the place 
 from any English claims or patents. I took his prudent mo- 
 tion as a hint and voice from God, and, waiving all other 
 thoughts and motions, I steered my course from Salem — 
 though in winter-snow, which I yet feel — unto these parts, 
 wherein I may say Peniel, that is, I have seen the face of 
 God. 
 
 " I first pitched, and began to build and plant at Seekonk ; 
 but I received a letter from my ancient friend, Mr. Winslow, 
 then governor of Plymouth, professing his own and others' love 
 and respect to me, yet lovingly advising me, since I was fal- 
 len into the edge of their bounds, and they were loth to dis- 
 please the Bay, to remove but to the other side of the water ; 
 and then he said I had the country free before me, and might 
 be as free as themselves, and we should be loving neighbors 
 together. These were the joint understandings of these two 
 wise and eminently christian governors, and others, in their 
 day, together with their counsel and advice as to the free- 
 dom and vacancy of this place, which in this respect, and 
 many other providences of the Most Holy and Only Wise, I 
 called Providence. 
 
 " Sometime after, the Plymouth great Sachem, Ousama- 
 quin,* upon occasion, affirming that Providence was his land, 
 
 Commonly called Massasoit. 
 
36 LIFE OF ROGER WILLAMS. 
 
 and therefore Plymouth's land, and some resenting it, the 
 then prudent and godly governor, Mr. Bradford, and others 
 of his godly council, answered, — that if, after due examina- 
 tion, it should be found true what the barbarian said, yet 
 having to my loss of a harvest that year, been now — though by 
 their gentle advice — as good as banished from Plymouth as 
 from the Massachusetts, and I had quietly and patiently de- 
 parted from them, at their motion, to the place where now I 
 was, I should not be molested and tossed up and down again 
 while they had breath in their bodies. And surely between 
 those, my friends of the Bay and Plymouth, I was sorely 
 tossed, for one fourteen weeks, in a bitter winter season, not 
 knowing what bread or bed did mean, beside the yearly loss 
 of no small matter in my trading with English and natives, 
 being debarred from Boston, the chief mart and port of New 
 England. God knows that many thousand pounds cannot 
 repay the losses I have sustained. It lies upon the Massa- 
 chusetts and me, yea, and other colonies joining with them, 
 to examine with fear and trembling, before the eyes of flam- 
 ing fire, the true cause of all my sorrows and sufferings. It. 
 pleased the Father of Spirits to touch many hearts dear to 
 him with some relentings; amongst which that great and 
 pious soul, Mr. Winslow, melted, and kindly visited me, at 
 Providence, and put a piece of gold into the hands of my 
 wife for our supply."* 
 
 In another letter, Williams says : — " It pleased the Most 
 High to direct my steps into this bay, by the loving, private 
 advice of the ever-honored soul, Mr. John Winthrop, the 
 grandfather, who, though he were carried with the stream 
 for my banishment, yet he tenderly loved me to his last 
 breath." Governor Winthrop's friendship for "Williams was 
 manifested afterwards on various occasions, and he advised 
 him to leave the colony, as a measure which he doubtless 
 thought the public peace required. At the time of his ban- 
 
 * Letter to Mason. Mass. Hist. Coll. vol. i. p. 275. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 37 
 
 ishment, Mr. Haynes was governor. Mr. Winfhrop having 
 been supplanted in the chief magistracy of the colony. 
 
 When Roger Williams left Salem, it appears that he made 
 his way through the desolate wilderness to Ousamequin, or 
 Massasoit, the sachem of the Pokanokets, who resided at 
 Mount Hope, near the present town of Bristol, Rhode Is- 
 land. This famous chief occupied the country north from 
 Mount Hope, as far as Charles River. He had known Mr. 
 Williams at Plymouth, and had often received from him to- 
 kens of kindness, and now the aged sachem extended to the 
 friendless exile hospitality and protection. Mr. Williams 
 ■obtained from this chief a tract of land on the Seekonk Riv- 
 er, where he was soon joined by several of his friends from Sa- 
 lem. This territory was within the limits of the Plymouth 
 colony ; and, under a mistaken apprehension as to the bounds 
 of the patent, his first location was on the east side of the See- 
 konk River, which separates Massachusetts from Rhode Island. 
 At this place, where he had begun to build and plant, new and 
 unexpected disappointments awaited him, for he received in- 
 telligence from his friend, Governor Winslow, that he had 
 " fallen into the edge of their bounds." Although Williams 
 recognized the Indians as the only rightful proprietors of the 
 land, and had bought a title from their chief sachem, yet he 
 immediately resolved to comply with the friendly advice of 
 the governor of Plymouth. He accordingly embarked in a 
 canoe, with five others, and proceeded down the Seekonk 
 river, in quest of another spot to found a separate colon}', 
 where the secular arm should have no dictation or control in 
 the concerns of religion. Tradition reports, that as the little 
 bark approached the eastern banks of the river, at a place 
 now called Whatcheer Cove, Williams saw a company of 
 Indians on the heights of the western banks of the stream, 
 who greeted linn with the friendly salutation, " IVha-cheer, 
 netop t Wha-cheer ?"* 
 
 * The common English phrase, What cheer ; equivalent to How do you 
 do ? they had learnt from the colonists. Netop means friend. 
 
38 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 After landing and exchanging salutations with the natives, 
 he again embarked, and passing round the headlands, now 
 known as India Point and Fox Point, he proceeded up the 
 river on the west side of the peninsula to a spot near the 
 mouth of the Mooshausick. Here Williams and his compan- 
 ions landed, and upon the slope of the hill that rises from the 
 river commenced the first settlement of Rhode Island. 
 
 ' : Oh, call it holy ground, 
 
 The soil where first they trod, 
 They have left unstained what there they found, 
 
 Freedom to worship God." 
 
 The town here founded he named Providence, in grateful 
 remembrance of " God's merciful providence to him in his 
 distress." It was in the spring of 1636 — probably in the 
 latter part of June — that this memorable event occurred. 
 Here, after enduring so many hardships, was the exiled con- 
 fessor to find the haven of rest, and to lay the foundations of 
 a state,whieh should " be for a shelter to persons distressed 
 for conscience." The " fourteen weeks he was sorely tossed, 
 in a bitter winter season," he probably spent in journeying 
 among the Indian tribes, in visiting their chiefs, and in ad- 
 justing matters for his permanent settlement. His wander- 
 ings were in a dense forest, covered with the deep snows of 
 winter, tracked by wild beasts, where the scream of the pan- 
 ther, the yell of the tiger, and the howl of the wolf, were 
 often heard. 
 
 The following lines, by a Rhode Island poet, present a 
 graphic illustration of the perils to which Williams was ex- 
 posed : — 
 
 " Growling they come, and in dark groups they stand, 
 Show the white fang, and roll the bright'ning eye ; 
 Till, urged by famine's rage, the shaggy band 
 
 Seemed the flame's bright terrors to defy. 
 Then, 'mid the group he hurled the blazing brand — 
 Swift they disperse, and raise the scattered cry ; 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 39 
 
 But, rallying, soon back to the siege they came, 
 And scarce their rage paused at the mounting flame. 
 
 Yet Williams deemed that persecution took 
 
 A form in them less odious than in men ; 
 He on their dreary solitude had broke, — 
 
 Aye, and had trespassed on their native glen. 
 His human shape they scarcely too might brook, 
 
 For it had been an enemy to them ; 
 But bigot man did into conscience look, 
 And for the secret thought his brother struck."* 
 
 In reflecting upon Williams and his little band of exiles in 
 1636, our minds must be forcibly struck by tlie contrast the 
 country now presents. The primeval forests have fallen 
 beneath the woodman's axe ; the war-whoop of the savage 
 has long since died away ; cultivation enriches the hills, and 
 smiles in the valleys ; agriculture has gained her triumphs 
 on the land, and commerce upon the seas ; schools, colleges, 
 and churches, adorn the banks of the Mooshausick, and a 
 flourishing commonwealth evinces that the broadest religious 
 equality is favorable to the progress of civilization and of 
 piety. 
 
 * Whatcheer ; or, Roger Williams in Banishment. A Poem, by the late 
 Hon. Job. Durfee, LL. D., Chief Justice of the State of Rhode Island. The 
 London Eclectic Beview for July, 1838, contains a eulogistic critique on thi? 
 poem, from the pen of John Foster. 
 
CHAPTER VH. 
 
 THE INDIAN TRIBES IN NEW ENGLAND — PURCHASE OF 
 LANDS PROM THE INDIANS — SETTLEMENT OF THE COL- 
 ONY AT PROVIDENCE — FREEDOM OF ITS GOVERNMENT. 
 
 The history of Roger Williams is so intimately connected 
 with that of the Indians, that it is necessary here to give a 
 brief sketch of the principal tribes occupying New England 
 when it was first settled by the English. The Pokanokets 
 inhabited the territory of the colony of Plymouth. This 
 tribe included several tributaries, among whom were the 
 Wampanoags, the particular tribe of Massasoit, who wel- 
 comed the pilgrims to the soil of New England, and opened 
 his lodge to shelter the founder of Rhode Island. The Po- 
 kanokets and several other tribes, a short period before the 
 arrival of the English, had been diminished by the ravages 
 of a pestilence to so frightful an extent, that some of the 
 tribes were almost extinct. The Narragansetts held domin- 
 ion over nearly all the territory which afterwards formed the 
 colony of Rhode Island, including the Islands in the Bay, 
 and a portion of Long Island. They were tbe most civilized 
 and the most faithful to the English of all the New England 
 tribes. They had cultivated some of their lands, and were 
 skilful in making wampum, or ivampumpeag — a kind of beads 
 made of shells, in use among the natives as money. They 
 were also the most ingenious manufacturers of pendants, 
 bracelets, stone tobacco-pipes, and earthen vessels for cook- 
 ing and other domestic uses.* They were a numerous tribe, 
 
 * Hutchinson, vol. i. p. 406. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 41 
 
 and though less warlike than their neighbors, they could 
 raise more than four thousand fighting-men. The Pequods 
 and Mohegans, the fiercest and most warlike of the New 
 England savages, occupied the greater part of that which is 
 now the state of Connecticut. They were treacherous as 
 well as powerful, and were hostile to the English. The 
 Massachusetts dwelt chiefly about the bay which bears their 
 name. 
 
 The chiefs, or sachems, of the several Indian tribes, held, 
 nominally, the supreme power, and received tribute, but 
 they were controlled by the wisdom of the aged men, and 
 the energetic eloquence of their young warriors, in their 
 councils, where all important questions were discussed. 
 " The sachems," says Roger Williams, " although they have 
 an absolute monarchy over the people, yet they will not con- 
 clude ought that concerns all, either laws, or subsidies, or 
 wars, unto which the people are averse, and by gentle per- 
 suasion cannot be brought."* There were also subordinate 
 chiefs, called sagamores, who held a limited authority. 
 
 The languages and dialects of the several tribes of Indi- 
 ans on the continent of America have been estimated by 
 Professors Adelung and Yater, and Baron Humboldt, the 
 authors of that learned work, the Mithridates, at the aston- 
 ishing number of twelve hundred and fourteen. A large pro- 
 portion of these, however, appear to have been only varia- 
 tions of a few parent languages. The dialects spoken in 
 New England are believed to have been varieties of the 
 Delaware language, whrch prevailed among the tribes of that 
 state, and New Jersey, and a part of New York. Roger 
 Williams informs us, that, with his knowledge of the Narra- 
 gansett tongue, he " had entered into the secrets of those 
 countries wherever the English dwell, about two hundred 
 miles between the French and Dutch plantations ;" and he 
 adds, that " with this help a man may converse with thou- 
 
 * Key into the Indian Language of America. 
 
42 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 sands of natives, all over the country." The Massachusetts 
 language, into which the the Rev. John Elliott — called the 
 Indian apostle — translated the Bible, was radically the same 
 as the Narrragansett. Roger Williams published, in 1G43, 
 the first vocabulary of an Indian language, a work which 
 then attracted much attention, and to which we shall have 
 occasion to recur. This language is exceedingly regular, 
 copious, and flexible. 
 
 With the tribes which have been mentioned, Williams had 
 frequent intercourse, and by his intimacy with several of 
 their chiefs, secured their confidence. His success in pur- 
 chasing lands, in establishing a new colony, and subsequently 
 preserving New England from the fury of the savages, was, 
 under God, the result chiefly of his personal influence with 
 the Indians. On the Rhode Island side, the two principal 
 sachems, to whom a large number of petty chiefs were 
 subject, were Canonicus and his nephew, Miantonomoh. 
 Their residence was on the island of Canonicut, in the Nar- 
 ragansett Bay, about thirty miles south of Providence. Ca- 
 nonicus was an old man when Williams entered his domin- 
 ions, and the cares of his government devolved chiefly on 
 Miantonomoh, who acted as his prime minister, and probably 
 his power was adequate, at this time, to have destroyed all 
 the colonies of New England. 
 
 They were the owners of the soil where Williams landed, 
 and made him a grant for his new colony. By a deed, dated 
 the 24th of March, 1638, certain lands and meadows "lying 
 upon the two rivers, called MooshausHk and Wanasquatuck- 
 et," which he had purchased two years before, were made 
 over to hhn by these sachems. They also, in " consideration 
 of his many kindnesses and services to them and their 
 friends, freely gave unto him all the land lying between the 
 above-named rivers and the Pawtuxet." 
 
 Roger Williams was thus the sole negotiator with the In- 
 dians, and the legal proprietor of the lands which they ceded 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 43 
 
 to him. In this transaction he acted in accordance with his 
 avowed principle, that the Indians were the lawful owners 
 of all the lands which they occupied, and that no charters 
 from popes or kings could give a right to their territory. He 
 says, " I spared no cost towards them, in tokens and presents 
 to Canonicus and all his, many years before I came in per- 
 son to the Narragansett ; and when I came I was welcome to 
 the old prince, Canonicus, who was most shy of all English 
 to his last breath." " It was not," he adds, " thousands, nor 
 tens of thousands of money, could have bought of him an 
 English entrance into this bay, but I was the procurer of the 
 purchase by that language, acquaintance, and favor with the 
 natives, and other advantages which it pleased God to give 
 me." He was obliged to mortgage his house and lands in 
 Salem in order to make additional presents and gratuities to 
 the sachems, and, consequently to remove his wife and family 
 immediately to the new settlement. The lands at Provi- 
 dence were conveyed to him alone, and, as he justly remarks, 
 " were his as much as any man's coat upon his back." He 
 might have been, like William Penn, the proprietary of his 
 colony, having secured it by a patent from the rulers in Eng- 
 lang, and thus have exercised a control over its government, 
 and amassed wealth for himself and family. But he chose to 
 found a commonwealth, where all civil power should be ex- 
 ercised by the people alone, and which " might be for a shel- 
 ter for persons distressed for conscieuce." Thirty-five years 
 afterwards he could say, " Here, all over this colony, a great 
 number of weak and distressed souls, scattered, are flying- 
 hither from Old and New England — the Most High and 
 Only Wise hath, in his infinite wisdom, provided this coun- 
 try and tliis corner as a shelter for the poor and persecuted, 
 according to their several persuasions." 
 
 The lands ceded to Williams he shortly after reconveyed 
 as a free gift to the persons who had united with him in form- 
 ing the settlement, reserving for himself an equal part only. 
 
44 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 The town afterwards voted liim thirty pounds, not as an 
 equivalent for the land, but as a " loving gratuity." The 
 following extract of a document written by Roger Williams, 
 and dated Narragansett, 10th of June, 1682, may be appro- 
 priately introduced in this place as an evidence of his integ- 
 rity and benevolence in his intercourse with the Indians, and 
 of their attachment to him : — " I testify, as in the presence 
 of the all-making and all-seeing God, that about fifty years 
 since, I, coming into this Narragansett country, found a great 
 contest between three sachems, two — to-wit, Canonicus and 
 jNIiantonomoh — were against Ousamequin, on Plymouth side. 
 I was forced to travel between them three, to pacify, to sat- 
 isfy, all their and their dependent's spirits of my honest in- 
 tentions to live peaceably by them. — I desire posterity to see 
 the gracious hand of the Most High — in whose hands are all 
 hearts — that when the hearts of my countrymen and friends 
 and brethren failed me, his infinite wisdom and mercy stirred 
 up the barbarous heart of Canonicus to love me as his son, 
 with his last gasp, by which means I had not only Miantono- 
 moh and all the Cowesit sachems as my friends, but Ousa- 
 mequin also ; who, because of my great friendship with him 
 at Plymouth, and the authority of Canonicus, consented 
 freely (being also well gratified by me) to my enjoyment of 
 Providence itself, and all the other lands I procured of Ca- 
 nonicus, which were upon the point, and, in effect, whatso- 
 ever I desired of him ; and I never denied him, or Mianto- 
 nomoh, whatever they desired of me, as to goods or gifts, or 
 use of my boats or pinnace ; and the travels of my own per- 
 son, day and night, which, though men know not, nor care 
 to know, yet the all-seeing Eye hath seen it, and his all-pow- 
 erful hand hath helped me. Blessed be his holy name to 
 eternity."* 
 
 The infant community of Providence admitted others to 
 the privileges of citizenship, and all were required to sub- 
 scribe the following covenant : — 
 
 * Colony Records. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 4,3 
 
 " We, whose names arc hereunder written, being desirous 
 to inhabit in the town of Providence, do promise to submit 
 ourselves, m active or passive obedience, to all such orders 
 or agreements as shall be made for public good of the body 
 in an orderly way, by the major consent of the present in- 
 habitants, masters of families, incorporated together into a 
 township, and such others whom they shall admit unto the 
 .same, only in civil things." 
 
 This simple instrument, which embodies the great princi- 
 ple for which Williams contended, it is believed, is the ear- 
 liest form of government recorded which expressly recogni- 
 ses the rights of conscience. The unrestricted religious lib- 
 erty which was the basis of the organization of the colony 
 has characterised the state of Ehode Island to the present 
 day. To her everlasting honor, she has always remained 
 true to the principles of her founder— her legislature has 
 never assumed the authority of regulating ecclesiastical con- 
 cerns, or giving privileges to men of one set of religious 
 opinions over those of another, and not a single act of relig- 
 ious intolerance has ever disgraced this state. 
 
 The government of Providence remained in the hands of 
 its citizens for several years ; and the legislative, judicial, 
 and executive acts were performed by a general assembly. 
 Two deputies were appointed to preserve order, to settle 
 disputes, to call town meetings, to preside in them, and to 
 see that their resolutions were executed* Here we have 
 an example of a commonwealth without representation, 
 which could not exist, except in a small community. 
 
 Soon after Williams had obtained a spot where he might 
 rest in peace, he appears to have been settled in his own 
 habitation ; for, in a letter written a short time after his 
 landing, he says, " Miantonomoh kept his barbarous court 
 lately at my house." Mrs. Williams and her two children, 
 it is probable, came from Salem to Providence in the sum- 
 
 * Hist, Proyiclence, 2 Mass. Hist. Col. ix p. 183. 
 
46 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 mer of 1636, in company with several persons who desired 
 to join their exiled pastor. 
 
 Williams had been obliged to leave the fields he had plant- 
 ed at Seekonk, and when he settled at the month of the 
 Mooshausick the season was too far advanced to raise a har- 
 vest. No supplies could be derived from the towns of Mas- 
 sachusetts Bay, as he had been debarred all intercourse with 
 them ; and for the means of subsistence for himself and fam- 
 ily, he must have depended principally on hunting and fish- 
 ing, or upon the simple food obtained from the Indians. But 
 he endured all is hardships with heroic and Christian forti- 
 tude, cheered with a prophetic confidence that the princi- 
 ples to which he so steadfastly adhered would ultimately tri- 
 umph. 
 
CHAPTER vm. 
 
 THE PEQUOD WAR — WILLIAMS PREVENTS THE INDIAN 
 LEAGUE, AND SAVES THE COLONIES FROM DESTRUC- 
 TION — SERVICES TO MASSACHUSETTS — LETTER TO 
 GOVERNOR WINTHROP — THE DEFEAT AND RUIN OF 
 THE PEQUODS, 
 
 We must here narrate briefly tlie agency of Roger Williams, 
 in averting the imminent danger of a general league among 
 the Indians, for the destruction of the New England colo- 
 nists. The Pequods. who, as we have already remarked, had 
 always been treacherous and hostile to the whites, were en- 
 deavoring to unite the neighboring tribes in a war of exter- 
 mination against the English. In 1G34, the governor and 
 council of Massachusetts Bay had concluded with this tribe 
 a treaty of peace and friendship, but no treaty could restrain 
 their hostility. In July, 1636, a short time after Williams's 
 removal to Providence, they attacked a party of traders in a 
 sloop, near Block Island, and murdered John Oldham, one 
 of the company, from Massachusetts. The first intelligence 
 of the proposed Indian league, and of the murder of Old- 
 ham, was communicated by Roger Williams in a letter to 
 Governor Vane, at Boston. He harbored no vindictive feel- 
 ings against those who had so recently expelled him from the 
 colony, but promptly informed his persecutors of the calam- 
 ities that threatened to overwhelm them. 
 
 The magistrates of Massachusetts solicited his mediation 
 with the Narragansetts, and he immediately accepted the 
 hazardous commission, and succeeding in defeating the en- 
 
48 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 deavors of the Pequods to win over the Narragansetts to a 
 coalition. In his letter to Major Mason, who was disting- 
 uished for his services in the war we are about to relate, 
 Williams has incidentally mentioned his own agency in this 
 undertaking, which we give in his simple and energetic lan- 
 guage :— 
 
 " Upon letters received from the governor and council of 
 Boston, requesting me to use my utmost and speediest en- 
 deavors to break and hinder the league labored for by the 
 Pequods and Mohegans against the English — excusing the 
 not sending of company and supplies by the haste of the 
 business— the Lord helped me immediately to put my life 
 into my hand, and scarce acquainting my wife, to ship my- 
 self alone in a poor canoe, and to cut through a stormy wind, 
 with great seas, every minute in hazard of life, to the sa- 
 chem's house. Three days and nights my business forced 
 me to lodge and mix with the bloody Pequod ambassadors, 
 whose hands and arms, methought, reeked with the blood of 
 my countrymen, murdered and massacred by them on Con- 
 necticut river, and from whom I could not but nightly look 
 for their bloody knives at my own throat also. God wond- 
 rously preserved me, and helped me to break to pieces the 
 Pequod's negotiation and design ; and to make and finish, by 
 many travels and changes, the English league with the Nar- 
 ragansetts and Mohegans against the Pequods." 
 
 In consequence of the agency of Williams, Miantonomoh, 
 the Narragansett sachem, and two sons of Canonicus, with 
 a large number of attendants, made a visit to the authorities 
 of Massachutetts Bay, at Boston, October, 1636. They were 
 received with much parade and demonstration of respect, 
 and a treaty of perpetual peace and alliance was concluded 
 between the English and the Narragansetts, in which it was 
 stipulated that neither party should make peace with the 
 hostile Pequods without the consent of the other.* The 
 
 * Winthrop, vol. i. p. 199. Hutchinson, vol. i. p. 61. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 49 
 
 terms of the treaty were arranged by the negotiation of Wil- 
 liams, but being written in the English language, and the ex- 
 planations of the magistrates being imperfect, it was found 
 difficult to make the Indians understand the articles. " We 
 agreed," says Governor Winthrop, " to send a copy of them 
 to Mr. Williams, who could best interpret them." This 
 measure was probably adopted at the request of the Indians. 
 who knew that Williams was their friend ; and it is a fact 
 that demonstrates the confidence reposed in him, both by the 
 Indians and by the government of Massachusetts. 
 
 Thus was Roger AVilliams instrumental, by the pacification 
 he accomplished, of saving the feeble settlements of Plymouth 
 and Massachusetts from the horrors of a universal savage 
 war. But his agency in averting this imminent danger was 
 but a part of the services his generous and exalted spirit 
 performed for those who had banished him. The Pequods, 
 though foiled in their attempts to secure the alliance of the 
 Narragansetts, determined, single-handed, to maintain the 
 conflict. They immediately commenced hostilities, and pros- 
 ecuted the war against the English with all the ferocity of 
 savages. They murdered several individuals at work in the 
 fields, and the barbarous tortures inflicted upon some of 
 them spread a chill of horror through the colonies. The 
 alarm was increased by their attack on the fort of Saybrook, 
 at the mouth of the Connecticut river. The colonies of 
 Massachusetts, Plymouth, and Connecticut, resolved imme- 
 diately to invade the territory of the Pequods with their 
 united forces, and attempt the destruction of this tribe, who 
 had meditated the entire extermination of the settlements of 
 New England. The following letter written by Roger Wil- 
 liams to his friend Governor Winthrop, during the Pequod 
 war, shows the invaluable services he rendered to the gov- 
 ernment of Massachusetts : 
 
 " Sir, — The latter end of the last week I gave notice to 
 our neighbor princes of your intentions and preparations 
 4 
 
50 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 against the common enemy, the Pequods. At my first com- 
 ing to them, Canonicus (morosus ceque ac barbarus senex) 
 was very sour, and accused the English and myself for send- 
 ing the plague amongst them, and threatening to kill him es- 
 pecially. 
 
 " Such tidings, it seems, were lately brought to his ears by 
 some of his flatterers, and our ill-willers. I discerned cause 
 of bestirring myself, and staid the longer, and, at last, 
 through the mercy of the Most High, I not only sweetened 
 his spirit, but possessed him that the plague and other sick- 
 nesses were alone in the hand of the one God, who made him 
 and us, who, being displeased with the English for lying, 
 stealing, idleness, and uncleanness (the natives' epidemical 
 sins), smote many thousands of us ourselves with general 
 and late mortalities. 
 
 "Miantonomoh kept his barbarous court lately at my 
 house, and with him I have far better dealing. He takes 
 some pleasure to visit me, and sent me word of his coming 
 over again some eight days hence. They pass not a week 
 without some skirmishes, though hitherto little loss on either 
 side. They were glad of your preparations, and in much 
 conference with themselves and others (fishing, de industria, 
 for instructions from them), I gathered these observations, 
 which you may please, as cause may be, to consider and take 
 notice of. 
 
 " 1. They conceive, that to do execution to purpose on 
 the Pequods will require, not two or three days and away, 
 but a riding by it, and following of the work, to and again, 
 the space of three weeks or a month ; that there be a falling 
 off and a retreat, as if you were departed, and a falling on 
 again within three or four days, when they are returned 
 again to their houses securely from their flight. 
 
 " 2. That, if any pinnaces come in ken, they presently 
 prepare for flight, women, and old men, and children, to a 
 swamp, some three or four miles on the back of them, a mar- 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 5] 
 
 vellous great and secure swamp, which they called Ohomo* 
 wauke, which signifies owl's nest, and by another name, 
 Cappacommock, which signifies a refuge or hiding-place, as 
 I conceive. 
 
 "3. That, therefore, Niantick (which is Miantonomoh's 
 place of rendezvous) be thought on for the riding and re- 
 tiring to of vessel or vessels, which place is faithful to the 
 Narragansetts, and at present enmity with the Pequod . 
 
 " 4. They also conceive it easy for the English, that the pro- 
 visions and munitions first arrive at Aquetneck, called by us 
 Rhode Island, at the Narragansett's mouth, and then a mes- 
 senger may be despatched hither, and so to the bay, for the 
 soldiers to march up by land to the vessels, who otherwise 
 might spend long time about the cape, and fill more vesssls 
 than needs. 
 
 "5. That the assault should be made in the night, when 
 they are commonly more secure and at home, by which ad- 
 vantage, the English, being armed, may enter the houses, 
 and do what execution they please. 
 
 " 6. That before the assault be given, an ambush be laid 
 behind them, between them and the swamp, to prevent their 
 flight, &c. 
 
 " 7. That, to that purpose, such guides as shall be best 
 liked of, be taken along to direct, especially two Pequods, 
 viz., Wequash and Wuttackquiackommin, valiant men, es- 
 pecially the latter, who have lived these three or four years 
 with the Narragansetts, and know every pass and passage 
 among them, who desire armor to enter their houses. 
 
 " 8. That it would be pleasing to all natives that women 
 and children be spared, &c. 
 
 " 9. That if there be any more land travel to Connecticut, 
 some course would also be taken with the Wunnashowatuc- 
 koogs, who are confederates with, and a refuge to, the Pe- 
 quods. - 
 
 " Sir, if anything be sent to the princes, I find that Ca* 
 
52 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 nonicus would gladly accept of a box of eight or ten pound 
 of su»-ar, and, indeed, he told me he would thank Mr. Gov- 
 ernor for a box full. 
 
 " Sir, you may please to take notice of a rude view how 
 the Pequods lie. [Here follows, in the original, a rude map 
 of the Pequod and Mohegan country.] 
 
 " Thus, with my best salutes to your worthy selves and 
 loving friends with you, and daily cries to the Father of 
 mercies for a merciful issue to all these enterprises, I rest, 
 " Your worship's unfeignedly respective, 
 
 "■ Roger Williams." 
 
 Of the English forces engaged in this battle, Massachu- 
 setts sent one hundred and twenty men, under the command 
 of General Stoughton, with the Rev. Mr, Wilson, of Boston, 
 as their chaplain. The troops marched by the way of Prov- 
 idence, and were hospitably entertained by Williams. Pie 
 accompanied the expedition to the Narragansett country, 
 where, by his influence, he established a mutual confidence 
 between the troops and the Indians. He then returned to 
 Providence, and at the request of the commander, during 
 the war, which continued nearly a year, he acted as a medi- 
 um of intercourse between the army and the government of 
 Massachusetts. This war was terminated by an attack upon 
 Mystic fort, near a river of that name in Connecticut, made 
 by Major Mason, in May, 1637. About five or six hundred 
 Pequods had taken refuge in this fort, and fortified it with 
 palisades, which offered but a feeble defence against the mil- 
 itary tactics and the fire-arms of the English. The Pequods 
 made a desperate resistance, but their simple weapons killed 
 and wounded but a few of the assailants. The action lasted 
 an hour, and terminated in the burning of the fort and the 
 destruction of all its inmates, except a few prisoners. The 
 forces of the colonists engaged in the battle were seventy- 
 seven men from Connecticut and Massachusetts, and several 
 hundred Narragansetts and other friendly Indians. The 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 53 
 
 principal force from Massachusetts, under General Stough- 
 ton, did not arrive till a few days after the action. The bat- 
 tle against the Pequods was fought by the whites, the friendly 
 Indians doing little service, except to intercept the fugitives. 
 
 A short time after, a considerable number of the Pequods 
 were killed in a battle in a great swamp, and the surviving 
 remnant of the tribe, about two hundred, surrendered. " Of 
 this number," says Dr. Holmes, " the English gave eighty to 
 Miantonomoh, and twenty to Ninigret, two sachems of Nar- 
 ragansett, and the other hundred to Uncas, sachem of the 
 Mohegans, to be received and treated as their men. A num- 
 ber of the male children were sent to Bermuda. Howevor 
 just the occasion of this war, humanity demands a tear on 
 the extinction of a valiant tribe, which preferred death to 
 what it might naturally anticipate from the progress of Eng- 
 lish settlements — dependence or extirpation."* Saccacus, 
 the Pequod sachem, was treacherously murdered by the Mo- 
 hawks, to whom he had fled for protection. Such was the 
 terror which this victory spread through all the tribes of 
 New England, that they refrained from open hostilities for 
 nearly forty years. 
 
 We have seen the part which Roger Williams took in this 
 contest, and may ascribe to his agency, and knowledge of 
 the Indian character and language, a large share in produc- 
 ing its favorable issue. A solemn thanksgiving was pro- 
 claimed by the colony of Massachusetts Bay, at the close of 
 the war, on account of the victory and of the signal deliver- 
 ance experienced by their general and his troops, who had 
 returned without the loss of a single soldier. But the mag- 
 istrates passed no vote of thanks to Williams, who had been 
 successful in frustrating the designs of the Pequods, which, 
 as an eminent American historian observes, was, " the most 
 intrepid and most successful achievement in the whole war ; 
 an action as perilous in its execution as it was fortunate in 
 
 * Holmes's Annals, vol. i. p. 241. 
 
54 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 its issue."* Some of the leading men of the colony felt that 
 he was entitled to an acknowledgement for his constant and 
 faithful services. He himself relates, that Governor Win- 
 throp, and " some other of the council, motioned, and it was 
 debated, whether or no I had not merited, not only to be 
 recalled from banishment, but also to be honored with some 
 mark of favor. It is known who hindered, who never pro- 
 moted the liberty of other men's consciences."! It was not 
 Roger Williams himself so much as his principles, that the 
 authorities of Massachusetts could not endure, and the fear 
 of their contagious influence overcame the sentiment of grat- 
 itude for his invaluable services. A mistaken sense of duty 
 confirmed them in their intolerance, and the decree of ban- 
 ishment was never revoked. It is mournful thus to trace 
 the influence of bigotry in extinguishing some of the finest 
 emotions of our nature, even when it does not proceed so for 
 as to quench every feeling of humanity in the destruction of 
 its objects. In this milder form we may often see it dis- 
 played even at the present day. 
 
 * Bancroft's History of the United States, vol. i. p. 399. 
 t Letter to Major Mason. The allusion is to Governor Dudley, who was 
 particularly opposed to toleration. At his death, some verses, written in his 
 own hand, were found in his pocket, of which the two following lines made a 
 a part :— 
 
 ;: Let men of God in court and churches watch 
 O'er such as do a toleration hatch." 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 CONDITION OF PROVIDENCE — LAW TO PROTECT CON- 
 SCIENCE—MRS. HUTCHINSON IS BANISHED FROM MAS- 
 SACHUSETTS — HER ADHERENTS ARE WELCOMED AT 
 PROVIDENCE — SETTLEMENT ON RHODE ISLAND COM- 
 MENCED — THE AGENCY OF WILLIAMS IN ITS PURCHASE. 
 
 The settlement at Providence was rapidly increased by the 
 arrival of persons from the other colonies, and from Europe, 
 who fled thither to enjoy soul-liberty. So tenaciously did 
 the little colony adhere to this principle, that they disfran- 
 chised one of their citizens for refusing to allow his wife to 
 attend public worship as often as she wished. It deserves 
 notice, as the earliest record in that colony of a struggle aris- 
 ing out of the law of liberty. 
 
 The wife of Joshua Verrin was desirous of attending the 
 ministry of Mr. Williams. Her husband refused to permit 
 her to do so, and the little community, considering their fun- 
 damental principle had been infringed, was immediately in 
 oreat excitement. A town meeting was called on the sub- 
 ject, and a warm debate ensued. The following act was 
 passed; viz. — "It was agreed that Joshua Yerrin, upon 
 breach of covenant for restraining liberty of conscience, 
 shall be withheld from liberty of voting, till he shall declare 
 the contrary." We cannot fail to notice the admirable adap- 
 tation of the punishment to the offence. The husband who 
 would deprive his wife of her religious rights, is condemned to 
 lose one of his own most valuable civil rights, until he shows 
 
56 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 repentance. The inhabitants of Providence maintained that 
 our duties to God are paramount to all human obligations, 
 and that if Mrs. Verrin, after faithfully discharging her do- 
 mestic claims, felt herself in conscience bound to attend Mr. 
 Williams's meetings, it was a right which could not be sur- 
 rendered. Here we have an example of the just interfer- 
 ence of law to protect conscience. 
 
 The banishment of Roger Williams, and the voluntary 
 exile of many of his adherents, did not secure uniformity of 
 religious sentiment, or put an end to the unhappy divisions 
 and contentions in Massachusetts Bay. New opinions mul- 
 tiplied, and spread alarm throughout the colony. At a gen- 
 eral synod held at Cambridge, on the 30th of August, 1637, 
 and attended by the ministers and magistrates, they denoun- 
 ced no less than eighty -two opinions as being erroneous. 
 The synod spent three weeks in debate, and finished the ses- 
 sion by condemning these errors, and pronouncing judgment 
 on certain points of discipline. 
 
 Of these opinions, the most dreaded were those promul- 
 gated by Mrs. Anne Hutchinson, who, with her husband, 
 came to Boston, from England, in 1636. She united a mas- 
 culine spirit to a somewhat fanatical character, and possessed 
 considerable talent. The opinions ascribed to her, by the 
 historians of the time, related to such points as the nature of 
 the indwelling of the Holy Ghost in the person of the be- 
 liever, and the connection between sanctification and justifi- 
 cation ; and from her peculiar views of these doctrines con- 
 sequences were deduced, which she did not admit. Mrs. 
 Hutchinson set np a meeting of females in her own house, 
 and a large portion of the members of the Boston church es- 
 poused her cause. Governor Vane, Rev. John Cotton, and 
 other distinguished individuals, treated her with great res- 
 pect ; a sufficient proof that she was not guilty of any civil 
 offence. 
 
 The effect of the Svnod at Cambridge was to increase the 
 
LIFE OF HOGER WILLIAMS. 57 
 
 asperity of the controversy. At length the magistrates in- 
 terposed, and Mrs. Hutchinson was summoned before the 
 General Court, on a charge of heresy ; found guilty, and 
 sentenced to be banished from the colony. Rev. John 
 Wheelwright, her brother-in-law, and William Aspinwall, 
 the leading advocates of her opinions, were sharers in her 
 banishment. The court, at the same time, proceeded to a 
 measure still more extraordinary. Upon the pretence that 
 the principles held by the disciples of Mrs. Hutchinson might 
 impel them to disturb the peace of the community, nearly 
 sixty of the citizens of Boston, and a number in other towns, 
 were required to give up their arms and ammunition, and 
 were forbidden, under a penalty of ten pounds, to buy or 
 borrow any others, until permitted by the court.* An act, 
 passed at the same session, decreed a severe punishment for 
 all persons who should speak evil of the judges and magis- 
 trates. We have given a recital of these events, because 
 they had an important influence upon the settlement at 
 Providence, and illustrate the mischiefs which result from an 
 interference by the civil magistrate in ecclesiastical affairs. 
 If Mrs. Hutchinson had been permitted by the ministers and 
 magistrates to continue her meetings and lectures unnoticed, 
 it is probable her zeal would soon have moderated, and she 
 would have laid aside her character as reformer. Their 
 injudicious censures exalted her opinions into undue impor- 
 tance, and her banishment deprived the colony of a large 
 number of citizens, and would have ruined a community less 
 intelligent and pious. 
 
 Many of the persons who had thus been proscribed by 
 the government of Massachusetts, departed from Boston, 
 under the superintendence of John Clarke, a learned phy- 
 sician, and proceeded southward, with a design to settle on 
 Long Island, or upon the shores of Delaware Bay. At Pro- 
 vidence they were kindly received by Roger Williams, who 
 advised them to form a settlement on the island of Aquet- 
 * Winthrop, vol. i. p. 247. 
 
58 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 neck, now called Rhode Island, which gives name to the 
 state. This beautiful island was beyond the limits both of 
 Plymouth and Massachusetts, and the adventurers were at- 
 tracted by its rich soil and salubrious climate. Accordingly, 
 they resolved to abandon their journey southward, and obtain 
 a grant of the island from the sachems of Narragansetts. By 
 the friendly and powerful influence of Roger Williams, they 
 purchased of Canonicus and Miantonomoh, Aquetneck and 
 other islands in the Narragansett Bay. He has left us an 
 account of his agency in negotiating the purchase in a letter 
 written in 1658. 
 
 " It was not price nor money that could have purchased 
 Rhode Island. Rhode Island was obtained by love ; by the love 
 and favor which that honorable gentleman, Sir Henry Vane, 
 and myself, had with that great sachem, Miantononioh, about 
 the league, which I procured between the Massachusetts Eng- 
 lish and the Narragansetts in the Pequod war. It is true I 
 advised a gratuity to be presented to the sachem and to the 
 natives; and because Mr. Coddington and the rest of my 
 loving countrymen were to inhabit the place, and to be at 
 the charge of the gratuities, I drew up a writing in Mr. Cod- 
 dington's name, and in the names of such of my loving coun- 
 trymen as came up with him, and put it into as sure a form 
 as I could at that time, for the benefit and assurance of the 
 present and future inhabitants of the island." 
 
 In another manuscript he tells us — " The Indians were 
 very shy and jealous of selling the lands to any, and chose 
 rather to make a grant of them to such as they effected, but, 
 at the same time, expected such gratuities and rewards as 
 made an Indian gift oftentimes a very dear bargain." "And 
 he colony, in 1666," says Callender, " averred, that though 
 the favor Mr. Williams had with Miantonomoh was the great 
 means of procuring the grants of the land, yet the purchase 
 had been dearer than cf any lands in New England."* The 
 deed of session was signed by the sachem, March 24, 1638. 
 * R. I. Hist. Coll. vol. iv p. 84. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 59 
 
 The little colony soon became so populous as to send out 
 settlers to the adjacent shores. To this pleasant and quiet 
 retreat, Mr. Hutchinson, with his family, removed from Mas- 
 sachusetts. It does not appear that Mrs. Hutchinson occa- 
 sioned any disturbance at Rhode Island ; but, removed from 
 the control of those who assumed the office of inquisitors into 
 her religious opinions, she led a quiet and peaceable life. 
 On the death of her husband, in 1642, she removed to the 
 neighborhood of New York, where a deeply affecting trage- 
 dy occurred. The year following, she was murdered by the 
 Indians, and all the members of her family, amounting to 
 sixteen persons, shared the same fate, with the exception of 
 one daughter, who was carried into captivity. 
 
 While Roger Williams was generously devoting his time 
 and property to rescue his countrymen from destruction by 
 the savages, and assisting in the establishment of a neighbor- 
 ing settlement at Rhode Island, his own colony was increas- 
 ing under the benign influence of spiritual freedom. The 
 late arbitrary measures adopted by Massachusetts Bay against 
 Mrs. Hutchinson, and her adherents, drove from that colony 
 a large number of its citizens, and made Providence a wel- 
 come home to some of the fugitives. It could not be expect- 
 ed that the persons whom the government had expelled from 
 her jurisdiction would entertain very favorable opinions of 
 such a proceeding. While the general court was in session, 
 March, 1638, "there came a letter directed to the court from 
 John Greene of Providence, who, not long before, had been 
 imprisoned and fined for saying, that the magistrates had 
 usurped upon the power of Christ in his Church." In con- 
 sequence of this, and suspecting others to be confederate in 
 the same letter, it was ordered, that if any one of the inhabi- 
 tants of Providence should be found within the jurisdiction 
 of Massachusetts, "he should be brought before one of the 
 magistrates ; and if he would not disclaim the charge in the 
 said letter, he should be sent home and charged to come no 
 
60 LIFE OF EOGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 more into this jurisdiction, upon pain of imprisonment and 
 further censure."* This act operated to the very serious 
 disadvantage of the settlers at Providence, and "Williams 
 himself complained that man)* thousand pounds would not 
 repay the losses he sustained in " being debarred from Bos- 
 ton, the chief mart and port of Xew England," and from 
 " trading with the English and natives" of Massachusetts. 
 So great was the scarcity of paper from this cause among 
 the settlers of Providence, that Governor Hopkins observes, 
 " the first of their writings that are to be found appear on 
 small scraps of paper, wrote as thick, and crowded as full as 
 possible." But this cruel law deprived them of articles of 
 still greater necessity, and they must have often been re- 
 duced to actual want. In referring to this period of his life, 
 Williams says, " My time was spent day and night, at home 
 and abroad, on the land and water, at the hoe and at the oar, 
 for bread." Xo injuries to himself or his fellow-settlers, 
 however, could provoke him to refuse Ins good offices on be- 
 half of the neighboring colonies, in order to preserve harmo- 
 ny between them and the Indians. 
 
 In "Winthrop's Journal there are repeated allusions to in- 
 formation received from Roger Williams, respecting the na- 
 tives, and services rendered by him to Massachusetts. An 
 event occurred about this time which deserves to be men- 
 tioned, as it exemplifies the character of "Williams, and re- 
 flects honor upon the colonists in their transactions with the 
 Indians. Four young Englishmen, who had been servants in 
 Plymouth, and had absconded from their masters, attacked 
 an Indian near Providence, but within the Plymouth colony. 
 After inflicting upon him a mortal wound they fled to Provi- 
 dence, where they were received by Mr. Williams with his 
 usual hospitality, for he was yet ignorant of their character 
 and crime. After their departure he was informed of the 
 atrocious act they had perpetrated, and immediately des- 
 
 * Winthrop, vol. i. p. 258. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. Gl 
 
 patched messengers for their apprehension. He then set out 
 himself" with two or three other persons, in search of the 
 wounded Indian. They conveyed him to Providence, but 
 all efforts to preserve his life were unavailing. The murder- 
 ers were soon arrested and brought to Providence ; and, by 
 the advice of Governor Winthrop, they were sent to Ply- 
 month, within whose jurisdiction the murder had been com- 
 mitted. One of the prisoners made his escape ; but the re- 
 maining three were tried for murder, confessed the crime, 
 and were executed in the presence of Mr. Williams and the 
 Indians. This vindication of law and the rights of the na- 
 tives secured their confidence. 
 
 "Winthrop relates another circumstance that evinces the 
 implicit confidence the Indians reposed in Roger Williams. 
 Rumors were circulated that the Indians were plotting new 
 mischief against the colonists. The government of Massa- 
 chusetts strengthened the defences of the towns, and sent an 
 officer, with three men and an interpreter, to the Narragan- 
 setts to ascertain the truth of the rumors, and to invite their 
 sachem to Boston. Miantonomoh denied any hostile inten- 
 tions, and expressed his readiness to visit Boston, provided 
 Mr. Williams might accompany him as his adviser. But the 
 authorities of Massachusetts would not relax the sentence of 
 banishment, even for the advantage of a personal interview 
 with the sachem, and in a matter so important to the peace 
 and welfare of the colony. 
 
 In 1640, the tranquility of Providence was disturbed by 
 disputes respecting the boundaries of lands ; and a commit- 
 tee was appointed authorized to terminate these dissensions 
 by arbitration. The report of this committee is highly char- 
 acteristic of the community. One of its prominent articles 
 is in these words : — " We agree, as formerly hath been the 
 liberties of the town, so still to It old forth liberty of 'conscience :" 
 From the social feuds which had arisen, it became evident to 
 the sagacious mind of Williams that a more energetic gov- 
 
62 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 ernment was necessary, and the citizens of Providence es- 
 tablished a form of civil polity which they deemed most suit- 
 able to promote peace and order in their present circum- 
 stances. 
 
 The government on Rhode Island was also more regular- 
 ly organized the same year, and the acts passed show that 
 the settlements there and at Providence were founded on the 
 same principles. On the 16th of March, 1641, it was or- 
 dered, by the authority of the general court, " that none be 
 accounted a delinquent for doctrine, provided it be not di- 
 rectly repugnant to the government or laws established." 
 And in September following, they passed a special act, " that 
 that law concerning liberty of conscience in point of doc- 
 trine be perpetuated." 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 LEAGUE OF THE NEW ENGLAND COLONIES — THE SET- 
 TLEMENTS IN RHODE ISLAND EXCLUDED — WILLIAMS^ 
 FIRST VISIT TO ENGLAND — PUBLISHES HIS KEY TO 
 THE INDIAN LANGUAGES — OBTAINS A CHARTER — HIS 
 LETTER TO COTTON — " THE BLOUDY TENENT"— HE 
 RETURNS TO AMERICA — HIS RECEPTION AT BOSTON 
 AND PROVIDENCE. 
 
 In the year 1642, the colonists of New England were alarmed 
 by reports of hostile designs on the part of the Indians, and 
 they accordingly adopted vigorous measures of defence. 
 The natives were becoming more formidable by their acqui- 
 sition of fire-arms and ammunition, from the English and 
 Dutch traders. 
 
 The following year is memorable in the history of New 
 England, by the establishment of the earliest confederacy of 
 the colonies. The articles of union were signed at Boston, 
 on the 19th of May, 1643, by the commissioners of the four 
 colonies of Plymouth, Massachusetts Bay, Connecticut and 
 New Haven, under the name of " the United Colonies of 
 New England." 
 
 The objects of the confederation were, mutual protection 
 against the depredations committed by the natives, together 
 with the enjoyment of " the liberty of the gospel, in purity 
 with peace, and the advancement of the kingdom of Jesus 
 Christ." By the articles, it was stipulated, that two commis- 
 sioners should be annually chosen by each colony, to meet 
 successively at Boston, Hartford, New Haven, and Plymouth, 
 
64 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 once a year, or oftener if necessary, and that this congress 
 should determine questions of peace or war, and consult for 
 the general welfare. This league had a beneficial effect, 
 and was continued till the year 1686. 
 
 The colony at Providence was not invited to join this con- 
 federacy, and her subsequent application for admission, like 
 that of the neighboring colony on Rhode Island, was refused. 
 The want of a charter was at first the reason alleged, but 
 when this objection was removed there was no disposition to 
 admit her to the privileges of the league. The entire sepa- 
 ration of the ecclesiastical from the civil power, which formed 
 the basis of her legislation, was undoubtedly the principal 
 cause of her exclusion. Providence was thus exposed to 
 many inconveniences and dangers, and left without defence, 
 except by her own citizens. But the powerful influence of 
 Roger Williams with the Indians preserved the colony, 
 amidst the perils to which the confederate colonies had aban- 
 doned her. 
 
 The authorities of Massachusetts, not satisfied with having 
 driven Williams and others from their territory, by their op- 
 pressive measures against conscience, laid claim to jurisdic- 
 tion over the settlements in Narragansett Bay. The in- 
 creasing prosperity of the colonies at Providence and on 
 Rhode Island, their exclusion from the confederacy, and the 
 declarations of their enemies that they had no legal authority 
 for civil government, led the inhabitants to feel the great im- 
 portance of obtaining a charter from the mother country. 
 At an assembly in Newport, September 19, 1642, a commit- 
 tee was appointed, with instructions to procure a charter, 
 who entrusted the agency to Roger Williams. He agreed, 
 on behalf of that colony and his own, to visit England, and, 
 if possible, obtain a charter defining their rights, and giving 
 them independent authority, free from the vexatious interfe- 
 rence of the other colonies. 
 
 He proceeded to New York to embark for England — for 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 65 
 
 he was not permitted to enter the territories of Massachu- 
 setts, and sail from the more convenient port of Boston. At 
 Manhattoes, while waiting for the ship to go to sea, he had 
 an opportunity of exerting his influence to preserve that 
 colony from the merciless attacks of the Indians. The sava- 
 ges of Long Island, provoked by the wanton cruelties of the 
 Dutch, had assailed them with great fury. They had burned 
 many houses in the neighborhood of Manhattoes ; murdered 
 several persons, among whom were Mrs. Hutchinson and her 
 family ; and assaulted the dwelling of Lady Moody, who had 
 lately removed thither from Massachusetts. It was by the 
 immediate interposition of Williams that peace was restored 
 between the inhabitants of the Dutch settlements and their 
 barbarous foes. In June, 1643, Williams embarked at New 
 York for his native land, but he has left no account of the 
 incidents of the voyage. He has, however, recorded one 
 fact which evinces the activity of his mind on the ocean as 
 well as on the land, and exemplifies the sentiment so beauti- 
 fully expressed in one of his works — " One grain of time's 
 inestimable sand is worth a golden mountain." He informs 
 us that he employed his leisure, during the voyage, in pre- 
 paring a " Key to the Indian Languages." " I drew 
 the materials," he says, " in a rude lump, at sea, as a private 
 help to my own memory ; that I might not, by my present 
 absence, lightly lose what I had so dearly bought in some 
 few years' hardship and changes among the barbarians."* 
 This book was published soon after his arrival in England, 
 and was the first work ever written on the language and 
 manners of the American Indians.f The work evinces much 
 industry and acuteness in collecting the words and phrases 
 of an unwritten language, and contains valuable information 
 
 * Key, p. 17. 
 
 t It is entitled, " A Key into the Language of America ; or, a Help to the 
 Language of the Natives, in that part of America called New England ; to- 
 gether with brief Observations of the Customs, Manners, Worship, &c. By 
 Eoger Williams, of Providence, in New England. London, 1643." 
 5 
 
QQ LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 concerning the various topics of which it treats. It is dedica- 
 ted to his " well-beloved friends and countrymen in Old and 
 New England." In this dedication he says, " This Key res- 
 pects the native language of it, and happily may unlock some 
 rarities concerning the natives themselves, not yet discover- 
 ed. A little key may open a box where lies a bunch of 
 keys." He shows his benevolent zeal for the welfare of the 
 natives, and professes his hope that his book may contribute 
 to the spread of Christianity among them, " being comforta- 
 bly persuaded that that Father of spirits who was graciously 
 pleased to persuade Japheth (the Gentile) to dwell in the 
 tents of Shem (the Jews), will, in his holy season (I hope 
 approaching), persuade these Gentiles of America to par- 
 take of the mercies of Europe ; and then shall be fulfilled 
 what is written by the prophet Malachi, ' from the rising of 
 the sun (in Europe) to the going down of the same (in 
 America) my name shall be great among the Gentiles.' " 
 
 The Key comprises one hundred and ninety-seven pages 
 of small duodecimo, and is divided into thirty-two chapters, 
 the titles of which are — Of Salutation ; of Eating and En- 
 tertainment ; of Sleep ; of their Numbers ; of Relations and 
 Consanguinity ; of their Religion ; of their Government ; 
 &c. Each chapter closes with pious reflections. As this 
 work is now exceedingly rare in this country,* we present 
 an extract — which will interest the curious reader — from the 
 twenty-first chapter, " Of Religion, the Soul, &c." 
 
 " Manit, Mannittowock, God, Gods. 
 
 " Obs. — He that questions whether God made the world, 
 the Indians will teach him. I must acknowledge I have re- 
 ceived, in my converse with them, many confirmations of 
 those two great points, Heb. xi. 6 ; viz. — 
 
 " 1. That God is. 
 
 * Only five or six copies of the original edition are known to exist. It 
 was published entire in vol. i. of the Collections of the Rhode Island Historical 
 Society, Providence, 1827. 
 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. G7 
 
 "That he is a re warder of all them that diligently sivk 
 him. 
 
 " They will generally confess that God made all ; but then, 
 in special, although they deny not that Englishman's God 
 made Englishmen, and the heavens and earth there, yet 
 their gods made them, and the heavens and earth where they 
 dwell. 
 
 " Nvmmus quauna — muckqun manit. God is angry with 
 me. 
 
 " If they receive any good in hunting, fishing, harvest, &c, 
 fchey acknowledge God in it. 
 
 " Yea, if it be but an ordinary accident, a fall, &c, they 
 will say, God was angry, and did it. 
 
 " Musquantum man It. God is angry. 
 
 " But herein is their misery : — 
 
 " First. They branch their godhead into many gods. 
 
 " Secondly. Attribute it to creatures. 
 
 " First. Many gods : they have given me the names of 
 thirty-seven, which I have, all which, in their solemn wor- 
 ship, they invocate ; as, 
 
 " Kautantowit. The great south-west god, to whose house 
 all souls go, and from whom came their corn and beans, as 
 they say. 
 
 " Wompanand. The eastern god. 
 
 " Chekesuwand. The western god. 
 
 " Wunnanameanit. The northern god. 
 
 " Soiowanand. The southern god. 
 
 " Wetuomanit. The house 'god. 
 
 " Squauanit. The woman's god. 
 
 " MuckquacliuckquaiuL The children's god. 
 
 " Secondly. As they have many of these feigned deities, 
 so worship they the creatures in whom they conceive doth 
 rest some deity : 
 
 " Keesuckquand. The sun god. 
 
 " Nanepausliat. The moon god. 
 
68 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 " Poumpagussit. The sea god. 
 " Yotaanit. The fire god. 
 " Supposing that deities be in these," &c. 
 The work breathes throughout a spirit of piety, and closes 
 with the following devout aspirations : — 
 
 " Now, to the most high and most holy, immortal, invisi- 
 ble, and only wise God, who alone is alpha and omega, the 
 becinnino- and the ending, the first and the last, who was, 
 and is, and is to come ; from whom, by whom, and to whom, 
 are all things ; by whose gracious assistance and wonderful 
 supportment, in so many varieties of hardship and outward 
 miseries, I have had such converse with barbarous nations, 
 and have been mercifully assisted, to frame this poor Key, 
 which may, through his blessing, in his own holy season, 
 open a door — yea, doors of unknown mercies to us and 
 them, be honor, glory, power, riches, wisdom, goodness, and 
 dominion, ascribed by all his in Jesus Christ to eternity. 
 Amen." 
 
 Ro^er Williams arrived in England when the nation was 
 convulsed by the civil war, and but a few months after the 
 death of the illustrious Hampden. Charles had already fled 
 from London, and parliament were in possession of the 
 executive and legislative authority. This state of affairs was, 
 in some respects, favorable to the successful accomplishment 
 of the mission of Williams. The issue of the conflict be- 
 tween the king and the parliament was then very doubtful, 
 and the latter were disposed to strengthen themselves by 
 conciliating the colonies in America. In March, 1643, the 
 House of Commons passed a resolution in favor of New 
 England, exempting its imports and exports from customs, 
 subsidy or taxation. By an ordinance, November 3rd, 1643, 
 a short time after the arrival of Williams, parliament ap- 
 pointed the earl of Warwick governor-in-chief and lord high 
 admiral of the American colonies, with a council of five 
 peers and twelve eonunoners. It empowered him, together 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 69 
 
 with his associates, to examine the state of their affairs, to 
 send for papers and persons, to remove governors and officers, 
 and appoint others in their places, and to assign to these such 
 part of the power granted as he should think proper.* 
 From these commissioners, Roger Williams, aided by the in- 
 fluence of his early friend, Sir Henry Vane, one of their 
 number, easily obtained a charter for the colony of Rhode 
 Island. It was dated March 17, 1644, and granted to the 
 inhabitants of the towns of Providence, Portsmouth, and 
 Newport, " a free and absolute charter of civil incorporation,'' 
 to be entitled, The incorporation of Providence plantations, 
 in the Narragansett Bay in New England. The instrument 
 conveyed to the inhabitants of these towns the most ample 
 powers to adopt such a form of civil government, and " to 
 make and ordain such civil laws and constitutions, as they, 
 or the greatest part of them, shall by free consent agree un- 
 to, provided, nevertheless, that the said laws for the planta- 
 tion be conformable to the laws of England, so far as the 
 nature and constitution of that place will admit." 
 
 While in England, Williams published a small quarto vol- 
 ume, entitled, " Mr. Cotton's Letter, lately printed, Exam- 
 ined and Answered. By Roger Williams, of Providence, in 
 New England. London, imprinted in the year 1644." It 
 is preceded by an address to " the impartial reader," from 
 which it appears, that, soon after Williams's banishment, in 
 the time of his " distressed wanderings amongst the barbari- 
 ans," Mr. Cotton sent him a letter in which he justifies that 
 persecuting act of the magistrates in banishing him, but de- 
 nies that he had any agency in the matter. Williams, in 
 this work, states the causes, which led to his banishment, 
 shows " the sandiness of the grounds" on which they rested, 
 the " rocky strength" of his own opinions, and concludes by 
 desiring " Mr. Cotton and every soul to whom these lines 
 may come, seriously to consider in this controversy, if the 
 
 * Holmes's Anrtais, vol. i. p. 273. 
 
70 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 Lord Jesus were himself in person in Old or New England, 
 what church, what ministry, what worship, what government, 
 he would set up, and what persecution he would practise to- 
 ward them that would not receive him." Its tone is cour- 
 teous, and he speaks of liis great antagonist, the Rev. John 
 Cotton, as a man " whom for his personal excellences I truly 
 honor and love." Mr. Cotton had been a minister of Bos- 
 ton, in England, and the city of Boston, in Massachusetts. 
 was named after his former place of residence, as a compli- 
 ment to this eminent man. He was unquestionably a very 
 talented preacher, and if he had lived at a period when the 
 rights of conscience were better understood, his powerful 
 pen, we doubt not, would have been differently employed. 
 During Williams's residence in England, he also published 
 an anonymous pamphlet, entitled, " Queries of Highest Con- 
 sideration proposed to Mr. Thomas Goodwin — presented to 
 the High Court of Parliament, London, 1644."* It is a 
 quarto of thirteen pages, and contains clear and accurate 
 observations on the distinct provinces of civil and ecclesias- 
 tical authority. 
 
 Notwithstanding the engrossing nature of his mission in 
 obtaining the charter for Rhode Island, and the great na- 
 tional conflict, in which he must have felt the deepest inter- 
 est, Williams found leisure to prepare for the press his cele- 
 brated book entitled, " The Bloudy Tenent of Persecution,, 
 for Cause of Conscience, discussed in a Conference between 
 Truth and Peace ; who, in all tender affection, present to the 
 High Court of Parliament (as the result of their discourse) 
 these, amongst other, passages of highest consideration. 
 London. Printed in the year 1G44." The origin of this 
 work illustrates the spirit of the age. A person, who was 
 confined in Newgate on account of his religious opinions, 
 wrote a treatise against persecution for cause of conscience. 
 Being deprived of the use of ink, it was written with milk* 
 
 * Orme*s Life of Owen, p. 100. Cotton's Answer, p. 2. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 71 
 
 on sheets of paper sent by a friend, as stoppers to the bottle 
 containing his daily allowance of milk. After its publica- 
 tion, the essay was sent about the year 1G35, to the Rev. 
 John Cotton, of Boston, who wrote a reply, of which Wil- 
 liams's book is an examination. Its title, " The Bloudy Ten- 
 ent," is chosen to exhibit, in strong contrast, the different 
 character of the two essays — the one, toleration, written with 
 milk; and, the other, persecution, steeped in blood. 
 
 The book comprises two hundred and forty-seven pages 
 of small quarto, and is printed without the name of the au- 
 thor or publisher. It is dedicated " to the Right Honorable 
 both Houses of the High Court of Parliament ;" and it ap- 
 pears to have attracted the attention of some of the leading 
 men in England. After an address " to every courteous 
 reader," the treatise of the prisoner, and Mr. Cotton's reply, 
 are inserted ; then follows the main work, which is in the 
 form of a dialogue between Truth and Peace. It was pre- 
 pared for publication, as the author himself observes, " in 
 change of rooms and corners, yea, sometimes in variety of 
 strange houses ; sometimes in the fields, in the midst of tra- 
 vel;" yet it is the best of his works, and contains a full exhi- 
 tion of his doctrines of religious- freedom, supported by lu- 
 minous and powerful reasoning. His st}de is generally ani- 
 mated, and often highly beautiful. 
 
 The colloquy between Truth and Peace commences thus : — 
 
 " Truth. — In what dark corner of the world, sweet Peace, 
 are we two met ? Plow hath this present evil world ban- 
 ished me from all the coasts and quarters of it V and how 
 hath the righteous God in judgment taken thee from the 
 earth ? Rev. vi. 4. 
 
 " Peace. — 'Tis lamentably true, blessed Truth, the foun- 
 dations of the world have long been out of course. The 
 gates of earth and hell have conspired together to intercept 
 our joyful meeting and our holy kisses. With what a weary, 
 tired wing have I flown over nations, kingdoms, cities, towns, 
 to find out precious Truth. 
 
72 LIFE OF ROGEE WILLIAMS. 
 
 " Truth. — The like inquiries in my flights and travels have 
 I made for Peace, and still am told, she hath left the earth 
 and fled to heaven. 
 
 " Peace. — Dear Truth, what is the earth but a dungeon of 
 darkness, where Truth is not ?" 
 
 A complete analysis of this work would occupy too much 
 space, but a syllabus is presented in the author's own 
 words : — 
 
 " The blood of so many hundred thousand souls, of pro- 
 testants and papists, spilt in the wars of present and former 
 ages, for their respective consciences, is not required nor ac- 
 cepted by Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace. — Pregnant 
 scriptures and arguments are, throughout the work, pro- 
 posed against the doctrine of persecution for cause of con- 
 science. — Satisfactory answers are given to scriptures and 
 objections produced by Mr. Calvin, Beza, Mr. Cotton, and 
 the ministers of the New English Churches, and others, 
 former and latter, tending to prove the doctrine of persecu- 
 tion for cause of conscience. — The doctrine of persecution 
 for cause of conscience is proved guilty of all the blood of 
 the souls crying for vengeance under the altar. — All civil 
 states, with their officers of justice, in their respective con- 
 stitutions and administrations, are proved essentially civil, 
 and, therefore, not judges, governors, or defenders of the 
 spiritual or christian state and worship. — It is the will and 
 command of God that, since the coming of his Son the Lord 
 Jesus, a permission of the most paganish, Jewish, Turkish, 
 or anti-christian consciences and worships be granted to all 
 men in all nations and countries ; and they are only to be 
 fought against with that sword which is only in soul matters 
 able to conquer ; to wit, the sword of God's Spirit, the "Word 
 of God. — The state of the land of Israel, the kings and peo- 
 ple thereof, in peace and war, is proved, figurative and cere- 
 monial, and no pattern or precedent for any kingdom or 
 civil state in the world to follow. — God requireth not an uni- 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 73 
 
 formity of religion to be enacted and enforced in any civil 
 state ; which enforced uniformity, sooner or later, is the 
 greatest occasion of civil war, ravishing of conscience, per- 
 secution of Jesus Christ in his servants, and of the hypocri- 
 sy and destruction of millions of souls. — In holding an en- 
 forced uniformity of religion in a civil state, we must neces- 
 sarily disclaim our desires and hopes of the Jews' conversion 
 to Christ. — An enforced uniformity of religion throughout a 
 nation or civil state, confounds the civil and religious, denies 
 the principles of Christianity and civility, and that Jesus 
 Christ is come in the flesh. — The permission of other con- 
 sciences and worships than a state professeth, only can, ac- 
 cording to God, procure a firm and lasting peace ; good as- 
 surance being taken, according to the wisdom of the civil 
 state, for uniformity of civil obedience from all sorts. — True 
 civility and Christianity may both flourish in a state or king- 
 dom, notwithstanding the permission of divers and contrary 
 consciences, either of Jew or Gentile." 
 
 The grand doctrine for which he contends is, that as God 
 is the Supreme Ruler, the obligation to love and obey him 
 binds the conscience of every man ; but he is responsible to 
 God alone. His fellow-men, therefore, have no right to in- 
 terfere with bis religious opinions, for God has not delegated 
 to any man this authority over the conscience ; consequently, 
 all human laws which either prescribe or prohibit doctrines 
 or rites that are not inconsistent with the civil peace, are an 
 invasion of God's prerogative, and no man is bound to obey 
 them. 
 
 Principles of religious liberty are expounded and illustra- 
 ted in the " Bloudy Tenent," which have since excited ad- 
 miration in the writings of Jeremy Taylor, Milton, Locke, 
 and Furneau. Bishop Heber, in his life of Jeremy Taylor, 
 remarks, of the " Liberty of Prophecying :" — " It is the first 
 attempt on record to conciliate the minds of Christians to 
 the reception of a doctrine, which, though now the rule of 
 
74 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 action professed by all christian sects, was then, by everv 
 sect alike, regarded as a perilous and portentous novelty." 
 Bishop Heber has here fallen into a mistake, as Taylor's ad- 
 mirable work was not published till 1647, three years after 
 the " Bloucly Tenent." In the latter work the principles of 
 liberty of conscience are far more clearly and consistently 
 maintained. Taylor claims toleration for those Christians 
 only who unite in the confession of the Apostle's creed; Wil- 
 liams claims not merely a right to toleration, but for every 
 man entire liberty of conscience. 
 
 Roger Williams, having accomplished the object of his 
 mission to England, embarked for America, and landed at 
 Boston, September 17th, 1G44. He brought with him the 
 following letter, signed by several noblemen, and other mem- 
 bers of parliament, and addressed " To the right worshipful 
 the governor and assistants, and the rest of our worthy 
 friends in the plantation of Massachusetts Bay, in New Eng- 
 land :"— 
 
 " Our much-honored Friends, — Taking notice, some 
 of us of long time, of Mr. Roger Williams, his good affec- 
 tions and conscience, and of his sufferings by our common 
 enemies and oppressors of God's people, the prelates ; as, 
 also, of his great industry and travail in his printed In- 
 dian labors in your parts (the like whereof we have not 
 seen extant from any part of America), and in which res- 
 pect it hath pleased both houses of parliament to grant unto 
 him, and friends with him, a free and absolute charter of 
 civil government for those parts of his abode ; and, withal, 
 sorrowfully resenting — that amongst good men (our friends) 
 driven to the ends of the world, exercised with the trials of 
 a wilderness, and who mutually give good testimony, each of 
 the other (as we observe you do of him, and he abundantly 
 of you), — there should be such a distance; we thought it fit, 
 upon divers considerations, to profess our great desires of 
 both your utmost endeavors of nearer closing and of readily 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 75 
 
 expressing those good affections (which we perceive you 
 bear to each other), in effectual performance of all friendly 
 offices. The rather because of those bad neighbors you are 
 likely to find in Virginia, and the unfriendly visits from the 
 west of England and of Ireland. That however it may 
 please the Most High to shake our foundations, yet the re- 
 port of your peaceable and prosperous plantations may be 
 some refreshings to your true and faithful friends." 
 
 This letter was delivered to the authorities of Massachu- 
 setts, and procured for Williams permission to proceed un- 
 molested to Providence, but it failed to soften their temper 
 towards him, or the heretical colony. The magistrates, says 
 Hubbard, upon the receipt of the letter, examined their 
 hearts, but saw no reason to condemn themselves for any 
 former proceedings against Mr. Williams. The colony being 
 now invested with the dignity of an independent govern- 
 ment, and under the protection of the parent country, ap- 
 peared to the united colonies to possess a greater power for 
 mischief, and they steadily pursued towards her an un- 
 friendly policy. 
 
 The news of Williams's arrival at Boston had preceded 
 him and the inhabitants of Providence met him at Seekonk, 
 with a fleet of canoes to welcome his return, and to convey 
 him home in triumph. These humble colonists could not 
 receive their constant friend and benefactor with the pomp 
 of regal display, but they offered him the more valuable hom- 
 age of heart-felt gratitude. Such an expression of it is hon- 
 orable to our common humanity, and is a reward seldom 
 withheld from those who, like Roger Williams, seek with 
 disinterested patriotism the welfare of their country. This 
 reception is a sufficient testimony of the esteem in which 
 his character and services were held by his fellow-citizens. 
 
CHAPTER XL 
 
 Williams's efforts in preventing a general Indi- 
 an WAR — FORM OF GOVEMNMENT UNDER THE CHAR- 
 TER — SPIRIT OF THE LAWS — DISSENSIONS — WILLIAMS'S 
 LETTER TO THE TOWN OF PROVIDENCE — CODDINGTON'S 
 COMMISSION — OPPRESSIVE POLICY OF THE OTHER NEW 
 ENGLAND COLONIES — PERSECUTION OF JOHN CLARKE, 
 AND OTHERS, IN MASSACHUSETTS — LETTER OF SIR 
 RICHARD SALTONSTALL — WILLIAMS AND CLARKE ARE 
 APPOINTED AGENTS TO THE MOTHER COUNTRY. 
 
 Immediately after his return, Rojjer Williams endeavored 
 to carry into operation the charter he had procured, but the 
 inhabitants were not prepared at once to agree on a form of 
 government. The charter gave them power to frame their 
 own laws, but much skill and delicacy were necessary to har- 
 monize the various conflicting interests of the respective 
 towns. 
 
 In the meantime, the beneficent services of Williams were 
 required in settling the difficulties which had sprung up, dur- 
 ing his absence, between the united colonies and the Narra- 
 gansetts. The latter, exasperated against the Mohegans, who 
 had put to death their favorite sachem, Miantonomoh, and 
 against the colonists, who had sanctioned the deed, resolved 
 on war. They soon commenced hostilities, killed several of 
 the Mohegans, and threatened to extend the war to all the 
 colonists of New England, except those at Providence, and 
 on Rhode Island, having, from regard to Williams, agreed to 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS, 77 
 
 maintain peace with these settlements. An extraordinary 
 meeting of the commissioners was held in Boston, when they 
 received a letter from Roger Williams, informing them of 
 the hostile determinations of the Narragansctts. Two mes- 
 sengers were sent to the sachems of the tribe to appease their 
 vengeance and prevent the war. Williams had already been 
 sent for by the sachems to advise them in this crisis ; and on 
 the arrival of the messengers he served them as an interpre- 
 ter. By his mediation, Passacus, the brother and successor 
 of Miantonomoh, and other chiefs of the tribe, were persua- 
 ded to go to Boston, where a treaty was concluded in Au- 
 gust, 1645, between the commissioners and the sachems, by 
 which the latter agreed to make peace with the Mohegans. 
 Thus were the settlements of KeAv England saved, a second 
 time, from a general Indian war, mainly by the good offices 
 and personal influence of Roger Williams. 
 
 The several towns of the Providence plantations at length 
 agreed on a form of civil government, closely analogous to 
 the organization of the United States, under their present 
 constitution. It was adopted in a general assembly of the 
 people of the colony, held at Portsmouth, May 19th, 1647. 
 This form required the annual election of a president and 
 four assistants, in whom the executive power was vested, and 
 who constituted the general court of trial for all cases of ap- 
 peal. The legislative assembly was composed of six commis- 
 sioners from each town, who should make laws and order the 
 general affairs of the colony. The laws adopted by the 
 above-mentioned general assembly were mainly taken from 
 those of England. This excellent code concludes with these 
 memorable words : — " These are the laws that concern all 
 men, and these are the penalties for the transgressions there- 
 of, which, by common consent, are ratified and established 
 throughout the whole colony. And otherwise than thus, 
 what is herein forbidden, all men may walk as their con- 
 sciences persuade them, every one in the name of his God. 
 
78 life of roger williams. 
 
 And let the saints of the Most High walk in this 
 
 COLONY WITHOUT MOLESTATION, IN THE NAME OF JeHO- 
 VAH THEIR GOD, FOR EVER AND EVER."* 
 
 An eminent American historian justly observes, " The an- 
 nals of Rhode Island, if written in the spirit of philosophy, 
 would exhibit the forms of society under a peculiar aspect. 
 
 Had the territory of the state corresponded to the import- 
 ance and singularity of the principles of its early existence, 
 the world would have been filled with wonder at the phe- 
 nomena of its early history."! Williams had a large share 
 in the organization of the new government, and he was just- 
 ly entitled, from his character and services, to be the first 
 president. It was, undoubtedly, to conciliate the other 
 towns that he cheerfully yieided his own claims to that of- 
 fice, while he accepted the subordinate place of assistant for 
 the town of Providence. Among the acts passed at this 
 first meeting of the general assembly, was a resolution grate- 
 fully recognising the services of Roger Williams in obtain- 
 ing the charter, and " in regard to his so great trouble, 
 charges, and good endeavors," granting him the sum of one 
 hundred pounds. This was, undoubtedly, a very inadequate 
 compensation, but the whole even of this sum was never 
 paid, owing, perhaps, to the unhappy jealousies which arose 
 between the different settlements ; or, it may be, Williams 
 was too generous to press his just claims. It must be con- 
 fessed, however, that gratitude has not been a conspicuous 
 virtue of any government, republican, or monarchical. In- 
 dividual conscience seems to be dissipated when men act to- 
 gether in large communities. 
 
 It could not be expected that the several towns of the col- 
 ony, composed of so many discordant materials, embracing 
 all sorts of opinions, would quietly coalesce in one form of 
 government. The harmony of Providence was early dis- 
 
 * Colony Records. t Bancroft, vol. i. p. 380. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 79 
 
 turbed, by the resort of many restless spirits from the other 
 colonies, who entertained mistaken views of religious free- 
 dom. The influence of Williams was often needed as a 
 peace-maker, to throw oil upon the troubled waters. 
 
 One of the principal sources of disquietude to Williams at 
 this time, and of injury to the colony, was the extraordinary 
 proceedings of William Coddington, the leading inhabitant 
 of the settlement on Rhode Island. The fierce conflict then 
 raging at home affected this distant dependency. Codding- 
 ton was attached to the king's party, and disposed to pro- 
 mote his authority in the colony. From the first organiza- 
 tion of the government, under the charter, his efforts were 
 directed to its overthrow. Having persuaded a faction to 
 unite with him, he first attempted to obtain admission for the 
 island settlements into the league of the New England colo- 
 nies, but, happily, this effort failed. 
 
 In this state of affairs Williams addressed a letter to the 
 town of Providence, dated August, 1648, which places his 
 character as a peacemaker in a very interesting light : — 
 
 "Worthy friends, that ourselves and all men are apt and 
 prone to differ, is no new thing. In all former ages, in all 
 parts of the world, in these parts, and in our dear native 
 country and mournful state of England, that either part or 
 party is most right in his own eyes, his cause right, his car- 
 riage right, his arguments right, his answers right, is as woe- 
 fully and constantly true, as the former. And experience 
 tells us, that when the God of peace hath taken peace from 
 the earth, one spark of action, word or carriage, is powerful 
 to kindle such a fire as burns up towns, cities, armies, navies, 
 nations and kingdoms. And since, dear friends, it is an 
 honor for men to cease from strife ; since the life of love is 
 sweet, and union is as strong as sweet ; and since you have 
 been lately pleased to call me to some public service, and 
 my soul hath been long musing how I might bring water to 
 quench, and not oil or fuel to the flame : I am now humbly 
 
80 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 bold to beseech you, by all those comforts of earth and hea- 
 ven, which a placable and peaceable spirit will bring to 
 you, and by all those dreadful alarms and warnings, either 
 amongst ourselves, in deaths and sicknesses, or abroad in the 
 raging calamities of the sword, death, and pestilence ; I say, 
 humbly and earnestly beseech you, to be willing to be pacifi- 
 able, willing to be reconcilable, willing to be sociable, and to 
 listen to the (I hope not unreasonable) motion following : 
 To try out matters by disputes and writings, is sometimes 
 endless ; to try out arguments by arms and swords, is cruel 
 and merciless ; to trouble the state and lords of England, is 
 most unreasonable, most chargeable ; to trouble our neigh- 
 bors of other colonies, seems neither safe nor honorable. 
 Methinks, dear friends, the colony now looks with the torn 
 face of two parties, and that the greater number of Ports- 
 mouth, with other loving friends adhering to them, appear 
 as one grieved party ; the other three towns, or greater part 
 of them, appear to be another. Let each party choose and 
 nominate three ; Portsmouth and friends adhering, three, the 
 other party, three, one out of each town ; let authority be 
 given to them to examine every public difference, grievance 
 and obstruction of justice, peace and common safety ; let 
 them, by one final sentence of all or the greater part of 
 them, end all, and set the whole into an unanimous posture 
 and order, and let them set a censure upon any that shall 
 oppose their sentence." 
 
 This excellent advice, however, could not be followed, for 
 Coddington persisted in his ambitious views. He went to 
 England, and procured from the council of state a commis- 
 sion, constituting him governor for life of the islands of 
 Rhode Island and Canonicut. He returned in 1651, bring- 
 ing his new charter, whose operation would at once subvert 
 the existing government and divide the colony. This pro- 
 duced great excitement throughout the different settlements, 
 and alarmed those inhabitants on the islands who were op- 
 posed to his measures. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 81 
 
 In addition to these internal dissensions, other troubles 
 arose. The colon}' was surrounded by Massachusetts, Ply- 
 mouth, and Connecticut, which were all opposed to the little 
 heretical state, and regarded her as their legitimate prey. 
 Plymouth was desirous of adding the beautiful island to her 
 territory ; Connecticut repeatedly asserted her claims to the 
 Narragansett country ; and Massachusetts claimed Provi- 
 dence and the neighboring settlement of Warwick. 
 
 The special aversion which Massachusetts felt towards in- 
 truders from Rhode Island is illustrated in the memorable 
 transactions in which the Rev. John Clarke, Mr. Obadiah 
 Holmes, and Mr. John Crandall, three citizens of Newport r 
 had so melancholy a share. They were appointed by the 
 church in Newport to visit one William Witter, an aged 
 member of that church, then resident at Lynn, a few miles 
 east of Boston, who had requested a visit for the purpose of 
 christian intercourse. The committee proceeded, in a peace- 
 able manner, on this benevolent mission to Lynn. The next 
 day being the Sabbath, it was thought projjer to spend it in 
 worship at the house of Witter. While Mr. Clarke was 
 preaching from Rev. iii. 10, relating to temptation, he was 
 suddenly interrupted by two constables, who arrested him 
 and his companions by virtue of the following warrant signed, 
 by one of the magistrates; viz. — "By virtue hereof, you are 
 required to go to the house of William Witter, and so to 
 search from house to house for certain erroneous persons, 
 being strangers, and them to apprehend, and in safe custody 
 to keep, and to morrow morning, at eight o'clock to bring 
 before me." Mr. Clarke and his companions were detained, 
 through the Sabbath, in the custody of the officers, and the 
 next day were committed to prison in Boston. On being 
 brought before the court for trial, Mr. Clarke defended him- 
 self and his companions so ably that the magistrates were not 
 a little embarrassed. " At length, however," says Mr. Clarke, 
 " the governor stepped up, and told us we had denied infant 
 6 
 
82 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 baptism, and, being somewhat transported, told me I bad de- 
 served death, and said he would not have such trash brought 
 into his jurisdiction." 
 
 The trial resulted in the conviction of the prisoners, and 
 Mr. Clarke was sentenced to pay a fine of twenty pounds, 
 Mr. Holmes of thirty pounds, and Mr. Crandall, of five 
 pounds ; or, in case of their refusal of payment, to be Avhip- 
 ped. They refused to pay the fines, as they acknowledged 
 neither the justice of the sentence, nor the jurisdiction of the 
 magistrates. They were accordingly committed to prison, 
 from which, after a few weeks, Messrs. Clarke and Crandall 
 were released, by the interposition of their friends, and per- 
 mitted to return to Newport. Mr. Holmes was confined 
 longer,' and before he was discharged, thirty lashes were in- 
 flicted on him with merciless severity. Two other persons, 
 also, who were present at his punishment, and expressed 
 sympathy with the sufferers, were fined and imprisoned.* 
 
 To record facts like these of the Pilgrim Fathers is inex- 
 pressibly painful. It tends, however, to deepen our abhor- 
 rence of the principle which could pervert the judgment and 
 harden the heart of. men so justly eminent for their piety. 
 If they had abandoned to their persecutors in the fatherland 
 the policy of state interference with religious opinions, no 
 shade would now rest upon their otherwise glorious memo- 
 ries. 
 
 It is refreshing, however, to turn to a brighter page, evin- 
 cing that these persecutions were not unanimously approved. 
 Sir Richard Saltonstall, one of the magistrates of Massachu- 
 setts Bay, then in England, wrote thus to the Rev. Messrs. 
 Cotton and Wilson, of Boston : — 
 
 " Reverend and dear friends, whom I unfeignedly love 
 and respect, — It doth not a little grieve my spirit to hear 
 what sad things are reported daily of your tyranny and per- 
 secution in New England, as that you fine, whip, and im- 
 
 * Backus 's History of New England, vol. i. p 207. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 8:} 
 
 prison men for their consciences. First you compel such to 
 come into your assemblies as you know will not join you in 
 your worship, and when they show their dislike thereof, or 
 witness against it, then you stir up your magistrates to pun- 
 ish them for such — as you conceive — their public affronts. 
 Truly, friends, this your practice of compelling any in mat- 
 ters of worship to do that whereof they are not fully persua- 
 ded, is to make them sin, for so the apostle (Rom. xiv. 23) 
 tells us, and many are made hypocrites thereby, conforming 
 in their outward man, for fear of punishment. We pray for 
 you, and wish you prosperity every way, hoping the Lord 
 would have given you so much light and love there, that you 
 might have been eyes to God's people here, and not to prac- 
 tice those courses in a wilderness, which you went so far to 
 prevent. These rigid ways have laid you very low in the 
 hearts of the saints." 
 
 In this distressed state of the colony, while the citizens 
 were at variance with each other, and were subjected to such 
 tyrannical acts from their powerful and ambitious neighbor, 
 Massachusetts, it was apparent that the only safety was in a 
 union of all the towns. The Indians, also, began to commit 
 depredations, and offer insults which the individual settle- 
 ments were too feeble to punish, and which the commission- 
 ers of the united colonies refused to redress. 
 
 In this crisis, nearly all the inhabitants of Newport, and 
 a large number of those of Portsmouth, requested John 
 Clarke to proceed to England, as their agent to procure the 
 repeal of Coddington's commission, and the confirmation of 
 the charter obtained by Williams. The appointment of Mr, 
 Clarke to this mission was, in every respect, most judicious. 
 He was a gentleman of liberal education, courteous manners, 
 and the original projector of the settlement on the island. 
 He was held in high estimation as a physician, and a minister 
 of the church at Newport, and, in every emergency, had 
 proved himself able in counsel, wise in deliberation, and en- 
 
84 LIFE OF ROGEK WILLIAMS. 
 
 ergetic in action. After his return, he was elected three- 
 years successively deputy-governor. 
 
 The towns of Providence and Warwick, which continued 
 to maintain the government under the original charter, ur- 
 gently importuned Williams to accompany Clarke, and co- 
 operate with him to accomplish this important object. He 
 at first absolutely declined accepting this important trust, 
 from reluctance again to leave his large family, and from in- 
 ability to sustain the expense. His warm interest in the 
 colony he had founded, and the importunities of the citizens, 
 at length induced him to accept the appointment, and he 
 prepared again to cross the Atlantic. Some efforts were 
 made by the inhabitants of Providence and Warwick to ob- 
 tain a sufficient sum for defraying the expenses of the mis- 
 sion, but they do not appear to have been effectual. To ob- 
 tain the means of making the voyage, and supporting his 
 family during his absence, he says, that " he sold his trading 
 house at Narragansett, with one hundred pounds profit per 
 annum ;" a new proof, if any were needed, of his self-sacrifi- 
 cing patriotism. 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 williams and clarke sail for england — codding- 
 ton's commission revoked, and the former char- 
 ter CONFIRMED — LETTER OF THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY 
 TO WILLIAMS PUBLISHES HIS EXPERIMENTS OF SPIR- 
 ITUAL LIFE AND HEALTH AND THEIR PRESERVATIVES 
 
 THE HIRELING MINISTRY REJOINDER TO COTTON 
 
 CORRESPONDENCE. 
 
 Having made the necessary arrangements preparatory to 
 his long absence from home, Williams joined his friend 
 Clarke at Boston, where they embarked together in Novem- 
 ber, 1G51. It was not without considerable difficulty that 
 Williams was allowed to pass through the territory of Massa- 
 chusetts, for the purpose of taking ship for England. He al- 
 ludes to the fact, in his subsequent letters, though he does 
 not mention the nature of the molestation he suffered from 
 the authorities. The objects of his embassy were offensive 
 to them, besides their hatred of his principles. 
 
 Great events had occurred in the mother country since 
 Williams last visited her shores. Monarchy had been sub- 
 verted, and the supreme authority was vested in a council of 
 state. On their arrival in England, Williams and Clarke 
 presented a petition to the council, in behalf of the colony 
 they had come to represent, who referred it to the committee 
 for foreign affairs. The application met with opposition 
 from various quarters ; but an order was at length passed by 
 
86 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 the council annulling Coddington's commission, and con- 
 firming the former charter. This important measure Wil- 
 liams ascribes mainly io the efforts of his friend Sir Henry 
 Vane, a man of kindred spirit, and a prominent member of 
 the council. 
 
 During the absence of Williams, the general assembly, 
 which met at Providence, addressed a letter to him which is 
 valuable, as a public testimonial of the esteem of his fellow 
 citizens. The following is an extract : — 
 
 " Honored Sir, — We may not neglect any opportunity to 
 salute you in this your absence, and have not a little cause 
 to bless God. who hath pleased to select you to such a pur- 
 pose, as avc doubt not will conduce to the peace and safety 
 of us all, as to make you once more an instrument to impart 
 and disclose our cause unto those noble and grave senators, 
 our honorable protectors, in whose eyes God hath given you 
 honor — as we understand — beyond our hopes, and moved 
 the hearts of the wise to stir on your behalf. We give you 
 hearty thanks for your care and diligence to watch all op- 
 pi rtunities to promote our peace, for we perceive your pru- 
 dent and comprehensive mind stirreth every stone to present 
 it to the builders, to make firm the fabric unto us, about 
 winch you are employed. . . . 
 
 " Sir. give us leave to intimate thus much, that we humbly 
 concern — so far as we are able to understand — that, if it be 
 the pleasure of our protectors to renew our charter for the 
 re-establishing of our government, that it might tend much 
 to the weighing of men's minds, and subjection of persons 
 who have been refractory, to yield themselves over as unto 
 a settled government, if it might be the pleasure of that hon- 
 orable State, to invest, appeint, and empower yourself to 
 come over as governor of this colony, for the space of one 
 year, and so the government to be honorably put upon this 
 place, which might seem to add weight for ever hereafter in 
 the constant and successive derivation of the same. We 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 87 
 
 only present it to your deliberate thoughts and consideration, 
 with our hearty desires that your time of stay there, for the 
 effectual perfecting and finishing of your so weighty affairs, 
 may not seem tedious, nor be any discouragement unto you ; 
 rather than you shall suffer for loss of time here, or expense 
 there, we are resolved to stretch forth our hands at your re- 
 turn, beyond our strength for your supply." 
 
 It does not appear that Williams took any steps to procure 
 for himself the appointment of governor, considering, pro- 
 bably, that it would be a dangerous precedent, and an inter- 
 ference with the right of his fellow-citizens to elect their own 
 officers. 
 
 Of Williams's literary industry, we have a new proof, in 
 the publication of a work immediately after his arrival in 
 England. It was written, he says, " in the thickest of the 
 naked Indians of America, in their very wild houses, and by 
 their barbarous fires." The volume is entitled, " Experi- 
 ments of Spiritual Life and Health, and their Preservatives. 
 London, 1652." After diligent inquiry, the writer is not 
 aware that more than one copy of this work now exists. In 
 the dedication " to the truly honorable the Lady Vane," he 
 says, " your favorable and christian respects to me, your god- 
 ly and christian letters to me, so many thousand miles dis- 
 tant in America ; and your many gracioue demonstrations 
 of an humble and christian spirit breathing in you, are a 
 three-fold cord which have drawn these lines into your pre- 
 sence." There is also prefixed to the work a letter to his 
 wife, which affords pleasing evidence of his affectionately 
 domestic character from which we give the following ex- 
 tract : — 
 
 " My dearest love and companion in this vale of tears, — 
 Thy late sudden and dangerous sickness, and the Lord's 
 most gracious and speedy raising thee up from the gates and 
 jaws of death, as they were wonderful in their own and 
 others' eyes, so I earnestly desire they may be ever in our 
 
88 LIFE OF r.OGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 thoughts, as a warning from heaven to make ready for a sud- 
 den call to be gone from hence — to live the rest of our short, 
 uncertain span, more as strangers, longing and breathing 
 after another home and country — to cast off our great cares, 
 and fears, and desires, and joys about the candle of this vain 
 life, that is so soon blown out, and to trust in the living God. 
 I send thee — though in winter — a handful of flowers, made 
 up in a little posy, for thy dear self and our dear children, 
 to look and smell on, when I, as grass of the field, shall be 
 gone and withered." 
 
 The work is divided into three parts — 1. " Arguments of 
 spiritual life, wher-em the weakest child of God may find his 
 spiritual life apparent, though overcast and eclipsed with 
 spiritual weakness. 2. Arguments of the strength and vig- 
 or of the spirit of life and holiness ; in which the strongest 
 and eldest in Christ may find experiments of spiritual health, 
 and christian activity and cheerfulness." 3. Some means 
 are proposed wherein the Spirit of God usually breatheth for 
 the preserving and maintaining of a truly spiritual and chris- 
 tian health and cheerfulness." It manifests throughout deep 
 and enlightened piety, and concludes in the following lan- 
 guage : — " How frequent, how constant, should we be — like 
 Christ Jesus, our founder and example — in doing good, es- 
 pecially to the souls of all men, especially to the household 
 of faith ; yea, even to our enemies, when we remember this 
 is our seed-time, of which every minute is precious, and that 
 as our sowing is, must be our eternal harvest." 
 
 Within less than a month from the time the above-men- 
 tioned book issued from the press, he published a small trea- 
 tise, with the title. " The Hireling Ministry none of Christ's ; 
 or, a Discourse touching the propagating the Gospel of Christ 
 Jesus," &c. The chief object of this work is, to oppose a le- 
 gal establishment of religion, and the compulsory support of 
 the clergy, by tithes, and other modes of taxation. It is not, 
 however, as its title would now seem to import, an argument 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 89 
 
 against the maintenance of ministers of the gospel, to which 
 the author insists they are entitled. He earnestly contends 
 for the right of " all the people of the three nations to choose 
 and maintain what worship and ministry their souls and con- 
 consciencesare persuaded thereof." He also expresses, in this 
 volume, the following enlightened opinions respecting the 
 Jews : — " By the merciful assistance of the Most High, I have 
 desired to labor in Europe, in America, with English, with 
 barbarians ; yea, and also I have longed after some trading 
 with the Jews themselves, for whose hard measure I fear the 
 nations and England hath yet a score to pay." 
 
 In the year 1647, the Rev. John Cotton attempted a reply 
 to the " Bloudy Tenent," in which he maintained the right 
 of the magistrate to interfere for the promotion of truth and 
 the suppression of error. It was during this visit to Eng- 
 land, and while thus engaged in the service of his own colo- 
 ny, that Williams, in the winter of 1652, prepared for the 
 press, and published, a rejoinder, entitled, " The Bloudy 
 Tenent, yet more bloody by Mr. Cotton's endeavor to wash 
 it white in the Blood of the Lamb. Of whose precious blood, 
 spilt in the blood of his servants, and of the blood of millions 
 spilt in former and later wars for conscience sake, that most 
 Bloody Tenent of persecution for cause of conscience, upon 
 a second trial, is found now more apparently and more no- 
 toriously guilty." 
 
 In this rejoinder to Mr. Cotton the following topics are 
 principally treated: — " 1. The Nature of Persecution. 2. 
 The Power of the Civil Sword in Spirituals examined. 3. 
 The Parliament's permission of Dissenting Consciences jus- 
 tified. Also (as a testimony to Mr. Clarke's) is added a 
 Letter to Mr. Endicott, Governor of the Massachusetts, in 
 N. E. By R. Williams, of Providence, in New England. 
 London, printed 1652." It is a quarto volume of three 
 hundred and seventy-four pages. The same clear, enlarged, 
 and consistent views of religious freedom are maintained in 
 
90 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 this work as in his preceding ones, with additional argu- 
 ments, evincing an acute, vigorous and fearless mind, imbued 
 with various erudition and undissembled piety. It is char- 
 acterized by the kindest tone, and pervaded by a courteous- 
 ness of style unusual in the controversial writings of that 
 age. The author says : — " The Most Holy and All-seeing 
 knows how bitterly I lament the least difference with Mr. 
 Cotton, yea, with the least of the followers of Jesus, of what 
 conscience or worship soever." 
 
 In the appendix is an address " To the Clergy of the four 
 great Parties, professing the Name of Christ Jesus, in Eng- 
 land, Scotland, and Ireland; viz., the Popish, Prelatical, 
 Presbyterian, and Independent ;" from which we make the 
 following extract: — 
 
 "Worthy Sirs, — I have pleaded the cause of your sev- 
 eral and respective consciences against the bloody doctrine 
 of persecution, in my former labors, and in this my present 
 rejoinder to Mr. Cotton. And yet I must pray leave, with- 
 out offence, to say, I have impartially opposed and charged 
 your cosciences also, so far as guilty of that bloody doctrine 
 of persecuting each other for your consciences. 
 
 " You four have torn the seamless coat of the Son of God 
 into four pieces, and, to say nothing of former times and 
 tearings, you four have torn the three nations into thousands 
 of pieces and distractions. The two former of you, the pop- 
 ish and protestant prelatical, are brethren ; so are the latter, 
 the presbyterian and independent. But, oh, how vara est, 
 &c. ? What concord, what love, what pity, hath ever yet 
 appeared amongst you, when the providence of the Most 
 High and Only Wise hath granted you your patents of mu- 
 tual and successive dominion and precedency. 
 
 " Just like two men, whom I have known break out to 
 blows and wrestling, so have the protestant bishops fought 
 and wrestled with the popish, and the popish with the pro- 
 testant ! The presbyterian with the independent, and the 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 91 
 
 independent with the presbyterian ! And onr chronicles 
 and experiences have told this nation, and the world, how he 
 whose turn it is to be brought under, hath ever felt a heavy, 
 wrathful hand of an unbrotherly and unchristian persecutor !" 
 
 The following passage, in allusion to the episcopal clergy 
 who had been ejected from their benefices, shows that his 
 sympathies embraced all the persecuted without regard to 
 denomination : " I make another humble plea — and that, I 
 believe, with all the reason and justice in the world — that 
 such who are ejected, undone, impoverished, might, some 
 way from the state or you, receive relief and succour : con- 
 sidering, that the very nation's constitution hath occasioned 
 parents to train up, and persons to give themselves to stud- 
 ies, though, in truth, but in a way of trade and bargaining 
 before God ; yet is, according to the custom of the nation, 
 who ought, therefore, to share also in the fault of such priests 
 and ministers who in all changes are ejected." But to re- 
 turn to the affairs of his own colony, which, whether at home 
 or abroad, were the primary objects of his solicitude. This, 
 and other interesting features in his public and private char- 
 acter, are illustrated in the following extracts from his cor- 
 respondence. In a letter to his friend, Gregory Dexter, of 
 Providence, dated August 7, 1652, he says: — 
 
 " By my public letters, you will see how we wrestle, and 
 how we are like yet to wrestle, in the hopes of an end. 
 Praised be the Lord, we are preserved, the nation is pre- 
 served, the parliament sits, God's people are secure, too se- 
 cure. A great opinion is, that the kingdom of Christ is risen, 
 and ' the kingdoms of the earth are become the kingdoms of 
 our Lord and of his Christ.' (Rev. xi.) Others have fear of 
 the slaughter of the witnesses yet approaching. Divers 
 friends, of all sorts, here, long to see you, and wonder you 
 come not over. For myself, I had hopes to have got away 
 by this ship, but I see^iow the mind of the Lord to hold me 
 here one year longer. It is God's mercy, his very great 
 
92 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 mercy, that we have obtained this interim encouragement 
 from the council of state, that you may cheerfully go in the 
 name of a colony, until the controversy is determined. The 
 determination of it, sir, I fear, will be a work of time ; I fear 
 longer than we have yet been here, for our adversaries 
 threaten to make a last appeal to the parliament, in case we 
 get the day before the council. 
 
 " Sir, in this regard, and when my public business is over, 
 I am resolved to begin my old law-suit, so that I have no 
 thought of return until spring come twelve months. My duty 
 and affection hath compelled me to acquaint my poor com- 
 panion with it. I consider our many children, the danger 
 of the seas and enemies, and, therefore, I write not positively 
 for her, only I acquaint her with our affairs. I tell her, joy- 
 ful I should be of her being here with me, until our state af- 
 fairs were ended, and I freely leave her to wait upon the 
 Lord for direction, and, according as she finds her spirit free 
 and cheerful, to come or stay. If it please the Lord to give 
 her a free spirit, to cast herself upon the Lord, I doubt not 
 of your love and faithful care, in anything she hath occasion 
 to use your help, concerning our children and affairs, during 
 our absence ; but I conclude, whom have I in heaven or 
 earth but thee ? and so humbly and thankfully stay in the 
 Lord's pleasure, as only and infinitely best and sweetest." 
 
 The order of the council of state, directing the several 
 plantations to unite again under the government of the char- 
 ter, was brought to Newport in the early part of the year 
 1653. Such, however, were the jealousies which had sprung 
 up during the separation of the towns, that it was found ea- 
 sier to command than to enforce obedience. Williams, with 
 his associate, continued in England, to watch the progress of 
 events and sustain the rights of the colony. The following 
 letter shows how much they were indebted to the friendly 
 aid of Sir Henry Vane. It is addressed to the towns of 
 Providence and Warwick : — 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 93 
 
 From Sir Henry Vanes, at Belleau, in Lincolnshire. 
 
 "April 1st, 1653. 
 
 " My dear and loving Friends and Neighbors of 
 Providence and Warwick, — Our noble friend, Sir Hen- 
 ry Vane, having the navy of England mostly depending on 
 his care, and going down to the navy at Portsmouth, I was 
 invited by them both to accompany his lady to Lincolnshire, 
 where I shall yet stay, as I fear, until the ship is gone. I 
 must, therefore, pray your pardon, that by the post, I send 
 this to London. I hope it may have pleased the Most High 
 Lord of sea and land to bring Captain C.'s ship and dear 
 Mr. Dyre unto you, and with him the council's letters, which 
 answer the petition Sir Henry Vane and myself drew up, 
 and the council, by Sir Henry's mediation granted us, for the 
 confirmation of the charter, until the determination of the 
 controversy. This determination, you may please to under- 
 stand, is hindered by two main obstructions. The first is, 
 the mighty war with the Dutch, which makes England, and 
 Holland, and the nations tremble. This hath made the par- 
 liament set Sir Henry Vane and two or three more as com- 
 missioners to manage the war, which they have done, with 
 much engaging the name of God with them, who hath ap- 
 peared in helping sixty of ours against almost three hundred 
 of their men-of war, and, perchance, to the sinking and tak- 
 ing about one hundred of theirs, and but one of ours, which 
 was sunk by our own men. 
 
 " Our second obstruction is the opposition of our adversa- 
 ries, Sir Arthur Haselrige, and Colonel Fenwicke — who hath 
 married his daughter — Mr. Winslow, and Mr. Hopkins, both 
 in great place ; and all the friends they can make in parlia- 
 ment and council, and all the priests, both presbyterian and 
 independent; so that we stand as two armies, ready to en- 
 gage, observing the motions and postures each of the other, 
 and yet shy each of other. Under God, the sheet-anchor of 
 
94 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 our ship is Sir Henry, who will do as the eye of God leads 
 him ; and he faithfully promised me that he would observe 
 the motion of our New England business, while I staid some 
 ten weeks with his lady in Lincolnshire. Besides, here are 
 great thoughts and preparation for a new parliament — some 
 of our friends are apt to think another parliament will more 
 favor us and our cause than this has done. You may please 
 to put my condition into your soul's cases ; remember I am a 
 father and a husband. I have longed earnestly to return 
 with the last ship, and with these ; yet I have not been wil- 
 ling to withdraw my shoulders from the burthen, lest it pinch 
 others, and may fall heavy upon all ; except you are pleased 
 to give to me a discharge. If you conceive it necessary for 
 me still to attend this service, pray you consider if it be not 
 convenient that my poor wife be encouraged to come over to 
 rne, and to wait together, on the good pleasure of God, for 
 the end of this matter. You know my many weights hang- 
 ing on me, how my own place stands, and how many reasons 
 I have to cause me to make haste, yet I would not lose their es- 
 tates, peace, and liberty, by leaving hastily. I write to my 
 dear wife, my great desire of her coming while I stay, yet left 
 it to the freedom of her spirit, because of the many dangers. 
 Truly, at present the seas are dangerous, but not comparably 
 so much, nor likely to be, because of the late defeat of the 
 Dutch, and their present sending to us offers of peace. 
 
 " My dear friends, although it pleased God himself, by 
 many favors, to encourage me, yet please you to remember, 
 that no man can stay here as I do, having a present employ- 
 ment there, without much self-denial, which I beseech God 
 for more, and for you also, that no private respects, or gains, 
 or quarrels, may cause you to neglect the public and com- 
 mon safety, peace and liberties. I beseech the blessed God 
 to keep fresh in your thoughts what he hath done for Provi- 
 dence Plantations. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 95 
 
 " My dear respects to yourselves, wives, and children. I 
 beseech the eternal God to be seen amongst you ; so prays 
 your most faithful and affectionate friend and servant, 
 
 "Roger Williams. 
 
 U P. S. My love to all my Indian friends." 
 
CHAPTER Xttl. 
 
 Williams's correspondence with the daughter of 
 sir edward coke — his intercourse with sir hen- 
 ry vane, cromwell, and milton. 
 
 Amidst his engrossing and important occupations, Roger 
 Williams did not forget the family of his former benefactor, 
 Sir Edward Coke. The following correspondence between 
 him and Mrs. Sadleir, the daughter of Sir Edward, is now 
 for the first time published :— 
 
 "My much-honored Friend, Mrs. Sadleir, — The 
 never-dying honor and respect which I owe to that dear and 
 honorable root and his branches, and, amongst the rest, to 
 your much-honored self, have emboldened me, once more, 
 to inquire after your dear husband's and your life, and health, 
 and welfare. This last winter I landed, once more, in my 
 native country, being sent over from some parts of New 
 England with some addresses to the parliament. 
 
 " My very great business, and my very great straits of 
 time, and my very great journey homeward to my dear yoke- 
 fellow and many children, I greatly fear will not permit me 
 to present my ever-obliged duty and service to you, at Ston- 
 don, especially if it please God that I may despatch my af- 
 fairs to depart with the ships within this fortnight. I am, 
 therefore, humbly bold to crave your favorable consideration, 
 and pardon, and acceptance, of these my humble respects 
 and remembrances* It hath pleased the Most High to carry 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 97 
 
 me on eagles' wings, through mighty labors, mighty hazards, 
 mighty sufferings, and to vouchsafe to use so base an instru- 
 ment — as I humbly hope — to glorify himself, in many of my 
 trials and sufferings, both amongst the English and barbari- 
 ans. 
 
 " I have been formerly, and since I landed, occasioned to 
 take up the two-edged sword of God's Spirit, the word of 
 God, and to appear in public in some contests against the 
 ministers of Old and New England, as touching the true 
 ministry of Christ and the soul freedoms of the people. 
 Since I landed, I have published two or three things, and 
 have a large discourse at the press, but 'tis controversial, 
 with which I will not trouble your meditations; only I crave 
 the boldness to send you a plain and peaceable discourse, of ' 
 my own personal experiments, which, in a letter to my dear 
 wife — upon the occasion of her great sickness near death — I 
 sent her, being absent myself amongst the Indians. And 
 being greatly obliged to Sir Henry Vane, junior — once gov- 
 ernor of New England — and his lady, I was persuaded to 
 publish it in her name, and humbly to present your honora- 
 ble hands with one or two of them. I humbly pray you to 
 cast a serious eye on the holy Scriptures, on which the ex- 
 aminations are grounded. I could have dressed forth the 
 matter like some sermons which, formerly, I used to pen. 
 But the Father of lights hath long since shown me the vanity 
 and soul-deceit of such points and flourishes. I desire to 
 know nothing, to profess nothing, but the Son of God, the 
 Kino; of souls and consciences: and I desire to be more 
 thankful for a reproof for aught I affirm than for applause 
 and commendation. I have been oft glad in the wilderness 
 of America to have been reproved for going in a wrong path, 
 and to be directed by a naked Indian boy in my travels. 
 How much more should we rejoice in the wounds of such as 
 we hope love us in Christ Jesus, than in the deceitful kisses 
 of soul-deceiving and soul-killing friends. 
 7 
 
98 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 " My much-honored friend, that man of honor, and wis- 
 dom, and piety, your dear father, was often pleased to call 
 me his son ; and truly it was as bitter as death to me when 
 Bishop Laud pursued me out of this land, and my conscience 
 was persuaded against the national church, and ceremonies, 
 and bishops, beyond the conscience of your dear father. I 
 say it was as bitter as death to me, when I rode Windsor 
 way, to take ship at Bristow, and saw Stoke House, where 
 the blessed man was; and I then durst . not acquaint him 
 with my conscience, and my flight. But how many thousand 
 times since have I had honorable and precious remembrance 
 of his person, and the life, the writings, the speeches, and 
 the examples of that glorious light. And I may truly say, 
 that beside my natural inclination to study and activity, his 
 example, instruction, and encouragement, have spurred me 
 on to a more than ordinary, industrious, and patient course 
 in my whole course hitherto. 
 
 " What I have done and suffered — and I hope for the truth 
 of God, according to my conscience — in Old and New Eng- 
 land, I should be a fool in relating, for I desire to say, not to 
 King David — as once Mephibosheth — but to King Jesus, 
 k What is thy servant, that thou shouldest look upon such a 
 dead dog V And I would not tell yourself of this, but that 
 you may acknowledge some beams of his holy wisdom and 
 goodness, who hath not suffered all your own and your dear 
 father's smiles to have been lost upon so poor and despicable 
 an object. I confess I have many adversaries, and also many 
 friends, and divers eminent. It hath pleased the general 
 himself to send for me, and to entertain many discourses 
 with me at several times ; which, as it magnifies his christian 
 nobleness and courtesy, so much more cloth it magnify His 
 infinite mercy and goodness, and wisdom, who hath helped 
 me, poor worm, to sow that seed in doing and suffering — I 
 hope for God — that as your honorable father was wont to say, 
 he that shall harrow what I have sown, must rise early. And 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 99 
 
 yet I am a worm and nothing, and desire only to find my all 
 in the blood of an holy Saviour, in whom I desire to be 
 " Your honored, 
 
 " Most thankful, and faithful servant, 
 
 " Eoger Williams. 
 
 " My humble respects presented to Mr. Sadleir. 
 
 " From my lodgings near St. Martin's, at Mr. Davis his 
 house, at the sign of the Swan." 
 
 " For my much-honored, kind friend, Mistress Sadleir, at 
 Stondon, Puckridge, these." 
 
 " Mr. Williams, — Since it has pleased God to make the 
 prophet David's complaint ours (Ps. Ixxix.) : ' O God, the 
 heathen,' &c, and that the apostle St. Peter has so long ago 
 foretold, in his second epistle, the second chapter, by whom 
 these things should be occasioned, I have given over reading 
 many books, and, therefore, with thanks, have returned 
 yours. Those that I now read, besides the Bible, are, first, 
 the late king's book; Hooker's Ecclesiastical Polity; Rev- 
 erend Bishop Andrews's Sermons, with his other divine med- 
 itations; Dr. Jer. Taylor's works; and Dr. Tho. Jackson 
 upon the Creed. Some of these my dear father was a great 
 admirer of, and would often call them the glorious lights of 
 the church of England. These lights shall be my guide ; I 
 wish they may be yours : for your new lights that are so 
 much cried up, I believe, in the conclusion, they will prove 
 but dark lanterns ; therefore I dare not meddle with them. 
 " Your friend in the old way, 
 
 " Anne Sadleir." 
 
 "My much-honored, kind Friend, Mrs. Sadleir, — 
 
 My humble respects premised to your much-honored self, and 
 Mr. Sadleir, humbly wishing you the saving knowledge and 
 assurance of that life which is eternal, when tins poor min- 
 
100 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 ute's dream is over. In my poor span of time, I have been 
 oft in the jaws of death, sickening at sea, shipwrecked on 
 shore, in danger of arrows, swords and bullets : and yet, me- 
 thinks, the most high and most holy God hath reserved me 
 -for some service to his most glorious and eternal majesty. 
 
 " I think, sometimes, in this common shipwreck, of man- 
 kind, wherein we all are either floating or sinking, despair- 
 ing or struggling for life, why should I ever faint in striving, 
 as Paul saith, in hopes to save myself, to save others — to call, 
 and cry, and ask, what hope of saving, what hope of life, and 
 of the eternal shore of mercy V Your last letter, my hon- 
 ored friend, I received as a bitter sweeting — as all, that is 
 under the sun, is— sweet, in that I hear from you, and that 
 you continue striving for life eternal ; bitter, in that we dif- 
 fer about the way, in the midst of the dangers and distresses. 
 
 " O blessed be the hour that ever we saw the light, and 
 came into this vale of tears, if yet, at last, in any way, we 
 may truly see our woful loss and shipwreck, and gain the 
 shore of life and mercy. You were pleased to direct me to 
 divers books, for my satisfaction. I have carefully endeav- 
 ored to get them, and some I have gotten ; and upon my 
 reading, I purpose, with God's help, to render you an ingen- 
 uous and candid account of my thoughts, result, &c. At 
 present, I am humbly bold to pray your judicious and loving 
 eye to one of mine. 
 
 " "lis true, I cannot but expect your distate of it ; and 
 yet my cordial desire of your soul's peace here, and eternal, 
 and of contributing the least mite toward it, and my humble 
 respects to that blessed root of which you spring, force me to 
 tender my acknowledgements, which, if received or rejected, 
 my cries shall never cease that one eternal life may give 'us 
 meeting, since this present minute hath such bitter partings. 
 
 " For the scope of this rejoinder, if it please the Most 
 High to direct your eye to a glance on it, please you to 
 know, that at my last being in England, I wrote a discourse 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 101 
 
 entitled, ' The Bloudy Tenent of Persecution for Cause of 
 Conscience.' I bent niy charge against Mr. Cotton especial- 
 ly, your standard-bearer of New English ministers. That 
 discourse he since answered, and calls his book, ' The Bloody 
 Tenent made white in the Blood of the Lamb.' This rejoin- 
 der of mine, as I humbly hope, unwasheth his washings, and 
 proves that in soul matters no weapons but soul weapons 
 are reaching and effectual. 
 
 " I am your most unworthy servant, yet unfeignedly res- 
 pective, 
 
 "Roger Williams. 
 
 " For his much-honored, kind friend, Mrs. Anne Sadleir, 
 at Stondon, in Hertfordshire, near Puckridge." 
 
 " Sir, — I thank God my blessed parents bred me up in the 
 old and best religion, and it is my glory that I am a member 
 of the church of England, as it was when all the reformed 
 churches gave her the right hand. When I cast mine eye 
 upon the frontispiece of your book, and saw it entitled ' the 
 Bloudy Tenent,' I durst not adventure to look into it, for 
 fear it should bring into my memory the much blood that has 
 of late been shed, and which I would fain forget ; therefore I 
 do, with thanks, return it. I cannot call to mind any 
 blood shed for conscience : — some few that went about to 
 make a rent in our once well-governed church were pun- 
 ished, but none suffered death. But this I know, that since 
 it has been left to every man's conscience to fancy what re- 
 ligion he list, there has more christian blood been shed than 
 was in the ten persecutions. And some of that blood, will, I 
 fear, cry till the day of judgment. But you know what the 
 Scripture says, that when there was no king in Israel, every 
 man did that which was right in his own eves, — but what be- 
 came of that, the sacred story will tell you. 
 
 " Thus entreating you to trouble me no more in this kind, 
 and wishing you a good journey to your charge in New Pro- 
 vidence, I rest 
 
 " Yottr Friend, in the Old and Best Way." 
 
102 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 My honored, kind Friend, Mrs. Sadleir, — I greatly- 
 rejoiced to hear from yon, although now an opposite to me, 
 even in the highest points of heaven and eternity. 
 
 " Two things your lines express : — First, your confidence 
 in your own old way, &c. 
 
 " Second. Civility and gentleness in that — not being 
 pleased to accept my respects and labors presented — yet 
 you gently, with thanks and your reason, return them. I 
 shall not be so sorry you differ from me, if yet the Father of 
 spirits please to vouchsafe you a spirit of christian searching 
 and examination. In hope of which I shall humbly consider 
 of the particulars of your letter. 
 
 "1. That you think an heap of timber or pile of stones to 
 be God's sanctuary now. (Ps. lxxix. 1.) In Christ's esteem, 
 and in gospel language, that you think those to be false 
 teachers and prophets (2 Pet. ii. 1) who are not — after the 
 old way — distinguished by the canonical colors of white, red, 
 black, &c. 
 
 " That you admire the king's book, and Bp. Andrews his 
 sermons, and Hooker's Polity, &c, and profess them to be 
 your lights and guides, and desire them mine, and believe 
 the new lights will prove dark lanterns, &c. I am far from 
 wondering at it, for all this have I done myself, until the 
 Father of Spirits mercifully persuaded mine to swallow 
 down no longer Avithout chewing ; to chew no longer with- 
 out tasting; to taste no longer without begging the Holy 
 Spirit of God to enlighten and enliven mine against the fear 
 of men, tradition of fathers, or the favor or custom of any 
 men or times. 
 
 " 2. I now find that the church and sanctuary of Christ 
 Jesus consists not of dead but of living stones.* Is not a 
 parish or a national church forced — to the pretended bed of 
 Christ's worship — by laws and swords ?f 
 
 " His true lovers are volunteers, born of his Spirit, the 
 
 * 1 Pet. ii. 3, 4. t Cant. i. 16. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 103 
 
 now only holy nation and royal priesthood (1 Pet. ii., Ps. ex.) 
 I find that, in respect of ministerial function and office, such 
 ministers, not only popish but protestant, not only episcopal 
 but presbyterian, not only presbyterian but independent 
 also, are all of them, one as well as another, false prophets 
 and teachers, so far as they are hirelings, and make a trade 
 and living of preaching (John x.), as I have lately opened 
 in my " Discourse of the Hireling Ministry none of Christ's.'' 
 
 " 3. I have read those books you mention, and the kino-'s 
 book, which commends two of them, Bp. Andrews's and 
 Hooker's — yea, and a third also, Bp. Laud's : and as for the 
 king, I knew his person, vicious, a swearer from his youth. 
 and an oppressor and persecutor of good men (to say nothing 
 of his own father), and the blood of so many hundred thou- 
 sands English, Irish, Scotch, French, lately charged upon 
 him. Against his and his blasphemous father's cruelties, 
 your own dear father, and many precious men, shall rise up 
 shortly and cry for vengeance. 
 
 " 4. But for the book itself — if it be his — and theirs you 
 please to mention, and thousands more, not only protestants 
 of several sects, but of some papists and Jesuits also — famous 
 for worldly repute, &c. — I have found them sharp and witty, 
 plausible and delightful, devout and pathetical. And I have 
 been amazed to see the whole world of our forefathers, wise 
 and gallant, wondering after the glory of the Romish learn- 
 ing and worship. (Rev. xiii.) But amongst them all whom 
 I have so diligently read and heard, how few express the sim- 
 plicity, the plainness, the meekness, and true humility of the 
 learning of the Son of God. 
 
 " 5. But, at last, it pleased the God and Father of mercies 
 to persuade mine heart of the merely formal, customary, and 
 traditional professions of Christ Jesus, with which the world 
 is filled. I see that the Jews believe Christ Jesus was a 
 deceiver, because he came not with external pomps and ex- 
 cellency. 
 
104 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 " The Turks — so many millions of them — prefer their Ma- 
 homet before Christ Jesus, even upon such carnal and world- 
 ly respects, and yet avouch themselves to be the only Mus- 
 elmanni or true believers. The catholics account us here- 
 tics, cliabloes, &c. ; and why ? but because we worship not 
 such a golden Christ and his glorious vicar and lieutenant. 
 The several sects of common protestants content themselves 
 with a traditional worship, and boast they are no Jews, no 
 Turks,* nor catholics, and yet forget their own formal dead 
 faith,f dead hope, dead joys, and yet, nescio vos, I know you 
 not, depart from me, which shall be thundered out to many 
 gallant professors and confidents, who have held out a lamp 
 and form of religion, yea, and possibly of godliness too, and 
 yet have denied the power and life of it. 
 
 " Therefore, my much-honored friend, while you believe 
 the darkness of the new lights, and profess your confidence, 
 and desire of my walking with you in the old way : I most 
 humbly pray so much Berean civility at your ladyship's 
 hands as to search and remember — 
 
 " 1. First, the Lord Christ's famous resolution of that ques- 
 tion put to him, as touching the number that shall be saved 
 (Luke xiii. 24), ' Strive to enter in at the strait gate ; for 
 many shall seek to enter, and shall not be able.' 
 
 " 2ndly. There is an absolute necessity (not so of a true 
 order of ministry, baptism, &c, but) of a true regeneration 
 and new birth, without which it is impossible to enter into 
 or to see the kingdom of God. (John iii. &c.) 
 
 " 3rdly. As to the religion and the worship of God, the com- 
 mon religion of the whole world, and the nations of it, it is 
 but customary and traditional, from father to son, from which 
 (old ways, &c), traditions, Christ Jesus, delivers his, not 
 with gold and silver, but with his precious blood. (1 Pet. i. 
 18, 19.) 
 
 " 4thly. Without spiritual and diligent examination of our 
 
 * Matt. vii. 21, 22. t 2 Tim. iii. 9. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 105 
 
 hearts, it is impossible that we can attain true solid joy and 
 comfort, either in point of regeneration or worship, or what- 
 ever we do. (2 Cor. xiii. 5 ; Rom. xiv. 23.) 
 
 " 5thly. In the examination of both these — personal regen- 
 eration and worship — the hearts of all the children of men 
 are most apt to cheat, and cozen, and deceive themselves : 
 yea, and the wiser a man is, the more apt and willing he is 
 to be deceived. (Jer. xvii. ; Gal. vi. ; 1 Cor. iii. 18.) 
 
 " 6thly. It is impossible there should be a true search, 
 without the Holy Spirit, who searcheth all things, yea, the 
 deep things of God. (Rom. viii. ; Ps. cxliii. 10.) 
 
 " Lastly. God's Spirit persuadeth the hearts of his true 
 servants : First, to be willing to be searched by him, which 
 they exceedingly beg of him, with holy fear of self-deceit and 
 hypocrisy. 
 
 " Second. To be led by him in the way everlasting : (Ps. 
 cxxxix.), whether it seem old in respect of institution, or 
 new in respect of restoration. This I humbly pray for your 
 precious soul, of the God and Father of mercies, even your 
 eternal joy and salvation. Earnestly desirous to be in the 
 old way, which is the narrow way, which leads to life, which 
 few find. 
 
 " Your most humble, though most unworthy servant, 
 
 "Roger Williams." 
 
 " My honored Friend, since you please not to read mine, 
 let me pray leave to request your reading of one book of 
 your own authors. I mean the ' Liberty of Prophesying,' 
 penned by (so called) Dr. Jer. Taylor. In the which is ex- 
 cellently asserted the toleration of different religions, yea, in 
 a respect, that of the papists themselves, which is a new way 
 of soul freedom, and yet is the old way of Christ Jesus, as 
 all his holy Testament declares. 
 
 " I also humbly wish that you may please to read over im- 
 partially Llr. Milton's answer to the king's book." 
 
106 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 " Mr. Williams, — I thought my first letter would have 
 given you so much satisfaction, that, in that kind, I should 
 never have heard of you any more ; but it seems you have a 
 face of brass, so that you cannot blush. But since you press 
 me to it, I must let you know, as I did before (Ps. lxxix.), 
 that the prohet David there complains that the heathen had 
 defiled the holy temple, and made Jerusalem a heap of stones. 
 And our blessed Saviour, when he whipped the buyers and 
 sellers out of the temple, told them that they had made his 
 Father's house a den of thieves. Those were but material 
 temples, and commanded by God to be built, and his name 
 there to be worshipped. The living temples are those that 
 the same prophet, in the psalm before mentioned (verse the 
 2nd and 3rd), ' The dead bodies of thy servants have they 
 given to the fowls of the air, and the flesh of thy saints to 
 the beasts of the land. Their blood have they shed like 
 water,' &c. And these were the living temples whose loss 
 the prophet so much laments; and had he lived in these 
 times, he would have doubled these lamentations. For the 
 foul and false aspersions you have cast upon that king, of 
 ever-blessed memory, Charles, the martyr, I protest I trem- 
 bled when I read them, and none but such a villain as your- 
 self would have wrote them. Wise Solomon has taught me 
 another lesson in his 24th of his Proverbs, at 21st verse, to 
 fear God and the king, and not to meddle with them that are 
 given to change. Mark well that. The 8th of Eccl., verse 
 the 2nd, ' I counsel thee to keep the king's commandment, 
 and that in regard of the oath of God.' Verse the 20th of 
 the 10th chap., ' Curse not the king, no, not in thy thought;' 
 and, if I be not mistaken, the fifth commandment is the 
 crown commandment. Rom. xiii., the 1st and 2nd verses, 
 " Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers, for,' &c. ; 
 with many more places to the same purpose. Thus, you see, 
 I have the law, with the Old and New Testament, on my 
 side. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 107 
 
 " But it has been the lot of the best kings to lie under the 
 lash of ill tongues. Witness blessed David, who was a man 
 after God's own heart, cursed by wicked Shimei, his own 
 subject, and called a man of blood ; and good Hezekiah was 
 railed on by a foul-mouthed Rabshakeh ; but I do not re- 
 member that they were commended, in any place of scrip- 
 ture, for so doing. For the blood you mention, which has 
 been shed in these times, which you would father upon the 
 late king, there is a book called the History of Independency 
 — a book worth your reading — that will tell you by whom 
 all this christian blood has been shed. If you cannot get 
 that, there is a sermon in print of one Paul Knells, the text 
 the first of Amos, verse the second, that will inform you. 
 
 " For Milton's book, that you desire I should read, if I be 
 not mistaken, that is he that has wrote a book of the lawful- 
 ness of divorce ; and, if report says true, he had, at that 
 time, two or three wives living. This, perhaps, were good 
 doctrine in New England ; but it is most abominable in Old 
 England For his book that he wrote against the late king 
 that you would have me read, you should have taken notice 
 of God's judgment upon him, who stroke him with blindness ; 
 and, as I have heard, he was fain to have the help of one An- 
 drew Marvell, or else he could not have finished that most 
 accursed libel. God has began his judgment upon him here 
 — his punishment will be hereafter in hell. But have you 
 seen the answer to it V If you can get it, I assure you it is 
 worth your reading. 
 
 " I have also read Taylor's book of the Liberty of Prophe- 
 sying ; though it please not me, yet I am sure it does you, or 
 else I [know]* you [would]* not have wrote to me to have 
 read it. I say, it and you would make a good fire. But 
 have you seen his Divine Institution of the Office Ministeri- 
 al ? I assure that is both worth your reading and practice. 
 Bishop Laud's book against Fisher I have read long since ; 
 
 * These words are not in the MS. 
 
108 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 which, if you have not clone, let me tell you that he has deep- 
 ly wounded the pope ; and, I believe, howsoever he be slight- 
 ed, he will rise a saint, when many seeming ones, such as 
 you are, will rise devils. 
 
 " I cannot conclude without putting you in mind how dear 
 a lover and great an admirer my father was of the liturgy of 
 the church of England, and would often say, no reformed 
 church had the like. He was constant to it, both in his life 
 and at his death. I mean to walk in his steps ; and, truly, 
 when I consider who were the composers of it, and how they 
 sealed the truth of it with their blood, I cannot but wonder 
 why it should now of late be thus contemned. By what I 
 have now writ, you know how I stand affected. I will walk 
 as directly to heaven as I can, in which place, if you will 
 turn from being a rebel, and fear God and obey the king, 
 there is hope I may meet you there ; howsoever, trouble me 
 no more with your letters, for they are very troublesome to 
 her that wishes you in the place from whence you came."* 
 
 Near the direction, on the outside, of Williams's first let- 
 ter, there is the following note by Mrs. Sadleir : — 
 
 " This Soger Williams, when he was a youth, would, in 
 a short hand, take sermons and speeches in the Star Cham- 
 ber, and present them to my dear father. He, seeing so 
 hopeful a youth, took such liking to him that he sent him in 
 to Sutton's Hospital, and he was the second that was placed 
 there ; full little did he think that he would have proved such 
 a rebel to God, the king, and his country. I leave his let- 
 
 * This correspondence, between Roger Williams and Mrs. Sadleir, is cop- 
 ied from the original manuscripts in the library of Trinity college, Cam- 
 bridge. Like many of Williams's letters, they are without date : but the al- 
 lusions to his works, and other circumstances, clearly show that they were 
 written during his second visit, in 1652-3. The writer has examined the 
 originals of the letters ; and for the knowledge of their existence he is in- 
 debted to the courtesy of the Hon. George Bancroft, author of the History 
 of the United States, and late minister to Great Britain. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 109 
 
 ters, that, if ever lie has the face to return into his native 
 country, Tyburn may give him welcome." 
 
 These letters present a lively picture of the influence of 
 party spirit upon social intercourse, at that remarkable pe- 
 riod. The gratitude and humility of Williams are finely 
 contrasted with the cold repulsiveness, and, at last, rude in- 
 solence of his correspondent, whose final letter pours forth 
 as much venom as could well flow from a lady's pen. The 
 concentrated essence of it, in her postscript, reminds us of 
 the mutation in human affairs. The rebel she denounces 
 lias acquired a nobler fame than even that of the acute law- 
 yer, her father ; while, if her own name is rescued from ob- 
 livion, she owes it to her accidental connexion with the man 
 she consigns to Tyburn. 
 
 We may here observe, that while "Williams was in Ensf- 
 land, in addition to his numerous avocations, his exertions 
 were called forth in the metropolis " for the supply of the 
 poor with wood during the stop of the coals from Newcastle, 
 and the mutinies of the poor," in consequence of the high 
 price of every species of fuel. He also refers to opportuni- 
 ties he had to " run the road of preferment, as well in Old 
 as in New England." 
 
 Though he made great sacrifices in order to undertake his 
 present agency, his visit, at this time, to the mother-country 
 must have been peculiarly gratifying. His official duties 
 brought him into frequent intercourse with many of the emi- 
 nent statesmen who then adorned the legislature, and wield- 
 ed the power of the state. Pie renewed his friendship with 
 Sir Henry Yane, the former governor of Massachusetts, and 
 enjoyed his hospitality, at his country-seat, for many weeks, 
 He secured on behalf of his beloved colony the powerful in- 
 fluence of Cromwell, with whom he had frequent interviews. 
 His hours of leisure were often passed with a kindred spirit, 
 of transcendent genius — ISiilton — to whom he refers in his 
 subsequent correspondence. Imagination conceives those 
 
110 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 two great men, representatives of a brighter future, discus- 
 sing the true nature of that religious liberty, which few be- 
 sides themselves clearly discerned. We can fancy them ap- 
 plying the simple principle of the non-interference of the 
 state with religion to the solution of the vexed questions 
 which still continued to harrass and divide the English 
 church reformers. And if their hopes of the speedy triumph 
 of this principle in England sometimes failed, they would re- 
 joice together that there was at least one spot on the earth's 
 wide surface, where conscience, with joyful exultation, might 
 exclaim, I am free ! 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 WILLIAMS RETURNS TO AMERICA — HIS LETTER TO GOV- 
 ERNOR WINTHROP — RE-ORGANIZATION OF THE GOV- 
 ERNMENT — HE IS ELECTED PRESIDENT OF THE COLONY 
 — HIS LETTER TO THE GOVERNMENT OF MASSACHU- 
 SETTS — HIS LETTER ON CIVIL AND RELIGIOUS LIBERTY. 
 
 Though it appears that inducements had been held out to 
 Williams to remain in England, yet nothing could detain 
 him from his beloved colony. The objects of his mission not 
 being fully accomplished, he left the remainder of the busi- 
 ness in the hands of Mr. Clarke, and returned, early in the 
 summer of 1654. He landed at Boston, bringing with him 
 an order from the lord-protector's council, requiring the au- 
 thorities of Massachusetts to allow him, in future, to embark 
 or land in their territories without molestation. 
 
 Soon after his return, he addressed a letter to his friend, 
 Mr. Winthrop, afterwards governor of Connecticut : a gen- 
 tleman greatly respected as a christian, a philosopher, and a 
 magistrate. In the following passage, he relates several in- 
 cidents connected with his visit to England : — 
 
 " For my much-honoured, kind Friend, Mr. John 
 Winthrop, at Pequod. 
 
 '• Providence, July 12th, '54. 
 
 " Sir j— I was humbly bold to salute you from our native 
 
112 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 country ; and now, by the gracious hand of the Lord, once 
 more saluting this wilderness, I crave your wonted patience 
 to my wonted boldness, who ever honored and loved, and 
 ever shall, the root and branches of your dear name. How 
 joyful, therefore, was I to hear of your abode as a stake and 
 pillar in these parts, and of your healths — your own, Mrs. 
 Winthrop, and your branches — although some sad mixtures 
 we have had from the sad tidings (if true) of the late loss 
 and cutting off of one of them. 
 
 " Sir, I was lately upon the wing to have waited on you at 
 your house. I had disposed all for my journey, and my staff 
 was in my hand, but it pleased the Lord to interpose some 
 impediments, so that I am compelled to a suspension for a 
 season, and choose at present thus to visit you. I had no 
 letters for you, but yours were well. I was at the lodgings 
 of Major Winthrop and Mr. Peters, but I missed them. 
 Your brother flourisheth in good esteem, and is eminent for 
 maintaining the freedom of the conscience, as to matters of 
 belief, religion, and worship. Your father Peters* preacheth 
 the same doctrine, though not so zealously as some years 
 since ; yet cries out against New English rigidities and per- 
 secutions 
 
 " Surely, sir, your father, and all the people of God in 
 England, formerly called Puritanus Anglicanus, of late 
 Roundheads, now the Sectarians (as more or less cut off 
 from the parishes), are now in the saddle and at the helm, so 
 high that non datur descensus nisi cadendo. Some cheer up 
 their spirits with the impossibility of another fall or turn ; so 
 doth Major- Gen. Harrison, and Mr. Feake, and Mr. John 
 Simpson, now in Windsor castle for preaching against this 
 last change, and against the protector as an usurper, Rich- 
 ard HI., &c. So did many think of the last parliament, who 
 were of the vote of fifty-six against priests and tithes, oppo- 
 site to the vote of the fifty-four who were for them, at least 
 
 * Mr. Winthrop had married a daughter of the Rer. Hugh Peters. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 113 
 
 for a while. Major-Gen. Harrison, was the second in the 
 nation of late, when the loving general and himself joined 
 against the former long parliament, and dissolved them ; but 
 now being the head of the fifty-six party, he was confined by 
 the protector and council, within five miles of his father's 
 house, in Staffordshire. That sentence he not obeying, he 
 told me (the day before my leaving London) he was to be 
 sent prisoner into Harfordshire. Surely, sir, he is a very 
 gallant, most deserving, heavenly man, but most liigh flown 
 for the kingdom of the saints. Others, as to my knowledge, 
 the protector, Lord President Lawrence, and others at helm, 
 with Sir Henry Vane (retired into Lincolnshire, yet daily 
 missed and courted for his assistance), are not so full of that 
 faith of miracles, but still imagine changes and persecutions. 
 
 " Sir, I know not how far your judgment hath concurred 
 with the design against the Dutch. I must acknowledge my 
 mourning for it, and when I heard of it at Portsmouth, I con- 
 fess I wrote letters to the protector and president from 
 thence ; as against a most uningenuous and unchristian de- 
 design, at such a time when the world stood gazing at the so 
 famous treaty for peace, which was then between the two 
 states , and near finished when we set sail. Much I can tell 
 you of the answer I had from court, and I think of the ans- 
 wers I had from heaven — viz., that the Lord would gracious- 
 ly retard us until the tidings of peace (from England) might 
 quench the fire in the kindling of it. 
 
 " Sir, I had word from the lord president, at Portsmouth, 
 that the counil had passed three letters as to our business. 
 First, to encourage us ; second, to our neighbor colonies not 
 to molest us ; third, in exposition of that word dominion, in 
 the late frame of the government of England — viz., that lib- 
 erty of conscience should be maintained in all American 
 plantations, &c. 
 
 " Sir, a great man in America told me that he thought 
 New England would not bear it. I hope better, and that 
 
 8 
 
214 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 not only the necessity, but the equity, piety, and Christianity 
 of that freedom will more and more shine forth, not to licen- 
 tiousness (as all mercies are apt to be abused), but to the 
 beauty of Christianity, and the lustre of true faith in God and 
 love to poor mankind, &c. 
 
 " Sir, I have desires of keeping home. I have long had 
 scruples of selling the natives aught, but what may bring or 
 tend to civilizing. It pleased the Lord to call me for some 
 time, and with some persons, to practise the Hebrew, the 
 Greek, Latin, French, and Dutch. The secretary of the 
 council, Mr. Milton, for my Dutch I read him, read me many 
 more languages. Grammar rules begin to be esteemed a 
 tyranny. I taught two young gentlemen, a parliament-man's 
 sons, as we teach our children English — by words, phrases, 
 and constant talk, &c. I have begun with mine own three 
 boys, who labor besides ; others are coming to me. 
 
 " Sir, I shall rejoice to receive a word of your healths, of 
 the Indian wars, and to be ever yours, 
 
 " R. W." 
 
 Here we have proof of the extent of Williams's acquire- 
 . ments as a linguist, while we see Milton and himself in the 
 very interesting relation of mutual instructors. It is proba- 
 ble that he " taught two young gentlemen, a parliament- 
 man's sons," as a mode of providing for his own support at 
 this period. 
 
 On his arrival at Providence, his first object was to re- 
 store union among the several towns, and re-establish the 
 government on its former basis, in accordance with the order 
 of the council of state. The accomplishment of this was no 
 easy task, in consequence of the petty jealousies and local 
 differences, which had been artfully fomented by some tur- 
 bulent spirits, who thought disorder more propitious to their 
 interests than good government. In this crisis, he addressed 
 a conciliatory letter to the citizens of Providence, in which 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 115 
 
 he alludes in affecting terms to his trials and sacrifices in 
 their behalf, and urges them to bury their animosities and 
 unite in the reorganization of the government on its old 
 foundations. His efforts to promote union were also en- 
 forced, by a letter entrusted to him by Sir Henry Vane, and 
 addressed to the inhabitants of the colony.* 
 
 By the skilful policy and persuasive earnestness of "Will- 
 lams, Providence and the other towns soon after appointed 
 commissioners, who met on the 31st of August, 1654, and 
 the articles of union were finally agreed upon, under the ex- 
 isting charter. 
 
 Williams was requested, also, by the citizens of Provi- 
 dence, to prepare an answer to Sir Henry Yane's letter in 
 the name of the town. In this answer, dated August 27, 
 1654, commencing with an expression of regret at the late 
 retirement of Sir Henry " from the helm of public affairs," 
 he speaks of his " loving lines" to the colony as " the sweet 
 fruits of his rest." " Thus the sun, when he retires his 
 brightness from the world, yet from under the very clouds 
 we perceive his presence, and enjoy some light, and heat, 
 and sweet refreshings." He points out the causes which had 
 disturbed the colony, and concludes by expressing the hope 
 " that, when we are gone and rotten, our posterity and chil- 
 den after us shall read, in our town records, your pious and 
 favorable letters, and loving kindness to us, and this our ans- 
 wer, and real endeavor after peace and righteousness." 
 
 The first general election was held at Warwick, on the 
 1 2th of September, when Roger Williams was chosen presi- 
 dent of the colony. At the same time, he was also appoint- 
 ed, together with Mr. Gregory Dexter, to " draw up and 
 send letters of humble thanksgiving to his highness, the lord 
 protector, and Sir Henry Vane, Mr. Holland, and Mr. John 
 Clarke, in the name of the colony ; and Mr. Williams is de- 
 sired to subscribe them, by virtue of his office." 
 
 * A curious extract from a work of Sir Vane will be found in the Ap- 
 pendix II. 
 
116 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 The auspicious union of the'settlements, after an unhappy 
 division of several years, was mainly accomplished by the 
 wisdom and firmness of Williams. One of his first acts after 
 entering upon the duties of his presidency, was to interpose 
 his friendly offices in order to prevent hostilities between 
 the united colonies and some of the neighboring Indian 
 tribes. For this purpose, he addressed a letter to the gov- 
 ernment of Massachusetts, from which we present the fol- 
 lowing extracts : — 
 
 " Providence, 5th October, '54, 
 
 " Much honored Sirs, — I truly wish you peace, and 
 pray your gentle acceptance of a word, I hope not unreason- 
 able. 
 
 " We have in these parts a sound of your meditations of 
 war against these natives, amongst whom we dwell. I con- 
 sider that war is one of those three great sore plagues with 
 which it pleaseth God to afflict the sons of men. I consider, 
 also, that I refused, lately, many offers in my native country, 
 out of a sincere desire to seek the good and peace of this. 
 
 " I remember, that, upon the express advice of your ever- 
 honored Mr. Winthrop, deceased,* I first adventured to be- 
 gin a plantation, among the thickest of these barbarians. 
 
 " That in the Pequod wars, it pleased your honored gov- 
 ernment to employ me in the hazardous and weighty service 
 of negotiating a league between yourselves and the Narra- 
 gansetts, when the Pequod messengers, who sought the Nar- 
 ragansetts' league against the English, had almost ended that 
 my work and life together. 
 
 " That at the subscribing of that solemn league, which, by 
 the mercy of the Lord, I had procured with the Narragan- 
 
 * Governor Winthrop died at Boston, on the 26th of March, 1649, aged 
 sixty-two years. He was eleven times chosen governor of Massachusetts. 
 He was one of the purest and most gifted men of his age, and spent his 
 large estate in the public service. His son and grandson were successively 
 governors of Connecticut. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 117 
 
 setts, your government was pleased to send unto me the copy 
 of it, subscribed by all hands there, which yet I keep as a 
 monument and a testimony of peace and faithfulness be- 
 tween you both. 
 
 " That, since that time, it hath pleased the Lord so to or- 
 der it, that I have been more or less interested and used in 
 all your great transactions of war or peace between the 
 English and the natives, and have not spared purse, nor 
 pains, nor hazards (very many times), that the whole land, 
 English and natives, might sleep in peace securely. 
 
 " That in my last negotiations in England with the par- 
 liament, council of state, and his highness, I have been forced 
 to be known so much that if I should be silent I should not 
 only betray mine own peace and yours, but also should be 
 false to their honorable and princely names, whose loves and 
 affections, as well as their supreme authority, are not a little 
 concerned in the peace or war of this country. 
 
 " At my last departure for England I was importuned by 
 the Narragansett sachems, and especially by Ninigret, to 
 present their petition to the high sachems of England, that 
 they might not be forced from their religion, and, for not 
 changing their religion, be invaded by war ; for they said 
 they were daily visited with threatenings by Indians that 
 came from about the Massachusetts, that if they would not 
 pray they should be destroyed by war. With this their pe- 
 tition I acquainted in private discourses divers of the chiefs 
 of our nation, and especially his highness, who, in many dis- 
 courses I had with him, never expressed the least displea- 
 sure, as hath been here reported, but in the midst of disputes 
 ever expressed a high spirit of love and gentleness, and was 
 often pleased to please himself with very many questions, 
 and my answers about the Indian affairs of this country, and 
 after all hearing of yourself and us, it hath pleased his high- 
 ness and his council to grant, amongst other favors to this 
 colony, some expressly concerning the very Indians, the na- 
 tive inhabitants of this jurisdiction. 
 
118 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 " I therefore humbly offer to your prudent and impartial 
 view, first, these two considerable terms, it pleased the Lord 
 to use to all that profess his name. — Rom. xii. 18. 
 
 " I never was against the righteous use of the civil sword 
 of men or nations, but yet, since all men of conscience or 
 prudence ply to windward to maintain their wars to be de- 
 fensive (as did both king and Scotch, and English, and Irish 
 too in the late wars), I humbly pray your consideration, 
 whether it be not only possible, but very easy, to live and 
 die in peace with all the natives of this country. 
 
 " For, secondly, are not all the English of this land gene- 
 rally a persecuted people from their native soil ? and hath 
 not the God of peace and Father of mercies made these na- 
 tives more friendly in this, than our native countrymen in 
 our own land to us ? Have they not entered leagues of 
 love, and to this day continued peaceable commerce with us ? 
 Are not our families grown up in peace amongst them ? 
 Upon wliich I humbly ask, how it can suit with christian in- 
 genuity to take hold of some seeming occasions for their de- 
 struction, which, though the heads be only aimed at, yet all 
 experience tell us, falls on the body and the innocent. 
 
 " Thirdly, I pray it may be remembered how greatly the 
 name of God is concerned in this affair, for it cannot be hid 
 how all England and other nations ring with the glorious 
 conversion of the Indians of New England. You know how 
 many books are dispersed throughout the nation on the sub- 
 ject (in some of them the Narragansett chief sachems are 
 publicly branded for refusing to pray and be converted) — 
 how all the pulpits in England have been commanded to 
 sound of this glorious work (I speak not ironically, but only 
 mention what all the printed books mention), and that by 
 the highest command and authority of parliament, and 
 churchwardens went from house to house to gather supplies 
 for this work. 
 
 ki Honored sirs, whether I have been and am a friend to 
 
LIFE OF KOGER WILLIAMS. 119 
 
 tlie natives' turning to civility and Christianity, and whether 
 I have been instrumental, and desire so to be, according to 
 my light, I will not trouble you with ; only I beseech you 
 consider how the name of the most holy and jealous God 
 may be preserved between the clashings of these two, viz., 
 the glorious conversion of the Indians in New England, and 
 the unnecessary wars and cruel destruction of the Indians in 
 New England. 
 
 " Fourthly, I beseech you forget not that although we are 
 apt to play with this plague of war more than with the other 
 two, famine and pestilence, yet I beseech you consider how 
 the present events of all wars that ever have been in the 
 world have been wonderfully fickle, and the future calami- 
 ties and revolutions wonderful in the latter end. 
 
 " Heretofore, not having liberty of taking ship in your ju- 
 risdiction, I was forced to repair unto the Dutch, where my 
 eyes did see that first breaking forth of that Indian war which 
 the Dutch begun, upon the slaughter of some Dutch by the 
 Indians, and they questioned not to finish it in a few days, 
 insomuch that the name of peace, which some offered to me- 
 diate, was foolish and odious to them. But before we weighed 
 anchor their bowries were in flames. Dutch and English 
 were slain. Mine eyes saw their flames at their towns, and 
 the flights and hurries of men, women, and children, the pre- 
 sent removal of all that could for Holland, and after vast ex- 
 pense and mutual slaughter of Dutch, English, and Indians, 
 about four years the Dutch were forced, to save their planta- 
 tion from ruin, to make up a most unworthy and dishonora- 
 ble peace with the Indians 
 
 " But, lastly, if any be yet zealous of kindling this fire for 
 God, &c, I beseech that gentleman, whoever he be, to lay 
 himself in the opposite scale, with one of the fairest buds that 
 «ver the sun of righteousness cherished, Josiah ; that most 
 zealous and melting-hearted reformer who would to war, and 
 against warnings, and fell in most untimelv death and lamen- 
 
120 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 tations, and now stands a pillar of salt to all succeeding gen- 
 erations 
 
 " How much nobler were it and glorious to the name of 
 God and your own, that no pagan should dare to use the 
 name of an English subject who comes not out in some degree 
 from barbarism to civility — forsaking their filthy nakedness, 
 keeping some kind of cattle, which yet your councils and 
 commands may tend to — and as pious and prudent deceased 
 Mr. Winthrop said, that civility may be a leading step to 
 Christianity, is the humble desire of your most unfeigned in 
 all services of love, 
 
 " Roger Williams, 
 of Providence Colony, President." 
 
 It appears that this letter had a salutary effect. Massa- 
 chusetts, with a spirit that is honorable to her rulers, was op- 
 posed to hostilities, and thus prevented a general war with 
 the natives, although it had been already determined on by 
 the commissioners of the united colonies. Williams had suc- 
 ceeded in restoring the regular operations of government, 
 but the office of president was at that time encompassed 
 with many difficulties. There were not wanting turbulent 
 spirits who were uneasy and impatient under the restraints 
 of law and order. During the early part of his administra- 
 tion, one of these addressed a seditious pamphlet to the town 
 of Providence, and was active in circulating it among the 
 citizens, maintaining " that it was blood-guiltiness, and against 
 the rule of the gospel, to execute judgment upon transgres- 
 sors against the public or private weal." This doctrine tend- 
 ed to the subversion of all civil society ; yet, it is not surpris- 
 ing that in a community enjoying unrestricted freedom of 
 opinion, some were found who would pervert the privilege 
 into unbounded license. While such sentiments were pro- 
 pagated, Williams could not remain silent, and accordingly 
 addressed a letter to the town, in which he explicitly denies 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 121 
 
 that he had ever given the slightest sanction to principles so 
 hostile to the civil peace, and the dictates of reason and 
 scripture. He clearly shows that absolute liberty of con- 
 science is quite consistent with the restraints of civil govern- 
 ment ; and illustrates this position by a very ingenious alle- 
 gory. The letter is copied from the records of the city of 
 Providence : — 
 
 11 That ever I should speak or write a tittle, that tends to 
 such an infinite liberty of conscience, is a mistake, and which 
 I have ever disclaimed and abhorred. To prevent such mis- 
 takes, I shall at present only propose this case : There goes 
 many a ship to sea, with many hundred souls in one ship, 
 whose weal and woe is common, and is a true picture of a com- 
 monwealth, or a human combination or society. It hath fal- 
 len out sometimes, that both papists and protestants, Jews 
 and Turks, may be embarked in one ship ; upon which sup- 
 posal I affirm, that all the liberty of conscience, that ever I 
 pleaded for, turns upon these two hinges — that none of the 
 papists, protestants, Jews, or Turks, be forced to come to the 
 ship's prayers or worship, nor compelled from their own par- 
 ticular prayers or worship, if they practise any. I further 
 add, that I never denied, that notwithstanding this liberty, the 
 commander of this ship ought to command the ship's course, 
 yea, and also command that justice, peace, and sobriety, be 
 kept and practised, both among the seamen and all the pas- 
 sengers. If any of the seamen refuse to perform their servi- 
 ces, or passengers to pay their freight ; if any refuse to help, 
 in person or purse, towards the common charges or defence ; 
 if any refuse to obey the common laws and orders of the 
 ship, concerning their common peace or preservation; if any 
 shall mutiny and rise up against their commanders and offi- 
 cers ; if any should preach or write that there ought to be no 
 commanders or officers, because all are equal in Christ, 
 therefore no masters nor officers, no laws nor orders, nor cor- 
 
122 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 rections nor punishments ; — I say, I never denied, but in 
 such cases, whatever is pretended, the commander or com- 
 manders may judge, resist, compel and punish such trans- 
 gressors, according to their deserts and merits. This, if se- 
 riously and honestly minded, may, if it so please the Father 
 of lights, let in some light to such as willingly shut not their 
 eyes. 
 
 " I remain studious of your common peace and liberty, 
 
 "Roger Williams." 
 
CHAPTER XY. 
 
 LETTER FROM CROMWELL — WILLIAMS'S ATTEMPTS TO 
 ESTABLISH FRIENDLY RELATIONS WITH MASSACHU- 
 SETTS — SEVERE LAWS AGAINST THE QUAKERS IN THE 
 OTHER COLONIES — RHODE ISLAND REFUSES TO JOIN 
 IN THE PERSECUTION — LETTER TO JOHN CLARKE — 
 WILLIAMS RETIRES FROM THE PRESIDENCY. 
 
 The current of affairs did not yet flow quite smoothly in the 
 little colony. Though a very large majority adhered to the 
 cause of the commonwealth, yet a few royalists attempted to 
 create factions. Complaints were made by the constituted 
 authorities to Cromwell, who addressed the following letter 
 to the colony : — 
 
 " To our trusty and well-beloved the president, assistants, 
 and inhabitants of Rhode Island, together with the rest 
 of the Providence Plantations, in the Narragansett Bay, 
 in New E no-land. 
 
 " Gentlemen, — Your agent here hath represented unto 
 us some particulars concerning your government, which you 
 judge necessary to be settled by us here. But by reason of 
 the other great and weighty affairs of this commonwealth, 
 we have been necessitated to defer the consideration of them 
 to a further opportunity ; for the mean time we were will- 
 ling to let you know that you are to proceed in your govern- 
 ment according to tbe tenor of your charter, formerly granted 
 
124 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 on that behalf; taking care of the peace and safety of those 
 plantations, that neither through any intestine commotions, 
 or foreign invasions, there do arise any detriment or dishon- 
 or to this commonwealth, or yourselves, as far as you, by 
 your care and diligence, can prevent And as for the things 
 which are before us, they shall, as soon as the other occasions 
 will permit, receive a just and fitting determination. And so 
 we bid you farewell, and rest 
 
 " Your very loving friend, 
 " 29th March, 1655 * " Oliver P." 
 
 The protector's interest in the colony, and his friendship 
 for Williams, was manifested on this as well as many other 
 occasions. In his letters the latter repeatedly alludes to fa- 
 miliar conversations with Cromwell, to whom he was drawn 
 by a unity of opinion 'on the great question of religious lib- 
 erty. 
 
 There is a tradition that these two distinguished men were 
 remotely allied by birth ; and a fact, recorded in the geneal- 
 ogy of the Cromwell family, gives an air of probability, at least, 
 to this supposition. Cromwell's paternal ancestry is traced to 
 Richard Williams, of Wales, who was knighted by Henry 
 VUI. by the name of Cromwell, after his uncle, whose heir 
 he became.f 
 
 The protector's letter served to strengthen the govern- 
 ment, and, in pursuance of his advice, the assembly immedi- 
 ately passed an act, declaring, that " if any person or per- 
 sons be found, by the examination and judgment of the gen- 
 eral court of commissioners, to be a ringleader or ringleaders 
 of factions or divisions among us, he or they shall be sent 
 over at his or their own charges, as prisoners, to receive his 
 or their trial or sentence, at the pleasure of his highness and 
 the lords of his council." This act shows, that while the leg- 
 
 * Colony Records. 
 t See a genealogy of the Cromwell family in Appendix III. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 125 
 
 islature recognized the rights of conscience, they were re- 
 solved to enforce civil obedience. The prompt and reso- 
 lute measures adopted by the authorities produced peace 
 and good order among the settlements. Coddington and 
 others gave in their allegiance to the colony, and the old form 
 of government continued until the adoption of the charter 
 of 1663. 
 
 During the presidency of Williams, he made efforts to es- 
 tablish more friendly relations with the neighboring colonies, 
 especially with Massachusetts. The people of Rhode Island 
 were not allowed to procure fire-arms and ammunition from 
 Boston, though they were exposed to imminent peril from 
 the Indians, who were abundantly supplied from various 
 quarters. In November, 1655, he addressed a letter to the 
 general court of Massachusetts, in which he remonstrated in 
 a firm, though courteous, tone against this oppressive policy, 
 by which the inhabitants of Rhode Island seemed " to be de- 
 voted to the Indian shambles and massacres." 'A few months 
 afterwards he wrote to the governor, Mr. Endicott, who in- 
 vited him to visit Boston, that he might present his requests 
 to the general court in person. The address he made to the 
 court, in the name and by the appointment of his colonv, 
 was successful in obtaining some of the privileges that he had 
 requested. This kindness he acknowledged in a brief note 
 to the assembly, in which he says, " I do cordially promise 
 for myself (and all I can persuade with), to study gratitude 
 and faithfulness to your service." 
 
 During the year 1656 a number of the then new sect 
 called Quakers arrived in Boston, and began to promulgate 
 their [doctrines. The wild fanaticism of some of the early 
 adherents of the sect forms a striking contrast to the quiet 
 and consistent demeanor of the Friends of the present day. 
 Experience had not yet been sufficient to teach Massachu- 
 setts the folly of interfering between God and man, and she 
 attempted the utter extermination of these new heretics. A 
 
126 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 large number were fined, imprisoned, banished, and whipped, 
 and by a sanguinary law, enacted October, 1G58, punishing 
 with death all quakers who should return into the jurisdic- 
 tion after banishment, four persons were barbarously execu- 
 ted. The persecution continued till September, 1661, when 
 an order was received from King Charles II. requiring that 
 neither capital nor corporal punishment should be inflicted 
 on them, but that offenders should be sent to England. The 
 other colonies of New England passed severe laws against 
 the quakers, and endeavored to prevail on Rhode Island to 
 join in the persecution. The commissioners of the united 
 colonies addressed a letter to the president of Rhode Island, 
 urging him to send away such quakers as were then in the 
 colony, and prohibit the entrance of any in future ; but the 
 government remaining true to their principle of " soul liber- 
 ty," promptly refused to comply with the request. The gen- 
 eral assembly, which met March 13, 1657, returned an 
 answer to the commissioners in the following terms : — 
 
 " Whereas freedom of different consciences to be protected 
 from enforcements was the principal ground of our charter, 
 both with respect to our humble suit for it, as also to the 
 true intent of the honorable and renowned parliament of 
 England in granting of the same unto us, — which freedom 
 we still prize as the greatest happiness that men can possess 
 in this world ; — therefore we shall, for the preservation of our 
 civil peace and order, the more seriously take notice that 
 those people and any other that are here, or shall come amongst 
 us, be impartially required, and to our utmost consrained, to 
 perform all civil duties requisite, towards the maintaining 
 the right of his highness and the government of that most 
 renowned commonwealth of England in this colonv. And 
 in case they the said people called quakers which are here, 
 or shall come among us, do refuse to submit to the doing all 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 127 
 
 duties aforesaid, then we resolve to make use of the first op- 
 portunity to inform our agent residing in England."* 
 
 This reply was not satisfactory to the commissioners, and 
 the next autumn they wrote again to the assembly, who re- 
 turned an answer, dated October 13, 1G57, in which they 
 use the following language : — 
 
 " As concerning these quakers (so called), which are now 
 among us, we have no law whereby to punish any for only 
 declaring by words, &c, their minds and understandings 
 concerning the things and ways of God, as to salvation and 
 an eternal condition. And we find, moreover, that in those 
 places where these people, aforesaid, in this colony, are most 
 of all suffered to declare themselves freely, and are only op- 
 posed by arguments in discourse, there they least of all, de- 
 sire to come."f 
 
 The letter then expressed disapprobation of the conduct 
 of some of the quakers, and promised at the next general 
 assembly that proper measures should be adopted to prevent 
 any "bad effects of their doctrines and endeavors." 
 
 The other colonies appear to have been greatly incensed 
 by the firm and consistent adherence of Rhode Island to the 
 glorious principles of her founder. The commissioners wrote 
 a third time to the general assembly, requiring the colony to 
 unite in a general persecution of the quakers, under the pen- 
 alty of being herself excluded from all commercial inter- 
 course with the rest of New England. This extraordinary 
 attempt to force the citizens of Rhode Island from their cher- 
 ished principles was unavailing. 
 
 Apprehensive, however, that attempts might be made to 
 accomplish this object indirectly they charged John Clarke, 
 their agent at the court of the protector, to plead their cause 
 that " they may not be compelled to exercise any civil pow- 
 er over men's consciences." The following letter to Mr. 
 
 * Colony Records. t HutchinsoD, vol. i. p. 454. 
 
128 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 Clarke was written by a committee appointed by the general 
 assembly, November 5, 1658. It reflects great credit upon 
 Rhode Island, and shows how far she was in advance of the 
 other colonies and of the age : — 
 
 " Worthy Sir and trusty Friend, Mr. Clarke, — 
 We have found not only your ability and diligence, but also 
 your love and care to be such concerning the welfare and 
 prosperity of this colony, since you have been entrusted with 
 the more public affairs thereof, surpassing that no small ben- 
 efit which formerly we had of your presence here at home, 
 that we in all straits and incumbrances are emboldened to 
 repair to you for your further and continued counsel, care 
 and help, finding that your solid and christian demeanor hath 
 gotten no small interest in the hearts of our superiors, those 
 noble and worthy senators with whom you have had to do 
 on our behalf, as it hath constantly appeared in your ad- 
 dresses made unto them, which we have by good and com- 
 fortable proof found, having plentiful experience thereof. 
 
 " The last year we have laden you with much employment, 
 which we were then put upon by reason of some too refrac- 
 tory among ourselves, wherein we appealed unto you for 
 your advice, for the more public manifestation of it with res- 
 pect to our superiors. But our intelligence it seems fell 
 short in that great loss of the ship, which is conceived here 
 to be cast away. We have now a new occasion given by an 
 old spirit, with respect to the colonies about us, who seem to 
 be offended with us because of a sort of people called by the 
 name of quakers, who are come amongst us, and have raised 
 up divers who seem at present to be of their spirit, whereat 
 the colonies about us seem to be offended with us, because the 
 said people have their liberty amongst us, are entertained into 
 our houses, or into any of our assemblies. And for the present 
 we have found no just cause to charge them with the breach 
 of civil peace, only they are constantly going forth amongst 
 them about us, and vex and trouble them in point of their 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 129 
 
 religion and spiritual state, though they return with many a 
 tbul scar in their bodies for the same. And the offence our 
 neighbors take against us, is because we take not some course 
 against the said people, either to expel them from among us, 
 or take such courses against them as themselves do, who are 
 in fear lest their religion should be corrupted by them. Con- 
 cerning which displeasure that they seem to take, it was ex- 
 pressed to us in a solemn letter, written by the commission- 
 ers of the united colonies at their sitting, as though they 
 would bring us in to act according to their scantling, or else 
 take some course to do us greater displeasure. A copy of 
 which letter we have herewith sent unto you, wherein you 
 may perceive how they express themselves. As also we 
 nave herewith sent our present answer unto them, to give 
 you what light we may in this matter. There is one clause 
 in their letter which plainly Implies a threat, though covertly 
 expressed — as their manner is — which we gather to be this : 
 that as themselves (as we conceive) have been much awed, 
 in point of their continued subjection to the state of Eng- 
 land, lest, in case they should decline, England might pro- 
 hibit all trade with them, both in point of exportation and 
 importation of any commodities, which were a host sufficient- 
 ly prevalent to subdue New England, as not being able to 
 subsist ; even so they seem secretly to threaten us, by cut- 
 ting us off from all commerce and trade with them, and 
 thereby to disable us of any comfortable subsistence, because 
 that the concourse of shipping, and so of all kind of commod- 
 ities, is universally conversant amongst themselves ; as also 
 knowing that ourselves are not in a capacity to send out 
 shipping of ourselves, which is in a great measure occasioned 
 by their oppressing us, as yourself well know ; as in many 
 other respects, so in this for one, that we cannot have any- 
 thing from them for the supply of our necessities, but, in ef- 
 fect, they make the prices both of our commodities and their 
 own also, because we have not English coin, but only that 
 9 
 
130 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 which passeth among the:*e barbarians, and such commodities 
 as are raised by the labor of our hands, as corn, cattle, to- 
 bacco, &c, to make payment in, which they will have at 
 their own rate, or else not deal with us ; whereby though they 
 gain extraordinarily by us, yet, for the safeguard of their re- 
 ligion, may seem to neglect themselves in that respect ; for 
 what will not men do for their God'? 
 
 " Sir, this is our earnest and present request unto you in 
 this matter, that as you may perceive in our answer to the 
 united colonies, that we fly as to our refuge in all civil res- 
 pects to his highness and honorable council, as not being 
 subject to any others in matters of our civil state, so may it 
 please you to have an eye and ear open, in case our adversa- 
 ries should seek to undermine us in our privileges granted 
 unto us, and to plead our case in such sort, as that we may 
 not he compelled to exercise any civil power over men's con* 
 sciences, so long as human orders in point of civility are 
 not corrupted and violated, which our neighbors about us do 
 frequently practise, whereof many of us have large experi- 
 ence, and judge it to be no less than a point of absolute 
 
 CRUELTY. 
 
 "John Sanford, 
 " Clerk of the Assembly."* 
 
 Thus terminated the controversy respecting the persecu- 
 tion of the quakers, between the commissioners of New Eng- 
 land and the colony of Rhode Island. It commenced near 
 the close of Williams's administration ; the measures on the 
 part of the colony were sustained by his advice and authori- 
 ty, and his liberal and tolerant spirit pervaded all these pro- 
 ceedings. He retired from the office of president in May, 
 1658, and it is probable he declined being a caudidate for 
 re-election, though, at intervals, for several years, he occu- 
 pied a seat in the upper house of the general assembly. 
 
 * Colony Records. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 131 
 
 Perhaps his motives were the same as those which, at a sub- 
 sequent period, influenced the immortal Washington, who 
 did not think it right that the highest office should be held i. 
 for a long period by the same individual. 
 
CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 THE KING GRANTS A NEW CHARTER — WILLIAMS APPOINT- 
 ED ASSISTANT — CHARGES AGAINST RHODE ISLAND RE- 
 FUTED — CONTROVERSY WITH THE QUAKERS — PHILIP'S 
 WAR — SERVICES OF WILLIAMS. 
 
 Although Roger Williams had retired from the post of 
 chief magistrate, yet he neglected no opportunity to promote 
 the interests of the colony. He was appointed by his fellow- 
 citizens of Providence to all the higher offices, and frequent 
 and honorable mention of his name appears in the records 
 both of the town and colony. 
 
 In the meantime, the various trials through which Rhode 
 Island passed increased her own love of liberty, and, by the 
 blessing of Divine Providence, she overcame all the machi- 
 nations of her adversaries, both at home and abroad. Her 
 prosperity augmented, and her inhabitants multiplied ; for, 
 to the persecuted of all denominations, she was an ark of 
 safety. 
 
 John Clarke, who was sent with Roger Williams to Eng- 
 land in the year 1651, still continued there, to watch over 
 the interests of the colony. After the death of the protect- 
 or, and the final subversion of the commonwealth, a commis- 
 sion was sent to Dr. Clarke to procure a new charter from 
 Charles II. On the 8th of July, 1663, it was granted, and 
 conferred full power upon the colony, the king not having 
 even reserved to himself the right of revising the proceed- 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 133 
 
 in^s. It gave her the choice of every officer, from the high- 
 est to the lowest — it authorized her to make peace and de- 
 clare war — and constituted her a sovereignty, under the pro- 
 tection of England. This instrument, like the former char- 
 ter, thus nobly embodies Rhode Island's great principle : — 
 
 " No person within the said colony, at any time hereafter, 
 shall be anywise molested, punished, disquieted, or called in 
 question, for any differences in opinion in matters of relig- 
 ion, who do not actually disturb the peace of our said colony; 
 but that all and every person and persons may, from to time, 
 and at all times hereafter, freely and fully have and enjoy 
 his own and their judgments and consciences, in matters 
 of religious concernments, throughout the tract of land 
 hereafter mentioned, they behaving themselves peaceably 
 and quietly, and not using this liberty to licentiousness and 
 profaneness, nor to the civil injury or outward disturbance 
 of others." 
 
 This charter, from such a source, cannot fail to awaken 
 both admiration and astonishment. One so favorable to civil 
 and religious liberty was never before granted by an Eng- 
 lish monarch ; and it may be doubted whether, up to the 
 present period, freedom so unlimited has even yet been be- 
 stowed by England upon any of her colonies. 
 
 The new charter was received with enthusiastic joy by 
 the colonists. It was brought to New England by Captain 
 George Baxter, and presented to the general court at New- 
 port, November 24th, 16C3. On the following day, it was 
 read in " a very great meeting and assembly of the freemen 
 of the colony." The records say, that "the said letters, with 
 his majesty's royal stamp and the broad seal, with much be- 
 seeming gravity, were held up on high, and presented to the 
 perfect view of the people." Thanks were voted to the king, 
 to the earl of Clarendon, and to Dr. Clarke, their " trusty 
 and well-beloved friend," together with a resolution to pay 
 
134 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 all his expenses, and to present him with a hundred pounds. 
 Thanks were also voted to Capt. Baxter, with a present of 
 thirty pounds, besides his expenses from Boston. 
 
 By the provisions of the charter, the king appointed the 
 first governor and assistants, who were to continue in office 
 till the first Wednesday of May next ensuing. Roger Wil- 
 liams was created one of the assistants ; and at the first meet- 
 ing of the assembly under the new government, he was ap- 
 pointed to transcribe the charter into the records of the 
 colony. In May, 1664, at the first general election held by 
 the people, Williams was chosen an assistant ; and at this 
 session, in connexion with Dr. Clarke, was appointed to 
 view the laws. He was also appointed one of the commis- 
 sioners to fix the eastern boundary of the colony. 
 
 Such were the auspicious circumstances in which this 
 charter went into operation ; and it continued to be the fun- 
 damental law of Rhode Island for nearly one hundred and 
 eighty years. The community prospered under its rule; 
 and when it was supplanted in 1843, by the present consti- 
 tution, it was the oldest charter of civil government in exist- 
 ence. 
 
 " There into life an infant empire springs I 
 There falls the iron from the soul : 
 There liberty's young accents roll 
 Up to the King of kings !" 
 
 Two charges have been brought against Rhode Island, 
 which claim here a passing remark. The first is made by 
 an English writer,* who states, that at the meeting of the 
 general assembly, in March, 1664, a law was passed, con- 
 taining the following passage : — " That all men professing 
 Christianity, of competent estates, and of civil conversation, 
 who acknowledge and are obedient to the civil magistrates, 
 though of different judgments in religious affairs, Roman 
 
 * Chalmer-s Political Annals, book i. c. 11, pp. 276-279. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 135 
 
 Catholics only excepted, shall be admitted freemen, or may 
 choose or be chosen colonial officers." 
 
 Such an act would have been an anomaly in the legislation 
 of Rhode Island, and a serious reflection upon the character 
 of Roger "Williams and the colony. It is certain that no 
 law containing the clauses above-written in italics was passed 
 in 1664 ; nor can such a law be found in the records of the 
 state, from its first settlement to the present time. The Hon. 
 Samuel Eddy, who was secretary of state in Rhode Island 
 from 1797 to 1819, and who examined the records with the 
 utmost care, and with a particular view to this law, declares 
 that he could find " nothing that has any reference to it, nor 
 anything that gives any preference or privileges to men of 
 one set of religious opinions over those of another."* 
 
 This testimony, while alone sufficient to disprove the alle- 
 gation, is abundantly confirmed by the fact, that the very 
 next year — in May, 1665 — the legislature asserted, that 
 " liberty to all persons as to the worship of God had been a 
 principle maintained in the colony from the beginning there- 
 of; and it was much in their hearts to preserve the same 
 liberty for ever." 
 
 The commissioners from England, also, who visited Rhode 
 Island the same year, reported of its people : — " They allow 
 liberty of conscience to all who - live civilly; they admit of 
 all religions."! 
 
 Again, in 1680, the legislature declared: — "We leave 
 every man to walk as God persuades his heart ; all our peo- 
 ple enjoy freedom of conscience." It is, moreover, utterly 
 incredible that they would enact a law at variance with all 
 their institutions, and which would have been a violation of 
 the charter. It conflicts with all their previous and subse- 
 quent policy, and especially with the principles of Williams, 
 who, in his Hireling Ministry, says : — " All these consciences 
 
 * For a full statement of Mr. Eddy's views, see Walsh's Appeal, pp. 427 — 
 435. t Hutch. Coll. p. 413. 
 
136 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 (yea, the very conscience of papists, jews, &c, as I have 
 proved al large in answer to Mr. Cotton's washings), ought 
 freely and impartially to be permitted their several respec- 
 tive worships, their ministers of worships, and what way of 
 maintaining them they please." 
 
 Judge Eddy accounts for the existence of the words in 
 italics, found in the copy of the laws printed in 1745, by 
 supposing they were inserted without authority by a revising 
 committee, who might be desirous to please the government 
 of England. It may be added, that in this very year, 1745, 
 great alarm was created in the mother country at the pros- 
 pect of the re-introduction of popery, in connexion with the 
 invasion of the pretender. The words, professing Christiani- 
 ty, and Roman catholics only excepted, are now regarded, by 
 all who have carefully examined the subject, as an interpo- 
 lation.* 
 
 The other charge is, that, in 1665, the quakers were out- 
 lawed for refusing to bear arms.f This statement has also 
 been proved to be as destitute of truth as the former by 
 Judge Eddy, in an article contained in the Massachusetts 
 Historical Collections, 2nd series, vol.vii. p. 97. From this 
 article, it appears that the commissioners of the king re- 
 quired, in his name, " that all householders, inhabiting this 
 colony, take the oath of allegiance," the penalty for refusal 
 being, a forfeiture of the elective franchise. The general as- 
 
 *At the time Judge Eddy wrote, there were no copies of the printed digests 
 of 1719 and 1730, in the Secretary's office. Since then, copies of these di- 
 gests have been found, and the paragraph referred to is inserted in both. 
 Still, the main part of Judge Eddy's defence, remains unaffected, as the 
 words relating to Roman Catholics are not to be found in the records. 
 
 It should be recollected that the first digest of 1719, was not printed until 
 Co years after the passage of the law, and that, previous to this, the law had 
 never been in print. It is also known, that several of the early digests of 
 laws were prepared by committees, and were probably never revised by the 
 Legislature. Only four copies of the digest of 1719 are now known to be in 
 existence. 
 
 t See an article signed Francis Brimley, in Mass. Hist. Coll. vol. v. p 216. 
 whose statement is repeated in Holmes's American Annals, vol. i. p. 341 
 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS, 137 
 
 sembly replied, that it had been the uniform practice of the 
 colony, from respect to the rights of conscience, to allow 
 those who objected to an oath to make an engagement, on 
 the penalties of perjury. An engagement was accordingly 
 drawn up, in which the individual promised to bear allegi- 
 ance to the king and his successors, and " to yield due obe- 
 dience to the laws established from time to time." To the 
 latter part of this engagement the quakers objected, because 
 they conceived it would bind them to conform to the militia 
 laws. The colony held not power to dispense with the king's 
 ordinance ; but the form of the engagement was altered the 
 very next year, to meet their scruples ; and the year follow- 
 ing, one of their number was elected deputy-governor. 
 
 It may be proper here to give a brief account of Roger 
 Williams's famous controversy with the quakers, which is 
 contained in the last of his published writings. It was an 
 unhappy dispute, in which all parties displayed more zeal 
 than christian charity ; and the result probably tended to 
 irritate rather than to convince. We must, however, honor 
 the motives by which Williams was actuated, and which he 
 declares to have been a desire to vindicate the name of God 
 from the dishonor brought upon it by the quakers — to justify 
 the colony for receiving them when banished from the other 
 colonies — and to bear public testimony, that, while he was 
 decidedly opposed to any measures which would impair li- 
 berty of conscience, he disapproved of the doctrines and 
 practices of that sect. Rhode Island, being the refuge of 
 these persons, was charged with approving principles and 
 conduct injurious to the morals and order of society. These 
 remarks must not be understood as applying in the slightest 
 degree to the estimable society of Friends as they exist at 
 the present day, for none would repudiate more sincerely 
 than they the fanatical extravagances of some of the adhe- 
 rents of George Fox, at that period, in New England. 
 
 In the month of July, 1672, Williams took occasion, when 
 
138 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 the distinguished founder of the sect was in Rhode Island, to 
 propose that the principles of the quakers should be exam- 
 ined in a friendly debate. Such public disputes were not 
 uncommon in that age, but they cannot be regarded as a test 
 of truth, and have seldom proved beneficial in demolishing 
 error. Williams sent fourteen propositions to Fox, at New- 
 port; but, from some cause, they were not delivered till 
 thirteen days after the date, and the latter left for England 
 without having seen them. 
 
 A discussion, however, was commenced with three of his 
 disciples at Newport ; and continued there, and at Provi- 
 dence, for four days, where it terminated, having produced 
 no change of opinion on either side. 
 
 Williams afterwards published an account of this debate, 
 which bears the following quaint title : " George Fox digged 
 out of his Burrowes ; or, an Offer of Disputation on Four- 
 teen Proposals, made this last Summer, 1672 (so-called), 
 unto G. Fox, then present on Rhode Island, in New Eng- 
 land. By R. W." It is a small quarto volume of 327 pages, 
 and displays considerable learning and acuteness, but is dis- 
 tinguished by an acerbity of language not found in his other 
 writings. This dispute naturally gave umbrage to some of that 
 sect for a time ; but there were others who cherished for him 
 the highest esteem, among whom was Joseph Jenckes, a sub- 
 sequent governor of Rhode Island, who bestows a merited 
 eulogy on Williams as a man and a christian. 
 
 He had now reached the appointed bourne of human life ; 
 but his physical and mental powers remained vigorous, and 
 circumstances occurred about this time which called forth all 
 his energies. Massassoit, the principal sachem of the Poka- 
 nokets, and the friend of the English, now slept with his fa- 
 thers, and his son, Philip, succeeded him as chief over the 
 allied tribes. He was able and ambitious, and endeavored 
 to establish a league among the Indians, in New England, in 
 order to arrest the progress of the whites, or drive them from 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 139 
 
 the land of his fathers. While Philip was making prepara- 
 tion for war, in 1671, the governor of Plymouth and the com- 
 missioners invited him to meet them at Taunton. The 
 haughty chieftain, suspicious of their design, refused; and 
 demanded that they should come to him. In this posture of 
 affairs, Williams, with a Mr. Brown, offered to become a 
 hostage in Philip's camp. He then acceded to the above re- 
 quest, delivered up about seventy guns, and promised future 
 fidelity. This event, through the successful agency of Wil- 
 liams, gave the colony four years to prepare for the impend- 
 ing conflict. He exerted himself, also, to prevent the pow- 
 erful tribe of the Narragansetts from joining the league. 
 They at first promised neutrality, and renewed their treaty 
 with the colonies ; but they afterwards united themselves to 
 Philip, and rushed, with their four thousand warriors, to the 
 final struggle. 
 
 In June 1675, the chief of the Pokanokets commenced a 
 war against Plymouth colony, that soon spread terror and 
 devastation to almost every settlement of New England. It 
 lasted more than a year, and for a time threatened the ex- 
 termination of her colonies. About six hundred men, the 
 flower of her strength, fell in battle or were butchered by 
 the savages ; twelve or thirteen towns were utterly destroyed ; 
 six hundred dwelling houses reduced to ashes : and the ex- 
 pense and loss equalled in value half a million of dollars. It 
 was the most distressing period the country had ever seen, 
 and almost every family lost some relative in this calamitous 
 war. 
 
 On this occasion, for the first time, Rhode Island became 
 exposed to the hostility of the Indians. Many of the inhabi- 
 tants of Providence, and of the other towns of the colony, 
 removed to the island for safety. Williams, however, re- 
 mained at home, and exerted his wonted energy. He ac- 
 cepted a commission as captain in the militia, and displayed 
 his patriotic valor by buckling on his armor for the defence 
 
140 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 of his fellow-citizens. He also presented a petition to the 
 town of Providence, for leave to convert one of the houses 
 into a garrison, and to erect other defences "for the safety 
 of the women and children." 
 
 It is said, that when the Indians appeared on the heights 
 north of the town, Williams took his staff, and fearlessly 
 went forth to meet them, hoping, as on former occasions, to 
 appease their vengeance. Some of the old warriors ad- 
 vanced from the main body to meet him, with whom he re 
 monstrated. He admonished them of the power and ven- 
 geance of the English. " Massachusetts," said he, " can 
 raise thousands of men at this moment, and if you kill them, 
 the king of England will supply their places as fast as they 
 fall." "Well," 'answered one of the chieftains, " let them 
 come. We are ready for them. But as for you, brother 
 Williams, you are a good man. You have been kind to us 
 many years. Not a hair of your head shall be touched."* 
 Finding their young warriors could not be restrained, he 
 returned to the garrison. The Indians subsequently entered 
 the town and destroyed by fire thirty deserted habitations ; 
 but it does not appear that any persons were killed. In one 
 of the houses the records were deposited, which were pre- 
 served by being thrown into the Mooshausick, from whence 
 they were afterwards recovered, though much injured. 
 
 This conflict was brought to a close, by the death of Phil- 
 ip, in August, 1676. The Pokanokets were nearly extermi- 
 nated, and of the once powerful Narragansetts hardly one 
 hundred men remained. In the wars of the New England 
 colonists with the Indians, the candid historian will find much 
 both to regret and condemn ; but it is due to the memory of 
 the pilgrims to state, that those hostilities were first com- 
 menced by the savages, and when the struggle came, it was 
 a contest for life or death. We cannot fail to recognize the 
 
 * Baylies' Hist, of Plymouth, vol. iii. p. 314. Thatcher's Indian Biogra- 
 phy, vol. i. p. 309. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 141 
 
 hand of an All-wise Providence in preserving the colonists 
 during their infant state from such a general league of the 
 natives, which, had it been formed at that period, must have 
 resulted in their utter extermination. 
 
 In May, 1677, Roger Williams was again elected a mem- 
 ber of the upper house of the colonial assembly, but he de- 
 clined the office. He continued, however, to watch with 
 parental solicitude over the affairs of the colony, and was 
 their counsellor in all emergencies. He was especially sen- 
 sitive to any departure from those great principles which are 
 essential to civil government as well as religious liberty. A 
 few factious persons raised objections to the payment of the ne- 
 cessary taxes, which induced him to present to his fellow- 
 citizens the following paper, entitled Considerations touching 
 Rates, many of which may be regarded as valuable civil 
 maxims : — 
 
 " I. Government and order in families, towns, &c, is the 
 ordinance of the Most High (Rom. xiii.) for the peace and 
 good of mankind. 
 
 " II. Six things are written in the hearts of all mankind, 
 yea, even in pagans: 1st, That there is a Deity; 2nd, That 
 some actions are naught ; 3rd, That the Deity will punish ; 
 4th, That there is another life ; 5th, That marriage is hon- 
 orable ; 6th, That mankind cannot keep together without 
 some government. 
 
 " IH. There is no Englishman in Ms majesty's dominions 
 or elsewhere, who is not forced to submit to government. 
 
 li IV. There is not a man in the world, except robbers, 
 pirates, and rebels, but doth submit to government. 
 
 " V. Even robbers, pirates, and rebels themselves cannot 
 hold together, but by some law among themselves and gov- 
 ernment. 
 
 " VI. One of these two great laws in the world must pre- 
 vail, — either that of judges and justices of peace in courts of 
 peace, or the law of arms, the sword and blood. 
 
142 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 " VLt. If it comes from the courts of trials of peace, to the 
 trial of the sword and blood, the conquered is forced to seek 
 law and government. 
 
 "VHI. Till matters come to a settled government, no 
 man is ordinarily sure of his house, goods, lands, cattle, wife, 
 children, or life. 
 
 " IX. Hence is that ancient maxim, It is better to live un- 
 der a tyrant in peace, than under the sword, or where every 
 man is a tyrant. 
 
 " X. His majesty sends governors to Barbadoes, Virginia, 
 &c, but to us he shows greater favor in our charter, to choose 
 whom we please. 
 
 " XL No charters are obtained without great suit, favor, 
 or charges. Our first cost a hundred pounds (though I nev- 
 er received it all) ; our second about a thousand ; Connecti- 
 cut about six thousand, &c. 
 
 " XII. No government is maintained without tribute, cus- 
 tom, rates, taxes, &c. 
 
 " Our charter excels all in New England, or in the world*, 
 as to the souls of men. 
 
 " XIV. It pleased God (Rom. xiii.) to command tribute, 
 custom, and consequently rates, not only for fear, but for 
 conscience sake. 
 
 " XV. Our rates are the least, by far, of any colony in 
 New England. 
 
 " XVI. There is no man that hath a vote in town or colo- 
 ny, but he hath a hand in making the rates by himself or his 
 deputies. 
 
 " XVH. In our colony, the general assembly, governor, 
 magistrates, deputies, towns, town-clerks, raters, constables, 
 &c, have done their duties ; the failing lies upon particular? 
 persons. 
 
 " XV HI. It is but folly to resist : (one or more, aud if 
 one, why not more ?) God hath stirred up the spirit of the 
 governor, magistrates, and officers, driven to it by necessity, 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 143 
 
 to be unanimously resolved to see the matter finished ; and 
 it is the duty of every man to maintain, encourage, and 
 strengthen the hand of authority. 
 
 " Roger Williams. 
 "Providence, 15th Jan. 1681." 
 
 On all questions of civil polity, the views of Williams were 
 enlarged, and decidedly in favor of the rights of the people. 
 He frequently states them in such passages as the following : 
 — " Kings and magistrates must be considered invested with 
 no more power than the people betrust them with." " The 
 sovereign power of all civil authority is founded in the con- 
 sent of the people/'* Though he sympathized with the pop- 
 ular party in the contests of that age, and was on terms of 
 friendship with many of its distinguished leaders, yet he ex- 
 pressed his disapprobation of some of their measures. His 
 own colony was a republic, established on the broadest foun- 
 dations of individual freedom ; but he was always a loyal 
 subject of the government at home, whether administered by 
 king, parliament, or protector. A firm friend to law and or- 
 der, he sought the essential spirit of liberty in whatever form 
 it was enshrined. 
 
 * " Bloudy Tenent,' 5 pp. 116, 243. 
 
CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 ■,'r 
 
 ECCLESIASTICAL AFFAIRS OF THE COLONY — WILLIAMS S 
 RELIGIOUS OPINIONS — HIS LABORS AS A MINISTER — 
 HIS LETTER TO GOVERNOR BRADSTREET — HIS DEATH. 
 
 In tracing the remarkable course of the subject of our nar- 
 rative, from the period of the establishment of his colony, we 
 have confined ourselves to those political and social events in 
 which he was the prime actor ; but it must not be supposed 
 that he ever merged the character of the minister and Indian 
 missionary in that of the legislator. We will now advert to 
 ecclesiastical affairs, and to the religious opinions and prac- 
 tice of Williams. 
 
 He has left us no account himself of the manner in which 
 public worship was maintained at Providence ; but we learn 
 from Governor Winthrop and others, that, on his first arri- 
 val, he was accustomed to preach both on the Sabbath and 
 on week-days. In pleasant weather the congregation are 
 said to have assembled under the shades of the forest, and at 
 other times, being few in number, they were accommodated 
 in a private habitation. There is no evidence of any imme- 
 diate ecclesiastical organization, but some of the inhabitants 
 had been members of the church at Salem, and probably still 
 regarded Williams as their pastor. As there was a diversity 
 of religious opinions among the people, he may have judged 
 it most conducive to the harmony of his little colony, at first 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 145- 
 
 to collect the whole into one assembly, until the number 
 should have increased, so as to enable them to form separate 
 societies in accordance with their own views. 
 
 In the course of two or three years, the settlement re- 
 ceived many accessions from the neighboring colonies and 
 from England, and some of these persons were inclined to 
 the opinions of the baptists. Williams embraced the same 
 views, but it was not easy for him to submit himself to the 
 ordinance as usually administered, there being no baptist 
 minister in New England. Under these circumstances^ 
 Ezekiel Holliman, a pious and gifted individual, who after- 
 wards became a minister, was selected to baptize Roger 
 Williams, and the latter then administered the ordinance to 
 Mr. Holliman and ten others. Few persons in the present 
 day, not wedded to sacerdotalism, will, under the peculiar 
 circumstances, condemn this proceeding of Williams and his 
 friends. They placed the essential value of gospel ordinan- 
 ces not in the official character of the administrator, but in 
 the spirit of the recipient. 
 
 At that time prophecy was a favorite study with many 
 good men, a predilection for which has always characterised 
 periods of religious or political excitement. The inquiries 
 of Williams appear to have taken the same direction ; and 
 he fell into the too common error of deriving the principles 
 of the christian church from the prophetic writings. Thus 
 imaginative interpretations usurped the place of the rules 
 and precedents of the Gospels and Acts of the Apostles. 
 He adopted the opinion, that the entire church had so far 
 departed from its primitive constitution, that the triumph of 
 Christ's kingdom could not be expected until a new dispen- 
 sation, resembling the apostolic, should arise. As, however, 
 little dependence can be placed on the prejudiced statements 
 of his opponents, our readers must judge of his views from 
 his own expositions, in the following passages, from his writ- 
 ings. In his " Bloudy Tenent" he says : " Thousands and 
 10 
 
146 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 ten thousands, yea, the whole generation of the righteous, 
 who (since the falling away from the first primitive state or 
 worship) have and do err fundamentally concerning the true 
 matter, constitution, gathering, and governing of the church, 
 and yet far be it from any pious breast to imagine that they 
 are not saved, and that their souls are not bound up in the 
 bundle of eternal life."* In his " Hireling Ministry" he ob- 
 serves : " In the poor small span of my life I desired to have 
 been a diligent and constant observer, and have been myself 
 in many ways engaged, in city, in country, in court, in 
 schools, in universities, in churches, in Old and New Eng- 
 land, and yet, cannot, in the holy presence of God, bring in 
 the result of a satisfying discovery, that either the begetting 
 ministry of the apostles to the nations, or the feeding and 
 nourishing ministry of pastors and teachers, according to the 
 first institutions of the Lord Jesus, are yet restored and ex- 
 tant."! In his opinion, the only ministry which existed was 
 that of prophets — i. e., teachers whose duty it was to explain 
 religious truths and bear witness against error. In a passage 
 of the same work he says : " The apostolical commission and 
 ministry is long since interrupted and discontinued; yet 
 ever since the beast antichrist arose, the Lord hath stirred 
 up the ministry of prophecy, who must continue their wit- 
 ness and prophecy until their witness be finished, and slaugh- 
 ters, probably near approaching, be accomplished." 
 
 These peculiar opinions, however, could not extinguish 
 his zeal for the conversion of men ; and in this, as well as in 
 other instances, we may observe, that if he was sometimes led 
 astray by the speculations of his head, he was restored to the 
 right path by the warmth of his heart. We have no evi- 
 dence that, after this period, he ever became officially con- 
 nected with any church. If, indeed, there had been no 
 other obstacle, his engrossing occupations in the general af- 
 
 * Bloudy Tenent of Persecution, p. 20. 
 t Hireling Ministry none of Christ's, p. 4. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. U7 
 
 fairs of the colony would have rendered it unsuitable. From 
 his first settlement in Providence, however, to the close of 
 his life, he continued frequently to preach the gospel to the 
 ignorant and destitute around him. He made laudable at- 
 tempts to instruct the Narragansett Indians ; and, when he 
 was more than three-score years and ten, continued his 
 monthly visits to preach to them and the English in that dis- 
 trict. A tribe of these Indians, called the Nianticks, were 
 objects of his peculiar care, and they would listen to him 
 when they would hear no one else. They were so far influ- 
 enced by his ministerial labors that they took no part in 
 Philip's war. A remnant of this once powerful people still 
 continue to reside in their original place of abode, in the 
 south-west part of Ehode Island, on lands settled upon them 
 by the state, where, civilized and christianized, they remain 
 a living monument of the zeal and benevolence of Roffer 
 Williams. 
 
 When very near the close of his life, he occupied his lei- 
 sure in preparing the discourses which he had delivered dur- 
 ing his missionary efforts, as will appear from the following- 
 letter. It derives peculiar interest from being the last pro- 
 duction of his pen which has been preserved : 
 
 " to my much-honored, kind friend, the governor 
 Bradstreet, at Boston. 
 
 " Providence, May 6th, 1682. 
 " Sir, — This enclosed tells you that, being old and weak, 
 and bruised (with rupture and colic), and lameness on both 
 my feet, I am directed, by the Father of our spirits, to de- 
 sire to attend his infinite Majesty with a poor mite (which 
 makes but two farthings). By my fire-side I have recollect- 
 ed the discourses which (by many tedious journeys), I have 
 had with the scattered English at Narragansett, before the war 
 and since. I have reduced them unto those twenty-two 
 heads (enclosed), which is near thirty sheets of my writing. 
 
148 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 I would send them to the Narragansetts and others : there is 
 no controversy in them ; only an endeavor of a particular 
 match of each poor sinner to his Maker. For [the expense 
 of] printing, I am forced to write to my friends at Massa- 
 chusetts, Connecticut, Plymouth, and our own colony, that 
 he that hath a shilling and a heart to countenance such a 
 soul work may trust the great Paymaster (who is beforehand 
 with us already)for an hundredth for one in this life. . . . 
 
 " Sir, I shall humbly wait for your advice where it may be 
 best printed — at Boston or Cambridge — and for how much, 
 the printer finding paper. We have tidings here of Shafts- 
 bury's and Howard's beheading — and, contrarily, their re- 
 release ; London manifestations of joy ; and the king's call- 
 ing a parliament. But all these are but sublunaries, tempo- 
 raries, and trivials. Eternity, O eternity ! is our business ; 
 to which end I am most unworthy to be 
 
 " Your willing and faithful servant, 
 
 " Eoger Williams. 
 
 " My humble respects to Mrs. Bradstreet, and other hon- 
 ored friends." 
 
 The preceding letter affords additional proof of the wri- 
 ter's disinterested benevolence and self-denying spirit. With 
 ample opportunities of enriching himself — to use the words 
 of his son — " he gave away his lands and other estate to them 
 that he thought were most in want, until he gave away all."* 
 His property, his time, and his talents, were devoted to the 
 promotion of the temporal and spiritual welfare of mankind, 
 and in conducting to a glorous issue the struggle to unloose 
 " the bonds of the captive daughter of Zion." 
 
 The last public act of Williams was to sign a document, 
 which bears date January 16, 1683, settling a dispute rela- 
 tive to the boundaries between the Providence lands and 
 those of an adjacent township. 
 
 * Letter of Daniel Williams to the town of Providence, dated August 24 
 1710. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 149 
 
 Having now accompanied this great man through all the 
 •events of liis remarkable career — from his youth until the 
 last year of his life — we should rejoice to go with him, step 
 by step, through the brief remainder of his pilgrimage — to 
 listen to the accumulated wisdom of years — to hear his ad- 
 monitions to his children, and to his fellow-citizens — his esti- 
 mate of the importance of the great principles for which he 
 had contended, in the near view of the final judgment — and 
 of his triumphant faith, as he stood upon the brink of the 
 river of death ; bnt on these points history is silent. We 
 are furnished only with a brief record of his death, related 
 in a manner which would lead us to suppose he was spared 
 the sufferings of lengthened illness, and called rather sud- 
 denly from his long service to his eternal reward. On the 
 10th of the following May, Mr. John Thornton, of Provi- 
 dence, wrote to the E-ev. Samuel Hubbard of Boston : — 
 "The Lord hath arrested by death our ancient and approved 
 friend, Mr. Roger Williams, with divers others here." " He 
 was buried/' says Callender, " with all the solemnity the col- 
 ony was able to show." His remains were interred in a spot 
 which he himself had selected, on his own land, a short dis- 
 tance from the place where, forty-seven years before, he 
 first set his foot in the wilderness. He had nearly attained 
 four score, being in the seventy-eighth year of his age. His 
 excellent wife survived him, and, as far as can be ascertained, 
 the whole of his family, consisting of six children. His lin- 
 eal descendants are numerous, and may justly rejoice in the 
 diffusion alike cf the fame and of the principles of their an- 
 cestor. 
 
CHAPTER XVm. 
 
 GENERAL ESTIMATE OF HIS CHARACTER — SPREAD OF HIS 
 GREAT PRINCIPLE — CONCLUDING OBSERVATIONS. 
 
 Having, in the preceding pages, made Williams, to a great 
 extent, his own biographer, an elaborate portraiture here is 
 unnecessary. The reader must have observed in his charac- 
 ter that harmony between the mental and moral qualities 
 which is essential to true greatness, and to the influence ne- 
 cessary for a reformer ; since the virtues of the man will 
 predispose to the favorable reception of his new opinions. 
 The powers of his mind were strong and original ; and what 
 he accomplished in the sphere he occupied, sufficiently indi- 
 cates what he might have done on a larger theatre. His 
 Writings manifest a lively imagination and vigorous reason- 
 ing powers ; and though his style is disfigured by the defects 
 common to the period, it occasionally rises into beauty and 
 eloquence. 
 
 His moral qualities were of the highest order. Inflexible 
 integrity, undaunted courage, and prompt decision, marked 
 all his conduct. In his pecuniary transactions, his disinter- 
 estedness was carried to an extreme, since he may be said to 
 have given to his fellow-citizens valuable tracts of land, which 
 strictly belonged to himself and his family. Every man, of 
 whatever clime, or color, or condition, he regarded as a 
 brother. In all the relations of domestic and social life, his 
 conduct was most exemplary. 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 151 
 
 Over his whole course his piety shed a hallo-wed lustre. 
 In him it was a permanent, living principle, as his publica- 
 tions and letters abundantly prove. In this testimony his 
 friends and his opponents unite. Even the prejudiced Cot- 
 ton Mather confesses, that "in many things he acquitted 
 himself so laudably, that many judicious persons judged him 
 to have had the root of the matter in him." Hubbard, who 
 was a contemporary, says, " Mr. Williams was a godly and 
 zealous preacher." Callender, one of the best authorities on 
 this subject, observes, " Mr. Williams appears, by the whole 
 course and tenor of his life and conduct here, to have been 
 one of the most disinterested men that ever lived — a most 
 pious and heavenly-minded soul." His forgiving spirit ; his 
 fervent devotion ; his energetic, vigilant, and untiring ef- 
 forts in the cause of humanity, demonstrate that he was an 
 eminent christian. We may regard it is an additional evi- 
 dence of his consistent piety, that the only charge his oppo- 
 nents have brought against him was a fondness for new opin- 
 ions, which they have employed in order to discredit his 
 great principle — the supremacy of conscience. Now it is of 
 great importance, in estimating religious character, to in- 
 quire whether a man changes his principles, or only his opin- 
 ions on non-essential points. If he is continually sliding off 
 from the basis of faith and salvation, even though he at last 
 return to saving truth, our confidence in the soundness of 
 his head and heart must be shaken. But this was not the 
 case with Wiliams. From the beginning to the end of his 
 course he never swerved from the great evangelical doctrines 
 of the gospel, defending them by his writings, and illustrating 
 them by the appropriate fruits of a holy life. 
 
 With respect to changes of opinion, one of two things 
 must be admitted ; either that all christians have received 
 the whole of scriptural truth already, or that, in attaining to 
 it, they must give up some old opinions. Those men of 
 penetrating understandings, who have been led to renounce 
 
152 LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 
 
 error and to discover new truths, have rarely avoided ming- 
 ling some chaff with the wheat, of which we many examples 
 at the Reformation. The subject of this narrative, like most 
 men of an ardent and speculative temperament, sometimes 
 pushed his reasonings so far as to lead to false conclusions ; 
 but he was a sincere lover of truth, and nothing could pre- 
 vent him from carrying out his earnest convictions. 
 
 That noble principle, which is the pillar of his fame, has 
 now been sufficiently tested. More than two centuries have 
 elapsed since his colony was founded. It has passed from 
 the protection of England to an independent state, forming 
 an integral part of a great republic ; but in all changes it has 
 preserved religious freedom unimpaired. In Rhode Island, 
 no man has ever been molested on account of his religious 
 opinions ; and civil officers, from the highest to the lowest, 
 have been chosen without regard to denomination. The 
 happy results have been apparent in the harmony existing 
 among the different sects, as well as in the liberal support 
 given to public worship and to religious institutions. In no 
 part of the world is the proportion of churches to the popu- 
 lation greater than in this state. 
 
 English travellers who have spoken favorably of the ex- 
 ample presented in the New World of religion, unsupported 
 by the state, have frequently qualified their approbation on 
 the ground that the experiment has been too short to afford 
 conclusive evidence. Probably many of these gentlemen 
 did not know that there was one state, at least, to which this 
 objection cannot apply. Two hundred and sixteen years are, 
 surely, long enough to judge of the results of any system. 
 Protestantism itself can boast of only one century more ! 
 
 It has proved to be an expansive system. The leaven, at 
 first hidden in one small territory, gradually extended itself 
 until Virginia, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and other states, 
 where episcopalianism or Congregationalism was established 
 by law, were penetrated by its influence. The last link 
 
LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 153 
 
 which bound religion to the state was burst asunder by Mas- 
 sachusetts in 1833, and every part of the union has now 
 adopted that great truth which occasioned the persecution 
 and banishment of Roger Williams. 
 
 Thus his principles have received a wide illustration, and 
 his name its noblest memorial. And when the system of 
 Rhode Island shall spread over the whole of Christendom, as 
 we believe it is destined to do, the founder of that state will 
 be remembered as one of its chief confessors. The approach 
 of that period is indicated by the signs of the times ; and 
 every Christian should endeavor, by effort and prayer, to . 
 accelerate its progress. It will be the harbinger of that long- 
 expected and glorious era, when anti-christ in all its forms 
 shall fall, and the triumphs of the church of Christ be uni- 
 versal and complete ! 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 No. I.— (P. 49.) 
 
 An extract from the following letter lias already been given 
 in the work. The remainder is here added, as presenting 
 some interesting traits in the character of Williams, as well 
 as of the circumstances of the colonies. Major Mason was 
 distinguished for his services in the Pequod war. He was 
 major-general of the Connecticut forces, deputy-governor of 
 that colony, &c. 
 
 "Providence, June 22, 1670. 
 
 " Major Mason, — My honored, dear, and ancient friend, 
 my due respects and earnest desires to God for your eternal 
 peace, &c. 
 
 " I crave your leave and patience to present you with 
 some few considerations, occasioned by the late transactions 
 between your colony and ours. The last year you were 
 pleased, in one of your hues to me, to tell me that you longed 
 to see my face once more before you died. I embraced your 
 love, though I feared my old lame bones, and yours, had ar- 
 rested travelling in this world, and therefore I was, and am, 
 ready to lay hold, on all occasions, of writing, as I do at pre- 
 sent. 
 
 " The occasion, I confess, is sorrowful, because I see your- 
 selves, with others, embarked in a resolution to invade and 
 
158 APPENDIX. 
 
 despoil your poor countrymen in a wilderness, and your an- 
 cient friends of our temporal and soul liberties. 
 
 "It is sorrowful, also, because mine eye beholds a black 
 and doleful train of grievous, and, I fear, bloody consequen- 
 ces at the heel of this business, both to you and us. The 
 Lord is righteous in all our afflictions, — that is a maxim ; 
 the Lord is gracious to all oppressed, — that is another ; he 
 is most gracious to the soul that cries and waits on him ; that 
 is silver, tried in the fire, seven times. 
 
 " Sir, I am not out of hopes but that, while your aged eyes 
 and mine are yet in their orbs, we shall leave our friends 
 and countrymen, our children and relations, and this land, in 
 peace behind us. To this end, sir, please you, with a calm, 
 and steady, and a christian hand, to hold the balance, and to 
 weigh these few considerations, in much love and due res- 
 pect presented 
 
 " When, the next year after my banishment, the Lord 
 drew the bow of the Pequod war against the country, in 
 which, sir, the Lord made yourself, with others, a blessed in- 
 strument of peace, to all New England, I had my share of 
 service to the whole land in that Pequod business, inferior to 
 very few that acted 
 
 " I marched up with General Stoughton and the English 
 forces to the Narragansett sachems, and brought my country- 
 men, and the barbarians, sachems and captains, to a mutual 
 confidence and complacency, each in other. 
 
 " Though I was ready to have marched further, yet, upon 
 agreement that I should keep at Providence, as an agent 
 between the bay and the army, I returned, and was inter- 
 preter and intelligencer, constantly receiving and sending 
 letters to the governor and council at Boston, &c, in which 
 work I judge it no impertinent digression to recite (out of 
 the many scores of letters, at times, from Mr. Winthrop), 
 this one pious and heavenly prophecy, touching all New 
 England, of that gallant man; viz., ' If the Lord turn away 
 
APPENDIX. 159 
 
 liis face from our sins, and bless our endeavors and yours, 
 at this time against our bloody enemy, we and our children 
 shall long enjoy peace in this our wilderness condition/ 
 And himself and some other of the council motioned, and it 
 was debated, whether or no I had not merited, not only to 
 be recalled from banishment, but also to be honored with 
 some remark of favor. It is known who hindered, who 
 never promoted, the liberty of other men's consciences. 
 These things, and ten times more, I could relate, to show 
 that I am not a stranger to the Pequod wars and lands, and 
 possibly not far from the merit of a foot of land in either 
 country which I have not. 
 
 " Considering (upon frequent exceptions against Provi- 
 dence men) that we had no authority for civil government, 
 I went purposely to England, and upon my report and pe- 
 tition the parliament granted us a charter of government for 
 these parts, so judged vacant on all hands. And upon this, 
 the country about us was more friendly, and wrote to us, and 
 treated us as an authorized colony ; only the difference of our 
 consciences much obstructed. The bounds of this our first 
 charter, I (having occular knowledge of persons, places, and 
 transactions) did honestly and conscientiously, as in the holy 
 presence of God, draw up from Pawcatuck river, which I 
 then believed, and still do, is free from all English claims and 
 conquests; for although there were some Pequods on this 
 side the river, who, by reason of some sachems' marriages 
 with some on this side, lived in a kind of neutrality with 
 both sides, yet, upon the breaking out of the war, they relin- 
 quished their land to the possession of their enemies, the 
 Narragansetts and Nianticks, and their land never came into 
 the condition of the lands on the other side, which the Eng- 
 lish, by conquest, challenged ; so that I must still affirm, as 
 in God's holy presence, I tenderly waived to touch a foot of 
 land in which I knew the Pequod wars were maintained and 
 were properly Pequod, being a gallant country ; and from 
 
160 APPENDIX. 
 
 Pawcatuck river hitherward, being but a patch of ground, 
 full of troublesome inhabitants, I did, as I judged, inoffen- 
 sively, draw our poor and inconsiderable line. 
 
 " It is true, when at Portsmouth, on Rhode Island, some 
 of ours, in a general assembly, motioned their planting on 
 this side Pawcatuck. I, hearing that some of the Massachu- 
 setts reckoned this land theirs, by conquest, dissuaded from 
 the motion, until the matter should be amicably debated and 
 composed ; for though I questioned not our right, &c, yet I 
 feared it would be inexpedient and offensive, and procrea- 
 tive of these heats and fires, to the dishonoring of the king's 
 majesty, and the dishonoring and blaspheming of God and 
 of religion in the eyes of the English and barbarians about 
 us. 
 
 " Some time after the Pequod war and our charter from 
 the parliament, the government of Massachusetts wrote to 
 myself (then chief officer in this colony), of their receiving 
 of a patent from the parliament for these vacant lands, as 
 an addition to the Massachusetts, &c, and thereupon request- 
 ing me to exercise no more authority, &c, for, they wrote, 
 their charter was granted some few weeks before ours. I 
 returned, what I believe, righteous and weighty, to the hands 
 of my true friend, Mr. Winthrop, the first mover of my com- 
 ing into these parts, and to that answer of mine I never re- 
 ceived the least reply ; only it is certain that, at Mr. Gor- 
 ton's complaint against the Massachusetts, the lord high 
 admiral, president, said openly, in a full meeting of the 
 commissioners, that he knew no other charter for these parts 
 than what Mr. Williams had obtained, and he was sure that 
 charter, which the Massachusetts Englishmen pretended, had 
 never passed the table. 
 
 " Upon our humble address by our agent, Mr. Clarke, to 
 his majesty, and his gracious promise of renewing our former 
 charter, Mr. Winthrop, upon some mistake, had entrenched 
 upon our line, and not only so, but, as it is said, upon the 
 
APPENDIX. 161 
 
 lines of other charters also. Upon Mr. Clarke's complaint 
 your grant was called in again, and it had never been re- 
 turned ; but upon a report that the agents, Mr. Winthrop 
 and Mr. Clarke, were agreed, by mediation of friends (and, 
 it is true, they came to a solemn agreement, under hands 
 and seals), which agreement was never violated on our part. 
 
 " But the king's majesty sending his commissioners (among 
 other of his royal purposes) to reconcile the differences of, 
 and to settle the bounds between, the colonies, yourselves 
 know how the king himself, therefore, hath given a decision 
 to this controversy. Accordingly, the king's majesty's afore- 
 said commissioners at Rhode Island (where, as a commission- 
 er for this colony, I transacted with them, as did also com- 
 missioners from Plymouth), they composed a controversy 
 between Plymouth and us, and settled the bounds between 
 us, in which we rest. 
 
 " However you satisfy yourselves with the Pequod con- 
 quest ; with the sealing of your charter some few weeks be- 
 fore ours ; with the complaints of particular men to your 
 colony ; yet, upon a due and serious examination of the 
 matter, in the sight of God, you will find the business at bot- 
 tom to be, 
 
 " 1. A depraved appetite after the great vanities, dreams, 
 and shadows of this vanishing life, great portions of land, 
 land in this wilderness, as if men were in as great necessity 
 and danger for want of great portions of land, as poor, hun- 
 gry, thirsty seaman have, after a sick and stormy, a long and 
 starving passage. This is one of the Gods of New England, 
 which the living and most high Eternal will destroy and 
 famish. 
 
 " 2. An unneighborly and unchristian intrusion upon us, 
 as being the weaker, contrary to your laws as well as ours, 
 concerning purchases of lands without the consent of the 
 general court. This I told Major Atherton, at his first going 
 up to the Narragansett about this business. I refused ail 
 11 
 
162 APPENDIX. 
 
 their proffers of land, and refused to interpret for theni to 
 the sachems. 
 
 " 3. From these violations and intrusions arise the com- 
 plaint of many privateers, not dealing as they would be dealt 
 with, according to law of nature, — the law of the proph- 
 ets and Christ Jesus, — complaining against others in a de= 
 si<m, when they themselves are delinquents and wrong-doers, 
 I could aggravate this many ways with scripture rhetoric 
 and similitudes, but I see need of anodynes (as physicians 
 speak) and not of irritations. Only this I must crave leave 
 to say, that it looks like a prodigy or monster, that country- 
 men among savages in a wilderness — that professors of God, 
 and of one Mediator, and of an eternal life, and that this is 
 like a dream — should not be content with those vast and 
 large tracts which all the other colonies have (like platters 
 and tables full of dainties), but pull and snatch away their 
 poor neighbors' bit or crust ; and a crust it is, and a dry, 
 hard one, too, because of the natives' continued trouble^ 
 trials, and vexations. 
 
 " Alas ! sir, in calm, midnight thoughts, what are these 
 leaves and flowers, and smoke and shadows, and dreams of 
 earthly nothings, about which we poor fools and children, as 
 David saith, disquiet ourselves in vain ? Alas ! what is all 
 the scuffling of this world for, but, come, will you smoke it ? 
 What are all the contentions and wars of this world about, 
 generally, but for greater dishes and bowls of porridge, of 
 which, if we believe God's Spirit in Scripture, Esau and Ja- 
 cob were types ? Esau will part with the heavenly birth- 
 right for his supping, after his hunting, for god belly ; and 
 Jacob will part with his porridge for an eternal inheritance. 
 O Lord, give me to make Jacob's and Mary's choice, which 
 shall never be taken from me. 
 
 " How much sweeter is the counsel of the Son of God, to 
 mind, first, the matters of his kingdom, — to take no care for 
 o-morrow, — to pluck out, cut off, and fling away, right eyes, 
 
APPENDIX. 16S-. 
 
 hands, and feet, rather than to be cast whole into hell-fire ; 
 to consider the ravens and the lilies, whom a heavenly Fa- 
 ther so clothes and feeds; and the counsel of his servant 
 Paul, to roll our cares, for this life also, upon the most high 
 Lord, steward of his people, the eternal God ; to be content 
 with food and raiment ; to mind not our own, but every man 
 the things of another ; yea, and to suffer wrong, and part 
 with that we judge is right, yea, our lives, and (as poor wo- 
 men-martyrs have said) as many as there be hairs upon our 
 heads, for the name of God and the Son of God his sake. 
 This is humanity, yea, this is Christianity. The rest is but 
 formality and picture, courteous idolatry, and Jewish and 
 Popish blasphemy against the christian religion, the Father 
 of spirits, and his Son the Lord Jesus. Besides, sir, the mat- 
 ter with us is not about these children's toys of land, mead- 
 ows, cattle, government, &c. But here, all over this colony, 
 a great number of weak and distressed souls, scattered, are 
 flying hither from Old and New England, the Most High 
 and Only Wise hath, in his infinite wisdom, provided this 
 country and this corner as a shelter for the poor and perse- 
 cuted, according to their several persuasions. And thus that 
 heavenly man, Mr. Haynes, governor of Connecticut, though 
 he pronounced the sentence of my long banishment against 
 me, at Cambridge, then Newtown, yet said unto me, in his 
 own house at Hartford, being then in some difference with 
 the Bay : ' I think, Mr. Williams, I must now confess to you, 
 that the most wise God hath provided and cut out this part 
 of his world for a refuge and receptacle for all sorts of con- 
 sciences. I am now under a cloud, and my brother Hooker, 
 with the Bay, as you have been ; we have removed from 
 them thus far, and yet they are not satisfied.' 
 
 " Thus, sir, the king's majesty, though his father's and his 
 own conscience favored lord bishops, which their father and 
 grandfather King James — whom I have spoke with — sore 
 against his will, also did, yet all the world may see, by his 
 
164 APPENDIX. 
 
 majesty's declarations and engagements before Ms return, 
 and his declarations and parliament speeches since, and many 
 suitable actings, how the Father of spirits hath mightily im- 
 pressed and touched his royal spirit, though the bishops much 
 disturbed him, with deep inclination of favor and gentleness 
 to different consciences and apprehensions, as to the invisi- 
 ble King and way of his worship. Hence he hath vouch- 
 safed his royal promise under his hand and broad seal, that 
 no person in this colony shall be molested or questioned for 
 the matters of his conscience to God, so he be loyal and keep 
 the civil peace. Sir, we must part with lives and land be- 
 fore we part with such a jewel. I judge you may yield some 
 land and the government of it to us, and we, for peace sake, 
 the like to you, as being but subjects to one king, &c, and I 
 think the king's majesty would thank us, for many reasons. 
 But to part with this jewel, we may as soon do it as the Jews 
 with the favor of Cyrus, Darius and Artaxerxes. Your- 
 selves pretend liberty of conscience, but, alas ! it is but self, 
 the great god self, only to yourselves. The king's majesty 
 winks at Barbadoes, where Jews, and all sorts of Christian 
 and antichristian persuasions are free ; but our grant, some 
 few weeks after yours sealed, though granted as soon, if not 
 before yours, is crowned with the king's extraordinary favor 
 to this colony, as being a banished one, in which his majesty 
 ■ declared himself that he would experiment, whether civil 
 government could consist with such liberty of conscience. 
 This his majesty's grant was startled at by his majesty's high 
 officers of state, who were to view it in course before the seal- 
 ing ; but, fearing the lion's roaring, they couched, against 
 their wills, in obedience to his majesty's pleasure. 
 
 " Some of yours, as I heard lately, told tales to the arch- 
 bishop of Canterbury; viz., that we are a profane people, 
 and do not keep the Sabbath, but some do plough, &c. But, 
 first, you told him not how we suffer freely all other persua- 
 • sions, yea, the common prayer, which yourselves will not 
 
APPENDIX. 165" 
 
 suffer. If you say you will, you confess you must suffer 
 more, as we do. 
 
 " 2. You know this is but a color to your design, for, first, 
 you know that all England itself (after the formality and su- 
 perstition of morning and evening prayer) play away their 
 Sabbath. 2nd. You know yourselves do not keep the Sab- 
 bath, that is, the seventh day, &c. 
 
 " 3. You know that famous Calvin, and thousands more, 
 held it but ceremonial and figurative, from Colossians ii., &c, 
 and vanished ; and that the day of worship was alterable at 
 the church's pleasure. Thus, also, all the Romanists confess t 
 saying, viz., that there is no express scripture, first, for in- 
 fant's baptisms ; nor, second, for abolishing the seventh day, 
 instituting the eighth day of worship, but that it is at the 
 church's pleasure. 
 
 " 4. You know that, generally, all this whole colony ob- 
 serve the first day, only here and there one out of conscience, 
 another out of covetousness, make no conscience of it. 
 
 " 5. You know the greatest part of the world make no con- 
 science of a seventh day. The next part of the world, 
 Turks, Jews, and Christians, keep three different days — Fri- 
 day, Saturday, Sunday — for their Sabbath and day of wor- 
 ship ; and every one maintains his own by the longest sword. 
 
 " 6. I have offered, and do, by these presents, to discuss 
 by disputation, writing or printing, among other points of 
 differences, these three positions : first, that forced worship 
 stinks in God's nostrils. 2nd. That it denies Christ Jesus 
 yet to be come, and makes the church yet national, figura- 
 tive, and ceremonial. 3rd. That in these flames about re- 
 ligion, as his majesty, his father, and grandfather have yield- 
 ed, there is no other prudent, christian way of preserving 
 peace in the world, but by permission of differing conscien- 
 ces. Accordingly, I do now offer to dispute these points and 
 other points of difference, if you please, at Hartford, Boston, 
 and Plymouth. For the manner of the dispute and the dis- 
 
166 APPENDIX. 
 
 cussion, if you think fit, one whole day each month in sum- 
 mer, at each place, by course, I am ready, if the Lord per- 
 mit, and, as I humbly hope, assist me. 
 
 "It is said, that you intend not to invade our spiritual or 
 civil liberties, but only (under the advantage of first sealing 
 your charter (to right the privateers that petition to you. It 
 is said, also, that if you had but Mishquomacuck and Narra- 
 gansett lands quietly yielded, you would stop at Cowesit, &c. 
 Oh, sir, what do these thoughts preach, but that private cab- 
 ins rule all, whatever become of the ship of common safety 
 and religion, which is so much pretended in New England ? 
 Sir, I have heard further, and by some that say they know, 
 that something deeper than all which hath been mentioned 
 lies in the three colonies' breasts and consultations. I judge 
 it not fit to commit such matter to the trust of paper, &c, 
 but only beseech the Father of spirits to guide our poor be- 
 wildered spirits, for his name and mercy sake. 
 
 " Whereas our case seems to be the case of Paul appealing 
 to Ca?sar against the plots of his religious, zealous adversa- 
 ries. I hear you pass not our petitions and appeals to his 
 majesty, for partly you think the king will not own a profane 
 people that do not keep the Sabbath ; partly you think the 
 king an incompetent judge, but you will force him to law al- 
 so, to confirm your first-born Esau, though Jacob had him 
 by the heels, and in God's holy time must carry the birth- 
 right and inheritance. I judge your surmise is a dangerous 
 mistake ; for patents, grants, and charters, and such like roy- 
 al favors, are not laws of England and acts of parliament, 
 nor matters of propriety and meum and tuum between the 
 king and his subjects, which, as the times have been, have 
 been sometimes triable in inferior courts ; but such kind of 
 grants have been like high offices in England, of high hon- 
 or, and ten, yea, twenty thousand pounds gain per annum, 
 yet revocable or curtable upon pleasure, according to the 
 king's better information or upon his majesty's sight, or mis- 
 
APPENDIX. 167 
 
 behavior, in gratefulness, or designs fraudulently plotted, 
 private and distinct from him. 
 
 " Sir, I lament that such designs should be carried on at 
 such a time, while we are stripped and whipped, and are still 
 under (the whole country) the dreadful rods of God, in our 
 wheat, hay, corn, cattle, shipping, trading, bodies, and lives ; 
 when on the other side of the water, all sorts of consciences 
 (yours and ours) are frying in the bishops' pan and furnace ; 
 when the French and Romish Jesuits, the firebrands of the 
 world for their god belly sake, are kindling at our back, in 
 this country, especially with the Mohawks and Mohegans, 
 against us, of which I know and have daily information. 
 
 " If any please to say, is there no medicine for this mala- 
 dy ? Must the nakedness of New England, like some noto- 
 rious strumpet, be prostituted to the blaspheming eyes of all 
 nations ? Must we be put to plead before his majesty, and 
 consequently the lord bishops, our common enemies, &c. ? 
 I answer, the Father of mercies and God of all consolations 
 hath graciously discovered to me, as I believe, a remedy, which, 
 if taken, will quiet all minds, yours and ours ; will keep yours 
 and ours in quiet possession and enjoyment of their lands, 
 which you all have so dearly bought and purchased in this 
 barbarous country, and so long possessed amongst these wild 
 savages ; will preserve you both in the liberties and honors 
 of your charters and governments, without the least impeach- 
 ment of yielding one to another ; with a strong curb also to 
 those wild barbarians and all the barbarians of this country, 
 without troubling of compromisers and arbitrators between 
 you ; without any delay, or long and chargeable and griev- 
 ous address to our king's majesty, whose gentle and serene 
 soul must needs be afflicted to be troubled again with us. If 
 you please to ask me what my prescription is, I will not put 
 you off to christian moderation, or christian humility, or 
 christian prudence, or christian love, or christian self-denial, 
 <?r christian contention or patience. For I design a civil, a 
 
168 APPENDIX. 
 
 humane, and political medicine, which, if the God of heaven 
 please to bless, you will find it effectual to all the ends I 
 have proposed. Only I must crave your pardon, both par- 
 ties of you, if I judge it not fit to discover it at present. I 
 know you are both of you hot ; I fear myself, also. If both 
 desire, in a loving and calm spirit, to enjoy your rights, I 
 promise you, with God's help, to help you to them, in a fair, 
 and sweet, and easy way. My receipt will not please you 
 all. If it should so please God to frown upon us that you 
 should not like it, I can but humbly mourn, and say with the 
 prophet, that which must perish, must perish. And as to 
 myself, in endeavoring after your temporal and spiritual 
 peace, I humbly desire to say, if I perish I perish. It is but 
 a shadow vanished, a bubble broke, a dream finished. Eter- 
 nity will pay for all. 
 
 " Sir, I am your old and true friend and servant, 
 
 « R. W."* 
 
 • * Mass. Hist. Coll. vol. i. 
 
APPENDIX. 169 
 
 No. II.— Letter of Sir Henry Vane.— (P. 115.) 
 
 The reader will have noticed the warm friendship, and 
 the coincidence of opinion on religions freedom, existing be- 
 tween Roger Williams and Sir Henry Vane. It has been 
 remarked by a distinguished historian, Sir James Mackin- 
 tosh,* that the latter was " the first who laid down, with per- 
 fect precision, the inviolable rights of conscience, and the 
 exemption of religion from all civil authority." Sir James 
 had probably never seen Williams's " Bloudy Tenent," 
 which was published twelve years before Sir Henry Vane's 
 " Healing Question propounded and resolved," &c. In the 
 last mentioned work, copies of which are now rare, Sir Hen- 
 ry, after having stated that the great design of the honest 
 party was " to restore to the whole body their natural rights 
 in civil things," makes the following striking observations on 
 " true freedom in matters of conscience :" — 
 
 ' : The second branch which remains briefly to be handled, 
 is that which also, upon the grounds of natural right, is to be 
 laid claim unto ; but distinguishes itself from the former, as 
 it respects a more heavenly and excellent object, wherein 
 the freedom is to be exercised and enjoyed ; that is to say, 
 matters of religion, or that concern the service and worship 
 of God. 
 
 " Unto this freedom the nations of the world have right 
 and title, by the purchase of Christ's blood, who, by virtue 
 of his death and resurrection, is become the sole Lord and 
 Ruler in and over the conscience ; for to this end Christ 
 
 * View of the Reign of James II., p. 166. 
 
1 70 APPENDIX. 
 
 died, rose, and revived, that lie might be Lord both of the 
 dead and of the living, and that every one might give an ac- 
 count of himself in all matters of God's worship, unto God 
 and Christ alone, as their own Master, unto whom they stand 
 or fall in judgment, and are not in these things to be op- 
 pressed, or brought before the judgment-seat of men. For 
 why shouldest thou set at nought thy brother in matters of 
 his faith and conscience, and herein intrude into the proper 
 office of Christ, since we are all to stand at the judgment- 
 seat of Christ, whether governors or governed, and by his 
 decision only are capable of being declared, with certainty, 
 to be in the right or in the wrong ? 
 
 " By virtue, then, of this supreme law, sealed and con- 
 firmed in the blood of Christ unto all men (whose souls he 
 challenges a propriety in, to bring under his inward rule in 
 the service and worship of God), it is that all magistrates 
 are to fear and forbear intermeddling with, giving rule or 
 imposing in those matters. They are to content themselves 
 with what is plain in their commission, as ordained of God 
 to be his ministers unto men for good, whilst they approve 
 themselves the doers of that which is good in the sight of 
 men, and whereof earthly and worldly judicatures are capa- 
 ble to make a clear and perfect judgment ; in which case the 
 magistrate is to be for praise and protection to them. In 
 like manner he is to be a minister of terror and revenge to 
 those that do evil in matters of outward practice, converse, 
 and dealings in the things of this life hetween man and man, 
 for the cause whereof the judicatures of men are appointed 
 and set up. But to exceed these limits, as it is not safe nor 
 warrantable for the magistrate (in that He who is higher 
 than the highest regards, and will show himself displeased at 
 it), so neither is it good for the people, who hereby are 
 nourished up in a biting, devouring, wrathful spirit one 
 against another, and are found transgressors of that royal 
 law which forbids us to do that unto another, which we 
 would not have them do unto us, were we in their condition. 
 
APPENDIX. 171 
 
 ° This freedom, then, is of high concern to be had and en- 
 joyed, as well for the magistrate's sake as for the people's 
 common good, and it consists, as hath been, in the magis- 
 trate's forbearing to put forth the power of rule and coercion 
 in tilings that God hath exempted out of his commission, so 
 that all care requisite for the people's obtaining this may be 
 exercised with great ease, if it be taken in its proper season ; 
 and that this restraint be laid upon the supreme power be- 
 fore it be erected, as a fundamental constitution, among 
 others, upon which the free consent of the people is given, to 
 have the persons brought into the exercise of supreme au- 
 thority over them, and on their behalf; and if, besides, as a 
 further confirmation hereunto, it be acknowledged the vol- 
 untary act of the ruling power, when once brought into a 
 capacity of acting legislatively, that herein they are bound 
 up, and judge it their duty so to be (both in reference to 
 God, the institutor of magistracy, and in reference to the 
 whole body by whom they are entrusted), this great blessing 
 will hereby be so well provided for, that we shall have no 
 cause to fear, as it may be ordered. 
 
 " By this means a great part of the outward exercise of 
 antichristian tyranny and bondage will be plucked up by the 
 very roots, which, till some such course be held in it, will be 
 always apt to renew and sprout out afresh, under some new 
 form or refined appearances, as by late years experience we 
 have been taught. For, since the fall of the bishops and 
 persecuting presbyteries, the same spirit is apt to arise in 
 the next sort of clergy that can get the ear of the magistrate, 
 and pretend to the keeping and ruling the conscience of the 
 governors. Although this spirit and practice hath all along 
 been decried by the faithful adherents to this cause, as a 
 most sore oppression and insufferable yoke of bondage, most 
 unrighteously kept up over the consciences of the people, 
 and therefore judged by them most needful to be taken out 
 of the way." — A Healing Question propounded and resolved, 
 
172 APPENDIX. 
 
 upon occasion of the late public and seasonable Call to Hu- 
 miliation, in order to love and union amongst the honest party, 
 and with desire to apply balsam to the wound before it be- 
 comes incurable. By Henry Vane, knight. Pp. 5 — 8. 4to. 
 London, 1656. 
 
APPENDIX. 173 
 
 No. Ill— (P. 124.) 
 
 The following is an abridgment of the genealogy of the 
 Cromwell family, taken from the " London Review," for 
 March, 1772. 
 
 This genealogy was extracted from Welsh chronicles, 
 about the year 1602, to show the descent of Sir Henry 
 Cromwell, who was then living. It commences in the per- 
 son of Glothyan, fifth lord of Powes, who married Morpeth, 
 daughter and heiress of Edwin ap Tydwall, lord of Cardigan, 
 who was descended from Cavedig, from whom the county of 
 Cardigan took the name of Cavedigion. His son, Gwaith 
 Voyd, was lord of Cardigan, Powes, Gwayte, and Gwayne- 
 saye. He died about 1066. 
 
 From Gwynstan ap Gwaith, seconci son of the above 
 Gwaith Voyd, was lineally descended, through about thir- 
 teen generations, or in about four hundred and forty years, 
 Morgan Williams, who, in the reign of Henry VEX, mar- 
 ried the sister of Thomas Cromwell. This Morgan Williams 
 had a son, Richard, who was knighted by Henry VHL, not 
 by the name of Williams, but by the name of Cromwell, af- 
 ter his uncle, whose heir he became. This Sir Richard had 
 a son, Henry, who was knighted by Queen Elizabeth, in 
 1563, and married Joan, daughter of Sir Ralph Warren, and 
 had six sons and four daughters. The sons were, Oliver, 
 Robert, Henry, Richard, Philip, and Ralph; Oliver, the 
 Protector, was the only son of Robert, and born in the par- 
 ish of St. John, in Huntingdon, April 25, 1599. 
 
 The tradition in the family of Williams, of there beino- a 
 relationship by blood with the Protector, may be true ; but 
 it was, as will be perceived, quite remote. 
 
/ *