EARLY HISTORY OF MASSACHUSETTS.








LECTURES
DELIVERED IN A COURSE BEFORE THE LOWELL
INSTITUTE, IN BOSTON,
BY MEMBERS OF THE
fataczatttb 1sztov'calt ocp5ie,
ON SUBJECTS RELATING TO THE
EARLY HISTORY OF MASSACHUSETTS.
Ii~  I t     ~ —~ I..
BOSTON:
PUBLISHED BY THE SOCIETY.
1869.




Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1869, by
THE MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts.
CAMBRIDGE:
PRESS OF JOHN WILSON AND SON.




PREFATORY NOTE.
THE Committee charged with the publication of this
volume of Lectures, must not allow it to go before the
public without a grateful acknowledgment of the indebtedness of the Society to their associate, the Hon.
JOHN AMORY LOWELL, for his liberal and obliging cooperation in the arrangements for their delivery and
for their publication.
It should be distinctly understood, in view of any conflicting opinions which may perhaps be found in these
Lectures, that the author of each Lecture is individually
and exclusively responsible for whatever he has advanced.








CONTENTS.
I.
PAGE
MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY: INTRODUCTORY LECTURE.
By Hon. ROBERT C. WINTHROP. Jan. 5, 1869.......            1
II.
THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS
COLONY. By GEORGE E. ELLIS, D.D. Jan. 8, 1869.....        29
III.
TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS BY THE FOUNDERS OF
MASSACHUSETTS. By GEORGE E. ELLIS, D.D. Jan. 12, 1869..  75
IV.
HISTORY OF GRANTS UNDER THE GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.
By SAMUEL F. HAVEN, AM. Jan. 15, 1869....... 127
V.
THE COLONY OF NEW PLYMOUTH AND ITS RELATIONS TO MASSACHUSETTS. By WILLIAM BRIGHAM, A.M. Jan. 19, 1869...     163
VI.
SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.    By EMORY
WASHBURN, LL.D. Jan. 22, 1869...........     191
VII.
RECORDS OF MASSACHUSETTS UNDER ITS FIRST CHARTER. By Hon.
CHARLES W. UPHAM. Jan. 26, 186,9...,.,.,.      227
VIII.
THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS. By OLIVER WENDELL
HOLMES, M.D. Jan. 29, 1869............ 257




Viii                       CONTENTS.
IX.
PAGE
EARLY RELATIONS WITH THE INDIANS. By SAMUEL ELIOT, LL.D.
Feb. 2, 1869................  303
X.
THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND. By CHANDLER ROBBINS, D.D. Feb. 5, 1869..............             319
XI.
THE FIRST CHARTER AND THE EARLY RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF
MASSACHUSETTS. By JOEL PARKER, LL.D. Feb. 9, 1869... 355
XII.
PURITAN POLITICS OF ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND. By EDWARD
E. HALE, A.M. Feb. 12, 1869........... 441
XIII.
EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS: EARLY LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.
By GEORGE B. EMERSON, LL.D. Feb. 16, 1869...... 463




MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.
Inttobuctotr Lectute
BY
H-ON. ROBERT C. WINTHROP.








MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.
INTRODUCTORY.
A N Introductory Lecture, my friends, like an overture to an
oratorio or an opera, has, proverbially, a wide scope; and I
shall avail myself, with your indulgence, of the largest privileges
of my position. It is no affectation in me, however, to say to
you at the outset, that I have little hope of satisfying even the
reasonable requisitions of the service which has been assigned
me. I am conscious, indeed, of coming here this evening to
offer an apology, rather than to deliver an historical lecture.
Most gladly would I have prepared myself to do something
worthy of such an occasion, and of such an audience as I see
before me. Most gladly would I have prepared myself, had it
been in my power, to deliver something suitable to the position
which I am called to occupy here, as the President of the old
Historical Society of Massachusetts, the oldest historical society
in our country; which, for more than three-quarters of a century, has devoted itself to the illustration of the Colonial history
of New England, publishing more than forty volumes of invaluable historical materials, which ought to be in the library of every
town and village of New England, but which, I am sorry to say,
have had fewer patrons, or certainly fewer purchasers, than they
deserved and needed.
Most gladly, too, would I have prepared myself, had it proved
to be possible, to say something appropriate and proportionate to
the great theme of that series of lectures which I am privileged
to introduce, -the historical merits and virtues of the founders
and builders-up of this old Puritan Commonwealth, - not second,




4          MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.
certainly, to any Commonwealth beneath the sun, for the influence it has exerted upon the welfare of the world, and the examples it has afforded for the admiration and imitation of mankind.
Such a theme, I am sensible, deserves and demands the best
treatment of which any of us are capable. The praises of the
New-England Fathers should not be feebly uttered. To preface
a course of lectures on such a subject, and by such lecturers
as are to succeed me, by any vapid commonplaces, or any mere
vaporing and boastful panegyrics, were like putting up a lathand-plaster portico to some stately Doric temple, or a faGade of
stucco upon some solid mausoleum of marble or porphyry.
Better let the structure be, without any facade at all, -as the
grand Cathedral of Florence, with that majestic dome which so
roused the emulation of Michel Angelo, has stood for so many
centuries - than impair its grandeur, and offend its majesty, by
any cheap or incongruous frontispiece. There was nothing of
sham in the character or the conduct of those with whom our
lectures are to deal; and nothing of sham should be associated
with their commemoration.
Why, then, am I here at all, - seeing that I must needs be so
reckless of my own rede, and'do only what I feel to be so far
short of my own conception, at least, of what is due to the occasion? The answer to this question, my friends, will supply me
with a subject, and will furnish the substance of the apology
which I am here to offer you.
Allow me, at the outset, to recall the circumstances under
which I first heard of these lectures. It was about the end of
last January, just as I was leaving the pleasant city of Nice, recently included in the Empire of France, that I received a kind
letter from my valued friend, Dr. George E. Ellis, -the original
proposer of these lectures, and without whom they would not
and could not have been undertaken, and who is himself to address you next Friday evening on the " Aims and Purposes of
the Founders of the Massachusetts Colony," -a letter announcing that such a course was in process of arrangement between
Mr. Lowell and himself, and suggesting the hope that I might
return home in season for its opening or its close. I had just
taken leave of our grand Admiral Farragut, who, throughout that
eventful circumnavigation from which he has recently returned,




MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.        5
made friends for his country, as well as for himself, wherever he
went; and the carriage was already at the door, which was to
bear me along that magnificent Corniche road, -on the very
brink of the Mediterranean, -of which any one who has ever
been over it will require no description, while to those who are
still strangers to its marvellous attractions and its magic beauty,
no words of others, certainly not of mine, could convey ally
adequate conceptions of them. I drove along this incomparable
road during three days of delicious weather, and on the fourth
day entered that superb city which a grander Admiral even than
Farragut might well have been proud to claim as his birthplace,
- Christopher Columbus, a native of Genoa. A noble monument to Columbus, recently finished, surmounted by a striking
statue of him, and adorned by a series of bas-reliefs illustrating
the strange, eventful story of his life, - from which, I need hardly
say, the Discovery of America was not wholly omitted, - greeted
us at the gates, with the simple inscription in Italian, " To
Christopher Columbus from his Country;" and, as I gazed upon
it with admiration, I could not help feeling that it was not there
alone that a monument and a statue were due to his memory,
but that upon the shores of our own hemisphere, too, there ought
to be some worthy memorial of the discoverer of the New
World. I could not help feeling, indeed, how fit it would be, if
we could have at New York,1 or in Boston, or at Washington, or
at Worcester, — under the auspices of our excellent American
Antiquarian Society, which has taken the supposed date of
Columbus's discovery as the date of its own anniversary,- an
exact reproduction of this admirable monument at Genoa, so
that hemisphere should seem to respond to hemisphere in a common tribute to the heroic and matchless old navigator. It would
be some sort of atonement, I thought, on the part of America,
-tardy and inadequate, indeed, but better than nothing,- for
having allowed the name of another, however meritorious, to
usurp the place to which his name was so pre-eminently entitled
in the geographical nomenclature of the globe.
No one, however, who observes the course of things in our
own land, if not in other lands, in regard to monuments and
statues, can be surprised that the claims of Columbus should
have been postponed. Shakspeare has portrayed the whole
I See p. 27.




6           MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.
philosophy of the matter, in that most impressive passage which
he has put into the mouth of the not altogether reticent Ulysses
of ancient Greece. You all remember it:"Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back,
Wherein he puts alms for oblivion,
A great-sized monster of ingratitudes:
Those scraps are good deeds past; which are devour'd
As fast as they are made, forgot as soon
As done:.....
One touch of nature makes the whole world kin, -
That all, with one consent, praise new-born gawds,
Though they are made and moulded of things past;
And give to dust, that is a little gilt,
More laud than gilt o'er-dusted.
The present eye praises the present object."
How true is it, my friends, here and elsewhere, now as in
Shakspeare's time, that the man who discovered a continent, or
founded a great commonwealth, is postponed to some living hero,
or to him who died but yesterday! For a time the heroes of our
Revolution crowded out all commemoration of the Pilgrim or
Puritan Fathers.  Then came the heroes of a later war with
England to crowd out the Revolutionary patriots.    Next followed the heroes of the conquest of Mexico.   More recently,
the heroes and martyrs of our late civil war have absorbed
all our sympathies and all our means. It is not unnatural;
nor is it a subject for reproach or complaint, or for any thing
but satisfaction.  We grudge no tribute, certainly, however
costly, to those heroic young lives which were offered up so
nobly for the recent rescue of the National Union.    Yet it
may be hoped that a day will still come, when America may have
time to look back, even as far as Columbus; and, coming down
through the various stages of her early colonial settlement, and
her later constitutional government, may provide some fit memorials of the men to whom she has owed her rise and progress.
It may be hoped that a day will come, when Massachusetts may
have leisure to examine that " wallet of oblivion at the back of
Time,' and to rescue from it some names and deeds of her own
earlier and later history, which she would not willingly let die.
It may be hoped that a day will come, when our own city may
have time to review her roll of honor, and may realize that no




MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.       7
Campo Santo, or Santa Croce, or Pere la Chaise, or Westminster
Abbey of the Old World, contains dust more precious, or more
worthy of commemoration, than that which lies almost unmarked in some of her own ancient graveyards. I will mention but a single name; that of the great minister of our first
Puritan church, in honor of whose intended coming our city is
said to have been called: - We sent, indeed, over the Atlantic,
not many years since, a considerable sum of money to repair the
little chapel of his noble church in Boston, Lincolnshire, Old
England; but there is nothing to tell the passer-by, unless he
stoops over the mouldering stone with the microscope of an Old
Mortality, where, in the Boston of New England, have reposed
for two centuries the ashes of JOHN COTTON.
But the statue of Columbus was not the only thing I saw in
Genoa, which awakened reflections and associations connected
with my own land. I did not fail to grope my way through the
old Historic Hall, with its double row of original portrait statues
of the old Genoese nobles, formerly known as the Bank of St.
George, but now desecrated to the use of the dingiest department of what, I should hope and believe, is the dingiest customhouse in the world. Heaven forbid, thought I, that any historic
ball of my own land should ever suffer such a profanation.
Yet when I remembered how inadequately cared for our own
Faneuil Hall, and still more our own old State House, had often
been; and how much of their sanctity and of their safety had
been sacrificed in years past, if they were not still, to any and
every purpose which might increase the rents, and add a few
more hundreds of dollars to a treasury from which so much goes
out from year to year for more than doubtful expenditures,- I
was less emboldened to indulge in any wholesale strictures upon
other cities. But better, a thousand-fold better, let me say in
passing, that all such structures, whether in Genoa or in Boston,
should be razed to the ground at once, and live only as they are
photographed on the hearts of those who have held them sacred,
than that they should be left cumbering the ground and blocking
the highway, only to signalize the more conspicuously that
indifference and irreverence towards the noblest scenes and
associations of a glorious past, which have been engendered by
the rush and crush of modern improvement and modern traffic.




8          MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.
But pardon me, my friends, for such a digression, and bear
with me kindly as I roll rapidly again along the Riviera, resting
at mid-day on the lofty hill at Rota, which commands so wonderful a view, and reaching Sestri di Ponente just in season to
enjoy one of those indescribable Italian sunsets. The necessity
of an early start, the next day, not only secured us an opportunity
of witnessing what Jeremy Taylor had so vividly in mind when
he quaintly recommended to the readers of his " Holy Living,"
that they should sometimes " be curious to see the preparations
which the sun makes, when he is about to quit his chamber in
the East;" but enabled us also to reach the summit of the last
mountain on our route, in season to look down upon the lovely
harbor of Spezia, just as the daystar was once more sinking
beneath the blue waters of the Mediterranean, and casting those
ineffable roseate hues upon the snow-capped Apennines in the
distance, while at the same instant a full-orbed moon was
rising majestically from behind them. A more delightful and
inspiring view it has hardly entered into the imagination of poet
or painter to conceive. Shall I be forgiven, however, for saying
that there was an added beauty to that view, -to American
eyes, certainly, - when we descried in the harbor below us,
safely riding at anchor, and surrounded by its companions of
the squadron, and surmounted by the stars and stripes, the same
noble propeller, bearing the name of the " Great Bostonian,"
Franklin, - which we had left at Nice, and which had come round
there that very day? I do not envy the apathy of any American,
young or old, who can suddenly find himself face to face, in a
foreign land, with the flag of his country, flying from the masthead of one of its noblest frigates, and symbolizing more especially the personal presence and authority of an admiral who
went into action lashed to a mast-head himself,- I do not envy,
I say, the composure of one who can confront that flag, under
such circumstances, without emotion; or, who would not consider any prospect, which sun and moon and azure waves and
snow-capt hills combined can make up, as beautified and glorified
by such an additional feature.
The next morning, I found myself in the train with Farragut
and his party, and went on with them to Pisa, where we all
ascended "the tower which leans and leans and leans, but




MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.       9
never falls." On the following day, I was where I could read
the inscription on the ancient residence of Americus Vespucius;
and where I was led to wish again, as I had more than once
wished before, that Boston would follow the example of Florence,
and so inscribe its local history on the names of its streets, and
the walls of its houses, that it might be read by every boy and
girl on their way to school.
But what, you may well ask, my friends, what has all this to
do with the course of historical lectures which I am here officially
to introduce? What has it all to do even with the apology
which I proposed to offer you? Not so much, perhaps, with
either as might be wished, yet by no means so little as some
of my hearers may at first be disposed to think.  For as I
drove along that magnificent road, during those five or six
days of superb weather, when sun and moon and each particular
star would seem to have shed their selectest influence upon
our pathway (and be it always borne in mind, that one may
as well look for the beauties of a landscape while passing
through a tunnel, as attempt to form any idea of the grandeur of
the Corniche by traversing it in a fog or a storm), -as I drove
along that marvellous road which, too soon, I fear, is to be
abandoned for the greater despatch and economy of an already
half-finished railroad, the letter of my friend Dr. Ellis, announcing these lectures, and which had been opened as I entered
Lhe carriage, was fresh in my mind and frequently in my hand.
I read it certainly more than once, or twice, or thrice; and the
subject to which it referred kept strangely blending itself with
all I was observing and enjoying, entering unbidden alike into
my thoughts by day and my dreams by night. As I gazed, at one
moment, on the glorious sea at my side, and marked the matchless blueness of its waters; and at another, on the gorgeous
hues of sunrise, or of sunset, around and above me, fulfilling,
as hardly anywhere else is so completely fulfilled, the exquisite
idea of the Psalmist, - " Thou makest the outgoings of the morning and the evening to rejoice;" -as I contemplated the varied
luxuriance of the climate and the soil, where, on those last days
of January and first days of February, the vine and the olive were
still wearing their leafy honors side by side; and oranges and
lemons still ripening on the branches; and the rose and the sweet




10         MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.
pea still blooming on the walls and in the gardens;-as I
inhaled that balmy air which made it a luxury to breathe; - as
I turned to the thousand forms of beauty and of grandeur which
greeted me from the distant hills and mountains, the Maritime
Alps or Ligurian Apennines, with their robes of ice and diadems
of snow:- all the while, old Massachusetts and its history and
its Historical Society, and this very course of Lowell lectures,
were still uppermost, or undermost, or somewhere in the midst of
my thoughts, -sometimes in the way of comparison and sometimes of contrast, sometimes of yearning and sometimes, I do
confess, of dread.
I could not help feeling, of course, that whatever else my
native State might have to boast of, she had nothing in
the way of sea, or sky, or soil, of climate or of scenery, to
be compared for an instant with what I was beholding. I
could not help contrasting the genial temperature and glowing
atmosphere which I was enjoying, with the bleak winds and
deep snows and drenching storms and freezing cold, which my
fellow-citizens at home must have been at that moment enduring. And while I was thus meditating and musing, the fire
kindled, and I found myself seriously asking myself, whether I
would permanently exchange, were it in my power to do so, such
sea and sky and soil, as we have here in New England to-day,
for those of southern France or central Italy; and suddenly I
found myself resolving, that if I should reach my home safely
and in season, and should be called on to take either an opening
or a closing part in this course of lectures,- ignorant, as I was,
what other subjects might be left open to me, — I would give my
reasons for saying no, —emphatically no,-to this question;
and would devote my little hour to some thoughts on the influences upon the character and career of our earlier and our later
people, and on the supreme results to our history as a Commonwealth, of that very soil and climate about which we are so often
disposed to complain, and of which my letters from home were
at that moment saying, "that it was feared the Gulf Stream
had changed its current, and that we might soon look out for
polar bears and other arctic curiosities!"  And soon the subject
and its treatment began to expand and shape itself in my mind.
I bethought me that Massachusetts, too, had a sea of her own,




MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.      11
- an historical sea, if I may so speak; that, indeed, she had
risen out of the sea, that she could not have been Massachusetts had she not been founded on the coast.  And I
followed that coast around, on the map of my memory, from the
farthest point of Cape Cod, to which Captain John Smith,-one
of the pioneers of New-England exploration, of whom my friend
Hillard has given us so good a Life; and who himself deserves a
statue or a monument somewhere along shore,-attempted to
affix the name of King James; round to the extremest verge of
Cape Ann, to which the same bold, though erratic —I had
almost said vagabond - navigator essayed to give the portentous
and not altogether musical title of Cape Tragabigzanda.  I
found myself pausing in this survey, as you will not doubt, to
mark the spot in Provincetown Harbor, where, in the cabin of the
" Mayflower," the first written Constitution known to the history
of the world, was drawn up, agreed upon, and signed. I found
myself pausing again, as you will not doubt, to mark the spot in
Plymouth Harbor, where the Pilgrim Fathers left the "Mayflower" at that terrible wintry season, and landed on that consecrated rock. I found myself pausing once more, you may be sure,
to mark the spot in the gentler waters which wash that charming
Beverly shore in the harbor-of Salem, where the "Arbella," with
the charter of Massachusetts, and its governor and company,
came to anchor ten years later.  Nor did I altogether forget the
little islands on which Bartholomew Gosnold had landed and
built a house, before Puritan or Pilgrim, or even John Smith, had
ventured within our bay. And then there came over me a more
vivid impression than ever before, of all that that bay, with the
great ocean of which it is an inlet, had done for the character
and enterprise and industry of our people, from those early days
to this. I bethought me of those whale-fisheries, of which it had
been the cradle and the nursery, and which elicited that wellremembered and magnificent tribute of Edmund Burke, in his
speech on conciliation with America, -a tribute, which, at the
end of nearly a hundred years, cannot be read without stirring
our blood like a trumpet, and which is worthy of being read
and re-read, as a piece of glorious prose which neither Macaulay
nor Milton often, if ever, surpassed:



12           MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.
"Look at the manner in which the people of New England," said
Burke, "have of late carried on the whale-fishery. Whilst we follow
them among the tumbling mountains of ice, and behold them penetrating
into the deepest frozen recesses of Hudson's Bay and Davis's Straits,
whilst we are looking for them beneath the arctic circle, we hear that
they have pierced into the opposite region of polar cold, that they are at
the antipodes, and engaged under the frozen serpent of the South. Falkland Island, which seemed too remote and romantic an object for the grasp
of rational ambition, is but a stage and resting-place in the progress of
their victorious industry. Nor is the equinoctial heat more discouraging
to them, than the accumulated winter of both the poles. We know that
whilst some of them draw the line and strike the harpoon on the coast of
Africa, others run the longitude, and pursue their gigantic game along the
coast of Brazil.  No sea but what is vexed by their fisheries.  No
climate that is not witness to their toils. Neither the perseverance of
Holland, nor the activity of France, nor the dexterous and firm sagacity
of English enterprise, ever carried this most perilous mode of hardy
industry to the extent to which it has been pushed by this recent people;
a people who are still, as it were, but in the gristle, and not yet hardened into the bone of manhood."
I bethought me, too, of the cod fisheries which our bay had
nourished and cherished, until they became at one time so far
the very staple of our Commonwealth, that their emblem,- as I
have the best reason for remembering,-was suspended, where it
still hangs, over the chair of the presiding officer of the representatives of the people in our legislative halls.  I bethought me,
again, of the mercantile marine it had built up, until Salem
became one of the great seats of the East-India trade; and
Captain Robert Gray, of Boston, discovered the Columbia River;
and Boston itself rose to be the third, -as it not long ago was,
I know not where it stands now, - while New Bedford was hardly
less than the fifth, in the commercial tonnage of the Union. Nor,
certainly, did I fail to remember what our bay and our sea had
done for the national navy, and the thousands of gallant tars it
had supplied for fighting their country's battles on the ocean,whether under Bainbridge and Lawrence and Chauncey and Hull
and Decatur, in those days when George Canning declared, in the
House of Commons, that " the spell of British invincibility on the
ocean was at last broken;" or in these latter days of not inferior
glory, under Porter and Rodgers and Winslow and Foote and Far



MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.      18
ragut. Was this a sea, I asked myself, to be disowned, or abandoned,
or exchanged for any other sea beneath the sun? It was no Mediterranean, indeed. It did not run between vine-clad hills and
romantic villages; and one could hardly sail an hour upon it, in
a straight course, without leaving capes and headlands and snug
harbors behind him, and going out to buffet with the big rollers
and swelling billows of the vast Atlantic, with nothing but the
sea and the sky, and the God above the sky, to witness the encounter. But, for this very reason, it was a sea to impart the
bravery it demanded; to stimulate the adventure it invited; and
to breed and educate, as it has bred and educated, a race of hardy
and intrepid mariners, taking to the water, - as Dr. Palfrey once
so happily said, - as naturally as so many ducks to a pond; whose
enterprise and exploits have supplied, and are still destined to
supply, the theme of solid history, as well as of brilliant romance,
to the end of time; mariners of New England, who are as worthy
of being famous in song and story, as those mariners of Old England, whose memories are embalmed in the immortal song of
Campbell.
And then I bethought me of the climate of Massachusetts,
which had so marvellously co-operated with the sea, in giving
vigor and energy and hardihood to our people. True, we had
no Januarys or Februarys like those I was experiencing. True,
our winters were almost always long and dreary and dreadful,
and our summers too often brief and scorching. A glorious
autumn we might generally boast of, kindling our forests into a
thousand glories, as the inexorable Frost King blazes his pathway through the valleys and along the hill-sides, in colors such as
never adorned the train of any other earthly monarch: but we
have had recent experience that even this cannot be counted on;
while as to spring, - why, if our poet Bryant had seen fit to vie
with Thomson, - as I think he might have done, - and to depict
the Seasons of New England, he could have done nothing but
include spring in a parenthesis.
Yet, would I alter all this? Would I, if the wand of Prospero,
to lay or lift a tempest, were in my hand, exchange even our
Boston east wind, eager and nipping as it is, for some sweet but
treacherous south, breathing, indeed, over a bank of violets, but
bringing in its track the lassitude, the self-indulgence, the aver



14         MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.
sion to labor, the inaptitude for liberty, the incapacity for selfgovernment, or for sustained and manly effort of any sort, which
characterize so many of the inhabitants of those sunny climes
through which I was then passing? Admit that our east wind
may have imparted not a little of its harsh and acrid quality to
the tempers of those who first weathered it, which has not been
wholly eradicated, which perhaps never can be eradicated, from
the tempers of their descendants; for I am disposed to think,
that the acrid quality of the climate was, in part at least, primarily responsible for creating that "acrid spirit of the times,'
which Longfellow tells us, at the close of one of his graceful
New-England tragedies, "corroded the true steel" of one of the
earliest and bravest of the old Puritan leaders. But what other
climate could have given them the muscle, the grit, the gristle (as
Burke called it), the strong right arms, and the stern and dauntless
souls, which enabled them to endure the deprivations of a wilderness, and to subdue a soil which would have repelled and
defied all feebler hands or hearts?
And, next, I bethought me of that soil: What a soil it was, here
in New England, what a soil it is still, compared with that then
beneath my feet! And I remembered but too vividly the dreary
and desolate.look of a Massachusetts landscape for six or seven
months of the year, not only without fruit or flowers, like those
which were on all sides around me, but without a spire of grass
or a leaf on the trees. But I remembered, too, a little dialogue
which I had once heard from the lips of Edward Everett.
Would that those lips had language still, and could repeat it, in
their own inimitable way, once more! He was accompanying
Henry Clay, during the month of April, I think it was in the
year 1833, through the county of Middlesex, which Mr. Everett
then represented in Congress, on a visit to Lowell. " Everett,"
exclaimed Mr. Clay, "in Heaven's name, what do your constituents live on? I see nothing hereabouts capable of supporting
human life, or animal life of any sort." " Why, Mr. Clay," replied Everett, "don't you see that tree in the middle of yonder
field there? " "Yes, I do," said Mr. Clay; " and a very small
and miserable specimen of a tree it is; there is not a leaf or a bud
on it; it looks dead already, and hardly fit for firewood." " Ah!"
said Mr. Everett (in playful resentment of an old impertinence




MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.         15
to a neighboring New-England State), "it makes capital wooden
nutmegs!"   Yes, my friends, the barrenness of our ground has
made our brains fertile; and even the invention which built up
Lowell, has owed not a little of its stimulus to the sterility of the
surrounding acres. The willing and luxuriant harvests of other
latitudes, are, indeed, unknown to us; but who shall complain of
a soil which has so enforced industry; which has so quickened and
sharpened the wits; which has so nourished independence and
freedom; which has presented no temptation to make woman a
yoke-fellow with the brutes, exhibiting her, like those I saw around
me, subjected to the hardest labors of the field; and which, above
all, - far, far above all, - has so repelled and repudiated from its
culture every form of human servitude! Boast as we will, and
as we well may, of the influence of free schools and free governments in moulding and training the characters and careers of
New-England men, - and my friend, Mr. Emerson, will tell you
all about that, when his turn to lecture comes, - we must not forget that there are influences underlying and overlying all these,
— the influences of the earth beneath us and of the sky above us.
One of the most popular of Old England's poets, even in the very
piece in which he proposed to illustrate the influence of education
and government upon mankind, - a piece which, though fragmentary and unfinished, is not unworthy to stand beside his own
exquisite elegy in a country churchyard, - has given expression to
this idea in some noble lines:' Not but the human fabric from the birth
Imbibes the flavor of its parent earth;
As various tracts enforce a various toil,
The manners speak the idiom of their soil.
An iron race the mountain-cliffs maintain,
Foes to the gentler genius of the plain."
One might almost imagine, indeed, that Gray had New England,
and New-England men, distinctly in his mind, when he adds:"For where unwearied sinews must be found
With side-long plough to quell the flinty ground,
To turn the torrent's swift-descending flood,
To brave the savage rushing from the wood, -
What wonder if, to patient valor train'd,
They guard with spirit what by strength they gain'd."




16         MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.
And you all remember that good, dear, pious Mrs. Barbauld
has condensed the whole thought into one of the grandest couplets in all poetry: —
"Man is the nobler growth our realms supply,
And souls are ripened in our northern sky."
Yes, my friends, we of New England, after all, may well thank
Heaven that our Pilgrim Fathers landed upon nothing softer
than a rock,l and that the Puritan founders of Massachusetts were
not persuaded, —as Oliver Cromwell endeavored to persuade
them, and would fain have forced them, had he dared to try it, -
to abandon their flinty glebe for the rich mould of the tropics. It
is not enough for us to be grateful, that the region to which they
so firmly adhered, was not a region exposed to such inundations
as have recently devastated so many of the fields and villages
of Switzerland, and made such a claim upon the sympathy and
succor of ail who have witnessed the glories of the Alps, and the
simple virtues of those who inhabit them. It is not enough for
us to be grateful, that the clime to which they clung so tenaciously, is not a clime subject to such convulsions as have recently
swallowed up whole cities on our own hemisphere; and the mere
liability to which is itself sufficient to unnerve and demoralize
even those who may escape all actual damage to person or
property. It is not enough for us to be grateful, that the bay
around which they nestled and clustered, had no smouldering
volcano on its right hand or on its left, threatening at every
outbreak, like Vesuvius or AEtna at this moment, to overwhelm all within its reach with a torrent of burning lava. It is
not enough for us to be grateful, that the land and the sea which
they refused so obstinately to abandon or exchange, were free
alike from the corrupting and distracting influences of mines of
silver or of gold, and of fisheries of coral or of pearl; though
I may not forget that, in these latter years, some of our not
very distant hills have occasionally been suspected of gold,
and that a few exquisite pearls have actually been found, in
the streams near Sandwich, not far from where the Pilgrims
landed. But, beyond and above all this, may we not well thank
God, as we review our history, even for that springless climate,
of short summers and long winters, of late and early frosts,
1 See p. 27.




MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.     17
of sharp and sudden vicissitudes, which has demanded, from
first to last, the steady and sturdy struggle of intelligent freemen for existence and for bread? May we not well thank God
for a soil, from which no North-western Ordinance or Missouri
Compromise, no Wilmot Proviso or Constitutional Amendment,
was ever needed to shut out slavery; and for a temperature
which has braced up our children to a manly, vigorous, independent, self-sustaining, and self-relying exercise of their own thews
and sinews and brains in every field of useful labor or worthy
enterprise?
Who is not willing to unite with me in exclaiming, in this sense
at least,-Let Massachusetts be "left out in the cold" for ever,
with nothing but ice and granite for her natural exports, rather
than have all the manhood melted and thawed out of her children,
as it was out of so many of those whom I saw by the way-side, too
limp for any thing but to bask in the sun and beg? Who can
say that upon a different soil, and under other skies, even NewEngland principles, as we call them, would have been proof
against the temptation of establishing, or at least permanently
tolerating, domestic institutions which have been so fatal elsewhere, and which it has cost at last such a deluge of blood and
treasure to abolish?  Who can say that if the pilot of the
Pilgrims, to whom, justly or unjustly, treachery has sometimes
been imputed, had conducted the Mayflower nearer to the
Southern Cross, instead of steering her ever by that blessed
North Star; and if the Massachusetts colony had followed in
their wake,-we, their descendants, might not at this moment
be suffering, as so many of our brethren elsewhere are suffering,
from the destitution and desolation, directly or indirectly brought
upon ourselves, by a vain struggle, in the interests and under the
influence of slavery, to overthrow that National Government,
and rend asunder that Constitutional Union, which it is now
our pride and glory to have defended and preserved for our
children?
Such, my friends, were some of the thoughts, on the influence
of soil and climate upon the character and history of New England, which came swarming through my mind as I whirled along
that magnificent Corniche road last winter, with the letter of my
friend Dr. Ellis in my hand. Such were the leading ideas of the
2




18         MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.
lecture I then conceived, and proposed to prepare deliberately, if
I should be called on to prepare any thing, for this occasion; and
which I thought might be worked up into a not altogether inappropriate Introductory to such a course. But a thousand unforeseen circumstances of foreign travel, and of domestic and personal experience, soon occurred to obliterate the whole subject
from my mind; and I returned home, not long ago, without ever
thinking of it again, and without a note on which I could rely
for reviving and reconstructing the train of ideas.  And all
that I have been able to do, since my return, has been to recall
thus hastily the associations of time and place, to gather up the
tangled threads wherever I could lay hold of them in my memory,
and to present to you thus crudely, what I would so gladly have
elaborated, illustrated, and perfected. If, however, by throwing
myself into the gap,-as I have done, at the last moment, and at
the imperative call of others, - I shall have prepared the way for
the instructive and well-considered and eloquent discourses which
I know are to follow, my hour will not have been spent in vain;
and you, I am sure, will all pardon me for so desultory and discursive an utterance.
I must not let you go, however, without reverting, in a few
closing remarks, to the original purpose of these lectures, and to
the general objects of the Society under whose auspices they
have been undertaken. There is something remarkable, and
more than remarkable, -there is something quite wonderful, I
think, - about the way in which the history of this old Commonwealth of ours, and the history of New England, of which it.was the capital colony, have been preserved, cared for, and
" treasured up as for a life beyond life," from the very outset of
their career. Not only are we spared the pains of seeking the
story of our origin in myths and fables, in traditions and
legends, like the people of so many other lands, but we may find
it written out for us at the moment, by those who could tell us
all that they saw, and a most important part of which they
were.
Hardly had the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth in 1620, before
William Bradford, who was so soon to succeed the lamented
Carver as their governor, began to collect the original letters
and papers, which, ten years afterwards, he commenced " piecing




MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.      19
up at times of leisure" (to use his own phrase), until he had
completed a connected and careful account of the first twentyseven years of that pioneer plantation. This invaluable work,
- after remaining in manuscript for more than two hundred
years, known only by a few citations which had been made from
it by later writers, who had enjoyed the privilege of consulting
it,  after having disappeared from all view, and eluded all
search, for more than half a century; and after having been
lamented over like one of the lost books of Livy -to us, if
not to the world at large, a thousand times more precious than
the whole of Livy, - was at last discovered in 1855, on the other
side of the Atlantic Ocean, in the library of the Bishop of
London at Fulham, and was printed for the first time, by this
Society, in 1856, from an exact copy made for the purpose, under
the faithful editorship of our present accomplished Recording Secretary, Mr. Charles Deane.
On the other hand, the Massachusetts Company proper, with
their charter, had not left their final anchorage at the Cowes,
near the Isle of Wight, in 1630, before the governor of that
colony (John Winthrop) had made the first entry in a journal or
history, which he continued from day to day, and from year to
year, until his death in 1648-9. That work, too, remained in
perishable manuscript for a century and a half. The original
was in three volumes; the two first of which were printed, for
the first time, at Hartford, in 1790, from an inaccurate copy, which
had been commenced by Governor Trumbull, with a preface
and dedication by the great lexicographer, Noah Webster, who
subsequently confessed that he had never even read the original
manuscript. It remained for one whom we now recognize, since
the death of-our veteran Quincy, as the venerable senior member of our Society, and its former President (James Savage), to
decipher and annotate and edit the whole; for lo! in 1816,
the third volume, of which nothing had been seen or heard for
more than sixty years, turned up in the tower of the Old South
Meeting-house! The Rev. Thomas Prince, the pastor of that
church, who kept his library in that tower, and is known to have
had all three of the volumes in 1755, died without returning this
third volume to the family of the author, from whom I have the
best reason to think they were all borrowed. And so in 1825-6,




20        MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.
one hundred and ninety-five years after that first entry, on that
Easter Monday, while the " Arbella " was "riding at the Cowes,"
these annals of the first nineteen years of the Massachusetts
colony were published in a correct and complete form. But as
if to illustrate the risks to which they had been so long exposed,
and to signalize the perils they had so providentially escaped,
one of the original volumes was destroyed by a memorable fire
in Court Street, before Mr. Savage had finished the laborious
corrections and annotations to which he had devoted himself.
Here, then, we find the striking fact of the two governors of
the two originally independent colonies of Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay, which afterwards, in 1691, were combined in a
single Commonwealth, -the two men who were the leading
witnesses of all that occurred, and the leading actors in all that
was done, -preparing careful histories of the rise and progress of each, and leaving them in manuscript at their death:
Those manuscripts we find remaining unprinted, uncopied, and
seemingly uncared for, during a period of a century and a half
and two centuries respectively; exposed to all and more than all
the common accidents which wait upon ancient papers,- the
moth, the bookworm, the damp, the flames, - owing to the unsettled and troubled condition of the colonies, from time to time,
and almost all the time: For instance, when the British cavalry
occupied the Old South Church, as a riding-school and a stable,
in 1775, and took Governor Winthrop's old house (which stood
next) for firewood, both of these precious manuscripts were in
the tower, where Prince had left them; and both were doomed,
to all human eyes, to be used as kindling; but they were really
destined for another sort of kindling: Both of them we find reappearing in the end, - substantially every leaf of them;- one
of them, and a large part of the other, turning up at last where
they would least have been looked for, or have been imagined to
be; and both of them waiting,- waiting, as it were, for the fulness of time,- to be published, as they have been, by those most
capable of appreciating them and doing them justice.
What is there in the curiosities of secular literature more
striking! Surely, we may say, so far as Massachusetts history
is concerned, " There's a divinity that shapes our ends, roughhew them how we will." But this is but the beginning of the




MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.      21
story. While these original and more authentic accounts of
the infant Commonwealth were still scarcely known to exist beyond the family circle of their authors,-as early as 1654,Edward Johnson, one of the intensest of Puritans, publishes in
London, his " Wonder-working Providence of Sion's Saviour in
New England," which, though written in a most inflated and
bombastic style, and full of blunders and doggerel, contains many
most important and valuable facts, and is worthy of being remembered as the first printed book of New-England history. A beautiful edition of it, with a valuable Introduction, has recently been
published by Mr. W. F. Poole, the late faithful Librarian of the
Boston Athenaeum. Then came Nathaniel Morton, a nephew of
Governor Bradford, with his " Memorial of Plymouth Colony,"
abounding, also, in important references to the Massachusetts
Colony proper, published originally at our Cambridge in 1669,
and republished in 1826, under the admirable editorship of another
former President of this Society,- the late excellent Judge
Davis.
And now " draws hitherward, - I know him by his stride,"the giant of New-England early literature, - the marvellous and
marvel-loving Cotton Mather, with a voracity for every thing relating to our colonial condition and history as insatiate as his
own vanity; seeking and searching for something new and
strange, like those men of ancient Athens whom Paul depicted;
of a credulity which swallowed every thing which was told him,
and a diligence which digested almost every thing which he swallowed; and publishing, in London, in 1702, after a prodigious
amount of strugglings and wrestlings, of prayers and fastings, of
visions by day and dreams by night, a huge folio volume, entitled " Magnalia Christi Americana," or, as the titlepage has it,
" The First book of the New-English History, reporting the Design whereon, the Manner wherein, and the People whereby, the
several Colonies of New England were planted, by the endeavour
of Cotton Mather; "-containing a monstrous mass of information and speculation, of error and gossip, of biography and history, of italics and capitals, of classical quotations, Latin and
Greek, and of original epitaphs, Latin and English, in prose
and in verse, which, as old Polonius said of Hamlet's actors,
" either for tragedy, comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical,




22         MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.
historical-pastoral, tragical-comical, scene individable or poem
unlimited," has hardly a parallel in the world. Let me not seem
to disparage or undervalue Cotton Mather, —a perfect Dr. Pangloss, as he was in many particulars, -for with all his foibles
and all his faults, all his credulity and all his vanity, it cannot be
denied that he did a really great work for New-England history.
The lives of our Worthies could not have been written without
him; while his " Essay to do Good" is known to have given the
earliest incentive to the wonderful career of New England's
most wonderful son,- Benjamin Franklin.
Passing rapidly now over Church's " King Philip's. War,"
first printed in 1716, of which a beautiful edition has recently been added to " the New-England Library" by the Rev.
Henry Martyn Dexter; and John Dunton's "Letters from New
England," in 1686, just printed for the Prince Society, from the
original manuscript in the Bodleian Library, under the careful
editorship of Mr. W. H. Whitmore, - we come next, in order of
date, to the " Chronological History of New England " by the accurate and indefatigable Thomas Prince himself, whose first volume
was published in 1736; and, who in 1755, began a second volume,
of which only three serial numbers were printed before his death,
in 1758. Then we have the valuable historical " Summary" of
Dr. William Douglas, published in Boston, in numbers, the first
of them in 1746-7; and the whole two volumes of which were
completed in 1751.
And now appears. upon the scene, as an historian of Massachusetts, another of her colonial governors, whose name was so
identified, justly or unjustly, with the Stamp Act, and others of
those acts of British oppression which drove us to rebellion, and
through rebellion to independence, that it long was held in too
much of passionate abhorrence to allow of any justice being
done to any thing he did or said or wrote; but who, take him
for all in all, did as much for the history of this his native State,
and did it as well, as any man who has lived before or since.
Let us not fail to do justice to his memory in this respect.
Governor Hutchinson's first volume was published in 1764.
The second volume, almost ready for the press, was in his house
in Garden-Court Street, on the 26th of August, 1765, when it
was so shamefully sacked and pillaged by a mob. Hutchinson,




MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.      23
as the mob approached, was engaged in bearing to a place of
safety a beloved daughter who had refused to quit his side, and
was thus compelled to abandon his precious papers to their fate.
Every thing was destroyed, or thrown out of the windows; and
the scattered pages of this second volume of his history were
left lying in the street for several hours in a soaking rain. But
thanks to the care and pains of the Rev. Andrew Eliot, one of
the servants, then and always, of the good God to whom we owe
the marvellous preservation of those other and earlier manuscripts of those other and earlier governors, all but eight or ten
sheets were collected and saved; and so much of them was still
legible that, in spite of the muddy footprints of the Vandals who
had trampled on them, the author was able to supply the rest,
transcribe the whole, and publish it in 1767. Still a third volume,
hardly less valuable than either, and written with an almost judicial fairness and a wonderful freedom from prejudice, considering the treatment he had received, remained in manuscript for
half a century after his death in 1780, and was only rescued from
perdition, and published in 1828, through the persevering efforts
of Mr. Savage, and other members of our Society.
I must not forget that still another governor of Massachusetts,
James Sullivan, the first President of our Society, early devoted
his leisure from professional and public labors to the preparation
of a history of his native Province of Maine, -then a part of
Massachusetts, -and published it in 1795. I must not forget
the excellent account of that great epoch in Massachusetts history, commonly called " Shays's Rebellion," published in 1788 by
George Richards Minot (the father of our venerable William);
and followed, in 1798 and 1803, by two substantial volumes of
the history of the province, from 1748 to 1765. I must not forget either the really great work of one who was so long our
Corresponding Secretary, and whose accomplished son, - who so
well illustrates the idea of ancient mythology, " one power of
physic, melody, and song"-is announced among the lecturers
of our course; I mean the " American Annals" of the late Dr.
Abiel Holmes, published in 1805, and abounding in dates and
facts of Massachusetts and New England, as well as of National
interest. Still less must I forget the elaborate History of New
England, by the Rev. William Hubbard, an early minister of




24        MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.
Ipswich, completed in manuscript as long ago as 1682, but which
it remained for this Society, with the patronage of the Legislature
of Massachusetts, to publish for the first time as lately as 1815.
Time would fail me, or certainly your patience would be exhausted, my friends, were I to attempt to speak, as I ought to
speak, of all the more recent contributions and contributors to
the historical illustration of our Commonwealth, and of New
England; of the Rev. John Eliot, and of Alden Bradford; of
Dr. Felt's Ecclesiastical History, and Governor Washburn's
Judicial History; of Drake's comprehensive and elaborate
History of Boston; of Quincy's Harvard University; of Young's
Chronicles of Plymouth and of Massachusetts, and of the
Records of those old Colonies, edited by our worthy Mayor, Dr.
Shurtleff; of Mr. Savage's Genealogical History of New England; of Tudor's James Otis; of Richard Frothingham's Siege of
Boston, and Life of Warren; of Sabine's Fisheries and Loyalists; of Dr. Holland's Western Massachusetts, and General
Schouler's Massachusetts in the late Civil War, with its
admirable portrait of the lamented Andrew, and its vivid
presentment of many of the stirring scenes through which we
have so lately passed; of the Life and Letters of John Adams
by his distinguished grandson; of Barry's Massachusetts; of
Bancroft's Colonial Period; of Upham's recent and most interesting History of Witchcraft; and of Palfrey's consummate and
crowning work on New England, which may fitly complete
the calendar, and which is worthy, I need not say, of far more
than any mere passing commendation of mine.
I have omitted, I doubt not, in this running catalogue, many
names which deserve to be mentioned; and I have said nothing
of what has been done so well, in their Collections and Registers,
by our sister societies of other States, and by kindred associations
in our own State; or of the numerous town histories, and church
histories, which have been so faithfully written. But I have said
enough to recall to your remembrance the fact, that while New
England has furnished not a few able and brilliant historians
and biographers for some of the great political and literary epochs
of other lands, ancient and modern, and for some of the great
statesmen of other parts of our own land,- in our lamented
Prescott and Sparks and Felton, and in our living Ticknor and




MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.      25
Motley and Parkman and Kirk, - her own history has by no
means been neglected; but that there has been a most striking
succession of men, - many of them governors, judges, ministers,
counsellors, men of renown, famous in their generation, -who
have been moved, as by a common impulse, to keep the record of
New England, and of Massachusetts in particular, and to illustrate the history of their rise and progress; some of whose
works, like those of William Bradford and John Winthrop and
Thomas Hutchinson, have come down to us under circumstances
of almost romantic interest; and all of which together can hardly
fail to leave the impression on a thoughtful mind,- I will not
admit that it need be a superstitious mind, - that for good or for
evil, for encouragement or for warning, for our glory or for our
shame, that history was not destined to be lost to mankind.
But I could not be forgiven, - I could not forgive myself,were I to close without an allusion to one other name, which I
have purposely reserved to the last,-the name of the Rev. Dr.
Jeremy Belknap, the recognized founder of our Society, whose
History of New Hampshire, in three volumes, published in
1784, 1791, and 1792, and his two volumes of early American
biography, published in 1794 and 1798, are full of importance
to the work of which I have been speaking.    Under his
lead, our Society was organized in 1791, -to gather up the
fragments, that nothing be lost,-composed of ten members,
at the outset, increased to thirty, and afterwards to sixty in all,
and now limited to a hundred members throughout the Commonwealth. Beginning their career upon the most economical scale;
ordering their Treasurer, Judge Tudor, to buy " twelve Windsor
green elbow-chairs, a plain pine table, painted, with a drawer
and lock and key, and an inkstand;" and with no resources but
an assessment of two dollars a year upon each member, -they
proceeded to collect papers and pamphlets and books, and to
publish, scrap by scrap, as an appendix or a preamble to a magazine called "The American Apollo," whatever original manuscripts, relating to New England, they were able to pick up;
the very first of these scraps having been published on the 6th
of January, 1792, just seventy-six years ago to-morrow. In
these latter years, the liberal and noble benefactions of Samuel
Appleton and Thomas Dowse and George Peabody have added




26         MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.
greatly to their library and to their funds, and have enabled them
to go on with their work more conspicuously and more confidently. But the enormous cost of printing, and the inadequate
sale of their volumes, are serious impediments to their progress;
and this very course of lectures has been arranged, as a labor of
love on the part of the members, not without at least a secondary
view to eking out the insufficiencies of our treasury.
Forty-five volumes of Collections and Proceedings have already
been printed, - many of them containing papers of unspeakable
importance and interest; and some of them throwing a light upon
the formation of our institutions, the establishment of our towns
and schools, and the inner life of the earlier and later settlers of
New England, which can be found nowhere else. Other papers
of eaual interest and value are awaiting the press. Without any
very large addition to our resources, if it were only secured before
some of our members, now in my eye, but whose names I forbear
to mention, shall have lost the taste and the faculty for this sort
of labor, our valuable manuscripts might be printed, and placed
beyond the reach of accident, as fast as is desirable. And it is
easy to suggest a legitimate and effectual mode of relief, - in the
wider circulation and sale of our Collections, -if we could only
accomplish its adoption. We cannot hope, indeed, that our
volumes will find any great number of purchasers or readers, in
competition with the illustrated poems or sensation novels, of
which the tenth or the twentieth thousand are advertised in successive months. But there are more than three hundred towns in
Massachusetts. In the public or social libraries of every one of
them, there ought to be a complete set, or as complete a set as is
still possible, of these Historical Collections. Everywhere we
observe liberal men, residents or natives of these towns, founding, or endowing, or aiding these public libraries. If we could
find enough of such liberal men, who, severally or jointly, would
be responsible for placing sets of these Collections in only onehalf of the town libraries, - and I know not what more appropriate
New-Year's present could be made by any one to the place of
his nativity, or of his winter or summer residence,- I should
feel the greatest confidence, that we and our successors could go
on, without let or hindrance, to continue the story of this noble
Commonwealth in all its earlier, and in all its later, relations to




MASSACHUSETTS AND ITS EARLY HISTORY.               27
New England and to the nation at large,-" nothing extenuating,
nor setting down aught in malice," but giving the truth, the
whole truth, and nothing but the truth, after the manner and example of those who have preceded us.
It is a work, my friends, which, you will all agree with me
ought not to be left incomplete. We owe it to the memory of
our fathers, that no authentic account of their lives and labors
should be lost. We owe it to our children, that the great examples of piety and purity, of endurance and enterprise, of
wisdom and patriotism and heroism, with which our earlier and
our later annals abound, should be handed down to them in all
the exactness of contemporaneous records. We owe it to ourselves not to be behindhand, at this day of our prosperity and
abundance, in doing our share towards completing a history, which
so many good and great men, under so many disadvantages and
discouragements, have labored at so lovingly and so successfully,
and which would almost seem to have been watched over from
the beginning by a higher than human Power.
iNOTE S.
PAGE 5, LINE 24.
I am glad to say that, only six weeks after the delivery of this lecture, a colossal statue of Columbus, by an accomplished American artist (Miss Emma Stebbins),
which is described as " grand in its conception and beautiful in its execution," was
presented to the Commissioners of the Central Park at New York, by the Hon.
Marshall 0. Roberts, an eminent and munificent merchant of that city, and is immediately to be added to the decorations of that noble park.
PAGE 16, LINE 8.
An accomplished and classical friend has reminded me that Herodotus (the old
father of History), at the end of his last book (Calliope), makes Cyrus say: "4 lEetv
yap Kc Tr&v yaaKwv %6Spv [La2aKovb dv6pag yiveoOaL."








THE AIMS AND PURPOSES
OF THE
FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.'TANTUM RELIGIO POTUIT.
BY REV. GEORGE E. ELLIS, D.D.








THE AIMS AND PURPOSES
OF THE
FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONLY,
"''TANTUM RELIGIO POTUIT,"
AM to speak of the Aims and Purposes of the Founders of
the Colony, now the State, of Massachusetts. What were
the ends and objects of their enterprise? what its motive and
its design? It ought to be easy for us to meet these questions
with a full and sufficient answer. We have many and very
distinct avowals from most of the leaders in that enterprise.
From these, digested and harmonized, we might well expect to
learn their real intent. And if it be suggested -as it often has
been   that these avowals of theirs were not frank disclosures
of their real motives, but were misleading or deceptive, designed
to cover their secret purposes, which it would not have been
safe or for their own ultimate success to reveal, then we have
another means of reaching the truth.  On the principle that
actions speak louder than words, we have a sure interpretation
of their motives in their deeds, in the course which they pursued,
in the measures which they originated, in the records of their
legislation and administration, and in their practical management of their affairs.
If the views which are now to be presented have the warrant
of truth, it will appear that there is no occasion for charging
them with insincerity, or with secrecy; and that their avowed
motives were put into their actions.
1 Less than half of the matter of the following Lecture, with the authorities
quoted in it, was read on its delivery. The extracts from documents on which its
statements and arguments are based, are here printed at length.




82                THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
It may as well be stated distinctly, at the start, that I intend
to controvert, or at least to qualify and correct, the current
opinion, the so-called popular and generally accepted idea, of the
motive of their enterprise. An error, of the sort defined as the
suppression of the truth, has worked into our history. By some
strange process, the key has been lost to modern use which alone
can make it intelligible as a whole, and reveal the consistency
of its parts.  Inadvertence and misconstruction, rather than any
intentional unfairness, have confused and mystified this subject.
Dr. Palfrey, the latest, and incomparably the best, of our historians, —so thorough and able and trustworthy indeed, that
there is no reason why he should not always be the last of them,
- after rehearsing preliminaries, and bringing the founders of
Massachusetts to these shores, gives us this sentence: -
"As a corporation, the company had obtained the ownership of a large
American territory, on which it designed to place a colony which should
be a refuge for civil and religious freedom." 
But on the very preceding page the historian has quoted the
words of Winthrop, the governor and master-spirit of the colony,
as found in a beautiful little treatise, called " A Model of Christian Charity," written by him on his ocean passage hither.
These are the words: -
" It is by a mutual consent, through a special overruling Providence,
and a more than ordinary approbation of the churches of Christ the
work we have in hand, to seek out a place of cohabitation and consortship, under a due form of government, both civil and ecclesiastical."2
1 Hist. of New Eng., vol. i. p. 814.
2 The spirit of earnest and gentle devoutness which runs through this little essay
gives us an engaging revelation of the character of the writer. Though it is anticipating a point to be more emphatically insisted upon by and by, another quotation
from the essay may be introduced here. It will prepare us for a further dealing
with more matter that is like it.
" Thus stands the cause between God and us. We are entered into Covenant
with Him for this worke.  We have taken out a Commission. The. Lord hath
given us leave to drawe our own articles. We have professed to enterprise these
and those accounts, upon these and those ends. We have hereupon besought Him
of favour and blessing. Now if the Lord shall please to heare us, and bring us in
peace to the place we desire, then hath hee ratified this covenant and sealed our
Commission, and will expect a strict performance of the articles contained in it; but
if wee shall neglect the observation of these articles, which are the ends wee have
propounded, and, dissembling with our God, shall fall to embrace this present world




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.        33
There is a wide discrepancy between the statement made by
the historian and that made by the Governor. The variance is
great even, as measured by words. —by words, which change
their meanings with time and use, and are charged with more
or less of meaning according to the intelligence of readers or
hearers. But far greater than the difference between the verbal
statements is the variance in the substance and the matter of the
two assertions. What Governor Winthrop so distinctly affirms
about the intentions of his company, taken for what it. signified
at the time when it was written, conveys something amazingly
different, wide apart, from the idea which those who read the sentence of Dr. Palfrey would draw from it. Now, the difference in
the substance and purport of what goes respectively with those
two statements, to my mind, corresponds exactly to the erroneous
writing and reading of our early history, which has dropped out
of recognition the real aims and purposes of the founders of
Massachusetts, and substituted for them other motives and ends,
avowed or secret.
The difference between the Governor's " place of cohabitation
and consortship, under a due form of government, both civil and
ecclesiastical," and the historian's " place of refuge for civil and
religious freedom," is, one may say, immeasurable by comparison or contrast. The purpose which the Governor recognizes, positively and completely excluded every thing that is
conveyed to us in the phrase used by Dr. Palfrey and by ourselves. We have civil and religious freedom in this State now.
But what we have as such was not in the minds of the Fathers.
They never designed it or planned for it. On the contrary, in
view of their real intent and aim, the purpose which mastered
and put them willingly and heroically to its service, what is
civil and religious freedom to us, would have been to them a
dread and woe.
I might quote a long and suggestive series of statements from
the pens of the ablest writers in Massachusetts, who have found
occasion to give their own views as to the purpose and aim of
and prosecute our carnal intentions, seeking greate things for ourselves and our
posterity, the Lord will surely breake out in wrathe against us, be revenged of such
a [sinful] people, and make us knowe the price of the breache of such a covenant."
- Mass. Hist. Collections, xxvii. p. 46.
3




34              THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
the original colonists. My space restricts me here within narrow
limits.
Governor Hutchinson says,"It was one great design of the first planters of the Massachusetts
colony to obtain for themselves and their posterity the liberty of worshipping God in such manner as appeared to them to be most agreeable to
the sacred Scriptures. - Upon their removal, they supposed their relation
both to the civil and ecclesiastical government of England, except so far
as a special reserve was made by their charter, was at an end, and that
they had right to form such new model of both as best pleased them."'
Judge Story says, -
" The fundamental error of our ancestors, an error which began with
the very settlement of the colony, was a doctrine which has since been
happily exploded; I mean the necessity of a union between church and
state. To this they clung as to the ark of their safety." 2
This error is what we see. The colonists found in it their
obligation and motive.
Mr. Quincy says the colonists did not come here " to acquire
liberty for all sorts of consciences, but to vindicate and maintain
the liberty of their own consciences. They did not cross the
Atlantic on a crusade in behalf of the rights of mankind in
general, but in support of their own rights and liberties." 3 But
all depends upon the view which the colonists had of the extent,
nature, and use of " their own rights and liberties."
There are those who charge themselves with the responsibility
of defending and vindicating the Fathers of Massachusetts, alike
against censures and assertions which are perfectly true, as well
as against aspersions and slanders which are false and malignant.  Their defence in either case is made difficult, and always
will be unsatisfactory and insufficient, unless we start fairly with
an understanding of their real motive and design. This may
prove, on the search, to have been one of such a nature, such
an inspiration, that they shall need no vindication or apology
for having been guided by it. It may prove that, in the light
and under the sway of a supposed obligation which furnished
1 History, vol. i. pp. 368-9.
2 Commemoration of the Settlement of Salem.
3 Address: Second Century of Boston.




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.       35
them their enterprise, they will as little need to be relieved of
any censure for what they did to others, or to each other, in
attempting to accomplish it, as to be condoled with, pitied, or
wept over for the stern sufferings to which they subjected themselves in pursuit of their great aim.
The attempts which are made to vindicate the Fathers of
Massachusetts - to extenuate their errors, to reduce or apologize
for their harsh spirit and their severe and, to us, cruel dealings
-do not reach to the bottom of the matter; they are not successful; they are not consistent with truth. By some strange
oversight, many of their descendants have failed to inform themselves how they may wisely deal with criticisms and censures
visited upon an ancestry whom they feel bound to defend. On
no subject dealt with among us, in lectures, orations, sermons,
poems, historical addresses, and even in our choice school literature, has there been such an amount of crude, sentimental, and
wasteful rhetoric, or so much weak and vain pleading, as on
this. Those old forefathers who are thus patronized, flattered,
and stood for, if they could listen to or read what is thus offered
in their behalf, would themselves repudiate the larger part of it.
They would feel aggrieved equally, perhaps, by their champions
as by their defamers. The root of the whole error, common alike
to those who censure and those who defend those ancient,
Fathers, is in the assumption that they came here mainly to seek,
establish, and enjoy liberty of conscience; that this was their
inspiration, their motive, their aim. Their assailants and their
defenders both agree, in the main, in asserting or allowing this;
and they are both wrong.
Starting from this assumption, their assailants proceed to say,
that these Fathers very soon showed that it was only liberty of
conscience, and that a very peculiar conscience, oftheir own, which
they sought for, -liberty to indulge their own notions and
intolerant spirit; that they at once became the relentless persecutors of everyopinion and belief varying from their own, and
stopped at no severity or cruelty in repressing and punishing
every form of dissent; imprisoning, banishing, whipping, fining,
mutilating, and hanging all who questioned their ways. They
did all these harsh and cruel things. They were deadly enemies
of every form of what they called heresy; and some free



36            THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
thinking, if they could have reached it, they would have regarded
as punishable as some free-speaking. They restricted the right
of citizenship, in the franchise,- the right of choosing and of
being chosen to office, —to those who had accepted their religious covenant and become church-members. They not only
punished strangers and interlopers coming into their jurisdiction
whose ways and opinions offended them; but they also proceeded, almost to the last penalties of their rigid code, against
a succession of men and women in their own religious fellowship, who raised strife or dissent. They even fettered themselves
by disabling covenants and compacts, and bound themselves in
severe subjection to tests and obligations of the sternest sort;
willingly renouncing a large measure of that liberty which we
so naturally exercise.
These, certainly, were strange doings for men and women
professing liberty of conscience, self-exiled for the purpose of
providing a safe harborage for it. If they did all these things
by a rule of their own opinionativeness, measured by a standard
of their own devising, with no appeal, outside of themselves, to
an authority held by them as equally supreme for their own
guidance and that of all others,-their course would indeed
present the most marvellous phenomenon in history. If they
had intended to afford such an asylum, and had in writing or in
spoken word avowed it, one would have thought that the first
instance in which they violated or impaired it, would have
opened'their eyes to the marked and glaring inconsistency of
their course. At any rate, how easy would it have been for the
first victim of their intolerance to have quoted their own professions against them! -an opportunity never availed of from
first to last by any one of their victims, for the very excellent
reason, as we shall soon see, that the founders of Massachusetts
had made no such professions, but were consecrated to an enterprise so pledged and constrained in itself that it would not have
admitted of any laxness.
The simple truth is, that the founders of Massachusetts never
professed or promised any thing that is implied to us in the
phrase " liberty of conscience." After having read every thing
that I know of as extant in print, or manuscript, from the pens
of those exiles, I feel justified in stating positively that they did




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.       87
not come here to seek, nor even to indulge themselves in,
" liberty of conscience," - in any thing like the meaning which
that phrase has to us. We mislead ourselves when we assert or
allow that they recognized any thing of the sort. Not a single
sentence can be quoted from any one of them committing them
to it. You may find the words, the phrase, in their writings,
often repeated and very emphatic; but when it is used to express
any thing of what we mean by it, that thing is sternly repudiated; and when the phrase is a part of their own vernacular, it
covers something which is only a part of a much larger whole,
and which defined rather a limitation, a subjection, than an
enfranchisement, of natural liberty.  We must not put our
meaning into their phrase, but their meaning.
It can hardly be necessary to avert here the suggestion of a
quibble or a cavil, to the effect that these self-exiled colonists
were still exercising that same free will and private judgment, alike
in what they renounced and in what they accepted and pledged
themselves to believe and do, — which practically defines liberty
of conscience. The subject of a Jesuit novitiate may exercise
that " liberty" in putting himself under a rule which henceforth
binds him to forego it. If, as I shall attempt to show, the
Fathers of Massachusetts felt, avowed, and put themselves under
the sway of, an obligation to an external rule, which overbore
henceforward the exercise of any natural freedom for changing
or qualifying their allegiance and subjection to it, then it would
seem that we should bring them before us rather as the awed
and pledged subjects of a yoke to which they had submitted
themselves, than as free rovers not as yet persuaded to what
they should commit themselves, if to any thing or to anybody.
They certainly were not " fancy-free."
Every conception which those men had of liberty, civil or
religious, was of something subjected to the sway and restraint
of law, - a qualified, dependent, conditioned, and reduced
freedom. Liberty under law was their motto, and it depended
upon the nature and the quality of the law to decide the nature
and the quality of the liberty. In any province or exercise of
liberty, they recognized, frowning or presiding over it, some
symbol or dispensation of authority.
In a great controversy rising here in the Court from a small




38              THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
occasion, in 1645, and leading to what is called " the impeachment" of Winthrop, then       Deputy    Governor, he made an
admirable speech, in which we find him giving his idea of
liberty as follows:" For the other point concerning liberty, I observe a great mistake in
the country about that. There is a twofold liberty, - natural (I mean as
our nature is now corrupt) and civil or federal. The first is common to
man with beasts and other creatures.  By this, man, as he stands in
relation to man simply, hath liberty to do what he lists; it is a liberty to
evil as well as to good. This liberty is incompatible and inconsistent
with authority. The exercise and maintaining of this liberty makes men
grow more evil, and in time to be worse than brute beasts: omnes sumus
licentid deteriores. This is that great enemy of truth and peace, that
wild beast, which all the ordinances of God are bent against to restrain
and subdue it. The other kind of liberty I call civil or federal; it may
also be termed moral, in reference to the covenant between God and
man, in the moral law, and the politic, covenants and constitutions amongst
men themselves. This liberty is the proper end and object of authority,
and cannot subsist without it; and it is a liberty to that only which is
good, just, and honest. This liberty you are to stand for, with the hazard
not only of your goods, but of your lives, if need be.  Whatsoever
crosseth this is not authority, but a distemper thereof. This liberty is
maintained and exercised in a way of subjection to authority; it is of the
same kind wherewith Christ hath made us free." 1
De Tocqueville, in his " Democracy in America,"2 quotes the
above, and describes it as a "' fine definition of liberty."
Of liberty of conscience, either as an abstraction or as an absolute right, they with whom   we are dealing had no conception,
as of a good thing. Certainly, they had no respect for it, no
confidence in it.   They would have dreaded it beyond our
power in these days to imagine. They had begun to see around
them, in their native England, the threatenings of some of the
effects and results of just what we mean by liberty of conscience,
and they shuddered at them. Their dread of those consequences
was one of the satisfactions which they afterwards found in
their exile.  It would be much nearer to the truth, -indeed, it
is the truth itself, - and it would be truer to all the facts of the
case, to the integrity of history, and to the right use of terms
1 Life and Letters, vol. ii. pp. 340, 341.
2 Bowen's ed., vol. i. p. 52.




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.       39
which get changed in their import and burden, to say, frankly
and boldly, that our Fathers came here to get away from, to get
rid of, such liberty of conscience, as to them a hateful, pernicious,
and ruinous thing, sure to result in impiety and anarchy. They
did not claim it for themselves, except under a restriction and
limitation, soon to be defined, which would render the claim
almost nugatory in our view of it. They would have shuddered
at indulging themselves in what is now known as such liberty.
To have expected them to approve of it in others, and to provide
for it, would be an absurdity. It was the one horrid, dreaded
bugbear of their fancies, - the one proscribed iniquity of their
religion.  A conscience free, in our loose sense of the word,
would have been to them far worse than no conscience at all.
Attracted as I was, years ago, to the study of their enterprise,
as one of the most striking episodes in the world's annals, considering what great and marvellously prospered issues have
come from it, I soon learned, that the fulsome panegyrics and
the sentimental rhetoric spent upon those stern old Fathers,
were worse than wasted; that the superficial way in which their
history has been read and referred to, was introducing misrepresentation and misunderstanding; and that they had become the
subjects of false praise and of unjust censure, the joint product
of which had come to be visited upon them in the form of a
facile and flippant ridicule. No one among the living generation here, native or alien, is called upon to undertake their
championship in terms which will vindicate their superstitions
or their severities, or which will cover an approbation of the
fundamental principles assumed or adopted by them.  They
are, however, justly entitled to be set forth in the light of their
own age, under the guidance of their own sincere convictions,
and with an intelligent, truthful recognition of their mastermotive, which was as lofty a one as has ever engaged sages,
philanthropists, or saints in any earthly enterprise. It is painful
to any one who, inheriting their blood and sharing the blessings
of their sufferings and labors, is also versed in their history, to
hear them either falsely praised or unfairly criticised, ridiculed,
and maligned. In the mixtures of populations in our northern
cities, and in the spirit of religious partisanship which is rife
among us, those who are very glad to avail themselves of the




40            THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
freedom and thrift of our Puritan heritage, often allow themselves to speak contemptuously and derisively of the original
colonists. What has come of their enterprise and institutions,
is found to be desirable by all who share in it; but not only
gratitude, truth itself, is often forgotten in the enjoyment of the
inheritance.  The story of the intolerance of the colonists is
curtly told in epigrams and stinging jests.  Their grim and
morose manners, their superstitions, austerities, and cruel enactments are enlarged upon. Some of their lineal progeny give
them over to travesties and railleries of light and bitter tongues.
Any thing that could be viewed as a defence or vindication
of them; any thing, even, which, falling short of that, would
claim for them an average measure of intelligence and common
sense, -must be given over, if it takes in the fancy that these old
Fathers had main regard for what we mean by liberty of conscience, or by civil freedom.
Read their history searchingly, penetrate to the motives and
convictions of the men and women themselves, and the truth
will reveal itself to you, that never was there in this world a company of persons who, individually and in their joint fellowship,
held their consciences as subject to a more constraining obligation
than they did theirs. I never find any one of their pleas or
avowals alleging a claim to, or an exercise of, liberty of conscience, which fails to qualify it by a recognition of their subjection to a Scripture rule, in indulging themselves in that liberty.
Thus, in the Humble Petition and Address of the General Court
to Charles II., in 1660-1, Endicott being governor, they say: "' Our
liberty to walk in the faith of the Gospel, with all good conscience,
according to the order of the Gospel, was the cause of our transporting ourselves," &c.
A rule, or mastery, which they accepted over their consciences,
became to them, in fact, a substitute for conscience. You must
look behind, deeply below, this pretence of freedom of conscience,
in the ordinary use of the phrase, for the influence, the sway, the
conviction, the purpose, aye, the inspiration, which moved them.
They were the last men in the world to trust to a natural conscience. They were a covenanted people. The Puritan Bible
was the Lord of their consciences; and they put themselves under
the most implicit and unlimited subjection to what they owned




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.      41
as its just authority over them. True, it may be said they followed their individual consciences, and allowed them exercise in
approving and putting themselves under a rule, which, for them,
represented a supreme authority. But, in so doing, they understood that they parted with what others, " uncovenanted," might
regard as their liberty. Their Bible training had preoccupied and
restricted their freedom.  Their opinions, their motives, their
actions, their laws, their institutions, were all restrained- we
should say, hampered- by their religious belief, reducing their
natural freedom within rigid limitations. We may in these days
of ours question the reasonableness of that belief of theirs; and
we may deny that the Bible has the kind and degree of authority
over the natural conscience which they assigned to it. But these
are our opinions, not theirs; and in order to see and know them,
we must get into their atmosphere. The fact is, that a conscience in subjection to a severe rule, and not a free conscience,
guided them. So little did they think of what they might do,
if they indulged their own notions and speculations, that their
whole earnestness of purpose was concentrated in putting themselves under a disabling restriction of their own wills and wishes.
The free exercise of their individual consciences would have
divided them in opinion, and prevented any harmony of action.
Only as they consented to forego individualism in speculation
and belief, through a common conscientiousness subjecting them
to the rule of the Bible, could they walk and act together.
I will endeavor to state, in a plain way, the simple and
authentic truth, which will furnish the key to the motives and
intent of the colonists.
Certain proprietary rights and privileges on land and water,
in a region defined as Massachusetts Bay, had been secured by
royal charter to a trading company of adventurers in England.
Twenty patentees were named as constituting that company;
viz., a governor, a deputy governor, and eighteen assistants, —
seven beside the governor and deputy governor being a quorum
for business. The company, by its charter, could make as many
more persons free of it, freemen, so called, -that is, members or
partners, voters, proprietors, - as they pleased, and on such
terms, conditions, and qualifications as they pleased. The company had absolute jurisdiction over its territory; and the charter




42            THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
gave it full powers of legislation and administration, subject only
to accordance with the laws of England. The charter provisions
for this power and these rights are explicit, full, and emphatic.
To the company was given " full and absolute power and authority, to correct, punish, pardon, and rule" all English subjects
that should at any time adventure to, or inhabit within, the precincts of its jurisdiction; and, "for their special defence and
safety, to encounter, expulse, repel, and resist by force of arms,
as well by sea as by land, and by all fitting ways and means
whatsoever, all such person and persons, as shall at any time
hereafter attempt or enterprise the destruction, invasion, detriment, or annoyance to the said plantation or inhabitants."
Here, certainly, was a large franchise, with broad privileges
and well-fortified rights. Yet nothing short of all this would
have secured the enlistment of able and well-disposed men
in an enterprise that stood out alone hopefully among many
similar enterprises in those days which had disastrously failed.
The company needed all that the charter pledged to it by
the royal seal: the right of self-administration; of deciding and
imposing the terms on which it would admit free associates,
who might advance or ruin its schemes; legal rights over its
jurisdiction; and power to punish, expel, and thwart the designs
of all who might threaten or practise harm or annoyance to it.
Certainly the question may be raised, and a very vigorous and
equal-handed discussion may be maintained upon it, whether the
three provisions in their charter, on which they insisted so
strenuously, and with their own self-favoring interpretation of
them,-the absolute jurisdiction of the soil, the authority to
define their own terms for admitting freemen, and the right to
drive out those whose presence troubled them, - allowed of the
strained use and application to which the proprietors applied
them. It is to my purpose, however, only to accept the fact, that
the authorities did so interpret those provisions, and did, in the
open face of day, act upon such interpretations. This they did,
not only in their secret confidences with each other, but equally
in public avowals. They could not expect to make a secret of
their pretensions, not even of their bold denial of a right of appeal
from them to English courts; for there was almost a worn track
and highway on land and sea, between the Massachusetts court




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.      43
and those courts, made by complainants. Indeed, even to the
last death-struggle of the authorities to retain their charter
against commissioners and against Charles II., they stood
stoutly to their first construction of it.
It was probably intended and expected, though not a word
was covenanted or intimated to that effect, that the company
and its charter should remain and be administered in England;
vessels and servants being sent hither to fish and trade. As to the
legality of its transfer by charter and local government to this
spot, it is not within the scope of my lecture to argue or pronounce. Nor is any discussion of that matter needful here and
now. For, as we have seen what powers of local jurisdiction
the charter assured to the company, it would seem that its officers might have done, through their resident agents here, substantially what, and all that, they did when they were established
in their jurisdiction. They could make laws for all who were
living here; they could admit or reject at their pleasure, and on
their own terms, any who sought to vote in their affairs; and
they could warn off and drive out intruders. Had the charter
and administration never been transferred, the company would
still have had rule here.
A merely mercenary spirit, bent on pecuniary gains, had, in
the main, guided the company in its origin, as it had similar
patentees corporated by prior grants and charters. But there
were in its membership men strongly swayed and leavened by
Puritanism; and the extraordinary excitement, the religious
fervor, and the civil and political agitations of the crisis in England,-fast working towards civil war and revolution, —increased and strengthened that influence. While Endicott at
Salem, with a body of associates and servants, was acting as
local governor and agent of the company, and receiving his instructions from the charter administration in England, we find
the following entry on the original records, -of matter of business, as the company was assembled in its General Court, at the
house of its deputy governor, Thomas Goff, in London, July 28,
1629:" Mr. Governor (Cradock) read certain propositions conceived by himself; viz., that for the advancement of the plantation, the inducing and
encouraging persons of worth and quality to transport themselves and
2




44              THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
families thither, and for other weighty reasons therein contained, to
transfer the government of the plantation to those that shall inhabit
there, and not to continue the same in subordination to the company here,
as now it is. This business occasioned some debate: but by reason of the
many great and considerable consequences thereupon depending, it was
not now resolved upon; but those present are desired privately and
seriously to consider hereof, and to set down their particular reasons in
writing pro and contra, and to produce the same at the next General Court;
where, they being reduced to heads, and maturely considered of, the company may then proceed to a final resolution thereon; and in the mean time
they are desired to carry this business secretly, that the same be not
divulged."
For any thing we know to the contrary, this significant proposition, as well as the purpose which it proposed, may have
originated in the mind of Governor Cradock. That it does not
appear to have surprised or at all displeased some of those, at
least, who heard it as " conceived by himself," would indicate
that preparation had been made for its bold utterance, and for
its entry upon the records, by previous suggestion and consultation. At any rate, the purpose of transferring the charter and
government was not of a sort to have been born full-shaped for
the occasion of its public utterance, on the spur of a moment.
The matter was made the especial business of the Court at a
meeting a month afterwards; the point under consideration
being, " to give answer to divers gentlemen intending to go into
New England, whether or no the chief government of the plantation, together with the patent, should be settled in New England or here." Committees were appointed representing both
alternatives, with liberty to get advice and opinions from others
not belonging to the company; and they were to prepare their
respective arguments, from which a report might be digested for
the General Court the next day. The deliberateness of the method,
and yet the short time allowed for the decision, is another indication of much previous conference. The decision was made on
the next day, August 29, when, after a hearing of reasons on
both sides, and a long debate, the question was called for,
whether the patent and the government be transferred, " so as it
may be done legally."   By erection of hands, it appeared by
the general consent of the company, that the transfer should be




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.        45
made; " and accordingly an order to be drawn up." At the Court
held on September 29, following, the orders above agreed upon
having been read, further decisive action was deferred, on account
of the absence of some of the leading assistants, who had been
at the previous meetings. But in the mean while some preliminary measures were provided for, especially " to take advice of
learned council, whether the same may be legally done or no."
At the meeting of the General Court, October 15,- at which,
significantly, Mr. John Winthrop, and some others of like spirit,
appear for the first time, -the transfer, and arrangements incidental to it, were fully decided. On the 20th of the same month,
a General Court was held, for the purpose of choosing new officers
of the company, with reference to the enterprise agreed upon, as
neither the governor nor the deputy intended to go over at that
time. Mr. John Winthrop, " both for his integrity and sufficiency,"
was chosen governor, and Mr. John Humphrey deputy; but as the
latter, when the time for embarkation came, was to stay behind,
Thomas Dudley was put in his place. One other entry on the
records must be copied here. At the Court on November 25," Upon the motion of Mr. White, to the end that this business might
be proceeded in with the first intention, which was chiefly the glory of
God; and to that purpose, that their meetings might be sanctified by the
prayers of some faithful ministers, resident here in London, whose advice
would be likewise requisite upon many occasions, - the court thought fit to
admit into the freedom of this company Mr. Jo: Archer and Mr. Philip
Nye, ministers here in London, who being here present kindly accepted
thereof. Also Mr.. White did recommend unto them Mr. Nathaniel
Ward, of Standon." 1
This last extract must convey to us all that it reports, all that
it suggests, and a great deal more also. It gives us explicitly a
fragment from a history which we have the means of setting into
a more full narration. A change had evidently passed upon the
Massachusetts Company, - a change in purpose, aim, and
membership. So far as its business proceedings had now come
to embrace a prayer meeting, the token is a reminder of much
beside. Some of the preparatory agencies which wrought to the
result may be indicated. When Deputy Governor Dudley had
1 Court Records, vol. i. pp. 49-63.




46             THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
got a rude cottage for himself here, less than a year after his arrival, he addressed a letter, of singular interest and pathos, to the
Countess of Lincoln, the mother of the wife of Isaac Johnson,
his associate. In this letter he says, -
" Touching the plantation which we have here begun, it fell out thus.
About the year 1627, some friends, being together in Lincolnshire, fell into
discourse about New England, and the planting of the Gospel there; and,
after some deliberation, we imparted our reasons, by letters and messages
to some in London and the west country; where it was likewise deliberately thought upon, and at length, with often negotiation, so ripened," &c.,
as to result in the procuring of the royal charter, and in the
plantation. These " Boston men," so called, reinforced the funds
of the company. It was the coming in of the religious spirit
into the business plans, by the new membership of the company,
which alone induced the transfer of the charter and the government. In the little treatise of Winthrop, written on the Atlantic
Ocean, already quoted, he says, " We are a company professing
ourselves fellow-members of Christ."  Some links out of the
chain which connected the trading company with the religious
colony, were wanting, until the recent discovery of a large mass
of the papers of Governor Winthrop revealed to us certain night
rides, secret consultations, and deliberate negotiations, weighing
of arguments and devotional exercises, which brought him into
membership of the company, committed him to its bold and
consecrated enterprise, and led to his choice, as its all sufficient
leader.
Nearly at the same time on which the valuable mass of
" Winthrop Papers " came to light in New London, Conn., con.
tainig, among others, the governor's autograph copy of that
significant document called " General Considerations for the
Plantation in New England," &c., John Forster. Esq., published
in London a biography of that noble patriot Sir John Eliot.
The Hon. R. C. Winthrop having published the above named
document in the " Life and Letters " of his ancestor, with the
reasons for assigning the authorship to him, had shortly afterwards noticed an allusion by Mr. Forster, to a paper found among
Eliot's, alluding to New-England colonization. The Earl of St.
Germans, a descendant of Eliot, on being applied to by Mr.
Winthrop, kindly sent to our Society a transcript of the paper,




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.      47
which proved to be a copy, with some variations, of the" Considerations." It was made by Eliot himself, in the Tower, to be
sent to his illustrious compeer, John Hampden. We have now
four copies of that important document which did such service
of a religious sort in our enterprise.1
The enterprise was eminently one which was originated, controlled, and guided by a leadership. It had favorers, coadjutors,
subordinates, sympathizers, and servants; but its aim, its quickening motive, and its inspiration, came from a very small
number, perhaps from only half a score of persons,- its masterspirits. These devised and purposed; they bore the sacrifices and
renewed the pledges of self-consecration under dark and discouraging aspects. They furnished in council the practical wisdom
adapted to the development of the scheme, and its only security
in emergencies. They were men who could confide in each
other.
I feel justified in adopting Winthrop as my chief authority
and guide in interpreting the motives of his associates for whom
he speaks, as well as for his own. The crisis in the affairs of the
company in England was marked by his coming into it, and his
coming in brought in a religious intensity in its purposes. He
was himself at the time under deep religious impressions. The
colony for the twenty remaining years of his life was more influenced by him than by any other person, alike in its civil and
religious administration, -not excepting even Cotton.  We
have more full and frank disclosures and avowals from his
pen, than from all others of his associates. These are cogent
reasons for implicit trust in him.
It was the working of the religious leaven in the company
which ensured the end of colonizing by the transfer of the government. Such members of the company as had no heart or
zeal for the work, dropped out of it; and new members were, for
its new consecration, drawn into it. Friends and well-wishers
in the kingdom, not belonging to it, nor intending to join it,
made generous and valuable gifts to it, because of its new
designs.
The counsellor of the company, Mr. White, who had procured
1 Historical Society Proceedings, 1864-5, pp. 413, &c.




48              THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
the drafting of its charter, and by whose calculation or foresight
it may perhaps have been contrived, that neither London nor
any other place was specified for its local administration, had
certified to the legality of its transfer. Had the intent been
known by the English authorities,-we are not certain that it was
not known, -the transfer would perhaps have been prevented.
Had those authorities been privileged with a prevision of what
was to come from establishing the charter here, they certainly
would have retained it in England; in fact would never have
allowed it to have passed the seals.
Coincidently with the departure of the colonists, the Rev. Mr.
White, of Dorchester, the chief prompter of the enterprise, published his "' Planters' Plea," in explanation and justification of it.
In this, he says, -
" I should be very unwilling to hide any thing I think might be fit, to
discover the uttermost of the intentions of our planters in their voyage
to New England; and therefore shall make bold to manifest, not only what
I know, but what I guess, concerning their purpose. As it were absurd
to conceive they have all one mind, so were it more ridiculous to imagine
they have all one scope. Necessity may press some; novelty, draw on
others; hopes of gain in time to come may prevail with a third sort: but
that the most, and most sincere and godly part, have the advancement of
the Gospel for their main scope, I am confident. That of them some may
entertain hope and confidence of enjoying greater liberty there than here
in the use of some orders and ceremonies" of our church, it seems very
probable."
The chosen leader of the enterprise was a providential man;
and from that hour till his death, twenty years after, he was its
hero and its saint. The members of that transported trading
company, represented by its officers, its freemen, and their servants, present themselves on this side of the great dreary ocean,
as a band of religious exiles. They appear in, they assume, that
character, at once. As such they prayed together under a huge
forest tree, and recognized the consecration of their enterprise.
And what was it? Now, in place of that silly fancy that they
were seeking to provide a refuge for freedom of conscience, let
us substitute their real inspiration and aim. Liberty of conscience, in our full sense of the phrase, was preparing to assert
and exercise itself in England, at the time of their exile; and it




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.     49
was this fact, with " the prophaneness " and " disorder " there fermenting, which frightened our Fathers away from their dear old
home. We have a multitude of queer books and pamphlets,
the relics of those days,-quaint, odd, wild, eccentric, in their
contents, gleaming here and there with grand and startling truths,
and proving fully this affirmation, that there is not a cobweb nor
a fancy, a notion nor a theory, a conceit nor an opinion in any
living brain to-day, in Boston, which was not soon after the emigration held and avowed then and there. And this positive
statement, if it does not exhaust, at any rate puts to trial, the
utmost power of language. These dreams and heresies of visionaries, mystics, and bold thinkers, were, as we shall note by and
by, especially and painfully odious to those from whom we
inherit this Commonwealth. They wanted to get away from all
such hateful license, and to find protection from its risk in a
pledged and covenanted purpose. The Fathers of Massachusetts,
parting with their lands and houses at home, finally, with no
intent of return, once for all, agreed by a most solemn compact
at their own charges, and by an investment of all their worldly
goods, to avail themselves of their charter rights over the territory covered by their patent, to try here an experiment, which
seemed to them alike noble, practical, and religious.
And here I must avail myself of the privilege indulged to one
who, in a historical review, infers from results and developments
the nature of the primary causes and motives which originated
and guided them. From the frank and earnest and reiterated
avowals of the leaders and the master-spirits of the enterprise,
and from their steadfast purpose and aim manifested in all their
subsequent measures, plans, legislation, and administration, I
infer the design which they had in view. I should have a right
to draw such an inference, if I had to do it solely as an interpreter of actions, without any avowals of a direct sort to aid me.
But these avowals in words are not wanting, and they are in full
harmony with the deeds done. It is not necessary, to assure the
position which I take, that I should be held to show that, if the
question of purpose and motive had been put to each and every
party to this enterprise, including all its subordinates and servants, he would have answered as I answer for its leaders.
Even the leaders may not all have seen the full shape of their
4




50            THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
vision. But I have no misgiving as to what it was. The enterprise was no hap-hazard experiment in drifting, no waiting on the
luck of events. The serious earnestness with which it was
undertaken, corresponds to the resolute purpose with which it
was pursued by them.
Their lofty and soul-enthralling aim - the condition and
reward of all their severe sufferings and arduous efforts -was
the establishment and administration here of a religious and
civil commonwealth, which should bear the same relation to the
spirit and the letter of the whole Bible that the Jewish commonwealth bore to the Law of Moses. This was the significance
and purport of the remarkable words written by Governor
Winthrop, on his passage hither, " to seek out a place of cohabitation and consortship, under a due form of government, both
civil and ecclesiastical."  The difference between the aim so
defined and the providing "a refuge for civil and religious freedom," will appear as we go along.  An experiment was to
be put on trial here which, even we must say, had a right to
be tested, and which was worthy of being tested; but which
was regarded by our Fathers as holding them under a consecrated obligation to commit themselves to it. They organized
here a body politic, all whose laws, functions, and institutions
had rigid reference to their one supreme aim. Their own consciences were held under thrall by it, and were free only in one
direction of obligation to it, -that of whole-souled and lifelasting loyalty to it. Two misgivings or fears, and only two,
were known to them: first, that they themselves, by fault or
infirmity, might fail of fidelity to it; or, second, that it should
be brought under peril from the wickedness or waywardness of
any who might creep in or start up among them. Against the
first danger, they sought security under a solemnly pledged
agreement and covenant, binding themselves to each other and
to God. Against the second risk, they believed they could protect themselves under their charter, by choosing only such
associates as they desired, and on their own terms, and by
exercising their royally sealed authority to resist, thwart, punish,
and drive out every one who might oppose or annoy them.
Mark the qualification in the statement just made, - that the
projected religious commonwealth was to be founded and ad



FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.       51
ministered by the Bible, the whole Bible, not by the New
Testament alone. If, as Christians, they had adopted what is
generally held in these days as to the substantial substitution
of the New Scripture for the Old, their whole creed and rule
and legislation would have been different. But they revered
and used and treated the Holy Book as one whole. A single
sentence from any part of it was an oracle to them: it was as a
slice or a crumb from any part of a loaf of bread, all of the same
consistency. God, as King, had been the Lawgiver of Israel:
he should be their Lawgiver too.  They had found so little
satisfaction under the legislation of men, that they longed to put
themselves under the legislation of the Deity.  Israel, as a
commonwealth, had been administered by his statutes: those
same statutes should bind their consciences, ratify their laws,
and rule their lives. They would make the support of religion
compulsory, as did the Jewish legislator. The Sabbath-breaker
and the blasphemer should stand as high criminals. The Church
should fashion the State, and be identical with it. Only experienced and covenanted Christian believers, pledged by their
profession to accordance of opinion and purpose with the original
proprietors and exiles, should be admitted as freemen, or full
citizens of the commonwealth. They would restrain and limit
their own liberty of conscience, as well as their own freedom
of action, within Bible rules. In fact,-in spirit even more
than in the letter, - they did adopt all of the Jewish code which
was in any way practicable for them. The leading minister of
the colony was formally appointed by the General Court to adapt
the Jewish law to their case; and it was enacted, that, till that
work was really done, " Moses, his Judicials," should be in full
force.  Mr. Cotton in due time presented the results of his
labor in a code of laws illustrated by Scripture texts.  This
code was not formally adopted by the Court; but the spirit of it,
soon rewrought into another body, had full sway.
It was known that Winthrop had written what he calls " a
small treatise," in 1644, at a period of some internal variance in
the colony, in which treatise he undertook to vindicate the
government from the " aspersion" of being arbitrary in its
conduct.  This treatise came to light only a few   years
ago, among some family papers, in the Governor's original




52               THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
autograph. In it are found the following very decisive statements: -
"By these it appears that the officers of this Bodye politick have a
Rule to walke by, in all their administrations, which Rule is the Worde
of God, and such conclusions and deductions as are or shalbe regularly
drawn from thence... 
" The ffundamentalls which God gave to the Commonwealth of Israeli
were a sufficient Rule to them, to guide all their Affaires; we havinge
the same, with all the Additions, explanations and deductions, which have
followed; it is not possible we should want a Rule in any case: if God
give wisdome to discerne it."'
In the life of Mr. Cotton by his friend Mr. Davenport, we find.he following most explicit statement, which shows how far
these Fathers were from recognizing the plea for liberty of conscience: -
"Considering that these Plantations had liberty to mould their civil
order into that form which they should find to be best for themselves, and
that here the churches and Commonwealth are complanted together in
holy covenant and fellowship with God in Christ Jesus, Mr. Cotton did,
at the request of the General Court in the Bay, draw an abstract of the
laws of judgement delivered from God by Moses to the Commonwealth
of Israel, so far forth as they are of moral, that is, of perpetual and universal, equity among all nations; especially such as these Plantations
are; wherein he advised that Theocrasie, i.e. God's government, might
be established as the best form of government, wherein the people that
choose rulers, are God's people in covenant with him, that is, members of
churches, and the men chosen by them to be rulers, such also, and the
laws of God, and the ministers of God, are consulted with by the Governor,
magistrates and people, in all hard cases and in matters of the Lord, that
is, of religion," &c.2
In July, 1634, the hearts of the colonists were gladdened
by the receipt of " Certain Proposals made by Lord Say, Lord
Brooke, and other persons of quality, as conditions of their
removing to England." Hutchinson has preserved these for us,
by printing them "with the answers thereto."
Besides proposing an aristocratic class for recognition in the
colony, these noblemen desired that the franchise should depend
1 Life and Letters, vol. ii. p. 445.  2 Hutchinson's Coll. of Papers, p. 161.




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.            53
upon property. The answer vindicates, wholly from Scripture
texts and examples, the law of the colony which restricted the
franchise to church-members.
Hutchinson also gives us a letter, on the same occasion, from
Mr. Cotton to Lord Say and Sele, which is in itself conclusive
as to the intent of the authorities.  He writes in vindication
of their rule: -
" God hath so framed the state of church government and ordinances,
that they may be compatible to any commonwealth, though never so
much disordered in its frame. But yet, when a commonwealth hath
liberty to mould its own frame (scriptzure plenitttdinem adoro), I conceive
the scripture hath given full direction for the right ordering of the same.
It is better that the Commonwealth be fashioned to the setting forth of
God's house, which is his church, than to accommodate the church frame
to the civil state.  Democracy, I do not conceive, that ever God did
ordain as a fit government either for church or commonwealth. If the
people be governors, who shall be governed?  As for Monarchy and
Aristocracy, they are both of them clearly approved and directed in
Scripture, yet so as referreth the sovereignty to himself, and setteth up
Theocracy in both, as the best form of Government in the Commonwealth, as well as in the church." 1
Captain Edward Johnson, that serviceable man in so many
capacities, civil and military, came over with Winthrop's company. He understood well, and heartily sympathized with, the
purposes of the colonists, whose toils he shared, and whose fortunes he sought to record, though anonymously, in poetry and
verse, - distressing as some of the latter is. His quaint and
grotesque but still instructive book -" YWonder-working Providence of Sion's Saviour in New England" - is strewn all over
with the tokens characteristic of the Biblical model of the
Commonwealth.
As a deputy of the Court, and himself one of the most
laborious and efficient members of the committee engaged in the
protracted work of digesting a body of laws, he may be regarded
as competent, as he certainly was frank, a witness of the intent
which underlaid all our early legislation. The following words
of his are certainly candid enough: —
"This year, 1646, the General Court appointed a Committee of divers
1 Hutchinson History, vol. i., Appendix.




54               THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
persons to draw up a Body of laws for the well ordering of this little
Commonwealth: and to the end that they might be most agreeable with
the rule of Scripture, in every county there was appointed two Magistrates,
two Ministers, and two able persons from among the people, who having
provided such a competent number as was meet, together with the former
that were enacted newly amended, they presented them to the General
Court, where they were again perused and amended; and then another
committee chosen to bring them into form, and present them to the Court
again, who the year following passed an Act of confirmation upon them,
and so committed them to the Press; and in the year 1648, they were
printed, and now are to be seen of all men, to the end that none may plead
ignorance; and that all who intend to transport themselves hither, may
know this is no place of licentious liberty, nor will this people suffer any
to trample down this vineyard of the Lord, but with diligent execution
will cut off from the City of the Lord, the wicked doers; and if any man
can shew wherein any of them derogate from the Word of God, very
willingly will they accept thereof, and amend their imperfections (the
Lord assisting); but let not any ill-affected persons find fault with them,
because they suit not with their own humour, or because they meddle with
matters of Religion, for it is no wrong to any man, that a people who have
spent their estates, many of them, and ventured their lives for to keep
faith and a pure conscience, to use all means that the Word of God allows
for maintenance and continuance of the same, especially they have taken
up a desolate Wilderness to be their habitation, and not deluded any by
keeping their profession in huggermug, but point and proclaim to all the
way and course they intend, God willing, to walk in; if any will yet,
notwithstanding, seek to justle them out of their own right, let them not
wonder if they meet with all the opposition a people put to their greatest
straits can make," &c.1
These extracts, and a score of others of a similar purport
might be culled from the writings of the leading exiles, tell the
whole story.   The actual code of laws adopted by the colony
- called " The Bodie of Liberties," prepared mainly by the Rev.
Nathaniel Ward     of Ipswich — differs essentially from     Mr.
Cotton's abstract, especially in dispensing for the most part with
scriptural citations; but in no single particular did the legislation
indicated by it, look away from or loosen its hold upon the
supreme purpose of the authorities, to establish and administer
here a strictly Biblical Commonwealth. Ward, who had had an
1 Book iii. chap. v., Poole's ed., p. 206.




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.        55
early legal training in England, stood for that aim and experiment as firmly as did Cotton.
And then we are to remind ourselves that their Bible faith
was not merely a simply vague and general reverence for it, like
the sentiment which lingers now with their descendants. They
had no theory about the Bible:- they never criticised it; and
they rarely suggested amendments, even of the English translation of it. They loved, honored, and revered it, and gave to it
the homage of their awed spirits. What testimony is borne to
this fact in their letters and diaries, in the implicit faith with
which they took down the texts and expositions of their ministers, and quoted illustrations and parallelisms from the Bible, as
decisions for all cases! How earnestly did they strive to incorporate into their private and family life, not only the preceptive,
but as much as they could of even the ceremonial, matter of the
Scriptures!
That frankly avowed and practically applied purpose of the
Fathers, of establishing here a Bible Commonwealth, "under a
due form of government, both civil and ecclesiastical," furnishes
the key to, the explanation of, all the dark things and all the
bright things in their early history. The young people educated
among us ought to read our history by that simple, plain interpretation. The consciences of our Fathers were not free in our
sense of that word. They were held under rigid subjection to
what they regarded as God's Holy Word, through and through
in every sentence of it, just as the consciences of their Fathers
were held, under the sway of the Pope and the Roman Church.
The Bible was to them supreme. Their church was based on it,
modelled by it, governed by it; and they intended their State
should be also. Two very striking and emphatic sentences from
the pen of Governor Winthrop convey the substance of volumes; and who had better right than he to tell us his own
aim and that of his associates?
"Whereas the way of God hath always been to gather his churches
out of the world; now, the world, or civil state, - must be raised out of
the churches." -"The Magistrates are limited, both by their church
Covenant, and by their oath, and by the duty of their places to square all
their proceedings by the rule of God's Word [why did he not say by the




56               THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
law of England?] for the advancement of the Gospel and the weale
publick," &c.1
This was their master aim,- this was the vision of the soul
which led those exiles hither, - and by the inspiration of which
alone, would they have come, or remained, or prospered. Constrained, compulsory, and rigidly enforced subjection to the
consecrated purpose and rule of their enterprise required of
those who imposed or recognized it, a personal suffering under
it, a painful loyalty to it, fully as severe, as tasking to the energies
of human nature, as were the disabilities and penalties which
they stood ready to inflict upon all opponents and mischiefmakers.   It is worth our while to remember that the heads of
that Commonwealth, its legislators and magistrates, found their
own yoke a very hard one in the bearing. Winthrop, Dudley,
Saltonstall, and others, the highest among them, were called to
question, put under discipline, and bound to penalties. While
their scruples forbade the kissing of the Bible, in the administration of an oath, their conduct and " carriage " were tried by the
statutory authority of that Book.
We must consider this also: these Fathers were proprietors
by purchase, members of a private joint-stock company, holding
this territory under mercantile conditions. They had the rights
of corporators. After parting with their property in England to
commit themselves to their enterprise, they subjected it to risks
in the transfer and occupancy here, which, as local residents on
their own territory, it was wise in them to foresee, and prudent
to provide against.    They did not put the right of franchise
among them at a money value.      It was not to be purchased at
any price. They would confer it on conditions of their own,
but never sold it to any one.     No one, resident or stranger,
could lay claim to it. The mass of those who came over with
1 These very significant statements are from Winthrop's "Reply," &c., to
Vane's "' Briefe Answer,'" &c., to "A Defence of an Order of Court made in the
year 1637," concerning the giving the magistrates power to deny to any, by their
own rule, the right of residence here. It must be owned that Mr. Vane presses the
honored governor with very able and cogent objections to the assumption of
the magistrates. Winthrop, certainly, has recourse to special pleading. But the
specialty is based, like all.the early legislation of the colony, upon the foregone conclusion of a Bible Commonwealth. (Hutchinson's Coll. Papers, pp. 88-98.)




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.       57
the company, were simply hired servants of the company; and
those whom they found here were interlopers and squatters.
The proprietors had a right to say on what terms other persons should come here to abide, to vote, to take any part in the
administration of affairs,- perilling either their property or their
enterprise, - which was a consecrated experiment. Mark these
words of Governor Winthrop, when he found occasion, in the
controversy with Vane, to stand for these proprietary rights:" Let the Patent be perused, and there it will be found, that the incorporation is made to certain persons by name, and unto such as they
shall associate to themselves, and all this tract of land is granted to them
and their associates.
" None other can claim privilege with them but by free consent."
It is true the original proprietors and exiles were most glad to
welcome new-comers of spirit and purpose like their own; but
they were very keen and rigid in their scrutiny. Yankee inquisitiveness, which was but old English shrewdness, sharpened on
our granite whetstones, began then its famed skill in interrogations put to all strangers. They wished to know every newcomer thoroughly, outside and inside; whence he came; what he
wanted; what he believed; if possible, what he thought; what
he intended to do; what was his substance; what was his spirit.
And these conditions were perfectly well understood in the Old
World, by those likely to come hitherwards. No man, who is
meditating an assault upon a hornet's or a wasp's nest, better
understands the nature of his enterprise, and the sort of reception
he will have, than did the Familist, Antinomian, Anabaptist, or
Quaker, know beforehand how Massachusetts would entertain
him. Courtesy, honesty, all fair principles, required that the
rights and purposes of the legal proprietors should be respected
by all others.
The conclusion is obvious. These exiled colonists, having
embarked all their worldly goods in this enterprise, would be dismayed and ruined by its failure. Having solemnly covenanted
with separate churches as Englishmen at home, they had entered
into another solemn agreement with each other, outside of their
court-meeting, before they embarked.
This "Agreement" was made at Cambridge, England, on
Aug. 26, 1629, and was subscribed by those who pledged




58             THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
themselves to embark on the following March. In it they say
they have engaged themselves to their enterprise, after having
"weighed the greatness of the work, in regard of the consequence,
God's glory, and the churches' good." They face " the difficulties and the discouragements" before them. They considered
this " withal, that this whole adventure grows upon the joint confidence we have in each other's fidelity and resolution herein, so
as no man of us would have adventured it without assurance of
the rest." The agreement was conditional, on this proviso,' that before the last of September next, the whole government,
together with the patent for the said plantation, be first, by an
order of court, legally transferred and established to remain with
us, and others which shall inhabit upon the said plantation." 
One other paper, very important in its bearings on this point,
is to be carefully noted, because as it was prepared and circulated
on the other side of the water, as preliminary to, and designed
to induce, the emigration, it exposes to us the intent of the
leaders in the enterprise. It is entitled, " General Considerations
for the Plantation in New England, with an Answer to Several
Objections," to which reference has already been made. We
have now four copies of the substance of this paper, with variations and comments from the different hands under which it
passed. It was a document which served a high agency in promoting the enterprise, being passed from friend to friend, and
used in those cross-country rides and night consultations which
drew its master-spirits into it. One copy of it, as has been related, came from the hands of that noble patriot, Sir John Eliot,
in the Tower; and was sent by him to his friend and corpeer,
John Hampden. There is a religious spirit and tone in the
whole paper. The seventh of the considerations reads thus:" What can be a better work, and more noble and worthy a Christian,
than to help to raise and support a particular church while it is in its
infancy, and to join our forces with such a company of faithful people,"
&c.2
There is a remarkable recognition in this document of a deeply
ominous foreboding, often finding utterance from the pens and
hearts of the leading colonists, that a catastrophe of utter anarchy
1 Hutch. Coll. Papers, p. 25.  2 Hutch. Coll. Papers, p. 27.




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.       59
and ruin was impending threateningly, at the time, over the realm
and the religion of England. From that awful wreck they would
save the gospel, by transplanting it, and rearing for it a church
which should guide the Commonwealth. The following solemn
sentences meant more to devout hearts in those days than they
mean to us:" Secondly, all other churches of Europe are brought to desolation; and
it may be justly feared that the like judgement is coming upon us: and
who knows but that God hath provided this place [New England] to be a
refuge for many whom he means to save out of the general destruction."
This was indeed a reason for regarding it " a service to the
church of great consequence, to carry the Gospell into those parts
of the world."
These Fathers of Massachusetts having thus solemnly covenanted with each other, in the terms of their august experiment,
were bound to stand for it, and to try it with heart and soul and
life. Any thing or any body that perilled it, any stranger or
interloper coming among them, or a troublesome spirit rising up
of themselves, must be dealt with in a summary way. He
brought under risk every thing which they had, or hoped for, or
revered. They were themselves under the same bond and pledge
which they exacted of others. They were all in the wilderness.
They were straitened of their own natural and lawful liberty in
many ways and things. They were held to personal and mutual
covenants of the most stringent sort. They could not say what
they pleased, still less do as they pleased. They had made
themselves amenable to what they called "the Gospel rule;"
and, if they swerved or broke terms, the penalty was sure and
stern. They were no triflers, no summer-day dreamers, no fancy
theorists, such as we have in our day. They knew well what an
opinion like theirs cost; what a conviction and a belief meant;
what the enterprise which they had in hand involved to those
who were determined to embark in it. They had looked before
them very deliberately: they had fronted the conditions of their
work, and come to meet them. They encountered no opposition
or discomfiture which they had not provided for.
At the first General Court of the company held on this soil,
May 18, 1631, one hundred and eighteen persons applied to be




60            THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
admitted as freemen, voters, new and full partners. Here was a
startling and critical predicament for the company, represented
by less than a dozen of the actual proprietors and administrators
under the charter. What was to be done? Some of the applicants for the franchise were "old planters," or squatters; some
had been sent here, and others had been just brought here, as
hired servants of the company; and others still were suspected or
disaffected persons, of a sort which a Quarter court had already
judged "unmeet to inhabit here."  Should this miscellaneous
multitude be at once lifted to a place and power which put the
whole enterprise effectually at their mercy? The court was
alarmed, as well it might be. It was alarmed, but it confronted
the juncture. These applicants were admitted to the franchise,
having first taken the freeman's oath. The oaths formally entered upon the Records, for every officer and member of the
company, furnish in themselves very significant matter bearing
upon the intent of the colonists as already set forth, to establish
here a Biblical Commonwealth. Before the transfer of the
charter, the form of oath for the governor, deputy, and assistants,
bound them "to admit none to be free of this fellowship but
such as may claim the same by virtue of our privileges." But
after the charter had been transferred, and the government had
been set up here, these official oaths had been significantly
changed into this form: the governor and magistrates bound
themselves to administer the government " according to the laws
of God, and for the advancement of his Gospel, the laws of this
land, and the good of the people of this plantation." This
change in the form of the oath meant all that it implies.
And whoever took the first freeman's oath here, swore as follows:
"I do freely and sincerely acknowledge that I am justly and lawfully
subject to the government of the Company: and do accordingly submit
my person and estate to be protected, ordered, and governed by the laws.and constitutions thereof."
Yet before letting in this crowd of citizens, " the generalitie,"
as they were called, the Court agreed and ordered, that henceforward the freemen should vote for the body of assistants, who,
after being chosen, should elect a governor and deputy out of




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.                 61
their own number, and should be the legislators, and also should
appoint all officers of the law. This restriction was, however,
removed the next year, and the freemen resumed their right of
voting directly for governor and deputy. Of the newly admitted freemen, more than half were already church-members, and
others soon became so.      A few of them    proved intractable or
mischievous persons, and had afterwards to be dealt with by
summary or deliberate process. The shock of apprehension,
almost of dismay, to which the Court had been subjected, led to
the adoption of that rule and order, for prospective operation,
which has been made the reproach and jeer of the early legislation  of Massachusetts.     It stands on our Records in these
words: -
"To the end the body of the commons may be preserved of honest and
good men, it was likewise ordered and agreed, that for 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." 
Looked at in the light of our days, or even by the contemporary
working of the rule as experimental trial tested it, we, of course,
may denounce it, or ridicule it. But we must be fair to those who
lived by their own light, and tried a serious enterprise.  In establishing that rule, the company exercised a charter-right, by their
own interpretation clearly conferred upon them; and sought,without doing wrong to any, to protect and defend themselves, their
own franchise, their own property, their own great design. What
else,what less, than this could they have done for their own
security? Even if only as the responsible administrators of a
1 Court Records, vol. i. p. 87.
Mr. Cotton, in a letter to Lord Say, Lord Brook, &c., in 1636, says (Hutch.
Hist., vol. i. Appen. 435), that no church-members "are excluded from the liberty
of freemen." But the being a church-member did not, of itself, constitute a freeman.
The application for the privilege must be made to the Court, and there be submitted to the vote of the other citizens; and then, if the candidate passed, he had
to take the freeman's oath. It would seem, however, that there was soon a considerable number of church-members who did not seek the privilege of citizenship;
perhaps shrinking from its annoyances and responsibilities. For, in 1643, the Court
"Ordered, concerning members that refuse to take their freedom, the churches
should be writ unto, to deale with them." (Records, ii. p. 38.)
Lechford, just before this time, wrote that "Three parts of the people of the
country remain out of the church."




62                THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
local government, they had had an ordinary concern to avert disorder and anarchy, and to maintain morality and religion, they
could hardly, in those days, have stopped short of that rule, at
least in its substance, or in an equivalent alternative. In every
Christian State, religion was then established; and uniformity of
subjection to it was imposed by laws and penalties.1
The inference, then, seemed to be that the more scriptural,
authoritative, pure, and practicable a method'or type of religion
was, the better was it entitled to the legislative warrant.
But if the Fathers of Massachusetts were under the sway and
in the service of the aim which has been defined as theirs, they
had especial reason, as they had legal right, in requiring of all
who sought to vote about their property and their experiment,
that they should be in accord with them.          They chose to put
foremost this condition, and to insist upon it:'Commit yourselves to our opinion, conviction, and purpose, then we will let
you in: join our religious fellowship, and you shall share our
civil rights, without money or price.' They thought confidently
-for them, reasonably -that they should thus make sure for a
stock of citizens, if not of saints, yet of those who were outwardly, visibly, and constrainedly free from the more scandalous
and mischievous human failings.         At any rate, they did thus
make sure of men who, before God and their fellows, had voluntarily pledged and covenanted themselves, by a well-defined
standard of obligation, the bond of a rigid intercommunion. No
1 In maintaining their form of administration of religion by a public tax, and
making an attendance upon its services compulsory, the colonists did but follow the
example of their native country. In the colony of Virginia, in 1610, attendance at
church twice every Sunday was enjoined "upon pain, for the first fault, to lose their
provision and allowance for the whole week following; for the second, to lose said
allowance, and also to be whipped; and for the third to suffer death." (Force's
Tracts iii. (ii.) 11.) Subsequent modifications of the law in Virginia were as follows:
" The Governor published several edicts, - That every person should go to church
Sundays and holidays: or lie Neck and Heels that night, and be a slave to the colony
the following week; for the second offence he should be a slave for a month; for the
third, a year and a day." (Stith, p. 147. 1618.)
In Virginia Assembly, Aug. 4, 1619. "All persons whatsoever upon the Sabbath days, shall frequent divine service and sermons, both forenoon and afternoon,
and every one that shall transgress this law, shall forfeit three shillings a time, to
the use of the church: all lawful and necessary impediments excepted. But if a
servant in this case shall wilfully neglect his master's commands, he shall suffer
bodily punishment."




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.        63
man could get into a church except through profession, confession, and the taking of a vow, and the putting himself under the
discipline of a brotherhood. Those who had passed that ordeal,
and were still held to its continuous control, were to be regarded
as Christians; and Christians might be trusted as citizens. So
far were the Fathers of Massachusetts from feeling that they
wronged any one by establishing this rule, that they were assured
that they were adopting an eminently wise way in conferring a
privilege which they might have withheld. It was fully competent for them to have declined making any more freemen on any
terms. They made more because they wished for more, provided
they could have them of their own sort, which was not our sort.
Those who were not freemen or voters had rights and privileges secured to them which still made them members of " ye body
politique."  The twelfth of the " Bodie of Liberties" made this
provision:
"Every man, whether inhabitant or foreigner, free or not free, shall
have libertie to come to any publique Court, Councel, or Towne meeting,
and either by speech or writing, to move any lawfull, seasonable, and materiall question, or to present any necessary motion, complaint, petition,
Bill or information, whereof that meeting hath proper cognizance, so it be
done in convenient time, due order, and respective manners."
To construct a commonwealth out of a church, as the honored and noble Winthrop so frankly avowed it, and to administer all civil affairs by church-members, -that was the intent
of the founders of this colony. They meant that the rulers and
those who chose the rulers should be upright, God-fearing men,
as, in a most emphatic sense, they were themselves. Enough
of such men, they believed, could be found, - men renewed,
baptized in the Spirit, gifted with wisdom, in faithful covenant
with Christ, their Master. Yet they were not to depend upon,
nor to trust to, their own wisdom, nor to follow their natural
consciences. They had God's Word, -divine statutes, an inspired oracle. Some of our ancestors used the Bible in earlier
English versions; but our version had won its way to the hearts
of many of them. The free and authorized circulation of the
royal version wrought an effect in England which we can
scarcely make real to ourselves.  It took the place of pope,
church, and minister for thousands, whom it brought under the




64            THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
direct teaching of God. Those who read it with that moderated
control of their own eccentric tendencies which would insure a
common influence from it, brought themselves under subjection
to it. Individual fanatics and " private interpreters " put it to
strange uses. By that Book. even without the aid of the new
covenant Scriptures, the chosen people of old -between whose
circumstances and their own our Fathers found many parallels
- had been trained in a wilderness, and fashioned into a commonwealth. They intended to repeat the process under fairer
auspices. With a stern and heroic spirit, in awful sincerity,
earnest men and gentle women, made calmly resolute for their
own share in it, set themselves to the work, after counting its
cost so wisely that they met with nothing which they had not
anticipated. Many died of the earliest hardships, in full faith
of a blessed success to be realized by their posterity. And these
were accounted happy by their survivors, who looked on their
fresh wilderness graves as the seed-bed of a glorious harvest.
It is not strange, though it is in many respects sad, that so
many of those high-souled exiles should have had to meet the
vexations of all the stages of a gradual, but finally a complete,
disappointment in the thwarting and failure of their experiment.
They could not create a State out of a church; for a State grew
up which would not come into their church, and which they
would not have allowed to come into it.  They could not
administer a civil government by Biblical statutes; for those
statutes have God, not man, for their administrator.  That
liberty of conscience which they themselves, and for themselves,
had put under restraining subjection to their own covenants and
religious limitations, was irresistibly exercised by some among
them, and by a continual succession of new-comers.  They
were made dreadfully uncomfortable by dissentients and intruders and interlopers,-honest and pure persons, men and
women, but eccentric, fanciful, and strong-headed, with strange
conceits, theories, and notions of their own. For a time, the
magistrates and ministers tried to stand by their first purpose
and aim, at all cost. Their legislation was pursued into the
most minute details. It was inquisitorial, severe, fearless, and
without respect of persons. They maintained their proprietary
rights, and clung to their Theocratical experiment against all




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.       65
intruders and heretics. Their Court (Sept. 4, 1639), in passing a
law against " the common custom of drinking one to another,"
as an occasion of much waste and sin, held it to be a duty
to prevent such wickedness, -" especially in plantations of
churches and common weales, wherein the least known evils are
not to be tolerated by such as are bound by solemn covenant to
walk by the rule of God's word in all their conversation." 1
Whatever the expectations of the leading colonists may have
been, before they crossed the seas, of the relations of dependence
and oversight which would continue to exist between their
remote home and England, and however vague or definite may
have been their intentions of setting up for themselves, as a
matter of fact they did find themselves charged with the whole
responsibility of administering a government. Their necessities
and emergencies settled that point for them.  England gave
them no help whatever; and all her attempted commissions
about their affairs were regarded and rejected, or resisted, as
mischievous interference.  The home government could not
have wisely disposed the affairs of this colony at any time
during its charter administration. For a large part of that term
England itself was in a distracted condition, through its own
civil war; and its intermeddlings here would but have caused
confusion and increased dissension.  Charged, then, with the
full responsibility of legislative, judicial, and executive offices,
the authorities developed their own scheme, and worked toward
the realizing of their Theocracy.  Their experiment proved
impracticable. Its weak points answered exactly to the kind of
assaults and the sort of weapons which were tried against it by
their own more restless spirits and by their ingenious tormenters.
In one aspect of the case, and in some moods of our minds, in
these days we cannot but smile as if we found fun in reading
some of their experiences; for there certainly is an element and
aspect of the ludicrous in some of them. It seems as if all the
ingenuities and whimsies, all the crotchets and extravagancies,
of crude and conscientious enthusiasm and fanaticism, were
conjured up at the time, and for the occasion of teasing and
worrying the poor sheep who had sought this fold. The tor1 Court Records, vol. i. p. 271.
5




66             THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
menting troublers of the new Israel were of every style and
pattern, of every variety of sting and venom. One who in our
dog-day season is trying to do diligent work with eye, hand, and
mind engaged, and who finds himself made the sport and prey
of flies, gnats, mosquitoes, and all summer bugs, may realize
what was often the vexed and harried experience of our Fathers,
as, from over the seas, or out of the woods, or in one of their
own cottages or congregations, some " extraordinary," " exorbitant," or " unsavory spirit," in man or woman, presented itself,
-to indicate a swarm in persistency and variety.
Beside the buffetings and distractions caused by strangers or
troublers among themselves, the authorities had soon to meet
with many serious perplexities arising from the practical working of their own theory. Thus, as the Court had made churchmembership the condition of eligibility to the franchise, they
found it essential for them to have a word to say about the
rightful constitution of churches whose prerogative it was to
decide the terms of admission for members. To prevent variance and undue privilege or license in this matter, the independence of the churches was brought under risk. In 1634-5, we
find the following on the Records: -
This Court doth intreate of the elders and brethren of every church
within this jurisdiction, that they will consult and advise of one uniform
order of discipline in the churches agreeable to the Scriptures, and then
to consider how far the magistrates are bound to interpose for the preservation of that uniformity and peace of the churches."
In the next year, the Court subjected the mode of gathering
churches to the order and approbation of the magistrates, and
refused the franchise to members of churches otherwise gathered.2
The "New-English Canaan" was the jesting title which the
roguish Thomas Morton gave to the site of the Puritan State;
showing how well he divined the nature of the enterprise which
he tried to vex and thwart. The experiment of the Fathers of
Massachusetts to form and administer a Commonwealth, in
which all civil affairs should be disposed by members of one order
of churches, is classed by us now among the visionary fancies
1 Records, vol. i. p. 168.  2 Vol. i. pp. 142-3.




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.      67
which have beguiled good but weak men, and which, on the trial,
have exposed their folly and error. So we judge; and then, too
often, condemn. Those covenanted legislators are not to be held
accountable for the logical or the practical consequences which
followed from their scheme when put on trial. They were not
bound to foresee these consequences, nor to be ready to abandon,
or even to re-adjust, their theory, as its experimental working
brought perplexities and unlooked-for resistance. They were
right, after having recognized what their faith and piety held to
be a constraining duty which would consecrate and bless them
in the doing of it, to throw their souls into its discharge, and
defy and resist all opposition.
The quotations which have been so abundantly made in the
preceding pages, from the authentic writings of the leading founders of Massachusetts, and from their legislative records, are
alike confidential and public testimonies of the design which
prompted them. It was not that they intended, however conscientiously they might have done so, to construct a theory or
form of government of their own devising, for ends of civil and
religious freedom. All motive to do this, if they had felt its influence, was overruled by a profound conviction, the result of
their religious training and belief, that the Bible offered them an
already perfected model and guide for a Commonwealth; and
that they were at liberty only, or could only safely use their liberty,
in following that model. Many pages more, from diaries, letters,
and more public documents, might be covered with confirmatory
and illustrative matter, similar to what has already been given.
But there is a record of such marked and emphatic significance
in its bearing upon the same point, that it must not be passed
over unnoticed.
Massachusetts alone, of all its sister colonies of New England,
with positive avowal, and with consistent efforts and measures
to realize it, aimed to establish a Bible Commonwealth. The
colonies of Plymouth, Connecticut, and New Haven, approximated to that aim, but fell short of it in actual legislation
for it.
What, then, was more natural than that Massachusetts should
have attempted to induce her sister colonies to follow her own
example, in making the church estate the condition of citizen



68              THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
ship? This attempt she did make in all sincerity, though with
but partial success. As early as 1638, at a meeting held at Cambridge, Connecticut had proposed a confederation with the
other three colonies. The proposition, failing of effect at the
time, was held in mind, till it resulted in a union of the four in
1643, by formal articles, providing for regular annual meetings
of two commissioners for each of them, appointed by their
several General Courts. The preamble of the Confederacy begins
thus:"Whereas, we all came into these parts of America with one and the
same end and aim, namely, to advance the Kingdome of our Lord
Jesus Christ, and to enjoy the liberties of the Gospell in puritie, with
peace," &c.
The object of the Union was chiefly for purposes of mutual
aid in defence against the Indians. They entered into " a firme
and perpetuall league of friendship and amytie, for offence and
defence, mutuall advice and succour, upon all just occasions,
both for preserving and propagating the truth and liberties of
the Gospell, and for their own mutuall safety and welfare."
After the organization had become familiar, and the commissioners, instructed by the General Courts which they severally
represented, and to whom they were to report the advisory measures recommended in their Congress, had experience of what
business might properly come before them, we find the following
proposition on their Records, at a meeting held in due order of
place and time, at New Haven, in September, 1646. It bears on
its face that it came from Massachusetts:" Upon serious consideration of the spreading nature of Error, the dangerous growth and effects thereof in other places, and particularly now
the purity and power both of religion and of civill order is already much
corrupted, if not wholy lost in a parte of New England, by a licentious
liberty graunted and setled; whereby many casting off the rule of the
word, professe and practise what is good in their owne eyes: And upon
information of what petitions have beene lately putt in some of the Colonies against the good and straite wayes of Christ, both in the Churches,
and in the Comon Wealth, the Commissioners remembering that those
Colonies for themselves and their posteritie did enter into this firme and
perpetuall league, -as for other respects so for mutuall advise that the
truth and liberties of the Gospell might be preserved and propagated,




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.             69
thought it their duty seriously to comend it to the care and consideration
of each Generall Corte within these United Colonies, that as they have
laid theire foundations and measured the temple of God, the worship and
worshippers by that straight Reed God hath putt into their hands, soe
they would walke on and build up (all discouragements and difficulties
notwithstandinge) with an undaunted heart and unwearied hand, according tothe same rules and patternes. That a due watch be kept and continued at the doores of God's house, that none be admitted as members of
the body of Christ, but such as hold foorth effectuall callinge and thereby
union with Christ the head, and that those whome Christ hath received,
and enter by an expresse covenant to attend and observe the lawes and
dutyes of that spirituall Corporation, that Babtisme, the seale of the Covenant, be administred onely to such members and their ymediate seed, that
Anabaptisme, familisme, Antinomianisme, and generally all errors of like
nature, which oppose, undermine and slight either the scriptures, the Sabboth, or other ordinance of God, and bring in and cry up unwarrantable
Revelations, inventions of men, or any carnall liberty, under a deceitfull
colloure of liberty of conscience, may be seasonably and duely supprest,
though they wish as much forbearance and respect may be had of tender
consciences seeking light as may stand with the purity of religion and
peace of the Churches."
The record adds:"The Commissioners of Plymouth desire further consideration concerninge this advise given to the generall Corts." 
Massachusetts had been consistent with herself in pressing her
Bible theory of State upon her sister colonies, but she could not
legislate for them.
Now look at, examine, that aim or scheme or experiment of
the first colonists, as it stands in the line of history, and holds
a place, certainly not a mean one, among the enterprises of
men. It was one of a hundred schemes, visions, lures, or devices
of men, which have floated before their busy and quickened
fancies, and engaged their whole souls, their worldly means, their
lives and heroism in attempts to realize them. The possible
nobleness of humanity has often gone into some of the dreamiest and most impracticable of these schemes. The Fathers of
Massachusetts had doubtless read the "Republic" of Plato, and
the " Utopia" of Sir Thomas More. But they had also read
1 From the Plymouth Copy of the Records of Commissioners.




70            THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
their Bible as they had read no other book. And if they had
seen the Book float down from the sky, and had received it by a
clutch of the hand from out of a mountain cloud, they could not
have given to it a more revering love, trust, and divine authority
than they did yield to it. It suggested to them the conception
and experiment of a Christian state, a commonwealth in which
human legislation should be patterned from the divine.
The conditions of time, opinion, opportunity, and persons, for
tile practical trial of a Biblical Commonwealth, were as follows:
1. A religiously earnest period, characterized by an implicit
faith in the divine authority, and in the literal, inspired infallibility of the whole Bible; and a mode of valuing it, and a sense
of subjection to its teachings conformed to that view of it.
2. A class of men and women to whom that belief should be
a bond of sympathy and fellowship.
3. Unfavorable or antagonistic circumstances forbidding the
practical trial of an ecclesiastical commonwealth where they
were then living.
4. The opening of a new field remote and sheltered in the
distance, with vested rights secured for its occupancy and juris.
diction.
I have used by preference the term a "Biblical Commonwealth:" I might have confined myself to the use of the term
" Theocracy," which has been quoted more than once, as used by
the Fathers as applicable to their form of government. And it is
applicable, if by it we mean the direct recognition of a Divine
Headship to a state. Our Fathers used it in that legitimate sense
of the term which subordinates all views of expediency, custom,
and human prerogative to a profound sense of subjection to a
Divine Ruler, and an obligation to accept and to follow what is
believed to be an intelligible revelation of His will, as the basis
and guide of legislation.
That conception was sure, in its turn and season, to come to
practical trial in this world. It stood entered on the docket of
time, awaiting human agents, fit field and opportunity, with the
prime condition of faith and self-renunciation in man and
woman. Then it would be entitled to a trial.
Glance with a single backward thought, over the long and
varied, generally interesting, but often melancholy, series of the




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.      71
visionary fancies, the social and political theories, by which men
and women with only good aims have sought to organize and
govern themselves. We have had the schemes of St. Simon, of
Fourier, and of Owen. You may have read Mr. Hepworth
Dixon's sketch of some of the experiments on trial among us,
in Shakerism and Communism. And it hardly becomes an age
and an indulgence, which, like our own, tolerate the filthy experiment of Mormonism, to be very critical in judging about
any of the past theories which have failed. There have been
many experiments of a purely religious sort, tried by men and
women devoutly sincere and high-minded, which had far less of
grandeur, nobleness, and practical feasibility to offer as motives,
than had that of our Fathers. Among the fashionings of the
millennium, and the plannings for it, theirs, certainly, was not one
which will unfavorably compare with others. They took care
to guard against the extravagancies and the follies of the Fifth
Monarchy men; and they had a sober, and never a fanatic,
spirit. Their experiment, as I have said, was sure of, and was
entitled to have, its time and trial. We may criticise and even
ridicule it, if we choose, on its weak side. But there was
an august grandeur, an attractive and spell-like power in it,
a beckoning promise of some unspeakable blessing with it,
which would be certain to give it an enthralling influence over
devout and high-souled men and women. Its time for trial came
at the most earnestly religious age which has as yet been
chronicled in the history of the church.
It is from the failure and from the success of great visions and
schemes, that men have learned all their practical and political
wisdom. We will not undertake to cast the proportions of
success or failure in the original enterprise, which is represented
now by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
Puritanism, in the strictly Bible theory and embodiment of it,
as accepted by our Fathers, had a thoroughly sincere discipleship, and a hearty earnestness of purpose engaged for it, only
for a little more than half a century and for two generations.
During that period, and for those full believers of it, it was
transiently consistent, because it was parallel with, and at the
level of, the degree of intelligence which had been reached in
some portions of Christendom, - especially in England, - for it




72            THE AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE
never had the same sway on the continent of Europe. Under
those temporary conditions, Puritanism secured the devout confidence of noble and eminent men, statesmen, jurists, and
scholars; and of such votaries as in those times there were, of
science and philosophy, as well as the profoundest reverence of
meek women, sturdy yeomen, and craftsmen in ordinary life.
But Puritanism could not outlast its own age, nor hold its unquestioned control beyond the limitations of time and generations, except by living on its traditions among people in secluded
places not reached by increasing light and extended knowledge.
It started with an estimate of, and a way of using, the whole
Bible, which have been discredited by more intelligence, independence of thinking, critical, scholarly, and scientific culture, and the
exercise of a higher grade of what we call common sense in
common people. But the theory and faith on which our
Fathers proceeded, though steadily impaired, modified, and
diminished, have only gradually yielded, only a little for each
generation, - retaining enough of inherited or traditional influence to avert the catastrophe of a complete revolutionary
repudiation at any one time. The spirit and shadow, the tone
and savor of Puritanism, still remain and have influence in our
State. Doubtless, there are members of our present Legislature,
certainly there are constituents of some of them, who in heart
and mind are persuaded, that it would be well if we could
restore Puritan legislation in our franchise, in our churches, in
household management and discipline, in Sabbath laws, in
many social customs and indulgences, against dissipation and
gambling.  But the dream is of the past.
No reader can engage his mind, candidly and seriously, upon
the original papers left to us by the Fathers of our colony,
without being impressed with the thought, that they subjected
themselves to all the sacrifices involved in their enterprise,'bore
willingly all the sharp inflictions of suffering incident to it, and
cheered themselves with great religious hopes of its issues, under
the quickening impulse of a belief that they were putting under
practical trial the loftiest aim which had ever inspired highminded and devout men.
True, it is unspeakably to our advantage and enjoyment in
the freedom and cheerfulness of life, that we have been released




FOUNDERS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.       73
from the severe sway of what we call, conventionally, the rigidness
and superstition of Puritan institutions and ideas. We may,
however, question the fairness of describing as the outgrowth of
Puritanism, what a more just view of facts recognizes as a general and comprehensive progress and enlightenment, by many
agencies of advance on the past.
Yet are we sure that the change, as all relaxing and liberalizing, is pure gain to us, and no loss? A large and liberal-minded
man might easily defend the position, that there were elements
and usages of Puritanism, which we are none the wiser, none
the better, none the freer, none the happier, for having left them.
Our domestic, civil, and religious life; our amusements, vices,
and wicked haunts,-all testify that our Fathers had some
virtues and safeguards which we have not.
Meanwhile, not with alarming and dangerous reaction of
revolution or anarchy, but slowly and safely relaxing its sway in
our Commonwealth, eight generations born and nurtured here,
and many bands of new exiles, have realized that Puritanism has
prepared for them a most pleasant heritage. So that this noble
and honored State has a repute of which all living in it, who
are not justly proud, will not increase its credit by staying here,
but had better avail themselves of their liberty by moving out
of it without process.
The Commonwealth in this our present age of it has these
four conspicuous honors: —
1. Its money bonds are set at a higher premium than are any
American paper obligations in the marts of the world.
2. Its educational system, and the high and general culture
produced by it, give us the pre-eminent advantages and safeguards of intelligence.
3. Its charitable, benevolent, and reformatory institutions are
most numerous, munificent, and humane. The State is treated
by the whole Union, as a bank for gathering, and a deep free
pocket for dispensing, all manner of pecuniary gifts; and those
who are for leaving us out in the cold, strangely enough, have
to come here to get warm.
4. There are in this Commonwealth more peaceful and happy
homes, palatial in our towns and cities, and simple and frugal in
our sheltered valleys and on our hill-sides, filled with those who




74   AIMS AND PURPOSES OF THE MASSACHUSETTS COLONY.
are favored beyond any people on the earth in an opportunity
to make the best thing possible out of life.
I have said nothing to rebut, or even as recognizing, the
charge against our Fathers of having a worldly outlook for
trade and profit. It is enough to say that they were in the body
and found it necessary to keep themselves alive, -to be fed,
housed, and clothed, as human beings always do, wherever they
may be, and whatever experiment they have on trial. Some of
them did keep alive. After stern and varied hardships, a few of
them gathered a comfortable substance. But as to the profit of
their undertaking, nearly the whole of that has come to the
generations between them and our own, -most largely to our
own. It would not have been agreeable or desirable, for such
persons as we are, to have lived with our Fathers; but it is
an inestimable privilege to us to live after them, in their own
places.




TREATMENT
OF
INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
BY THE
FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.
BY REV. GEORGE E. ELLIS, D.D.








TREATMENT
OF
INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
BY THE
FOUNDERS     OF  MASSACHUSETTS.
A   CORRECT view of the aims and purposes of the Founders
of Massachusetts carries with it a certain consistent course
of treatment, which might be expected to be visited upon all
who should interfere with them, or cause them trouble. Their
project was in itself of such a nature, that it would very easily
afford a test for distinguishing between a friend and an enemy,
-between measures, intentions, and even opinions, which would
tend to advance it, and those which would thwart and wreck it.
Once committed to their enterprise, and holding in their hands a
royal instrument, which they regarded as securing to them the
territorial rights and jurisdiction necessary for a practical trial
of it, they felt that it would be their own fault or folly if it
failed in that trial. To keep possession of their charter was
their first security. For this they trusted to law, to policy, to
shrewd management; and to a final reinforcement from obstinacy, and something that looks like cunning,- the last, however, brought into use only in opposition to cunning. There
were in their view, or construction, three privileges secured to
them by that charter, which were their main reliance:First, An absolute jurisdiction over the soil included in their
patent;
Second, The right to define and impose terms on which alone
new members should be admitted into their company;




78        TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
Third, The right, "for their special defence and safety, to incounter, expulse, repel, and resist, all such person and persons, as
shall at any time attempt the destruction, invasion, or annoyance to the plantation or its inhabitants."
No doubt they had some intelligent apprehensions of the nature
and sources of the hostility from parties and individuals which
they would have to deal with. They had reason to believe that
their hold upon their charter would always be under peril, from
their enemies residing in England, and from those smarting under
their discipline carrying ill reports from hence. These they
would need to circumvent in one way. Their internal troubles
they would meet in another way.
Only the actual reading of the early volumes of the original
Records of the colony, page by page, carefully and intelligently
too, can put their case before us, as they might claim that we
should look at it. And we should need to begin with them at
their own beginning.  Their enterprise in colonizing had been
preceded by a series of like undertakings, which had proved costly
and disastrous failures. Unfit men, and insufficient or unblessed
purposes or aims, had brought those enterprises into painful
discomfiture, and stained them  with reproach. If a new one
was to be undertaken, it was with    cautions and warnings
learned from those which had been blasted. The excellent and
revered John White, of the English Dorchester, the most effective promoter of the Massachusetts colony, in his " Planters'
Plea," 1630, had well defined the sort of persons who alone
might hope to prosper in such an enterprise.  He wrote:" The persons chosen out for this employment, ought to be willing, constant, industrious, obedient, frugal, lovers of the common good, or, at
least, such as may be easily wrought to this temper; considering that
works of this nature try the undertakers with many difficulties, and easily
discourage minds of base and weak temper."
With equal force and frankness, he describes the sort of persons
not wished for, as not suitable: -
"'Ilen nourished up in idleness, unconstant, and affecting novelties,
unwilling, stubborn, inclined to faction, covetous, luxurious, prodigal, and
generally men habituated to any gross evil, are no fit members of a
colony."




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.         79
We have one letter by Governor Cradock, and two fromn the
company in England, addressed to Endicott, as their representative here before the charter was brought over.  The explicit
directions which they contain indicate the measures which the
authorities themselves would pursue when established here.
Endicott is told, "that the propagating of the Gospel is the
thing we do profess, above all, to be our aim in settling this
plantation."  He is instructed to press a rigid restriction upon
the sort of persons allowed to reside here; and " that none be
partakers but such as be peaceable men; and of honest life and
conversation, - and desirous to live amongst us and conform
themselves to good order and government." The company had
yielded to the desire of the Rev. Ralph Smith to come over,
" before we understood his difference of judgment in some things
from our ministers."  The order to Endicott is, " that, unless he
will be conformable to our government, you suffer him not to
remain within the limits of our grant." Explicit directions also
are given him for settling all single persons and servants in
families, that they may have part in morning and evening
devotions.l
Such hints as these prepare us for what we find when the
government was established here.  An agreement had been
made with their ministers in England. The first business of
the first Court, held on this soil, is entered thus: " Imprimis, it
was propounded how the ministers should be maintained. It
was ordered that houses should be built for them, with convenient speed, at the public charge;" and salaries paid in money
and in produce. Following on with the Records from that page,
we find the development of their purpose to establish here a
Bible Commonwealth formed out of a church, -the legislators
of which, should be bound by solemn covenant, as professed
Christians pledged to one sacred design.  We find in those
records, too, a series of legislative acts, and of cases of enforcement of them, which are now pronounced absurd, arbitrary,
intolerant, and even of merciless cruelty. These are candidly
entered, never apologized for, but always justified by those
responsible for them. From these and other original records, we
1 Col. Rec., i. 386-397.




80        TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
have a fair and full presentment of the materials for dealing with
this subject, - The Treatment visited by the authorities of the
colony of Massachusetts upon the Intruders who came into their
jurisdiction, and upon the Dissentients who, from time to time,
individually, or in company, started forth among themselves.
Readers generally, among us, know that that treatment was
severe. The occasions and reasons they do not generally know.
And even though it may be unnecessary for me to say so, yet
let me distinctly and emphatically avow, that I am not to argue
for the abstract justice or fairness of the course pursued by the
authorities of Massachusetts; nor to attempt to vindicate it as
necessary; nor to palliate its severity; nor even to assert its
wisdom or expediency under the circumstances. If a faithful
exposition of the facts shall avail in either of these directions,
those who now stand charged with folly, harshness, and cruelty,
will, so far, have the benefit in judgment. I am not undertaking
a vindication of those Fathers, in the sense of an approval or
justification either of their religio-political theory, or of their
measures for a practical trial of it. I hold myself simply to the
obligation to make a fair statement of the facts of the case;
to set what is to us an historic past, in the light, - or under the
darkness, if such it were,- of the times when it was living,
present experience; to expound the views, the actions, and, if
possible, also the motives of those who, in the exercise of what
they held to be rightful authority, as under covenant and oath,
did what they believed to be their duty to themselves in doing
as they did towards others.
We must first put ourselves into the light or -if, as suggested, it was - under the darkness of those times. The basis
of fellowship, of accord, and of legislation, in Massachusetts, was
different from that of either of her sister colonies of New England. That stern and strong form of faith, founded on a reverential regard for the letter of the Bible, which was held here,
was also substantially held by the leading spirits of the other
colonies.  But it was more especially wrought in with the
spirit, the purposes, and the measures, which had sway in
Massachusetts; and the peculiar working and shaping of that
belief here account for all the peculiarities of our early history.
As we read that history, we are at times surprised at the kind




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.        81
and degree of unanimity, of accordance in opinion and purpose,
of so many persons of strong and really independent spirits.
Why did they not fall out oftener and more threateningly
among themselves? What was it that kept enough of them of
one mind and of one will for the ends of legislation and administration? It was simply and solely their common aim, founded
upon their common faith; their idolizing, so to speak, of the
Bible; their way of thinking about it, interpreting it, and using
it. This common religious sentiment and purpose - restraining
an indulgence of what we mean by liberty of conscience - held
them firmly in sympathy and mutual confidence. To a certain
extent, and that a large extent, it repressed and checked the
tendency to diversity of judgment. That diversity of judgment,
individualism, opinionativeness, was the most marked characteristic of the age that was then opening, and even of the class
of persons with whom they had many strong atfinities. Their
common faith discouraged, averted, much of what would have
been utterly fatal to their enterprise. Had they allowed individualism, or tolerated any of the crotchets of eccentric and
independent speculation, their scheme would have come to an
end before it had had a beginning. There were many occasions
and emergencies- such were furnished indeed in every case
of their dealing with opposers and dissentients - in which
variance of judgment among themselves would have fatally
discomfited them. The strength of their one bond of harmony
enabled them to deal as with one mind with all who differed
with them.
This suggestion brings us directly to the point from which we
have to start. The especial dread of the Fathers of Massachusetts was of all individuality and eccentricity of opinion.
They had an intense- by us an unappreciable- horror and
distrust of those who professed to be favored with private interpretations, revelations, and inspirations. And, strangely enough,
it so proved, that nearly every one-of their troublers - Antinomians, Gortonists, and Quakers -laid claim to those oracular
qualities and gifts. The epithets of description and reproach
attached to the names of such intruders and dissentients, carry
with them a key to the history. They were "exorbitant" persons, " heady," "fantastic,"  blasphemous," "malignant," un6




82         TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
savory spirits," &c. The decisive blow which fell on the head
of Mrs. Hutchinson, on her trial before the court, came from the
testimony of a reverend fellow-passenger with her on her way
over the sea, that, in the ship, " she had vented her revelations "
about some calamity that was coming on the country. Gorton's
mystic creed was to the authorities the'very hyperbole and
quintessence of crazy enthusiasm.     The Quaker's "inward
light" and "testimony-bearing by the Spirit" was utter blasphemy to the pious ears that heard it. It is a very curious fact,
that not a single one of those men or women, who were treated
with the severest or most cruel penalties by the authorities of
Massachusetts, was of immoral character or of impure life; not
one of them. On the contrary, they were especially such as we
should regard as blameless, even excellent and exemplary, in
their moral character and conduct, - honest, truth-speaking,
kind, and tender-hearted.  But erratic individuality of opinion
or interpretation, or a claim to a " revelation" of their own,
would bring the best and purest of them under judgment. In
one point of view, this whole series of the troublers of the New
England Israel gives us a most interesting and even fascinating
study of characters.  They were such as make especial favorites
for the mystic, the pietist, and the transcendentalist.  They
would have made an admirable stock for " Brook Farm."
They did make a most miscellaneous and heterogeneous stock
for the early Rhode-Island and Providence plantations. With
the single exception of that sad scapegrace Captain Underhill,1
even the Antinomians were all free of moral reproach.     But
they were not wanted, and they could not be tolerated in Massachusetts. " Transcendentalism " was wasted on our Fathers.
It was a thing of which they would very soon have had too
much, if they had admitted any of it. We must get ourselves
as far away as possible from the atmosphere and liberalism of
this modern Boston, with its free invitation and its large hos1 Underhill, though very serviceable in his military capacity, was a man of a
shaky morality and a cloudy theology. He was " convented " on grave suspicions of
impurity, but explained his conviction that he was one of the elect, by saying, that,
"having lain under a spirit of bondage and a legal way five years, he could get no
assurance till the Spirit set home an absolute promise of free grace, as he was taking
the moderate use of the creature called tobacco." - Winthrop's Journal, vol. i. p. 270.




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.          83
pitality for all novelties and individualisms, - its churches,
synagogues, cathedrals, halls and theatres for preaching,-its
conventions, fraternities, and woman's club, - if we would have
before us the Boston that once was.   Did it enter into the
imagination of its first occupants to conceive what a posterity
they should be responsible for?
Their dread of all persons professedly illuminated by special
revelations was by no means the result of a merely imaginary
apprehension of a possible evil that might befall them. I have
affirmed that it might with truth be alleged, and with full evidence, that the Fathers of Massachusetts, instead of coming
hither to provide for liberty of conscience, left their old home
to keep themselves clear of the workings and effects of the
license, lawlessness, and mischief, which had already begun to
threaten a wild indulgence in England. Any one who is well
read in the history of England, either in its capital or in its byplaces, during the period just following the planting of this
colony, needs not to be told that that period, of all the Christian ages, was most rife in religious fancies, speculations,
eccentricities, and frenzies. Some persons, without this knowledge, take for granted that sectarianism, individualism, and
free thinking, with all their developments, moderate or extravagant, healthful or harmful, are the especial products of our
modern age. They are strangely and egregiously mistaken. It
is just as difficult to devise a new heresy or a new fancy or a
new oddity in religious belief or practice, as it is to discover
a new truth. There is no opinion, conceit, or notion in such
matters, recognized among us, which had not its living belief and
avowal at the period of which I am speaking.
Before me lie three quaint and time-worn old books, very
communicative witnesses as to what I am now saying. They
were written and published after the time when our General
Court began to legislate on this soil, but their contents cover
materials that were familiar and notorious.  I will copy and
read their titles, which, I think, will serve the purpose, without
asking you to read their contents.
1. " Gangrrena: or A Catalogue and Discovery of many of the Errors,
Heresies, Blasphemies, and pernicious practices of the Sectaries of this




84        TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
time, vented and acted in England in these four last years, &c. By
Thomas Edwards, Minister of the Gospel."
2. "Heresiography, or a Description of the Heretics and Sectaries
sprung up in these latter times, &c. By Ephraim Pagitt, late Minister of
St. Edmonds."
3. "The Dippers Dipt. Or the Anabaptists Duck'd and Plunged over
Head and Eares, at a Disputation in Southwark, &c. By Daniel Featley,
D.D."
This was Milton's " year of sects and schisms."
A precious medley do these books, and others like them,
" adorned with cuts," present us, of the workings of individualism and sectarism in England then. And there were on the
stage of life earnest and fantastic characters, answering to
each belief and opinion, each notion, scruple, and extravagance,
by garb, behavior, habit, and speech. There were then in
England men who wore long hair and women who wore short
hair; the bearded and the shaven; the dandy and the drabcoated; those who said Thee and Thou, and those who kept on
their hats, where others took them off, before Fox became the
apostle of such.
To assume, as some carelessly do, that when Roger Williams
and others asserted the right and safety of liberty of conscience,
they announced a novelty that was alarming, because it was a
novelty, to the authorities of Massachusetts, is a great error. Our
Fathers were fully informed as to what it was, what it meant;
and they were familiar with such results as it wrought in their
day. They knew it well, and what must come of it; and they
did not like it; rather, they feared and hated it. They did not
mean to live where it was indulged; and, in the full exercise of
their intelligence and prudence, they resolved not to tolerate it
among them. They identified freedom of conscience only with
the objectionable and mischievous results which came of it. They
might have met all around them in England, in city and country,
all sorts of wild, crude, extravagant, and fanatical spirits. They
had reason to fear that many whimsical and factious persons
would come over hither, expecting to find an unsettled state of
things, in which they would have the freest range for their eccentricities. They were prepared to stand on the defensive.




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.         85
Now we turn back again to the Colony Records, without an
actual perusal of which, page by page, as I have said, will
the history, as it is apt to be written, not stand before us as truth.
On those pages we are impressed at once by the high-handed,
resolute, straightforward, and systematic way, -never faltering,
halting, doubting, or justifying themselves,-in which the authorities proceeded to put the soil and its inhabitants under their
mastery. They proceeded on the calm, full assurance, that it
was for them to begin with a clear, or a cleared, field. Exactly
as one who, having purchased a large freehold, on which he contemplates improvements, runs his eye over it to see what nuisances he must remove; the stumps to be grubbed up, the holes
in the fences, and so forth. The colonial proprietors by charter
found here some chance and irregular residents; " old planters,"
and others, who, with a mysterious history behind them in
England,- rogues, adventurers, or romantic spirits loving solitude
and the wilderness, -had occupied many of the headlands and
promontories of our Bay. These had to be packed off, sent
home to England, or brought under the authority and discipline
of the colonists. Some of these, getting before the Privy Council with the tale of their grievances, and with ill reports of what
was going on here, originated that suspicion and jealousy
towards the colony which brought its charter and authorities
under threats and peril. The only effect which such complaints
had here was, to make legislation and oversight more rigid and
watchful, and the dealing with mischief-breeders more sharp
and stern. Never in a single instance were the authorities intimidated or thwarted. All interlopers here, all roving characters,
seeking the delights of a proximate return to the state of
nature, were at once looked after. The roisterous and reckless
Morton, of Merry Mount, has the honor of coming first under
their discipline. At the very first Court held in the Bay, it was
"Ordered, that Morton, of Mount Woolison, should presently
be sent for by process." They had him in hand in less than a
fortnight, set him in the " bilbowes," and then sent him to England, confiscating his goods to make satisfaction to Indians whom
he had wronged, and then burning his shanty as a scene of
wicked revelry. In a few months after, six persons have a
passage home provided for them against their will; the all-suffi



86         TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
cient reason being given that they are "persons unmeete to
inhabit here." At the same time, as one of two prisoners to be
sent to England, is that dark and mysterious character, Sir Christopher Gardiner, " an undoubted Papist," professedly a Knight of
the Sepulchre, sorely charged as having temporary and contemporary wives, two in England, and a certain Italian woman
here.  On the same date, the first quack was treated in a way
which reminds us how different the law was then from what it
is now.
" Nich. Knopp is fined five pounds for taking upon him to cure the
scurvey by a water of noe worth nor value, which he sold at a very deare
rate, to be imprisoned till he pay his fine, or give security for it, or els to
be whipped, and shall be liable to any man's action of whome he hath
received money for the said water." 
Again, -
"Thomas Gray is enjoined under the penalty of ten pounds to attend
on the Court in person this day three weeks, to answer to divers things
objected against him, and to remove himself out of the limits of this
patent," before six months. (p. 77.)
Another unaccounted-for old planter, who seems to have had
dangerous relations with the Indians, was Thomas Walford, of
Charlestown.
He was, May, 1631, "fined forty shillings, and is enjoined, hee and
his wife, to depart out of the limits of this pattent, before the 20th day of
October nexte, under pain of confiscation of his goods, for his contempt
of authority, and confronting officers," &c.
" Capt. John Stone for his outrage comitted in confronting authority,
abuseing Mr. Ludlowe, both in words and behavour, assalting him and
calling him a just ass &c. is fined 100 pds, and prohibited coming within
this pattent without leave from the Goveriment under the penalty of
death." (p. 108.)
Again, -
"/ Mr. Thomas Makepeace, because of his novile disposition, was informed we were weary of him unlesse hee reforme." (p. 252.)
Mr. Blaxton, an old planter on the peninsula of Boston, a
mysterious man, shrewdly foreseeing what sort of a sway was
1 Records, vol. i. p. 83.




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.              87
about to be established here, quietly took himself off, selling out
to the settlers his own squatter rights and improvements.
While the soil was thus cleared of intruders, and the proprietors asserted their rights of jurisdiction over strangers, they were
none the less resolute in putting their own magistrates and servants under rigid discipline. Sir Richard Saltonstall, and others
of the highest among them, were fined for absence or tardiness at
the Court-meetings, or for irregularities of conduct. It is hard to
read the Records without feeling the motions for many a smile,
or even for more marked demonstrations.      So rigid was the
inquisition, so petty were many of the offences punished, and so
severe were the penalties, that we find our smiles repressed. But
those stern and grim legislators understood themselves.   They
knew what were their aims, and the caution, severity, and resoluteness requisite to realize them, or, at least, to guard the trial
of them. Before we hear of their making stocks or whippingposts, such conveniences seem to have been all handy for use as
subjects were sentenced to them.
It would seem from the following order of the Court, that the
use of the Boston stocks was very fittingly inaugurated: —
"Edward Palmer, for his extortion, takeing 11 13s 7T. for the plank
and wood-work of Boston stocks, is fined five pounds, and censured to bee
set an hour in the stocks. This fine was remitted to 10., 1
" Robert Shorthose, for swearing by the blude of God, was sentenced
to have his tongue put into a cleft stick, and to stand so by the space of
halfe an houre."
" Elizabeth, the wife of Thomas Apelgate, was censured to stand with
her tongue in a cleft stick, for swearing, raileing, and revileing."
Edward Woodley, for attempting a rape, swearing, and breaking into
a house, was censured to be severely whipt 30 stripes, a yeares imprisonment, and kept to hard labour with course dyot, and to weare a coller of
yron." 2
"' Capt. Lovell was admonished to take heede of light carriage." 3
A specimen of the severity of their discipline on a grievous
offender, a servant on Governor Cradock's farm, is as follows:
At the Court, June 14, 1631.
"It is ordered that Philip Ratliffe shall be whipped, have his eares cut
off, fined 40 pounds, and banished out of the limitts of this jurisdiction,
I Records, vol. i. p. 260.  2 Id. p. 177.  3 Id. p. 193.




88        TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
for uttering malicious and scandalous speeches against the government,"
&c.
Again, at the Court, in March, 1638,"Mr. Ambros Marten, for calling the Church covenant a stinking
carrion and a human invention, and saying he wondered at God's patience, feared it would end in the sharpe, and said the ministers did
dethrone Christ, and set up themselves; he was fined 10 pds. and counselled to go to Mr. Mather to be instructed by him."
These last two extracts are very significant to us of a fact, evidence of which is strewn all over the Records, that the authorities
were especially stern, unflinching, and unrelenting, in dealing
with those whose offence was a contumacious trifling with the
dignity of the government, or an irreverent reproaching of their
church covenant. Security and harmony, respect and submission, as to both those vitally fundamental matters, held at stake
the prosperity or the absolute ruin of the enterprise.
Yet it would be doing harsh injustice to the early legislators
of Massachusetts, to recognize in their records only a stern
spirit. Gentleness and mercy show many pleasing and impressive manifestations even there.  The reader is constantly reminded of the same characteristic in the Jewish code, in which
severity is set in contrast with mildness. The tender regard for
the widowed and the fatherless; the privileges secured to the
gleaners, as illustrated in the beautiful pastoral in the Book of
Ruth; consideration for the impoverished and the honest debtor;
the distinction between disciplinary punishment and inhuman
vengeance, -are admirably paralleled between the Old-Testament code and that of Massachusetts.  Our legislators stood for
absolute equity between man and man. They protected the
unfortunate and the wronged. They provided for the fair settlement of estates, and the adjustment of private controversies.
Their legislation was rigidly impersonal and sternly impartial.
They remitted fines on confession and submission. As has
been already said, the ever-upright Winthrop and the other
associates in the chief magistracies, stood in turn at the same
bar where offenders and culprits were held to judgment. Here,
certainly, is an act of even-handed justice, done by the Court, in
September, 1631: -




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.           89
"It is ordered that Josias Plastowe shall (for stealeing four basketts of
come from th'e Indians) returne them eight basketts againe, be fined five
pounds, and hereafter, to be called by the name of Josias, and not Mr., as
formerly hee used to be." 1
Some distinction of difference is certainly to be recognized by
us, for it was recognized by the authorities, in their mode of
treating, respectively, intruders or strangers who caused them
annoyance, and the dissentients from their opinions, measures,
or policy, members of their own company and churches. The
harshness which in either case is rightly charged upon the
authorities, and the injustice and cruelty which, with less ground
of reason, are also ascribed to them, can be fairly judged of by
us only when we keep in mind the distinction between the two
classes of troublers. As regards those who were not proprietors,
members of the company, or freemen, but chance residents,
strangers, interlopers, adventurers, or visitors, the authorities felt
that their rights of self-protection and privacy, with security
from molestation, were as plain and sufficient as are those of
any householder among us on his own premises, or those of any
joint-stock company in managing its corporate affairs.  They
did not feel themselves bound in any case, beyond their own
inclinations, to give a reason for keeping out, warning off, or
expelling, such as came under the description just named. It
was enough if any such person was thought " unmeete to inhabit
here." If he was not wanted, he must stay away, or he might
be sent away. If he did any thing wrong while here, he might
be fined, whipped, or otherwise punished first, and then be
ordered and helped to take himself off.  So the authorities
insisted their charter gave them a right to judge and act in
every case for themselves; and so they knew it was wise and
necessary for them to proceed, if they meant that their profoundly sincere and exacting religious enterprise should have a
fair trial. The issue stood thus between the two parties,-the
housekeepers and the visitants, the proprietors and the outsiders.
Here were the owners of certain property, and proprietary rights
of local government and jurisdiction.  They understood each
other, and were solemnly covenanted with each other, in a pur1 Records, vol. i. p. 92.




90         TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
pose which had brought them hither, at their own charges,
furnished with the means of self-protection.    They must stay
here, identifying themselves and their fortunes with their experiment. They had parted with their homes and possessions in
the old world; and, if they could not make and keep such here,
they would be vagabonds on the earth.1
The other party to the issue were those who came unasked,
for curiosity, adventure, or caprice.  They did not intend to stay
except for private ends of their own.    They had no property
here.  They did not love the air of the place, nor its society.
Very many of them       were possessed    of the whimsies and
crotchets which the colonists intended to be clear of, as one
reason for coming hither.    Others of those intruders had the'prophetical spirit," which classed them    as nuisances of the
most offensive character.   It certainly was easier and more
reasonable for the visitors to leave, than for the householders to
break up their establishment, or to live in a constant ferment and
dissension.  And it is to be frankly and distinctly admitted, that
not a single such intruder, however summarily he was dealt
with here, would have escaped legal process and punishment
under like circumstances in     England.    Any one who will
search curiously into the vagrant laws of the mother country,
and mark what a careful watch was kept, and what discipline
was visited upon the unthrifty and those who had no visible
means of a livelihood, will find abundant evidence that our
Fathers followed precedents; though, it must be owned, they did
not care for such support.
The case was somewhat different when dissent and variance
sprang up within their own fellowship in state or church. The
grievance was a deep and a sore one, in each instance of it,
when those who had the rights of freemen, and the sanctity of
1 In a "Declaration " issued by the Court, in 1659, in the course of the proceedings against the Quakers, this ground is assumed: " There is no man that is possessed of house or land, wherein he hath just title and property as his own, but he
would count it unreasonably injurious that another who had no authority thereto
should intrude and enter into his house, without the owner's consent." The argument proceeds, that, if the intruder in such a case should be killed by the householder, the latter will be guiltless; and if an individual may thus defend his private
rights, how much more the authorities of a government.- Miscellaneous MSS. in
the State House.




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.          91
the covenant of church-membership raised diversities of judgment or variances of purpose, and so caused distraction. It
was evident in all such cases, that the umpireship, the appeal,
would be found in referring to the common pledge of aim and
enterprise which had bound the proprietors together, and to the
seal which they had set upon their pledge in their church vows
and in their civil oath.  It was perfectly fair, as they were held
themselves, that they should hold each other to the most stringent terms of their joint and common obligations. It was to be
taken for granted, that each and every one of them was concerned to avert the failure of their enterprise; and if that was
risked by any variance of opinion in civil or religious matters,
such variance was to be held in check before it resulted in
sedition or dangerous heresy.
Roger Williams was the first conspicuous subject of what is
called the intolerance, the severity, aye, the cruelty, of the
authorities of Massachusetts. Fact and fiction, or great misapprehension and misrepresentation, are about equally mingled
in the popular reading of his story. An enterprise to which he
fortuitously committed himself, helped alike by the sort of discomfitures and compulsory straits which it encountered, as well
as by any deliberate and intentional purpose of his own thrown
into it, was crowned with the same success as was reached by
Massachusetts through another process.  His purity of character, his integrity, perseverance, and magnanimity, and his
lengthened life, give a personal and historic interest to his
career. But none the less was he the occasion of much trouble
here. The quarrel which he had on this soil was of his own
originating. If he had had his way a grievous wrong would
have been visited on the colonists. He found occasion, indeed,
to reconsider, with maturer wisdom, the course he had pursued
here, when the adoption oi imitation of it by some of his own
associates in Rhode Island led him to ask sympathy and aid
firom Massachusetts.
Sir William Martin, a warm friend of the colony and of Governor Winthrop, in a letter to the latter from England (in March,
1636), afterWilliams had come under censure, wrote as follows:"I am sorry to hear of Mr. Williams' separation from you. His
former good affections to you and the plantations were well known to me,




92        TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
and make me wonder now at his proceedings. I have wrote to him
effectually to submit to better judgements, and especially to those whom
formerly he reverenced and admired; at least, to keep the bond of peace
inviolable. This hath been always my advice; and nothing conduceth
more to the good of plantations. I pray show him what lawful favor you
can, which may stand with the common good. He is passionate and precipitate, which may transport him into error; but I hope his integrity
and good intentions will bring him at last into the way of truth, and confirm him therein. In the mean time, I pray God to give him a right use
of this affliction."1
This kindly and impartial estimate of Williams was made by
one who evidently knew him well. It corresponds at every
point with the view which a fair-minded reader would take of
his case as history.
Williams came here in 1631 as a young, ardent, and strongly
self-willed-man, at his own prompting. He was not a proprietor in the company, and never became a freeman of it. He was
a rigid separatist from the English Church, in which he had
been a minister; while the authorities of Massachusetts were not
so rigid, certainly not in avowal, as Williams wished them to
be. He was invited, on his arrival, as he long after affirmed,
though there is no other testimony to the fact, to become the
teacher of the Boston Church; which he says he refused to do,
because its members would not humble themselves for their
former communion with the English Church, and renounce it.
He served a short time in the ministry at Salem, though the
Court remonstrated at his being put into that office, both because of that severe judgment of his already mentioned, as
also because of an opinion for which he stood stoutly, that the
power of the magistrates and of government should be limited
to civil affairs, taking no cognizance of an infraction of the first
four commandments. This opinion and avowal of Williams, of
course struck a fatal blow at the very life of the " Theocrasie,'
which the Fathers of Massachusetts were establishing. He
made warm friends in Salem, notwithstanding the restlessness
of his spirit. Yet, for reasons not known to us, he left there
within a year, and shared a more congenial ministry with the
separatist pastor, Mr. Smith, at Plymouth. The excellent and
1 Hutch. Coll. Papers, p. 106.




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.         93
gentle Elder Brewster, and the judicious and even-tempered
Governor Bradford, both had occasion to mark his hastiness of
spirit and his "unsettled judgment," though they loved him.
They were glad to have him go away; and on his return to
Salem, in 1633, they addressed a word of caution on his account
to his old friends. While he was at Plymouth, he had shown to
the authorities there a written paper, in which he struck another
blow against the very fundamentals of any local government to
be administered on this soil, by denying the validity of any rights
conferred by the patents held by the colonists.. This treatise
coming to the knowledge of the authorities of Massachusetts on
his return to Salem, he was summoned to answer for it. In the
only single instance known to us in his life, of his yielding in
judgment or pertinacity, - and even this instance, as it proved,
was not to be permanently an exception, - he penitently confessed
that he was in error, submitted to the judgment of the Court, and
consented that his treatise should be burned. The magistrates in
vain tried to prevent the Salem Church from putting him into
office in 1634, and withheld a grant of land from that town on
account of this contumacy. He was again summoned before
the Court in 1635, for having broken his promise by renewing
his assault upon the patent, for calling the English churches, reproachfully, anti-Christian, and for denying the right to put an
unregenerate person under oath in a civil court. Altercation
and acrimony mingled in this dispute. The result which might
reasonably- and shall we not say, fairly? - be expected, came
in the form of this judgment, by the Court, Sept. 3, 1635:"Whereas, Mr. Roger Williams, one of the elders of the Church of
Salem, hath broached and divulged divers new and dangerous opinions
against the authority of magistrates, as also writ letters of defamation
both of the magistrates and churches here, and that before any conviction,
and yet maintaineth the same without retraction, it is therefore ordered,"
that he depart from the jurisdiction within six weeks, failing of
which he was to be sent away, never to return without leave.
On account of the season, his time was extended to the next
spring. As he was planning for a settlement on Narragansett
Bay, and continued to keep Salem in a ferment, the magistrates
concluded to ship him for England. This coming to his knowl



94       TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
edge, he anticipated the measure by starting off, as his last biographer, Mr. R. A. Guild, thinks, in a shallop, and  coasting
probably from place to place during the' fourteen weeks' that he'was sorely tossed,' and holding intercourse with the native tribes,
whose language he had acquired." 1
Less than a dozen close friends accompanied Williams; and
the supporters which he left behind him were reduced to about
the same number, when the nature and tendency of his selfwilled course were fully realized. Much romantic and sympathizing interest has been connected with his supposed wilderness
experience. But all the settlers were in a wilderness then, and
it would have been a wilder one than it was, on the edge of our
Bay, if the disorganizing notions of Williams had had sway.
There was no intentional inhumanity in the treatment of him.
He might have gone to friends in Plymouth. He had no right
of residence here, and his course was not such as to give him a
claim on courtesy or hospitality. We must not transfer our
sense of security, our tolerance, and our familiarity with what
are to us harmless extravagances, to our Fathers, and then wonder why they allowed this well-meaning but troublesome man
to visit upon them such fears. It was a matter of life or death
with them.
Cotton Mather's oft-quoted saying about Williams, "that he
had a windmill in his head," is not exactly true. A windmill
admits of being adjusted to breezes and currents, however fickle;
and its use depends upon its turning these breezes to account in
ministering to the homely necessities of the body's life. Williams
had in him neither mechanical nor moral appliances or impulses
for seeking any selfish ends. He was sound to the core in integrity, frank, disingenuous, and large-hearted.
John Quincy Adams best characterized him on the less agreeable side of his nature, when young, by calling him " a conscientious contentious man."
In the old age of a long life, Williams, mellowed by time, and
taught patience by having to deal in his own colony with such
opponents and troublers as he himself had been to Massachusetts, became, even more benignantly and lovingly, what he had
1 Publications of the Narragansett Club. vol. i. p. 32.




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.         95
always been in the real temper of his heart. His noble magnanimity disposed him to be of the highest service to Massachusetts, in averting from her peril, and establishing for her friendly
relations with the Indians in threatening times. He appreciated,
too, the personal kindness which he had received from individuals,
who, in the exercise of their authority, had had to deal with
him as a dangerous and mischievous offender. There is great
tenderness in the tones and words in which, in his old age, he
speaks of " that ever-honored Governor, Mr. Winthrop," who, he
says, " advised him, for many high and heavenly and public
ends," to steer his course to the Narragansett Bay; and also of
the bounty of "that great and pious soul, Mr. Winslow;" and
of others.
Mr. Williams may be classed either among the intruders or
the dissentients against whom, as individuals or as classes, Massachusetts exercised its charter authority or its ecclesiastical discipline. As one who came hither unbidden, not as a member of
the company, and never made a freeman under it, he might be
said to have been here only on sufferance, liable to be warned
off at the pleasure of the proprietors whenever his presence
should prove undesirable. But as having exercised a ministry
in one of the regular church assemblies of the jurisdiction, it
might be claimed that he had been adopted as a full citizen.
Yet that his having come into full standing in the colony would
have made little, if any, difference in the course pursued towards
him, may fairly be inferred from the facts now to be recognized
in the dealing with a large company of dissentients springing
up here, alike in full civil and church relations. These are
known to us as Antinomians, and as the followers and sympathizers with Mrs.'Hutchinson.
The agitation and strife connected with the Antinomian controversy, opened by Mrs. Ann Hutchinson, came dangerously
near to bringing the fortunes of the young Massachusetts colony
to a most disastrous ruin. Discord and division, of the most
imbittered sort, among brethren, proposing a recourse to open
violence with blows and arms, reached an advanced stage of
sedition, and threatened complete anarchy. The peril overhung
at a time when the proprietary colonists had the most reasonable
and fearful forebodings of the loss of their charter by the inter



96       TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
ference of a Privy Council Commission, and also were waging
war against the Pequot Indians. Those were dark and wretched
days here, for the colonists, whose all was at stake. Ominously
enough, too, Mrs. Hutchinson arrived here, Sept. 18, 1634, in
the vessel which brought the copy of that commission. Winthrop describes her as a woman of a " ready wit and bold spirit."
Strongly gifted herself, she had a gentle and weak husband, who
was guided by her. She had at home enjoyed no ministrations
so much as those of Cotton, and her brother-in-law, Mr. Wheelwright. She came here to put herself again under the preaching of the former. On her passage, she had'raised the fears of
Symmes, the minister of Charlestown, by " venting some private
revelations," and by uttering some strange opinions.  By his
interference and warning, the admission which she sought to
membership of the Boston Church was delayed, though afterwards granted. She had been here for two years, known as a
ready, kindly, and most serviceable woman, especially to her own
sex in their straits and sicknesses. But she anticipated the introduction of " the woman question " among the colonists in a
more troublesome form than it has yet assumed for us. Joined
by her brother-in-law, who was also admitted to the church,
after those two quiet years she soon made her influence felt for
trouble, as he did likewise. There were no newspapers in those
days, no clubs, no daily mails, no gatherings for friendly intercourse, no food for the mind other than religious discoursing to
vary the strain upon one class of thoughts, or to occupy the listless or social hours.
Besides the regular substantial repast of listening to many
sermons, the dessert consisted of talking them over. As a general
rule, men are apt to leave out something, and women are apt
to put in something, in their respective reports and criticisms of
sermons.  The male members of the Boston Church had a
weekly meeting, in which they discussed the ministrations of
Cotton and Wilson. Mrs. Hutchinson organized and presided
over one, held soon twice in a week, for her own sex, attended
by nearly a hundred of the principal women on the peninsula
and in the neighborhood. It was easy to foresee what would
come of it, through one so able and earnest as herself, even if
she had no novel or disjointed or disproportioned doctrine to




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.         97
inculcate; which, however, it proved that she had. Antinomian
means a denying, or, at least, a weakening, of the obligation to
observe the moral law, and to comply with the external duties;
to do the works associated with the idea of internal, spiritual
righteousness. It was a false or disproportioned construction of
St. Paul's great doctrine of justification by faith, without the
works of the law, - a doctrine which is safe only exactly as St.
Paul defines and limits it, - easily misrepresented and exposed
to dangerous application. Its truth is restricted to its Divine
relations, and fails as it is applied between man and man. God
takes the right and sincerely earnest heart-purpose for the deed,
and pities and forgives shortcomings.  Man sometimes will do
the same, but not always: nor can man always be expected to
do it, f6r he cannot be sure of a heart-purpose, even if it would
satisfy him. A debtor burdened with obligations, with a sincere
desire to pay, asks that that desire be accepted as payment.
This is satisfactory to all except to the creditors. Mrs. Hutchinson was understood to teach, that one who was graciously justified by a spiritual assurance, need not be greatly concerned for
outward sanctification by works. She judged and approved, or.
censured and discredited, the preachers whom she heard, according as they favored or repudiated that view. Her admirers
accepted her opinions. Winthrop 1 ascribes to her " two dangerous errors, from which grew many branches:" "first, that the
person of the Holy Ghost dwells in a justified person; second,
that no sanctification can help to evidence to us our justification."
Word soon went forth that Mrs. Hutchinson had pronounced in
her meetings, that Mr. Cotton and her brother-in-law Wheelwright, alone of all the ministers in the colony, were under " a
covenant of grace," the rest being "legalists," or under " a covenant of works." These reports, which soon became more than
opinions, were blazing brands that it would be impossible to
keep from reaching inflammable material. The matter of dissension was just of the sort to cause contention of the most alarming character, because concerned with matters already exaggerated in their interest, and entertained in the community with a
morbidness of zeal. As the contention extended it involved all
1 Journal, vol. i. p. 200.
7




98         TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
the principal persons of the colony. Cotton and all but five
members of the Boston Church -though one of these five was
Winthrop, and another was Wilson - proved to be sympathizers with Mrs. Hutchinson; while the ministers and leading
people outside in the other hamlets were strongly opposed to her.
She had a partisan, moreover, of transcending influence in the
young Governor Sir Henry Vane.     The son of a Privy Councillor, and one of the Secretaries of State, he had (not with the
sympathy of his father) given himself to zeal for the Puritan
form of religion; and, by suggestion of the King, had a three
years' leave of residence in New England.   He had come here
the year before the Antinomian controversy opened; and was
but twenty-three years old.   Though   pure and devout, and
ardent in his zeal, he had not then the practical wisdom for
which Milton afterwards praised him in his noble sonnet:"Vane, young in years, but in sage counsels old."
So gushing was the admiration quickened in the colony
toward their noble visitor, that the people at once chose him for
their governor, electing Winthrop as deputy.    Vane, sincere
and right intentioned as he was, erred in judgment; and the
results of his administration of a single year were so unsatisfactory to himself, as well as prejudicial to the colony, that he
soon returned to England, disappointed and under a cloud.1
With his strong support, and that of two other prominent magistrates and of so overwhelming a majority of the Boston Church,
Mrs. Hutchinson naturally felt emboldened. The other ministers
of the Bay coming to Boston to the Court, took up, and in conference, heightened the strife. The Boston Church was for introducing Wheelwright to office over them; and this design was
with difficulty frustrated. He then was invited to a church gathered at Mount Wollaston.   The cloud grew very dark over the
colony, as the terrible war with the Pequots was coincident with
1 Richard Baxter gives us an account of the trouble which he had, when chaplain
to the garrison in Coventry, with " one or two persons who came among us from
New England, of Sir Henry Vanes party, and one Anabaptist tailor." (Life, Part I.)
Baxter unfairly attributes to the Anabaptist party, as largely composed "of abun.
dance of young, transported zealots, and a medley of opinionists," the responsibility
of bringing forth "the horrid sects of Ranters, Seekers, and Quakers, in the land."
(Life, Part II.)




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.           99
the threatenings of sedition.  Meetings of ministers and of
magistrates, separately and jointly, were held; at one of which
the plain-spoken Hugh Peter opened his mind, without compliment of matter or manner, to the young governor.
Mrs. Hutchinson and some of her followers rose and went out
of meeting when Wilson officiated.    Bitterness and rancor
came between former friends. A General Fast Day was ap-.
pointed for pacification. But Wheelwright preached a sermon
of an exciting character, quoting passages from the Old Testament intimating a recourse to arms and violence. Ile was at
once proceeded with for sedition.   Members of the Boston
Church presented a petition in his behalf, for which they were
disarmed and otherwise censured. He himself made an appeal
to the King, which only aggravated his offence; and as Winthrop writes, "refusing to leave either the place or his public
exercisings, he was disfranchised and banished." Seven years
afterwards, having lived away, he reviewed his course with
regret and manfully apologized for it in a letter, to the Governor
for the Court, in which he said that, after long and mature
consideration, he had found that the main point of difference in
the controversy about justification and the evidence of it"is not of that nature and consequence as was then presented to me in
the false glass of Satan's temptations and mine own distempered passions,
which makes me unfeignedly sorry that I had such a hand in those sharp
and vehement contentions raised thereabouts, to the great disturbance of
the churches of Christ."
He also regrets the censoriousness of his sermon, and the
countenance which he gave in it to persons of corrupt judgment;"and that, in the Synod, I used such unsafe and obscure expressions,
falling from me as a man dazzled with the buffetings of Satan, and that I
did appeal [to the King] from misapprehension of things."
He "confessed that herein he had done very sinfully, and he
humbly craved pardon." This letter was dated at Wells, Sept.
10, 1643, probably after he had learned of the tragic death of his
sister. His sentence of banishment was revoked.1
1 Winthrop's Journal, vol. i. p. 162.




100        TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
This penitence was an after work. He stood stoutly for his
sister through her convention before the Court.
The civil sentence passed against her, Nov. 2, 1637, was as
follows: 
" Mrs. Hutchinson (the wife of Mr. Wm Hutchinson) being convented
for traducing the ministers and their ministry in this country, she declared volentarily her revelations for her ground, and that shee should be
delivred, and the Court ruined, with their posterity; and thereupon was
banished, and the meane while comited to Mr. Joseph Weld untill the
Court shall dispose of her." 
After she had been sentenced to civil banishment, she was
dealt with by the Church, and excommunicated.        She lost her
temper, and seemed once to part with veracity, on her trial.
Her " revelations" were especially offensive.  At one time " she
made a retraction of near all" the errors attributed to her, and
" declared that it was just with God to leave her to herself, as
he had done, for her slighting his ordinances, both magistracy
and ministry." A question involving her veracity arose, when
she affirmed that she had never advanced some of the opinions
charged upon her; and for this, Winthrop says, "the church
with one consent cast her out," for " having impudently persisted
in untruth." Many of her sympathizers at once fell away. As
the summing up of the strife, seventy-six persons were disarmed; 2 two were disfranchised and fined; two more were
fined; eight more were disfranchised; three were banished;
and eleven who had asked permission to remove, had leave, in
the form of a limitation of time within which they must do it.
The more estimable and considerable of them apologized, and
were received back. Those who did not, proved troublesome persons where they went. After various removes with her husband,
and a vexed and troubled life, Mrs. Hutchinson, a widow, with
many children and grandchildren, living on the shore opposite
1 Records, vol. i. p. 207.
2 There was thought to be need of especial caution in this measure of disarming.
The military power of the colony had recently been organized into three regiments,
carefully officered, and for the time admirably well equipped. The sound of war
was in the land; and Wheelwright, in his sermon, had carried the rhetoric of battle
and violence, from the Old Testament, as far as it was safe to use it for Bible
champions. The authorities reasonably apprehended a direct recourse to arms.




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.        101
Long Island, was murdered in the summer of 1643, on an
inroad of the Indians. A daughter of eight years of age, the
only survivor, was carried into captivity. Four years afterwards, she was recovered by the General Court, and brought
back to Massachusetts.  Edward Hutchinson, a son of this
excellent though perhaps ill-balanced woman, had been among
those who were disfranchised and fined.  His fine of forty
pounds was remitted, though I do not find any record of his
restoration to full citizenship, which probably he obtained. He
remained in Boston, on the removal of the family, and was a
brave captain, doing good service in Philip's war, and receiving a
mortal wound in Quaboag [Brookfield] fight. He was the greatgrandfather of Thomas Hutchinson, our provincial governor and
historian, who, in his latter capacity, seeking to subordinate filial
sentiment to impartiality, has hardly done justice to his ancestress in his narration of her troubles.
Thomas Savage, another of the disarmed, had married a
daughter of Mrs. Hutchinson, and afterwards he became sonin-law of her strongest enemy, Rev. Zachariah Symmes. The
Hon. James Savage, his descendant, as editor and cormentator of Winthrop, gives us another example of impartiality in
his faithful annotations concerning the Antinomian controversy.
A period of twenty years elapsed between the struggle against
Antinomianism and the special legislation against the Quakers.
But the interval was divided by another contentious issue,
which threatened to put the ecclesiastical basis of the government to a severer strain than it could safely bear, though still it
triumphed.  Again the issue was one which engaged both
intruders and dissentients against the Government, though the
disaffection was mainly that of transient residents and nonfreemen.  Mr. William Vassall, one of the original assistants,
had come over with Winthrop; but, from some disaffection, had
very soon returned to England. After residing there five years,
he came hither again, but, by preference, to Plymouth colony. He
was intensely opposed both to the civil and ecclesiastical rule
set up by his old associates. Being, as Winthrop says,1 " a man
of a busy and factious spirit," and "never at rest but when in
the fire of contention, he had practised with such as were not
1 Jour., vol. i. pp. 26 and 321.




102      TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
members of our churches" to initiate a new strife.  Robert
Child and six others, accordingly, in May, 1646, addressed a
Remonstrance and Petition to the General Court, complaining
that the residents here were not governed by the laws of England; that they were kept out of civil privileges as not being
church-members, while church-membership was to be secured
only by a covenant which was not fairly framed; that their
children were denied Christian baptism, and they themselves
compelled by fine to support and attend religious ministrations:
for all which grievances they asked redress. The Court, having
made arrangements for a synod of churches, issued, on Nov. 4,
1646, a stiff " Declaration " in answer.  They insist that " ye
Government is framed according to our charter and ye fundamental and common laws of England, and carried on according
to the same;" adding, however, these important clauses, which
we know now how to fill in with all the meaning they then
implied, - " taking the words of eternal truth and righteousness
along with them, as that rule by which all kingdoms and jurisdictions must render account of every act and admistration in
the last day." What was so "' taken along " with the laws of
England, was the Bible, not by any means as of secondary
authority. The " Declaration" is followed by a series of parallelisms between Magna Charta and the Colony Laws, a liberal
allowance being made for statutes " alterable for occasions." 1
The petitioners carried their appeal to Parliament, but without
avail, there being then a good understanding between that Court
and ours. The complaints which were zealously urged in England against the rigid and persecuting course of the authorities
of Massachusetts, drew from their old associate, the noble Sir
Richard Saltonstall, a letter of sharp rebuke, addressed to Cotton
and Wilson, somewhere between 1645 and 1653. A leading
and highly honored assistant, he had arrived here with Winthrop,
June 12, 1630; but, after some trifling alienating experiences, he
went back to England at the close of the following March, leaving here some of his family, but never returning himself. lie
continued, however, to exert his powerful influence to befriend
the colony, and to circumvent its enemies at the English courts.
The difficulty of his task in that capacity, rather than any doubt
1 Hutchinson's Coll., pp. 188-218.




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.              103
that he had not shared, or had lost his interest in, the religious
designs of his former associates, may have prompted some of the
stinging rebukes of that letter.  He writes, -
"Reverend and deare friends whom I unfaynedly love and respect:
It doth not a little grieve my spirit to hear what sadd things are reported
dayly of your tyranny and persecutions in New England, as that you fyne,
whip and imprison men for their consciences. First, you compel such to
come into your assemblies, as you know will not join with you in your
worship, and when they show their dislike thereof or witniss against it,
then you styrre up your magistrates to punish them for such (as you conceyve) their public affronts. Truly, friends, this your practice of compelling
any in matters of worship to doe that whereof they are not fully persuaded,
is to make them sin, for so the Apostle (Rom. 14 and 23) tells us, and
many are made hypocrites thereby, conforming in their outward man for
fear of punishment."
He prays for them and hopes they will —
"not practice those courses in a wilderness which you went so farre to
prevent. These rigid wayes have layed you very lowe in the hearts
of the saynts. I doe assure you I have heard them pray in the publique
assemblies, that the Lord would give you meeke and humble spirits, not
to stryve so much for uniformity, as to keep the unity of the spirit, in the
bond of peace.- I hope you do not assume to yourselves infallibilitie of
judgement, when the most learned of the Apostles confesseth he knew but
in part, and saw but darkely as thro a glass. Oh that all those who are
brethren, tho yet they cannot thinke and speake the same things, might be
of one accord in the Lord." 1
Cotton, for himself and for his brother Wilson, replied to this
letter of frank and friendly rebuke, in a spirit of loving respect
for the writer, but disclaiming all blame, and standing stoutly for
their Bible model in their proceedings. Saltonstall had been at
least fourteen years withdrawn from any present share of administering " the church in the wilderness."  Away from the tentative
processes and the actual difficulties of the scheme on trial here,
he had the equally tasking responsibility of meeting the perplexities which it involved on the other side of the water.
The saddest and darkest stain upon the early annals of
Massachusetts attaches to the treatment of the people called
Quakers.   And yet the fair and full rehearsal of the facts which
1 Hutchinson Papers, pp. 401-407.




104      TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
compose a faithful narrative of what, beginning in comedy ended
in tragedy, will certainly avail to relieve the burden of wanton
and ruthless cruelty cast upon our legislators. Two leading
positions must be taken at the start.
First, it is to be frankly admitted, that those legislators, though
beyond measure provoked and goaded to the course which they
pursued, and though they acted with slow deliberation, and were
always ready to interpose mercy for judgment, did nevertheless,
as seen in the light of our day, act very unwisely; allowed their
timid fears to master their reason, and committed themselves to
a dilemma, either horn of which humiliated and tortured them.
Second, it is to be as frankly and positively affirmed, that their
Quaker tormentors were the aggressive party; that they wantonly initiated the strife, and with a dogged pertinacity persisted
in outrages which drove the authorities almost to frenzy; while
with a stiff temper of audacity, as the authorities saw it, but of
fidelity to holy duty as they felt, they courted the extreme penalties which they might at any moment have escaped, except
through constraint of their " inspirations."
This episode in our history, mingled of the ludicrous and the
dismal, dates from more than a quarter of a century after the
planting of the colony. Many of the wiser and gentler spirits
which at first had sway here, and whose judgment would doubtless have stopped short of the tragic inflictions visited on four
so-called Quakers, had gone to their rest. Winthrop, Cotton,
Wilson, and others like them, as they passed away, left the administration of affairs in State and Church to men more stern
and less wise than themselves. In the mean while, foreign and
domestic troubles and perplexities had contributed to endanger
the colony, to threaten its liberties, and to make the management of its affairs even more difficult. The emergencies of the
time made it of the most critical necessity to keep out all disturbers, to secure internal harmony, and to cling to the wellproved safeguards of the first enterprise.
The root of the prevalent superficial opinion, founded upon
an unintelligent, cursory, and hap-hazard way of writing and
reading our history, and which heaps an unrelieved burden of
censure upon our colonial court for its proceedings against the
Quakers, presents itself at once to an impartial inquirer. Mis



BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.                   105
apprehension and error, leading to positive injustice to our legislators, come    in  the popular mind, from       identifying   modern
Quakers with the sort of persons whom        our Fathers knew and
dealt with under that name. When one or a group of those
excellent people known as Friends is seen quietly passing our
streets, if any descendant of our colonists, or any foreign-born
citizen, trusting to ignorance in the lack of knowledge, should say
to himself, " Those are the sort of people who, two hundred years
ago, were imprisoned, whipped, and mutilated here, and four of
whom were hung on Boston           Common," he would need to be
sent back to the record.
The intrusive, pestering, indecent, and railing disturbers of
early Massachusetts, lawless and ignorant as most of them were,
have scarcely a single point of affinity with the dignified and
highly esteemed Friends of our day. These last are, and for
several generations have been, especially noted for quietude of
spirit, for a grave solemnity of demeanor, and a modest unobtrusiveness.   Indeed, it would be hard to define stronger points
of contrast in speech, conduct, and even in some important matters of opinion and religious belief, than those which really distinguished between the first and the modern Quakers. Those
whom our Fathers knew were of the type of Fox and Burroughs
and Naylor.1
I In vol. i. pp. 10 to 158, of Burton's Parliamentary Diary, may be read the curious and wearisome debate upon the case of Naylor, extending over eleven days.
That the wise and grave men of the English Parliament of 1656 should have found
material in that case for so long a discussion, when so much important business had
to be postponed by it, is in itself a suggestive fact. The perusal of that tedious
story will nevertheless reward a reader, if he will take it as a chapter of the struggle
and development of opinion concerning full liberty of conscience. Naylor, however,
was indicted and condemned for blasphemy. He had rode into Bristol in a guise,
and with observances, imitating the entry of Jesus Christ into Jerusalem. The indictment against him was: " That he assumed the gesture, words, names, and attributes of our Saviour, Christ." Narrowly escaping capital punishment, he was
sentenced to be pilloried and whipped in two places in London, to have his tongue
bored with a hot iron, to be branded on the forehead with the letter B, to be sent to
Bristol, there to ride " on a horse bare-ridged, with his face back," to be whipped again,
and then brought back to prison in London, debarred the use of pen, ink, and paper,
and of all food but what he should labor for. Cruelly treated as he had been, the
victim for a time of an insane enthusiasm, and of the fanatical folly of some admirers,
he was for a time disowned by the Quakers. Coming to his senses after two years'
imprisonment, he grieved over his delusions, and became an approved and effective
preacher. His utterances just before his death have a deep tenderness, sweetness,
and beauty.




106       TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
In "An addition to the book entitled,' The Spirit of the Martyrs revived,'" published just one hundred years after the first
coming of the Quakers to Massachusetts, Joseph Bolles, one of
the earnest Friends, draws a censorious contrast, " concerning the
difference between the former Quakers, that suffered Persecutions
and these in this day," as follows:" If we may know them by their Fruits, they were two manner of People; the first often going to Meeting Houses, and bearing a godly testimony, after the speaker had done [not always waiting for that, however],
also Teaching and Exhorting at other public places, for which they suffered
much Persecution, which they took joyfully, being upheld by the Power
of God. And these, only holding Meetings of their own in a formal way,
as other Professors do, having a form of Godliness, and not the Power
and Life thereof, as the suffering Quakers had; minding earthly things,
being adulterated and living in the friendship of the World, which is enmity
with God. So these, not having the spirit as the first Quakers had, are
no more to be compared with them, than a dead Tree may be compared
to a living Tree."
The writer was certainly unjust in thus making the difference
wrought by a century to consist only in this, that the first Quakers kept themselves alive by disturbing other people, while his
contemporaries stagnated among themselves.  The Friends did
not settle into quietude, till they had secured a general recognition of the vitalities of their system of truth. They have ever
since met the unpopularity of standing for advanced and unwelcome truths, and for reforms.
Those whom we know are of the type of Penn, Barclay, and
Whittier. The conduct, at least, of those who first bore the name,
would find its severest rebukers in such as now bear it. As to
religious opinions, or theology, distinctly characteristic of the intruders here, it is curious to note how little those had to do with
the strife. Penn and Barclay wrought out for the Friends, a religious system for belief and practice which would do honor to
any fellowship of Christians at the present time. But that was
the product of a later age of Quakerism, calmly, intelligently,
and even philosophically elaborated by nobly endowed men.
The crude and indigested notions which the early Quakers uttered
" in a prophetical way," sounded like the wildest rant, to be relieved of the reproach of blasphemy only by being referred to a




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.        107
besotted stupidity or a shade of distraction. Our Fathers cared
little, if at all, for the Quaker theology. They did not get so
far as that in dealing with them. Not being inclined to accept
the account which the Quakers gave of themselves as being
under the peculiar guidance of the Holy Spirit, our Fathers dealt
with them on the score of their manners, their lawlessness, and
their offensive speech and behavior. Yet it is also true that the
peculiar set of Quakers who came and testified, and defiantly
insisted upon returning and staying here, would not have been in
all respects exactly what they were, nor have done all that they
did, and as they did, if they had not had just such persons to
deal with them as they confronted here.
We, indeed, in the calm retrospect by which we study past
developments of new opinions, and in the intelligent analysis
which we make of the working elements that go to the production of a fresh truth, can apprehend the high and pure motive
which not only led, but really inspired, those unwelcome missionaries to our Bay. They were the advanced pleaders for a liberty
which is now our life, for a form of faith and piety which alone
has power for a free soul. The most illiterate and incoherent of
them had the Divine gift. They put their sincerity beyond all
question, by their often meek, but always unflinching, endurance
of contumely and violence. And, without doubt, much of their
terrible abusiveness of language was wholly free from malice and
any ill-intention, but was prompted wholly from an honest and
severely righteous sense of the errors and superstitions which
they assailed. But all this, we must again remind ourselves, is
from our own point of view, not from that of our Fathers. The
colonists had themselves suffered for opinion's sake. They, too,
had their visions, not "of private interpretation," and they
thought they had a skill in "trying spirits," and must look for
the devil always under a disguise.
George Fox, the reputed founder of the system of belief and
practice known as Quakerism, has come to stand in many
sketchy and aesthetic essays, as a profoundly original genius, a
man of nature's own large endowing, a seer and an organizer.
He was nothing of the sort. A cursory perusal of those old
books describing the heresies and sectaries then abounding in
England, to which I have referred, will convince a reader that,




108      TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND' DISSENTIENTS
before Fox came upon the stage, all the fancies, scruples, and
oddities of opinion and behavior by which he and his companions first won their notoriety, were all ready for their adoption.
Fox was an eclectic. He picked up in the various places where
he wandered, and from  the mixed and multiform  company
with which he associated, every one of his peculiar ideas and
crotchets.
Though he had a native vigor of understanding, and a soul
of sincerity and purity, he was an illiterate and ill-balanced man.
Shoemaker and shepherd as he was by turns, he was given to
hypochondriac meditations; and when, with his seeking and
inquisitive mind, he commenced his rovings, he found stimulant
and food for his morbidly eccentric nature in any shred of truth
which he gathered on the way. The fellowship which he drew
around him was of those like himself, waiting- as the phrase
went -- for some one who would " speak to their condition," and
then ready by public or private harangues," testimonies," or " prophetical burdens," to make that condition of theirs a standard for
trying other peoples' spirits. Some of the sect did get hold of,
and urge with earnest, simple eloquence, living truths which lay
latent in the Christian Scriptures, unrecognized and unapplied,
according to their due value and authority, by the Church of
their day. But the Quakers threw these fresh truths out of their
proportions and relations in dealing with them.
If Fox, as he once purposed, had gone into physic, instead of
into divinity, he would not have led so harmless a life. But, as
a preacher, he was known as a disturber of the peace, a reviler
of other ministers of religion, and of magistrates. His tongue
was a sharp one, though he referred its sharpness to the Spirit.
He railed and testified in all public places and assemblies, and
of course was buffeted, mobbed, and put into jail. He was one
of those harmless enthusiasts, who are best reduced to soberness
by being to a degree listened to, and then let alone. But neither
he nor his fellows would have been satisfied with being slighted:
nor were those whom they abused and reviled, inclined to give
them the benefit of indifference. Some of his associates far
exceeded him in their offensiveness of speech and behavior.
The English jails soon became filled with Quakers, who, curiously enough, were by many regarded as disguised Popish emis



BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACIHUSETTS.      109
saries of the Franciscan order in the service of Rome. Baxter
rashly asserts that many such friars had been found speaking in
the Quaker assemblies.
The home-field of England, Ireland, and Scotland, inviting
and rewarding as it was, soon proved too limited for the missionary zeal of the new enthusiasts. Men and women of the sect
soon found "the burden and call of their spirit" to carry their
testimony over the earth. The continent of Europe, with its
princes and peasants, offered them promising opportunities, and
the Pope and the Grand Turk received visits from them.
Our Fathers were on the watch for an inroad of these despised but dreaded intruders some considerable time before they
found their way hither. Through letters from friends at home,
and the abounding pamphlets of religious controversy of those
days, the people of Massachusetts were well informed as to the
spirit and actings of the Quakers. Dangerous books had already
been found circulating in the colony, and had been proscribed by
law in 1654; especially some of those of John Reeves and Ludovick Muggleton, "the two last Witnesses," which contained
similar notions to those advanced by Fox. The authorities were
on the alert. Indeed, but a few weeks before the first two
Quakers arrived here, a solemn Fast-day had been kept in the
colony, the first object of which was stated to be, "to seek
the face of God in behalf of our native country, in reference
to the abounding of errors, especially those of Ranters and
Quakers." 1
It was not till July, 1656, ten years after the first preaching
of Fox, that the unwelcome news was circulated in Boston, that
a ship in the harbor, from Barbadoes, had on board two women
Quakers. One of these, Mary Fisher, had visited the Grand Turk,
at Adrianople. By order of the magistrates, they were searched
and committed to jail, and their books were burned; the master
of the vessel being put under bonds to take them away again.
Hardly were they got rid of, than a vessel arrived from England,
having on board four Quaker men, and as many women, together
with a ninth passenger, a man, who, having come on board at
Long Island, had been converted by his companions. They
were committed to jail, examined, and found by their abusive
1 Rec., iv. (1) 276.




110      TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
speech to belong to a class of persons for whom there was no
room  or welcome here. Gorton, from  Rhode Island, found
means to communicate with them in jail, proposing to get them
out of the vessel somewhere along the coast, as the master of
it, in conformity with his heavy bonds, was carrying them out
of this jurisdiction.  But the magistrates thwarted Gorton's
purpose.
Then began a series of deliberative and legislative measures
on the part of our authorities, founded, as they believed, on
their full right to secure themselves from the seditious and rancorous visitors; either by warning them off from coming, or by
at once banishing them on their arrival, with some form of
punishing for a return those who, having come more than once,
were to be shipped off again. There was a gradation and an
adaptation of the penalties enacted, designed to be fitly and
righteously adjusted to the measure of provocation, insolence,
and defiance exhibited by the intruders themselves. In every
previous instance in which any offender had been banished from
the jurisdiction, the sentence had been effective. No one who
had suffered it had ever defied it by returning hither again.
The magistrates had reason to suppose that that measure would
be sufficient for their protection in the case of the Quakers.
When it is considered, too, that any shipmaster who should
bring such as passengers, was liable to a heavy fine, and to other
enforced charges; and also, that any resident who should harbor
or encourage a Quaker, would be severely dealt with for the
offence, - it might appear as if good manners, and generosity
and magnanimity of spirit, would have kept the Quakers away.
Certainly, by every rule of right and reason, they ought to have
kept away. They had no rights or business here, and a simple
prohibition ought to have been sufficient even to release their
consciences from all obligation to meddle with other people's
consciences. Most clearly, they courted persecution, suffering,
and death; and, as the magistrates affirmed, " they rushed upon
the sword."  Those magistrates never intended them harm, nor
would have done them harm, except as they believed that all their
successive measures and sharper penalties were positively necessary to secure their jurisdiction from the wildest lawlessness and
an absolute anarchy.




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.         1lt
But they erred in their calculation, reasonable as it was.
They little knew how stiff and indomitable was the will of a
Quaker, what a new energy and persistency of purpose came of
a conscience reinforced and guided by a supposed inspiration
from above. An hour's meditation, in some favorable mood of
mind or feeling, would lead a Quaker to the persuasion, that a
certain utterance from his lips, or a certain course of conduct,
was as clearly indicated to'him by God, as if a commission had
floated down to him from the visible heavens.
These "revelations " came in a very simple form, as promptings or directions, which the subjects of them seem to have been
persuaded that they could distinguish, by some test of quality
or intensity, from the mere impulses or inclinations which it
would be unwise to yield to.   Thus, two of the victims on
whom fell the last penalty of Massachusetts law, as we shall
soon have to read, gave this account of their reasons for provoking that penalty. William Robinson, being in Rhode Island,
felt that " the Lord had commanded him to go to Boston, and to
lay down his life there."  Marmaduke Stevenson, at Barbadoes,
heard that New England had made a law to put the servants of the
living God to death, if they returned after they were sentenced away.
Immediately came the Word of the Lord unto me, saying,' Thou knowest
iot but that thou mayest go thither.' - So after that, a vessel was made
ready for Rhode Island, which I passed in; and the Word of the Lord
came unto me, saying,' Go to Boston with thy brother William Robinson, " &c.1
It was in vain that ministers and magistrates pressed any
Quaker who returned here, after being banished the second,
third, and fourth time, and complained of persecution, with
the argument, that the Master, in-whose name he professed to
preach, had expressly instructed his disciples, that, "when persecuted in one place, they should flee to another."  The Quaker
had a revelation which nullified that command.
With the purpose and aim of impartiality held in the mind
of one who is historically dealing with this episode, it seems as
if the only way to secure it, is to divide between the parties
either censure or palliation. The facts cannot be written with1 Miscellaneous Papers in the State House.




112       TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
out the use of the stronger and the harsher adjectives on both
sides. There was no down, or rosewater, or language of compliment, in use among them. Stern, sinewy, Saxon speech, and
a calling of things by their right names, and a setting before us
of pitched combatants in the attitude of striking and striking
back, alone befit the facts. We like to feel that the fight was
fair on both sides.  One party represented a renovated Israel
on the ocean border of a wilderness, seeking, with wrong or
malice for none outside of them, to obey the call of God in
planting a religious Commonwealth. They required peace and
harmony. The other party had new light; and they felt upon
them the obligation of making the darkness comprehend it The
Quakers had hold in common of an advanced truth, quick with
the energy of the Spirit.  There was accord enough among
them to assure them that their oracles were not private delusions.,
Their oracles were, indeed, better than the utterance of them.
There was much that was irritating and aggravating in the
sharpest degree, - and intended to be such - in the language and
conduct of the Quakers.  Their persistency, their seeming wilfulness, and aimless spirit of annoyance, indicated a set purpose
of defying all remonstrance, and of inviting a violent handling.
I do not know that an essay has ever been written upon the
satisfactions of being persecuted, as the word is, especially when
that persecution is incurred by persecuting other people.1 But
there is matter for such an essay, and for its copious and rich
illustration. The men and women who regarded themselves as
led by the Spirit to give " testimony," which, as things then were,
would subvert all civil and religious order in this colony, and
overwhelm it with confusion and anarchy, -while travelling
through the wilderness, or coursing inland waters, or pinched in
the stocks, or screaming out through barred windows,- doubtless
took an appreciable comfort in their own " sufferings."  They
felt that they entered thereby into the fellowship of prophets and
martyrs. An hour of brooding and elated thought lifted them
1 Worcester defines persecute thus: " To pursue with malignity or enmity; to
harass with penalties; to afflict; to distress.; to oppress;-generally on account of
opinions." Webster's definition is, "To pursue in a manner to injure, vex, or
afflict; to cause to suffer pain from hatred or malignity; to harass; to beset in an
annoying way." The reader may make his own selection and application.




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.         113
to heights of intense enthusiasm. A spell wrought upon their
spirits; and they yielded themselves, as they thought, to a guidance from above. Their full sincerity was proved by their
shrinking from no burden, mortification, sacrifice, or pain, which
lay in their way of obligation. Modest and pure women, under
this spell, would rush into the public highways, or into a crowded
place of worship, and, independent of all the art or materials of
dressmakers, would make a distressing spectacle of themselves.
One such, coming into a meeting-house in this condition, had
smeared herself with black paint, -as a sign, she said, of the
black-pox, which she prophesied God would send on this cruel
jurisdiction.
I have before me a copy, which I made from a miscellaneous
mass of manuscripts in our archives in the State House, of
official papers connected with the legislation and the proceedings
against the Quakers. Among these are many original letters,
on scraps of paper, written, in the jail, by imprisoned Quakers
to their friends or to the magistrates. Most of these, even those
whose grammar, diction, and chirography indicate the least of
culture, express, often with great sweetness and gentleness of
spirit, a heroism of heart and a self-centred calm of conviction
fully befitting witnesses for the truth of God. In general, these
papers fail of bearing out the charge of our own authorities, that
the Quakers were beyond measure abusive in their speech. And
it is probable that the sternness of face which was set against
them, the rough handling which they received, and the offensive
epithets applied to them, occasionally irritated them into coarseness and violence of language not habitual with them.
Some livelier specimens of their rhetoric than any which I
have found in our own records, passed under my eyes among
the rich stores of the British Museum.
Among these is a tract 1 bearing this title:"N. England's Ensigne, It being the Account of Cruelty, the Professors' Pride, and the Articles of their Faith; signified in characters
written in blood, wickedly begun, barbarously continued and inhumanly
finished (so far as they have gone) by the present power of darkness
possest in the Priests and Rulers in N. England, with the Dutch also
1 Numbered in Catalogue, 493. h
6
8




114       TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS.
inhabiting the same land. In a bloody and cruel birth which the Husband to the Whore of Babylon hath brought forth by ravishing and
torturing the seed of the Virgin of Israel," &c. "Written at sea, by us
whom the wicked in scorn call Quakers."
Of this, Humphrey Norton was the writer.        The Massachusetts people are described as " Cruel English Jewes." New
England is "the most vainest and beastliest place of all Bruits
[brutes], the most publicly prophane, and the most covertly
corrupt."  One of his company, he says, went to the meetinghouse in Martha's Vineyard; "and after the Priest Thomas
Maho [Mayhew] had done his speech, unspake a few words."
Being thrust out for this, he repeated his visit in the afternoon.
Here is a graphic piece of etching:"A man that hath a covetous and deceitful rotten heart; lying lips
which abound among them, and a smooth, fawning, flattering tongue, and
short hair, and a deadly enmity against those that are called Quakers and
others that oppose their wayes, such a hypocrite is a fit man to be a
member of any N. England church.
" J. Rous and H. Norton were moved to go to the great meeting house
at Boston upon one of their Lector days, where we found John Norton
their teacher set up, who like a babling Pharisee run over a vain
repetition near an hour long (like an impudent smooth fac'd harlot, who
was telling her Paramoors a long fair story of her husband's kindness,
while nothing but wantonness and wickedness is in her heart.) When
his glass was out he begun his sermon, wherein, amongst many lifeless
expressions, he spake much of the danger of these who are called Quakers.
Some of his hearers gaped on him as if they expected honey should have
dropped from his lips.  And amongst other of his vain conceits he
uttered this, (whereby he plainly discovered the blindness and rottenness
of his heart,) that the Justice of God is the Armor of the Devil: the
which, if true, then is the Devil sometimes covered with Justice: which
is more than ever I heard any of his servants say on his behalf before,"
&c.
"13Q' of 2d Month, 1658 Sarah Gibbins and Dorothy Waugh
spoke at Lector. Death fed Death through the painted sepulchre
John Norton."   And, " as a sign of his emptiness," the women
broke two empty bottles over him.
The same lively journal contains an impudent letter to
Governor " Indicot.": If there was an epithet beyond all others




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.        115
offensive to a New-England minister, it was that of " Priest"
which the Quakers so freely used. " Baal's priests," " the seed
of the Serpent," " the brood of Ishmael," were other titles. We
can hardly conceive of the indignation caused by these wanton
disturbances of the exercises of the " Thursday Lecture."
It is possible, that, when a Puritan congregation was startled
and shocked by such an apparition among them as that of an
unclothed woman, or by a less indecent method of Quaker
testifying, the minister may at the moment have been reading
from the Bible, how one of the old prophets had, without his
garments, delivered himself in a similar prophetical way of his
burden. Our Fathers listened to the holy record of such doings
with the profoundest reverence; but the living imitation infuriated them. They could not, or they would not, on the bare
word of the Quakers themselves, believe that they were inspired
directly from the Holy God. They had another way of accounting for the phenomena. Yet who can doubt but that some
high-wrought fervors, or some sweet inward satisfactions, compensated the reproachings, buffetings, and whippings which
the victims drew upon themselves. Indeed, they often contrived
to make rather a good thing of it. They rallied and comforted
and reinforced each other. They would not work in the prisons,
nor pay jail fees. They excited the sympathy of some of the
tender and less rigid members of the colony, who would introdulce food into the windows of the prison, and who very soon
began to protest against the cruelty used towards them, and to
listen favorably to their utterances.  This sympathy for the
Quakers, so likely to be, and so soon actually, followed by discipleship among our own people, was what the magistrates
greatly dreaded. Many of their harsher measures they regarded
as simply cautions and safeguards against the spread of Quaker
notions with the weaker and more sympathetic among themselves. If a Quaker in prison could get pen, paper, and inkhorn,-or, failing the last, blood from a pricked finger would
serve, - he would address a missive to magistrates and ministers,
not always conciliatory. There are many of these preserved in
our State House. As the parties to this terrible struggle came
better to understand each other, the terms of either party were
as follows -




116        TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
The magistrates, regarding the opinions and conduct of the
Quakers as seditious. and blasphemous, resolved, in the exercise
of their charter-rights, to keep them out, or to drive them out,
of their jurisdiction; steadily increasing the penalties against
such as, having been again and again banished, returned.
The Quakers, on their part, - assured that persecution among
Christians was wicked, that the Puritan church-way was
oppressive and wrong, and that its intolerance could be worn
down and worn out only by the most resolute defiance and
endurance of penalties, - professed their purpose, in the name
and under the power of God, to persecute the persecutors till they
ceased to persecute. It was a struggle between two indomitable
wills; the one fortified by a parchment charter and a church
covenant, the other borne up by an intense conviction of direct
spiritual guidance. Our sympathies must go — for go they
will- with those who thus held to a still inspiring and revealing
God, beyond the contents of a Book taken by its letter.
There is something more yet to be said, in order that we may
set the constituted authorities of Massachusetts in the light in
which they themselves stood and acted.    Their horror of fanaticism  in religion had been learned and intensified from      the
terrible extravagancies and the bloody tragedies connected with
the wild doings of the Anabaptists of Munster under King John,
the tailor of Leyden,, in the century preceding.    Visions of a
repetition of these frenzies came up before the horrified minds
of our magistrates and ministers; and they felt the responsibility of averting what they so often in their records call up in
reference to these mad Anabaptists. Again, mutilation of the
body had been made familiar to them in England, as a penalty
for malignity, sedition, and heresy. They may have seen Leighton, Burton, Prynne, and Bastwick,1 as thus mutilated by the
1 Dr. Leighton, for his book against Prelacy, had been sentenced " to suffer the
loss of both ears, to have his nostrils slit, his forehead branded, to be publicly
whipped, fined ten thousand pounds, and perpetually imprisoned." The sentence
was executed to the letter, save that he was set at liberty by the Long Parliament,
after twelve years' confinement, when he could neither see, hear, nor walk.
Henry Burton, Dr. Bastwick, and William Prynne were mutilated in a similar
manner. The last of these having been sentenced a second time to a part of the
punishment, the stumps of his ears were sawed out. These acts were done under
Episcopal and Royal sanction. It is melancholy to think that they should have to




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.           117
highest English law. And, once more, our Fathers regarded
Quakers as representing for them, of danger and evil, exactly
what plotting Jesuits represented to the realm of England. The
penalty of death, on Quakers coming here a fourth time after
banishment, was copied by them from the English statute
against Jesuits. The mutilation law was never but partially
enforced here.
The miscellaneous manuscripts of scraps of paper, to which
I have referred as now among the old files in the State House,
enable us to trace the course of proceedings in this harassing
experience, and contain much curious matter. By an order of
Court, June 10, 1658, the Rev. John Norton was appointed to
write and publish a treatise against the Quakers. This he did,
under the title of " The Heart of New England rent by the
Blasphemies of the present Generation," &c.; and he received a
grant of land for his remuneration. The Court had been moved
to ask this service of him; and to other measures, by the zeal of
the sterner portion of their constituents. In October, 1658, a
petition was addressed to the Court from leading citizens of
Boston, in which they asked for severer laws against the Quakers.
The dangers and ruin threatening from their behavior and testi-monies, and the darkly drawn apprehensions of the same horrors
as followed from Anabaptism at Munster, are alleged as justifying a law inflicting death upon such as should return from
banishment. Singularly enough, the names of several of the
signers of this petition indicate them as some of those who had
been censured and disarmed, for having signed the petition in
behalf of Mr. Wheelwright.   Some persons here had evidently
changed sides, from that of sufferers to that of advocates of the
sternest discipline.
As I have said, there was a steadily progressive legislation of
enactments and penalties undertaken by Massachusetts, designed
to meet and punish the successive acts of boldness and cona degree been imitated by the Puritan against the Quaker. It is remarkable, however, that, even after his second barbarous punishment, Mr. Prynne should have
written a book to prove "that Christian Kings and magistrates have authority,
under the Gospel, to punish idolatry, apostasy, heresy, blasphemy, and obstinate
sclism, with pecuniary, corporal, and, in some cases, with capital punishments."
(Wood's Athen Ox., ii. pp. 811-827.)
1 Vol. of Miscel. Papers in the State House, p. 246, &c.




118         TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
tumacy, on the part of the Quakers, - prison, fines, whippings,
mutilation of ears and tongue, branding, and the gallows. Sad,
sad indeed, was the climax to which our Fathers were led on,
from an error at the start.    They sought, with only partial success, to induce the other New-England colonies to keep pace
with them in legislation against the Quakers.      Rhode Island, as
furnishing a harborage for all sorts of consciences, made our
Fathers uncomfortable, because from it the Quakers had such a
ready access to our jurisdiction. Would that Massachusetts, in
her own course with them, had anticipated the method suggested
in the sly wisdom of the reply which she received from Benedict
Arnold, the President of Rhode Island, in answer to a request
that that colony would imitate the legislation of the Bay
colony against the Quakers.     Arnold, speaking for his associates,
says:"' We find that in those places where this people aforesaid, in this
Colony, are most of all suffered to declare themselves freely, and are
only opposed by arguments in discourse, there they least of all desire to
come. And we are informed that they begin to loathe this place, for
that they are not opposed by the civil authority; but with all patience
and meekness are suffered to say over their pretended revelations and
admonitions. Nor are they like or able to gain many here to their way.
Surely, we find that they like to be persecuted by civil powers; and,
when they are so, they are like to gain more adherents by the conceit of
their patient sufferings, than by consent to their pernicious sayings."
(R. I. Records, i. 377.)1
But even the all-including tolerance of Roger Williams suf1 Our historian, Hutchinson, tries to divide equally his censure upon our magistrates and the Quakers, when he speaks (Hist. i. 380) of "the strange delusion the
Quakers were under, in courting persecution; and the imprudence of the authorities
in gratifying this humour, as far as their utmost wishes could carry them."
The famous Richard Baxter, of Kidderminster, who had been greatly exercised
and annoyed by the personal abuse visited on him by Quakers, came at last to
learn the same wise way of humoring them. He writes in his Life: -
"The Quakers would fain have got entertainment, and set up a meeting in the
town, and frequently railed at me in the congregation; but when I had once given
them leave to meet in the church for a dispute, and, before the people, had opened
their deceits and shame, none would entertain them more, nor did they get one
proselyte among us."
One of his most pertinent questions to them concerning their doctrine of the
"inner light," which they said all men had, was this: " If all have it, why may not
I have it "




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.                  119
fered a strain too much from     the  Quakers.     Rowing in a skiff
over the Narragansett Bay, quickened by his ever-ardent love of
disputation, to match himself against some of them, the keenspirited old man had a sore trial of his patience. He afterwards wrote of Quakers, -
"They are insufferably proud and contemptuous. I have, therefore, publicly declared myself, that a due and moderate restraint and punishment of
these incivilities, though pretending conscience, is so far from persecution
properly so called, that it is a duty and command of God unto all mankinde, first in Families, and thence into all mankinde Societies." 1
The summing up of the severities in our own colony is as
follows: twenty-two Quakers were banished on pain of death;
four were hung, one a woman; three lost the right ear; one was
branded in the hand with the letter H; between thirty and forty
were whipped.
The death penalty was legalized by only a majority of two in
the General Court; and was so strongly resisted, as soon to be
left in abeyance.
The Court, from     time to time, urged to the most stringent
measures by some of the more austere spirits, and discouraged
1 "George Fox digged out of his Burrowes," &c., p. 200. This curious book, of
which, though it was published in Boston, in 1676, there are only four copies known
to be extant, -one being in the Boston Atheneum, — is promised in a reprint by
the Narragansett Club. It is to be hoped, that a few of those who had known of
Roger Williams's youthful experiences in Massachusetts survived to enjoy its perusal. The old fire of disputation had not gone out in its writer. Its severity of
bitterness and invective, its unsparing contemptuousness, streaked with real goodnature and the old "conscientious contentiousness," -make it one of the curiosities
of literature. Williams had evidently been'beyond measure provoked and horrified
by the Quakers. He had tried his skill upon them in a meeting at Newport, in 1671;
but he says, that, while he was speaking, one cut him off by " falling to prayer,"
and then another by singing. George Fox being then in the country, Williams
challenged him and his followers to a public discussion on fourteen propositions, the
thirteenth of which is that, " Their many Books and writings are extreamly poor,
lame, naked, and swelled up with high titles and words of boasting vapour."
Williams, says Fox, was afraid to meet him. " This old Fox thought it best to run
for it; and leave the work to his journeymen and chaplains." The disputation was
held at Newport, and rare sport it must have afforded to uncircumcised listeners.
" God graciously assisted me in rowing all day with my old bones, so that I got to
Newport towards the midnight of the day before the meeting" (p. 24.) It was in
August, 1672.
There is a double joke in the title of the book, as it includes a sly hit at Burroughs,
one of Fox's chosen companions.




120        TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
by a steadily increasing number of opponents, moved either by
pity or by a sense of the utter futility of the legislation, were
evidently, as shown by scraps of paper still extant, most sorely
perplexed. Under a sense of their responsibility, and moved by
their convictions, that Quakers were to the colony they were
guarding from ruin and anarchy, precisely what Jesuits were to
the realm of England, they felt justified in enacting and inflicting
the death penalty against the most obstinate and insidious
offenders. They issued several formal vindications and arguments in support of their successive measures. The pleas which
they set up were all minutely and elaborately illustrated by
Scripture texts and examples, like that of Solomon's putting to
death of Shimei.1
The stern issue was to be fully tried.   Four Quakers were
banished, Sept. 12, 1659, on pain of death if they returned.
Two of these, Mary Dyer being one, " found freedom to depart."
But she returned again in a month, with the other two, who
were attended by a woman from Salem, bringing with her some
linen, which she showed to the Governor, as intended for the
winding-sheets of the victims.
The rest is best narrated by the Court Record:"SECOND SESSION, GENERAL COURT, OCTOBER 18, 1659.
"It is ordered that William Robbinson, Marmaduke Stephenson, and
Mary Dyer, Quakers, now in prison for theire rebellion, sedition, and presumptions obtruding themselves upon us, notwithstanding their being sentenced to banishment on paine of death, as underminers of this government, &c., shall be brought before this Court for theire trialls, to suffer
the poenalty of the lawe (the just reward of their transgression) on the
morrow morning, being the nineteenth of this instant."
Being " brought to the barre, they acknowledged themselves to be the
persons banished. After a full hearing of what the prisoners could say
for themselves, it was put to the question, whether the prisoners, who
have been convicted for Quakers, and banished this jurisdiction on paine
of death, should be putt to death according as the lawe provides in that
case. The Court resolved this question on the affirmative; and the
Governor, (Endecott) in open Court, declared the sentence to W. Robbinson, that was brought to the barr: W. R. yow shall goe from hence to
the place from whence yow came, and from thence to the place of exe1 Kings, chap. ii.




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.              121
cution, and there hang till yow be dead. The like sentence the Gov'., in
open Court, pronounced against Marmaduke Steephenson and Mary Dyer,
being brought to the barre one after another, in the same words:' Whereas"- the above named-" are sentenced by this Court to death
for theire rebellion, &c., it is ordered that the Secretary issue out his warrant to Edward Michelson, marshall generall, for repairing to the prison
on the 27th of this instant October, and take the said persons into his custody, and then forthwith, by the aid of Capt. James Oliver, with one hundred souldiers, taken out by his order proportionably out of each company
in Boston, compleatly armed with pike and musketteers, with powder and
bullett, to lead them to the place of execution, and there see them hang
till they be dead, and in theire going, being there, and retourne, to see all
things be carried peaceably and orderly. Warrants issued.
"It is ordered that the Reverend Mr. Zackery Simes and Mr. John
Norton, repaire to the prison, and tender theire endeavors to make the
prisoners sencible of theire approaching dainger by the sentence of this
Court, and prepare them for theire approaching ends.
"Whereas Mary Dyer is condemned by the Generall Court to be executed for hir offences, on the petition of William Dier, hir sonne, it is
ordered that the said Mary Dyer shall have liberty for forty eight howers
after this day to depart out of this jurisdiction, after which time, being
fcund therein, she is forthwith to be executed, and in the meane time that
she be kept close prisoner till hir sonne or some other be ready to carry
hir away within the aforesaid time; and it is further ordered, that she,shall be carried to the place of execution, and there to stand upon the
gallowes, with a rope about her necke, till the rest be executed.
"Itt is ordered, that thirty-six of the souldiers be ordered by Capt.
Oliver to remain in and about the towne as centinells, to preserve the peace
of the place, whiles the rest goe to the execution.
"It is ordered that the selectmen of Boston shall, and heereby are required and impowred to presse tenn or twelve able and faithfull persons
every night during the sitting of this Court to watch with great care the
toune, especially the prison," &c. 1
This last order is an evidence, among others which the Records
show, that the magistrates, charged as they felt with the gravest
responsibility in vindicating the authority of the law against all
trifling and defiance, were still well aware that a protesting and
indignant spirit, widely working among the citizens, was ready
to manifest itself in a threatening way.
On the 27th of October, 1659, a gallows stood on Boston
1 Vol. iv. pt. 1, pp. 383-4.




122      TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
Common, for the execution of three condemned Quakers, who,
after repeated banishments, refused to accept their lives on the
condition that they would go away and keep away, - W. Robinson, Marmaduke Stevenson, and Mary Dyer. The train-band
accompanied them, and drums were beat to drown their testimony. The town, also, was put under guard, by thirty-six soldiers, against apprehended tumult. The two men were hung,
and buried beneath the gallows. Mary Dyer, who for more than
twenty years had been a trouble to Massachusetts, after having
the noose put round her neck, was pardoned, and sent back to
Rhode Island, though with difficulty prevailed on by her son to
go. She must have been past middle age, if not in the decline
of life. In the Antinomian troubles, she had been prominent as
a fast friend of Mrs. Hutchinson, and had suffered from the poor
superstition of the times, because of an unhappy incident in her
maternity. She walked to the gallows between her two condemned companions, holding each of them by a hand. The
marshal asked her, "If she was not ashamed to walk, hand in
hand, between two young men?"  She replied, "It is an hour
of the greatest joy I can enjoy in this world. No eye can see,
no ear can hear, no tongue can speak, no heart can understand,
the sweet incomes and refreshings of the Spirit of the Lord which,
now I enjoy."
When she understood, on being returned to the prison, upon
what account she was reprieved, she wrote to the authorities repudiating the ground of it, and tendered the sacrifice of her life
against the law. It was only by compulsion that she was got
out of the jurisdiction on horseback. She came back again the
next spring. On the gallows the second time, June 1, 1660, she
was offered her life, if she would promise to keep out of Massachusetts. Her reply was: " In obedience to the will of the Lord
I came; and in his will I abide faithful to the death." She
did so.
I have before me, as I write, the autograph, on sadly stained
paper, of a poor and sorrowful letter, dated at Portsmouth, R.I.,
May 3, 1660, and addressed to Governor Endicott, by his " most
humble suppliant, W. Dyer."  The letter draws tears now, if it
did not from the eyes that first read it. The husband pleads to
save his wife from death on the gallows:



BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.              123
"HONORED SIR, - It is no little grief of mind and sadness of hart, that
I am necessitated to be so bould as to supplicate your honored self, with the
Hon.' Assembly of your Generall Court, to extend your mercy and favor
once agen to me and my children. Little did I dream that I should ever
have had occasion to petition you in a matter of this nature, but so it is
that throw the divine providence and your benignity, my sonn obtained so
much pity and mercy att your hands, as to enjoy the life of his mother.
" Now my supplication to your Honors is to begg affectionately the life
of my deare wife. Tis true I have not seene her above this halfe yeare,
and therefore cannot tell how in the frame of her spirit she was moved
thus again to run so great a hazard to herself and perplexity to me and
mine, and all her friends and well-wishers: so it is, from Shelter Island
about by Pequid, Narragansett and to the town of Providence, she secretly
and speedily journied, and as secretly from thence came to your jurisdiction. Unhappy journey may I say, and woe to that generation saye I
that gives occasion thus of grief and trouble to those that desires to be
quiet, by helping one another (as I may say) to hazard their lives for I
know not what end, or to what purpose. If her zeale be so greate as thus
to adventure, oh, let your favour and pitye surmounte itt, and save her
life. Let not your forewonted compassion be conquered by her inconsiderate madness, and how greately will your renowne be spread, if by so
c onquering you become victorious. What shall I say more? I know you
are all sensible of my condition, and let the reflect be, and you will see
what the petition is and what will give me and mine peace. Oh let mercies wings once more soar above justice ballance, and then whilst I live
shall I exalt your goodness. But otherwise twill be a languishing sorrowe, yea, soe great that I should gladly suffer the blow att once muche
rather. I shall forbear to trouble your Honors with words, neither am I
in a capacitye to expatiate myselfe at present. I only say this, yourselves
have been and are, or may be, husbands to wife or wives, and so am I,
yea, to one most dearlye beloved. Oh, do not you deprive me of her, but
I pray give her me out again, and I shall bee soe much obliged forever,
that I shall endeavor continually to utter my thanks, and render your
Love and Honor most renowned. Pitye me. I beg it with tears."
Those tears are in the paper still. If he could have answered
for his wife, she would have lived.  She answered for herself.
The next year, one more banished Quaker, William Leddra,
who had been a weary nuisance in many places, refused to accept his life, and was executed on the Common, March, 1661.
Another condemned and sentenced man was in the prison,
but he wrote to the magistrates,



124       TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS
"I, the condemned man, do give forth under my hand, that if I may
have my liberty, I have freedom to depart this jurisdiction, and I know
not that ever I shall come into it any more. W. CHRISTOPHERSON." 1
The Quaker will had overcome the Puritan will. The magistrates relaxed. The people withstood the death penalty. It has
been often affirmed, and has been generally supposed, that the
authorities were arrested in their course by a mandate procured
by a Quaker, who had been whipped in Salem, fiom Charles II.,
which forbade any further capital proceedings against Quakers,
and required that the condemned be sent to England. Such a
royal letter was written by the King, Sept. 9, 1661, and received
by our Court in November. But before it was even procured
from the monarch, the Court had evidently been convinced of the
utter folly of its measures. It had wavered in suspense, vacillated, and failed to enforce its capital law against victims in its
power, while it shrunk from using its appliances to secure others
whom it might easily have reached.
It may be that the king's command was a welcome salvo to
the chagrin or mortification of the authorities. Certain it is, that;
the Quakers revelled over the discomfiture of the magistrates,
and played some of their most offensive antics of railing and defiance. But they were by no means left to their liberty. The
whip and the cart-tail, the prison and the pillory, were still kept
in service against them, even by allowance of the King, and the
course pursued in England. The General, the Quarterly, and
the Magistrates' and Local Courts found subjects in them for
penalties, more or less severe, till perfect tolerance was found to
be the lesson of wisdom, and the condition of peace.
The Puritan Commonwealth, after a resolute struggle against
the successive shocks, personal and practical, which its essential
elements invited, as well as were sure to encounter, yielded even
then only gradually, though I can hardly add gracefully, to a
steady modification of its original theory. Yet there was more
of success than of failure in the experiment. All of profound
sincerity, and of God-fearing self-consecration, and of stern resolve, which put that august experiment on trial, planted for it
foundations, giving to it its early security, and constituting the
1 Miscel. Papers.




BY THE FOUNDERS OF MASSACHUSETTS.       125
stability and glory of the Commonwealth which succeeded
to it.
Sometimes, as I walk in our city streets, or ride through our
clustering towns and villages, I imagine myself as having by my
side one of the old first comers to this wilderness; some grave
man, in church or magistracy, who, after his coming, may have
lived and wrought here more than half a century, in laying the
hard and deep foundations of things. I raise him up —in a
shadow - for my companionship. He goes along with me, looks
round him, puts questions, and turns to me to relieve his surprise, to refix landmarks, to relate and account for the changes
and developments of things on our way. He is stern and sharp:
but I am. not afraid of him; for I know that what I have of
him is only dust, and that something more substantial represents
him elsewhere. Shadow as he is, we can hardly keep our footing in the crowded streets. He is inclined, at a glance, favorably
to regard our humanity in providing bird-roosts in the wires
which run over our roofs in the air, unless he surmise them to be
snares for catching birds. But these rows of shops and stores,
with all their gilded gew-gaws and displays of trifles and luxuries, are about to prompt his utterance, just as he is choked by a
whiff from some " tobacco-taker" passing by. The theatres, and
-palaces of vice for gambling or intemperance, make him sad and
sour. But the great school-houses offer a temporary relief. He
wishes to rest awhile in the burial-grounds, and study their
stones, -asking where is his own. The hardest part of the
explanatory work which falls to me, is as we pass many churches,
— Jewish Synagogues, the Roman College and Cathedral, at
the sight and name of which those shadowy lips seem to utter
something that sounds like a very bad word. The lists of voters,
with the un-English names upon them, and the prevalence of
Hibernian patronymics, are evidently too much for him. The
explanation of the national flag plainly engages his sympathies.
He remembers that he and his old contemporaries were rather
tame in their loyalty, and that he died thinking, - perhaps hoping, -that things would one day come about so, that we should
have a flag of our own. On the whole, though the facts which
he would have to hear and face, and to take for just what they
are and mean, would fearfully exercise him, and lead him to ask




126      TREATMENT OF INTRUDERS AND DISSENTIENTS.
how all this freedom and license had worked in among us, and
whether Church and State had not been wrecked over and over
again in the process; on the whole, I think, he would rather remain alive with us, and take his chance, and take things as they
are, than go back into the ground again. One thing, I know,
would reconcile him to taking things as they are; viz., the
clear conviction, that if he and all his generation could come
again into their old places, they could not introduce a force
which would turn back the current. They would have to take
things as they are, and submit to the dispensation of human
freedom, as safer than Puritan sway.
Freedom,-sad and fearful and wicked things are done in
that name, by that plea, for that good; but we must accept it,
with all its risks, which sometimes frighten or dismay us. Any
thing but the most perfect and unfettered freedom of thinking,
speaking, and acting among us, would peril the experiment we
are trying here, grander than that of our Fathers,- of making
one nation out of fragments of all the populations of the globe.
There is no form of force, no method of restraint, no devices of
imperial, ecclesiastical, military, or even constitutional sway,
which could possibly control the processes of risk involved in the
contact and citizenship of all the races, colors, temperaments, and.
classes, which we hold in solution here. No: the wit of man,:
piety, wisdom, statesmanship, would in vain attempt, by any
repressive or coercive measures, any interference, however gentle
or however stern, to introduce any agency of external authority
in the mighty process which is working here. Nothing but perfect freedom, absolute soul-liberty for the individual, can make
the process safe on the trial. We can dam rivers. We can
imprison thousands of pounds of steam. We can use a flash
oft lightning for a common carrier. But we cannot overmaster
the workings of human nature.




HISTORY OF GRANTS
UNDER
THE GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.
BY SAMUEL F. HAVEN.








HISTORY OF GRANTS
UNDER
THE GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.
HE subject assigned to me for a lecture to-night is, " History
- of Grants under the Great Council for New England."
However important this may be in a historical point of view,
so far as pleasurable interest is concerned it certainly has a rather
dry and unpromising aspect.
Moreover, it was said of this Great Council for New England,
by the learned Dr. Belknap, after he had tried in vain to harmonize their proceedings, that" Either from the jarring interests of the members, or their indistinct
knowledge of the country, or their inattention to business, or some other
cause which does not fully appear, their affairs were transacted in a confused manner from the beginning; and the grants which they made were
so inaccurately described, and interfered so much with each other, as to
occasion difficulties and controversies, some of which are not yet ended."
So, too, Governor Sullivan in his work on " Land Titles in
Massachusetts " declares that the legislative acts of the Council
for New England and their judicial determinations " were but a
chain of blunders; " and " their grants, from the want of an accurate knowledge of the geography of the territory, were but a
course of confusion."
Possibly, it was with the hope of obtaining additional light
upon these obscurities and perplexities, to the extent of reconciling apparent discrepancies, that the subject was selected for
treatment in this series of historical lectures. But intricacies
which learned historians and acute lawyers have failed to elucidate, it may be presumed are not susceptible of a distinct and
9




130            HISTORY OF GRANTS UNDER THE
definite solution, such as Courts require for the establishment of
a title to property; and we may be compelled to find in a narrative of the circumstances under which they had their origin
their only reasonable explanation.
You will therefore be spared a technical dissertation upon
charters, patents, grants, and other methods of conveying territorial rights, and be asked to listen to a relation of the rise, the
character, the operations, and the end of the great corporation in England created by James I. on the 3d of November,
1620, consisting of forty noblemen, knights, and gentlemen, and
called " The Council established at Plymouth, in the County of
Devon, for the Planting, Ruling, and Governing of New England
in America."
It will be necessary to go back a little; not indeed to the days
of Adam and Eve, as did our distinguished New England chronologer, Dr. Prince, who devoted so much time and space to the
preliminary annals of the world, that he died before completing
those of this limited portion of the globe, which were the real
object of his work, - but to the beginning of England's conventional title to American possessions. It was a conventional title,
inasmuch as it rested upon an understanding among the so-called
Christian powers, that the rights of nations and peoples, who were
not at least nominally Christian, should be entirely disregarded.'
The sovereigns of Europe carried out in practice the principle
which the Puritans of Cromwell's parliament were said to have
asserted in theory, and apparently regarded the scripture promise
that the saints shall inherit the earth as a mere statement of their
own just prerogative. Among Catholics, the Pope, as an inspired
administrator, distributed newly discovered regions according to
his inclination and infallible discretion. His assignments of continents and seas by the boundaries of latitude and longitude
were valid in Spain and Portugal and France; but in England
the King, when he had become also the head of a church, claimed
authority to empower his subjects to discover " remote, heathen,
and barbarous lands, not actually possessed of any Christian
prince or people, and the same to hold, occupy, and enjoy, with
all commodities, jurisdictions, and royalties, both by sea and
land;" of course, in subordination to his own paramount authority, but with no reference to the supremacy of the Roman pontiff.




GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.         131
John and Sebastian Cabot were commissioned, in like phraseology, by Henry VII., " to seek out countries or provinces of
the heathen and infidels, wherever situated, hitherto unknown
to all Christians, and to subdue and possess them as his subjects." If their discoveries had been followed at once by possession, the papal sanction might have been deemed essential to
a sound title; but England had long been a Protestant country
before steps were taken to maintain her claims to a portion of
the New World. Remote events, like distant objects, are apt to
seem crowded together, for want of a perspective to make the
intervals which separate them evident to our perceptions. Thus
we often fail to realize the duration of uneventful periods of
history which come between the strifes and commotions, or
other great occurrences which chiefly occupy the attention of
both the historian and his reader. From A.D. 1495, the date
of the commission to the Cabots, to A.D. 1578, the date of the
letters patent to Sir Humphrey Gilbert, under which possession
was first taken for the English crown, the lapse of time exceeds
that of two generations of men, as these are usually estimated.
Meanwhile, circumstances were silently and indirectly, as well
as slowly, preparing for the settlement of this portion of the
American continent. Unrecorded voyages were annually made
to our coasts for fish by the Spaniards, Portuguese, and French;
the fasts of the church causing a large demand for that article
of food in Catholic countries. The people bordering on the Bay
of Biscay were hereditary fishermen. Their ancestors had captured whales in their own tempestuous sea; and Biscayans, or
Bacsques, as they were more frequently termed, were in great request as experts for the fisheries at Newfoundland, and along the
shores of New England. They professed to believe that their
countrymen visited the same fishing-grounds before Columbus
crossed the ocean. The business was so lucrative that the reports first brought home by the Cabots of the great abundance
of codfish in those regions produced an excitement among the
people engaged in that trade, not unlike that which rumors of
gold in California and Australia have created in more recent
times.
No account has been preserved of the commencement of fishing
voyages to the American seas; but they can be traced back to




132            HISTORY OF GRANTS UNDER THE
within half a dozen years of the return of the Cabots; and
twelve or fifteen years later as many as fifty vessels of different
nations were employed on the Grand Banks.
Of such voyages no journal was kept and no history was written; because it was the policy of the adventurers to keep these
prolific sources of wealth, as much as possible, from attracting
the attention of competitors.
The presence of European vessels on our shores, in considerable numbers, a century before the arrival of the Pilgrims, may
account for traditions among the natives, and the occasional discoverv of articles of European manufacture in their graves, that
have been supposed to point to the visits of the Northmen at
far more distant periods.1
A process of preparation not less marked and effective was at
the same time going on in England itself. Until the reign of
Henry VII., that kingdom had been behind all other European
States in mercantile enterprise. Italy, Spain, Portugal, Holland,
and even Germany, were before her in commerce or manufactures. The fluctuations of trade, in the removal of its seats from
one place or country to another, are among the marvels and curiosities of history. The chief wonders of the world -the costly
and gigantic remains of decayed cities, where now all is silence
and desolation —are the fruits of accumulated capital in what
were once the forwarding and distributing stations of trade.
Thebes, Babylon, Nineveh, Palmyra, Tyre, and Carthage were
great and magnificent, because, as the prophet Nahum saith of
Nineveh, "They multiplied their merchants above the stars of
heaven."
Wherever traffic has found a seat and centre, art, architecture,
enterprise, and political power have been its inevitable fruits. The
growth and decay of these local influences, and their distribution
in turn among the kingdoms of the earth, though springing from
natural causes, belong no less to the mysterious operations of
Providence. It was the commercial decline of Italy (the industrial Italy of the Middle Ages), whose prodigal remains of
aesthetic splendor are the memorials of her merchant princes, that
1 When Captain John Smith visited the Susquehanna Indians, in 1608, they had
utensils of iron and brass, which, by their own account, originally came from the
French of Canada.




GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.          133
carried Venetian navigators to England, among them the family
of Cabots, seeking employment for the exercise of their native
arts.' At the same time, the incessant wars upon the continent
were driving tradesmen and manufacturers from the free cities
of central Europe, which they had built up and enriched; many
of whom took refuge in the British Isles, which thus easily
acquired the advantages of skill and experience in the production
and sale of important fabrics. England's opportunity had come.
Though not lying in the course of the world's great thoroughfares, yet, by insular position, favorably formed for maritime
pursuits, her chances of wealth and power from the magic
agencies of commerce had at length arrived.   Through the
reigns of Henry VII., Henry VIII., Edward VI., and the bloody
Mary, to their full fruition in the Augustan era of Queen Elizabeth, these causes were not only increasing the riches, but
developing wonderfully the mental and physical character and
capacities of the British people. More independent, politically
and socially, than their neighbors in Holland, they shared with
them the accumulation of the precious metals which flowed
from American mines, through Spain and Portugal, to the chief
marts of trade, and experienced the stimulating effects of capital
in all departments of life and action. Enterprise, extravagance,
ambition, emulation, greed, were the healthy and unhealthy
consequences of a prosperous and excited community.
The tendency to a sort of theatrical exaggeration in sentiment
and manners that followed upon this development of physical
resources and mental energies was perhaps a natural result.
Man has often been declared to be the product of the peculiarities of the period in which he was born.  Well might
Shakespeare say of his own time, " All the world is a stage, and
all the men and women are mere players;" for the whole reign
of Elizabeth was a theatrical pageant, where Leicester and
Essex, Sidney, Southampton, and Raleigh, and not excepting
Bacon, the representative of philosophy, personated the various
characters of an heroic drama; while the many-sided Shake1 The superior naval advancement of Italy at that period is illustrated by the
fact, that the leaders of discovery in the western hemisphere - Columbus in the
service of Spain, Cabot in the service of England, Vespucius in the service of Portugal, and Verazzano in the service of France - were Italians.




134            HISTORY OF GRANTS UNDER THE
speare was himself a dramatic embodiment of the entire intellectual expansion of his age.
There lived then a certain remarkable woman, —remarkable
for having two sons of different fathers, whose heroic temperament and versatile talents must have been derived from their
common mother.    The half-brothers, Humphrey Gilbert and
Walter Raleigh, were more alike in tastes and genius than is
often seen in a nearer relationship. It was the blood of the
Cliampernons, -a name that has a place of its own in our
colonial history,-and not that of the Gilberts or Baleiglis,
which made them what they were.
To these two men, of honorable birth and social standing,
each of whom combined the habits and qualities of a soldier
with those of a studious scholar, and could handle with equal
skill the pen and the sword, we owe it that this New England
where we live, and this entire Union of vigorous States, are not
dependencies of France or Spain, or such as are those feeble
provinces which sprang fromn French or Spanish colonization.
Whatever constructive right or title England had acquired by
the discoveries of the Cabots, a little more delay, and their
assertion would have been no longer practicable, except at the
point of the sword. It was Gilbert and Raleigh who, in the
nick of time, gave this direction to British energies; and apparently nothing but the grand ideas and exhaustless resolution of
these great minds, and their inspiring influence amid disappointment and disaster, saved an indefinite and uncertain claim by
means of a positive and substantial possession.
The rival claims of the leading European powers, at this
juncture, to the soil of our continent north of the Gulf of Mexico,
were not better defined, or more easy of satisfactory adjustment
upon legal and equitable principles, than are those of the
grantees of the Great Council for New England, which are
now the particular subject of consideration. The rules and precedents of national and international law furnish a convenient
phraseology for the discussion of questions relating to territorial
ownership and boundaries, as phrenology provides a convenient
nomenclature for describing the faculties of the mind although
it may not be admitted to determine their actual position and
limits. In larger divisions of land, even where private citizens




GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.         135
alone are concerned, the most tenacious grasp is apt ultimately
to acquire the legal title. Time heals defects, and the pertinacious possessor finds his right to hold and convey secured by
circumstances, and protected by judicial tribunals.
The English jurists of the reign of Elizabeth maintained, that
discovery and possession united could alone give a valid title to
a new country. But how far asunder in point of time might
these acts be, and yet retain their virtue when brought together?
And what if another discovery and a possession came between
them? Will a possession fairly taken, but not continued by
uninterrupted occupancy, avail for a completion of title?
The answers to these questions are not so distinctly given as
to enable us to found upon them, clearly, the right of the British
crown to issue patents and charters, empowering its subjects to
hold and distribute the regions which, under the names of Virginia and New England, embraced a large portion of the North
American continent.
John and Sebastian Cabot discovered, and to some extent
explored, the American coast (A. D. 1497-8) from Labrador to
the Carolinas, more than a year before the continent had been
seen by Columbus or by Americus Vespucius; but the subjects
of other powers had visited these shores familiarly, and some of
them had taken formal possession in the name of their sovereign,
long before Sir Humphrey Gilbert came to Newfoundland in
1583.
On behalf of the King of Portugal, Cortereal ranged the
northern coast only two years later than the Cabots, and gave
the name Labrador to the country still so called.
A map of the Gulf of St. Lawrence and the neighboring
country was made by the French, from their own observations,
as early as 1507.
It is said, that in 1522 there were fifty houses at Newfoundland occupied by people of different nations. There were probably some English among them, although the English fisheries
were then chiefly in the direction of Iceland.
In 1524, an expedition for discovery was sent by Francis I. of
France, under John De Verazzano, a Florentine, who explored
our coast from the Carolinas to Newfoundland, as the Cabots
had done, but with more particularity, and called the country




136            HISTORY OF GRANTS UNDER THE
NEW FRANCE; and in the same year Stephen Gomez, in the
service of Spain, sailed from Florida to Cape Race; his object
being, as was then the case with almost all the navigators that
preceded him here, to find a passage through to the Pacific
Ocean, then called the South Sea.
After this, while the Spaniards were seeking a foothold in
Florida, the French, in a series of expeditions from 1534 to
1542, with Cartier as chief leader, were, on behalf of France,
erecting monuments in token of possession, and planting colonies, in the region of the gulf of St. Lawrence. Having endured
several seasons of trial and suffering, these colonies came to an
end, as settlements; leaving, it is claimed, some of their members
still in the country. With the exception of a disastrous expedition in 1549, when Roberval and a numerous train of
adventurers were supposed to have perished at sea, no farther
measures were taken by the French to re-establish themselves in
the North till near the close of that century.
Thus, while England had neglected to maintain her rights as
a discoverer, Spain, Portugal, and France had explored the
same parts of North America; and France had planted heir
subjects on the soil, without formal remonstrance, so far as is;
known, from any other power. The English fishery at Newfoundland had become important in 1548; but no record has been
preserved of any attempt at colonization.
This negligence, or indifference, was first broken by Sir
Humphrey Gilbert.  He had written a discourse to show the
probability of a passage by the north-west to India, which may
have promoted the voyage of Frobisher to the Arctic Sea in
1576; and, in 1578, he received from Queen Elizabeth authority
to discover and take possession of remote and barbarous lands
unoccupied by any Christian prince or people, as the Cabots had
been empowered to do by Henry VII. It is noticeable, that the
patent to Gilbert contains no allusion to the Cabots, or to any
rights of the crown derived from former discoveries. For aught
that appears in the instrument itself, this was an independent
and original enterprise for discovery and conquest, with a right
on the part of Gilbert to possess and govern the discovered and
conquered lands in subordination to the Queen.  But such was
not the view of the grantee himself. He did not survive to be




GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.            137
his own historian; but we learn from the narrative of Edward
Haies, "a principall actour in the same voyage," —
1st, That the enterprise of Gilbert was based upon the consideration, that "John Cabot, the father, and Sebastian, his son,
an Englishman born, were the first finders out of all that great
tract of land stretching from the Cape of Florida unto those
Islands which we now call the Newfoundland; all of which
they brought and annexed unto the crown of England."
2d, That if a man's motives " be derived from a virtuous and
heroical mind, preferring chiefly the honor of God, compassion
of poor infidels captived by the devil, tyrannizing in most
wonderful and dreadful manner over their bodies and souls," and
other honorable purposes specified, " God will assist such an
actor beyond the expectation of man."  Especially as, " in this
last age of the world, the time is complete for receiving also
these Gentiles into his mercy;... it seeming probable by the
event of precedent attempts made by the Spaniards and French
sundry times, that the country lying North of Florida God hath
reserved to be reduced unto Christian civilization by the English
nation."
"Then seeing the English nation only hath right unto these countries
of America, from the Cape of Florida northward, by the privilege of
first discovery,... which right also seemeth strongly defended on our
behalf by the powerful hand of almighty God, withstanding the enterprises of other nations; it may greatly encourage us upon so just
ground, as is our right, and upon so sacred an intent as to plant religion,
to prosecute effectually the full possession of these so ample and pleasant
countries appertaining unto the crown of England; the same (as is to be
conjectured by infallible arguments of the world's end approaching) being
now arrived unto the time by God prescribed of their vocation, if ever
their calling unto the knowledge of God may be expected."
This conviction, that the end of the world was near, was the
source of much of the heroic adventure, and the excuse for
much of the merciless barbarity towards the natives, which
attended the occupation of this continent by Europeans. The
WORD was first to be preached among all nations; and soldiers
and priests alike believed themselves agents of heaven in the
fulfilment of prophecy, when, acting under papal or royal authority, they compelled the submission of heathen nations to the




138           HISTORY OF GRANTS UNDER THE
Christian faith by violence and bloodshed. Columbus thought
he had ascertained by calculation, that there remained but one
hundred and fifty years from his time before the final catastrophe.'C My enterprise," said he, " has accomplished simply that which
the prophet Isaiah had predicted, - that, before the end of the
world, the gospel should be preached upon all the earth, and the
Holy City be restored to the church."  Nearly ninety years of
that remnant of time had expired, when, influenced by similar
sentiments, Sir Humphrey Gilbert set forth on a similar errand.
It was his intention to take possession at Newfoundland for
the northern portion of the country, and at some point nearer
Florida for the southern portion of the English claim; going
first to Newfoundland to gain the advantage of a favorable
season of the year, and the period when fishing vessels were
most numerous at that station. The ships of different nations
then engaged in that employment, were one hundred from Spain,
fifty from Portugal, and one hundred and fifty from France, to
fifty from England. But England had become full-blooded and
dangerous, and already aspired to rule the seas. She had the
best ships, which, as Haies expresses it, were " admirals" over
the rest, and controlled the harbors.
Gilbert landed, and calling together the merchants and ship-.
masters of the several nations, took possession with all the
prescribed formalities.  He promulgated laws, to which the
people, by general voice, promised obedience; and made grants
of land, the recipients covenanting to pay an annual rent, and
yearly to maintain possession of the same by themselves or their
assigns as his representatives.
We know that Gilbert was lost at sea, without having been
able to make a like demonstration elsewhere. But his proceedings at Newfoundland have been regarded by all English writers
as substantiating the English title to the whole country. No
distinct colony was left behind him; but the British domination
continued to be recognized by the mixed population on the
shore, and was, when necessary, enforced by summary process
among the ships.
On learning the death of his heroic half-brother, Sir Walter
Raleigh, his partner in the enterprise, immediately obtained a
similar commission and patent in his own name, and sought to




GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.        139
complete their purpose by planting a colony at the South. It
was his fortune, too, to fail in that part of his design which contemplated the establishment of settlements under his own rule
and tributary to himself; but he was the first to possess and
occupy the soil of Virginia; and, although interrupted for a
time, the occupancy of British subjects in that region became
permanent, without the interference of rival attempts at colonization.
It was under such circumstances, and in such manner, that
tile title of England, be it good or bad, to a portion of our continent, was originally acquired and maintained.
It seemed to be desirable to refer to the nature of that title,
ito the civil condition of England, to the operations of trade and
i.shery, and to the colonial projects which preceded the incor]oration of that semi-commercial, semi-political body known as
tihe Great Council for New England. For it was the wealth of
the mercantile classes, resulting in some degree from the discAvery of new sources and new courses of trade in distant
regions, that made the nobility and gentry eager to partake of
thWeir gains.  The " Fellowship of English Merchants for the
Diiscovery of New Trades," sometimes called also the Muscovy
or) Russian Company, which had a charter as early as 1554-5,
tiad been remarkably successful. Immense fortunes, like those'of Sir Thomas Smith and Sir John Wolstenholm, and others
who took part in the Virginia enterprises, had been realized by
merchants who became knights and baronets. The wealth of
the House of Commons far exceeded that of the House of Lords.
The great increase of extravagance in private expenditure had
become a serious drain upon the resources of the nobility; and
it was the hope of profit from the fur trade and fisheries, com-,bined with the advantage and dignity of territorial proprietorship, that caused the formation and governed the conduct of the
New-England Company, while ignorance of business and embarrassments arising from conflicting claims, domestic and foreign, brought it to an end.
There is another preliminary fact, which is of great interest
to New England, and especially to Massachusetts.  At the
beginning of a new century, A. D. 1602, Raleigh's colonies had
disappeared, and all traces of them were lost. Dr. Holmes, in




140            HISTORY OF GRANTS UNDER THE
his Annals, remarks, that then "in North America north of
Mexico not a single European family could be found." If we
understand by family a household of men, women, and children,
this statement may be nearly correct; and yet it is estimated
that there were at that time, at Newfoundland, as many as ten
thousand men and boys employed on board and on shore in the
business of taking and curing fish. Colonization, however, had
been virtually abandoned in despair. At that critical period, it
was revived by two men whose service to this country in that,
respect has never been properly or sufficiently acknowledged.
These were the Earl of Southampton and Bartholomew Gosnold: the first, the friend and patron of Shakespeare, and the
subject of many of his sonnets, who had impaired his fortune by.
his liberality to men of letters; the other, an intrepid mariner
from the west of England, who became the leading spirit, and
one of the first victims, of the attempt to renew the settlements'
of Virginia.
You are all familiar with the story of Gosnold's visit to
Massachusetts Bay, in 1602; and it hardly needs to be statedd,
that the expedition was undertaken with the consent of Raleig'h,
as coming within his jurisdiction; that the cost was chieffly
defrayed by the Earl of Southampton; that the design of the
voyage was to find a direct and shorter way across the ocean
and a proper seat for a plantation; that the company consisted
of thirty-two men, twenty of whom were to remain in the
country; that, in fact, they were the first to take a straight course
across the Atlantic, instead of the usual passage to Virginia by
the West Indies; that they reached land near Salem Harbor;
that from them came the familiar names of Cape Cod, Martha's
Vineyard, the Elizabeth Islands, &c.; and that they built a fort
at Cuttyhunk in Buzzard's Bay. They were delighted with the
country, but were compelled to return home for larger supplies.
Before they could come back better provided for a permanent
settlement, Queen Elizabeth died, Raleigh was thrown into
prison by her successor, and all schemes for American colonization were of necessity to be abandoned, or organized upon a new
basis under a new sovereign himself destitute of energy and
enterprise. Fortunately, Gosnold and his companions were not
merely men of action, but could write and speak as well; and to




GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.         141
their glowing narratives and zealous exertions, aided by the
famous Hakluyt, and men of influence at Court, historians
ascribe the procurement of the charter of 1606, from which the
ultimate settlement of the United States and the resulting
heritage of territorial rights are to be dated.
The fact of Gosnold's selection of our own coast for an
intended colony is sufficiently well known; but I am sure, that
the characters and services of the leaders of that little company
are not sufficiently understood and appreciated, or, instead
pf the farce which was enacted over the later and inconseq4uential landing and brief continuance of a body of outlaws on
tihe coast of Maine, all New England would have united in meashires to honor the memory of the real founders of permanent
tIabitation and indisputable title within our national bounds., For some reason, the charter of 1606 did not embrace the
Wxvhole of the British claim. It extended no farther south than
ithe present limits of North Carolina, and no farther north than
ihe present limits of the State of Vermont; that is, from the
thlirty-fourth to the forty-fifth degree of latitude. Within these
b unds there were to be two colonies under separate administraticns, subject to a paramount administration in the mother
ccuuntry. The southern colony could plant anywhere between
thlie thirty-fourth and forty-first degrees, and the northern colony,
anywhere between the thirty-eighth and forty-fifth degrees;:eaving three degrees, or the space from the southern point of
Maryland to the southern point of Connecticut, as common
ground.
The northern company had need of hot haste in choosing a
location; as, in the race for possession, the French had once
more taken the lead, and renewed their plans of founding an
Amrerican empire. Having before sent over a ship-load of felons
from the jails, who were left to take care of themselves at the'Isle of Sables, a more formidable expedition was organized in
1603, the year succeeding Gosnold's memorable voyage. Henry
the Great being then King of France, a gentleman of his household, named De Monts, received from him a patent of the American territory from the fortieth to the forty-sixth degree of north
latitude, with power, as lieutenant-general, to colonize and rule
it. It will be noticed that this grant almost exactly covers the




142            HISTORY OF GRANTS UNDER THE
territory assigned to the northern colony of Virginia by the English charter of 1606. De Monts lost no time in entering upon
his dominion; and he and his followers settled themselves in
Nova Scotia, at MConts desert (now called Mount Desert), and
along the coast of Maine as far as the Penobscot. They looked
into Boston Harbor in search of a more genial climate, but
were repelled by the hostile attitude of the natives.
The company of outlaws which, in imitation of the French,
Chief-Justice Popharn sent to the mouth of the Sagadehoc or
Kennebec River, in 1607, was undoubtedly intended and expected
to check the advances of that nation. It not only failed, but itL3
failure paralyzed the energies of the northern company of Virginia for many succeeding years.
That portion of the duplex contrivance of James I. accom-,
plished nothing important of itself until, after much opposition,
a separate organization and charter were obtained in 1620. In'
the mean time, its twin-brother, at Jamestown, flourished, after iT
fashion; it is doubtful whether most aided or hindered by the;
frequent interference of the English monarch, that "Dominie
Sampson" spoilt into a king, who believed himself to be tlhe
fountain of wisdom, not less than the fountain of honor. It wvs
able, in 1613, to fit out an armed vessel, commanded by Captai n
Argall, which broke up the French settlements at Port Royai,
Mount Desert, &c., and compelled their inhabitants to retire
towards Canada; protesting all the while, that whatever abstract
rights Great Britain might possess, if any there were, the Virginia charter expressly excepted in its grants regions already
occupied by any Christian prince or people; they (the French)
being a Christian people, in occupation of the places from which
they were driven two years before the Virginia charter was made;
which was very true.
Upon the island of Manhattan at the mouth of Hudson's river,
on the common ground of the two so-called Virginia companies,
the Dutch had located themselves, claiming title from its discovery by Hudson, in their service. While returning from his
expedition against the French, Captain Argall called on them
also, and required submission. They were too feeble to resist;
but the next year a new governor came from Amsterdam, with
reinforcements, asserting the right of Holland to the country, and




GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.         143
refusing the tribute which his predecessor had consented to pay
to the English.
It was to this inheritance, of not undisputed possessions, to
which the new corporation, styled " The Council established at
Plymouth, in the County of Devon, for the Planting, Ruling, and
Governing of New England in America," succeeded on the 3d
of November, 1620.
The charter, after referring to the previous charter of 1606,
and the changes that had since been made for the benefit of the
southern company, states that Sir Ferdinando Gorges, and other
principal adventurers of the northern company, with divers persons of quality who now intend to be their associates, resolving
to prosecute their designs more effectually, and intending to establish fishery, trade, and plantation, within the precincts of the said
northern company; for that purpose, and to avoid all confusion
sand difference between themselves and the other company,
ipave desired to be made a distinct body.
It proceeds to grant to the persons named, the territory from
#he fortieth to the forty-eighth degree of north latitude and
through the main land from sea to sea, to be called NEW ENG4AND; that is, from the latitude of Philadephia to the middle of
Wl.Newfoundland, and through all that width from the Atlantic to
*the Pacific; varying a few degrees of latitude from the bounds
prescribed in the original patent.
They were to be one body politic and corporate, to consist of
forty persons, and no more, with perpetual succession. Vacancies were to be filled by the members. They were empowered
to establish laws not contrary to the laws of England; and to
their " governors, officers, and ministers," according to the natural
limits of their offices, was given authority to correct, punish,
pardon, and rule all English subjects that should become colonists, according to the laws and instructions of the Council; and
in defect thereof, in cases of necessity, according to their good
discretions, in cases criminal and capital as well as civil, and
both marine and others. Such proceedings to be, as near as
conveniently may be, agreeable to the laws, statutes, government,
and policy, of the realm of England. The continent, from the
fortieth to the forty-eighth degree, from sea to sea, was absolutely
given, granted, and confirmed to the said Council and their suc



144             HISTORY OF GRANTS UNDER THE
cessors, to be holden, as of the manor of East Greenwich, in free
and common socage,1 as distinguished from the feudal tenure
of personal service; and all subjects were forbidden to trade or
fish within their limits without a license from the Council under
seal.
The rank and personal standing of the grantees corresponded
to the extent of territory and the magnitude of the powers bestowed upon them. They consisted of many of the highest
nobility of the kingdom, and knights and gentlemen of prominence and influence. Their aims and purposes were not less lofty
and aristocratic. Upon the general ground, that kings did first
lay the foundations of their monarchies, by reserving to themselves the sovereign power (as fit it was), and dividing their kingdoms into counties, baronies, hundreds, and the like, they say,"This foundation being so certain, there is no reason for us to vary
from it; and therefore we resolve to build our edifices upon it. So as
we purpose to commit the management of our whole affairs there in'
general unto a governor, to be assisted by the advice and counsel of so)
many of the patentees as shall be there resident, together with the officers,
of State."
Among the "officers of State" were to be a treasurer, a
marshal, an admiral, and a master of ordnance. Two part-i
of the whole territory were to be divided among the patentees,
and the other third reserved for public uses; but the entire
territory was to be formed into counties, baronies, hundreds,
and the like. From every county and barony deputies were
to be chosen to consult upon the laws to be framed, and
to reform any notable abuses. Yet these are not to be assembled
but by order of the President and Council in England, "who
are to give life to the laws so to be made, as those to whom of
right it best belongs." The counties and baronies were to be
governed by the chief, and the officers under him, with a power
of high and low justice, subject to an appeal, in some cases, to
the supreme courts. The lords of counties might also divide
their counties into manors and lordships, with courts for determining petty matters.  When great cities had grown up, they
1 "An estate of the highest nature that a subject under any government can
possibly receive and hold." -Sullivan, Land Titles in Massachusetts, p. 86.




GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.         145
were to be made bodies politic to govern their own private
affairs, with a right of representation by deputies or burgesses.1
There was a provision in the charter for its renewal and
amendment, if changes should be found expedient; and measures were taken for a new patent, omitting the requirement that
their government should be as near the laws of England as may
be, and inserting authority to create titles of honor, and establish feudal tenures.
The chief managers of the affairs of the Council were Sir
Ferdinando Gorges, a friend and fellow-soldier of Raleigh, who,
ever since the failure of the Popham enterprise in Maine, had
been striving to settle a plantation for trade and fishing there on
his own account; Captain John Mason, who had been governor
of Newfoundland; and the Earl of Warwick, the President.
The patents issued to colonists, whether companies or single
adventurers, were intended to conform to the political system'hey had adopted.
The influence of Gorges is seen in the project, which was'arly started, of laying out a county, on the general behalf, forty
ailes square, on the Kennebec River, and building a great city at
he junction of the rivers Kennebec and Androscoggin. Two
inds of patents were provided for by the Council: one for
private undertakers of petty plantations, who were to have a
certain quantity of land allotted them at an annual rent, with
conditions that they should not alienate without leave, and
should settle a stated number of persons with cattle, &c., within
a definite period; the other for such parties as proposed to build
towns, with large numbers of people, having a government and
magistrates, who were to have power to frame such laws and
constitutions as the majority should think fit, subordinate to the
State which was to be established, " until other order should be
taken."
The grand schemes of the Council were not destined to
experience even the promise of success. They began to fail
from the very beginning of their operations. They had to contend not only against the active hostility of the Southern corporation, the remonstrances of the French, and the pertinacity
1 Brief Relation of the President and Council. In Mass, Hist. Soc. Col., vol. xix#
10




146            HISTORY OF GRANTS UNDER THE
of the Hollanders, who said little, while they encroached upon
the fisheries, and inclined to take possession of Connecticut
River; but the fishermen and fur-traders of England itself,
whose rights, become prescriptive by long enjoyment, were so
summarily interfered with. The matter was taken up by Parliament, and Sir Ferdinando Gorges was summoned to their bar.
His argument, that the enlargement of the King's dominions
and the advancement of religion were of more consequence than
a disorderly course of fishing, which, except for their plantation,
would soon be given over, (as so goodly a coast could not long
be left unpeopled by the French, Spanish, or Dutch), if it did not
satisfy the Commons, had weight with the King, who continued
his favor and protection.
Gorges was to be the Governor of the new State; and, in
1623, the attempt was made to transfer an operative government to the American soil. The King had issued a proclamation enforcing their authority; and now Robert Gorges, son of
Sir Ferdinando, was sent over as Lieutenant-General anc
Governor of New England, with a suite of officers, to establish
his court at Massachusetts Bay; where a tract extending tei
miles on the north-east side of the bay had been granted to himl
personally by patent.
This proved an unfortunate procedure.  It increased the
hostile feeling in England, so that, in a list of public grievances
brought forward by Parliament, the first was the patent for New
England.   This public declaration of the House's dislike,
Gorges tells us, " shook off all adventurers from the plantation,
and made many of the patentees quit their interest." The Lieutenant-Governor and his military and ecclesiastical officers were
advised to return home; and thus the plan of a State ruled by
a Company, such as we have seen to succeed in India, failed in
New England.
The other purpose of the Council, viz., to derive a profit
from the fisheries and the fur-trade, with a view also to the
ultimate advantages of territorial proprietorship, was continued
in a feeble and desultory way. The great object was to get the
country occupied at all events, and grants of land were made
with a singular disregard of boundaries and of previous conveyance. Gorges and Mason were the only persons at all acquainted




GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.        147
with localities here, and Gorges had become despondent and
almost desperate. Many members of the corporation gave up
their partnership rather than pay their shares of the expenses;
and it was difficult to find others to take their places. They
tried the policy of dividing the whole territory among their
members, in severalty, which came to nothing.  Dissensions
arose, and the Earl of Warwick withdrew from their meetings,
but still kept the great seal, and evaded the calls that were
made upon him to deliver it to the treasurer. They did not
know what patents had been issued, and the President was
" entreated to direct a course for finding out." It was proposed
to send over a surveyor to settle limits, and commissioners to hear
and determine grievances. The company became reduced from
forty to twenty-one, notwithstanding recruits had been diligently sought among the merchants.  Their records from
November, 1632, to January, 1634, are wanting. When they:egin again, the only remaining objects aimed at seem to have
been a renewal of the policy of assigning to members distinct
portions of the region embraced in their charter, and a surrender
of the charter to the King, who is besought to graciously ratify
the division, and confirm it by his own decree. This he does
not appear ever to have formally done; and the Great Council
for planting, ruling, and governing New England, came to an
end in 1635, leaving no other incumbrances upon the soil than
such as arose from a few larger patents, which depended for their
force and validity very much upon the royal sanction they ultimately received, and some grants whose proprietors were in the
country engaged in actual occupancy or management.
Dr. Palfrey, in his history, gives a list of twenty-four grants
made, or supposed to have been made, by the Council for New
England before the final partition attempted among themselves.
From these we must take the doubtful, or at any rate futile,
division among the partners alleged to have been effected in
1622; also the Charter of Nova Scotia to Sir William Alexander,
which came directly from the King with the assent of the
Council, how signified does not appear; also the supposed grants
to Thompson, Weston, and Wollaston, which, if ever formally
executed, were soon forfeited or abandoned, like some others that
might be added from the Records; also the patent of Connecticut,




148              HISTORY OF GRANTS UNDER THE
March 19, 1631, which proceeded from the Earl of Warwick personally, and was apparently founded on an actual or expected title
passed, or to be passed, from the Council to himself. It is possible that, like the deed of Cape Ann to the Pilgrims, by Lord
Sheffield in 1623, it was based on a contemplated division
among the Council that was never perfected.1      Grants were
sometimes spoken of as made that were not drawn up; and
sometimes the execution, long delayed, was not formally completed, so that the Council felt at liberty to confirm or reject
them.   To some patents there were conditions attached; such as
rent, and the introduction of settlers within a certain time, to
remain a certain time, which, if not complied with, might
occasion a forfeiture.
Four in Dr. Palfrey's list are for the benefit of the Pilgrims at
Plymouth; but the last and amplest absorbed or cancelled the
others.
The first act of this nature for the benefit of the Pilgrims,
was dated June 1, 1621. The other grants to them of 1622,
1627, and 1630, enlarged their property and powers at Plymouth,
and gave them a large tract of land on the Kennebec, for trade
with the Indians; by the special favor, it is said, of the Earl of
Warwick, who seems to have been devoted to the interests of
the Puritans.
There remain to be mentioned fourteen grants professedly
emanating from the Council:1st, To Captain John Mason, March 9, 1622, of the coast and islands
between Salem River and the Merrimack, called by him " Jariana."  It
is said to have been imperfectly executed; and was disregarded in subsequent conveyances.
2d, To Gorges and Mason jointly, Aug. 10, 1622, of the country
between the Merrimack and Kennebec Rivers, and sixty miles inland from
their mouths, "which they intend to name the PROVINCE OF MAINE."
3d, To Robert Gorges, of ten miles from Boston towards Salem, just
I Historians have stated, without giving any authority, that the Connecticut
territory was granted by the Council to Warwick, in 1630, and even that it was
confirmed to him by the King. But the Council Records show that "a rough
draft" of a patent for the Earl of Warwick, relating to the same territory,
was under consideration three months after his conveyance to Lord Say and
Sele, &c.




GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.                149
before he came over as Lieutenant-Governor. The tenure was by the
sword, or per gladium comitatus.
4th, To a grandson of Sir F. Gorges and his associates, of twentyfour thousand acres, on both sides of York River in Maine, with the
islands within three leagues of the coast. This patent, though referred
by Gorges to 1623, was not executed till Dec. 2, 1631, and was reissued
the following March, with a partial change of associates. The consideration was their engaging to build a town.
5th, To the Massachusetts Company, which, as confirmed by the royal
charter, March 4, 1629, covered Mason's Mariana, the tract of Robert
Gorges, and a part of the territory of Gorges and Mason; as it was to
embrace the country from three miles north of every part of the Merrimack River to three miles south of Charles River.
6th, To Captain John Mason, Nov. 7, 1629, from the middle of the
Merrimack River to the middle of the Piscataqua, and sixty miles inland
from their mouths, and all islands within five leagues of the doast;
" which he intends to name NEW  HAMPSHIRE."
A series of grants succeeded, that are well known as prolific
of suits and legal questions to the inhabitants of Maine. These
are1st, The joint patents of what are now the towns of Saco and
Biddeford.
2d, The Muscongus, or Lincoln grant, between the Muscongus and the
Penobscot Rivers, which became the famous Waldo patent.
3d, The Lygonia, or Plough patent, of forty miles square, between
Cape Porpoise and Cape Elizabeth, including the now City of Portland.
The date and the grantees are both uncertain.1
4th, The Swamscot patent, covering the towns of Dover, Durham,
and Stratham.
5th, The Black Point grant of fifteen hundred acres in Scarborough.
6th, To Gorges and Mason, and certain associates, of lands on the
Piscataqua, where some of their people had settled.
7th, To Richard Bradshaw, fifteen hundred acres above the head of
" Pashippscot," where he had been living.2
8th, To Trelawney and Goodyear, a tract between the Black Point
patent and the Casco River.
9th, The well-known Pemaquid patent of twelve thousand acres, Feb.
29, 1632, to be land "not lately granted, settled, and inhabited by any
English."
1 Willis, in Hist. of Portland.
2 This is added from the Council Records.




150           HISTORY OF GRANTS UNDER THE
All writers, until recently, have called the grant of Aug. 10,
1622, the Laconia grant. It was not till a copy of the grant of
August, 1622, was obtained from England, by the Maine Historical Society, for publication in 1863, that the error became
apparent. The real Laconia grant was dated Nov. 17, 1629,
and conveyed to Gorges and Mason " all those lands and countries bordering upon the great lake, or lakes and rivers known
by the name of the River and Lake, or Rivers and Lakes of the
Iroquois," meaning thereby Lake Champlain. The final and
effective grant of the Province of Maine was to Gorges, directly
from the King, April 3, 1639, when the Council for New England
had ceased to exist.
The heirs of Gorges and Mason, after vain efforts to sustain
their title to Maine and New Hampshire, ultimately surrendered
their claims for a moderate consideration; while the minor tracts,
in process of time, came to be defined and adjusted by legislative and judicial interference.
It may be said, with probable truth, that, but for the success
of Massachusetts, all other grants or patents from the CounciL
would have come to nought; and that, on one side the French,
and on the other the Dutch, or else the original natives, would
have become possessed of all New England.  It was so asserted when Massachusetts was summoned to show cause why
its charter should not be revoked.
Yet the charter of the Massachusetts Company gave the death
blow to the Council for New England. In connection with the
litigious attacks of the Virginia Company, who desired to break
up the monopoly of the fisheries, and the protest of the French
ambassador, it is assigned, by themselves, as the principal cause
of the surrender of their charter. They complained that their own
grant to this company had been unfairly obtained and unreasonably enlarged, absorbing the tract of Robert Gorges, and riding
over the heads of all those lords who had portions assigned them
in the King's presence; that its members wholly excluded themselves from the government of the Council, and made themselves
a free people, " whereby they did rend in pieces the first foundation of the building." On account of these troubles, and upon
these considerations, they resolved to surrender their own patent
to the King.




GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.          151
The political purpose of the founders of Massachusetts, and
its friends in England, when clearly understood, will be seen to
shed a new light upon many obscure points of our own and also
of English history.
It is curious to observe, among the men who intended to come
to New England, Pym, Hampden, Sir Arthur Hazierig, and
Oliver Cromwell. It is instructive to notice, that it was the
Earl of Warwick who managed to obtain the patent for the
Massachusetts Company, as Gorges relates; that it was the
same earl who, on his own responsibility, conveyed Connecticut
to Lord Say and Sele, Lord Rich, Charles Fiennes, John Pym,
John Hampden, Herbert Pelham, and others; and then to remark that, in the revolution which soon took place in England,
the Earl of Warwick, Lord Say and Sele, and Lord Mandeville,
the son-in-law of Warwick, are designated by Clarendon as chief',nanagers among the Peers; while in the House of Commons,
YPym, Hampden, Sir Harry Vane, and Nathaniel Fiennes, brother
1if Charles, were principal leaders. From these, and many other
coincidences, it looks as if the revolution at home was only a
carrying out and extending of the political experiment which it
had first been their intention to try in New England. And the
impression is strengthened, when we learn that members of the
original Massachusetts Company took a prominent part in all
the public movements of the revolutionary party, —in Parliament, in the Army, in the Assembly of Divines at Westminster,
and among the Judges appointed for the trial of the King. It is
not strange that the lesser purpose, and the more limited intention, should have been forgotten or obscured, amid the exciting
events of the grander and more comprehensive undertaking.1
A more particular account of the grants made or proposed by
the Council, which would have been tedious in a lecture before
a general audience, is given in a supplement.
1 Dr. Palfrey (Hist. of N. E., vol. i. p. 308) refers to the probable purpose of a
renovated England in America entertained by the Puritan leaders, in view of the
clouds that were gathering over the political prospects at home; and quotes a remark
of Burke, to whom the same reflection had occurred. See also Hist. of N. E.,
vol. i. p. 390, n.




152             HISTORY OF THE GRANTS UNDER THE
SUPPLEMENT.
EvERY one at all familiar with the grants from the Council for New England must be aware that their history would properly fill the pages of a large
volume. All that a single lecture can accomplish, even with the aid of a
supplement, is to take the place of an introductory chapter, giving some account
of the subject-matter, and an abstract of the most important facts and conclusions. It is believed that the list of grants here presented is more fill and
more correct than any before attempted; but in a case where our most careful
historians have been led into remarkable errors, it would be unreasonable to
demand absolute accuracy or completeness.  The patience required for the
selection and verification of the particulars now brought together, the reader
will hardly be able to appreciate.
SUMMARY OF GRANTS FROM THE GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.
No. 1. —The first grant from the Council, of which there is any record.,
was taken out in the name of John Peirce, citizen and clothworker of London,
and his associates, June 1, 1621, for the benefit of the Pilgrims at Plymouth.
It allowed one hundred acres to each planter within seven years, free liberty
to fish on the coast of New England, and fifteen hundred acres for public uses.
After seven years, a rent of two shillings for every one hundred acres to be paid
annually.  The lands having been properly surveyed and set out-by metes and
bounds at the charge of the grantees, upon reasonable request within seven
years they are to be confirmed by deed, and letters of incorporation granted,
with liberty to make laws and constitutions of government. In the mean time,
the undertakers and planters are authorized to establish such laws and ordinances, and appoint such officers, as they shall by most voices agree upon.
This patent was first printed from the original manuscript, with an introduction
and notes, by Charles Deane, Esq., in 1854. The land was to be taken anywhere not within ten miles of land already inhabited, or located by authority
of the Council, unless it be on the opposite side of some river.
No. 2.-1622, March 9. Captain John Mason's " MIariana."   The headland " known by the name of Tragabigsenda, or Cape Anne, with the north,
south, and east shores thereof," from Naumkeag River, to a river north-westward from the Cape (the Merrimack), then up that river to its head, thence
across to the head of the other river; with all the islands within three miles of
theshore. Hubbard, Hist. of N. E., pp. 614-16.
No. 3. -1622, April 20. To John Peirce. This was an attempt of Peirce
to surrender the indenture of June 1, 1621, and take a deed of the lands to
himself, his heirs, associates, and assigns. When it was ascertained that his
associates were not privy to this movement, he was compelled to agree to




GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.                   153
submit the matter to the authority and pleasure of the Council. See Council
Records, in Proceedings of American Antiquarian Society of April, 1867.
No. 4. - 1622, May 31. In the Records of the Council of this date, it is
stated, that " order is given for patents to be drawn for the Earl of Warwick,
and his associates, the Lord Gorges, Sir Robert Mansell, Sir Ferdinando
Gorges."  Dr. Palfrey regards this order as referring to a division of the
country, from the Bay of Fundy to Narraganset Bay, among twenty associates, in which the region about Cape Ann fell to Lord Sheffield, who sold
a patent for it to the New-Plymouth people.  Captain John Smith, in his
" Generall Historie," published in 1624, says that New England was " engrossed
by twenty patentees who divided my map into twenty parts, and cast lots for
their shares."  Mr. Thornton, in his interesting work on Cape Ann, has a
map from Purchas representing this division, and a fac-simile of the patent
from Lord Sheffield above mentioned. There may have been such a division
suggested when Captain Smith wrote, and Purchas, writing at the same date, may
have prepared the map to correspond with that expectation. The above order
from the Records of the Council seems, however, to be limited in its applica-'tion to the Earl of Warwick, and three associates; and there is no account of
suich a division as the map exhibits in the Records, as we have them, or in the
" Relation of the President and Council," or in the "Briefe Narration" of
Grorges, or in the act of the Resignation of the Charter, where it would
n!turally appear. The division referred to by Gorges in his " Briefe Narration,"
aind which is described in the proceedings for the surrender of the charter, is a
vytry different one, and quite inconsistent with that exhibited by the map. It is
not improbable that the distribution mentioned by Smith, may be alluded
"co in the agreement for the division, Feb. 3, 1634-5, thus: "Forasmuch
as... in the 8th (? 18th) year of the reign of King James, of blessed
memory, in whose presence lots were drawn for settling of divers and sundry
divisions of land, on the sea-coast of the said country, upon most of us, which
hitherto have never been confirmed in the said lands so allotted, and to the intent
that every one of us according to equity, and in some reasonable manner
answerable to his adventures or other interest, may enjoy a proportion of the
said country to be immediately holden of his Majesty, we therefore," &c.
The deed from Lord Sheffield, dated Jan. 1, 1623-4, is in direct conflict with the
grant from the Council to Mason, March 9, 1622. (See above, No. 2.) Lord
Sheffield's conveyance of Cape Ann, like that of Connecticut by the Earl of
Warwick, was probably based upon a proposed division that was never
legally completed. See note at the end of this Supplement.
No. 5. —1622, Aug. 10. By indenture to Sir Ferdinando Gorges and
Captain John Mason, "All that part of the mainland in New England lying
upon the sea-coast, betwixt the rivers of Merrimack and Sagadahoc, and to the
furthest heads of the said rivers, and so forwards up into the land westward,
until threescore miles be finished from the first entrance of the aforesaid rivers,
and half way over; that is to say, to the midst of the said two rivers," "together with all the islands and islets within five leagues' distance of the
premises," which, it is stated, the grantees with the consent of the President
and Council intend to name " The Province of Maine."




154             HISTORY OF THE GRANTS UNDER THE
The error of Dr. Belknap in supposing this to be the Lacoinia grant, has
been repeated by historians to the present time. Mr. Deane, who saw the
true Laconia deed in the Record Office in London, two years ago, gives the
correct statement in the Report of the Council of the American Antiquarian
Society, Oct. 21, 1868. The grant of Aug. 10, 1622, is given in full in the
Provincial Papers of New Hampshire, edited by Dr. Bouton (Concord, 1867),
who also makes the correction. Hutchinson, Hist., vol. i. p. 282, ed. of 1795, says
this grant " did not appear to have been signed, sealed, or witnessed by any
order of the Council."  See Provincial Papers of New Hampshire, p. 28, note.
For an interesting opinion of Sir William Jones, the King's Attorney-General, in
1679, on the validity of the several grants to Mason, on the absence of any
right in the Council for New England to confer powers of government, and on
the requirement of their charter that their grants should appear to be the acts
of a majority of the Council present at a lawful meeting, see Hubbard's
Hist. of N. E., pp. 616-621.
No. 6.-1622, Nov. 16. The Council Records speak of Mr. Thompson's
patent as " this day signed.' In the Appendix to the memorial volume of the
Maine Historical Society, is a copy of an ancient, but imperfect list of NewEngland patents, from the Record Office, London, in which the first named is
" a patent to David Thompson, M. Jobe, M. Sherwood, of Plimouth, for a pt.
of Piscattowa River." Whatever Thompson's grant may have been, it canie
to nothing. He was a Scotchman, apparently in the service of the Gorges'
family, and lived at one time on the Piscataqua River; and at another, cm
" Thompson's Island," in Boston Harbor.
No. 7. - 1622. Thomas Weston was supposed to have a patent of land ait
Wessagusset (Weymouth, Mass.). Bradford, p. 122. " Weston's patent is not,
extant, and little is known respecting it."  Deane, in Bradford, p. 124, note.
No. 8. -1622, Dec. 30. To Robert Gorges, son of Sir Ferdinando, "All
that part of the mainland commonly called Messachusiac, on the north-east
side of the Bay known by the name of Massachuset, together with all the shores
along the sea for ten English miles in a strait line towards the north-east, and
thirty miles into the mainland through all the breadth aforesaid," including the
islands, within three miles of any part of said land, not before granted. The
grant is given at length in the " Briefe Narration," chap. xxiii. Its tenure is by
"the sword," per Gladinm Comitatus. When Robert Gorges came over, he
located himself at Wessagusset, which was not within his grant. Among the
manuscript records of Massachusetts is a memorandum to the effect, that, Robert
Gorges having died without issue, the land descended to his eldest brother, John,
who conveyed it to Sir William Brereton, Jan. 10, 1628. Brereton died,
leaving a son and a daughter. The son died, and the daughter married Edmund
Lenthall; and their only daughter and heir married Mr. Levett, of the Inner
Temple, who claimed the land in right of his wife. See note to the "Briefe
Narration" of Gorges, in Coll. of Me. Hist. Soc., vol. ii. p. 46.
No. 9.-1623. To Ferdinando Gorges, grandson of Sir Ferdinando, and
his associates, among whom  were "Walter Norton, Lieutenant-Colonel
Thomas Coppyn, Esq., Samuel Maverick, Esq., Thomas Graves, Gent. (an
engineer), Raphe Glover, merchant, William Jeffryes, Gent., John Busley,




GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.                    155
Gent., Joel Woolsey, Gent., all of New England." The date of 1623 is
derived from the " Briefe Narration," chap. xxv., where Gorges says his grandson, and some of his associates, hastened to take possession at the time, carrying with them their families; but according to the Council Records, the date
of sealing the patent was Dec. 2, 1631. It was renewed March 2, 1632, with
some change in the associates, and the former patent cancelled. The grant was
first, of one hundred acres to each person transported within seven )'ears, if he
remained three years; second, of twelve thousand more, to the associates, on
the east side of the river Agamenticus, on the coast three miles, and into the
land so far as to contain twelve thousand acres, and one hundred acres more for
each person; third, to F. Gorges himself, besides the above,twelve thousand acres
on the opposite or western side of the river along the coast westerly to the land
appropriated to the plantation at Pascataquack (Portsmouth), and so along the
river Agamenticus, and the bounds of Pascataquack, into the mainland so far as
to contain twelve thousand acres; with all the islands within three leagues into
the ocean. In consideration that they have undertaken to build a town. Two
shillings to be paid yearly for every one hundred acres of arable land after seven
years. This description is from the Records of the Council, in Proceedings of
tbke American Society of April, 1867.  See also respecting this grant, Coll. of
Mle. Hist. Soc., vol. ii. pp. 49, 50, note. At a meeting of the Council, March 22,
16,37 (after the surrender of their charter), it is stated that this grant was
renewed to Edward Godfrey and others, and " this day the seal of the compatny was set thereunto."
No. 10. -1628.   To the Plymouth people, of lands on the Kennebec.
flenewed and enlarged the next year. Bradford, p. 232.
No. 11.- The Massachusetts patent of March 19, 1628, made into a Royal
charter, March 4, 1629. Dr. Palfrey expresses an opinion, that the patentees
among whom the coast of New England had been partitioned six years before
surrendered their claims, founded on the following record of the Massachusetts Company: " Sept. 29, 1629. -It is thought fit, and ordered, that the
secretary shall write out a copy of the former grant to the Earl of Warwick and
others, which was by them resigned to this company, to be presented to his
lordship."
The patent of the Massachusetts Company from the New-England Council
is not extant; and there is some mystery attending the manner of its procurement, as well as about its original extent. Sir F. Gorges says, that, on the
request of the Earl of Warwick, he consented to a grant that should not be
prejudicial to the interests of his son Robert. In the act of resignation of their
charter by the Council, they say, that the Massachusetts Company, "presenting the names of honest and religious men, easily obtained their first desires;
but those being once gotten, they used other means to advance themselves a
step beyond their first proportions to a second grant, surreptitiously gotten,
of other lands also, justly passed unto Captain Robert Gorges long before."
Robert Mason, petitioning the King, in 1676, for possession of the lands granted
to his grandfather, declares that the Massachusetts Company " did surreptitiously, and unknown to the said Council, get the seal of the said Council
affixed to a grant of certain lands;" and did, by their subtile practices, get a




156             HISTORY OF THE GRANTS UNDER THE
confirmation under the great seal of England. In their answer to this petition,
the Massachusetts authorities deny the charge, no doubt with sincerity; but all
circumstances leave an impression on the mind that, by the influence, perhaps
by the management, of the Earl of Warwick, advantages were gained, which
many, if not most, of the Council would have objected to. By the favor of
Warwick, the Plymouth people obtained their lands on the Kennebec; and the
patent of Connecticut was made in his own name, by what authority does not
sufficiently appear. These facts may explain the dissatisfaction which arose between the Council and Warwick, their president, and the efforts of the Council
to get the seal out of his possession. He seems not to have cared for personal
proprietorship, but to have desired to give his Puritan friends the advantage
of his official position and influence.
No. 12.  1629, Nov. 7. By indenture, to Captain John Mason, part of the
same territory whichwas conveyed by a similar deed to Gorges and Mason, jointly,
Aug. 10, 1622. The difference being, that instead of extending fiom the middle
of the Merrimack River to the middle of the Sagadahoc, on the coast, and back
into the interior sixty miles between those limits, this grant extends no farther
than the middle of the Piscataqua River, but the same distance into the interior;
between the Merrimack and the Piscataqua, including also islands within five
leagues of the shore; " which the said Captain John Mason, with the consent
of the President and Council, intends to name Nezo Hampshire." In the deed
to Gorges and Mason, it was proposed to call the whole territory the Province
of Maine. The form and general phraseology of the two deeds are alike.
If the first instrument was valid, this one, of necessity, could be of no effect.
See above, No. 5; Provincial Papers of New Hampshire, pp. 2.1 and 28, note.'
Hazard, vol. i. p. 289.
No. 13. -1629, Nov. 17. This is the true Laconia grant, which, by a mistake,
originating doubtless in a misprint, has sometimes had the date Nov. 27,
instead of Nov. 17, assigned to it. There is a copy of it in the office of
the Secretary of State of Massachusetts. It embraces, in substance, the lands
bordering upon the great lake (Champlain), or lakes and rivers commonly
known by the name of the river and lake, or rivers and lakes, of the Iroquois;
together with those lakes and rivers, and the land within ten miles of any part
of them on the south or east, and from the west end or sides so far to the west
as shall extend half-way into the next great lake to the westward; thence
northward into the north side of the main river running from the great western
lakes into the river of Canada, including all islands within the precincts.
The nullity of this grant is shown by the fact, that so many careful historians
have confounded it with that of Aug. 10, 1622, another imperfect and ineffectual
instrument. See N. H. Provincial Papers, vol. i. pp. 28 and 38. Hubbard,
Hist. of N. E., chap. xxxi., says, that after three years of fruitless endeavors
for the more fill discovery of "an imaginary Province called Laconia," the
agents of Gorges returned to England with a "non est inventa Provincia."
No. 14. - 1629, o.s., Jan. 13. The last Plymouth patent, to William Bradford and his associates, in consideration that they have lived nine years in New
England, and planted a town at their own cost, and are able to relieve new
planters: All that part of New England between the middle of Cohasset River




GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.                   157
and the middle of Narraganset River, and up from the mouths of those rivers
in a strait line into the mainland as far as the utmost limits of the country
called " Pokenacutt, alias Sowamsett;" and bounded on the east by the ocean,
without including islands on the coast. And as the grantees have no convenient place for trading or fishing within their own precincts, there is also
conveyed to them all that tract of land, between, or extending from, the utmost
limits of Cobbisconte, which adjoins the river Kennebec, towards the western
ocean, and a place called the Falls at Nequamkike; and the space of fifteen
miles on each side of the river Kennebec, and all the said river Kennebec
that lies within the said limits and bounds, eastward, westward, northward,
or southward, last above mentioned. The patent gave a right of passage to
and from the ocean, and the right of fishing on the neighboring shores, not
inhabited or otherwise disposed of, and also privileges of administration. It
appears to have no other signature than that of the Earl of Warwick.
The Plymouth people tried in vain to procure a charter from the Crown, with
powers of government. They strengthened their rights in Maine by deeds from
the Indians, and endeavored to establish settlements; but tired of the vexation
which that property gave them, they sold their entire interest, in 1661, to four
peirsons, for four hundred pounds. In 1753, the then owners became a corpotation, by the name of " the Proprietors of the Kennebec Purchase " and,
after much controversy and litigation, the obscure boundaries were ultimately
adjjusted. See Gardiner's " Hist. of the Kennebec Purchase," in Coll. of Maine
Hijst. Society, vol. ii. The patent is in Hazard, vol. i. pp. 298-303.
f No. 15.-1630, Feb. 12. At this date, two deeds were issued of the land
b tween Cape Elizabeth and Cape Porpoise in Maine, each of four miles along the
coast, and eight miles into the mainland; one on the north side of the Saco River;to Thomas Lewis and Richard Bonython, the other on the south side of the Saco
River to John Oldham and Richard Vines. From these grants have sprung the
two towns of Saco and Biddeford, retaining nearly the same limits. Hist. of
Saco and Biddeford, by George Folsom.
No. 16. - 1630, March 13. The Muscongus grant, afterwards known as the
WTaldo patent. The abstract of this grant, in Hazard, Coll. vol. i. pp. 304, 305,
taken from the Maine Records, is unintelligible. Williamson, Hist. of Me.
vol. i. p. 240, describes it as extending from the seaboard, between the rivers
Penobscot and Muscongus, to an unsurveyed line running east and west so far
north as would, without interfering with any other patent, embrace a territory
equal to thirty miles square; and adds, in a note, that the north line, as since
settled, is in the south line of Hampden, Newbury, and Dixmont. The grant
was to John Beauchamp and Thomas Leverett, of England. Leverett is said
to have succeeded to the property on the death of Beauchamp. John Leverett,
President of Harvard College, as sole heir of his grandfather, became the owner
in 1715. By the admission of partners, a company was formed, consisting of
thirty proprietors, who first employed Brigadier-General Samuel Waldo as
agent, and ultimately assigned to him the largest interest in the patent. Coll.
of Me. Hist. Society, vol. vi. art. xv.
No. 17. -1630. The Lygonia, or Plough patent, considered to extend from
Kennebunk River to Harpswell in Casco Bay, or, as usually stated, from Cape




158             HISTORY OF THE GRANTS UNDER THE
Porpoise to Cape Elizabeth, and forty miles inland. Hubbard, Ind. Wars,
part ii. p. 9, says the patent was granted in the year 1630, and signed by the
Earl of Warwick and Sir Ferdinando Gorges. Willis, Hist. of Portland, p. 29,
says he has never "been able to discover this patent, nor ascertain its date,
nor who are the patentees."  Different names are given in different accounts.
An unsuccessful attempt at settlement was made in 1631. In 1643 the patent
was transferred to Alexander Rigby, a rich English lawyer, who appointed
George Cleaves as his deputy. The contest of conflicting jurisdictions between
the representative of Rigby and the representatives of Gorges was only ended
when Massachusetts took possession of the whole territory in 1672. Sullivan,
Hist. of Me., pp. 309-319; ib., " Land Titles," p. 44; Williamson, Hist. of Me.
vol. i. p. 238; Folsom, Hist. of Saco and Biddeford, pp. 26-28.
No. 18. -1631, March 12. To Edward Hilton, " all that part of the river
Piscataqua called Hilton's Point, with the S. side of the said river up to the falls
of Squamscot (or Swamscot), and three miles into the mainland for breadth."
Following Dr. Belknap and Dr. Palfrey, I stated in the lecture that this grant
covered the towns of Dover, Durham, and Stratham. But in the recently published Provincial Papers of New Hampshire, p. 29, Dr. Bouton, the editor,
says, " No document relating to New Hampshire has been so grossly misrepresented as this.... It covered only Hilton's Point;... and the whole did not
exceed a township five miles square." Its extent and its ownership, in 165t3,
as shown in a record of partition, by authority of Massachusetts, may be see.n
in ibid., pp. 221-223.
No. 19.-1631, Nov. 4, by the Council Records (Willis, and others, say
Nov. 1).  To Thomas Cammock, fifteen hundred acres, lying upon the
mainland along the sea-coast, on the east side of Black Point River. This is'
now a part of Scarborough, and included Stratton's islands. Possession given
in 1633; patent confirmed by Gorges in 1640. The tract is now held under
this title. Willis, Hist. of Portland, p. 31.
No. 20. -1631, Nov. 4. To Richard Bradshaw, "fifteen hundred acres,
to be allotted above the head of Pashippscot (Pejepscot), on the north side
thereof, not formerly granted to any other."  Council Records. This, and the
grant to Cammock, were in consideration that the grantees had been living on
the premises for some years.
The Council Records of Dec. 2, 1631, say, that Lord Gorges and Sir Ferdinando Gorges gave order for two patents, one for Walter Bagnall for a small
island, called Richmond Island, and fifteen hundred acres on the mainland, to
be selected by Walter Neale and Richard Vines; another for John Stratton, of
two thousand acres, on the south side of Cape Porpoise, and " on the other
side northwards into the south side of the harbor's mouth of Cape Porpoise."
Sainsbury's Calendar, p. 137, has it "John Stratton of Shotley, co. Suffolk,
and his associates."
Bagnall was at Richmond Island in 1628, where he was killed by the Indians,
Oct. 3, 1631 (previous to the date above stated). Willis, Hist. of Portland, p. 25.
No. 21.-1631, Nov. 4. To Sir Ferdinando Gorges and Captain John
Mason, and their associates, a portion of land on the Piscataqua River, " along
the seashore westward five miles, and by an imaginary line into the mainland,




GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.                   159
north to the bounds of a plantation belonging to Edward Hilton; and the islands
within the same river eastward, together with three miles along the shore to the
eastward of said river, and opposite to the habitation and plantation where
Captain Neale lives, and up into the mainland northerly, by all the breadth
aforesaid, thirty miles; with the lakes at the head of said river." In consideration of service formerly done, and the settlement there by Captain Neale, the
erection of salt-pans, &c.
They were to pay to the Council forty shillings sterling, payable at the
Assurance House, Royal Exchange, London, if demanded. First payment at
the Feast of St. Michael, 1632, "and so for all service from year to year."
Abstract in the Council Records. Hubbard, Hist. of N. E., chap. xxxi., says,
that in his time, a copy of this indenture was extant at Portsmouth. He makes
the date Nov. 3, 1631, and the instrument to be without signature or seal; but
he says, " it seems to be of as much force as other instruments of like nature
produced on such like accounts at the present time."  The Council Records
state that the patent was sealed Nov. 4. Hubbard calls the sum to be paid
forty-eight pounds per annum, instead of the forty shillings mentioned in the
Records. The names of the associates are in Hubbard.
No. 22.-1631, Dec. 1. To Robert Trelawny and Moses Goodyear, the
traict lying between Cammock's patent " and the bay and river of Casco, and
extending northwards into the mainland, so far as the limits and bounds of the
lar ds granted to the said Thomas Cammock, do and ought to extend towards
th&e north." It was claimed that this grant included Cape Elizabeth, and nearly
all' the ancient town of Falmouth, and part of Gorham and Richmond island.
A'ontest was maintained, in reference to boundaries, for many years, extending
beyond the lives of the first settlers. Willis, Hist. of Portland, pp. 32, 33;
(council Records.
No. 23. —1632, Feb. 29. To Robert Aldworth and Giles Elbridge: first,
one hundred acres for every person transported by them within seven years,
adjacent to twelve thousand acres, afterwards mentioned, and not lately granted,
or settled and inhabited, by any English. Second, twelve thousand acres more
to be laid out near the river Pemaquid, along the sea-coast as the coast lieth,
and up the river as far as may contain the said twelve thousand acres and
the hundred acres for each person transported, together with all the islands
opposite their coast within three leagues into the ocean. In consideration that
they have undertaken to build a town, &c. Powers of government, or administration, are also expressed in the deed, which was signed by the Earl of
Warwick and Sir Ferdinando Gorges. Pemaquid, like other territories in
Maine, has been a subject of much controversy, and has experienced many
vicissitudes. It is said that one of its sons is preparing a history of its fortunes.
~'Ancient Pemaquid" has already been the subject of an Historical Review, by
Mr. Thornton. A notarial copy on parchment of the original deed, and two
volumes of the records of its proprietors, from 1743 to 1774, are in the library
of the American Antiquarian Society.
No. 24. - 1632, June 16. Under this date, in Mr. Sainsbury's Calendar
of Colonial Papers in the State Paper Office, London, is the following entry:
" Grant of the Council for New England to George Way and Thomas Purchas,




160             HISTORY OF THE GRANTS UNDER THE
of certain lands in New England, called the River Bishopscotte, and all that
bounds and limits the mainland adjoining the river to the extent of two miles."
By Bishopscotte is meant Pejepscot, now Brunswick.   Purchas, it is said,
took possession in 1628, and lived there many years. In 1639, he conveyed
the title and jurisdiction to Massachusetts, reserving the interest and possession
of such lands as he should use and improve within seven years. Hazard, vol. i.
p. 457. The country was depopulated during the Indian war of 1675; after
which, Richard Wharton obtained the claims of both Purchas and Way, expecting a confirmation from the King, but died before his plans were completed.
See Willis, Hist. of Portland, p. 24; Coll. of Me. Hist. Society, vol. iii. articles
v. and vi.
The original deed to Way and Purchas has long since been lost, and no
record of it remains. This grant was the subject of a long and bitter controversy between the Pejepscot proprietors and other claimants, not finally settled
till about 1814. Willis, Hist. of Portland, p. 64, note.
The efforts of the Council to divide New England into provinces, or lordships, and distribute these among themselves, remain to be noticed. There
are indications that such a design was entertained at an early period; but the
charter was found to be defective, and arrangements were soon made for a neow
one, from which all the patentees who had not paid their dues were to be e'xcluded. To entitle a partner to the benefit of the lands and the privileges (of
a patentee, a payment of ~110 was required. It was voted that delinquents
should forfeit all interest under the charter, and their rights and privileges }oe
transferred to persons willing to take their places and make the payments.
Not more than half of the original patentees accepted the conditions of membership, and fewer still seem to have redeemed their pledges.
At various dates in the Records, -May 31, 1622, July 24, 1622, June 21,
and 26, 1632, - agreements and orders are introduced having in view the
assignment of territory, more or less particularly designated, to certain members. But all these orders and agreements, whatever may have been the intentions of the Council at the time, were treated as of no validity when they came
to surrender the charter to the King. In preparation for that event, they met
on the 3d of February, 1634-5, and divided the coast of New England into
eight parts; viz.:1st, From the southern limits in the fortieth degree of latitude to Hudson's
River.
2d, From Hudson's River to a river or creek (" near a place called Redunes
or Reddownes") about sixty miles eastward.
3d, From that river eastward about forty-five miles, to a river or creek called
Fresh River.
4th, From the Connecticut River to the Narraganset River, accounted about
sixty miles.
5th, From Narraganset River around Cape Cod to Naumkeag (Salem).
6th, From Naumkeag to Piscataqua Harbor and River.
7th, From Piscataqua Harbor to the Kennebec River.
8th, From the Kennebec River to the St. Croix.




GREAT COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND.                   161
By comparing the Council Records, the " Briefe Narration" of Gorges, and
Hubbard's History of New England, we find that the First portion was assigned
to the Earl of Arundel (Gorges says Lord Mulgrave, who was originally Lord
Sheffield); the Second to the Duke of Richmond (in place of the Duke of
Lenox); the Third to the Earl of Carlisle; the Fourth to Lord Gorges; the
Fifth to the Marquis of Hamilton; the Sixth to Captain John Mason; the
Seventh to Sir Ferdinando Gorges; the Eighth to Lord Alexander.
Each of these divisions was to extend back into the interior sixty miles,
except the last, which reached to the " river of Canada."
Each division, except the last two, was to have, in addition, ten thousand
acres on the " east part of Sagadahoc." The seventh division was to have
with it the north half of the Isles of Shoals and the Isles of Capawock, Nautican, &c., near Cape Cod; and the eighth division the Island called Mattawack,
or the Long Island, west of Cape Cod. The south half of the Isles of Shoals
was to go with the division of Captain Mason.
There is apparently a space omitted between " Fresh River," wherever that
was, and the Connecticut.
These divisions are described with particularity in the Records of the Couneilk It is stated that the grants were signed and delivered on the fourteenth
day of April; that, on the eighteenth, leases, for three thousand years, of the
several divisions, were made to the persons interested; and that on the twentysecond, deeds of feofment were made to them.
To every one that had previously a lawful grant of lands was reserved the
fr;ehold with its rights, he " laying down his jura regalia (if he have any) and
playing some small acknowledgment, for that he is now to hold his land anew
fof the proprietor of the division.'
It is to be inferred that this remnant of the Council included all who were
then desirous, or qualified, to receive assignments of territory.
The account of this division by Hubbard, Hist. of N. E., chap. xxxi., differs
from that in the Records in many important particulars, and is less likely to be
correct.
On the 26th of April, 1635, the Council prepared a petition to the King that
he would cause patents to be made for the several divisions, to be held immediately from himself; and on the 5th of May resolved that the deeds should be
acknowledged before a Master in Chancery, and enrolled before the surrender
of the charter, and the King be requested to confirm them under the Great
Seal; also to prosecute a suit at law for the repeal of the Massachusetts patent.
They also prepared the form of an acceptance for the King to adopt on their
surrender of the charter, and a declaration of the reasons on account of which
the surrender was made. The formal resignation was dated June 7, 1635.
The acceptance of the surrender may have been held in abeyance for a
time, as meetings of the Council are recorded, Nov. 26, 1635, March 22, 1637,
and Nov. 1, 1638, at which business was transacted. The Earl of Lindsay desired to have a proportion of land allotted to him; which was assented to, to be
"on ye river where the Flemings are seated," above the Duke of Richmond.
Lord Maltravers wished for " a degree more in longitude and latitude joining
his limits (had he taken the place of some one of the eight grantees?), which the
11




162            HISTORY OF THE GRANTS FOR NEW ENGLAND.
Council were willing to assent to, if he would declare in what direction he wanted
it. The Earl of Sterling's (Lord Alexander's) proportion was carried more
distinctly to the Kennebec River; and Lord Gorges, and Sir Ferdinando Gorges,
were each allowed sixty miles further up into the mainland.
Our supplement can afford no space for comments or inferences; but it is
apparent that no such division as is referred to by Captain John Smith in 1624,
and laid down on the map published by Purchas, was recognized by the Council
as valid, and that no territorial rights were admitted as having belonged to the
Earl of Warwick. The charter of Massachusetts was to be annulled, the entire
coast of New England divided among the eight Proprietary's above named, and
all remaining rights and powers belonging to the Grand Patent surrendered to
the King, Sir Ferdinando Gorges to be made his Lieutenant or Governor over
the whole country as a province of the Crown. Political events at home prevented the accomplishment of this design.     Captain John Mason and Sir Ferdinando Gorges alone contrived to secure permanent advantages to themselves.
No other executed deed of any of the proposed divisions has come down to us but
that to Mason, April 22, 1635, without, however, a confirmation from the King.
Gorges received his division, with the additional sixty miles into the interior, in
the form of a charterfrom the Crown, dated April 3, 1639. Obscurity of descrip-.
tion, the overlapping of boundaries in different deeds, the introduction of powers
which the Council could not legally confer (such as those of government aaud
administration), and imperfect execution, seem to have rendered most of their
early grants unsound in their own estimation; and perhaps all of them would
have proved to be void or voidable if subjected to a strict legal test. It w ill
simplify the subject, if we strike from the list of those which preceded
the final division the first eight and the thirteenth as of no subsequent consequence, and rest the claims of Mason and Gorges upon the deeds to Mason
of Nov. 7, 1629 and April 22, 1635, and the charter to Gorges of April 3, 1639,
as some of their representatives appear to have done (see Prov. Papers of N.SH.
p. 28, note). Massachusetts ultimately took the place of these great proprietors,
and extended her jurisdiction over most of the territory covering the minor
patents, whose adjustment among the parties interested was the work of much
time, and a great deal of law.
NOTE.
In Hubbard's History of N. E., pp. 231-2, is what purports to be an attested copy of so much of the
agreement for a division among themselves, by the Council, as relates to the portion assigned to Captain
John Mason. It is signed.by the other seven Council members. It contains also the paragraphs
which, in the Records of the Council, precede and follow the list and descriptions of the several divisions;
and an error in copying the first paragraph has increased the confusion heretofore attending this subject.
The agreement, as the Records show, was dated Feb. 3, 1634; and the copyist of Iubbard's document
introduced that date into the first paragraph, which alludes to an attempt in the lifetime of King James,
and in his presence, to effect a similar division, making it appear as if the attempt occurred on that
date. In the second edition of Hubbard, the editor, Mr. Harris, observing that there must be a mistake,
altered the figures from 1634 to 1624; a worse error, as it has led to the belief that a division was actually made on the 3d of February, 1624. The Records mention no such date.
It is proper to state, that the original Records of the Council for New England are not extant. The
copy printed by the American Antiquarian Society, in 1867, was obtained by me in London, at the State
Paper Office, where the parts so recovered exist in the form of a transcript, apparently made for a judicial purpose. Our historians were already familiar with them there.




THE COLONY OF NEW PLYMOUTH
AND
IrVtS RELATIONS TO MASSACHUSETTS.
BY WILLIAM BRIGHAM.








THE COLONY OF NEW PLYMOUTH
AND
ITS RELATIONS TO MASSACHUSETTS.
THE colony of New Plymouth comprised all the present
territory of the counties of Plymouth, Barnstable, and
Bristol, with the exception of Hingham, which was. a part of
the colony of Massachusetts Bay. It had also an additional
strip on its southern border, now included in the State of
E/hode Island. Its history as a civil community begins on the
signing of the compact, on the eleventh of November, 1620, in
the cabin of the " Mayflower," while she lay at anchor in the
harbor of Cape Cod; and ends on its union with Massachusetts,
under the province charter, in 1691, -a period of seventy-one
years. It began with a population of about one hundred persons; and terminated with a population of about nine thousand.
It began in doubt and uncertainty, in what they called a
"remote corner of the earth;" but the threescore and eleven
years of its existence enabled its people to accomplish the great
purposes for which they endured and suffered so much, and to
establish institutions and principles of civil government, which
are now, and will ever be, the pride and admiration of every
true friend of freedom.
This colony was the first permanent European settlement in
New England. Other and earlier attempts had been made, but
had failed. An English colony had been established at Jamestown, in Virginia, a few years before; and the French had made
a feeble settlement in Canada. These two colonies were their
only European neighbors; and either of them was as incapable
of affording aid to the Pilgrims at Plymouth, if they had been




166           THE COLONY OF NEW PLYMOUTH
so disposed, as if they had been on the other side of the Atlantic.
Previous to this settlement, Smith and Gosnold had sailed along
the shores of New England, explored various places on its
coast; and had published accounts of their voyages at home,
giving a most favorable impression of its climate and soil, and
the thousand sources of wealth which must follow its occupation.
Early in the seventeenth century, the people of England were
looking with intense interest towards the new world, not only as
a place for the acquisition of wealth, but as a refuge from the
oppressions and burdens which they began so severely to feel.
It was this state of feeling which induced James I., in 1606, to
grant a charter to two companies to settle Virginia, which was
then the name given to the whole country. This charter granted
a strip of land on the coast, about one hundred miles wide, and
extending from the thirty-fourth to the forty-fifth degree of
north latitude. The first, or southern colony, had permission to,
settle anywhere between the thirty-fourth and forty-first degrees;
and the northern colony, anywhere between the thirty-eighth
and forty-fifth degrees; but neither colony was permitted t o
settle within one hundred miles of the one which should make
the first settlement.
I refer to this charter now, and shall refer to other charters,
merely to enable us fully to understand some of the difficulties,
under which the Plymouth colony labored, during their whole
history. The Pilgrims before leaving home had obtained a
charter from the southern colony, undoubtedly expecting to
settle within its limits; but when they arrived at Cape Cod,
they found themselves beyond the limits of the southern Virginia
company, and, of course, their charter was of no use to them in
that position.
It was under these circumstances, and for these reasons, that
they established, under their own hands, a Constitution of
government in the famous compact of Nov. 11, 1620, in which
they acknowledged themselves the subjects of King James, and
say, -
"That having undertaken for the glory of God, and advancement of
Christian faith, and the honor of our king and country, a voyage to plant
the first colony in the northern parts of Virginia, do by these presents, sol



AND ITS RELATIONS TO MASSACHUSETTS.        167
emnly and mutually, in the presence of God and one another, covenant
and combine ourselves in a civil body politic, for our better ordering and
preservation, and furtherance of the ends aforesaid. And by virtue'
hereof, do enact, constitute, and form such just and equal laws, ordinances,
acts, constitutions, and offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most
meet and convenient for the good of the colony, unto which we promise
all due submission and obedience.
"In witness whereof, we have hereunder subscribed our names at
Cape Cod, the eleventh of November, in the year of the reign of our
sovereign lord, King James of England, France, and Ireland, the eighteenth; and of Scotland, the fifty-fourth. Anno Domini, 1620."
This was their whole constitution of government then, and
for ten years afterwards, and was in fact their real constitution, during the whole history of the colony.   Subsequent
events gave them other claims of authority; but how valid these
claims were, we shall see in what thereafter took place.
This agreement bearing the names of nearly all the adult male
immbers of the company, and executed on the very day of their
arrival at Cape Cod, and before any one had left the ship, for the
p/irpose of establishing a civil government, under which they
p-ould enact laws, and protect and control their little community,
is certainly one of the most remarkable acts of these remarkable
men. The history of the world had afforded them no precedent
of this character.  This is the first of written constitutions the.
world ever knew, and is the sole invention of the Pilgrims. It
established principles which were then new and untried. All
were made equal before the law, and had an equal voice in the
government. All were compelled to submit to the majority, and
to give obedience to such laws as the majority should enact.
There was no division of powers, no creation of offices, no
restraints or checks upon the government. The majority rule of
all the people was their only guide.  These principles have
since become familiar to the American mind, and have in fact
become the basis of all our governments; and two and a half
centuries have proved the truth of the remark of Governor
Bradford, that " such an act, under their circumstances, might be
as firm as any patent, and in some respects more sure." 1
At about the time of the signing of this compact, and without
1 Bradford's Hist., p. 89; Morton's Memorial, p. 37.




168           THE COLONY OF NEW PLYMOUTH
the knowledge of the Pilgrims, the great patent of New England was granted to forty persons, called the " Council established at Plymouth, in the County of Devon, for the Planting and
Governing of New England in America." It superseded the first
grant to the northern Virginia colony; and granted all the
territory from forty to forty-eight degrees north latitude, and
from sea to sea. It was this extensive grant, and those that
followed it, that afterwards created conflicting claims among the
American colonies, which were not fully settled till after the
Revolution, and the Independence of the country.
This charter gave the company most extensive powers, and
included within its limits the territory which the Pilgrims had
settled. As this was a charter from the King, it gave to that
company rights superior to those of the Pilgrims, which rested
on no higher claim than " squatter sovereignty."
As soon, therefore, as the Pilgrims had learned what this
grant was, they applied to the Council at Plymouth, for a grant
of the soil which they had taken possession of. A charter was
obtained in the name of John Pierce,'in 1621; but it was s'o
imperfect, and so little suited to their wants and condition, tha't
the colonists never used it. It gave them no distinct and separate territory; but a grant of a certain number of acres to each
settler. It really accomplished nothing towards the establishment
of a civil government, which the Pilgrims had so much at heart.
In 1629, another charter was granted to William Bradford and
his associates, which, if it had been ratified and approved by the
King, would have fully answered the purposes in view. It defined
the boundaries of the territory, and gave them, nominally at least,
power to make such laws and regulations as should be necessary.
But this charter came from the Council at Plymouth. That
Council could grant the soil, but could not confer on the colony
powers of government. A grant of these powers could come
only from the King. And it was for this reason, that, during their
whole history, they exhibited constant anxiety about it, and
were from time to time seeking the King's ratification. They
sought it from Charles I., and also at the restoration of Charles
II.; but they met with no success from either. It was from this
want of authority that they lost the territory on their southern
border, - the charter to the Rhode Island colony from the King




AND ITS RELATIONS TO MASSACHUSETTS.     169
extending over and beyond the boundary of the Plymouth
colony, and being regarded as of higher authority than the
charter of the latter, which the King had never sanctioned.
The colonists of Massachusetts Bay were more fortunate.
They had a grant of their charter both from the King and the
Council at Plymouth. It was made before they left home, and
was brought with them as their constitution of government.
It will thus be seen that the compact of 1620 was the basis of
the Plymouth Constitution. Under it they enacted laws and
accomplished the great ends of civil government, and it was
always referred to as affording the highest evidence of their
authority. In 1636, the General Court, in declaring the sources
of the authority of this government, and the title to its lands,
cited this compact, the treaty with Massasoit, the grant from the
Indians, and the charters to Pierce, and to Bradford and his associates. But the enumeration of so many grounds of authority
betrays a consciousness of the weakness of their several claims,
aid this may have been a prominent cause of a less determined
resistance to the demands of the commissioners of Charles II.
t/an was made by their neighbors of the Massachusetts Bay.
During the first ten years the Plymouth colony was very
feeble. At the end of the first winter there were but fifty-one persons, three-fourths of whom were women and children. In 1627,
their number had increased to one hundred and sixty-six. There
was some increase afterwards, but at the time of the settlement of
Boston in 1630, they probably did not exceed two hundred and
fifty. In the charter to Bradford, it is stated that the population
of the colony was near three hundred persons. This was undoubtedly an exaggeration, for the whole evidence shows that it
did not exceed the number before-mentioned. But feeble though
it was, it was nevertheless a real, success. Ten years had made
it a well-established community. They had built their dwellings
and had established their farms, cultivating the soil, and obtaining therefrom ample means for their support. They had suffered
from famine and endured almost every privation, yet they did
not complain; nor were they discouraged, but trusted in God,
believing that better things were in store for them. Their faith
in the future was never shaken. They never doubted that this
was their home, and that they should be the founders of a free,




170           THE COLONY OF NEW PLYMOUTH
God-fearing people. When the " Mayflower " left them in April,
1621, on her return voyage, not one of the surviving Pilgrims
went back with her; but all stayed in their new home, already
consecrated by the graves of one-half of their number. They
planted their seed, and when the harvest was gathered, appointed
a day of thanksgiving for their mutual rejoicing, and thus unconsciously established an institution which has already become
national, and has given joy to at least eight generations of their
descendants.
Fortunately, we have a record of most of the public acts of
this colony; and from that record, as it appears in their laws,
judicial proceedings, conveyances of land, wills, and inventories
of property, we have the means of learning their character and
condition almost as accurately as if they had been our contemporaries. It was the custom of the day to record in the inventory of every deceased person's property, a detailed statement of
every article, so that we can now ascertain how many shoes,
what clothing, and what articles of furniture each man had. If
he had any books, all the titles were given, and it would not be
difficult to give a list of every volume found in the colony.
For the first ten years most of the people resided in Plymouth. This was necessary for their protection. They had no
officers but a governor, with at first one assistant, - afterwards
increased to seven, - and a constable. All the freemen met in
General Court, enacted such laws and made such orders as they
needed, and tried and punished offenders. The legislation during this period was very meagre. The first law recorded established trial by jury in all cases, both civil and criminal. This
was in 1623, showing their strong attachment to an institution
of their native country, which has ever been regarded as the
protector and birthright of the English race. In 1626, they enacted that no boards or timber should be exported from the
colony without the consent of the Governor and Council; and
this was done too, as the act expressed it, from fear that they
should not have timber enough for their own use, though the
whole country was filled with it, -a fear that the experience
of two hundred years has proved to be wholly groundless.
The right of the franchise during the early history of the
colony was confined to the freemen: afterwards in the election




AND ITS RELATIONS TO MASSACHUSETTS.        171
of deputies, and in the management of town affairs, other persons were allowed to vote; and so general was the franchise, that
in some towns a majority of voters were not freemen. In 1669,
none were allowed to vote in town affairs but freemen, or freeholders of twenty pounds' ratable estate. The General Court
alone admitted freemen; but the same was often done on the
recommendation of the towns, and for many years no special
qualifications were required; but in 1671 it was providedThat none shall be admitted a freeman of this corporation, but such
as are one-and-twenty years of age, at the least, and have the testimony
of their neighbors that they are of sober and peaceable conversation,
orthodox in the fundamentals of religion, and such as have also twenty
pounds of ratable estate in the government."1
In this respect they differed from their neighbors in Massachusetts, where a voter must have been a member of a church.
The right of taking away the franchise in case of crime or loss
of character was always claimed and frequently exercised by the
General Court. The right of suffrage created a duty on the
part of the freeman, and if he failed to attend the Court, he sub-jected himself to a penalty of ten shillings. The right of suf1rage was regarded by them, as it always will be by all men who
value free institutions, as a right which should never be neglected, and one in which the whole public, as well as the individual, have an interest.
The right of inquiring into the fitness of the deputies was
always exercised, and in 1658 it was provided, that" The General Court should, on being assembled, first take notice of their
members, and if any were found unfit for such a trust, that they and the
reasons therefore be returned to the town from which they were sent, that
they might make choice of more able and fit persons to send in their stead;"
a right which, if exercised properly and fairly in some modern
assemblies, would leave them without a quorum.
The success of this colony, though comparatively small, undoubtedly did much to promote other settlements in New England. The reports of Winslow and Bradford were read eagerly
at home, and may have been an influential cause in promoting
the settlement of Massachusetts Bay. But whether so or not, the
settlement of Massachusetts was a most auspicious event to
1 Plymouth Laws, p. 258.




172           THE COLONY OF NEW PLYMOUTH
the colony of New Plymouth. It established at once as their
neighbors a community of intelligent people, having the same
great objects in view, and ready at all times to exercise towards
them their friendly offices, and afford them such aid and protection as their situation required. The Massachusetts colonists
were soon numbered by thousands, and were guided by men of
great intelligence and purity. Compared with the people of Plymouth, they were rich, and able to supply themselves with such
things as were necessary to the successful planting of a colony.
They imported at once large numbers of neat cattle, horses, sheep,
goats, and swine, so that in four or five years they had an ample
supply for all their wants, and by the introduction of such agricultural implements as were known and used at that day, they
were enabled at once to cultivate and improve their lands, and
to obtain abundant crops.
The prosperity of Massachusetts soon reacted on Plymouth;
and of the great tide of emigration which soon set in, Plymouth
received her proportional part, so that in 1643 its population had
increased to three thousand, and had extended beyond Plymouth,
establishing several other towns in the colony.
This increase and extension of population required a more
extensive system of legislation, and in 1636 there was a revision
of the laws, and something like a code adopted. Before they
adopted their code, however, they made a declaration as a fundamental law -' That no imposition, law, or ordinance be made by ourselves or others
at present or to come, but such as shall be made or imposed by consent,
according to the free liberties of the state and kingdom of England, and no
otherwise."
The very doctrine maintained by their descendants in the
Revolution, and the violation of which led to American Independence. The early enunciation of this doctrine would indicate,
that even then they expected and intended to make their own
laws, and not to be governed by those of any other country.
At this period, there was a secretary who kept their records,
and it was not unusual to record the repeal of a law by a simple
erasure, giving the date of such repeal. This appears in the
forms of the oaths of office, which as first drawn required the
officer to swear to be truly loyal to our Sovereign Lord, his heirs




AND ITS RELATIONS TO MASSACHUSETTS.      173
and successors. After the Rebellion in England, these words
were erased, and the words, "the State and Government of
England as it now stands," were interlined. At the Restoration,
these were in turn erased, and the original restored.
During this period a law was enacted, making it penal in the
sum of twenty pounds sterling for any one elected to the office
of governor to decline the service; a fact showing that the race
of gubernatorial candidates, so abundant in our times, had not
then begun to exist.
Till 1639, all the freemen assembled together for the enactment
of laws. As the settlements extended, this became inconvenient,
and their families were left exposed. At first, proxies were
allowed, then delegates were chosen who could enact laws; but
they were subject to repeal by the whole body of freemen at the
general election. In fact, during the whole history of the colony,
though most of the laws were enacted in a meeting of delegates
from the towns, yet the right of all the freemen to come together,and take the legislation into their own hands was never entirely
abandoned.
In 1658, there was a new revision of the laws, and the secretary was directed to send a manuscript copy of this revision to
every town in the colony, and the towns were required to furnish
the secretary with the necessary paper to make a copy, and to
have them read publicly once a year. One of these copies, at
least, is still in existence. The third revision was in 1671, when
the laws for the first time were printed. Massachusetts printed
her first code in 1648, anticipating Plymouth in this respect
twenty-three years.
These laws show more fully than any thing else, what were
the wants, opinions, and policy of the people. The charter to
Bradford declared that the tenure of their lands should be, as of
the manor of East Greenwich, in the county of Kent,- an old
Saxon tenure, by which the lands descended to the sons equally,
to the exclusion of the daughters. This tenure was adopted in
their code of 1636; and there is no provision of law making
any change till 1685, when it was provided that all the lands
should descend to the sons equally, except that the oldest son
should have a double portion; and if there was but one son,
he should have the whole, even if there were a dozen daughters




174           THE COLONY OF NEW PLYMOUTH
excluded. There was, however, a provision by which the daughters could be protected. They could apply to the County Court
for an allowance, and thereupon the Court would order the son
or sons to pay a fixed sum of money to them, if they thought it
expedient.
Massachusetts early adopted a more equitable rule, dividing
the lands among all the children, the sons and daughters alike,
except that the oldest son had a double portion, -a system that
continued through the whole history of the province, and was
not abolished till 1789, nine years after the adoption of our
State Constitution.
This rule of descent in Plymouth, though different from that
of Massachusetts, was often rendered inoperative by the making
of wills. These often provided lands for the daughters, and in
some cases gave the oldest son a double portion. Captain Standish gave a double portion to his oldest son. This system of a
double portion to the oldest son was borrowed from the Jewish
law, and seemed to our ancestors more equitable than the English law of primogeniture.
The authority to make disposition of property by will was
fully recognized; and many of the colonists availed themselves
of it. It is from these wills that we learn more fully than from
any other source the true views of the colonists. They often
refer to the object of their coming to this country, express their
religious belief, and a desire to distribute their property for the
glory of God, and the good of the colony, not forgetting to provide for the education of their children, and for works of charity.
Their estates were very small, varying from ~50 to ~600; and,
of course, their charitable contributions were necessarily small.
As they had no money, they were compelled to make contributions from their domestic animals and other personal property. The church to which they belonged was seldom forgotten.
Dr. Samuel Fuller, whose will was proved in 1633, after providing for his family and friends, says,"I give, out of my stock of cattle, the first cow-calf that my brown
cow shall have, to the church of God, at Plymouth, to be employed by
the Deacon or Deacons of the said church, for the good of the said church,
at the oversight of the ruling elders."
Others of equal generosity, but of less means, gave smaller




AND ITS RELATIONS TO MASSACHUSETTS.     175
things, frequently a ewe-lamb, which was not only a common
gift to the church, but to all grandchildren throughout the colony.
These gifts appear small, but it must be recollected that they
were poor; and even fifteen years later, when the Commissioners
of the United Colonies proposed a contribution through the
colonies, for the benefit of poor students at Harvard College, they
asked only for a peck of corn from each family. And at a later
date there was an actual contribution through the colony, for the
benefit of Harvard College; and the people of the colony showed
their interest in that institution, by contributing from their scanty
means corn and other grains, in quantities which appear at this
day very small.  Yet even these were most acceptable gifts;
and, by this universal good will, that institution, created "to
prevent learning from being buried in the graves of the fathers,"
was sustained, and its usefulness extended.
The inventories which were presented by executors and administrators, show some very curious facts.  I have stated that
lhley present every article in detail, so that we can see and know,
atfter two hundred years, exactly what furniture and clothing
tWhey had, even to the number of chairs and shoes. They were
all provided with some kind of gun or arms. Some of them'had armor.  Their cattle, at the end of twenty years, had
become numerous, and constituted a considerable part of their
personal property. The titles of all their books are given in
detail, with some few exceptions.  Dr. Fuller's medical works
are described in his inventory, as "Physic Books," and were
valued at ~1; and his chest of surgical instruments was appraised at ~5, making the whole stock of books and instruments
of the physician of the colony, of the value of ~6. All of them
had one or more Bibles; and generally a psalm-book, together
with various religious books, generally an exposition of Revelations, or some of the books of the Old Testament. They had
spinning-wheels almost without exception, together with a small
quantity of hemp and flax, from which they manufactured their
own clothing.
In the inventory of Miles Standish, the military man of the
colony, I find about the usual kinds of property. He had a
library of some twenty volumes, among which were three
Bibles, Caesar's Commentaries, and a law-book. It is not




176           THE COLONY OF NEW PLYMOUTH
stated what the law-book was, but it is one of the few found in
the colony for thirty years; and whether it contributed any
thing to a knowledge of the common law of England, does not
appear. Of his instruments of war, he had one fowling-piece,
three muskets, four carbines, two small guns, one old barrel,
one sword, one cutlass, and three belts.
Of his furniture, he had a warming-pan, a frying-pan, and a
cullender. He also had two saddles, a pillion, and a bridle;
sixteen pieces of pewter, a still, a malt-mill, and some spinningwheels. It also appears that he was a successful farmer, as well
as warrior; for he had a large herd of cattle, including four
oxen; and the product of his farm was twenty-five bushels
of corn, eleven bushels of wheat, fourteen bushels of rye, and
thirty bushels of pease.  His whole property amounted to
~358.
Governor Bradford had a much larger estate; and from the
inventory of his property, it appears that he had three matchlock muskets; a snaphance musket; a birding-piece; a pistol, and
cutlass; and one pair of old bandelaires. Of his furniture, he had
four leather chairs; one great leather chair; two great woodean
chairs, and two stools; also two spinning-wheels. Of his cloth-.
ing, he had a stuffe suit, with silver buttons; a cloth cloak, faced
with taffety; a pair of black breeches, and a red waistcoat; one
black hat, and one colored one; one pair of boots, and twentyone pairs of shoes. He had some hundred volumes of books,
among which are two Bibles; also Mr. Cotton's answer to Mr.
Williams, which, at that time, excited much interest in the
Plymouth colony, where Mr. Roger Williams resided for a time,
and was treated with great kindness and consideration by many
of the leading men.
I give this as a specimen of the property which some of the
principal men of the colony had. Most of them had only the
furniture necessary to furnish a log hut, or a dwelling equally
humble; and I have no doubt that there is more furniture, in
value, in any one of fifty houses in Boston, at the present day,
than there was in the whole Plymouth colony in 1650. A full
statement of all their property, as it appears in their inventories,
would give almost as accurate an idea of their condition as we
could obtain from a daguerreotype.




AND ITS RELATIONS TO MASSACHUSETTS.      177
In the judicial proceedings there was great simplicity. They
intended to follow, as far as they could, the common law of England. But they had few law-books and no lawyers; and it was
not always easy to ascertain what the common law was. They
discarded all the cumbersome forms in use at that time in England; and adopted such forms as their own good sense dictated.
The General Court was the only Court for some years; and the
Governor and assistants tried most of the cases during the whole
history of the colony. For some years their deeds of land were
neither signed nor sealed; but an acknowledgment of the sale
was made before a magistrate, who made a memorandum of it.
They had a grand jury to find an indictment; but when one was
found, it was often contained in two or three lines, and meant
what it said; and a common man could understand far better
what the charge was, than he could in the excessive verbiage of
some more modern indictments.
The punishments were often left to the discretion of the
Courts; but they were chiefly fines, whipping, placing in the
tocks, or town cage, - for every town was compelled by law to,ave a cage.
Their criminal law was remarkably mild for that day, and was
mildly administered. At the revision of 1636, there were but
eight capital offences. At that time there were twenty in Massachusetts, and thirty-one in England, where they afterwards
increased to upwards of two hundred. Baylies informs us, that
no execution ever took place in the colony for any crime but
murder. In this he is not strictly correct; though executions for
other crimes were very rare, and perhaps there was but a single
exception to the statement which the historian of the colony has
made. At any rate, more trials for a capital offence have taken
place in Massachusetts, during the year 1868, than all the trials
of that character which took place in this colony during its whole
existence. Crimes of the highest character were very rare. Most
of the offences actually punished would have been passed over
at the present day without notice. Taking tobacco, smoking,
laughing in public religious meetings, inveigling the affections
of young girls without the consent of their parents, were all
offences which they could not tolerate; and they, and others of
like character, make up the great part of the crimes which en12




178           THE COLONY OF NEW PLYMOUTH
titled the guilty one to a moderate whipping, or a temporary
confinement in the stocks, or town cage.
There is nothing more erroneous than to suppose that the
Pilgrims, or the people of Plymouth, were harsh or severe in
their laws, or in their mode of executing them. The reverse is
the actual truth. There is not an instance of a civilized community, certainly not of that day, whose criminal code was so
mild, or whose citizens were more obedient to the laws under
which they lived. Where their own laws were defective, they
had recourse to the law of God. There was a law against
witchcraft, or compaction with the devil; but no person was ever
tried for that offence. There was a law against Quaker Rantors; but no Quaker had a hair of his head hurt. Gorton presented to the Court a railing accusation, which, in modern times,
would have sent him to the lunatic asylum; yet they took no
further notice of it, than to order it to be recorded in their public
records, thus perpetuating the evidence of their own forbearance
and discretion, and the folly and malice of their accuser.
They intended, undoubtedly, in their judicial proceedings, t
follow the common law of England. This they claimed as thei
birthright. But they were not educated to the law, and they di(
not always know what was the law of their native country.
They were thoroughly conversant with the law of Moses; and
they sometimes found it better suited to their condition than the
law of England; and when it was so, they did not hesitate to
adopt it. There were no lawyers, by profession or education,
for many years; and it was not until 1671, that the law expressly
authorized any party to employ one or two attorneys to manage
his case, but on the express condition that they should do nothing "to deceive the Court or to darken the case;" a provision
which, perhaps, might be adopted with profit at the present
time.
In this respect, Massachusetts had a decided advantage over
Plymouth. Her early emigrants were many of them either educated to the law, or at least conversant with it: all the laws and
records show this. They adopted the substance, without the use
of the technicalities, of the law at home. Their conveyances of
land were in form, their laws clearly and properly drawn, and
their judicial proceedings preserving the form and order practised




AND ITS RELATIONS TO MASSACHUSETTS      179
at home. The leading men of Plymouth always sought the
advice of the leading men of Massachusetts, and they were happy
to follow it; and in nothing is the influence of Massachusetts
more apparent than in the laws. Massachusetts was then the
leading colony in New England, and her influence on all the
other colonies is very striking; and it is not unusual to find her
laws copied, word for word, and adopted by the other colonies.
This influence was very much increased by the formation of the
Confederacy in 1643, which brought the colonies into more intimate relations, and united them upon various matters necessary
for their defence. The recommendations of the Commissioners
of the United Colonies were generally treated with respect by
the local legislatures, and oftentimes adopted by all of them at
about the same time. These Commissioners did not confine
themselves to the questions of peace and war, or of foreign
commerce, but considered most matters connected with the
irosperity of the colonies. If any one was lacking in the means
of education, or in the support of a learned ministry, they did;not hesitate to call attention to the fact, and to suggest a remedy.'The influence of this Confederacy on the policy and fortunes of'the several colonies would be an interesting subject of inquiry;
and it would undoubtedly appear that this union was one of the
important series of events, which not only sustained and protected New England in her weakness and infancy, but which
finally led to the independence of the country, and the formation
of our present national government.
In ecclesiastical matters, there was a difference between Massachusetts and Plymouth. The Plymouth colonists were Brownists, or Separatists. They had separated themselves wholly from
the Church of England, and maintained the doctrine of Independency. The Massachusetts colonists had not, when they
left home, wholly so separated themselves, but were connected
with the mother church, though protesting against its service
and ritual. But on finding themselves in a new country, they
soon discovered that there was no material difference between
them and the Independents at Plymouth. The Pilgrims at Plymouth assisted in the organization of the church at Salem, and
Governor Bradford gave them the right hand of fellowship. In
ecclesiastical matters, there is no doubt that the example of Ply



180           THE COLONY OF NEW PLYMOUTH
mouth exercised an important influence over the churches of
Massachusetts: both, in a short time, became branches of one
denomination, which has always been known as Congregational.
Plymouth adhered to its system with great strictness, and Massachusetts substantially adopted it. The Plymouth churches sang
from the Psalter of Ainsworth through their whole history, but
Massachusetts prepared a version of the Psalms for herself, which
was used very generally in her churches for more than a century,
and was known as the New-England version.
The Plymouth colonists were zealous in establishing churches
and in supporting public worship, but it was many years after
the settlement before they supported their ministers by a general
tax.
But in process of time there began to be some complaint that
the ministers were not properly supported, and in 1655 the magistrates were ordered"to use all gentle means to pursuade them to do their duty, but if any of
them shall not be reclaimed thereby, but shall persist through plain obstinacy against an ordinance of God, that then it shall be in the power of
the magistrate to use such other means as may put them on their duty."
These gentle means of persuasion did not answer the purpose;
and, in a few years after, the legal obligation to support public
worship throughout the colony was established by law, and pretty
strictly enforced.
The Plymouth colonists were not so much wiser than the rest
of the world, as to avoid all errors in political economy and legislation.  They undertook much which modern experience has
shown to be impracticable. In 1638 they fixed the wages of a
laborer at twelvepence per day and board, or eighteen pence
without board, allowing but sixpence a day for board.  They
also provided, that no single person who did not belong to the
family should reside in it without the consent of the Governor
and Council. They attempted to fix the price of corn and other
grains, and to determine for what sum they should be received in
pay. In 1669 the constables of every town were ordered to look
after such as sleep or play about the meeting-house, in times of
the public worship of God, on the Lord's day, and to report their
names to the Court; and it is not unusual to find that persons




AND ITS RELATIONS TO MASSACHUSETTS.      181
were fined for these offences. At that time the men sat on one
side of the meeting-house, and the women on the other, and the
children by themselves with some one to keep them in order.
In the church at Amsterdam, a deaconess was created to look
after the children and sit among them with a birchen rod, ready
to inflict summary punishment on any poor child who was so
much of a mortal that he could not sit two whole hours, in that
grave assembly, without seeing something which would render
it impossible for him to suppress a smile. The wonder is, not
that they laughed, but that they kept sober at all. In 1651 it
was made penal for any one to neglect public worship, and subjected him to a fine of ten shillings. There was then about the
same difficulty as to a license law as now, yet they had the good
sense to make the owner of an estate, where an intoxicated man
wias found, liable, rather than the intoxicated man himself.
In 1646 a law was enacted which shows that there has been
a great change in the business habits of our legislators. By this
l'.aw, the General Court was required to meet in the morning at:seven o'clock in summer, and at eight in winter, and to remain
itogether till half-past eleven o'clock, when they adjourned for
dinner, -that being then the usual dinner-hour.  After dinner
they were required to hold another session, till such hour as the
Governor saw fit; and, in order to insure punctuality and constant attendance, each member was liable to a fine of sixpence
for tardiness, and a like amount for each hour's absence during
the session: a provision of law which we commend to all our
legislators who desire a short session, if there are any such.
The organization of towns was substantially the same in the
colonies of Plymouth and Massachusetts. They were organized
for the transaction of such matters as related to their local
interests, such as maintaining highways, supporting public worship, and, at a later period in the history of the colony, public
schools. They were also required to support their own poor,
and to train their own men in the art of war. The towns sent
the deputies to the General Court, and recommended candidates
for freemen. The selectmen held courts for the trial of small
causes.  In short, the towns were then, as now, small civil
communities, exercising all the powers of self-government in all
matters relating to their own local affairs.




182           THE COLONY OF NEW PLYMOUTH
Plymouth was far behind Massachusetts in the support of
public schools. In 1663, the General Court advised the towns
"to set up a schoolmaster to train up children to reading and
writing." In 1673, the profits of the Cape fishery were appropriated to the support of a public school at Plymouth. In 1677,
every town having twelve families was required to support a
public grammar school. This is really the first act requiring the
support of public schools. Yet, notwithstanding this, there is
ample evidence that education was not neglected..This was a
part of the religion of the Puritans, and in their indentures and
wills they made provision for it so far as they could. In the infancy of the colony, they were ready to do, and did do, voluntarily
what they afterwards required to be done by authority of law.
On the 24th of April, 1685, James II. was duly proclaimed at
Plymouth. It soon became apparent, however, that he had no
more regard for his subjects at Plymouth than at home. The
charters granted by his predecessors offered no obstacle to the:
furtherance of his schemes. It made little difference with himrs
whether the charter came from the Council at Plymouth, or was.
a direct royal grant. These charters had existed for more than
half a century, and had been granted for the purpose of encouraging emigration to New England, and under them flourishing
colonies had grown up. During the troublesome times in England, the people had enjoyed the favor of utter neglect from the
home government. James looked with no favor on the people
of New England or their institutions. They had from necessity
established their own governments and laws, and these were
not in accordance with his arbitrary schemes. He knew that
they had no attachment to any of the Stuart race.  Their
charters were to him mere cobwebs; but still they were inconvenient, and must be swept away.  So far as related to Plymouth, this was done in the most summary manner, and without
any of the legal machinery used to annul the charter of Massachusetts Bay.
Sir Edmund Andros was appointed Governor of New England, and made the instrument for the subversion of their
governments. And notwithstanding what has lately been said
in his vindication, his conduct towards the people of the Plymouth
colony was cruel, arbitrary, and unjust. For three years neither




AND ITS RELATIONS TO MASSACHUSETTS.       183
General Court nor town meetings were permitted; land titles
were deemed invalid; and all the powers of self-government
which the Pilgrims and their descendants had claimed and
exercised for three generations, were held in contempt, and
totally subverted.
But there is a limit beyond which tyranny cannot go. That
was soon reached by Andros, and the news of his overthrow and
imprisonment by the patriotic people of Boston gave universal
joy throughout the Pilgrim colony. They at once resumed their
former government, and the Revolution in England gave them
full faith in their ability to acquire a new charter, which would
secure a separate and permanent government.
To accomplish this end, they appointed as their agents Sir
Henry Ashurst, Rev. Ichabod Wiswell, of Duxbury, and Rev.
Increase Mather, of Boston.  Mather was then in England,
having left Boston secretly for the purpose of laying the complaints of Massachusetts before the King. The result of the
niegotiations of these agents led to the suspicion that Mather
iActed for the interests of Massachusetts rather than of Plymouth.
tSuch was the belief of Wiswell, who, in a letter to Governor'Hinckley, says, -
"All the fiame of heaven moves on one axis, and the whole of New
England's interests seems designed to be loaden on one bottom, and her
particular motion to concentrate to the Massachusetts tropic. You know
who were wont to trot after the Bay horse. I do believe that Plymouth's
silence, Hampshire's neglect, and the rashness and influence of one who
fled from New England in disguise by night, has not a little contributed
to our disappointment."
Mather, however, always claimed to have acted in good faith,
and to have prevented the annexation of Plymouth to New
York, in whose charter it was at first actually included. And
so far as we have any evidence on this subject, it appears that
when Mather found it was impossible to procure a charter for
the separate and independent existence of Plymouth, he made
all laudable efforts to secure its union with Massachusetts.
This was undoubtedly in accordance with the wishes of the
people of Plymouth, who preferred a union with Massachusetts,
if any union was to take place at all.




184           THE COLONY OF NEW PLYMOUTH
Upon the union of the two colonies under the province
charter, it was provided that the local laws of each should
remain in full force, - first, for six months, and afterwards indefinitely till altered by the province legislature. The institutions
and laws of both were so nearly alike that it was no difficult
matter to establish a uniform system over both portions. Some
alterations were made by express enactment, and some by silent
acquiescence. Of the latter class was the famous Massachusetts
Ordinance of 1647 relating to the riparian ownership of flats on
tide-waters, which has been adopted in that portion of our Commonwealth for more than a century.
It would hardly be just to speak of the colony of Plymouth,
without referring to the charge of bribery against the captain of
the " Mayflower." It is said that the Pilgrims intended to have
settled near the Hudson River, but that the Dutch secretly bribed
the captain of the " Mayflower" to bring them to Cape Cod.
There is no doubt that such was their intention; but it is not
necessary to account for the change in the place of settlement;
by making so gross a charge against the captain. It was firstmade by Morton, nearly fifty years after the event. He says he
has late and certain intelligence of the fact,1 but refers to no
authority; and from that time to the present no record or other
writing has been found which has the least tendency to sustain
the charge. The charge is that the Dutch gave a bribe. It
must of course have been known to several persons, who would
have been likely to have left some official record or intimation
of so important a fact; yet none has been found, though there
has been, during the last twenty years, a most thorough examination of the Dutch as well as the English records relative to the
Pilgrims, the absence of which is strong evidence that the
charge is not true. The evidence of Morton must have been
mere hearsay, and should not be received after the death of a
man to destroy his character. We might perhaps rest our case on
that ground alone. But as the story has been repeated a thousand
times from that day to the present, and is now publicly taught
in the schools of Boston as true, it may be well to consider
some of the reasons which render it wholly improbable.  In
1 See Memorial, p. 84.




AND ITS RELATIONS TO MASSACHUSETTS.          185
the first place, there was no motive for the act. The Dutch
would have been glad to have had the Pilgrims settle at New
York, and had actually had negotiations with them on the subject before they left Holland.  None of the passengers of the
"Mayflower" ever intimated or suspected such a crime in their
captain, but had full faith in him, not only on the voyage, but
through the first winter, and while he was employed by them
some years afterwards. At that important council, while the
5' Mayflower" was in mid-ocean, when the great question was
to be settled whether they should go forward or return, it does
not appear that the captain did or said any thing to dissuade
them from going forward, -a thing which he would have been
likely to have done, had he then an intention to defeat their
designs.  But, on the other hand, Bradford's account of this
event shows, that, while the seamen were almost in a state of
mutiny, and the passengers in doubt what course should be'?ursued, the master did more than any other person to allay;heir fears, and to encourage them to proceed. In a fierce storm,
hle says,"One of the main beams in the mid-ship was bowed and cracked,
which put them in some fear that the ship would not be able to perform
the voyage. So some of the chief of the company, perceiving the mariners
to fear the sufficiency of the ship, as appeared by their mutterings, they
entered into serious consultation with the master and other officers of the
ship, to consider in time of the danger, and rather to return than to cast
themselves into a desperate and inevitable peril; and truly there was
great distraction and difference of opinion among the mariners themselves.
Fain would they do what could be done for their wages when being now
half the seas over; and, on the other hand, they were loath to hazard
their lives too desperately. But, on examining of all opinions, the master
and others affirmed that they knew the ship to be strong and firm under
water; and for the buckling of the main beam, there was a great iron
screw the passengers brought out of Holland, which would raise the
beam into his place; the which being done, the carpenter and master
affirmed that, with a post put under it, set firm in the lower deck and
otherwise bound, he would make it sufficient; and as for the decks and
upper works, they would caulk them as well as they could; and though,
with the working of the ship, they would not long keep stanch, yet there
would otherwise be no great danger, if they did not overpress her with
sails." (Bradford's Hist., p. 75.)




186             THE COLONY OF NEW PLYMOUTH
But there is still stronger evidence of the innocence of the
captain, in Bradford's account of their approach to Cape Cod.
He says, on seeing land, and having ascertained that it was Cape
Cod,
" we were not a little joyful. After some deliberation had amongst themselves and with the master of the ship, they tacked about, and resolved to
stand for the southward (the wind and weather being fair), to find some
place about the Hudson's River for their habitation. But, after they had
sailed the course about half a day, they fell amongst dangerous shoals and
roaring breakers; and they were so far entangled therewith, as they conceived themselves in great danger; and the wind shrinking upon them
withal, they resolved to bear up again for the Cape, and thought themselves happy to get out of those dangers before night overtook them, as
by God's providence they did."
In Mourt's Relation, which Dr. Young supposes to have been
the journal of Bradford and Winslow, it is said that," By the break of day we espied land, which we deemed to be Cape Cod,,
and so afterward it proved; and the appearance of it much comforted us,
especially seeing so goodly a land and wooded to the brink of the sea. It
caused us to rejoice together, and praise God that had given us once again
to see land, and thus we made our course south-south-west, purposing to
go to a river ten leagues to the south of the Cape; but at night, the
wind proving contrary, we put round again for the bay-of Cape Cod."
The captain and the passengers undoubtedly all supposed that
the Hudson River was some ten leagues south of Cape Cod,
and by going there, they would reach their destined point. The
whole statement is perfectly natural, and there was not then
even a complaint of a mistake, or a suggestion of one. But
very little was then known of the geography of the country. It
was then, and for years afterwards, supposed, that New England
was an island; and it will be recollected that the charter of
Massachusetts Bay, granted ten years afterwards, conveyed all
the land from sea to sea, without a suspicion that it extended
thousands of miles across a continent.   With their imperfect
knowledge of our coast, it is no wonder that they did not reach
the wished-for point.  The real cause for wonder is, that they
came so near as they did.  We have no knowledge of the track
of the " Mayflower" across the ocean. None of the journals or




AND ITS RELATIONS TO MASSACHUSETTS.     187
letters of the passengers give us any intimation of it. All they
tell us' is, that they started from Southampton; had favorable
winds for several days; then were overtaken by storms, when
they were compelled to beat about till, after a voyage of sixtyfive days, they came in sight of Cape Cod. It has been commonly supposed that they had made some mistake, and were
not in the position they intended; but if they followed the
track of Smith, Gosnold, and other navigators who had, during
the twenty years previous, visited the New-England coasts, as
they probably did, by taking the northern route, then they were
pursuing a direct course to the Hudson River; and a modern
navigator, with a full knowledge of our coast, might with great
propriety follow the same track, and go to New York through
the Vineyard and Long Island Sounds. These statements of
Bradford wholly rebut all suggestion of fraud or mistake on the
part of the captain, and show us the real cause of cutting short
their voyage, and landing at Cape Cod, instead of going to
t!he Hudson River. They had been at sea sixty-five days; and
\Vhen they saw Cape Cod, "they rejoiced to see so goodly a!tand." It was then the nineteenth of November, according to
"our present style. They were wholly unacquainted with the
navigation of our coasts, and they fell in with " dangerous shoals
and roaring breakers," by which they conceived themselves in
great danger. It was these several causes united, that induced
the passengers, and not the master, to turn about, and seek
safety in the harbor of Provincetown; and they then regarded their
ability to do so as a special favor of that Providence which had
brought them safely across the ocean. This movement was not
the result of any premeditated scheme, but sprang from sudden,
unexpected, and overwhelming necessity. And who can now
doubt that, under the circumstances, they acted wisely? and what
folly and injustice to attribute an act to the machinations of the
Dutch, or the fraud of the master, which can be fully and satisfactorily accounted for by the storms of winter, the dangerous
shoals, the unknown coast, and the longing to leave the crowded
vessel after so long a voyage! Thus much is due to the man
whose name has been tarnished, and whose character has been
most unjustly injured. It is due to the heroic commander of
that frail bark, freighted as it was with the founders of an




188           THE COLONY OF NEW PLYMOUTH
empire, to say that he acted his part most manfully, and that
during the whole of that perilous voyage he did every thing
which skill, care, and industry could do. In justice, there should
be neither spot nor blemish upon his fame; but to him as well
as to his passengers the world owes a deep and lasting debt of
gratitude.
The colony of Plymouth, now happily incorporated into and
made a part of our Commonwealth, has a history of its own,
and it is a history that will never be forgotten.  As a civil
magistrate, Bradford, the father of the colony, and for twentyone years its governor, would by his sound good sense and
elevated patriotism have done honor to any age. To his wisdom
and discretion, the colony owed much of its prosperity, and
undoubtedly its prolonged political existence. Of the services
of Brewster one can hardly make too high an estimate. For
twenty-four years he was the spiritual father and guide of the
colony. Of the intrepid and courageous Standish, - the leader
in all military enterprises, whether against the Indians, the followers of Morton at Merry Mount, or their Dutch neighbors, —it was as true of him as of the Trojan, that success was never to
be despaired of when he led the way. So the Winslows, Allerton, Alden, Hatherly, Prince, Howland, and Hinckley, were all
good men and true, and their names are enrolled in letters of light
in the history of the remarkable events which created this colony,
and enabled it to do so much for the good of mankind.
Its duration was short. One or two of the passengers of the
" Mayflower" may have survived it. Never was there a more
successful experiment of popular government than it exhibited.
During the whole seventy-one years there were but six governors,
two of whom continued in office thirty-nine years. In their
intercourse with the Indians, they present the same bright example of humanity and justice as in all their public acts. Not
a foot of soil was taken from them without their consent, nor
without the payment of an equivalent. The treaty with Massasoit was most scrupulously observed for half a century; and
it was not their fault, nor that of that faithful sachem, that it
was at last violated.
The Pilgrims belonged to that class of men of whom it has
been said, that " God sifted a whole nation that he might send




AND ITS RELATIONS TO MASSACHUSETTS.                   189
choice grain into the wilderness;" and their bright example will
give new courage to the oppressed everywhere, and inspire in
them   new hope.     Nor will the lustre of their fame diminish as
time passes on, but will continue to grow brighter and brighter;
and we may reasonably hope and expect, that the future generations which shall fill our continent, will regard the Fathers of this
little colony as the founders of the free institutions which it will
be their pride and joy to sustain and extend.
NOTE.
Since preparing the above, I have been able to examine the " Notes " of Sir Joseph
Williamson, Under-Secretary of State, copied from the State Paper Office in England, at the request of the President of the Massachusetts Historical Society, and
soon to be published in the Proceedings of that Society. They purport to have been
written about 1663, just before the fitting out of the expedition against New Netherland, which led to its conquest. These Notes were evidently prepared as a justification of the English government in asserting their claim to the territory occupied
by the Dutch; and take the ground that the Dutch claim was fraudulent from the
beginning. In reference to the Pilgrims, they allege that they "hyred a ship at
Tarnere in Zealand of 500 tunns to transport themselves, beinge the number of 460
persons to Hudson's river aforsaid. But the Dutch which transported the said
English, brake faith with them most perfidiouslye, landing them, contrary to the
agreement at their shipping, 140 leagues from the place N.E. in a barren country,
since called Plymouth Colonie in New England." - This is undoubtedly the same
story which Morton, six years after, published in another form in his Memorial;
and his " late and certain intelligence " was probably derived from reports which the
conquerors of New Netherland industriously circulated, with less regard to truth
than as a justification of their acts. Morton may have received this intelligence from
Plymouth men who had removed to Manhattan, among whom were Isaac Allerton
and Thomas Willett. The whole statement is an utter perversion of the truth, and
shows very plainly how, after a lapse of more than forty years, the false charge
against the captain of the "Mayflower" originated.








SLAVERY
AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS..Y EMORY WASHBURN.








SLAVERY
AS IT ONCE PREVAILED          IN   MASSACHUSETTS.
T   HE subject of this evening's lecture is, Slavery as it once
prevailed in Massachusetts. The inquiry will involve how
far it was legalized here as an institution, and to what extent
the people of the Commonwealth were responsible for its introduction and its continuance. As a thing of the past, its history
is; no otherwise interesting than as it is connected with the
ssocial and political condition of the colony and province, and as
iitt awakens the inquiry how far the founders of the Common-wealth are obnoxious to blame for having tolerated it among
"them.   To do justice to either of these, requires a further
inquiry into the social and political condition of the world itself
when the colony was planted. It would be difficult, without
such a reference, to explain why and by what means an institution so hostile to every principle of human freedom should have
been sustained in a colony of Christian men, whose object in
coming here was to escape from oppression, and to found a
Christian commonwealth. The facts of history, however, seem
to establish this conclusion, that slavery never was in harmony
with the public sentiment of the colony. It was sustained only
by force of the policy and laws of the mother country, and was
abolished by the people by the very first clause in the organic
law of the State. One fact stands out on the very threshold of
such an investigation; and that is, that history does not go back
to a time when slavery was not sustained by civil society and
enforced by law. No matter what may have been the form of
its government or the character of its religious faith,- Pagan,
Jewish, Hindoo, Moslem,or Christian,- every state, kingdom, and
13




194   SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.
empire of which we have any account, has at some time cherished slavery as a social element. Nay, more: it has, in all these,
been the basis on which rights and obligations have rested, which
were in utter antagonism with that simple but sublime conception of revelation which regards mankind as brothers, the children
of a common parent, and endowed with a common heritage of
life and immortality.
An investigation, such as is here contemplated, might help to
disabuse the Commonwealth of the reproach that many have
been ready to cast upon her, by holding up to view, in the light
of the present age, the events which characterized her history
two centuries ago. Facts may often be so colored and arranged
as to leave as false an impression upon the mind as if the
picture had been false in all its parts. The existence of slavery
in Massachusetts is, in itself,an historical problem which the
association with which we are connected owes to itself to
attempt to solve by applying the test of fair criticism and
investigation.  It is for such an effort, that an appeal is no v
made to your indulgence.
Let it not be supposed, however, that, to do this, we are to
assume that slavery ever was a wise, a Christian, or a humane
institution. Nor have we any occasion to arrogate perfection.
for the Fathers of Massachusetts.  They were men, and, as
such, had their weaknesses and their errors, as they had their
virtues and their merits.  They walked in the light of such
moral and social science as they had, and it would be as obviously unjust to try them by the test of modern experience, as it
would have been to condemn the philosophy of the days of
Pericles, because it did not come up to the standard of the Sermon on the Mount.
A large proportion of the early colonists had come from the
sturdy, strong-minded, middling classes of England. They had
been trained in the school of Puritanism and the sharp contests
of religious persecution, to think for themselves, and to judge of
men rather by the intrinsic qualities which they exhibited than
by the accident of birth. A man with them was a living soul,
rather than a thing to wear the decorations of royal favor. They
had grown up in those habits of thought which were then rife,
which regarded the precepts of the Bible above the dogmas of




SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.  195
political belief. And the laws of Moses had for them a higher
sanction than any code of mere human legislation. Another
circumstance connected with the period in which they lived
ought to be constantly kept in mind, when undertaking to
judge of them as the founders of a colony; and that is, the condition of the law of nations as it was then understood compared
with the science as it is now practised and interpreted. It was
still in its infancy. Customs, both in the prosecution of war
and the treatment by one nation of the citizens of another,
though utterly discarded in our day by every civilized state, were
not only tolerated, but were recognized as a part of the code of
Christian morality in the intercourse of nations. Grotius, who,
more than any other writer, may be regarded as the founder of
that system of international law which is now in force, and
which changed the whole policy of civilized war, had published
his great work on War and Peace, in Latin, only five years
ibefore the settlement of Boston. And the peace of Westphalia,,which is regarded by many as the event from which the modern
science of international law should date, was concluded eighteen
years after the planting of the colony.1
Not only was Slavery then prevailing in England, and the
trade in slaves held to be an established branch of commerce,
but this had been true of every nation of whose affairs we have
any certain knowledge. The Jews had their slaves, the Greeks
theirs, and the same was true of the Romans and the Germans.
If we attempt to trace this custom, which had become so
universal, to its origin or source, we find the most prolific of all
to have been the incessant wars in which the nations of the old
world were engaged. By the notion that long prevailed, prisoners taken captive in such wars were at the mercy of their
captors, either to take their lives or sell them into bondage.
And when this right of election on the part of captors was
taken away, and the selling of captives into slavery superseded
the right of taking their lives, it was regarded as a decided
advance in the science of international law. The result was,
that in some of the ancient states the slaves multiplied to an
almost incredible extent. In Rome, in the time of the empire,
single individuals, we are told, held from ten to twenty thousand
1 Wheat. 55, 69




196    SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.
of these at a time. We are told, too, that the custom of ransoming prisoners of war did not originate till after the thirteenth
century. And the present custom of exchanging prisoners was
not known until after the sixteenth century.' Not only were
prisoners of war thus early sold into bondage as slaves, but the
right to do this was recognized as still existing by Grotius,
Puffendorf, and Bynkershoek, the accredited oracles of the law
of nations, long after Massachusetts was settled.2
And the circumstance which will hereafter be referred to again,
may be mentioned in this connection, of the disposition by the
English of their Scotch prisoners taken at the battle of Dunbar, a portion of whom were sent to the Massachusetts colony
for sale, and sold as late as 1650.   The language of C. J.
Marshall, upon this subject, is this,"' From the earliest times war has existed, and war confers rights in
which all have acquiesced. Among the most enlightened nations of antiquity, one of these was that the victor might enslave the vanquished..
This, which was the usage of all, could not be pronounced repugnant tc,
the law of nations, which is certainly to be tried by the test of general
usage." (10 Wheat. R. 120.)
And as another illustration of the lax state of international
law, we are told that, as late as the time of Cardinal Richelieu,
one nation might arrest and imprison the citizens of another
who should come into a couintry without a safe conduct from its
government. And Richelieu died thirteen years after the settlement of the Massachusetts colony. In this connection, too, it
should be borne in mind, that the enslaving of negroes in Africa
was itself based upon the right of making slaves of captives
taken in war.3  And we have the authority of C. J. Marshall, in
1825, that" Throughout the whole extent of that immense continent, so far as we
know its history, it is still the law of nations that prisoners are slaves."
(10 Wheat. R. 121.)
Though this was much the most prolific source of slavery,
there were others recognized by the laws of different nations as
well as by Grotius and Puffendorf; and one of these in use
among the Jews was the selling of himself by one to another as
1 1 Kent, 15.  2 20 How. St. Tr. 28.  3 Tayl. Civ. L. 414.




SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.  197
a slave.1 Another ground upon which men were reduced to
slavery was by the way of punishment for crimes.  This prevailed also among the Jews, especially in case of theft. If the
thief was unable to make recompense to the injured party, he
might be sold.2
One of the incidents of slavery which ought to be kept in
mind was, that the child of a slave was itself a slave. By the
Roman civil law the status of the child as to being free or otherwise followed that of its mother. If she was a slave, her child
was one also.
By the law of slavery, when a person became a slave in either
of these modes, he became changed into a thing of property, to
be used or sold at the beck of a master. Among the Romans,
he might be cut up to feed the fish in his master's ponds; and
even in the so-called Christian States, the law lent but the feeblest
protection to a class so theoretically brutalized and debased.
But here, again, there grew up, in process of time, a distinction in favor of Christians, which ought not to be overlooked,
when treating of this subject historically.
The notion began to be entertained at a pretty early period,
that it was hardly becoming for one Christian to make another
of his own faith a slave, merely because he had taken him captive in war; and it came in time to be a grave question in the
English Courts, whether one could be held as a slave after he
had been baptized: but for pagans and infidels no such scruple
was entertained; and one of the salvos to the public conscience
for engaging in the African slave trade was, that it was a means
of converting infidels to Christianity. It is surprising, at this
day, to know with what gravity such nonsense was listened to
in the English courts. In 1677, nearly fifty years after our
ancestors came to Massachusetts, the Court of King's Bench
solemnly adjudged, " that negroes being usually bought and sold
among merchants as merchandise, and being Infidels," there
might be a property in them.3 And seventeen years later, in
1694, the same Court held that " trover will lie for a negro boy,
for they are heathen, and therefore a man may have property in
them; and the Court, without averment made, will take notice
1 Jahn Antiq. 77, 2 How. St. T. 28 n.  2 Jahn Sup., 20 How. St. T. 30.
3 Lev. R. 201.




198   SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.
that they are heathen." 1 In other words, the law would presume a black man to be a heathen, until he could show to the
contrary.
Negro slavery, moreover, which had been introduced by Spain
into her colonies in 1508, became domesticated in England in 1553,
when twenty-four slaves were imported directly from Africa.
And in 1562 the slave-trade was inaugurated by Sir John Hawkins, who, for the atrocities which he committed in its prosecution, was knighted by Queen Elizabeth; and it became from that
day a regular and recognized branch of English Commerce.
Such, in brief, was the state of public law, and such the condition of public sentiment among the Christian nations of Europe
upon the subject of slavery and the slave-trade, when Winthrop
and his colony set sail for America, bringing with them the royal
charter, under which a settlement had already been begun at
Salem.
Whatever may have been the individual motives of the colo.
nists in planting themselves on these shores, their corporate
powers were limited by the terms of their charter, which were
rather those of a trading company than the organic law of a
State. They might make such rules and regulations as would be
necessary to carry on the business of the corporation, and maintain order and good government in the colony. But they were,
in no measure, absolved from their allegiance as citizens, to the
crown, or from the obligations they were under, as subjects, to
the government at home; and the charter itself forbade them
to make any laws or ordinances'" contrary or repugnant to the
laws and statutes " of the realm of England. And we are told
by Judge Story that " the commercial intercourse of the colonies
was regulated by the general laws of the British empire, and
could not be restrained or obstructed by colonial legislation." 2
In nothing was the policy which this provision was meant to
guard more persistently adhered to by the home government,
than in that which had been inaugurated in 1562 in respect to
the trade in slaves, and was subsequently continued for more
than an hundred years after New England was colonized. It
was regarded as an object of the first importance to the English
government to acquire and maintain a command of this trade;
l 1 Raym. R. 147.     2 1 Const. ~ 178.




SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.  199
and to that end, not only were the English colonies rigidly kept
open as a market for this commerce, but efforts were made and
treaties entered into, with a view of obtaining a monopoly of the
traffic. Thus in 1713, by means of the " Assiento Treaty," so
called, England obtained the exclusive right of supplying the
Spanish islands and provinces in America with four thousand eight hundred negroes annually, for the term of thirty
years.1
And that such was the purpose of the English government in
respect to its American colonies, is illustrated in history, as well
as conceded by the language of the highest judicial tribunals of
that country.2
It was under circumstances like these, that the colony of Massachusetts Bay was planted and began its administration. At
first, its affairs were carried on as a pure Democracy; and, after
a few years, through delegates chosen for that purpose by the
\reemen in their several towns. In either form, therefore, whate ver laws they did make are to be regarded as a reflex of the
average sentiment and opinion of the freemen of the colony.
So far as negro slavery was concerned, their power to act at all
was exceedingly circumscribed. They could prohibit neither the
importation nor the sale of slaves without clashing at once with
the interests and wishes of government at home.  Nothing
seems to have been left open to them in respect to it, but simply
to deal with all such as, by residence, were subject to their laws,
independent of a prior jurisdiction, and to regulate the status
of the children of slaves born in the colonies. This might be done
without interfering, in terms, with what had once been the subject of sale or traffic, under the English laws of importation and
trade. And, if denying to the owner of the parent the right to
hold the child as a slave, was violating the spirit of the law
under which the parent himself was held, it would go to show
that the colonists were ready to break away from every thing
but the letter of the law in favor of freedom. Laying aside then,
for the present, so much as relates to the slavery of the African
race, it might still exist in respect to such captives as were
taken in war, such persons as sold themselves, and such as
were reduced to slavery as a punishment for crime. It will be
I Wheat. 56.       2 2 Hagg. Rep. 106.




200    SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.
necessary therefore to consider how far the laws of the colony
authorized or tolerated either of these modes.
Unfortunately, for a full and precise understanding of the
subject in all its possible bearings, it is difficult, if not impossible,
to trace the course of legislation in the colony during the first
ten years of its history. Many of its laws during this period
are still preserved; but none of them were printed until 1648.
If all had been preserved, it is believed, that, like some of those
extant, they would be found to correspond, in many respects,
with the provisions of the Levitical Code.  This, however,
we do know historically, that the freemen of the colony, as
early as 1635, began to be restive, under the idea that the
magistrates were clothed with too much discretionary power;
and that a body of laws ought to be established by which the
rights and duties of the citizen should be ascertained, and
remedies provided for both public and private wrongs.  The
General Court, though somewhat reluctantly, came at last into
the measure so far as to raise a committee to prepare a drafNt
of such laws as should be agreeable to the word of God, and be
the fundamentals of a Commonwealth.
Every thing, however, was done with great deliberation; and
one reason for this, as we are told, was, that they might not pass
any law which should transcend the power given them by the
charter, by being repugnant to those of the mother country.1
It was, besides, deemed desirable that the proposed body of
laws should embrace, as far as possible, the prevailing sentiments
and opinions of the freemen of the colony. And, to that end,
an order was passed in 1638, calling upon them to come together
in their respective towns, and prepare a statement of the heads
of such laws as they desired. After this had been done, the
whole were placed in the hands of the Rev. Mr. Ward of
Ipswich, who, from having been bred a lawyer in England, it
was supposed would be competent from these to put into form
a body of laws to be reported to the General Court. The result
was, that a collection of elementary rules declaratory of the
duties, privileges, and restrictions which the people of the colony
were to observe, was adopted in 1641, and took the name of
the " Body of Liberties. 2 In some respects it answered to the
1 Palf. Hist., vol. i. p. 443.  2 Ib. vol. ii. pp. 23-27.




SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.,  201
English Magna Charta, but more nearly to the Declaration of
Rights in our Constitution.
The object in having been thus minute in this detail was, to
reach, if possible, the true state of public feeling in the colony,
upon the subject of maintaining slavery, as it existed at the time
of the adoption of this code. And it may be added, that, after
all this precaution, provision was made in the code itself, that
it should be read and revised at the three next annual sessions
of the Genera] Court.'  It may, therefore, be assumed, that
whatever found a place in the Body of Liberties, was in accordance with the judgment and wishes of the freemen of the
colony.
Slavery was one of these topics; and the manner in which it
was regarded is best judged of by the language of the code
Itself. This Body of Liberties consisted of ninety-eight articles,
although generally spoken of as containing a hundred. In it
there is no allusion to color, nor to any distinction of race, or creed,
in the matter of rights or privileges. Unlike the English notion,
the Christian and the Heathen, in this respect, stood upon the
same level in the eye of the law. Among its criminal provisions, " man-stealing" was made a capital offence, resting for
its authority, upon the 16th verse of the 21st chapter of Exodus.
But it is the ninety-first article which bears more immediately
upon the question under consideration.  It is there declared
that" There shall never be any Bond Slavery, Villinage, or Captivity
amongst us, unless it be lawful Captives taken in just Wars, and such
strangers as willingly sell themselves, or are sold to us. And these shall
have all the liberties and Christian usages which the law of God,
established in Israel concerning such persons, doth morally require. This
exempts none from servitude, who shall be judged thereto by authority."
(Mass. Hist. Col., vol. xxviii. p. 231.)
It contemplates, it will be perceived, slavery as an institution
already existing.  Its purpose is not to introduce something
new; but, obviously, to limit and restrict it as it exists, to three
classes of persons, and declares that, beyond these, " there shall
never be any Bond Slavery, Villinage, or Captivity " in the colony.
1 Palf. Hist., vol. ii. p. 25.




202    SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.
And, what is most significant in the matter, the children of
slaves born in the colony are thereby excluded from the classes
that might be subjected to bond slavery. Around every human
being in the colony, without regard to race or creed, not embraced in one of these classes, it throws the protection of the
law, and declares the sanction of the death penalty for its
violation.
The framers of such a law must have had some motive for
such a declaration; and it is something more than a mere idle
inquiry, to ascertain, if we can, what that motive was. A recent
writer upon this subject has told the world, that this article in
the Body of Liberties " sanctions the slave trade, and the perpetual bondage of Indians and negroes, their children and their
children's children." I  Whether this position is sought to be
sustained by a fair review of the general facts of history, or
by the writer's own construction of such as he has seen fit to
select, can be better judged of, by a brief recurrence to the
actual condition of the world, at the time of which he is speaking. Slavery, as we have seen, prevailed not only in England,
but throughout Christendom; and, what is more, slavery existed,
at that very moment, in the colony itself, by a previous importation of slaves under the sanction of the English government.
Lord Stowell, the learned and illustrious Chief Justice of the
English Court of Admiralty, tells us in an opinion given by him
upon the subject, that"Slavery was a very favored introduction into the colonies: it was
deemed a great source of the mercantile interest of the country, and was,
on that account, largely considered by the mother country as a great source
of its wealth and strength. Treaties were made on that account, and the
colonies compelled to submit to those treaties by the authority of this
country."
With slavery, then, existing among them, under the sanction
of a law which they could not repeal or gainsay, if it was in
coincidence with the wishes of the colonists, what occasion was
there for them to act upon the matter at all? And if it was their
desire to perpetuate it as an institution in the colony, why limit
and restrict it so that it must, from the nature of things, be certain
1 Moore, Hist. of Slavery in Mass., p. 18.




SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.   203
to die out in a few years, unless kept alive by new importations?
These are questions which one might suppose would naturally occur to the mind of any one undertaking to fasten upon
this colony the imputation of sanctioning " perpetual bondage."
But the evidence does not stop here. If the colonists were actuated by the feelings and motives which were entertained by
slaveholders generally, they would have manifested this by the
slave code under which they were to regulate and perpetuate it;
and a comparison of their legislation upon the subject, such as
it was, with that of one or two of the other colonies may help
us to form a judgment upon the matter. In 1664, a body of laws
"collected," as the record shows, " out of the several laws now
in force in his Majesty's American Colonies and Plantations,"
and, of course, including the Massachusetts colony, was adopted
for the Duke of York's province, afterwards a part of New
York. Under the head of "Bond Slavery," in that body of
iws, there is a provision that " no Christian shall be kept in
Bond Slavery, Villinage, or Captivity," except as therein stated,
jxcluding from this exemption agreeably to the prevailing notion
of some of the English courts, to which reference has already
been made, all such as were infidels or heathen.1  A law of Virginia of 1669 provides that-' If a slave resist his master or others, by his master's orders, correcting him, and by the extremity of the correction should chance to die, such
death should not be counted a felony; but the master or other person appointed by his master to punish him, be acquit from molestation, since it
could not be presumed that prepensive malice, which alone makes murder
a felony, should induce any man to destroy his own estate." (1 Tuck.
Black. pt. 2, 45.)
What a contrast is here presented between a law exempting a
master, or any one employed by'him, from punishment for whipping his slave to death, and that of this Body of Liberties which
secures to the most friendless heathen that had ever endured the
horrors of the "middle passage," " the liberties and Christian
usages which the law of God, established in Israel" concerning
those under bond slavery, morally required. And he might by
1 N. Y. Hist. Col., vol. i. p. 322.




204   SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.
way of safeguard, even demand sureties of the peace against a
violent and barbarous master.1 With how much candor, then,
can a writer not only charge the Body of Liberties with sanctioning the slave-trade and the perpetual bondage of Indians
and negroes, their children and their children's children, but as
entitling, in his words, " Massachusetts to precedence over any
and all other colonies, in similar legislation."2
The subject of this Body of Liberties does not end here. It
was not originally printed, and only nineteen copies were distrilbuted, in manuscript, among the towns. An early transcript
of one of these copies was discovered by the late Hon. Francis
C. Gray, about forty years since, and was published by the Massachusetts Historical Society in 1843. The first printed edition of
the colony laws was published in 1648. But no copy of that is
known to be now extant. Another edition was printed in 1660, of
which a few copies remain. In that edition, the ninety-first article
of the original body stands by itself as a distinct law. The latter, however, omits, the words;" such strangers" which are foundA
in the original. Instead, therefore, of reading, that there shall be
no bond slavery, unless it be lawful captives, &c., and such strangers as willingly sell themselves, it reads, " lawful captives taken
in just war, as willingly sell themselves," &c., obviously showing
that some words had been accidentally or intentionally omitted;
for there was an inconsistency in speaking of captives taken in
war willingly selling themselves. It required no such sale to
make such persons slaves. We, accordingly, find that preparatory to a new edition of the laws which was published in 1672,
a committee of the General Court was raised to examine those
already published, and report such errata therein as required to be
corrected. Among the errata reported by them, and passed upon
by the General Court, was the mistake in the sentence above
quoted. They supplied the omission by the words, " such as
shall," which makes the clause read thus, "lawful captives taken
in just wars, such as shall willingly sell themselves, or are sold to
us," not limiting it to strangers who sell themselves, or are sold
to us. But the change, even if it had any meaning or effect, left
the matter of the children of slaves just where it was before,
1 4 Mass. Rep. 127.   2 Moore Hist., p. 18.




SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.  205
within the category of those of whom there should never be any
bond slavery.
And that such is the true construction of the clauses referred
to, has been settled by the repeated adjudications of the highest
courts of Massachusetts, who have, again and again, held that
no child born here since 1641, was ever, by law, a slave. Single
judges may have dropped language, at times, that might be
capable of another construction; but that of the courts, when
speaking authoritatively upon the point, has all been one way,
that freedom was the child's birthright.1
Starting with this early action of the freemen of the colony in
their towns and by their representatives, we are next to trace
the dealings of the people upon the subject of slavery, to see
how, at any time, Massachusetts became implicated in its maintenance, and how far they had a right to claim the commendation of Edmund Burke of having refused to "deal any more
in the inhuman traffick of the negro slave," the doing of which
he pronounced to be "one of the causes of her quarrel with
Great Britain." 2
But before taking up this in detail, it may be well to inquire
how far bond slavery, arising from either of the other sources,
existed, at any time, in Massachusetts. No instance has been
discovered of a sale by one man of himself to another, although
the power of doing this was recognized in the Body of Liberties.
But of sales by the way of punishment for crime, under a sentence
of a court there are several instances recorded. Thus we have
one in Sandwich, in 1678, where three Indians were thus sold for
having broken into a house and stolen. Being unable to make
recompense to the owner, the Court authorized him to sell them.3
That a measure like this would seem harsh in our day, is not to
be denied. But to judge of it in its true light, we should place
ourselves in the condition in which our Fathers stood, and see
how far circumstances justified the measure. In the first place,
they were justified in this policy by the respect they had for the
Mosaic law, from which it was borrowed. In the next place,
the idea of compelling the thief to make compensation to the
1 4 Mass. 128 n.; 16 Mass. 75; 13 Mass. 552; 10 Cush. 410; Quincy Rep. 29,
Gray's note.
2 Wheat. 590; Burke's Works, vol. ii. p. 44.  3 Thach. Plym. 139.




206   SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.
injured party by his own labor is an obvious dictate of remunerative justice.  The Hon. Mr. Lushington, of the British
Parliament, in his examination before a committee of that body
upon the subject of criminal law, in 1835, in answer to an inquiry
involving the justice and expediency of obliging the guilty party
to make restitution to the person injured, by his labor, said:
" My own opinion is this, that, in every case where the offender
is capable of indemnifying the person robbed for the loss he has
sustained, he ought to be compelled so to do." 1 And a still more
important consideration is, that the science of prison discipline
and reform was, at that time, literally unknown.  Hanging,
drawing and quartering; whipping, maiming, and mutilating the
person; or shutting up offenders in dungeons, in idleness, in cold,
darkness, and pestilential filth, - were some of the punishments
by which the public at that day sought to be avenged upon those
who violated the law; so that, even upon the score of humanity as
well as justice, the sale of a convict's services must have had much
to commend itself to the judgment of a community situated as
were the colonists of New England. But it ought to be added,
that the instances in which this mode of punishment was
adopted, appear to have been few, and under peculiar circumstances.
Of captives taken in war and sold into slavery by the colony,
the number appears to have been larger, though it is not easy
to ascertain in how many instances it was done. As a measure
of policy, it was adopted in the case of such as were taken in
the early Indian wars, and was justified, so far as such an act of
severity could be justified, by the dread and alarm in which the
colonists were held, while contending with a foe who recognized
none of the laws of civilized warfare. It was chiefly confined
to the remnants of the Pequod tribe, and to such as were taken
in the war with King Philip, which, at one time, seemed to
threaten extermination to the white race.  As they could be
bound by no treaty, the only measure of safety for the colonists
was to hang or shoot their prisoners, shut them up and maintain
them in jails or prisons, or put them in a situation not to again
engage in burning the towns and murdering the inhabitants of
the colony. And this could be done effectually by selling them
1 2d Rep. of Com. 53.




SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.  207
into bondage.  The first was obviously too barbarous to be
justified. The colonists were too few and too feeble to make
the second possible. And the last alternative was resorted to
as their only means of protection and intimidation. And this,
at least, may be said in palliation, if not in approbation, of this
policy, -it does not seem to have been dictated by considerations
of gain or by mercenary motives; but rather as a measure of selfdefence, justified, as we have seen, by the usages of Christian
nations, and authorized by the best writers upon international
law which were then accessible to the colonists, whose works
they might have read in the light of their blazing dwellings.
The war with the Pequods was terminated in 1637. Nor
was there any occasion to resort to this severe alternative again
for the space of forty years, when the struggle with Philip began;
and, even then, there were many in the colony who deprecated
the principle upon which it rested.  The Plymouth colony,
immediately after Philip's war, forbade any one to buy the ciildren " of those our captive salvages that were taken and became our lawful prisoners in our late wars with the Indians,
without special leave of the government."l  And a law of
Massachusetts, as early as 1712, prohibited the importation of
Indian servants into the colony.2  There never was in fact a
time when there were not earnest advocates and devout laborers
in the colony for the conversion of these sons of the forest to the
faith and habits of Christian civilization. Slavery was never
their normal condition, and never reached beyond the individual
who was personally subject to it.
If now we recur to negro slavery, it does not appear when it
was first introduced into the colony. One thing is certain, that
it did not come in with Winthrop's Company. When Josslyn
was here in 1638, he found Mr. Maverick the owner of three
negro slaves. He probably acquired them from a ship which
brought some slaves from the West Indies in that year. And
this is the first importation of which we have any account. But
Maverick was not properly a member of Winthrop's Company.
He came here before they left England, and had his establishment, and lived by himself, upon Noddle's Island. Nor was he
in sympathy with them in church government or religious senti1 Plym. Laws, p. 187.  2 1 Holmes's Annals, p. 509.




208   SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.
ment. Governor Winthrop gives an account of the admission
to the church, in 1641, of " a negro maid, servant to Mr. Stoughton, of Dorchester." 1
The arrival of a Massachusetts ship with two negroes on
board, whom the master had brought from Africa for sale, in
1645, four years after the adoption of the Body of Liberties, furnished an opportunity to test the sincerity of its framers, in
seeking to limit and restrict slavery in the colony.  And it
derives an additional importance from the circumstance, generally overlooked, that it happened at a time when the colonists
were more nearly at liberty to act out their own wishes in this
respect than they had ever been before, or were at any time
afterwards, by reason of the civil war in England, which had
then begun, and the King's being in no condition to look after
the conduct of his foreign subjects. Being, for the moment, in
no fear of the home government, they must have acted as their
own sense of right and sound policy dictated. Upon information
that these negroes had been forcibly seized and abducted from
the coast of Africa by the captain of the vessel, the magistrates
interposed to prevent their being sold. But though the crime
of man-stealing had been committed, they found they had no
cognizance of it, because it had been done in a foreign jurisdiction.  They, however, went as far towards reaching the
wrong done as they could; and not only compelled the shipmaster to give up the men, but sent them back to Africa, at
the charge of the colony, with " a letter," as it is said, " of
the indignation of the Court thereabouts and justice thereof." 2
And they made this, moreover, an occasion, by an act of legislation of the General Court, in 1646, " to bear witness," in the
language of the act, " against the heinous and crying sin of manstealing, as also to prescribe such timely redress for what is past,
and such a law for the future, as may sufficiently deter all
others belonging to us to have to do in such vile and most
odious courses, justly abhorred of all good and just men" 3
-an act of legislation to say the least, singularly at variance
with the assumption, so confidently put forth, that the framers
of the Body of Liberties (passed only four years previous to
1 Life and Letters, vol. ii. p. 263.  2 Wint. Jour., vol. i. p. 245, Col L. 53.
3 Col. 7, 53.




SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.  209
this) intended thereby to sanction " the slave-trade and the perpetual bondage of Indians and negroes."
In a few years, however, King Charles was again restored to
his throne, and the legislation of the colony went on under its
original restrictions and limitations.
In 1703, an act was passed which has subjected the General
Court to some severe criticism, though evidently because the
reasons and purposes of it were misunderstood by such as
sought to cast censure upon their conduct. The substance of
this act was, that no one should emancipate his slave, without
giving bond to hold the town harmless from the expense of his
support. And it has been assumed, that this was from a wish
to check the facility of emancipating slaves. So far, however,
is this from being true, that, while the act recognizes emancipation as being properly in use for freeing slaves, it simply attempts
to prevent the gross injustice and inhumanity of a master holding his slave in bondage as long as his labor was profitable, and
then turning him over, as a pauper, to be supported at the
public charge. And the act itself holds such master or mistress
chargeable for the slave's support.'
To show that no change in this respect had taken place in the
policy of the government, we find that the General Court, in
1705, imposed a duty of ~4 upon every slave imported into the
province. And this law was renewed in 1728.2 In 1767, a bill
to restrain the importing of slaves passed the popular branch
of the General Court, but failed in the Council. Nor would it
have availed, if it had passed both branches, because it would
have been vetoed by the Governor, acting under instructions
from the Crown. This was shown in 1774, when such a bill
did pass both branches of the General Court, and was thus
vetoed.3  These successive acts of legislation were a constantly
recurring illustration of the truth of the remark of a modern
writer of standard authority upon the subject, that" Though the condition of slavery in the colonies may not have been
created by the imperial legislature, yet it may be said with truth, that the
1 See 4 Mass. Rep. 130; Col. Law, 745. 2 Felt's Sal., p. 340; Statis., p. 203.
3 Coffin's Newbury, p. 339; Felt's Statis., p. 205; Wheat. 588. See also Declaration of Independence.
14




210   SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.
colonies were compelled to receive African slaves by the home government." (1 Hurd, &c., 208 n.)
We have reached, in this review of the legislation of Massachusetts, the point at which the pressure of the royal power was
taken from the action of the people, and the popular will began to
have free play upon this, as well as other topics of public interest.
The power of the Crown here ceased, for all practical purposes,
in October, 1774. Nor was there any organized government in
the Province, until the July following, except such as was furnished by what was called the Provincial Congress, composed of
a convention of delegates from the several towns coming together
for mutual consultation and advice. Committees of Correspondence, chosen in the towns and counties of the Province, shared
with this Congress in giving a direction to public affairs. The
subject of negro slavery was early agitated by these bodies,
though they had no authority to act upon it. What they did,
however, is an indication not to be mistaken, of what the
feeling in the community upon that subject was.  The slaves
of Bristol and Worcester Counties addressed a memorial to a
convention of these committees in Worcester in June, 1775.
The response was in these words," We abhor the enslaving of any of the human race, and particularly
the negroes of this country; and whenever there shall be a door opened,
or an opportunity present, for any thing to be done towards the emancipation of the negroes, we will use our influence and endeavor that such a
thing may be brought about."' (Lincoln, Hist. Wor. 110.)
The action of the government, when reorganized under the
advice of the Continental Congress, was shown in September,
1776, in respect to several negroes, who had been taken in an
English prize-ship, and brought into Salem to be sold. The
General Court, having learned these facts, put a stop to the sale
at once. And this was accompanied by a resolution on the part
of the House," That the selling and enslaving the human species is a direct violation
of the natural rights alike vested in them by their Creator, and utterly
inconsistent with the avowed principles on which this and the other States
have carried on their struggle for liberty."
The result was, that the rights of prisoners of war were extended to such negroes as might thereafter be taken from the




SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.  211
enemy during the war. In other words, the negro, though a
slave to an English master, attained the attributes of a man
when in a situation to be dealt with by the Commonwealth,
though the law did not yet disturb the rights of private property
in slaves, on the part of the citizen.
We have thus far had to do chiefly with the acts of legislation
in the Colony and Province, in undertaking to trace the course of
public sentiment, as well as the condition of slavery, up to the
time of the Revolution. But there are other sources of evidence
than legislation upon those subjects, which ought not to be
overlooked, when undertaking to reach the truth, as it stands in
history. Unfortunately, those sources'are, at the best, meagre;
and the facts derived from them are only fragmentary. It is to
be remembered, that the Colony, while it remained such, never
had a newspaper; and printing presses were almost unknown.
Nor was there any newspaper in the Province until the beginning
of the last century. The laws even were not printed till 1648;
and not again till 1660. There are two or three sources from
which may be drawn conclusions that will serve to indicate
now slavery was regarded during the periods of the colonial
and provincial history. One of these is the number of slaves
who were held here, at any one time, as it tends to show whether
the people were eager, or otherwise, to possess them; for,
5f they had wished for them, the English merchants were ever
ready to supply such a desirable demand; it was a branch of
English commerce. Another is the manner in which they were
treated by their owners, as serving to show whether the motive
in holding them was wholly a selfish one, for the sake of
the labor which might be wrung out of them by harsh and
cruel treatment; and, lastly, the expression which remains of
individual and associate opinion, as it is contained in letters,
pamphlets, and the records of religious and other associations.
Nor should we forget, that, in the discussions to which the
question of slavery gave rise, there were those in the Province
who doubted the expediency of immediate emancipation; and
that some went so far as to insist that the trade itself had better
be regulated, than wholly suppressed.  And this statement is
due to fairness in undertaking to give the true measure of public
sentiment upon the subject.




212   SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.
In respect to the number of slaves living here at any one time,
no census seems to have been taken of them prior to 1754.
And it is proper, in this connection, to meet a suggestion which
has been industriously propagated by individuals, that the early
settlers of Massachusetts engaged in, and prosecuted the slavetrade as a regular business. The writer already quoted, in the
work referred to, indulges in this statement: " At the very birth
of the foreign commerce of New England, the African slavetrade became a regular business."1 The facts upon which a
precisely opposite conclusion, so far as it relates to Massachusetts,
has been arrived at by others, will enable one to judge whether
such a sweeping charge is well founded. Mr. Felt says, that the
first vessel that brought slaves to Massachusetts, in 1638, was
only of one hundred and twenty tons burthen, and was freighted
with cotton and tobacco; so that the number of these slaves
was, probably, small.2  He also refers to a statement of
Governor Bradstreet in 1680, who expressly declares that there
had not been a company of blacks or slaves brought into the
country since the beginning of the plantation, except one small
vessel about two years before the time of making this state
ment, which brought between forty and fifty negroes, mostly
women and children. And it is also stated by Governor Bradstreet, that these were sold here " for 10, 15, and ~20 apiece,"
although they stood the merchant "in near ~40 apiece,"3 which
must certainly have offered rather a poor encouragement to
prosecute such a commerce, as "a regular business."  And
Governor Bradstreet adds, that, "now and then, two or three
negroes were brought hither from Barbadoes, and other of his
majesty's plantations, and sold here for about ~20 apiece;"
and he concludes, "that there' may be within our government
about one hundred, or one hundred and twenty. "4 Not a very
extensive commerce certainly, after having been prosecuted for
fifty years, as " a regular business"! But the evidence does not
stop here.  The Secretary of the Historical Society has a
printed letter, bearing date November, 1690, addressed to a
member of the then House of Commons, the title of which is,
"That the trade to Africa is only manageable by an Incorporated
l Moore, p. 29.     2 Hist. Salem, p. 109.
3 Felt's Statis., p. 586.  4 See Hist. Col., vol. xxviii. p. 337.




SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.       213
Company and a joint stock; demonstrated," &c.        The letter
goes on to show, that to carry on the trade requires ample funds
and a well-regulated system, to make it profitable at all. One
of its statements is in these words:"And as it could not then escape your observation, no more than it
can now your memory, that the trade of Africa was, about twenty years
ago, not only so abated, but sunk to such a degree that it became a matter
of State, challenging the utmost wisdom and care of his then majesty;
and of those of the profoundest prudence and of the largest mind, for the
public good, who were, at the time, in the ministry, how to revive and
restore it, so as to render it consistent with the honor of the government, useful to the American Plantations, and of ample advantage to the
Nation."
And it adds, -
" Nor can any body of men, but an incorporated society acting by and
-upon a joint stock, gain and maintain such intelligence as may, upon so
vast and extended a coast, either give life unto or procure an advantage
i)y trade." 
If now we recur to the colonial statistics, they seem to
establish two facts in connection with the circumstances already
mentioned: first, that there was no such demand or desire for
slaves on the part of the colonists, as to induce them to enter to
any considerable extent, into the trade of supplying them; and,
second, that if, as there appears to have been, there was an
increase of the traffic after the year 1700, it was probably in
consequence of the increased encouragement given to the trade,
by the government at home, as recommended by the letter referred
to, rather than of any action of the colonists, or any increased favor
on their part, for the institution of slavery. We ought not to
forget another fact in connection with the number of slaves, as
given by Governor Bradstreet; that while, of the latter, there
were only one hundred or one hundred and twenty, as late as
1680, the number of Scots, who had been captured by the
English, and sold into the colony in 1651, was about two hundred
and seventy-four, - all purchased in a single year, which showed,
1 Confirmatory of this is the statement of Governor Dudley in 1708. " The African
Company of England had not had any factory or ship here. Some traders on their
own account, a long time since, have been upon the Coast of Guinea, and imported
slaves." (Felt's Statis., p. 586.)




214   SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.
in some measure, the estimate at which our ancestors held the
trade in African slaves.
In 1708, Governor Dudley estimates the whole number in the
colony at five hundred and fifty; two hundred having arrived
between 1698 and 1707.1 Dr. Belknap thinks they were the
most numerous here about 1745. And Mr. Felt, upon careful
calculation, computes their number in 1754, at four thousand
four hundred and eighty-nine. In 1763, the proportion of blacks,
slave and free, to the whites in the province, as given by Dr.
Belknap, was as one to forty-five.2  While, at the same time, in
Virginia, where slavery was in favor, there were ten blacks to
eight whites, or one hundred thousand blacks to eighty-five
thousand whites in that colony.
Nor was this because the colonists of Massachusetts did not
wish for laborers. Labor is one of the great necessities of every
new settlement. And we know, from various sources, at what
cost and trouble they were to procure it. One means of doing
it, was by some sort of contract with those who sold their service to the company, probably to pay for the cost of their trans-.
portation into the colony. In the Life and Letters of Governor
Winthrop,3 it is stated, that of the residents under Endicott,
whom Governor Winthrop found here at his arrival, one hundred
and eighty were bond servants of the planters who were to
follow, all of whom were emancipated by him, on account of a
scarcity of provisions in the colony, although they had cost them
from 16 to ~20 each.4
And the reason why the colonists preferred white to black servants was, not so much their profitableness, as that given by
Governor Dudley, - they were " serviceable in war presently, and
after, became planters," adding to the productive population and
military strength of the colony; and Governor Bradstreet tells
us in 1680, that of the Scots who were sold here in 1651, most
of them had married and were then living, with about half as
many Irish brought here, at several times, as servants.5 They
1 Felt's Statis.,p. 586.
2 Felt's Statis., p. 211; Hist. Col., vol. iv. pp. 198-199.  3 Vol. ii. p. 29.
4 Felt's Salem, p. 42. This class of servants are described by Randolph in 1676,
as being those " who serve for years for the charge of being transported thither by
their masters" (Felt's Statis., 202.)
5 Felts, Statis., p. 586.




SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.     215
seem to have passed from servants to planters, and to have
acquired homes and families of their own.
If, now, we turn to the question of, how such slaves as they
had were treated by their masters, the testimony seems to have
been uniform throughout the colonial period. Dr. Belknap made
a systematic business of ascertaining this point by an extended
correspondence with many of the most intelligent men in the
province. And among them were John Adams, Governor Sullivan, Dr. Holyoke, and others of that class; and the testimony he
gives us is, that this treatment "was far from  rigorous. No
greater labor was exacted from them than of white people."
" In the country, they lived as well as their masters, and often sat
at the same table." 1 A large proportion of them were employed
in domestic service in families in the larger towns. They could
not have been worked in gangs, as was the case in the Southern
States; for their number was so few, that, if equally divided
among the families in the province, not more than one family in
seven or eight could have had a single slave; and some judgment can be formed upon this subject, from the fact which many
still can remember, that when the entire slave population of the
State was emancipated by the adoption of the Constitution in
1780, many of them continued members of their masters' families,
by preference, as long as they lived. The record has yet to be
found of a slave woman ever being worked as a " field-hand"
in Massachusetts.  More than that, in many towns, and I know
not but in all, the slave, if otherwise qualified, was admitted to
the communion and fellowship of the church. For some years
after 1652, negro servants were, moreover, enrolled in the militia.
Nor is there any thing in the law, or, so far as history tells us, in
usage, that excluded the children of slaves from the privileges
of the free schools of Massachusetts.  Marriages between slaves
were celebrated by clergymen, and carried with them the legal
incidents of such a relation.2 That many of the children of slaves
1 See also 4 Mass. Rep. 128.
2 Col. L. 746; Quincy Rep. 30, Gray's note. J. W. Thornton, Esq., has in his
possession the original of a form used by the Rev. Mr. Phillips, of Andover, who
was ordained in 1710, in the marriage of slaves, in which he is careful to remind
them that they remain still, really and truly, as ever, their master's property. The
form seems to have been a special one of his own, and merely shows that, in 1756,
when slavery was recognized in Massachusetts, there were minds constituted like




216    SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.
were brought up as slaves, and, when the affairs of their masters' families were settled, were inventoried as property, and disposed of as such, there is probably no reason to doubt. Nor is
it difficult to imagine how such a state of things should more
or less frequently have arisen.
A remark of Judge Cooley, of Michigan, in his recent work on
Constitutional Limitations, applies with much force to the subject here referred to.
"A power," says he, "is frequently yielded to, merely because it is
claimed; and it may be exercised for a long period, in violation of the constitutional prohibition, without the mischief which the Constitution was
designed to guard against appearing, or without any one being sufficiently
interested in the subject to raise the question." (p. 71.)
In the first place, nobody seems to have thought whether they
were or were not slaves, until just before the Revolution. The
number, at best, was too few to excite much attention. There
was but here and there a lawyer to agitate the question, if
it had been raised; and it was, obviously, for the policy of
the towns, as well as a measure of humanity to the child, to
have him   brought up in his master's family, instead of being
separated from his parents, and supported or bound out as
a pauper. Such children grew up, unquestioning and unquestioned, as slaves de facto, without being, in any sense, slaves de
jure.  It was not, however, ordinarily, for the value they were
of to their masters; for we are told by Dr. Belknap and his correspondents, that they were often given away in childhood. Nor
does the fact that they were held as slaves, where the question
as to their being such was never raised, militate with the position
already stated,- that no child was ever born into lawful bondage
in Massachusetts, from the year 1641 to the present hour. And
when, at last, questions of this kind began to be raised, juries
seem  not to have been slow in vindicating the freedom of the
some in 1856, when it had ceased to be lawful there, who regarded the rights of the
master to his human chattel, as more to be respected than the inborn rights of the
slave himself as a human being. Judge Sewall, in his diary in 1700, speaks of a contemplated marriage between a negro servant-man of Mr. Wait and a negro servantmaid of Mrs. Thair, and adds, "and Mrs. Thair gave up the note of publication to
Mr. Wait, for him to carry it to William Griggs Esq., town clerk, and to Williams,
in order to have them published according to law."




SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.           217
slave. All they had wanted was an occasion to act. If we
turn now to the third source of knowledge as to how slavery was
regarded in the colony and province, - what was written and published and done by individuals and associations in respect to it,
- we find a pamphlet by Judge Sewall, afterwards Chief Justice
of the Superior Court, published in 1700, aimed directly at the
unchristian character of slavery and the abominations of the
slave-trade; 1 and, in 1716, he followed up this attack by a strenuous effort to change the form   of valuing and taxing slaves, and
to take them   out of the list of chattels.  In 1702, the people of
Boston applied to their representatives in the General Court
to have an end put to holding negroes as slaves. This may have
been the moving cause of the act of 1705 already mentioned,
which laid a duty upon all imported slaves; and the historian of
Boston tells us, that, prior to 1727, those who were engaged in
the traffic in slaves, and had occasion to advertise their human
wares, often concealed their names, as people do now, who
choose to keep dark as to what they think and say, by referring
persons who wish for information to " the Printer." 2
The record of how the people of Massachusetts stood in respect to the institution of slavery among them would be greatly
imperfect if it omitted to mention the part which the Quakers
of Nantucket took in the attempts made to suppress it. The
venerable Nathaniel Barney, now of Poughkeepsie, has published an interesting account of their proceedings, and is in
1 The account given by Judge Sewall, in his diary, of the circumstances under
which this was written, is as follows: " Having been long and much dissatisfied with
ye trade of fetching Negroes from Guinea, at last I had a strong inclination to write
something about it; but it wore off. At last reading Bayne Ephs, abt servants who
mentions Blackamores, I began to be uneasy that I had so long neglected doing any
thing. When I was thus thinking, in came Bro. Belknap, to shew me a petition he
intended to present to ye Gen' Court for the freeing a negro and his wife who were
unjustly held in Bondage. And there is a motion by a Boston Committee to get a
law yt all importers of negroes shall pay 4~ per head to discourage ye bringing
of y". And Mr. C. Mather resolves to publish a sheet to exhort masters to labor
yr conversion, which makes me hope that I was called of God to write this apology
for them. Let his blessing accompany the same."
In a letter of Judge Sewall, in 1706, in speaking of this pamphlet, he says, "It
is no small refreshment to me that I have the learned, reverend, and aged Mr. Higginson for my abettor. By the interposition of this breastwork, I hope to carry on and
manage this enterprise with safety and success." (Letter-Book, p. 180.)
2 Drake's Hist., p. 525.




218   SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.
possession of a manuscript copy of a tract against the making
slaves of men, by Elihu Colman, written in 1729, and published in 1733. Following these as our guide, there can be little
doubt that this body of Christians deserve the honor of being the
first associated organization who made open war upon slavery
in this country, or, so far as I have discovered, in the world.
The Friends, at their Philadelphia yearly meeting in 1688, had
begun the discussion without taking any decided action; but the
Friends of Nantucket, moved and aroused by the fervid eloquence
of a distinguished preacher of that denomination, a daughter of
Tristram Coffin, and the wife of Nathaniel Starbuck, made a
public protest and declaration, "that it is not agreeable to the
truth for Friends to purchase slaves and hold them for the term
of life."  This was in 1716, and was followed in 1729 by an
appeal from the same body to the Philadelphia yearly meeting,
that -.
"Inasmuch as we are restrained by the rule of discipline from being
concerned in fetching or importing negro slaves fiom their own country,
whether it is not as reasonable that we should be restricted from buying
them when imported."
There is a peculiar significance in this language from the fact,
stated by the venerable John Woolman, so kindly spoken of in
the writings of Charles Lamb, that, when he was in Newport in
1760, he was pained to see slaves imported from Africa by a
member of the society of Friends, then on sale there by the
importer.
This movement by the people of Nantucket was followed by
others of a similar character, which showed how generally the
attention of the public was being aroused to the mischief and
absurdity of tolerating such an institution in the midst of a people who professed a desire to be free.
And this feeling continued to gain strength, as the difficulties
with the mother country became more threatening. In 1755,
Salem applied to the General Court to suppress slavery.1 Boston did the same in 1766, in 1767, and, as already stated, in 1772.
In 1773, the action of the towns was more general and decided;
and, without attempting to enumerate them all, it will be enough
1 Felt's Salem, p. 204.




SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.       219
to mention, as representing different sections of the Province, the
towns of Salem, Leicester, and Sandwich, which, in that year,
specially and pointedly instructed their representatives to use
their endeavors to put a stop to the importation of slaves.1 The
subject, too, found its way into the college; and, at the Commencement at Harvard that year, there was a public forensic
disputation upon the question, " Whether slavery is in accordance with the law of nature?"
Pamphlets and newspapers began, as early as 1765, to discuss
this question of slavery.2 And, as the country approached the
crisis of the Revolution, masters, in many cases, voluntarily
emancipated their slaves; and appeals began to be made to the
Courts, by those held in bondage, to be declared free. There
were two such cases in Middlesex, between 1768 and 1770, in
which judgment was rendered in favor of the parties suing for
freedom; and another was decided in the same way in Essex,
in 1773: which are referred to rather as examples, than to indicate the number or localities of these actions.3
There is a significant circumstance in the proceedings of the
Courts of Massachusetts, in the fact, that, contrary to the uniform
usage of other States where slavery has prevailed, slaves were
here admitted to testify against white men, even in capital
cases.4
It has sometimes been asked, Upon what ground, in the cases
above referred to, the Courts pronounced in favor of the party
suing for his freedom?  Unfortunately the Records do not show
this. If it was placed upon the circumstance of their being born
in this Commonwealth, as seems to have been the case, from the
language of C. J. Parsons,5 it would be in accordance with the
doctrine afterwards declared and maintained by the Courts. If
it was because the jury saw fit, of their own accord, to render
their verdict in such a way as to insure the negro his freedom,
1 Felt's Salem; Freem. Hist. Barnst.; Hist. Leicester.
2 Felt's Statis., p. 204.     3 Coffin's Newb., p. 339.
4 Quincy Rep. 30, Gray's note. The following is an extract of a letter from Judge
Sewall, in 1719, "to Addington Davenport, Esq., going to judge Samuel Smith, of
Sandwich, for killing his negro." -" The poorest boys and girls within the province,
such as are of the lowest condition, whether they be English or Indians or Ethiopians,
they have the same right to religion and life that the richest heirs have."
6 4 Mass. Rep., 127.




220   SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.
it serves, at least, to show how strong the sentiment then was in
the community against the institution itself. We are told by
John Adams, that " he never knew a jury, by a verdict, to determine a negro to be a slave.  They always found him free."
And he gives us to understand, that the arguments addressed to
the Courts in favor of his liberty, were those " arising from the
rights of mankind."'
Nor was the pulpit silent. The venerable pastor of the church
in Newbury, as well as the late Mr. Coffin, the historian of that
town, have given us interesting accounts of two spirited sermons
preached in that pulpit, in 1774, by the Rev. Mr. Niles, afterwards a member of Congress from Vermont, and a judge of the
Supreme Court. And, as evidence of their pertinency and effect,
we are also told, that one of his parishioners, the next morning,
called up the only slave he had, and gave him his freedom unsolicited.2
In this connection, moreover, a circumstance mentioned by the
learned and faithful biographer of General Warren, ought not
to be omitted, inasmuch as it shows how freely the feeling against
the encroachments of the mother country was identified with that
against slavery in every form. In November, 1772, the Committee of Correspondence of the town of Boston submitted to
their constituents a statement of what they deemed to be the
" Rights of the Colonies," and a list of the infringements of
these.
It was unanimously adopted at a meeting in Faneuil Hall;
and the selectmen of the town were directed to send copies of it
to the selectmen of the several towns in the province. One of
its positions is, -" The right to freedom being the gift of God
Almighty, it is not in the power of man to alienate this gift, and
voluntarily become a slave." And to show how the sentiments
of this statement of the " Rights of the Colonies" chimed in with
the feelings of the people of the towns, more than eighty of them
sent in their cordial response in its favor, within the first five
weeks after it had been issued.
The part which was taken by the black men of the Province
in the struggle for our independence, has been admirably told by
1 Original letter to Dr. Belknap, in possession of Mass. Hist. Soc.
2 Dr. Withington's Letter; Coffin's Newbury, p. 340.




SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.           221
one fully competent to do it justice, in a work of our late associate, George Livermore; nor does any thing need to be added
to show its bearing upon the subject now before us.        Contemporary history is full of illustrations; and the language ascribed
to Colonel Timothy Bigelow, of the Massachusetts Fifteenth of
the Continental Line, was but an echo of the sentiment pervading this community everywhere, that, " while fighting for liberty,
he would never be guilty of selling slaves."
With all this feeling, however, the events of that day show
that it was tempered with prudence, and kept in subserviency to
the great interests of the united colonies, in the common struggle
for independence in which they were engaged. In 1777, a petition was presented to the General Court of Massachusetts by
a number of Africans, for the abolition of slavery. A bill to
that effect was reported and read twice, and then laid upon the
table, for the purpose of consulting with the Continental Congress
as to its expediency. In their letter, or petition, to Congress, the
Legislature use these words:-'" Convinced of the justice of the measure, we are restrained from passing it, only from an apprehension that our brethren in the other colonies
should conceive there was an impropriety in our determining on a question
which may, in its nature and operation, be of extensive influence, without
previously consulting your Honors."
They then proceed to -
4' ask the attention of your Honors to this matter, that, if consistent with
the union and harmony of the United States, we may follow the dictates
of our own understanding and feelings; at the same time assuring your
Honors, that we have such a sacred regard to the union and harmony of
the United States, as to conceive ourselves under obligation to refrain
from any measure that should have a tendency to injure that union which
is the basis of our defence and happiness." 1
1 A writer in the "New-York Evening Post," of Jan. 28, 1869, informs the public, in a communication dated Jan. 25, 1869, including the letter referred to in the
above text, that he had " discovered the draft of the letter to Congress, which is of
sufficient interest to deserve publication." A copy of the original had been read
before the Massachusetts Historical Society, at its regular meeting in September,
1868, by Charles Deane, Esq., its secretary; and the above extract had been taken
from the printed sheets of the forthcoming volume of its Transactions, and had been
delivered, forming a part of this lecture, on the 22d of the same January.




222   SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.
It is hardly necessary to add, that such a suggestion as the
abolition of slavery could not have found favor among those
who madly clung to an institution which was, even then, beginning to demoralize the coming republic. But the delicacy of
Massachusetts in the manner of insisting upon it does not derogate from the sincerity with which she sought to procure it.
And when the time came that she felt at liberty to act, it will be
found that she did, by herself, what she had been disposed to ask
permission of her sister States to do, -set open the doors of
bondage, by an organic law of freedom; and, in 1780, echoed
back the spirit of the Fathers of 1641, by declaring her slaves
free.
To understand this measure, it should be remembered, that,
in becoming a free State, she had no other form of government than the inadequate one under which her affairs had
been administered under the Crown.   It was, accordingly,
attempted, in 1777, to frame a constitution, as had been
done by some others of the colonies which had now become
States.
But the instrument offered to the people contained no Declaration of Rights, and was otherwise so defective, that it was
rejected, almost without a count of the votes. This was followed
by the Constitution of 1780, the opening declaration of which
serves as a key to the whole instrument, that " all men are born
free and equal, and have certain natural, essential, and unalienable rights." Important as this clause was held to be in its
practical bearing upon the condition of the slave, it contained no
new thought, nor was it the enunciation of any new dogma in
political science. It had come down from early times, having
been advanced and maintained by a Tuscan writer as early as
1540; and had been often repeated, even by the politicians and
statesmen of our own country. WTe read it, substantially, in the
Declaration of our Independence of 1776. It had found a place,
the same year, in the Bill of Rights of the Constitution of Virginia; and it was repeated in that of New Hampshire. But
in its application to bodies politic, it seems to have borrowed its
meaning and interpretation from the habits of thought on the
part of the people by whom it was used. In New Hampshire,
it seems to have been read, as saying, that all who should be




SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.          223
born after its publication were to be free. While to the slaveholders of Virginia, and such as construe the Declaration of Independence in the same light, these words were nothing but a
"glittering generality."   But to the people of Massachusetts,
these words were things. The framers of that constitution
made no promise to the ear to break it to the hope. And
when the highest judicial tribunal in the State was called
upon to construe and apply this clause, they gave a response
which struck off the chains from every slave in the Commonwealth; and Massachusetts was, at last, what she had so long
been struggling to be, in all her dwellings, indeed the home
of freemen.
T'he case in which this important decision was made, was that
of a black man in the County of Worcester, by the name of
Quork Walker.1     And a similar case was soon after decided in
Berkshire, where a black woman, by the name of Betty, was
the subject. A case involving the same question is said to
have arisen in Nantucket, about the same time, in which a like
decision  was had, when      that staunch old Quaker, William
Rotch, Sr., without waiting, as it is said, for any action of the
Court, resolved to pay the lay of a black seaman, in a whaling
voyage, to himself, instead of his master, on the ground that the
Bill of Rights had made him free. And the Court sustained him
in so doing. And what is worthy of notice, is the character and
position of the men in the profession who were ready to engage
in the cause of the slave.   The counsel for Walker were Levi
Lincoln, Sr., and Caleb Strong, whose very names are a part of
our political history. And the counsel for the slave woman in
Berkshire was Theodore Sedgwick, afterwards Speaker of Con1 In June, 1781, Walker recovered judgment in the Court of Common Pleas
against Jennison, for ~50 damages; and Jennison appealed to the Superior Court.
But, failing to prosecute his appeal, judgment was rendered for Walker, at the September Term of the Superior Court, 1781. At the same term of the Court of Common
Pleas, Jennison's action against Caldwell for depriving him of the services of his
servant, Walker, was tried; and a verdict was returned in favor of the defendant. The
plaintiff appealed; but, at the September Term of the Superior Court, judgment was
rendered for the defendant, Caldwell. At the same term of the Superior Court, September, 1781, an indictment was found against Jennison, for an assault upon Walker.
It was tried before a jury, at the April Term, 1783; and the defendant was found
guilty, and sentenced to pay a fine of $40 and costs. (Superior Court Records,
Suffolk, 1781-2, p. 84; ib. 79, 1783, p. 85.)




224   SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.
gress, and Judge of our Supreme Court. To these we might
add the names of Judge John Lowell and John Adams, to say
nothing of Samuel Adams, and other prominent leaders in the
politics of the State.
It ought not, however, to be kept out of sight, that there have
been those who, to this day, cavil at the construction thus put
upon this clause in the Constitution. And the writer already
referred to, contests the idea that this clause in the Bill of Rights
was intended "to annul the condition of servitude;" and adds,
" We have made diligent inquiry, search, and examination,
without discovering the slightest trace of positive contemporary evidence to show that this opinion was well founded."'
He seems to have forgotten, that every member of the Court
which pronounced this judgment, had been members of the
Convention which formed this Constitution, and took part in its
discussions; and two of them were of the committee who were
appointed to prepare a draft of the Bill of Rights. Nor is this
all: Judge Sullivan, one of these, and afterwards AttorneyGeneral and Governor of Massachusetts, in a letter to Dr.
Belknap, in 1795, declared, that " this decision put an end to the
idea of slavery in this State." And the venerable Samuel
Dexter, father of the still more eminent statesman of that name,
sums up an account of this case with this brief declaration:
" Thus ended slavery in Massachusetts."  And here the subject
might properly be left, so far as the truths of history and the
good fame of Massachusetts are concerned. But there is that in
the history of this subject which suggests a contrast between
slavery as it existed here in 1660, and as we had occasion to
witness it elsewhere in 1860.
It was a living organism in 1660, because, as we are told by
Lord Brougham, when speaking of the abolition of slavery,
" Every measure proposed by the Colonial Legislature, which
did not meet the entire concurrence of the British Cabinet, was
sure to be rejected in the last instance by the Crown."
In 1860, it owed its life to the persistent will of the States
themselves in which it prevailed. It never, in Massachusetts,
divided men socially into classes; nor did it build up a spurious
oligarchy upon the roll-call of wretched beings under the ban of
1 Moore, p. 203.




SLAVERY AS IT ONCE PREVAILED IN MASSACHUSETTS.  225
the law. It did not arrest the privileges or progress of free education, nor did it stifle the sense of faith and allegiance with
which a generous mind regards the government that has protected and the country that has reared and cherished him. And
when the time came for the emancipation of the black man, it
found the master ready to offer the sacrifice upon the altar of
liberty, or decorously yielding to the destiny that had made
him free.
And the history of the Commonwealth for more than fourscore years has shown, that, in the relations of civil and political
liberty, the black man and the white may live together in harmony under just laws, and a wise and liberal Constitution.
And may we not hope that, with such a lesson before them,
with slavery gone for ever, the men of our day may yet be wise;
and with power restored, industry revived, and national harmony
secured, our land may be the home of a free, a united, and a
prosperous people?
15








RECORDS OF MASSACHUSETTS
UNDER ITS
FIRST CHARTER.
BY CHARLES W. UPHAM.








RECORDS OF MASSACHUSETTS
UNDER ITS
FIRST CHARTER.
T   HE design of the lecture this evening is to consider the
Records of Massachusetts, under its first charter, from the
point of view in which they illustrate the formation of a bodypolitic.
The organization of families and communities into some
established order is demanded by the conditions of our nature.
More than any other temporal concern, it merits and compels
the attention of thoughtful minds; and the questions relating to
it have always been acknowledged to rank in the highest department, as subjects of inquiry and meditation. Through the entire
range of history, the greatest minds have been turned to it. But
a glance at the condition of the nations of the earth shows how
unsatisfactory have been the results. The experience of ages
has effected little; and the theories of philosophers, not much
more. The human race in all lands, and all ages, has groaned
under the crushing weight of institutions constructed on false
principles. Governments everywhere are upheld by military
force; and depend for continuance upon ignorance and superstition. So far as we are an exception, it becomes us to inquire
to what we owe the degree of our exemption.
Enlightened views on the subject of government are especially
important to a people that governs itself. We can hardly expect
to obtain them from treatises and essays, however ingenious and
learned. There is, indeed, an inherent obstacle in the way of
attaining to the truth by these means. Attempts to reason and
speculate concerning it are thwarted by the influence on the




230             RECORDS OF MASSACHUSETTS
mind of pre-existing usages and ideas.  Every suggestion of
reform is encountered by the necessity of adapting it to a surrounding state of things, and by well-grounded fear, that, however specious the theory, it may not work well in practice. The
elements of motive, sentiment, and association, that actuate mankind, are so infinitely diversified that they cannot be calculated.
Casual events, and complicated circumstances, not to be foreseen,
may bring to naught the best considered schemes.
On this subject, the world craves and needs, not what theorists
have conjectured, or philosophers propounded, but what has been
tried, and found sufficient. The question is -Has a fair experiment ever been made, under favorable auspices, of laying the
foundation, and building the fabric of a government of men?
and, if so, let it be brought before us.
As answering this question, and meeting this demand, I cite
the colony of Massachusetts, during its first half-century, as
more to the purpose than any other instance in history.
In pursuance of the recommendation of Governor Clifford, in
a special message of Feb. 12, 1853, the Legislature of Massachusetts ordered the first and second volumes of the " Records
of the Governor and Company of the Massachusetts Bay in
New England," to be printed, embracing the proceedings in
London prior to the transfer of the patent; and continued after
that event, under the style of " Colony Records," to 1649.
The next year a resolve was passed, approved by Governor
Washburn, February 17, for printing the third, fourth, and fifth
volumes, carrying the record to 1686, and covering, altogether,
the entire period of the government under the first charter. The
form and manner in which they were printed do honor to the
Commonwealth, and to the distinguished member of our
society, intrusted with the responsible duty of editing them,
Nathaniel Bradstreet Shurtleff. The copying was done, under
his appointment, by David Pulsifer, whose thorough acquaintance
with the chirography of early colonial times gives assurance of
exactness.
These volumes supply the most important instruction anywhere to be found, on the formation of a civilized State. They
are the text-book on the subject; and stand alone in their character, and.the value of their contents, as I proceed to show.




UNDER ITS FIRST CHARTER.           231
On the 3d of November, 1620, James I. granted by letterspatent all that section of North America, between the fortieth
and forty-eighth parallels of latitude, from sea to sea, to the
" Council established at Plymouth, in the County of Devon, for
the Planting, Ruling, Ordering, and Governing of New England
in America."
The Council at Plymouth conveyed by a contract, indented
March 14, 1628, so much of the territory, included in their aforesaid patent, as was between lines, three miles north of Merrimack
River and three miles south of Charles River, running from sea
to sea, to Sir Henry Rosewell and Sir John Young, Knights,
Thomas Southcott, John Humphries, John Endicott, and Simon
Whitcomb, their heirs, assigns, and associates.
One year afterwards, namely, on the 4th of March, 1629, in
the fourth year of the reign of Charles I., letters-patent passed
the seals, confirming to the above-named six persons, and twenty
others, severally named, who had become associated with them,
and their heirs, and assigns, " to their only proper and absolute
use and behoof forevermore," the territory purchased from the
Council at Plymouth. These twenty-six individuals thus came
into complete possession, and were owners, so far as the crown
of England could give title, of the continent within the limits
described. The vocabulary of ordinary language, and of the law,
was exhausted in expressing, in every possible iteration and
reiteration, the fulness, absoluteness, and perpetuity of the
feofrnent and jurisdiction thus conveyed. In three particulars
only was any limitation imposed.
The company was forbidden, in ruling its vast American
domain, to make regulations repugnant to the laws of England.
But this was merely nominal, as no provision was made, or required to be made, for redress of any wrong done by the company to a planter, or to any outside party.  There was, indeed,
no way left open, through which the regulations of the company
could be brought to adjudication on this point. No political
powers, or rights whatever, were given by the patent to the
people of the settlement; for the negative protection implied in
the language, that no laws should be imposed upon them in conflict with the statutes of the realm, was a mere shadow of a shade,
as events proved.




232             RECORDS OF MASSACHUSETTS
The company was required to pay to the crown one-fifth part
of all ores of gold or silver found in the country.  This
amounted to nothing.
There was one other condition, which also, in practice, hardly
amounted to any thing. The patent exempted the settlements,
to be made by the company, from all duties of any kind, "inward or outward," for seven years; and, after that, for twentyone years more, with this exception only, that, during the latter
period, they were to be subject to a duty of five per cent upon
goods shipped from the plantations to any other part of the
dominions of England. But this had no sensible effect here, for
the duty was to be exacted at the outer end of the voyage, in
the port of discharge; and was there imposed upon all alike,
foreigners as well as other colonists. Further, it was pledged by
the crown, that on the re-exportation, at any time within thirteen
months, of goods upon which this duty had been paid, to any
country whatever, no further duty of any kind should be levied
on them. The whole arrangement was justly to be regarded as
the assurance of a privilege rather than the imposition of a
burden. No provision was made relating to the subject, on the
expiration of the twenty-one years, but the whole matter left, as
between the crown and the company; for it must be noticed that
there is no reference whatever, in the patent, to the authority, or
even the existence, of Parliament, except as implied in the clauses
requiring the regulations of the company not to be repugnant to
the laws of England. The duty on goods was not in deference
to any acts of Parliament, but carefully described, as " according
to the ancient trade of merchants." In order that it might be
made clear and certain, that the territories embraced in the
patent should not be subject to Parliament, but exclusively connected with the personal private property of the crown, the
device was adopted, as in the patent to the Council at Plymouth,
of repeating over and over again, that they were appendages of
the royal demesnes, " to be holden of us, as of our manor of
East Greenwich."  They were to be regarded as an enlargement of the grounds of one of the favorite residences of the
sovereign. While thus protecting them from interference by any
other parts of the government, the King bound himself, and his
heirs and successors, to the end of time, not to encroach upon,




UNDER ITS FIRST CHARTER.           233
but, on the contrary, to uphold the administration of the grantees
in governing their territory; and enjoined the same upon all exercising authority, civil or military, throughout his dominions.
The persons to whom the patent was issued, were constituted
a body-politic. They were to choose, annually, from among
themselves, a governor, deputy governor, and eighteen assistants.
Any seven or more of the assistants, together with the governor
or deputy governor, were to hold a monthly court, for disposing
of questions arising from time to time, and requiring immediate
attention. There were to be quarterly meetings, held at specified
times, by the whole body of the members, or " freemen," as they
were called, of the company. These were for making laws or
regulations, and the transaction of weighty business. They are
spoken of in the patent as " great, general, and solemn assemblies," and termed the " four Great and General Courts " of the
company. At the quarterly meeting, occurring in Easter term,
that is, in the latter part of May, the annual elections were
required to be made.
The King, in the patent, named the persons who were to fill
the offices of the company, until the time fixed for an election
should arrive. It is remarkable, that, although there were several
knights among the grantees, he selected an untitled one for governor. "-We do, by these presents, for us, our heirs, and successors, nominate, ordain, make, and constitute our well-beloved
Matthew Cradock, the first and present Governor of the said
company."  Cradock was a London merchant of great wealth,
and, as the Records show, of eminent practical ability, energy,
and wisdom. He is said to have been connected by family ties,
in some way, with Endicott, which accounts, perhaps, for his
having been drawn in as an associate of the six original proprietors, and for the deep interest he took in the enterprise. It can
hardly be doubted, I think, that he was the same Matthew Cradock, son of a wool merchant in Stafford, who, in the reign of
James I., became the owner of the baronial estate in Staffordshire, called Caverswall. The castellated mansion, built as early
as the Norman conquest, was reconstructed by him, under the
superintendence of Inigo Jones. It is still standing in the form
Cradock gave to it, and justly regarded as " one of the most
striking, picturesque, and interesting remains of a distant age. A




234                RECORDS OF MASSACHUSETTS
venerable and " solemn fortress-like structure," it demands special
attention, as "presenting the ideal of the great architect of the
transition from  the ancient castle to the baronial mansion."
To an American it has a deeper interest. If its possessor and
occupant was the "well-beloved" Matthew         Cradock, of the
patent, it will appear, as we proceed, that to us that noble mansion will ever be invested with sacred memories and associations.
Within its massive walls the thought, perhaps, was conceived
which has made Massachusetts and our country what they are
to-day. Cradock was returned to Parliament from the city of
London, in 1640, and died not long after.1
It is important to bear in mind that the patent conferred
upon the company, in the most emphatic language, all political
power whatever, without any reservation that touched the substance of the grant. This is so vital to the case, as I am presenting it, that the expressions used may be quoted,"We do, of our further grace, certain knowledge, and mere motion,
give and grant to the said governor or deputy governor, and such of the
assistants and freemen of the said company, for the time being, as shall
be assembled in any of their General Courts, or in any other courts to be
specially summoned and assembled for that purpose, or to the greater part
of them, that it shall and may be lawful to and'for them, from time to time,
to make, ordain, and establish all manner of wholesome and reasonable
orders, laws, statutes, and ordinances, directions, and instructions, not contrary to the laws of this our realm of England, as well for settling of the
forms and ceremonies of government and magistracy fit and necessary for
the said plantation and the inhabitants there, and for naming and styling of
ail sorts of officers, both superior and inferior, and setting forth of the
several duties, powers, and limits of every such office and place, and for
impositions of lawful fines, mulcts, imprisonment, or other lawful correction, and for the directing, ruling, and disposing of all other matters
and things."
Some dozen or two knights and gentlemen, more or less, sitting in the parlors of Matthew    Cradock, in Swithen's Lane,
within the ancient limits of London, by virtue of powers thus
granted, held absolute sway over this part of America, from
1 Baronial Halls and Ancient Picturesque Edifices of England, by S. C. Hall,
F.S.A. London, 1858. Proceedings of Essex Institute, vol. i. p. 242: Memoir of
Cradock, by David Roberts.




UNDER ITS FIRST CHARTER.           235
Massachusetts Bay to the Pacific Ocean; and they proceeded to
administer their government by transporting settlers forthwith.
Very soon it was found expedient to send some one over to
superintend affairs here on the spot, and John Endicott, an original purchaser of the country from the Council at Plymouth, was
despatched accordingly. Some months after his departure, the
company, on the 30th of April, 1629, elected him " Governor of
the Plantation in the Massachusetts Bay," and a commission
was duly forwarded to him with the form of an oath of office.
This was, however, an arrangement, whereby no power was
parted with by the company. It was a limited appointment.
Endicott's office was to terminate in one year from the day when
he took the oath, and the right was expressly reserved of removing him at any time within the year. His authority was limited
by sundry conditions, and reports of all his doings were required
to be transmitted to London for approval. He executed his
functions with fidelity, energy, and ability. But, notwithstanding all his efforts and those of his employers, the affairs of the
company were getting into embarrassment, and its operations
threatened with ruin.
Cradock, a thorough business man, appreciated the condition
of things. He saw the impending catastrophe; and, being of a
bold and courageous spirit, with the comprehensive views of
a statesman, proved himself competent to discover and apply the
only remedy that could save the enterprise. That which had
been fatal to colonial success in other attempts, was the difficulty
in the Massachusetts plantation. It was managed by a distant
administration. Deliberations and determinations by a body
sitting in London could not meet the exigencies of a community,
with an ocean between, and the interlapse of months in the
transmission of orders and intelligence. Forming a plan by
which all concerned might be extricated from the responsibilities
in which they were becoming more and more involved, he was
so fortunate as to secure the co-operation of parties competent
to carry it through. A number of gentlemen of property, character, and influence, were found willing to join the company and
assume its burdens, with the understanding that they would personally transport themselves and families to America, and make
it their permanent home, provided they were allowed to carry




236             RECORDS OF MASSACHUSETTS
the patent with them, hold its offices, execute its functions, and
possess all its rights and powers. This was Cradock's proposal,
and the arrangement was consummated.
John Winthrop, Thomas Dudley, and others, took their seats
in the company, at a meeting, Oct. 15, 1629. At a meeting, five
days afterwards, Cradock vacated the chair, and Winthrop was
elected governor, with a new board of assistants, all to hold
office for one year from that date. Early the next spring, he embarked for Massachusetts Bay, with the patent, and the frame
and body of the government. Not a vestige of it was left in
England.
There were undoubtedly great and daring irregularities in
these proceedings, which could not have escaped notice, and
would have been summarily arrested, had there been the slightest suspicion of their ultimate consequences. There is no pretence of authority in the patent for the removal of the company
out of the realm, or for the relinquishment of his office by Cradock, in the time and manner. His stepping out of the chair,
on the 20th of October, without even going through the ceremony of a resignation, and the election of Winthrop to serve an
annual term, when by the patent he could only fill out an unexpired term, were equally without justification. Indeed, no provision is made in that instrument for the resignation of any office,
and it is a procedure inadmissible by English usage. The
transfer of the company to America brought with it another
violation of the patent, inasmuch as they were on the passage
across the Atlantic at the date fixed in express terms for the
annual election, which was pretermitted in consequence altogether. These departures from and violations of the implied
meaning and explicit requirements of the patent were necessities involved in the operation of the transference of it from
England to America. Those engaged in it, faced the responsibilities of the occasion without shrinking. No stricture, or
comment of any kind, appeared from any quarter; and the thing
was done.
From the Records, Matthew Cradock alone appears as the
originator and manager of this business; but from the nature of
the whole proceeding, it is evident that Winthrop shared with
him, as a principal co-actor. Let them each have the glory of




UNDER ITS FIRST CHARTER.           237
the transaction. It is a glory that will become brighter through
all time. History sheds no purer lustre upon any names than
belongs to the men whose wisdom and statesmanship led to the
bold and decisive step that enabled the colony of Massachusetts
to bear its great part in teaching how a republic can be built up
on a solid and permanent foundation.
The patent of Charles I. to the Massachusetts colony is what
is called our First Charter; and, from this point, I shall speak of
it under that appellation.
When Winthrop's fleet came to anchor in the harbor of Salem,
he, and such members of the company as had accompanied or
preceded him, found themselves in absolute and uncontrolled
possession of the country, within the'limits of their charter.
Their jurisdiction and powers were complete; and had they been
actuated by selfish motives, or a low ambition, and retained the
character of a close corporation, the fortunes of the plantation,
and their own fame, would have had the same fate, that of a brief
duration and an ignoble end.
The charter gave to them, il express and repeated terms and
without limitation, the right to admit new associates. Persons
thus admitted became full partners and equal members of the
company, called, as has been stated, Freemen. The exercise of
this right was the magic by which they converted what was
originally a royal act of incorporation for business and commercial purposes, into the constitution of a free and noble Commonwealth. In the year 1631, one hundred and twenty-six of
the resident population were admitted, and in the next ten years
twelve hundred more.
By this generous and enlightened policy, the PEOPLE here
acceded to the rights and powers given in the charter.  The
Colony of Massachusetts became an independent State. Parliament could not touch it, and the crown had bound itself to keep
its hands off.
The result of the proceedings thus far may be restated, at this
point, in a few words: The charter gave to the Massachusetts
Company sovereignty over its territory. The admission of the
people of the plantation into the company gave that sovereignty
to them. Having the charter in their possession, and rightfully
holding under it, they claimed and exercised absolute self-government.




238             RECORDS OF MASSACHUSETTS
One hundred and forty-six years before the Declaration of the
Independence of the United States, this was an independent
government, and continued so for more than half a century,more independent, in fact, than it has ever been since. Between
the period of the First Charter and the war of the Revolution, it
was a dependent province, its governors appointed by the British
monarch, and the royal assent needed to give validity to its laws.
Since the opening of the Revolutionary conflict, to this hour, it
has been, in many respects and to a considerable extent, subject
to the old Congress of the Confederation, and subsequently to
the Government of the United States. But during the fifty-eight
years of the First Charter, the people were as free to rule themselves as if they had been on another planet. They chose all
their own officers, asked no approval of their laws, suffered
no appeal in any case to the mother country, and bowed to no
tribunals but of their own erection. This was, and ought to be
considered, the first era of American independence.
In this respect, that is, in exemption from foreign interference,
the situation of the original colonists of Massachusetts was all
that could be desired; in other respects it was equally favorable.
All the requisite conditions for the formation of a good government existed. A country lay before them, unoccupied, open,
and free; sufficiently large to give room for the experiment, and
comprising features and resources adapted to the uses of an industrious and intelligent people, with only here and there a solitary previous settler, or remnants of Aboriginal tribes in no way
fastened to the soil. They had among them many persons of
large experience in affairs, conversant with the laws and customs,
not only of their own native country, but of the nations of Continental Europe, and well read in ancient history. Some of them
had held eminent social position, and were of enlarged culture;
and not a few, having enjoyed the advantages of the highest
schools and seats of academic learning, and of Inns of Court,
were remarkably qualified to act the part of statesmen. There
probably was a greater amount of practical wisdom and energy
among them than in any community, of equal numbers, ever
brought together. What they had endured in the old country,
and the sacrifices they had encountered in getting away from it,
and in opening their wilderness homes, had given them an indi



UNDER ITS FIRST CHARTER.           239
vidual force and independence of character, and liberated their
minds from the influence of all sentimental associations and traditional attachments to the usages, institutions, and social
fixtures of all kinds in the old country.
An opportunity was thus given to solve the problem of government; to ascertain and determine the true method of forming a
political organization in accordance with nature, reason, justice,
and right, not to be paralleled elsewhere in the old or new
world.
The colony of Plymouth, although dating ten years earlier
than Massachusetts and extending its distinct history to the close
of the era of our First Charter, cannot, in some respects, be
regarded as standing on the same level. Its territory was not
large enough to form the basis of a State, developed to its full
dimensions and ramifications. Until after the process of political
organization was under way here, the older colony could hardly
give its attention to any thing else than the struggles required to
extricate itself from financial entanglements with parties in England. It was long before they could feel that the houses they
had built, and the lands they had cleared, were their own. The
infant community springing from Plymouth rock demands, however, the sympathy, veneration, and imitation of the friends of
freedom and virtue.
Before landing, on the t1th of November, 1620, the Pilgrims executed a written instrument, known as " The Compact,"
covenanting and combining themselves together " into a civil
body politick," subscribed by forty-one persons.  Among the
names are those of several who were servants, some who were
sailors, and one, at least, who could have had no pretensions to
consideration on the ground of personal merit, for he is spoken
of by Bradford as having been " shuffled into their company."
From the first, he appears to have incurred censure for his " miscarriages." In 1621, he was tied together " neck and heels" for
contempt of authority and " opprobrious speeches," and in 1630,
hanged for murder.
In view of these facts we must consider the compact, drawn
up in the cabin of the " Mayflower," as an instance of universal
suffrage, announcing the cardinal principle of a government resting upon the whole people, and deriving its authority from the




240             RECORDS OF MASSACHUSETTS
voices of all descriptions of persons, without distinction of rank,
condition, or character, with a comprehensiveness which Massachusetts was long in reaching, and to which the United States
could only have been brought by passing through the Red Sea
of our recent intestine war.
The public documents and records of the colony of Plymouth
have justly been regarded as among the chief historical treasures
of the Commonwealth in which it was merged. In 1836, a
resolve of the Massachusetts Legislature was approved by Governor Everett for the publication of the Laws of the Old Colony;
and by his appointment they were prepared for the press and
edited by our esteemed associate who, in a preceding lecture of
this course, has done justice to the legislation of that colony. The
result of his labors appeared in a valuable and interesting volume
entitled " The Compact, with the Charter and Laws of the Colony
of New Plymouth." In 1855, a resolve was passed, approved by
Governor Gardner, to publish the " Records of the Colony of New
Plymouth; " which was executed by printing them in the same
beautiful shape as the Massachusetts Records, during the period
of the First Charter. The work was performed under the
superintendence of the same editor, Dr. Shurtleff. They show
in detail the proceedings of a community, of a comparatively
small population, on a limited area, conducting its affairs wisely
and justly. Its institutions were simple and unpretentious, and
administered by enlightened men, with as righteous purposes
and free a spirit as the world ever saw. But when we consider government, as branching out in the directions demanded
by a people in the exigencies of an expanding growth, requiring
complicated arrangements and functions to meet its wants,
it is obvious that such an opportunity to develop it was not
afforded in Plymouth as in Massachusetts. It was not, for
instance, until 1640 that any thing like a House of Deputies
appeared, representing towns in a General Assembly in the
older colony. In such respects it fell in our rear, even in the
order of time.
Rhode Island originally consisted of several plantations, conflicting with each other, and carrying their contentions to the
notice of the mother country, thereby keeping their affairs more
or less within its jurisdiction. Its first General Court, in which




UNDER ITS FIRST CHARTER.           241
towns were represented, was held in 1647. Nothing, however,
can impair its glory, in having first planted and ever sacredly
cherished the immortal principle of religious liberty.
What is now Connecticut consisted, for some time, of distinct
jurisdictions. Their affairs, like those of Rhode Island, were
dependent upon decisions looked for from the mother country;
and finally, in 1665, they were consolidated, by the authority of
the crown, extinguishing the colony of New Haven, into one
government. The gallant rescue of the charter obtained at that
time, from the grasp of Sir Edmund Andros, at Hartford in 1687,
is justly regarded one of the most memorable incidents of American history. It continued in force to the time of the Revolution,
and saved Connecticut from experiencing the fate to which
Massachusetts was subjected, after the loss of its First Charter
privileges, of a dependent province. It remained, in fact, the
constitution of the State of Connecticut until 1818.
What are now Maine and New Hampshire were claimed by
conflicting proprietors; a large part of the former, more or less,
under a foreign jurisdiction, and both of them much of the time
under that of Massachusetts.
As this colony was organized, and in. full action, as a civil
government, before the other New-England plantations; as it was
central to them, to a great degree their common mother, and so
much more populous than either, - its history is of larger significance and importance. In many instances, - indeed, for the most
part, - they followed in its track and conformed to its practices.
New York was a Dutch dependency until 1664; and its first
legislative Assembly was in 1683. New Jersey, Pennsylvania,
Delaware, and the Carolinaswere proprietary provinces. Maryland had a legislative Assembly in 1639; but remained a proprietary government. The early colonial condition of Virginia
was much interrupted, and long in an unsettled state.
The records and memorials of all the colonies are, however,
of great value, presenting many features worthy of study, and,
in some particulars, severally having claims to special credit.
Massachusetts alone, was all along, for more than half a
century, left unmolested to form a government, at her leisure,
and as she saw fit. The Records that tell how she did it, possess, therefore, a value altogether unique. They exhibit precisely
16




242              RECORDS OF MASSACHUSETTS
what a student of political science needs to know, and what can
nowhere else be found. I proceed to note a few of the stages
in the progress of eliminating the elements, and shaping the
forms, of an effective, natural, and well-adjusted social and
political organization, narrated in them.
After admitting the people to the freedom and power of the
company, the founders of Massachusetts applied themselves
slowly and cautiously, but with decisive measures, to their work.
For some time, the company, at its meetings, which were all
called Courts, took the entire management of affairs, however
trivial, into its own immediate hands, acting directly on all
matters whatsoever relating to person or property. At their first
meeting, the governor and assistants were invested with the
necessary powers to execute orders and decisions. At the next
meeting, a beadle, afterwards dignified with the title of marshal,
was sworn in, whose duty it was to attend the governor and
execute his commands; also to be present at the Court, to maintain and enforce respect for its authority. The character and
functions of justices of the peace were conferred upon the
governor, deputy governor, and six of the assistants. Constables
were appointed in the principal settlements.
It soon became apparent, that it was impracticable for assemblies of the whole body of the freemen, or for the Governor and
assistants at their monthly meetings, to attend to the multifarious
matters constantly demanding adjudication, in settlements as yet
without known laws or established customs, and separated from
each other by pathless forests.  Cases could not reach the
Court, with all the evidence required to decide upon them justly;
and the Court, therefore, had to go to the cases. Certain persons
were appointed in several localities, with limited jurisdiction, "to
end small causes," as they expressed it. The body of the freemen, in General Court assembled, having thus begun to part
with a portion of their power, and entered upon the path that
separates judicial from legislative functions, carefully felt their
way along, creating local tribunals in the towns, establishing
counties with courts of trial within them, and gradually developing a comprehensive system of judicature.
In 1630, certain persons, their number not always being
twelve, were appointed by the General Court to find and report




UNDER ITS FIRST CHARTER.            243
to it the facts relating to particular cases, thus originating here the
institution of a jury, as it has come down to us. The General
Court continued, however, in most cases, to examine and decide
matters directly. In 1635, grand juries were provided to present
cases to the General Court.
The administration of estates, and the distribution of property,
whether of testates or intestates, the General Court, for some
time, kept in its own hands, heeding the law and practice in
England, as far as it saw fit; but at a very early period, the
policy was discussed, and finally carried into effect, of passing
the whole business over to special functionaries.  Probate
officers were provided. Special care, however, was taken to
divest this branch of the law of the ecclesiastical character
given to it in the mother country. In arranging the judicial
department, the General Court, consisting as it did, immediately
or by representation, of the whole people, seems during the entire
period of the First Charter, to have retained in its own hands an
ultimate control. An appeal to its revising and final judgment
was kept open from all tribunals and in all descriptions of cases.
Although subsequent experience has shed great additional light
upon the subject of the true position of the judiciary, the records,
now under review, may well be studied, conveying, as they do,
much pertinent instruction and matter for reflection.
As the plantations multiplied, and spread into the interior, it
became inconvenient for the people to be fully present at the
meetings of the GeneralCourt, and the transaction of business
was embarrassed by an irregular and unreliable attendance. In
1632, the expedient was adopted of advising the appointment
of two persons in each plantation to confer with the Governor
and assistants, about the raising of a public stock. In 1634, it
was made lawful for the freemen of the several settlements, to
choose two or three of their number to attend the Court, to
confer about public affairs generally, and to " have the full power
and voices of all the said freemen derived to them for the making
and establishing laws, granting lands," &c. The principle of
representation was thus gradually introduced. All the plantations fell into the practice of appointing such delegates, who
were called deputies. For a few years they sat with the assistants in the same room, the Governor or deputy governor presiding




244              RECORDS OF MASSACHUSETTS
over the joint body. It seems to have become the custom for the
deputies, to vote separately from the assistants; and a concurrence of the votes of the two portions of the assembly was
required to carry a measure. Finally, it was concluded to have
them sit in different rooms; and the deputies were organized as
a distinct house, choosing their own speaker.  In this way a
double legislature was established. The fact that it has been
adopted in all our States, and in the United States government,
would seem to prove that it is founded on sufficient reasons, and
essential to good legislation. In this, as in all things else, where
the practice established here resembled that of the mother
country, the resemblance was not the result of a spirit of conformity, or in deference to authority from that quarter, but
solely because, in the natural progress of events, it was found
expedient.
At an early day the General Court parted with a very considerable portion of its sovereignty to the several plantations,
together with the fee of the lands within the limits of the same,
thereby calling into existence what has always been regarded
one of the chief elements of our political civilization,- Towns.
John Adams declared, that to them, in a great degree, was to be
attributed the preparation of this people to engage in, and carry
through, the conflict of the Revolution. They are the nurseries
of freedom, schools of universal education in popular rights, and
alone can fit a people to make, obey, and execute the laws. No
country can take the true start, or secure reliable progress in
political reform, without them; and there is no race so degraded,
as not to be redeemed to a capacity for self-government, if
trained by such an institution to the exercise of control over
affairs, by local communities in distinct neighborhoods.
Similar arrangements had existed for centuries in the mother
country; and to them can be traced the characteristics which
have made the English people competent to uphold a constitutional government. The encroachment upon these small local
jurisdictions,-by modern Parliamentary interference and the
establishment of central commissions or bureaus,-is regarded as
having already lowered the character of the population of the
rural districts of the kingdom. Towns were the basis of what
are called hundreds; and in different sections of England, at




UNDER ITS FIRST CHARTER.               245
different times, had different appellations, as thorp, now village,
or hamlet; burgh, now borough; and town. The last, being probably the original name, was the prevalent one; although when
our fathers left England, it had become superseded, in some localities, by ville, and parish. But, under the latter designation, the institution had been perverted from its original character, which was
purely secular, brought under the power of the Church, and made
to receive an ecclesiastical impress.2 The lawgivers of Massachusetts were too true to their British ancestry to call them villes,
and their repugnance to associations, connected with the hierarchy
at home, forbid their calling them parishes.  They went back to
the old Anglo-Saxon name.     They made the jurisdiction of
towns quite limited at first, gradually enlarging it, until it
reached the dimensions still retained, embracing powers the
most momentous, and constituting by far the greatest portion
of what we feel to be the government under which we live.
When the public exigencies demanded it, a confederation of
colonies was effected at the suggestion of the Connecticut plantations, but under the lead of Massachusetts.  The entries contained in the Records on this subject, and the documents connected
with its organization and operation, may be safely said to stand
the test of comparison with the State papers of the originators of
the Confederation of the Revolutionary age, and of the founders
of our Federal Constitution, as showing the legitimate boundaries
between the powers of separate States and of any general government that may be established among them.
The elements that give energy to a commonwealth, in peace
or war, are strikingly disclosed and illustrated in the history of
Massachusetts under the First Charter.  A more efficient government for the preservation of order, security, and the common
welfare, has never existed; and the rapidity with which the public
resources were brought to bear in military movements, while it
was repeated at the opening of the war of Independence, has
never been surpassed, even in our day, which has witnessed
1 A Restitution of Decayed Intelligence in Antiquities concerning our Nation,
by Richard Verstigan, 1605, chap. ix. p. 295.
2 The Parish, its Obligations and Powers; its officers and their duties, with illustrations of the practical workings of the institution in all secular affairs, by Toulmin
Smith. London, 1854.




246             RECORDS OF MASSACHUSETTS
the uprising in their might of a great people to save the national
life.
The early records of Massachusetts shed light upon all subjects that relate to the development of the moral as well as
physical strength of a State, particularly the diffusion of knowledge, and of a public spirit ready to assume burdens and face danger; and to sacrifice ease, property, and life, for the common weal.
The promptitude, boldness, and impartiality of the internal
administration of the government are particularly noticeable.
Offences were rebuked and disorder suppressed by sure and
decisive measures: no rank or station, no popular affection or
habitual reverence for particular persons, however eminent or
honored, could obstruct the course or embarrass the movements
of even-handed power. The General Court, in the exercise of
its sovereignty, treated all men alike, in as well as out of its own
body. Sir Richard Saltonstall was fined; Endicott was admonished, disqualified temporarily for holding office, and committed
for contempt of the authority and dignity of the Court; and even
Winthrop, once in a while, was dropped from his high place.
In the administration of external affairs, the General Court
was equally disregardful of all weak and timid considerations.
Nothing can surpass the spirit, courage, ability, and success, with
which it withstood and repelled attempts of encroachment from
the mother country.
There was always a powerful party busily at work in the
Court at London, bent upon the suppression of the Massachusetts colony; but by skilful diplomacy on the part of the Court
and its able agents in England, following the policy comprehended by Winthrop in two words, - " Avoid and protract;" by
standing tenaciously and resolutely upon their charter, particularly that feature of it which left no opening for an appeal to the
mother country, and provided no process by which complaints
could legitimately be brought against the company; by the
opportune diversion of attention from colonial matters to occurrences in England, especially those connected with the controversy between the King and Parliament; and by the blessing of
Providence, -every blow was warded off, until two generations
had laid the foundations of the political fabric too deep to be
moved.




UNDER ITS FIRST CHARTER.            247
It became, indeed, quite early a general feeling, among sensible people in England, that it was about as well to let the
unmanageable and spunky little colony alone.
Collier, in his " Ecclesiastical History of Great Britain," quotes
at length the Order in Council Archbishop Laud issued, June
17, 1634, to all places of trade and plantation where the English
were settled, enjoining the establishment of the national church
in them, and remarks, that, while that order was extended to all
the four great divisions of the world, and generally received and
obeyed in all colonies and settlements, " New England was somewhat of an exception. The Dissenters," he continues, "who
transported themselves thither, established their own fancy."
Charles II., however, was prevailed upon by the enemies of the
colony to send over, in 1664, Commissioners to reduce it to subordination; but they went back as they came, disconcerted by the
firmness and outgeneralled by the strategy of the colonial
authorities. The records containing the communications that
passed between these gentlemen and the General Court, show the
wonderful sagacity, wariness, and ability of the latter. The royal
commissioners were allowed to gain no advantage in the encounter, but were drawn into false positions and exposed attitudes
by the expert fencing of their adversary, until they were utterly
discomfited and disarmed.  The whole affair, as we read its
particulars, becomes absolutely amusing, from the superior wisdom and adroitness of the Court. Every attempt to bring the
administration here under the control of the mother country,
ended in equally humiliating failure.
It cannot, indeed, be doubted, that, if matters had come to
extremities at any time, even at the earliest period, when the
population scarcely reached up into the thousands, they would
have resisted in arms any hostile force that should have ventured
to land on their shores, from whatever quarter it might come;
relying on the justness of their cause, and the Divine aid, on
which they cast themselves with prayer and faith, as no other
people ever did. Winthrop informs us, that in January, 1635, in
the prevalence of an apprehension that a General Governor was
about to be sent over from England, the Court asked the ministers, convened on the occasion, what ought to be done in that
event? and they replied, with one voice, that he ought not to be




248             RECORDS OF MASSACHUSETTS
received. The fort at Castle Island was immediately built, and
a large commission appointed, consisting of the principal inhabitants, of which Winthrop was at the head, for " military affairs,"
to organize and arm the whole strength of the country for either
" offensive or defensive war."  The idea was familiarly expressed
by all, that they would no sooner relinquish their rights under the
charter than their estates, that they would fight for both; and,
if driven from their houses and lands on the seashore, they
would withdraw deeper and deeper into the forests, carrying their
charter, the ark of their covenant, with them. And finally, when
James II. abrogated the charter and took ruthless possession of
the country, with a design, as the colonial statesmen believed,
in pursuance of a secret treaty, to cede it to France, the people of
Boston and the vicinity rose in their wrath. Sir Edmund Andros
found himself, the next morning, in the lock-up at Fort Hill.
He was removed for safer keeping to Castle Island, which, by
holding as a prisoner the deposed royal governor, fairly won a
right to the title, subsequently given it, of Fort Independence.
Finally, he was shipped back to England. In the mean time, old
Simon Bradstreet, in his eighty-seventh year, who, fifty-nine years
before came over with Winthrop, and was the first secretary and
the last governor under the First Charter in Massachusetts, was
recalled to his place by an insurgent people, and for three more
years affairs were administered as in the days of the old charter.
The bold procedure was acquiesced in at home and abroad, no
one was called to account for it, and Andros got no redress.
The First Charter history of Massachusetts thus closed in glory.
The study of these records will help us avoid errors into which
the Fathers of Massachusetts were led. A large department
of their legislation, that embracing sumptuary laws and police
regulations, is now considered as passing beyond the boundaries of the legitimate power of government, and trenching upon
the rights of private life, and the domain of personal freedom.
The severities of their penal code are condemned by the sentiments of a more enlightened age; but, in reference to this
point, allowance must be made for their circumstances. In the
prevention and punishment of crime, they had not what we
possess in philanthropic, reformatory, and penitentiary establishments.




UNDER ITS FIRST CHARTER.           249
In initiating and organizing a government, errors were committed, but they were readily rectified when discovered. In
1636 and 1637, the General Court was led into a measure singularly in conflict with its usual policy and the spirit of the
people: a council for life was established, and Winthrop,
Dudley, and Endicott elected to it. The prevalence of sounder
views prevented any further proceedings, and the plan was
dropped.
There is one branch of their administration exposed especially
to stricture, and universally condemned, at the present day,
which must not be overlooked; for their views and designs in
relation to it are proved to have been fallacious and impracticable.  They came here with a purpose most dear to their
hearts, of establishing and enjoying a system of society and
government in which all would be of one mind, in the reception
of a particular theological creed and ecclesiastical order. This
did not, in their view, involve any violation of the rights of conscience. The New World, as they reasoned, could accommodate
persons of all persuasions.  They had purchased and planted
their territory, and cherished the hope of enjoying it in peace
and unity. This idea had captivated their imaginations. The
agitations and dissensions arising from conflicting religious
theories were distasteful to their feelings. They had left the Old
World to get rid of them, and thought it no wrong to ask those
who desired to establish and propagate opinions in conflict with
theirs, as there was room enough for all, to go elsewhere. To
preserve peace, tranquillity, and order, they undertook to keep
out Anabaptists, Antinomians, and Quakers. It was an error
to expect to succeed in such a policy, and the attempt involved
them in the follies and mischiefs of intolerance and persecution.
As followers of the divine Word, and disciples of the Great
Teacher, they ought to have known better. Tares will spring
up with the wheat. LET THEM BOTH GROW TOGETHER UNTIL THE
HARVEST. The Lord of the harvest, and he alone, has the right
or the power to separate them. In this, then, - it cannot too
emphatically be affirmed, - the founders of Massachusetts
were in the wrong, and their example is to be held up as a
warning. For having pursued the opposite policy, in opening
a shelter for all sorts of opinions, and patiently enduring the




250             RECORDS OF MASSACHUSETTS
turmoil of wrangling bigots and fanatical enthusiasts, rather than
suffer the hand of the civil power to be lifted against them, the
name of Roger Williams will be illustrious, and the peculiar
honor of Rhode Island secure for ever.
At the very first meeting of the Massachusetts General Court,
after the transfer of the charter, at which a governor and assistants were chosen, on the 18th of May, 1631, it was voted, that
" no man shall be admitted to the freedom of this body-politic,
3but such as are members of some of the churches within the
limits of the same;" and they suffered no churches to be
gathered, but such as were sound in doctrine, according to the
estimation of the General Court.  Admitting that the policy
announced in this vote was erroneous, and rejoicing, as we all
do, that it has long ago been repudiated, it is but fair to give
heed to what may be offered in its palliation. It was, in part,
suggested by their peculiar situation. It was necessary, by all
means, to keep their government fiom falling into the hands of
persons who might appear among them with a disposition to
win favor from the parties hostile to them around the royal
court; and this seemed the most sure way to keep them out.
Further, in spite of all precautions to prevent it, here, as in all
first settlements, there were individuals of loose and profligate
lives, wholly unfit to share in the government. It was an effectual bar against them. And, after all, it must be conceded, that
there was one good feature in it. It ignored the distinction
between high and low, rich and poor, bond and free; and was,
as far as it went, in this view, a liberal measure. It is due to
the Church, Catholic and Protestant, to give it the credit, in
every age and every communion, whatever other barriers it has
raised, of having welcomed to its bosom persons of all ranks and
races, without reference to their position in the scale of society.
It has been in advance of the State in this particular.
While we condemn the policy of the Fathers in reference to
religious opinions, we must not charge them with having contemplated an established religion as a part of the frame of their
government. To that they were utterly opposed. They often,
it is true, sought the advice of the ministers concerning public
affairs, appreciating their learning and wisdom, but never allowed
them to participate in the government. They went further in




UNDER ITS FIRST CHARTER.           251
this respect than we do. No minister, or church officer of any
kind, not even a lay-elder, was permitted to hold any legislative,
political, or civil appointment.
Increase Nowell, an original patentee and assistant, belonging to a high family at home, who came over with the charter,
was a man of eminent gifts and graces, and all his life in distinguished public employment. When the church at Charlestown was planted, he was chosen a ruling or lay elder, and
acted as such. The question was raised, whether he, being a
magistrate, could hold office in a church. It was decided that
he could not, and Nowell laid down his eldership.
Samuel Sharp was probably one of the best educated men of
the first age of the colony. Bred to learning during his youth, and
transferred at opening manhood to business as a merchant, he
continued through life to cultivate his mind and gratify his literary
tastes. He seems to have been a proficient also in military knowledge, as he was intrusted, from the first, with all that related to
engineering, fortification, and ordnance, in the plantation. Colonial enterprise seems to have particularly attracted his interest.
He was one of the company in London which managed the first
settlement at Plymouth.  The Records of the Massachusetts
Company show the active part he took in its affairs, and the
extent to which it availed itself of his business efficiency.
When Endicott was elected temporary local governor, April 30,
1629, he divided the vote with him, was appointed one of his
council, and authorized, in conjunction with Samuel Skelton,
the first pastor of the Salem church, in the event of Endicott's
death, to assume the government of the plantation. Although
Matthew Cradock never came to America in person, he took lands,
and shipped over successive cargoes of provisions, live stock,
and other needful articles, selecting suitable persons to look out
for their disbursement and distribution. Sharp was his chief
agent, and enjoyed his full confidence. Henry Haughton was
also concerned in the management of Cradock's affairs.  The
latter, at the formation of the Salem church, was elected its layelder; but, dying a few months afterwards, Sharp was chosen to
his place, which he filled to his death in 1656. In consequence
of holding this office, the great talents and capacity of Elder
Sharp were lost to the civil service of the colony. His name,




252             RECORDS OF MASSACHUSETTS
although consecrated by the memory of his various usefulness,
Christian learning, and eminent piety, is seen no more on its
records, except as having, with Endicott and others, been bound
over to answer before the General Court, as representatives of
the Salem church, for having denounced the proceedings of the
Court against its minister, Roger Williams.
These instances sufficiently show how thoroughly the policy
was carried out of not allowing any officers whatever of a church
to hold political or civil appointments, or in any degree or shape
to have share in the government.
The Fathers of Massachusetts have been ridiculed for the respect in which they held the Hebrew polity, and for bringing the
authority of the Scriptures, particularly of the Old Testament,
to corroborate their legislation. But it may be asked, Where else
could they have gone?  Not surely to precedents drawn from
ancient despotisms, or European monarchies. References to the
statutes of the Pentateuch were more to their purpose, and justly
carried greater weight, than to feudal rolls of parliaments, basely
obsequious to Tudors and Stuarts. The Hebrew government, for
the ends it was designed to accomplish, was the most perfect ever
contrived. It left a deeper imprint on national character than
any government ever has. It gave to a people a national life
which no power on earth has been able to extinguish. Subjugation, dispersion, and the scorn, hate, and persecution of all nations
for two thousand years, have made no impression on it. The
Jewish race has survived it all. In our day the proudest monarchs are bowing before its banking-houses, and it affords leading minds to parliaments and cabinets. Its perpetuity, as a
distinct people, although scattered everywhere, and everywhere
trodden down for ages, is the marvel of the world's history, and
attests the greatness of Moses as a lawgiver.
The Massachusetts statesmen of the first age did not follow
indiscriminately the details of the Jewish system; but, as the
Records show, sought to discover and obey the requirements of
eternal moral laws. They acted, in their secular administration,
upon principles that will stand the test of all time; but found
gratification and confirmation in the ancient Scriptures. It is
wonderful to what an extent they were able to avail themselves
of this resource. Any one who verifies, collates, and examines




UNDER ITS FIRST CHARTER.              253
their references to the events, characters, and expressions of Holy
Writ, will be surprised to find how apposite they are, and what a
mine was thus opened. Verily, the volume containing the most
ancient literature of the world, is worthy of being called the
Book of Books. Not wholly unaware of the disparagement, in
which some have indulged, of the Old Testament scriptures, I
am constrained to say, that the longer I live, and the more I ponder them, the profounder is my admiration and veneration of the
unapproached dignity and simplicity of style of their historical
and narrative passages, and of the beauty, splendor, and sublimity
of the conceptions and imagery that glorify their strains of eloquence, poetry, and prophecy, breathing an influence that
expands and lifts up the soul, and is felt to be inspiration.
In support of what I have said, in reference to the legislation
of the first colonial age, allow me to fall back upon the judgment
of one whose name is among the ornaments of the Massachusetts Historical Society, and the memory of whose genius and
scholarship is fresh in the hearts of the older members. Francis
Calley Gray, in a notice of the compendium, made in 1641, of
the laws of the Massachusetts colony, known as the " Body of
Liberties,"' says,
"Our ancestors, instead of deducing all their laws from the Books of
Mloses, established, at the outset, a code of fundamental principles, which,
taken as a whole, for wisdom, equity, adaptation to the wants of their
community, and a liberality of sentiment superior to the age in which it
was written, may fearlessly challenge comparison with any similar production, from Magna Charta itself, to the latest Bill of Rights that has
been put forth in Europe or America."
The early lawgivers of Massachusetts were, indeed, in advance
of their times. Before we ridicule or reproach their legislation,
it becomes us to see to it that those whom we choose to make
and administer law, are equally in advance of our times.
The just formation of a body-politic which these Records have
now been used to illustrate, demands attention in our day. Much
remains to be done, even in the most advanced and enlightened
nations. Much is being done. All the light that can be obtained is needed. Men everywhere are crying out for it. Agita1 Massachusetts Historical Collections, vol. vini. Third Series, p. 191.




254             RECORDS OF MASSACHUSETTS
tion and change rule the hour. The future is felt to be subject to
unknown and indeterminable influences, and to depend upon the
wills or fortunes or lives of individuals, or the fluctuating conflicts of parties. Who can predict what is in store for Spain,
France, Italy, the German States, or the northern kingdoms of
Europe? The current of events seems to be working radical
changes in Great Britain and Ireland, and the dependencies of
that empire. Although, in many respects the most advanced
of the old forms of political civilization, it can hardly be doubted
that it is doomed to pass through momentous crises; for the
whole structure of its constitutional system rests upon fictions
that must give way, sooner or later, to truth and right. It
assumes that there are three estates essential to the composition
of a nation, -king, lords, and commons. The last only has a
legitimate and permanent existence. The people are the whole
of a country, so far as its government is concerned, and must
finally vindicate their rightful claim to power.
The framers of the Constitution of the United States are
justly regarded as among the wisest statesmen of all times; but
they failed, in some points, in contriving their scheme of government, to estimate aright the action of the principles of human
nature, or calculate their forces. They did not foresee the operation or even the existence of what are called national parties.
The arrangement they made for the election of a President was
soon found utterly impracticable for the end designed. The
Amendment of 1803, introducing the plan that has been subsequently followed, was only carried by the decision of the then
Speaker of the House of Representatives, Nathaniel Macon, of
North Carolina, who claimed the right, since conceded, of the
presiding officer of that body, to vote when the House is not
equally divided. His vote made the requisite two-thirds.
Indications are appearing that some further change may be
demanded.   The intermediate machinery of Electors is justly
criticised; but great difficulty will be experienced, in contriving in
any other way, to preserve the rights of the smaller States. So,
also, on the elementary subject of suffrage, great enlargements
have been recently made, but others are demanded. It is, indeed,
evident that questions are impending that reach the foundations
of political science.  Let them be met, not with ridicule or




UNDER ITS FIRST CHARTER.            255
reproach, but with intelligence and fairness.  Having been
brought to a higher stand-point, with a wider field of view than
the Fathers, we ought to have a more liberal spirit; but for integrity of purpose, and independence of authority, for carefulness
in deliberation, and firmness and courage in action, we may well
study their example.
Pardon me for detaining you a moment longer, while summarily delineating the spectacle the early records of Massachusetts present.
Here, on a clear field, unoccupied by any organized society,
with no pre-existent institutions to cumnber the ground, but all as
fresh as if never trodden by man before, the experiment of planting and constructing a civil government was fairly worked out.
No external power was suffered to interfere, and no foreign
precedents allowed to claim authority; no closet statesman or
fanciful theorist formed the scheme; no lordly proprietor, or distant corporation, or board of trade, directors, or officials of any
kind, dictated.  The whole procedure was left, without let or
hindrance, suggestion or influence, from any outside quarter, to
the people on the spot. They were a select people for the work;intelligent, thoughtful, brave, and devout. They were settled in
families, and comprised all the elements of a State. Although
emigrants from the Old World, they trailed none of its arbitrary,
outgrown institutions or usages after them. Conversant with
all the learning of ancient and feudal forms, they applied none
of it here. Having a new country to dwell in, they resolved to
establish nothing but what facts, as they occurred, should prove
to be necessary or desirable. Oglethorpe planned a social system
for Georgia, John Locke drafted a contrivance of government for
the Carolinas, Lord Baltimore superintended Maryland, William
Penn Pennsylvania, and other proprietors and patrons their several
settlements. Not so in Massachusetts: the Fathers of this colony
followed no far-off light; they moved only as experience opened
the way; they tried every step as they advanced, indulged in no
theories or speculations, and held fast only what was found, in
their view, to be good, and thus accomplished the great end of a
stable, prosperous, powerful, and permanent commonwealth. All
the essential features of our present security and happiness were
stamped into the fabric of society during the period of the First
Charter.




256             RECORDS OF MASSACHUSETTS.
The early growth of Massachusetts was natural; and the matured result as complete, as of every natural growth; but, unlike
the growths of nature in other things, there was, in this, no element of decay. The institutions planted during our first fifty
years withstood a century of immediately subsequent provincial
endurance; and as another century under the flag of our Union is
approaching its completion, they are striking their roots deeper
every day. The foundation here laid can never be moved; and
we owe it to the men who laid it, that, in education, arts, wealth,
and power, we hold a rank second to none in the Republic. The
path, here opened, other Colonies and States have travelled, and
all must travel, to reach the fruition of liberty, order, justice, and
the rights of man.
Of the grand Epic, Time is writing, of the Regeneration of
Nations, the old charter history of Massachusetts is the First
Book.




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION
IN MASSACHUSETTS.
BY OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES.
17








THE MEDICAL PROFESSION
IN MASSACHUSETTS.
T   HE medical history of eight generations, told in an hour,
must be in many parts a mere outline. The details I shall
give will relate chiefly to the first century. I shall only indicate
the leading occurrences, with the more prominent names of the
two centuries which follow, and add some considerations suggested by the facts which have been passed in review.
A geographer who was asked to describe the tides of Massachusetts Bay, would have to recognize the circumstance that
they are a limited manifestation of a great oceanic movement.
To consider them apart from this, would be to localize a planetary phenomenon, and to provincialize a law of the universe.
The art of healing in Massachusetts has shared more or less
fully and readily the movement which, with its periods of ebb
and flow, has been raising its level from age to age throughout
the better part of Christendom. Its practitioners brought with
them much of the knowledge and many of the errors of the
Old World; they have always been in communication with its
wisdom and its folly; it is not without interest to see how far
the new conditions in which they found themselves have been
favorable or unfavorable to the growth of sound medical knowledge and practice.
The state of medicine is an index of the civilization of an age
and country, — one of the best, perhaps, by which it can be
judged.  Surgery invokes the aid of all the mechanical arts.
From the rude violences of the age of stone,- a relic of which
we may find in the practice of Zipporah, the wife of Moses, —
1 Exodus iv. 25.




260      THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
to the delicate operations of to-day upon patients lulled into
temporary insensibility, is a progress which presupposes a skill
in metallurgy and in the labors of the workshop and the laboratory it has taken uncounted generations to accumulate. Before
the morphia which deadens the pain of neuralgia, or the quinine
which arrests the fit of an ague, can find their place in our
pharmacies, commerce must have perfected its machinery, and
science must have refined its processes, through periods only to
be counted by the life of nations. Before the means which
nature and art have put in the hands of the medical practitioner
can be fairly brought into use, the prejudices of the vulgar must
be overcome, the intrusions of false philosophy must be fenced
out, and the partnership with the priesthood dissolved. All this
implies that freedom and activity of thought which belong only
to the most advanced conditions of society; and the progress
towards this is by gradations as significant of wide-spread
changes, as are the varying states of the barometer of farextended conditions of the atmosphere.
Apart, then, from its special and technical interest, my subject
has a meaning which gives a certain importance, and even dignity, to details in themselves trivial and almost unworthy of
record. A medical entry in Governor Winthrop's journal may
seem at first sight a mere curiosity; but, rightly interpreted, it
is a key to his whole system of belief as to the order of the
universe and the relations between man and his Maker. Nothing
sheds sutch light on the superstitions of an age as the prevailing
interpretation and treatment of disease. When the touch of a
profligate monarch was a cure for one of the most inveterate of
maladies, when the common symptoms of hysteria were prayed
over as marks of demoniacal possession, we might well expect
the spiritual realms of thought to be peopled with still stranger
delusions.
Let us go before the Pilgrims of the " Mayflower," and look
at the shores on which they were soon to land. A wasting pestilence had so thinned the savage tribes, that it was sometimes
piously interpreted as having providentially prepared the way
for the feeble band of exiles. Cotton Mather, who, next to the
witches, hated the "tawnies," "wild beasts," "blood-hounds,"




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.      261
"rattlesnakes," "infidels," as in different places he calls the
unhappy Aborigines, describes the condition of things in his
lively way, thus: -
" The Indians in these Parts had newly, even about a Year or Two
before, been visited with such a prodigious Pestilence; as carried away not
a Tenth, but Nine Parts of Ten (yea'tis said Nineteen of Twenty) among
them: so that the Woods were almost cleared of those pernicious Creatures to make Room for a better Growth." 1
What this pestilence was has been much discussed. It is
variously mentioned by different early writers as " the plague,"
"a great and grievous plague," "a sore consumption,     as
attended with spots which left unhealed places on those who
recovered, as making the whole surface yellow as with a garment.2  Perhaps no disease answers all these conditions so well
as small-pox. We know from different sources what frightful
havoc it made among the Indians in after years, - in 1631, for
instance, when it swept away the aboriginal inhabitants of
whole towns,3 and in 1633.4  We have seen a whole tribe, the
Mandans, extirpated by it in our own day. The word " plague "
was used very vaguely, as in the description of the " great sickness" found among the Indians by the expedition of 1622.5
This same great sickness could hardly have been yellow fever,
as it occurred in the month of November.    I cannot think,
therefore, that either the scourge of the East or our Southern
malarial pestilence was the disease that wasted the Indians.
As for the yellowness like a garment, that is too familiar to the
eyes of all who have ever looked on the hideous mask of confluent variola.
Without the presence or the fear of these exotic maladies, the
forlorn voyagers of the " Mayflower " had sickness enough to
contend with. At their first landing at Cape Cod, gaunt and
hungry and longing for fresh food, they found upon the sandy
shore " great muscles, and very fat and full of sea-pearl." Sailors
1 Magnalia, book i. chap. 2.
2 Young, Chron. of the Pilgrims, p. 183, note.
3 Holmes's Annals, vol. i. p. 211, note.
4 Young, Chronicles of Massachusetts, p. 386.
6 Chronicles of the Pilgrims, p. 302.




262      THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
and passengers indulged in the treacherous delicacy, which
seems to have been the sea-clam; and found that these mollusks,
like the shell the poet tells of, remembered their august abode,
and treated the way-worn adventurers to a gastric reminiscence
of the heaving billows. In the mean time, it blew and snowed
and froze.1 The water turned to ice on their clothes, and made
them many times like coats of iron. Edward Tilley had like to
have " sounded" with cold.  The gunner, too, was sick unto
death, but " hope of trucking " kept him on his feet,- a Yankee,
it should seem, when he first touched the shore of New England.
Most, if not all, got colds and coughs, which afterwards turned
to scurvy, whereof many died.2
How can we wonder that the crowded and tempest-tossed
voyagers, many of them already suffering, should have fallen
before the trials of the first winter in Plymouth? Their imperfect shelter, their insufficient supply of bread, their salted food,
now in unwholesome condition, account too well for the diseases
and the mortality that marked this first dieadful season; weakness, swelling of the limbs, and other signs of scurvy, betrayed the
want of proper nourishment and protection from the elements.
In December six of their number died, in January eight, in February seventeen, in March thirteen. With the advance of spring
the mortality diminished, the sick and lame began to recover, and
the colonists, saddened but not disheartened, applied themselves
to the labors of the opening year.3
One of the most pressing needs of the early colonists must
have been that of physicians and surgeons. In Mr. Savage's
remarkable Genealogical Dictionary of the first settlers who
came over before 1692 and their descendants to the third generation, I find scattered through the four crowded volumes the names
of one hundred and thirty-four medical practitioners. Of these,
twelve, and probably many more, practised surgery; three were
barber-surgeons. A little incident throws a glimmer from the
dark lantern of memory upon William Dinely, one of these practitioners with the razor and the lancet. He was lost between
Boston and Roxbury in a violent tempest of wind and snow;
ten days afterwards a son was born to his widow, and with a
1 Chronicles of the Pilgrims, p. 119.  2 Ib., pp. 138, 151.  3 Ib., p. 198.




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.    263
touch of homely sentiment, I had almost said poetry, they called
the little creature " Fathergone" Dinely. Six or seven, probably a
larger number, were ministers as well as physicians, one of whom,
I am sorry to say, took to drink and tumbled into the Connecticut
River, and so ended. One was not only doctor, but also schoolmaster and poet. One practised medicine and kept a tavern.
One was a butcher, but calls himself a surgeon in his will, a
union of callings which suggests an obvious pleasantry. One
female practitioner, employed by her own sex, - Ann Moore, -
was the precursor of that intrepid sisterhood whose cause it has
long been my pleasure and privilege to advocate on all fitting
occasions.
Outside of this list I must place the name of Thomas Wilkinson, who was complained of, in 1676, for practising contrary to
law.
Many names in the catalogue of these early physicians have
been associated, in later periods, with the practice of the profession, - among them, Boylston, Clark, IDanforth, Homan, Jeffrey,
Kittredge, Oliver, Peaslee, Randall, Shattuck, Thacher, Wellington, Williams,Woodward. Touton was a Huguenot, Burchsted a
German from Silesia, Lunerus a German or a Pole; " Pighogg
Churrergeon," I hope, for the honor of the profession, was only
Peacock disguised under this alias, which would not, I fear, prove
very attractive to patients.
What doctrines and practice were these colonists likely to
bring with them?
Two principal schools of medical practice prevailed in the Old
World, during the greater part of the seventeenth century. The
first held to the old methods of Galen: its theory was that
the body, the microcosm, like the macrocosm, was made up of the
four elements —fire, air, water, earth; having respectively the
qualities hot, dry, moist, cold. The body was to be preserved in
health by keeping each of these qualities in its natural proportion; heat, by the proper temperature; moisture, by the due
amount of fluid; and so as to the rest. Diseases which arose
from excess of heat were to be attacked by cooling remedies;
those from excess of cold, by heating ones; and so of the other
derangements of balance. This was truly the principle of con



264      THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
traria contrariis, which ill-informed persons have attempted to
make out to be the general doctrine of medicine, whereas there
is no general dogma other than this: disease is to be treated by
any thing that is proved to cure it. The means the Galenist
employed were chiefly diet and vegetable remedies, with the use
of the lancet and other depleting agents. He attributed the four
fundamental qualities to different vegetables, in four different
degrees; thus chicory was cold in the fourth degree, pepper was
hot in the fourth, endive was cold and dry in the second, and
bitter almonds were hot in the first and dry in the second degree.
When we say "cool as a cucumber," we are talking Galenism.
The seeds of that vegetable ranked as one of "the four greater
cold seeds" of this system. Galenism prevailed mostly in the
south of Europe and France. The readers of Moliere will have
no difficulty in recalling some of its favorite modes of treatment,
and the abundant mirth he extracted from them.
These Galenists were what we should call " herb-doctors " today. Their insignificant infusions lost credit after a time; their
absurdly complicated mixtures excited contempt, and their
nauseous prescriptions provoked loathing and disgust.  A simpler and bolder practice found welcome in Germany, depending
chiefly on mineral remedies, mercury, antimony, sulphur, arsenic,
and the use, sometimes the secret use, of opium. Whatever we
think of Paracelsus, the chief agent in the introduction of these
remedies, and whatever limits we may assign to the use of these
long-trusted mineral drugs, there can be no doubt that the chemical school, as it was called, did a great deal towards the expurgation of the old, overloaded, and repulsive pharmacopoeia. We
shall find evidence in the practice of our New-England physicians
of the first century, that they often employed chemical remedies,
and that, by the early part of the following century, their chief
trust was in the few simple, potent drugs of Paracelsus.
We have seen that many of the practitioners of medicine,
during the first century of New England, were clergymen. This
relation between medicine and theology has existed from a very
early period; from the Egyptian priest to the Indian medicineman, the alliance has been maintained in one form or another.
The partnership was very common among our British ancestors.
Mr. Ward, the Vicar of Stratford-on-Avon, himself a notable




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.       265
example of the union of the two characters, writing about
1660, says," The Saxons had their blood-letters, but under the Normans physicke
begunne in England; 300 years agoe itt was not a distinct profession by
itself, but practised by men in orders, witness Nicholas de Ternham, the
chief English physician and Bishop of Durham; Hugh of Everham, a
physician and cardinal; Grysant, physician and pope; John Chambers,
Dr. of Physick, was the first bishop of Peterborough; Paul Bush, a
bachelor of divinitie in Oxford, was a man well read in physick as well as
divinitie, he was the first bishop of Bristol.1
"' Again in King Richard the Second's time physicians and divines were
not distinct professions; for one Tydeman, Bishop of Landaph and Worcester, was physician to King Richard the Second." 2
This alliance may have had its share in creating and keeping
up the many superstitions which have figured so largely in the
history of medicine.  It is curious to see that a medical work
left in manuscript by the Rev. Cotton Mather, and hereafter to be
referred to, is running over with follies and superstitious fancies;
while his contemporary and fellow-townsman, William Douglass,
relied on the same few simple remedies which, through Dr.
Edward Holyoke and Dr. James Jackson, have come down to our
own time, as the most important articles of the materia
medica.
Let us now take a general glance at some of the conditions
of the early settlers; and first, as to the healthfulness of the
climate. The mortality of the season that followed the landing
of the Pilgrims at Plymouth has been sufficiently accounted for.
After this, the colonists seem to have found the new country
agreeing very well with their English constitutions. Its clear
air is the subject of eulogy. Its dainty springs of sweet water
are praised not only by Higginson and Wood, but even the
mischievous Morton says, that for its delicate waters Canaan
came not near this country.3  There is a tendency to dilate on
these simple blessings, which reminds one a little of the Marchioness in Dickens's story, with her orange-peel-and-water
beverage.  Still more does one feel the warmth of coloring,1 Diary of the Rev. John Ward, A.M., p. 117. London, 1839.
2 lb., p. 160.   3 Chronicles of the Pilgrims, p. 129, note.




266       THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
such as we expect from converts to a new faith, and settlers
who want to entice others over to their clearings,- when Winslow speaks in 1621, of'; abundance of roses, white, red, and
damask; single, but very sweet indeed." 1 Most of all, however,
when, in the same connection, he says, "Here are grapes white
and red, and very sweet and strong also."  This of our wild
grape, a little vegetable Indian, which scalps a civilized man's
mouth, as his animal representative scalps his cranium.  But
there is something quite charming in Winslow's picture of the
luxury in which they are living. Lobsters, oysters, eels, muscles,
fish, and fowl, delicious fruit, including the grapes aforesaid, -
if they only had " kine, horses, and sheep," he makes no question
but men would live as contented here, as in any part of the
world. We cannot help admiring the way in which they took
their trials, and made the most of their blessings.
"And how Content they were," says Cotton Mather, "when an Honest
Man, as I have heard, inviting his Friends to a Dish of Clams, at the
Table gave Thanks to Heaven, who had given them to suck the abundance
of the Seas, and of the Treasures hid in the Sands! " 2
Strangely enough, as it would seem, except for this buoyant
determination to make the best of every thing, they hardly appear
to recognize the difference of the climate fiom that which they
had left. After almost three years' experience, Winslow says, he
can scarce distinguish New England from Old England, in respect of heat and cold, frost, snow, rain, winds, &c. The winter,
he thinks (if there is a difference), is sharper and longer; but yet
he may be deceived by the want of the comforts he enjoyed at
home. He cannot conceive any climate to agree better with the
constitution of the English, not being oppressed with extremity
of heats, nor nipped by biting cold:"By which means, blessed be God, we enjoy our health, notwithstanding those difficulties we have undergone, in such a measure as would have
been admired, if we had lived in England with the like means."3
Edward Johnson, after mentioning the shifts to which they
were put for food, says, -
"And yet, methinks, our children are as cheerful, fat, and lusty, with
1 Chronicles of the Pilgrims, p. 284.  2 Magnalia, book i. chap. 5.
3 Chron. of the Pilgrims, 369, 370.




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.     267
feeding upon those muscles, clams, and other fish, as they were in England with their fill of bread." 
Higginson, himself a dyspeptic, " continually in physic," as he
says, and accustomed to dress in thick clothing, and to comfort
his stomach with drink that was "both strong and stale,"2the "jolly good ale and old," I suppose, of free and easy Bishop
Still's song, - found that he both could and did oftentimes drink
New-England water very well, - which he seems to look upon
as a remarkable feat. He could go as light-clad as any, too,
with only a light stuff cassock upon his shirt, and stuff breeches
without linings. Two of his children were sickly: one - little
misshapen Mary- died on the passage, and, in her father's
words, "was the first in our ship that was buried in the bowels
of the great Atlantic sea; "3 the other, who had been "most
lamentably handled " by disease, recovered almost entirely " by
the very wholesomeness of the air, altering, digesting, and drying
up the cold and crude humors of the body."   Wherefore, he
thinks it a wise course for all cold complexions to come to take
physic in New England, and ends with those often quoted
words, that " a sup of New England's air is better than a whole
draught of Old England's ale." 4 Mr. Higginson died, however,
"of a hectic fever," a little more than a year after his arrival.
The medical records which I shall cite, show that the colonists
were not exempt from the complaints of the Old World. Besides
the common diseases to which their descendants are subject,
there were two others, - to say nothing of the dreaded small-pox,
which later medical science has disarmed, - little known among
us at the present day, but frequent among the first settlers. The
first of these was the scurvy, already mentioned, of which
Winthrop speaks in 1630, saying, that it proved fatal to those
who fell into discontent, and lingered after their former conditions
in England; the poor homesick creatures in fact, whom we so
forget in our florid pictures of the early times of the little band
in the wilderness. Many who were suffering from scurvy, got
well when the " Lyon" arrived from England, bringing store
of juice of lemons.5 The Governor speaks of another case in
1 Chron. of Mass., p. 352, note.  2 Ib., pp. 251, 252.
3 Ib., p. 223.               4 Ib., p. 252.
5 Winthrop's New England, vol. i. pp. 44, 45.




268      THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
1644; and it seems probable that the disease was not of rare
occurrence.
The other complaint from which they suffered, but which has
nearly disappeared from among us, was intermittent fever, or
fever and ague. I investigated the question as to the prevalence
of this disease in New England, in a dissertation, which was
published in a volume with other papers, in the year 1836.
I can add little to the facts there recorded. One which escaped
me was, that Joshua Scottow, in " Old Men's Tears," dated 1691,
speaks of " shaking agues," as among the trials to which they
had been subjected. The outline map of New England, accompanying the dissertation above referred to, indicates all the places
where I had evidence that the disease had originated. It was
plain enough that it used to be known in many places where it
has long ceased to be feared. Still it was and is remarkable to
see what a clean bill of health in this particular respect our barren
soil inherited with its sterility. There are some malarious spots
on the edge of Lake Champlain, and there have been some temporary centres of malaria, within the memory of man, on one or
more of our Massachusetts rivers, but these are harmless enough,
for the most part, unless the millers dam them, when they are
apt to retaliate with a whiff from their meadows, that sets the
whole neighborhood shaking with fever and ague.
The Pilgrims of the" Mayflower" had with them a good physician, a man of standing, a deacon of their church, one whom
they loved and trusted, Dr. Samuel Fuller. But no medical
skill could keep cold and hunger and bad food, and, probably
enough, desperate homesickness in some of the feebler sort,
from doing their work. No detailed record remains of what they
suffered or what was attempted for their relief during the first
sad winter. The graves of those who died were levelled and
sowed with grain that the losses of the little band might not be
suspected by the savage tenants of the wilderness,1 and their
story remains untold.
Of Dr. Fuller's practice, at a later period, we have an account
in a letter of his to Governor Bradford, dated June, 1630. " I
have been to Matapan " (now Dorchester), he says, " and let some
1 Holmes's Annals, vol. i. p. 168, note.




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.   269
twenty of those people blood."1 Such wholesale depletion as
this, except with avowed homicidal intent, is quite unknown
in these days; though I once saw the noted French surgeon,
Lisfranc, in a fine phlebotomizing frenzy, order some ten or
fifteen patients, taken almost indiscriminately, to be bled in a
single morning.
Dr. Fuller's two visits to Salem, at the request of Governor
Endicott, seem to have been very satisfactory to that gentleman.2
Morton, the wild fellow of Merry Mount, gives a rather questionable reason for the Governor's being so well pleased with the
physician's doings. The names under which he mentions the
two personages, it will be seen, are not intended to be complimentary. " Dr. Noddy did a great cure for Captain Littleworth.
He cured him of a disease called a wife."3 William Gager,
who came out with Winthrop, is spoken of as " a right godly
man and skilful chyrurgeon," but died of a malignant fever not
very long after his arrival.4
Two practitioners of the ancient town of Newbury are entitled to special notice, for different reasons. The first is Dr.
John Clark, who is said by tradition to have been the first regularly educated physician who resided in New England. His
portrait, in close-fitting skull-cap, with long locks and venerable flowing beard, is familiar to our eyes on the wall of our
Society's antechamber. His left hand rests upon a skull, his
right hand holds an instrument which deserves a passing comment. It is a trephine, a surgical implement for cutting round
pieces out of broken skulls, so as to get at the fragments which
have been driven in, and lift them up.  It has a handle like that
of a gimlet, with a claw like a hammer, to lift with, I suppose,
which last contrivance I do not see figured in my books. But
the point I refer to is this: the old instrument, the trepan, had
a handle like a wimble,-what we call a brace or bit-stock.
The trephine is not mentioned at all in Peter Lowe's book, London, 1634; nor in Wiseman's great work on Surgery, London,
1676; nor in the translation of Dionis, published by Jacob Tonson, in 1710. In fact it was only brought into more general use
by Cheselden and Sharpe so late as the beginning of the last
1 Chron. of Mass., p. 312.  2 Ib., p. 32.  3 Ib., p. 131.
4 Winthrop's New England, vol. i. p. 33.




270       THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
century.1 As John Clark died in 1661, it is remarkable to see
the last fashion in the way of skull-sawing contrivances in
his hands,-to say nothing of the claw on the handle, and a
Hey's saw, so called in England, lying on the table by him, and
painted there more than a hundred years before Hey was born.
This saw is an old invention, perhaps as old as Hippocrates, and
may be seen figured in the Armamentarium      Chirurgicum  of
Scultetus, or in the Works of Ambroise Pare.
Dr. Clark is said to have received a diploma before he came,
for skill in lithotomy.2 He loved horses, as a good many doctors
do, and left a good property as they all ought to do. His grave
and noble presence, with the few facts concerning him, told with
more or less traditional authority, give us the feeling that the
people of Newbury, and afterwards of Boston, had a wise and
skilful medical adviser and surgeon in Dr. John Clark.
The venerable town of Newbury had another physician who
was less fortunate.  The following is a court record of 1652: -
"This is to certify whom it may concern, that we the subscribers, being
called upon to testify against [doctor] William Snelling for words by
him uttered, affirm that being in way of merry discourse, a health being
drank to all friends, he answered, -'I'll pledge my friends,
And for my foes
A plague for their heels
And,'[a similar malediction on the other extremity of their feet.]
"Since when he hath affirmed that he only intended the proverb used
in the west country, nor do we believe he intended otherwise.
[Signed],                      WILLIAM THOMAS.
THOMAS MILWARD.
"March 12th 1651, All which I acknowledge, and I am sorry I did not
expresse my intent, or that I was so weak as to use so foolish a proverb.
[Signed],                 GULIELMUS SNELLING."
Notwithstanding this confession and apology, the record tells
us, that" William Snelling in his presentment for cursing is fined
ten shillings and the fees of court." 3
1 British and For. Med. Rev., vol. xvi. p. 49.
2 Thacher, Med. Biography, p. 222.
3 Coffin, Hist. of Newbury, p. 55.




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.    271
I will mention one other name among those of the Fathers of
the medical profession in New England. The " apostle" Eliot
says, writing in 1647, " We never had but one anatomy in the
country, which Mr. Giles Firman, now in England, did make
and read upon very well." 1
Giles Firmin, as the name is commonly spelled, practised physic
in this country for a time. He seems to have found it a poor
business; for, in a letter to Governor Winthrop, he says, " I am
strongly sett upon to studye divinitie: my studyes else must be
lost, for physick is but a meene helpe." 2
Giles Firmin's Lectures on Anatomy were the first scientific
teachings of the New World. While the Fathers were enlightened enough to permit such instructions, they were severe in
dealing with quackery; for, in 1631., our court records show that
one Nicholas Knopp, or Knapp, was sentenced to be fined or
whipped " for taking upon him to cure the scurvey by a water of
noe worth nor value, which he solde att a very deare rate." 3
Empty purses or sore backs would be common with us to day if
such a rule were enforced.
Besides the few worthies spoken of, and others whose names I
have not space to record, we must remember that there were many
clergymen who took charge of the bodies as well as the souls of
their patients, among them two Presidents of Harvard College,
- Charles Chauncy and Leonard Hoar, —and Thomas Thacher,
first minister of the " Old South," author of the earliest medical
treatise printed in the country,4 whose epitaph in Latin and
Greek, said to have been written by Eleazer, an " Indian Youth"
ana a member of the Senior Class of Harvard College, may be
found in the " Magnalia." 5 I miss this noble savage's name in
our triennial catalogue; and, as there is many a slip between the
cup and lip, one is tempted to guess that he may have lost his
degree by some display of his native instinct, -possibly a flourish of the tomahawk or scalping-knife. However this may have
been, the good man he celebrated was a notable instance of the
1 Hist. Coll. 3d Series, vol. iv. p. 57.
2 Winthrop Papers in Hist. Coll. 4th Series, vol. vii. p. 273.
3 Mass. Col. Court Records, vol. i. p. 63.
" A Brief Rule to guide the Common People in Small-pox and Measles." 1674.
5 Book iii. chap. 26.




272      THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
Angelical Conjunction, as the author of the " Magnalia " calls it,
of the offices of clergyman and medical practitioner.
Michael Wigglesworth, author of the "Day of Doom," attended
the sick " not only as a Pastor, but as a Physician too, and this,
not only in his own town, but also in all those of the vicinity."1
Mather says of the sons of Charles Chauncy, "All of these did,
while they had Opportunity, Preach the Gospel; and most, if not
all of them, like their excellent Father before them, had an eminent skill in physick added unto their other accomplishments,"
&c. Roger Williams is said to have saved many in a kind of
pestilence which swept away many Indians.
To these names must be added, as sustaining a certain relation to the healing art, that of the first Governor Winthrop,
who is said by John Cotton to have been " Help for our Bodies
by Physick [and] for our Estates by Law," 2 and that of his son,
the Governor of Connecticut, who, as we shall see, was as much
physician as magistrate.
I had submitted to me for examination, in 1862, a manuscript
found among the Winthrop Papers, marked with the superscription, "For my worthy friend Mr. Wintrop," dated in 1643,
London, signed Edward Stafford, and containing medical directions and prescriptions. It may be remembered by some present
that I wrote a report on this paper, which was published in the
" Proceedings " of this Society. Whether the paper was written
for Governor John Winthrop, of Massachusetts, or for his son,
Governor John, of Connecticut, there is no positive evidence that
I have been able to obtain. It is very interesting, however, as
giving short and simple practical directions, such as would be
most like to be wanted and most useful, in the opinion of a physician in repute of that day.
The diseases prescribed for are plague, small-pox, fevers, king's
evil, insanity, falling-sickness, and the like; with such injuries as
broken bones, dislocations, and burning with gunpowder. The
remedies are of three kinds: simples, such as St. John's wort,
Clown's all-heal, elder, parsley, maidenhair; mineral drugs, such
as lime, saltpetre, Armenian bole, crocus metallorum, or sulphuret of antimony; and thaumaturgic or mystical, of which the
1 Cotton Mather's Funeral Sermon, preached Jan. 24, 1705.
2 Ib., book ii. chap. 4.




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.   273
chief is, " My black powder against the plague, small-pox; purples, all sorts of feavers; Poyson; either, by Way of Prevention or after Infection." This marvellous remedy was made by
putting live toads into an earthen pot so as to half fill it, and
baking and burning them "in the open ayre, not in an house,"
-concerning which latter possibility I suspect Madam Winthrop
would have had something to say, - until they could be reduced
by pounding, first into a brown, and then into a black, powder.
Blood-letting in some inflammations, fasting in the early stage
of fevers, and some of those peremptory drugs with which most
of us have been well acquainted in our time, the infragrant
memories of which I will not pursue beyond this slight allusion,
are among his remedies.
The Winthrops, to one of whom Dr. Stafford's directions were
addressed, were the medical as well as the political advisers of
their fellow-citizens for three or four successive generations. One
of them, Governor John, of Connecticut, practised so extensively,
that, but for his more distinguished title in the State, he would
have been remembered as the Doctor. The fact that he practised
in another colony, for the most part, makes little difference in
the value of the records we have of his medical experience,
which have fortunately been preserved, and give a very fair idea,
in all probability, of the way in which patients were treated in
Massachusetts, when they fell into intelligent and somewhat
educated hands, a little after the middle of the seventeenth
century.
I have before me, while writing, a manuscript collection of the
medical cases treated by him, and recorded at the time in his
own hand, which has been intrusted to me by our President, his
descendant. They are generally marked Hartford, and extend
from the year 1657 to 1669. From these manuscripts, and from
the letters printed in the Winthrop Papers published by our
Society, I have endeavored to obtain some idea of the practice
of Governor John Winthrop, Jr. The learned eye of Mr. Pulsifer would have helped me, no doubt, as it has done in other
cases; but I have ventured this time to attempt finding my
own way among the hieroglyphics of these old pages. By
careful comparison of many prescriptions, and by the aid of
Schr6der, Salmon, Culpeper, and other old compilers, I have
18




274      THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
deciphered many of his difficult paragraphs with their mysterious
recipes.
The Governor employed a number of the simples dear to ancient
women, - elecampane and elder and wormwood and anise and
the rest; but he also employed certain mineral remedies, which
he almost always indicates by their ancient symbols, or by a name
which should leave them a mystery to the vulgar. I am now
prepared to reveal the mystic secrets of the Governor's beneficent
art, which rendered so many good and great as well as so many
poor and dependent people his debtors - at least, in their simple
belief- for their health and their lives.
His great remedy, which he gave oftener than any other, was
nitre; which he ordered in doses of twenty or thirty grains to
adults, and of three grains to infants. Measles, colic, sciatica,
headache, giddiness, and many other ailments, all found themselves treated, and I trust bettered, by nitre; a pretty safe
medicine in moderate doses, and one not likely to keep the good
Governor awake at night, thinking whether it might not kill, if it
did not cure. We may say as much for spermaceti, which he
seems to have considered "the sovereign'st thing on earth " for
inward bruises, and often prescribes after falls and similar injuries.
One of the next remedies, in point of frequency, which he
was in the habit of giving, was (probably diaphoretic) antimony;
a mild form of that very active metal, and which, mild as it
was, left his patients very commonly with a pretty strong conviction that they had been taking something that did not exactly
agree with them. Now and then he gave alittle iron or sulphur
or calomel, but very rarely; occasionally, a good, honest dose
of rhubarb or jalap; a taste of stinging horseradish, oftener
of warming guiacum; sometimes, an anodyne, in the shape of
mithridate, - the famous old farrago, which owed its virtue to
poppy juice;1 very often, a harmless powder of coral; less frequently, an inert prescription of pleasing amber; and (let me
say it softly within possible hearing of his honored descendant),
twice or oftener, — let us hope as a last resort, - an electuary
1 This is the remedy which a Boston divine tried to simplify. See " Electuarium
Novum Alexipharmacum," by Rev. Thomas Harward, lecturer at the Royal
Chappell. Boston, 1732. This tract is in our Society's library.




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.   275
of millipedes, - sowbugs, if we must give them their homely
English name. One or two other prescriptions, of the many
unmentionable ones which disgraced the pharmacopoeia of the
seventeenth century, are to be found, but only in very rare
instances, in the faded characters of the manuscript.
The excellent Governor's accounts of diseases are so brief,
that we get only a very general notion of the complaints for
which he prescribed.  Measles and their consequences are at
first more prominent than any other one affection, but the common infirmities of both sexes and of all ages seem to have come
under his healing hand. Fever and ague appears to have been
of frequent occurrence.
His published correspondence shows, that many noted people
were in communication with him as his patients. Roger Williams wants a little of his medicine for Mrs. Weekes's daughter;
worshipful John Haynes is in receipt of his powders; troublesome Captain Underhill wants " a little white vitterall" for his
wife, and something to cure his wife's friend's neuralgia (I think
his wife's friend's husband had a little rather have had it sent by
the hands of Mrs. Underhill, than by those of the gallant and
discursive captain); and pious John Davenport says, his wife
" tooke but one halfe of one of the papers" (which probably
contained the medicine he called rubila), "but could not beare
the taste of it, and is discouraged from taking any more;" and
honored William Leete asks for more powders for his "poore
little daughter" Graciana, though he found it "hard to make her
take it," delicate, and of course sensitive, child as she was, languishing and dying before her time, in spite of all the bitter things
she swallowed, - God help all little children in the hands of
dosing doctors and howling dervishes! Restless Samuel Gorton, now tamed by the burden of fourscore and two years,
writes so touching an account of his infirmities, and expresses
such overflowing gratitude for the relief he has obtained from
the Governor's prescriptions, wondering how" a thing so little in
quantity, so little in sent, so little in taste, and so little to sence
in operation, should beget and bring forth such efects," that we
repent our hasty exclamation, and bless the memory of the good
Governor, who gave relief to the worn-out frame of our longdeparted brother, the sturdy old heretic of Rhode Island.




276      THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
What was that medicine which so frequently occurs in the
printed letters under the name of " rubila"?  It is evidently a
secret remedy, and, so far as I know, has not yet been made out.
I had almost given it up in despair, when I found what appears
to be a key to the mystery. In the vast multitude of prescriptions contained in the manuscripts, most of them written in
symbols, I find one which I thus interpret:" Four grains of (diaphoretic) antimony, with twenty grains
of nitre, with a little salt of tin, making rubila."  Perhaps something was added to redden the powder, as he constantly speaks
of "rubifying" or " viridating" his prescriptions; a very common practice of prescribers, when their powders look a little too
much like plain salt or sugar.
Waitstill Winthrop, the Governor's son, "was a skilful physician," says Mr. Sewall, in his funeral sermon; "and generously
gave, not only his advice, but also his Medicines, for the healing
of the Sick, which, by the Blessing of God, were made
successful for the recovery of many." 1 His son John, a member of the Royal Society, speaks of himself as "Dr. Winthrop," and mentions one of his own prescriptions in a letter
to Cotton Mather. Our President tells me that there was an
heirloom of the ancient skill in his family, within his own remembrance, in the form of a certain precious eye-water, to which
the late President John Quincy Adams ascribed rare virtue,
and which he used to obtain from the possessor of the ancient
recipe.
These inherited prescriptions are often treasured in families, I
do not doubt, for many generations. When I was yet of trivial
age, and suffering occasionally, as many children do, from what
one of my Cambridgeport schoolmates used to call the " ager," -
meaning thereby toothache or faceache, - I used to get relief
from a certain plaster which never went by any other name in
the family than " Dr. Oliver."
Dr. James Oliver was my great-great-grandfather, graduated
in 1680, and died in 1703. This was, no doubt, one of his
nostrums; for nostrum, as is.well known, means nothing more
1 See also his epitaph in "Life and Letters of John Winthrop," by his descendant, Hon. Robert C. Winthrop.




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.   277
than our own or my own particular medicine, or other possession or secret, and physicians in old times used to keep their
choice recipes to themselves a good deal, as we have had occasion
to see.
Some years ago I found among my old books a small manuscript marked " James Oliver. This Book Begun Aug. 12, (16)85."
It is a rough sort of account-book, containing among other
things prescriptions for patients, and charges for the same, with
counter-charges for the purchase of medicines and other matters.
Dr. Oliver practised in Cambridge, where may be seen his tomb
with inscriptions, and with sculptured figures that look more
like Diana of the Ephesians, as given in Calmet's Dictionary,
than like any angels admitted into good society here or elsewhere.
I do not find any particular record of what his patients suffered from, but I have carefully copied out the remedies he
mentions, and find them to form a very respectable catalogue.
Besides the usual simples, elder, parsley, fennel, saffron, snakeroot, wormwood, I find the Elixir Proprietatis, with other elixirs
and cordials, as if he rather fancied warming medicines; but he
called in. the aid of some of the more energetic remedies, including iron, and probably mercury, as he bought two pounds of it
at one time.
The most interesting item is his bill against the estate of
Samuel Pason, of Roxbury, for services during his last illness.
He attended this gentleman —for such he must have been, by
the amount of physic which he took, and which his heirs paid
for  from June 4th, 1696, to September 3d, of the same year —
three months. I observe he charges for visits as well as for
medicines, which is not the case in most of his bills. He opens
the attack with a carminative appeal to the visceral conscience,
and follows it up with good hard-hitting remedies for dropsy,as I suppose the disease would have been called, - and finishes
off with a rallying dose of hartshorn and iron.
It is a source of honest pride to his descendant that his bill,
which was honestly paid, as it seems to have been honorably
earned, amounted to the handsome sum of seven pounds
and two shillings. Let me add that he repeatedly prescribes
plasters, one of which was very probably the C Dr. Oliver"




278      THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
that soothed my infant griefs, and for which I blush to say that
my venerated ancestor received from  Goodman Hancock the
painfully exiguous sum  of no pounds, no shillings, and sixpence.
I have illustrated the practice of the first century, from the two
manuscripts I have examined, as giving an impartial idea of its
every-day methods. The Governor, Johannes Secundus, it
is fair to remember, was an amateur practitioner, while my
ancestor was a professed physician. Comparing their modes
of treatment with the many scientific follies still prevailing in
the Old World? and still more with the extraordinary theological
superstitions of the community in which they lived, we shall
find reason, I think, to consider the art of healing as in a
comparatively creditable state during the first century of New
England.
In addition to the evidence as to methods of treatment furnished by the manuscripts I have cited, I subjoin the following
document, to which my attention was called by Dr. Shurtleff,
our present Mayor. This is a letter of which the original is to be
found in vol. lxix. page 10 of the " Archives" preserved at the State
House in Boston. It will be seen that what the surgeon wanted
consisted chiefly of opiates, stimulants, cathartics, plasters, and
materials for bandages. The complex and varied formula have
given place to simpler and often more effective forms of the
same remedies; but the list and the manner in which it is made
out are proofs of the good sense and schooling of the surgeon,
who, it may be noted, was in such haste that he neglected all his
stops. He might well be in a hurry, as on the very day upon
which he wrote, a great body of Indians- supposed to be six
or seven hundred-appeared before Hatfield; and twenty-five
resolute young men of Hadley, from which town he wrote,
crossed the river and drove them away.1
HADLY May 30: 76
M1 RAWSON S'
What we have reed by Tho: Houey the past month is not
the cheifest of our wants as you have love for poor wounded I pray let us
not want for these following medicines if you have not a speedy conveyance of them I pray send on purpose they are those things mentioned in
I Holmes's Annals, vol. i. p. 381.




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.        279
my former letter but to prevent future mistakes I have wrote them att
large wee have great want with the greatest hast and speed let us be
supplyed                                           S'
Tr Sert
WILL LOCKE
1 Imp. Ungt Basilic..... lb ij  Oxycroceum........    j
1 Liniment Arcei......  lb ij   Emp: Diachyl: Cum Gum.. > j
Ungt Nervin:....  lb ij   De betonica.......     lb j
01: Rosarum.......     lb ij   Flor: chamemseli.....  lb j
2 01: terebinth:.....  lb ij    Flor: meliloti......   lb j
Mithridat:........     b j    Sal: prunelle.......    iiij
Diascordii....      lb j   pul: Aloes........   iiij
theriac: Andromac:...  b ss  1 Sem: Anisi Santonicse an..  iiij
Licortie........        b j    Aq: theriacalis....    lb ij
Hord: Gallic:...... lb iiij   Spt. Cinnamomi......   b j
Empl: Diapal:......    lb iij  Syr: Gariophyllor:.....  ij
Empl: De Minio.....   lb iij  Syr: Rosarum Solut:... b. ij
Empl: De Meliloti..... lb ij     Croci........ 3 ss
Empl: paracelsi...... lb j     Old linnin as much as you can get
[Direction] for M' Edward Rawson                WILL: LOCKE
SecrY: wth hast & speed humbly
present These in
Boston
[Endorsed]
Mr Locke's Letter Reed from the Governor 13 June & acquainted ye Council with
it but could not obtaine any thing to be sent in answer thereto 13 June 1676
I have given some idea of the chief remedies used by our earlier physicians, which were both Galenic and chemical; that is,
vegetable and mineral. They, of course, employed the usual perturbing medicines which Montaigne says are the chief reliance
of their craft. There were, doubtless, individual practitioners who
employed special remedies with exceptional boldness and perhaps success. Mr. Eliot is spoken of, in a letter of William
Leete to Winthrop, Junior, as being under Mr. Greenland's
mercurial administrations.3  The latter was probably enough one
of these specialists.
There is another class of remedies which appears to have been
employed occasionally, but, on the whole, is so little prominent
as to imply a good deal of common sense among the medical
practitioners, as compared with the superstitions prevailing
around them. I have said that I have caught the good Governor,
1 Crossed out in the letter.  2 "The last was broken."
3 Hist. Coll. 4th Series, vol. vii. p. 575.




280      THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
now and then, prescribing the electuary of millipedes; but he is
entirely excused by the almost incredible fact that they were retained in the materia medica so late as when Rees's Cyclopaedia
was published, and we there find the directions formerly given
by the College of Edinburgh for their preparation.  Once or
twice we have found him admitting still more objectionable
articles into his materia medica; in doing which, I am sorry to
say that he could plead grave and learned authority. But these
instances are very rare exceptions in a medical practice of many
years, which is, on the whole, very respectable, considering the
time and circumstances.
Some remedies of questionable though not odious character
appear occasionally to have been employed by the early practitioners, but they were such as still had the support of the medical
profession. Governor John Winthrop, the first, sends for EastIndian bezoar, with other commodities he is writing for.1 Governor Endicott sends him one he had of Mr. Humfrey.2 I hope it
was genuine, for they cheated infamously in the matter of this
concretion, which ought to come out of an animal's stomach, but
the real history of which resembles what is sometimes told of
modern sausages. There is a famous law-case of James the
First's time, in which a goldsmith sold a hundred pounds' worth
of what he called bezoar, which was proved to be false, and the
purchaser got a verdict against him. Governor Endicott also
sends Winthrop a unicorn's horn, which was the property of a
certain Mrs. Beggarly, who, in spite of her name; seems to have
been rich in medical knowledge and possessions.3  The famous
Thomas Bartholirnus wrote a treatise on the virtues of this
fabulous-sounding remedy, which was published in 1641, and
republished in 1678.
The " antimonial cup," a drinking vessel made of that metal,
which, like our quassia-wood cups, might be filled and emptied
in scecula sceculorum without exhausting its virtues, is mentioned
by Matthew Cradock, in a letter to the elder Winthrop, but in a
doubtful way, as it was thought, he says, to have shortened the
days of Sir Nathaniel Riche; and Winthrop himself, as I think,
refers to its use, calling it simply "the cup." 4 An antimonial
1 Hist. of N. England, vol. ii. p. 385. Appendix.
2 Hist. Coll. 4th Series, vol. vii. p. 156.  3 Ibid.
4 Hist. of N. England, vol. i. p. 894.




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.   281
cup is included in the inventory of Samuel Seabury, who died
1680, and is valued at five shillings.1 There is a treatise entitled
" The Universall Remedy, or the Vertues of the Antimoniall
Cup, By John Evans, Minister and Preacher of God's Word,
London, 1634," in our own Society's library.
One other special remedy deserves notice, because of native
growth. I do not know when Culver's root, Leptandra Virginica
of our National Pharmacopceia, became noted, but Cotton
Mather, writing in 1716 to John Winthrop, of New London,
speaks of it as famous for the cure of consumptions, and wishes
to get some of it, through his mediation, for Katharine, his eldest
daughter.2 He gets it, and gives it to the " poor damsel," who
is languishing, as he says, and who dies the next month,3- all the
sooner, I have little doubt, for this uncertain and violent drug
with which the meddlesome pedant tormented her in that spirit
of well-meant but restless quackery, which could touch nothing
without making mischief, not even a quotation, and yet proved
at length the means of bringing a great blessing to our community, as we shall see by and by; so does Providence use our
very vanities and infirmities for its wise purposes.
Externally, I find the practitioners on whom I have chiefly
relied, used the plasters of Paracelsus, of melilot, diachylon, and
probably diaphoenicon, all well known to the old pharmacopoeias,
and some of them to the modern ones,-to say nothing of
" my yellow salve," of Governor John, the second, for the composition of which we must apply to his respected descendant.
The authors I find quoted, are Barbette's Surgery, Camerarius on Gout, and Wecherus, of all whom notices may be
found in the pages of Haller and Vanderlinden; also, Reed's
Surgery, and Nicholas Culpeper's Practice of Physic and
Anatomy, the last as belonging to Samuel Seabury, chirurgeon,
before mentioned. Nicholas Culpeper was a shrewd charlatan,
and as impudent a varlet as ever prescribed for a colic; but
knew very well what he was about, and badgers the College
with great vigor. A copy of Spigelius's famous Anatomy, in
the Boston Athenaeum, has the names of Increase and Samuel
1 Thacher's Medical Biography, p. 18.
2 Mather Papers in Hist. Coll. 4th Series, vol. viii. p. 420.
3 Ibid, note.




282      THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN "IASSACHUSETTS.
Mather written in it, and was doubtless early overhauled by the
youthful Cotton, who refers to the great anatomist's singular
death, among his curious stories in the " Magnalia," and quotes
him among nearly a hundred authors whom he cites in his
manuscript F" The Angel of Bethesda." Dr. John Clark's " books
and instruments, with several chirurgery materials in the closet," 1
were valued in his inventory at sixty pounds; Dr. Matthew
Fuller, who died in 1678, left a library valued at ten pounds;
and a surgeon's chest and drugs, valued at sixteen pounds.2
Here we leave the first century and all attempts at any
further detailed accounts of medicine and its practitioners. It is
necessary to show in a brief glance what had been going on in
Europe during the latter part of that century, the first quarter of
which had been made illustrious in the history of medical
science, by the discovery of the circulation.
Charles Barbeyrac, a Protestant in his religion, was a practitioner and teacher of medicine at Montpellier. His creed was
in the way of his obtaining office; but the young men followed
his instructions with enthusiasm. Religious and scientific freedom breed in and in, until it becomes hard to tell the family of
one from that of the other.. Barbeyrac threw overboard the old
complex medical farragos of the pharmacopceias, as his church
had disburdened itself of the popish ceremonies.
Among the students who followed his instructions, were two
Englishmen: one of them, John Locke, afterwards author of an
" Essay on the Human Understanding," three years younger
than his teacher; the other, Thomas Sydenham, five years
older.  Both returned to England.  Locke, whose medical
knowledge is borne witness to by Sydenham, had the good
fortune to form a correct opinion on a disease from which the
Earl of Shaftesbury was suffering, which led to an operation
that saved his life. Less felicitous was his experience with a
certain ancillc culinaria virgo,- which I am afraid would in those
days have been translated kitchen-wench, instead of lady of the
culinary department,-who turned him off after she had got
tired of him, and called in another practitioner.3 This helped,
1 Thacher's Med. Biog., p. 222.  2 Ib., p. 18.
3 Locke and Sydenham, p. 124. By John Brown, M.D. Edinburgh, 1866.




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.  283
perhaps, to spoil a promising doctor, and make an immortal
metaphysician. At any rate, Locke laid down the professional
wig and cane, and took to other studies.
The name of Thomas Sydenham is as distinguished in the
history of medicine, as that of John Locke in philosophy. As
Barbeyrac was found in opposition to the established religion,
as Locke took the rational side against orthodox Bishop
Stillingfleet, so Sydenham  went with  Parliament against
Charles, and was never admitted a Fellow by the College of
Physicians, which, after he was dead, placed his bust in their hall
by the side of that of Harvey.
What Sydenham did for medicine was briefly this: he
studied the course of diseases carefully, and especially as
affected by the particular season; to patients with fever he gave
air and cooling drinks, instead of smothering and heating them,
with the idea of sweating out their disease; he ordered horseback exercise to consumptives; he, like his teacher, used few
and comparatively simple remedies; he did not give any drug
at all, if he thought none was needed, but let well enough alone.
He was a sensible man, in short, who applied his common sense
to diseases which he had studied with the best light of science
that he could obtain.
The influence of the reform he introduced must have been more
or less felt in this country, but not much before the beginning
of the eighteenth century, as his great work was not published
-until 1675, and then in Latin. I very strongly suspect that
there was not so much to reform in the simple practice of the
physicians of the new community, as there was in that of the
learned big-wigs of the " College," who valued their remedies
too much in proportion to their complexity, and the extravagant
and fantastic ingredients which went to their making.
During the memorable century that bred and bore the Revolution, the medical profession gave great names to our history.
But John Brooks belonged to the State, and Joseph Warren
belongs to the country and mankind, and to speak of them
would lead me beyond my limited subject. There would be
little pleasure in dwelling on the name of Benjamin Church;
and as for the medical politicians, like Elisha Cooke in the early




284      THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
part of the century, or Charles Jarvis, the " bald eagle of Boston,"
in its later years, whether their practice was heroic or not, their
patients were, for he is a bold man who trusts one that is making
speeches and coaxing voters, to meddle with the internal politics
of his corporeal republic.
One great event stands out in the medical history of this
eighteenth century; namely, the introduction of the practice of
inoculation for small-pox. Six epidemics of this complaint had
visited Boston in the course of a hundred years.1 Prayers had
been asked in the churches, for more than a hundred sick in a
single day, and this many times. About a thousand persons had
died in a twelvemonth, we are told, and, as we may infer, chiefly
from this cause.2
In 1721, this disease, after a respite of nineteen years, again
appeared as an epidemic.   In that year it was that Cotton
Mather, browsing, as was his wont, on all the printed fodder
that came within reach of his ever-grinding mandibles, came upon
an account of inoculation as practised in Turkey, contained
in the Philosophical Transactions.  He spoke of it to several
physicians, who paid little heed to his story; for they knew his
medical whims, and had probably been bored, as we say nowa-days, many of them, with listening to his " Angel of Bethesda,"
and satiated with his speculations on the Nishmath Chajim.
The Reverend Mather, - I use a mode of expression he often
employed when speaking of his honored brethren, -the Reverend Mather was right this time, and the irreverent doctors who
laughed at him were wrong. One only of their number disputes
his claim to giving the first impulse to the practice in Boston.
This is what that person says: -
"The Small-Pox spread in Boston, New England, A. 1721, and the
Reverend Dr. Cotton Mather, having had the use of these Communications from Dr. William /Douglass" (that is, the writer of these words);
"surreptitiously, without the knowledge of his Informer, that he might
have the honour of a New fangled notion, sets an Undaunted Operator to
work, and in this Country about 290 were inoculated." 3
All this has not deprived Cotton Mather of the credit of sug1 W. Douglass's Diss. concerning Inoc., p. 25. Boston, 1730.
2 Magnalia, book i. " The Bostonian Ebenezer."
3 Diss. concerning Inoculation, p. 2.




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.   285
gesting, and a bold and intelligent physician of the honor of
carrying out, the new practice. On the twenty-seventh day of
June, 1721, Zabdiel Boylston, of Boston, inoculated his only son
for small-pox, - the first person ever submitted to the operation
in the New World. The story of the fierce resistance to the introduction of the practice; of how Boylston was mobbed, and
Mather had a hand-grenade thrown in at his window; of how
William Douglass, the Scotchman, "always positive, and sometimes accurate," as was neatly said of him, at once depreciated
the practice and tried to get the credit of suggesting it, and
Lawrence Dalhonde, the Frenchman, testified to its destructive
consequences; of how Edmund Massey, lecturer at St. Albans,
preached against sinfully endeavoring to alter the course of nature
by presumptuous interposition, which he would leave to the
atheist and the scoffer, the heathen and unbeliever, while in
the face of his sermon, afterwards reprinted in Boston, many of
our New-England clergy stood up boldly in defence of the practice, - all this has been told so well and so often that I spare you
its details. Set this good hint of Cotton Mather against that
letter of his to John Richards, recommending the search after
witch-marks, and the application of the water-ordeal, which means
throw your grandmother into the water, if she has a mole on her
arm;-if she swims, she is a witch and must be hung; if she
sinks, the Lord have mercy on her soul!
Thus did America receive this great discovery, destined to
save thousands of lives, via Boston, from the hands of one of our
own Massachusetts physicians.
The year 1735 was rendered sadly memorable by the epidemic
of the terrible disease known as " throat-distemper," and regarded
by many as the same as our" diphtheria."  Dr. Holyoke thinks
the more general use of mercurials in inflammatory complaints
dates from the time of their employment in this disease, in which
they were thought to have proved specially useful.1
At some time in the course of this century, medical practice
had settled down on four remedies as its chief reliance. When
Dr. Holyoke, nearly seventy years ago, received young Mr. James
Jackson as his student, he pointed to the labelled drawers and
bottles all around his office, - for he was his own apothecary, -
1 Memoir of Edward A. Holyoke, M.D., LL.D., p. 64. Boston, 1829.




286      THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
and said, "I seem to have here a great number and variety of
medicines; but I may name four, which are of more importance
than all the rest put together; namely, Mercury, Antimony,
Opium, and Peruvian Bark." 1 I doubt if either of them remembered, that, nearly seventy years before that, in 1730, Dr. William
Douglass, the disputatious Scotchman, mentioned those same four
remedies, in the dedication of his quarrelsome essay on inoculation, as the most important ones in the hands of the physicians
of his time.
In the "Proceedings" of this Society for the year 1863 is a
very pleasant paper by the late Dr. Ephraim Eliot, giving an
account of the leading physicians of Boston during the last
quarter of the last century. The names of Lloyd, Gardiner,
Welsh, Rand, Bulfinch, Danforth, John WlTarren, Jeffiies, are all
famous in local history, and are commemorated in our medical
biographies. One of them, at least, appears to have been more
widely known, not only as one of the first aerial voyagers, but
as an explorer in the almost equally hazardous realm of medical
theory. Dr. John Jeffries, the first of that name, is considered by
Broussais as a leader of medical opinion in America, and so referred to in his famous " Examen des Doctrines Medicales."
Two great movements took place in this eighteenth century,
the effect of which has been chiefly felt in our own time; namely,
the establishment of the Massachusetts Medical Society, and the
founding of the Medical School of Harvard University.
The third century of our medical history began with the introduction of the second great medical discovery of modern times,
-of all time up to that date, I may say, -once more via Boston, if we count the University village as its suburb, and once
more by one of our Massachusetts physicians. In the month of
July, 1800, Dr. Benjamin Waterhouse, of Cambridge, submitted
four of his own children to the new process of vaccination, -the
first persons vaccinated, as Dr. Zabdiel Boylston's son had been
the first person inoculated in the New World.
A little before the first half of this century was completed, in
the autumn of 1846, that great discovery went forth from the
Massachusetts General Hospital,which repaid the debt of America
1 Another Letter to a Young Physician, p. 15.




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.   287
to the science of the Old World, and gave immortality to the
place of its origin in the memory and the heart of mankind.
The production of temporary insensibility at will-tuto, cito,
jucunde, safely, quickly, pleasantly-is one of those triumphs over
the infirmities of our mortal condition which change the aspect
of life ever afterwards. Rhetoric can add nothing to its glory;
gratitude, and the pride permitted to human weakness, that our
Bethlehem should have been chosen as the birthplace of this
new embodiment of the divine mercy, are all we can yet find
room for.
The present century has seen the establishment of all those
great charitable institutions for the cure of diseases of the body
and of the mind, which our State and our city have a right to
consider as among the chief ornaments of their civilization.
The last century had very little to show, in our State, in the
way of medical literature. The worthies who took care of our
grandfathers and great-grandfathers, like the Revolutionary
heroes, fought (with disease) and bled (their patients) and died
(in spite of their own remedies); but their names, once familiar,
are heard only at rare intervals. Honored in their day, not unremembered by a few solitary students of the past, their memories
are going sweetly to sleep in the arms of the patient old drynurse, whose "l black-drop " is the never-failing anodyne of the
restless generations of men. Except the lively controversy on
inoculation, and floating papers in journals, we have not much
of value for that long period, in the shape of medical records.
But while the trouble with the last century is to find authors
to mention, the trouble of this would be to name all that we
find. Of these, a very few claim unquestioned pre-eminence.
Nathan Smith, born in Rehoboth, Mass., a graduate of
the Medical School of our University, did a great work for the
advancement of medicine and surgery in New England, by his
labors as teacher and author,- greater, it is claimed by some, than
was ever done by any other man. The two Warrens, of our
time, each left a large and permanent record of a most extended
surgical practice. James Jackson not only educated a whole
generation by his lessons of wisdom,but bequeathed some of
the most valuable results of his experience to those who came
after him, in a series of letters singularly pleasant and kindly




288      THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
as well as instructive. John Ware, keen and cautious, earnest
and deliberate, wrote the two remarkable essays which have
identified his name, for all time, with two important diseases,
on which he has shed new light by his original observations.
I must do violence to the modesty of the living byreferring
to the many important contributions to medical science, by
Dr. Jacob Bigelow, and especially to his discourse on " Self-limited
Diseases," an address which can be read in a single hour, but
the influence of which will be felt for a century.
Nor would the profession forgive me if I forgot to mention
the admirable museum of pathological anatomy, created almost
entirely by the hands of Dr. John Barnard Swett Jackson,
and illustrated by his own printed  descriptive catalogue,
justly spoken of by a distinguished professor in the University
of Pennsylvania, as the most important contribution which
had ever been made to the branch to which it relates in this
country.
When we look at the literature of mental disease, as seen in
hospital reports and special treatises, we can mention the names
of Wyman,Woodward, Brigham, Bell, and Ray, all either natives
of Massachusetts or placed at the head of her institutions for the
treatment of the insane.
We have a right to claim also one who is known all over the
civilized world as a philanthropist, to us as a townsman and a
graduate of our own Medical School, Dr. Samuel Gridley Howe,
the guide and benefactor of a great multitude who were born to
a world of inward or of outward darkness.
I cannot pass over in silence the part taken by our own physicians in those sanitary movements which are assuming every
year greater importance. Two diseases especially have attracted
attention, above all others, with reference to their causes and
prevention; cholera, the "black death" of the nineteenth century, and consumption, the white plague of the North, both of
which have been faithfully studied and reported on by physicians
of our own State and city. The cultivation of medical and surgical specialties, which is fast becoming prevalent, is beginning
to show its effects in the literature of the profession, which is
every year growing richer in original observations and investigations.




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.    289
To these benefactors, who have labored for us in their peaceful vocation, we must add the noble army of surgeons, who went
with the soldiers who fought the battles of their country, sharing
many of their dangers, not rarely falling victims to fatigue, disease, or the deadly volleys to which they often exposed themselves in the discharge of their duties.
The pleasant biographies of the venerable Dr. Thacher, and
the worthy and kind-hearted gleaner, Dr. Stephen W. Williams,
who came after him, are filled with the names of men who
served their generation well, and rest from their labors, followed
by the blessing of those for whom they endured the toils and
fatigues inseparable from  their calling.  The hard-working,
intelligent, country physician more especially deserves the gratitude of his own generation, for he rarely leaves any permanent
record in the literature of his profession. Books are hard to
obtain; hospitals, which are always centres of intelligence, are
remote; thoroughly educated and superior men are separated by
wide intervals; and long rides, though favorable to reflection, take
up much of the time which might otherwise be given to the
labors of the study. So it is that men of ability and vast experience, like the late Dr. Twitchell, for instance, make a great and
deserved reputation, become the oracles of large districts, and yet
leave nothing, or next to nothing, by which their names shall be
preserved from blank oblivion.
One or two other facts deserve mention, as showing the readiness of our medical community to receive and adopt any important idea or discovery. The new science of Histology, as it is
now called, was first brought fully before the profession of this
country by the translation of Bichat's great work, "Anatomie
G4nerale," by the late Dr. George Hayward.
The first work printed in this country on Auscultation -that
wonderful art of discovering disease, which, as it were, puts a
window in the breast, through which the vital organs can be seen,
to all intents and purposes -was the manual published anonymously by " A Member of the Massachusetts Medical Society."
We are now in some slight measure prepared to weigh the
record of the medical profession in Massachusetts, and pass our
judgment upon it. But in order to do justice to the first genera19




290      THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
tion of practitioners, we must compare what we know of their
treatment of disease with the state of the art in England, and
the superstitions which they saw all around them in other departments of knowledge or belief.
English medical literature must have been at a pretty low ebb
when Sydenham recommended Don Quixote to Sir Richard
Blackmore for professional reading. The College Pharmacopceia was loaded with the most absurd compound mixtures, one
of the most complex of which (the same which the Reverend Mr.
Harward, " Lecturer at the Royal Chappel in Boston" tried to
simplify) was not dropped until the year 1801. Sir Kenelm
Digby was playing his fantastic tricks with the Sympathetic
powder, and teaching Governor Winthrop, the second, how to
cure fever and ague, which some may like to know. Pare the
patient's nails; put the parings in a little bag, and hang the bag
round the neck of a live eel, and put him in a tub of water. The
eel will die, and the patient will recover.1
Wiseman, the great surgeon, was discoursing eloquently on
the efficacy of the royal touch in scrofula.2  The founder of the
Ashmolean Museum at Oxford, consorting with alchemists and
astrologers, was treasuring the manuscripts of the late pious
D)r. Richard Napier, in which certain letters (R Ris) were
understood to mean Responsum Raphaelis, - the answer of the
angel Raphael to the good man's medical questions.3  The
illustrious Robert Boyle was making his collection of choice and
safe remedies, including the sole of an old shoe,4 the thigh bone
of a hanged man,5 and things far worse than these, as articles of
his materia nedica. Dr. Stafford, whose paper of directions
to his "friend, Mr. Wintrop," I cited, was probably a man
of standing in London; yet toad-powder was his sovereign
remedy.
See what was the state of belief in other matters among the
most intelligent persons of the colonies, - magistrates and
clergymen. Jonathan Brewster, son of the church-elder, writes
1 Hist. Coll. 3d Series, vol. x.
2 Several Chirurgicall Treatises, p. 245. London, 1676.
3 Turner (William), Remarkable Providences, part i. chap. 2. Also referred to in
Mather's MS. " The Angel of Bethesda."
4 Medicinal Experiments, p. 105. 5th edition. London, 1712.  6 Ib., p. 105.




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.     291
the wildest letters to John Winthrop about alchemy, - mad for
making gold as the Lynn rock-borers are for finding it.1
Remember the theology and the diabology of the time. Mr.
Cotton's Theocracy was a royal government, with the King of
kings as its nominal head, but with an upper chamber of saints,
and a tremendous opposition in the lower house; the leader of
which may have been equalled, but cannot have been surpassed
by any of our earth-born politicians. The demons were prowling round the houses every night, as the foxes were sneaking
about the hen-roosts. The men of Gloucester fired whole flasks
of gunpowder at devils disguised as Indians and Frenchmen.2
How deeply the notion of miraculous interference with the
course of nature was rooted, is shown by the tenacity of the
superstition about earthquakes.  We can hardly believe that
our Professor Winthrop, father of the old judge and the
" squire," whom  many of us Cambridge people remember so
well, had to defend himself against the learned and excellent Dr.
Prince, of the Old South Church, for discussing their phenomena as if they belonged to the province of natural science.3
Not for the sake of degrading the aspect of the noble men
who founded our State, do I refer to their idle beliefs and painful
delusions, but to show against what influences the common
sense of the medical profession had to assert itself.
Think, then, of the blazing stars, that shook their horrid hair
in the sky; the phantom ship, that brought its message direct
from the other world;4 the story of the mouse and the snake at
Watertown; 5 of the mice and the prayer-book; 6 of the snake
in church;7 of the calf with two heads;8 and of the cabbage
" in the perfect form of a cutlash,"9 - all which innocent occurrences were accepted or feared as alarming portents.
We can smile at these: but we cannot smile at the account
of unhappy Mary Dyer's malformed offspring;10 or of Mrs.
1 Hist. Coll. 4th Series, vol. vii. pp. 72, 77.
2 Magnalia, book vii. art. 18.
8 Two Lectures on Comets, p. vii. Boston, 1811.
4 Magnalia, book i. chap. 6. Winthrop, Hist. of N. E., vol. ii. p. 828.
5 Life and Letters of John Winthrop, p. 108.
6 Winthrop, Hist. of N. E., vol. ii. p. 20.
7 Ib., vol. ii. p. 330.
8 Mather Papers in Hist. Soc. Coll. 4th Series, vol. viii. p. 614.  9 Ibid.
10 Winthrop, Hist. of N. E., vol. i. p. 261.




292      THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
Hutchinson's domestic misfortune of similar character,1 in the
story of which the physician, Dr. John Clark of Rhode Island,
alone appears to advantage; or as we read the Rev. Samuel
Willard's fifteen alarming pages about an unfortunate young
woman suffering with hysteria.2  Or go a little deeper into
tragedy, and see poor Dorothy Talby, mad as Ophelia, first
admonished, then whipped; at last, taking   her own little
daughter's life; put on trial, and standing mute, threatened to
be pressed to death, confessing, sentenced, praying to be beheaded; and none the less pitilessly swung from   the fatal
ladder.3
The cooper's crazy wife —crazy in the belief that she has
committed the unpardonable sin -tries to drown her child, to
save it from misery; and the poor lunatic, who would be
tenderly cared for to-day in a quiet asylum, is judged to be
acting under the instigation of Satan himself.4 Yet, after all,
What can we say, who put Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, full of.
nightmare dreams of horror, into all our children's hands; a
story in which the awful image of the man in the cage might
well turn the nursery where it is read into a madhouse?
The miserable delusion of witchcraft illustrates, in a still more
impressive way, the false ideas which governed the supposed
relation of men with the spiritual world.  I have no doubt
many physicians shared in these superstitions. Mr. Upham says
they - that is, some of them - were in the habit of attributing
their want of success to the fact, that an "evil hand" was on
their patient.5  The temptation was strong, no doubt, when
magistrates and ministers and all that followed their lead were
contented with such an explanation. But how was it in Salem,
according to Mr. Upham's own statement? Dr. John Swinnerton was, he says, for many years the principal physician of
Salem.6 And he says, also, " The Swinnerton family were all
along opposed to Mr. Parris, and kept remarkably clear from
the witchcraft delusion."7 Dr. John Swinnerton- the same, by
the way, whose memory is illuminated by a ray from the genius
1 Winthrop, Hist. of N. E., p. 271.
2 Case of Elizabeth Knapp, Hist. Coll. 4th Series, vol. viii. p. 555.
8 Winthrop, Hist. of N. E., vol. i. p. 279.  4 Ib., vol. ii. p. 65.
5 Salem Witchcraft, vol. ii. p. 361. Boston, 1867.
6 lb., vol. i. p. 140.          7 Ib., vol. ii; p. 495 (Supplement).




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.   293
of Hawthorne - died the very year before the great witchcraft
explosion took place. But who can doubt that it was from him
that the family had learned to despise and to resist the base
superstition; or that Bridget Bishop, whose house he rented, as
Mr. Upham tells me, the first person hanged in the time of the
delusion, would have found an efficient protector in her tenant,
had he been living, to head the opposition of his family to the
misguided clergymen and magistrates?
I cannot doubt that our early physicians brought with them
many Old-World medical superstitions, and I have no question
that they were more or less involved in the prevailing errors of
the community in which they lived. But, on the whole, their
record is a clean one, so far as we can get at it; and where it is
questionable, we must remember, that there must have been
many little-educated persons among them; and that all must
have felt, to some extent, the influence of those sincere and
devoted but unsafe men, the physic-practising clergymen, who
often used spiritual means as a substitute for temporal ones,
who looked upon a hysteric patient as possessed by the devil,1
and treated a fractured skull by prayers and plasters, following
the advice of a ruling elder in opposition to the unanimous
opinion of seven surgeons.2
To what results the union of the two professions was liable to
lead, may be seen by the example of a learned and famous person, who has left on record the product of his labors in the
double capacity of clergyman and physician.
I have had the privilege of examining a manuscript of Cotton
Mather's relating to medicine, by the kindness of the librarian of
the American Antiquarian Society, to which society it belongs. A
brief notice of this curious document may prove not uninteresting.
It is entitled " The Angel of Bethesda: an Essay upon the
Common Mlaladies of Mankind, offering, first, the sentiments of
Piety," &c., &c., and " a collection of plain but potent and
Approved REMEDIES for the Maladies."  There are sixty-six
" Capsula's," as he calls them, or chapters, in his table of contents; of which, five - from the fifteenth to the nineteenth,
inclusive - are missing. This is a most unfortunate loss, as the
eighteenth capsula treated of agues, and we could have learned
1 Ante, p. 292.  2 Winthrop's History, vol. ii. p. 203. The child recovered.




294       THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
from it something of their degree of frequency in this part of
New England. There is no date to the manuscript; which,
however, refers to a case observed Nov. 14, 1724.
The divine takes precedence of the physician in this extraordinary production. He begins by preaching a sermon at his
unfortunate patient. Having thrown him into a cold sweat by
his spiritual sudorific, he attacks him with his material remedies,
which are often quite as unpalatable. The simple and cleanly
practice of Sydenham, with whose works he was acquainted,
seems to have been thrown away upon him. Every thing he
could find mentioned in the seventy or eighty authors he cites,
all that the old women of both sexes had ever told him of, gets
into his text, or squeezes itself into his margin.
Evolving disease out of sin, he hates it, one would say, as he
hates its cause, and would drive it out of the body with all
noisome appliances. " Sickness is in Fact Flagellum Dei pro
peccatis mundi." So saying, he encourages the young mother
whose babe is wasting away upon her breast with these reflections: -
"Think; oh the grievous Effects of Sin! This wretched Infant has
not arrived unto years of sense enough, to sin after the similitude of the
transgression committed by Adam. Nevertheless the Transgression of
Adam, who had all mankind Foederally, yea, Naturally, in him, has
involved this Infant in the guilt of it. And the poison of the old serpent,
which infected Adam when he fell into his Transgression, by hearkening
to the Tempter, has corrupted all mankind, and is a seed unto such diseases
as this Infant is now laboring under. Lord, what are we, and what are
our children, but a Generation of Vipers?"
Many of his remedies are at least harmless, but his pedantry
and utter want of judgment betray themselves everywhere. He
piles his prescriptions one upon another, without the least discrimination. He is run away with by all sorts of fancies and
superstitions.  He prescribes euphrasia, eyebright, for disease
of the eyes; appealing confidently to the strange old doctrine of
signatures, which inferred its use from the resemblance of its
flower to the organ of vision. For the scattering of wens, " the
efficacy of a Dead Hand has been out of measure wonderful."
But when he once comes to the odious class of remedies, he revels
in them like a scarabeus.  This allusion will bring us quite near




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.      295
enough to the inconceivable abominations with which he proposed to outrage the sinful stomachs of the unhappy confederates
and accomplices of Adam.
It is well that the treatise was never printed, yet there are
passages in it worth preserving. He speaks of some remedies
which have since become more universally known -
" Among the plants of our soyl, Sir William Temple singles out Five
[Six] as being of the greatest virtue and most friendly to health: and his
favorite plants, Sage, Rue, Saffron, Alehoof, Garlick, and Elder."
" But these Five [Six] plants may admitt of some competitors. The
QUINQUINA- How    celebrated: Immoderately, Hyperbolically celebrated!"
Of Ipecacuanha, he says, -
"This is now in its reign; the most fashionable vomit."
" I am not sorry that antimonial emetics begin to be disused."
He quotes "Mr. Lock" as recommending red poppy-water
and abstinence from flesh as often useful in children's diseases.
One of his" Capsula's'" is devoted to the animalcular origin
of diseases, at the end of which he says, speaking of remedies for
this supposed source of our distempers: -
" Mercury we know thee: But we are afraid thou wilt kill us too, if we
employ thee to kill them that kill us.
" And yett, for the cleansing of the small Blood Vessels, and making
way for the free circulation of the Blood and Lymph - there is nothing
like Mercurial Deobstruents."
From this we learn that mercury was already in common use,
and the subject of the same popular prejudice as in our own
time.
His poetical turn shows itself here and there:"0 Nightingale, with a Thorn at thy Breast; Under the trouble of a
Cough, what can be more proper than such thoughts as these?"..
If there is pathos in this, there is bathos in his apostrophe to
the millipede, beginning "Poor sowbug!" and eulogizing the
healing virtues of that odious little beast; of which he tells
us to take " half a pound, putt'em alive into a quart or two of
wine," with saffron and other drugs, and take two ounces twice
a day.




296       THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
The " Capsula" entitled " Nishmath Chajim," was printed in
1722, at New   London, and is in the possession of our own
Society. He means, by these words, something like the Archmus
of Van Helmont, of which he discourses in a style wonderfully
resembling that of Mr. Jenkinson, in the " Vicar of Wakefield."
"Many of the Ancients thought there was much of a Real History in
the Parable, and their Opinion was that there is, DIAPHORA KATA TAS
MORPHAS, A Distinction (and so a Resemblance) of men as to their
Shapes after Death."
And so on, with Irenaeus, Tertullian, Thespesius, and " the TA
TONE PSEUCONE CROMATA," in the place of" Sanconiathon, Manetho,
Berosus," and ". Anarchon ara kai ateleutaion to pan."
One other passage deserves notice, as it relates to the single
medical suggestion which does honor to Cotton Mather's memory.
It does not appear that he availed himself of the information
which he says he obtained from his slave, for such I suppose he
was.
In his appendix to " Variole Triumphatoe," he says, —
"There has been a wonderful practice lately used in several parts of
the world, which indeed is not yet become common in our nation.
" I was first informed of it by a Garamantee servant of my own, long
before I knew that any Europeans or Asiaticks had the least acquaintance
with it, and some years before I was enriched with the communications of
the learned Foreigners, whose accounts I found agreeing with what I
received of my servant, when he shewed me the Scar of the Wound made
for the operation; and said, That no person ever died of the small-pox, in
their countrey, that had the courage to use it.
I have since met with a considerable Number of these Africans, who
all agree in one story; That in their countrey grandy-many dy of the
small-pox: But now they learn this way: people take juice of small-pox
and cutty-skin and put in a Drop; then by'nd by a little sicky, sicky: then
very few little things like small-pox; and nobody dy of it; and nobody
have small-pox any more. Thus, in Africa, where the poor creatures dy
of the small-pox like Rotten Sheep, a merciful God has taught them an
Infallible preservative.'Tis a common practice, and is attended with a
constant success."
What has come down to us of the first century of medical practice, in the hands of Winthrop and Oliver, is comparatively simple
and reasonable. I suspect that the conditions of rude, stern life,
in which the colonists found themselves in the wilderness, took the




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.   297
nonsense out of them, as the exigencies of a campaign did out
of our physicians and surgeons in the late war. Good food and
enough of it, pure air and water, cleanliness, good attendance,
an anaesthetic, an opiate, a stimulant, quinine, and two or three
common drugs, proved to be the marrow of medical treatment;
and the fopperies of the pharmacopoeia went the way of embroidered shirts and white kid gloves and malacca joints, in their
time of need. " Good wine is the best cordiall for her," said
Governor John, Junior, to Samuel Symonds, speaking of that
gentleman's wife,-just as Sydenham, instead of physic, once
ordered a roast chicken and a pint of canary for his patient in
male hysterics.
But the profession of medicine never could reach its full development until it became entirely separated from that of divinity.
The spiritual guide, the consoler in affliction, the confessor who
is admitted into the secrets of our souls, has his own noble sphere
of duties; but the healer of men must confine himself solely to
the revelations of God in nature, as he sees their miracles with
his own eyes. No doctrine of prayer or special providence is
to be his excuse for not looking straight at secondary causes, and
acting, exactly so far as experience justifies him, as if he were
himself the divine agent which antiquity fabled him to be.
While pious men were praying- humbly, sincerely, rightly, according to their knowledge- over the endless succession of little
children dying of spasms in the great Dublin Hospital, a sagacious physician knocked some holes in the walls of the ward, let
God's blessed air in on the little creatures, and so had already
saved in that single hospital, as it was soberly calculated thirty
years ago, more than sixteen thousand lives of these infant heirs
of immortality.'
Let it be, if you will, that the wise inspiration of the physician
was granted in virtue of the clergyman's supplications. Still,
the habit of dealing with things seen, generates another kind of
knowledge, and another way of thought, from that of dealing with
things unseen; which knowledge and way of thought are special
means granted by Providence, and to be thankfully accepted.
The medieval ecclesiastics expressed a great truth in that say1 Collins's Midwifery, p. 312. Published by order of the Massachusetts Medical
Society. Boston, 1841.




298      THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
ing, so often quoted, as carrying a reproach with it: " Ubi tres
medici, duo atlei,"-" - Where there are three physicians, there
are two atheists."
It was true then, it is true to-day, that the physician very commonly, if not very generally, denies and repudiates the deity of
ecclesiastical commerce. The Being whom Ambroise Pare meant
when he spoke those memorable words, which you may read
over the professor's chair in the French School of Medicine, —
" Je le pensay, et Dieu le guarit," -"I dressed his wound, and
God healed it,"-is a different being from the God that scholastic
theologians have projected from their consciousness, or shaped
even from the sacred pages which have proved so plastic in their
hands. He is a God who never leaves himself without witness,
who repenteth him of the evil, who never allows a disease or an
injury, compatible with the enjoyment of life, to take its course
without establishing an effort,- limited by certain fixed conditions,
it is true, but an effort, always, to restore the broken body or the
shattered mind. In the perpetual presence of this great Healing
Agent, who stays the bleeding of wounds, who knits the fractured
bone, who expels the splinter by a gentle natural process, who
walls in the inflammation that might involve the vital organs,
who draws a cordon to separate the dead part from the living,
who sends his three natural anesthetics to the overtasked frame
in due order, according to its need, - sleep, fainting, death; in
this perpetual presence, it is doubtless hard for the physician to
realize the theological fact of a vast and permanent sphere of the
universe, where no organ finds itself in its natural medium, where
no wound heals kindly, where the executive has abrogated the
pardoning power, and mercy forgets its errand; where the omnipotent is unfelt save in malignant agencies, and the omnipresent
is unseen and unrepresented; hard to accept the God of Dante's
Inferno, and of Bunyan's caged lunatic. If this is atheism, call
three, instead of two of the trio, atheists, and it will probably
come nearer the truth.
I am not disposed to deny the occasional injurious effect of
the materializing influences to which the physician is subjected.
A spiritual guild is absolutely necessary to keep him, to keep us
all, from becoming the " fingering slaves" that Wordsworth treats
with such shrivelling scorn. But it is well that the two callings




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.  299
have been separated, and it is fitting that they remain apart. In
settling the affairs of the late concern, I am afraid our good
friends remain a little in our debt. We lent them our physician
Michael Servetus in fair condition, and they returned him so
damaged by fire, as to be quite useless for our purposes. Their
Reverend Samuel Willard wrote us a not overwise report of a case
of hysteria; and our Jean Astruc gave them (if we may trust Dr.
Smith's Dictionary of the Bible) the first discerning criticism on
the authorship of the Pentateuch. Our John Locke enlightened
them with his letters concerning toleration; and their Cotton
Mather obscured our twilight with his Nishmath Chajim.
Yet we must remember that the name of Basil Valentine, the
monk, is associated with whatever good and harm we can ascribe
to antimony; and that the most remarkable of our specifics long
bore the name of "Jesuit's Bark," from an old legend connected
with its introduction. " Frere Jacques," who taught the lithotomists of Paris, owes his ecclesiastical title to courtesy, as he did
not belong to a religious order.
Medical science, and especially the study of mental disease,
is destined, I believe, to react to much greater advantage on
the theology of the future than theology has acted on medicine
in the past. The liberal spirit very generally prevailing in both
professions, and the good understanding between their most enlightened members, promise well for the future of both in a
community which holds every point of human belief, every institution in human hands, and every word written in a human
dialect, open to free discussion to-day, to-morrow, and to the end
of time. Whether the world at large will ever be cured of
trusting to specifics as a substitute for observing the laws of
health, and to mechanical or intellectual formula as a substitute
for character, may admit of question. Quackery and idolatry
are all but immortal.
We can find most of the old beliefs alive amongst us to-day,
only having changed their dresses and the social spheres in which
they thrive. We think the quarrels of Galenists and chemists
belong to the past, forgetting that Thomsonism has its numerous
apostles in our community; that it is common to see remedies
vaunted as purely vegetable, and that the prejudice against "mineral poisons," especially mercury, is as strong in many quarters




300      THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
now as it was at the beginning of the seventeenth century.
Names are only air, and blow away with a change of wind; but
beliefs are rooted in human wants and weakness, and die hard.
The oaks of Dodona are prostrate, and the shrine of Delphi is desolate; but the Pythoness and the Sibyl may be consulted in
Lowell Street for a very moderate compensation. Nostradamus
and Lilly seem impossible in our time; but we have seen the
advertisements of an astrologer in our Boston papers year after
year, which seems to imply that he found believers and patrons.
You smiled when I related Sir Kenelm Digby's prescription with
the live eel in it; but if each of you were to empty his or her pocket,
would there not roll out a horse-chestnut from more than one of
them, carried about as a cure for rheumatism?  The brazen
head of Roger Bacon is mute; but is not " Planchette" uttering
her responses in a hundred houses of this city? We think of
palmistry or chiromancy as belonging to the days of Albertus
Magnus, or, if existing in our time, as given over to the gypsies;
but a very distinguished person has recently shown me the line
of life, and the line of fortune, on the palm of his hand, with a
seeming confidence in the sanguine predictions of his career
which had been drawn from them. What shall we say of the
plausible and well-dressed charlatans of our own time, who
trade in false pretences, like Nicholas Knapp of old, but without
any fear of being fined or whipped; or of the many follies
and inanities, imposing on the credulous part of the community,
each of them gaping with eager, open mouth for a gratuitous
advertisement by the mention of its foolish name in any respectable connection?
I turn from this less pleasing aspect of the common intelligence which renders such follies possible, to close the honorable
record of the medical profession in this our ancient Commonwealth.
We have seen it in the first century divided among clergymen,
magistrates, and regular practitioners; yet, on the whole, for the
time, and under the circumstances, respectable, except where it invoked supernatural agencies to account for natural phenomena.
In the second century it simplified its practice, educated many
intelligent practitioners, and began the work of organizing for
concerted action, and for medical teaching.




THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN MASSACHUSETTS.   301
In this, our own century, it has built hospitals, perfected and
multiplied its associations and educational institutions, enlarged
and created museums, and challenged a place in the world of
science by its literature.
In reviewing the whole course of its history we read a long list
of honored names, and a precious record written in private
memories, in public charities, in permanent contributions to
medical science, in generous sacrifices for the country. We can
point to our capital as the port of entry for the New World
of the great medical discoveries of two successive centuries, and
we can claim for it the triumph over the most dreaded foe that
assails the human body, - a triumph which the annals of the race
can hardly match in three thousand years of medical history.








EARLY RELATIONS WITH THE INDIANS.
BY SAMUEL ELIOT, LL.D.








EARLY RELATIONS WITH THE INDIANS.
LAST New Year's, a general of the United-States army sends
a despatch from the field to his commanding general, saying that the destruction of a Comanche village, on Christmas Day,
had given the final blow to the Indian rebellion; that the tribes
were in mourning for their losses, the people starving, their
dogs eaten, and no buffalo remaining. Such is the soldier's view
of the situation. The Indian's may be easily conceived. Could
he read Tacitus, he would perhaps repeat the complaint of the
British chieftain against the Romans: Ubi solitudinem faciunt,
pacem appellant.
If these are our relations with the Indians within our borders;
if a nation which has mastered a continent, absorbed emigrants
from every civilized race, and from some races not civilized,
which has driven slavery back into the past, and thrown open
the future to liberty, is still doomed to struggle with a handful
of savages, we shall not expect, in turning back the pages of
our history two centuries and more, to find the early relations
of our forefathers with their Indian neighbors all that they
or their descendants could desire. The Indians, now a remote
minority, were then a hard-pressing majority of the American
population; the country, now ours, was then theirs; all that long
settlement and immemorial possession can confer in the way of
security, then inured to their advantage, as it now inures to ours;
and he would have been a far-seeing prophet whose eye could
pierce beyond the clouds then lowering upon the English frontier, and predict with any degree of assurance that successive
suns would ever dispel them.
Of all the difficulties attending the colonization of these
20




306         EARLY RELATIONS WITH THE INDIANS.
shores, all the perplexities which the colonists brought with them,
all their uncertainties of purpose, all their conflicts of jurisdiction; or, again, of all the difficulties they found here, whether
arising from the loneliness and, in a human point of view, the
helplessness of their position, whether caused by the hardness of
the soil, the severity of the climate, or any other privation and
anxiety inseparable from their lot, - the difficulty of dealing wisely, religiously, and successfully with the red men was the greatest. Could they have solved it, they would have been more than
mortal. That they should even have attempted to solve it, and
that the attempt should have been to any extent successful, implies a spirit and a power on their part which we have every
reason to hold in reverent remembrance.
As seen from the mother country, the problem appeared comparatively simple. When King James issued the patent of
Virginia in 1606, he foresees, or pretends to foresee, that the
enterprise in which his subjects had engaged, might hereafter tend
to the glory of God in propagating the Christian religion to people as yet in darkness and ignorance. It was much easier for a
king like James to make a prediction than to contribute to its
fulfilment. Missionary work of any kind lay far beyond his
sphere of action; missionary work of such a kind as Virginia
required lay far beyond his sphere of thought. It is as hard to
conceive of him at the head of a mission to the Indians, as to
imagine Dominie Sampson leading the British charge at Waterloo.
His son, Charles I., was a monarch of a more missionary mould.
Whatever his faults, they did not consist in a want of sincere reverence toward God, or of an equally sincere regard for the spiritual
welfare of his fellow-beings. Could he have risen to the height of
the work which he might have furthered in behalf of the Indians
here, instead of plunging into the stormy contests of prerogative
and the fathomless agonies of civil war, his reign might have had
a different course, and his life a different end. But the conversion of the American Indian was an even more impracticable
undertaking for Charles than the subjection of the English freeman. He was content to leave it to the colonists themselves;
and we can find no deeper trace of his interest in the cause than
in the words of the Massachusetts charter, where it is asserted
that the conversion of the natives "in our Royal intention, and




EARLY RELATIONS WITH THE INDIANS.       807
the Adventurer's free profession is the principal end of this plantation."
Fifteen years later, when Charles must have long since forgotten his royal intentions, or, at any rate, despaired of carrying
them out, and at the height of the conflict between him and his
subjects in England, in the year 1644, Master William Castell,
parson of Courtenhall, in the County of Northampton, presents
a petition to the " High Court of Parliament for the Propagating
of the Gospel in America."  After stating the necessity of the
andertaking, he dwells upon the easiness of effecting it, and explains its long delay by showing how the English have placed
themselves too much in the skirts of the Continent, as in New
England; or how they have suffered from the want of " able and
conscionable ministers," as in Virginia, where they are " more
likely," as he thinks, " to turn heathen than to turn others to the
Christian faith." The petition, drawn up in his name, is signed
by Churchmen, Presbyterians, and Scotch Covenanters, for once
united in a religious purpose, and that in the full violence of
civil war. It was a beautiful omen; but no omens, however
beautiful, are enough to bring to a successful issue a labor
depending upon action long sustained, and sacrifice unmeasured
to the last. Nor would the conversion of the Indians have followed as a matter of course, could the hindrances to which
Master Castell alludes, have been removed, and the English settlers penetrating farther into the interior, or obtaining the assistance of better ministers, placed themselves in a situation where,
according to his opinion,' their success as missionaries would
have been easy. In truth, there was no such thing as easiness
in connection with the Indian missions, except as these were
seen from across the seas.
Their aspect on this side was very different. The first view
revealed the alarming fact, that the relations between the English and the Indians were not to originate in any course upon
which the former could determine. The case was, so to speak,
prejudged, at least to a considerable degree, by events which had
occurred before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth. As early as
the year 1614, the mister of a ship in Captain John Smith's expedition " stayed to fit for Spain with the dried Fish;" and, not
content with this cargo, he took on board another, consisting of




808         EARLY RELATIONS WITH THE INDIANS.
four-and-twenty " Poore Salvages," whom he carried to Malaga,
and there attempted to sell into slavery. The greater part were
rescued by some Spanish friars, who treated them as brethren,
and taught them their faith. Some time after, and not long
before the arrival of the " Mayflower," another English captain
enticed a band of Indians on board his vessel, and there opened
fire upon them, without any provocation, of which we can now
learn. It seemed strange to the Plymouth colonists that more
than three months should elapse after their arrival, before the
Indians appeared. As soon as any came, they told the story of
what had been done to their countrymen, and it was then clear
why they had been so long in coming. "By all which, it may
appear," says Governor Bradford, " how far these people were
from peace, and with what danger this plantation was begun."
Two years later, Massasoit, then on his sick-bed, revealed to
his visitors from Plymouth the existence of a conspiracy, by
which it was proposed to sweep away the whole line of English
settlements on the Massachusetts shore. This arose among the
Indians at Wessaguscus, now Weymouth, where a party of
adventurers had landed, a few months before, and presently sunk
so low as to deserve not only the hatred but the scorn of the
Indians near them. "So base were they," says Governor Bradford, as to become "servants to the Indians, and would cut
them wood and fetch them water for a cap full of corn," while
"others fell to plain stealing both night and day." Such was the
effect of this reckless degradation upon the savages, that they
resolved to destroy the settlement; and to take care that no
revenge should follow from the English at Plymouth, the Weymouth Indians urged Massasoit to join them, and to strike the
same blow against his neighbors that they were to strike against
theirs. In disclosing the danger, he advised his friends at Plymouth to lose no time in seizing some of the Weymouth chiefs,
whose capture would be followed by the submission of their tribe.
Miles Standish was thereupon despatched with a party of soldiers, and, in an encounter with the Indians, seven of their number were slain, and the remainder driven into the interior;
while the English there were assisted to embark and leave the
spot where they had been so near to death. It was concerning
the seven Indians who fell in this conflict, that John Robinson




EARLY RELATIONS WITH THE INDIANS.       309
wrote the often-quoted words: " Oh, how happy a thing had it
been, if you had converted some before you had killed any!" So
Cotton said, afterwards, to the colonists of Massachusetts Bay:
" Offend not the poor natives; but as you partake in their land,
so make them partakers of your precious faith; as you reap their
temporals, so feed them with your spirituals." But both Robinson and Cotton were where these things looked very differently
from what they did here.
To establish such relations with the Indians as they desired,
was not therefore in our fathers' power. The enemy was before
them, and after them, with his tares. It was no fault of theirs
that the natives had been carried into slavery, or put to death
by English sailors; no fault of theirs that English adventurers
should have stolen from the natives, or degraded themselves in
the natives' eyes; and yet they suffered as much from these sad
incidents as if they themselves had been the aggressors. The
dragon's teeth were sown for them, not by them, but the armed
men were just as sure to spring up. Oh that the pure principles
of Plymouth or of Massachusetts could have reached the Indians
without the intervention of alien crimes!
The circumstances upon which we have been dwelling are external; there are some internal to be remarked. From the moment that the Englishman landed upon our soil, the Indians were
objects of apprehension; he knew nothing of their numbers, nothing of their situation, except that they bordered close upon his
dwelling, and might at any time descend upon it with the warwhoop; he knew nothing of the country itself, of its extent, its
divisions, or its resources; and his ignorance, both with regard
to the inhabitants and their territory, must have made him feel
as if they were very strong and he very weak in any human contrast. One of the four-and-twenty slaves taken to Spain, found
his way back to his own land; and he was so forgiving as to help
the Plymouth settlers in setting their corn, taking their fish and
procuring other supplies.  The incident is very suggestive; for
it shows how much the English needed to make friends with the
Indian, how much, therefore, they would be moved by selfish as
well as unselfish considerations to live on friendly terms with
him. A race of untold capacity for good or for evil could not
but excite the anxiety of the New-England pioneers.




310         EARLY RELATIONS WITH THE INDIANS.
As time passed, and the Indians were found less formidable
than they had at first appeared, the feeling of apprehension was
displaced by another feeling, yet more threatening to the establishment of serviceable relations between the two races. The
white man began to despise the red man: he found him treacherous, irresolute, incapable of industry, unequal to the shock of
arms, a creature of inferior energies as well as of inferior aspirations to his own. He used harsh language in speaking of him;
he put on a scornful manner in dealing with him; he thought
him unworthy of the consideration which he gave to any other
human being, and sometimes even unworthy of that which he
gave to the brute. Daniel Gookin, for many years superintendent of the converted Indians in Massachusetts, speaks of them
as " not many degrees above beasts."  John Eliot, whose selfdenying labors are familiar as household words, -whose life of
sacrificeand endurance, in behalf of the truth, is like a pillar of
fire by night amid many a dark passage of our early annals, whose
heart knew no distinction between the Indian and the Englishman
as followers of the Saviour, - can speak of the people for whom
he labored unto death, " as the dregs of mankind." If men like
Gookin and Eliot described the red men in such terms as these,
what must the rude colonists, the men of war or of intrigue,
have said to express the scorn with which they regarded their
enemies or their victims among the Indians?
Thus while distance lent enchantment to the view of the
American tribes, roaming in a sort of heroic simplicity through
their native forests, and only waiting for a missionary to speak
the word that should give them the Christian faith, nearness
excited very different emotions; and the colonists passed from
apprehension to contempt, and perhaps back again, in states of
mind which boded any thing but good to the Indians. The
hills we see in the distance, soft with haze and responsive to
every passing shadow, are not more unlike the hills we climb
with panting breast and weary foot, than were the natives
of this soil, as seen from across the ocean, objects of tender sympathy and promise; but as seen on the soil itself,
objects of terror and abhorrence.  It is not strange that a
Martha's Vineyard sagamore should have told the Missionary
Mayhew, in the year 1646, " He wondered the English should




EARLY RELATIONS WITH THE INDIANS.        311
be almost thirty years in the country, and the Indians fools
still."
To make them wise, the first requisite was a willingness to
teach them; and this, as we have seen, could not come without
an effort. To convert the Indians, the English needed to convert themselves. But to turn one's own heart, is a far harder
thing than to turn, or try to turn, another's; and so many of the
colonists found it, in endeavoring to form any satisfactory relations between themselves and the Indians. "Those that labor
in this harvest," says Daniel Gookin, " are first to endeavor to
learn perfectly that first lesson in Christ's school,- I mean selfdenial.'
The teacher being ready, the next requisite was a proper
mode of teaching. This, too, was no light thing to hit upon.
For such instruction as the American savage required, the Englishman had never received a training, nor did he now see
plainly where to seek it. Even the Bible, on which he leaned
for support in all other emergencies, seemed to fail him in this,
particularly if he turned to the Old Testament, as was the
Puritan's wont, for any historical precedent.
"Like some watcher of the skies,
When a new planet swims into his ken,"
the colonist found himself in presence of a race whose peculiarities demanded peculiar,,and in many respects original, treatment.
The earliest experiment was made, in a treaty between the
Plymouth colony and Massasoit, in March, 1621. It was so far
successful as to last for upwards of half a century; a long
duration for treaties of that period, even between European
States. But the experiment was not at all comprehensive. It
aimed at benefiting the English rather than the Indians, for
whose conversion or civilization it contained no provision.
From the treaty of 1621, we follow a gradual advance in the
methods of dealing with the Indians, till we reach the legislation
of Massachusetts, in 1646. On the 4th of November, in that
year, a series, it might almost be called a code, of laws in relation to the natives, was adopted by the General Court. Among
its provisions, is one assigning " parcels of lands," in order to




312          EARLY RELATIONS WITH THE INDIANS.
encourage the natives "to live in an orderly way."  Another
enjoins that " those necessary and wholesome laws, which may
be made to reduce them to civility of life, shall be once in the
year (if times be safe) made known to them." After these
enactments looking to their civilization, another follows, ordering
that two ministers should be sent " to make known the Heavenly
council of God among the Indians."
W7e have here a plan both large and wise. It shows more
than legislative wisdom in the twofold purpose which it embraces. The social element had the first place, as was fit. In
all ages of Christianity, its missionaries have felt the necessity of
changing the outward, as well as the inward, life of their converts. For this the mediaeval monks made their monasteries the
schools of industry, as well as faith; for this the modern explorers, like Livingstone in Africa, insist that new occupations,
as well as new doctrines, are essential to reclaim the heathen.
"I T confess," said John Eliot of his Indians, "I think no great
good will be done till they be more civilized." Grave obstacles,
too grave to be surmounted wholly, presented themselves at
every turn. What the Englishman most liked, -his house, his
farm, his trade, his studies, - the Indian seemed most to dislike.
Governor Winthrop tells us, in his journal, of a question put by
an Indian to "an honest, plain Englishman," concerning the
first beginnings, or principles, of a commonwealth. The answer
came after some thought, that the first principle was salt to preserve flesh or fish for use in time of need; the second, iron to cut
down trees, build houses, and till the land; the third, ships to
carry away what can be spared, and bring back what is needed.
" Alas! " said the Indian, " then I fear we shall never be a commonwealth, for we can neither make salt, iron, or ships." Chief
obstacle of all was the tribal organization: to do away with it,
supposing that possible, was to rouse hostility; to leave it untouched, was to insure the continuance of barbarism. Eliot
describes a collision between himself and the Sachem Cutshamoquin, of Dorchester, who remonstrated against the apostle's
course, which, he said, all the sachems were determined to resist.
" It pleased God," says Eliot, "to raise up my spirit, not to
passion but to a bold resolution, telling him it was God's work
I was about, and He was with me, and I feared not him nor all




EARLY RELATIONS WITH THE INDIANS.      313
the sachems in the country."  Notwithstanding all these difficulties, the working plan was seen to be right. The effort to
civilize the Indian was not relaxed; the hope of converting him
was not shaken.
Indeed, there was great encouragement at the outset. The
volume of tracts relating to the Indian missions, reprinted by the
Historical Society, thirty odd years ago, recalls the fond hopes
with which this work of our fathers began.  The titles run, -
" The Day-Breaking, if not the Sun-Rising, of the Gospel," " The
Clear Sun-Shine of the Gospel," " The Glorious Progress of the
Gospel," " The Light appearing more and more towards the Perfect Day." These are but words, and yet they stand for deeds
which move one's heart to a deep sympathy as he recalls the
time when it was hoped that they would open the way to successful issues. For, as we now know too well, the sunshine was
made only in some shady places, and the general darkness remained unbroken.
One of the earliest converts was Hiacoomes, "a man of a
sad and sober spirit," says his teacher, Thomas Mayhew. He
was born about 1620, and his conversion took place in 1643;
when, as Mayhew writes, "this work had its first rise and
beginning."  A neighboring sagamore, railing at the convert
for his submission to the English, struck him in the face; and
when Hiacoomes told the story, he said: " I had one hand for
injuries, and the other for God; while I did receive wrong with
the one, the other laid the greater hold on God." A few years
afterwards, Hiacoomes lost an infant child, at whose simple
funeral there were no "black faces," no food or ornaments
buried in the grave, no savage outcries, " but a patient resigning of it," says Mayhew, "to Him that gave it." Here evidently was a convert whose sincerity could not be questioned, nor
could any one be more fitly employed in bringing his countrymen to the truth. His example must have been all-availing;
and the patient labors in which he engaged as a teacher, are
described as having been much assisted " for his own and their
spiritual good and advantage."  This early employment of a
native missionary is another proof of the judicious system upon
which the work for the Indians was carried forward. He could
reach many an ear closed to the English preacher; he could




314         EARLY RELATIONS WITH THE INDIANS.
overcome many a prejudice against which the white men, however earnest, were powerless.
Among the most touching narratives from these times is that
which Eliot gives concerning the death-bed of Wamporas, " one
of our first and principal men." He said, that God gives us
three mercies in this world: the first, health and strength; the
second, food and clothes; the third, sickness and death. And
when, he added, "we have had our share in the two first, why
should we not be willing to take our part in the third?"  His
last request to Eliot was, that the Englishmen with whom some
of the Indian children had been placed should be strongly
entreated to teach them  "to know  God."  His last words
were, " Lord, give me Jesus Christ." Instead of fleeing from
him, as his countrymen were wont to flee from the dying, they
flocked around him, eager to hear his counsels, and to witness
the peace in which he died. " I think," says Eliot, "he did more
good by his death than he could have done by his life."
Waaubon, in whose wigwam the apostle Eliot first preached
to the Indians, offered his eldest son to be educated by the
English, in the hope "that he might come to know God,
although he despaired much concerning himself." It was a part
of the missionary scheme, from the very beginning, that the
sons and daughters of the Indians should receive special care.
Like the children of every class to be reclaimed at any time,
these excited greater hopes and encouraged greater exertions
than their fathers did. Not many years after Eliot's apostleship began, an Indian college was founded at Cambridge, as a
department of the still infant institution there. The building, large enough to hold twenty students, cost between three
and four hundred pounds. One of its inmates was Joel, a son
of Hiacoomes, who had nearly completed his academic course,
when, returning from his home in Martha's Vineyard, he was
wrecked on Nantucket, and murdered by the natives of that
island. " Thus perished our young prophet Joel," says Gookin:
" he was a good scholar and a pious man." The solitary Indian
graduate of Harvard, Caleb Cheeshahteaumuck, died the year
after he took his degree. Did the aboriginal Freshman suffer at
the hands of the Puritan Sophomore?  Was there any emphasis in the class-room on Barbarus has segetes? Alma Mater,




EARLY RELATIONS WITH THE INDIANS.       315
at all events, was never more gracious or more maternal than
in the nurture she gave to her Indian sons. If the lessons she
taught them were of brief avail in life, they must have been a
comfort in death.
"The air is full of farewells to the dying,
And mournings for the dead."
It seems as if learning could not touch the Indian without
inflicting a mortal wound; as if his civilization were his extinction, and conversion a speedy release from a world of tribuiation.
The Indian college was built by the Society for Propagating
the Gospel in New England, established by the Long Parliament, in 1649, at the instance chiefly of New Englanders. As
Gookin wrote afterwards, "There is always more occasion
to disburse than there is money to be disbursed," - a remark not
yet without force. The English Society proved of great service;
its contributions came not only from the churches and the universities, but from the army of England, and it was unwearied for
many years in aiding both the missionaries and their converts in
New England.   The Indian college, though soon bereft of the
students for whom it was designed, continued to serve the natives,
as the printing-house from which text-books and versions of the
Scriptures, in their own tongue, were issued. As early as 1649,
Eliot wrote of his desire to translate some parts of the Bible, for
the use of his converts, which, he says, " I look at as a sacred
and holy work." In 1651, he writes, " I have no hope to see
the Bible translated, much less printed, in my days." But, with
the help of the Society for Propagating the Gospel, and in the
college which they reared, the work went on beyond his hopes,
and was at length completed. It was the crowning labor, not
only of his life, but of the lives of all who labored in the same
cause; and the Indian Version on which their minds were employed, and in which their hearts were interested, served as the
messenger of peace and good-will amid all the storms of passion
by which the country and its races were distracted.
Such, so far as they can be described within these limits, were
the early relations with the Indians. The results were never so
considerable as had been anticipated, on either side of the ocean.
About thirty years after Mayhew began his labors in Martha's




316         EARLY RELATIONS WITH THE INDIANS.
Vineyard, and Eliot preached his first sermon in the neighborhood of Boston, there were perhaps four thousand Praying
Indians, so called, in Massachusetts; nearly one-half of whom
belonged to the Vineyard and adjacent islands, rather more than
one quarter to Eliot's churches, and the remaining quarter to
Plymouth and other places. Mayhew writes to Gookin, in 1674,
" The whole holds forth the face of Christianity: how sincere, I
know not." The numbers just given show that the work had
not been a colonial one, or it would have attained to much
greater proportions. It was the individual rather than the community who took an interest in the Indians; it was only a man
like Mayhew or Eliot who," With filial confidence inspired,
Could lift to Heaven an unpresumptuous eye,
And smiling say,'My Father made them all."'
Nor, on the other hand, was the work an Indian one collectively.  Men like Hiacoomes and Wamporas entered into it
with all their souls; but the great majority of their countrymen
regarded it with indifference, if not positive aversion.  The
sketches of Christianity, as it extends among them, are all individual, like that of Mayhew's convert who told him," When I walk
in the woods alone, I have much talk with God, and great
repentance for my sins, and now I throw behind me all my
strange gods, and my heart goes right to God in prayer." This
was the trail of one, not all, not even many.
The hindrances to general relations with the Indians have been
touched upon: it remains only to account for the drawbacks to
their conversion. We need not dwell on their accountability
alone: they were unfit, both as savages and as heathens, to become facile or thorough converts; but were not their teachers
unfit, in some respects, to convert them? The Englishman was
too much preoccupied as a settler, to be an ideal missionary: he
was laden with cares of his own, or of the colony; and the burden of another race was more than he could bear with ease or
with efficiency.  Nor were his missionary methods such as
smoothed his way to the Indian. Eliot's first service, in Waaubon's wigwam, crowded with men, women, and children, consisted of a prayer in English, a sermon of one hour and a quarter,
and " certain questions to see what they would say to them, that




EARLY RELATIONS WITH THE INDIANS.        317
so we might screw, by variety of means, something or other of
God into them." " After three hours' time thus spent with them,"
says the missionary, "we asked them if they were not weary,
and they answered,' No."' Yet the not inappropriate name then
given to these exercises, was "heartbreakings."  The religious
divisions of the teachers were another stumbling-block to their
disciples. Mayhew's people were told, by some Quakers, that
he was a priest of Baal. Two of Eliot's converts were taken to
task, for his errors and theirs, by the Gorton sectaries at Warwick. It was difficult for the Indians to know which doctrine to
believe, - indeed to feel that any doctrines, in such dispute, were
worth believing at all.
But the one great hindrance to the conversion of the red men
was the repeated outbreak of war, drowning the Christian's voice
in the clash of arms. That meeting-house, which the Plymouth
people built on Burial Hill, a casemate to their fort, with the
sign not of the cross but of the cannon, is symbolic of all the
Indian missions. The English came hither, as Bolingbroke to
England, -
"To ope
The purple testament of bleeding war;"
and the drops from its pages blotted out the Scriptures of Peace.
King Philip's war, in 1675, scattered the Christian Indians as
sheep before a pack of wolves.
And yet the work, though broken up beyond the possibility of
restoration, is not to be pronounced a failure. Had it saved but
one soul; had Hiacoomes or Joel, or others of a higher rank in
Indian eyes, like Wamporas or Waaubon, been the only gleanings, - the harvest would not have been vain. Even if it seems a
failure, compared with the promises of the seed-time, it deserves
to be classed with other failures, nobler than many a success;
nobler, because their lines of light are broader; nobler, because
their ideals are loftier: so that even a partial attainment of them
is better than the perfect triumph of an inferior cause.








THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN
NEW   ENGLAND.
BY REV. CHANDLER ROBBINS, D.D.








THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN
NEW ENGLAND.
TF it were merely that a romantic interest attaches to the story
of the Regicides sheltered in New England- however inviting
on that account the theme might be —it would not have been
selected as the subject of a lecture in the course now in progress.
Its claim to this distinction rests rather upon the fact that it
touches at various points the policy and the characters, the public
and private life, of the Founders of Massachusetts. We cannot
retouch the fading portraits of those stern puritan soldiers; we
cannot review the stirring scenes in which they performed a prominent part; we cannot pass judgment upon their characters in
connection with those transactions to which they owe both their
celebrity and their sufferings; nor can we trace them in their
long and dreary exile, -so far as it is possible to penetrate the
mystery in which they were enveloped,- without throwing some
light upon the pages of our early history, - upon persons, opinions, and movements, of greater importance than that which
attaches to those ill-starred individuals.
And yet another reason influenced the friend to whom we are
indebted for the arrangement of these lectures, in the selection
and assignment of this topic. In preparing for publication in the
Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society a mass of
manuscripts, originally belonging to the Mather family, and which
afterwards formed a part of the Library of Rev. Thomas Prince,
the Annalist of New England, I discovered that a large number
related to the Regicides. Many of these proved to be in the handwriting of William Goffe himself; consisting of letters which he
had written and received while in seclusion. He had employed
secret characters to conceal the names of individuals and certain
21




322      THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.
other particulars, in case the correspondence should be intercepted:
but these were easily deciphered. The printing of these letters,
which occupy nearly a hundred pages, has revived the interest
which has always been felt in these refugees, and added a few
particulars to the scanty information which history and tradition
have heretofore supplied.
Our subject requires a preliminary glance at one of the most
interesting and eventful periods in the history of England - I
might say in the history of Liberty - that of the revolution which
led to the overthrow of the British Monarchy and the establishment of a Commonwealth, in 1649.
Although the conflict between Charles I. and the Commons was provoked by circumstances peculiar to the period
itself, and aggravated by the stubborn temper of the parties
engaged in it, its real origin is to be traced back to principles
which had been at work in the bosom of English society centuries
before the accession of that misguided monarch to the throne.
Whatever variety of motives and interests may have been accessory to the strife, and whatever prejudices and passions may have
embittered it, it was, in the main, the renewal, only with unusual
intensity, of the old struggle between despotism and liberty.
Whether we regard it in its political or its religious aspects,for both political and religious animosities were blended in it, in
nearly equal proportions,- the ruling principle was the same.
The King and his party were contending for absolute power
both in the State and in the Church; the majority of the Parliament and its supporters in the army and in the nation for
popular rights.
No iust judgment can be formed of the character of this
conflict without carefully distinguishing the prime cause from
the collateral objects which became entangled with it,-the
principles in controversy between the two great parties from the
personal motives, exceptional designs, and incidental acts of
the individuals and factions included in their ranks.
In respect to the cause itself, no loyal descendant of the Pilgrims can hesitate to give his sympathy to the side of the Commons. The tyranny against which they were struggling was the
scourge which had driven our Forefathers from their pleasant
land. The political and religious reform for which the best




THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.         323
spirits among them were striving was the very same in which the
members of the Massachusetts Company were engaged. The
liberal movement which was going on with such fierce throes in
the very heart of Old England, was simultaneously at work, with
more quiet earnestness, because less actively resisted, in these
distant Colonies. The men who were undertaking to build up
a Christian Commonwealth on this side of the ocean were of one
brotherhood with those who were engaged in demolishing the
fabric of despotism on the other.  Not only were they allied by
the closest ties of personal friendship and political and religious
sympathy, but in many instances by actual association in the enterprise that founded Massachusetts. Ten or twelve of the Massachusetts Company, including Cradock the Governor, and Vane a
former Governor, were members of the Long Parliament. Hampden, Pym, and Fiennes, Patentees of Connecticut, were among
its most influential Commoners.   Six or seven sat in judgment
on the King; and a long list might be added of others connected
with the civil war -some of them representing the best blood in
England -who were more or less directly concerned with Winthrop and his Colleagues. Nothing but a prohibitory order from
the King's Council had prevented Cromwell himself, with Hampden and Pym, who had actually embarked for the purpose, from
transferring their persons and estates to America.2 Who can
tell what a different fate might have befallen Charles and England, had not tyranny, in gratifying its present malice, sharpened
and laid up in store the weapons of its future destruction?
The Commons were mainly in the right.    Their cause was the
cause of liberty and justice. Many of the greatest and best
men of the period, at home and in the Colonies, were on their
side. The common heart of England was beating in unison with
their purpose, so long and so far as they adhered to it with pure
1 Archseologia Amer., vol. iii.; Dr. Palfrey's History of N. E.
2 This fact has been questioned; but it appears to me that it is supported by sufficient authority. It is stated by Hume and several other historians. In " Cromwelliana," London, 1810, fol. p. 1, there is the following statement, -" In 1637, he,"
Cromwell, " had a design to remove to New England. Sir Matthew Boynton, Sir
William Constable, Sir Arthur Haslerigg, Mr. John Hampden, and several other
gentlemen were preparing to remove themselves with him, and were actually
embarked for that purpose; but were prevented by a proclamation and order of
Council."




324        THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.
patriotism, loyalty to justice, and unmixed devotion. And this
they did- with due allowance for human imperfection -at
least up to the moment when the sword was actually drawn.
Nor does the responsibility for its unsheathing rest with them.
The fatal challenge was given when the King with his armed
retinue made his way to the Speaker's desk to enforce his demand that the five obnoxious members, with Hampden at their
head, should be delivered up to his power. That infatuated
act was virtually a declaration of war.1 From that hour the
grand struggle for liberty, which had hitherto been guided by
Wise and thoughtful statesmen, and pure and ardent patriots,
began to pass over to the army, and while acquiring new force
became subjected to new perils.
The elements of which that army was composed, while rendering it irresistible in the field, made it all the more dangerous in
the State. It was made up not of ordinary soldiers who take
up arms under the pressure of poverty, or from the love of fierce
excitement and reckless adventure; but principally of respectable citizens, farmers, tradesmen, and rural gentlemen, of good
estate and good education: not of mere human machines
moving blindly at the beck of their commanders; but each one a;hinking and reflecting individual, conscious of his power, and
jealous of his independence; who regarded himself as a " chosen
vessel in the hands of the Lord," specially ordained to fight his
battles: many of them political zealots and religious enthusiasts,
and not a few agitators, demagogues, levellers, and wild fanatics,
breathing the ferocious spirit, and borrowing the vindictive
language of the prophets and warriors of the Old Dispensation;
men of austere morals, of iron will, of fiery temper, and desperate courage; a host of Titans, whom no difficulties discouraged, and no odds dismayed; who marched into battle with
1 The question has been often debated whether the King or the Parliament began
the civil war. There may be room for difference of opinion, as to which of the
parties actually commenced the final struggle of arms; but there can be no dispute
as to the fact that the " deplorable excesses by which it was so fatally provoked and
embittered," mainly originated with the party of prerogative. The cruel persecutions, "imprisonments, fines, pilloryings, brandings, cutting off of ears," and
other sanguinary punishments for opinion's sake, began with them. If it could be
shown that the party of the Parliament first resorted to arms, it is clear that they
were goaded to it beyond endurance.




TEE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.    325
exultation, determined to conquer and confident of victory, and
never failed to crush and scatter the strongest force opposed to
them.
Invariable success confirmed their conceit that they were the
special favorites of Heaven. As hostile to the party of the
Presbyterians as to that of the King, they sifted them more and
more from their ranks as the war went on. That party, however,
constituted the majority of the Parliament, and therefore, no
sooner had the army broken the forces of the King than it
directed its power against the Parliament itself. Thus, the war
which had begun as a contest between royal usurpation and
popular rights, ended in a struggle between Independency and
Presbyterianism.  The high and patriotic purpose for which
HIampden and other kindred spirits had reluctantly unsheathed
the sword was comparatively lost sight of; and the great
national party, which had been united under their leadership
by a common zeal for liberty and right, separated into two rival
religious factions, contending with each other for supremacy
with hardly less acrimony than they had together fought against
the King. To secure his person and influence was an object
of the first importance to both, and each resorted to intrigue to
gain him over to their side. The Presbyterians desired a limited
monarchy with their own particular system of church government; and offered to reinstate the King, if he would consent to
its establishment as the religion of the State. The Independents
preferred a Republic; but knew that if the King gave up
Episcopacy, and combined with the Presbyterians, they should
be defeated; and for this reason the leaders of the army offered
to replace him upon the throne, on the single condition of liberty
of conscience, and the security of the military power in their
hands. The Parliament attempted to destroy the influence of
the Independents and of Cromwell, their ruling spirit, by diminishing the army and forcing its officers to conform to the system
of church government which they had established by an ordinance. The latter seeing that there was not a moment to be
lost, if they would maintain their power, resolved, at a meeting
in Cromwell's house, to seize the person of the King, and prepare to defend themselves against the votes of Parliament by
force. The order was instantly executed; and the army, sum



326      THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.
moned to a general rendezvous, not only entered into a solemn
engagement that they "would not disband nor divide, nor suffer
themselves to be disbanded or divided," but passed a declaratory
resolution that " the public welfare demanded the removal from
credit and office of the men by whose counsels the army had
been calumniated and oppressed."
The Parliament in alarm passed votes to pacify the army,
which were read at the head of each regiment. The officers
returned an evasive reply, and moved their headquarters nearer
to the metropolis. Again Cromwell tried by every device to
induce the King to throw himself upon the generosity of the
army.  He protested that "nothing was nearer to his heart
than the restoration of Charles to his authority upon moderate
and equal terms -that if he would co-operate with the Council
of War, they would repay the obligation with interest."
Finding that the King was unyielding,- for he was as distrustful of their sincerity, as they were sure of his duplicity, -
Cromwell and his associates plainly saw that nothing was left to
them but either to relinquish their power, surrender the claims
of the soldiers, give up all for which they had been fighting,
and subject themselves to the penalties which surely awaited
them, into the hands of whichsoever of the hostile parties the
government should fall; or to resort to such desperate measures
as would involve King, Parliament, and the Constitution itself,
in common ruin.
Such a conclusion certainly did not enter into their original
plan, although there may have been some zealots who looked
forward to it in their wild dreams, or even suggested it in their
ravings, but was a hasty result to which they were driven by a
series of disappointments on their own part, and a train of
mistakes on the part of the Prelatists and Presbyterians, together
with the intense religious and political excitement to which the
soldiers had wrought themselves up. They were not men who
would hesitate long in such an extremity, or shrink from the path
which necessity and Providence, as they believed, had marked
out for them, however disastrous the consequences to which it
might lead.
Their course was instantly decided upon. They seized the
person of the King, and marched the army to London. " Now




THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.   327
that I have the King in my hand," said Cromwell, "I have the
Parliament in my pocket." A strong guard was placed over
the two Houses. A demand was made that all the leading
Presbyterians, and all who had adhered to them, and all the
members who had recently voted in favor of pacification with
the King, should be expelled from their seats. The demand was
enforced by violence. The purged House became the tool of
the army, which had now  usurped the civil as well as the
military power of the nation. At the beck of these grim soldiers, a small minority were compelled to resolve upon the impeachment of the King, and to pass an ordinance for his trial,
by a special tribunal, which they called a High Court of Judicature. The Lords immediately rejected the measure, with a
declaration that no resolution of the Lower House was valid
without their concurrence. The indignant Commoners at first
thought of accusing all the Peers of high treason; but instead
of taking a step so absurd and reckless, concluded to cover their
revolutionary design with a thin semblance of loyalty, by passing a resolution that, " as the people were, under God, the original
of all just power, and the Commons were their representative,
all the enactments of the latter had the force of law without the
concurrence of King and Peers." Having now at one blow
virtually overturned the Constitution and seized the supreme
power, the way was cleared of every obstacle to the execution of
their purpose.
The body of the people who were opposed to the tyranny of
the army, and at heart attached to the Constitution, were the
only quarter from which effective resistance could be apprehended. But the strong arm of the military could keep them
down, at least for a time; and the stunning suddenness of the
meditated blow would allow them no opportunity to rally.
Meanwhile, the prime movers availed themselves of strange instruments to confirm their own zeal and warp the minds of the
populace to their purpose. The revelations of visionary prophets, male and female, giving assurance of the sanction of
Heaven upon their measures, were accepted with avidity and
diligently reported. Cromwell himself declared that when he
was lately praying for the restoration of the King, he had been
favored with a preternatural sign that God had rejected him.




828       THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.
And, as "a fit prelude to the tragedy" about to be enacted,
Hugh Peters, that wild enthusiast and crafty incendiary, was
employed to preach to an audience of soldiers and citizens, with
the fanatical eloquence of which he was a master. He took
his text from the 149th Psalm, perverting the true application by
a cunning change of the pronouns: "Bind your kings with
chains and your nobles with fetters of iron." He compared the
King to Barabbas, called the army the saviours of the people,
and affirmed that there were in its ranks " five thousand saints
not inferior to those who surround the throne of God." Then
suddenly pausing, he closed his eyes, laid his head upon the
cushion, and exclaimed, "I have had a revelation. The Slavery
of the children of Israel and of the elect shall have an end by
the extirpation of royalty in England, and in all other Kingdoms."
On the eighth day of January, 1649, only fifty-three out of the
one hundred and thirty-three Commissioners sat for the first
time in the Painted Chamber in Westminster Hall, - and sixtyseven was the largest number present on any subsequent day.
The twelve Judges of the realm, who were at first appointed
members of the Commission, having given their opinion that
trial was illegal, were afterwards set aside, together with several
of the Peers.  Many others refused to take a part. Fairfax,
the Commander-in-Chief of the Army, never appeared. Vane
and St. John held themselves aloof. Algernon Sidney says, —
" I was at Penthurst when the act for the King's trial was passed, and
coming up to town, I heard that my name was put in it. I presently
went to the Painted Chamber where the Judges were assembled. A
debate was raised, and I positively opposed the proceeding. Cromwell
using these formal words,'I tell you we will cut off his head with the
Crown on it,' I replied,'You may take your own course, I cannot stop
you; but I will keep myself clear from having any hand in this business.
Saying this, I immediately left them, and never returned."
One or two others who had the courage to attempt to stay
the proceedings were summarily put down.    A few of the
weaker minded, who had no heart for the business, were intimidated into compliance. The remainder engaged in the work
with a will:- Cromwell, who professedly, perhaps really, had
entered upon it only after many struggles, and prayers specially




THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.    329
answered, throwing himself into it with all his relentless resolution and indomitable energy, and at once assuming that lead,
which in every enterprise his ambition prompted him to take,
and his masterly powers fitted him to maintain:- others from
a frenzied desire for a revolution which should level all prerogative, and all barriers to universal freedom:-and still others
from a sincere and fervid conviction that they were serving
God and their country in a holy and glorious cause.
Before this strange and terrible tribunal - not of Judges, not
even of members of Parliament alone, but of grim soldiers also,
and fierce partisans selected from among the people - constituted
not for judgment, but for condemnation -implacable hostility
stamped upon every face - Charles I. was arraigned.
The circumstances attending the trial are familiar to every
reader of English history:-the charges brought against the
King, of treason against the State, and of having been the cause
of all the blood which had been shed, and of all the calamities
which had afflicted the Kingdom since the commencement of
the war,-the stern and rude manner of his treatment by
Bradshaw, the President of the Court, - his persistent refusal, on
three several occasions, to acknowledge the jurisdiction of the
Court, -the insults of the mob and the clamorous demand of
the soldiers for his execution,-the self-possession and dignity
of his deportment, - and the final procedure of the Court, after
an ex parte examination of a few witnesses, to pass the fatal
sentence. 
There are, however, a few incidents of the trial, related by one
of the Judges, which appear to have escaped the notice of historians.  They are interesting, not only as showing to what
extent the Court was under the domineering influence of Cromwell, but from their incidental reference to one of the three individuals whom we shall have occasion, by and by, particularly to
notice. They are copied here in a condensed form from a contemporary "broad-side" in the archives of the Massachusetts
Historical Society.
When the President - after having refused to take any notice
of the King's reiterated objection to the authority of the Court,
and his earnest appeal to be allowed to speak to his Parliament,
as he had "something to offer for the settlement of the nation




330        THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.
that might be satisfactory to all" - had ordered the Clerk to read
the sentence, John Downes, Esq.-who had been an adventurer
to Virginia in 1620- became so agitated, as he says, as to attract
the notice of Cromwell, who occupied a contiguous seat, and
who seeing him about to rise turned to him and said, " What
ails thee, art thou mad, canst thou not sit still and be quiet?"
The reply was, " No, Sir, I cannot be quiet."  He then stood up
and objected to the sentence, declaring that he had reasons to
offer against it, and desired the Court to adjourn to hear them.
The President decided that if any judge was dissatisfied the
Court must adjourn, and ordered an adjournment to the inner
Court of Wards. As soon as they had assembled in secret session, Cromwell called upon Downes to give an account why he
had brought this trouble and disturbance upon the Court.  When
he had stated his objections, Cromwell in scornful wrath charged
him with only pretending dissatisfaction out of servility to his old
master.
" Surely," said he," the gentleman doth not know that he has to deal with
the hardest hearted man on earth. But, Sir, it is not the opinion of one
peevish, tenacious man that must sway the Court, or deter them from their
duty in so great a business; therefore, Sir, I pray you lose no more time,
but return to the Court and do your duty."
Cromwell further whispered in his ear that he was convinced
he " aimed at nothing but making a mutiny in the army and the
cutting of throats."  Another told him it was as much as his
life was worth to make any disturbance; that it was not in the
power of man, nor of this Parliament, to save the King's life;
for "the whole army are resolved that if there be but any check
or demur in giving judgment, they will immediately fall upon
him and hew him to pieces, and the House itself will not be out
of danger."  The relater further says that he knew   that " Mr.
Dixwell amongst some others were dissatisfied." 1  Without fur1 An authentication of this statement may be found in " A trLe Copy of the Journal of the High Court of Justice for the Tryal of King Charles I., as it was read
in the House of Commons and attested under the hand of Phelps, Clerk to that
infamous Court. Taken by J. Nalson, LL.D., Jan. 4th, 1683, London, 1684;" in
Fellowes's Sketches:" 27th Jan. 1648. The President ordered the Court to withdraw for a time. This
he did to prevent the disturbance of their scene, by one of their own members,
Colonel John Downes, who could not stifle the reluctance of his conscience when he




THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW       ENGLAND.          331
ther debate the Court resumed its session and proceeded to pass
the sentence of death by beheading.       This was on the 27th of
January, 1649. On the 29th it was determined that the open
street in front of the royal palace of Whitehall was a fit place for
the execution, which was assigned for the following day. The
warrant was immediately given.
But the last and most trying duty, that of affixing their individual signatures to the fatal order, still remained. It is no
wonder that some of them should have shrunk from its performance. it was with difficulty the Commissioners could be got
together for the purpose.    Two or three of the most resolute took
their station outside of the door to stop such of their colleagues
as were passing towards the House of Commons. Cromwell
sat within, boisterous, overbearing, and in high spirits, stimulating and even forcing the timid and reluctant. Some who had
agreed to the sentence kept out of the way or utterly refused to
sign.' At last fifty-nine signatures were obtained, and the deathwarrant was complete.
Among the names affixed to this memorable instrument were
those of the three individuals to a brief sketch of whose personal
history it is high time to turn our attention.
EDWARD WHALLEY was descended from an ancient and highly
respectable family. His father Richard, a member of Parliament,
Sheriff of the County of Nottingham and the proprietor of large
estates, had married a daughter of Sir Henry Cromwell, uncle
saw his Majesty press so earnestly for a short hearing; but declaring himself unsatisfied, forced them to yield to the King's request. The Court withdraws for half an
hour into the Court of Wards. Their business was not to consider his Majesty's
desire, but to chide Downes, and with reproaches and threats to harden him to go
through the remainder of their villany with them. Which done they return."
1 It is difficult to distinguish between what is true and what is false in the accounts
which have been given by different narrators of Cromwell's behavior, - colored as
they all appear to be, more or less, in accordance with the prejudices of the writers.
There must, however, have been some foundation in his actual conduct for such
stories as several highly respectable historians have credited and recorded as facts:
for example, that after having signed himself, he smeared the face of the reckless wag
Henry Martin with ink,- who immediately did the same to him; and that when his
cousin, Colonel Ingoldsby, who had been appointed one of the Court, but never took
his seat, came into the hall, he cried out, " This time he shall not escape," and laughing, seized hold of him, put the pen into his hand, and with the aid of one or two
others forced him to sign.




332      THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.
to Oliver. The son was bred a merchant, but at the breaking out
of the civil war, under the influence of his religious convictions,
more than for any other reason, took up arms on the side of the
Parliament, in opposition to the sentiments of his nearest relations.
He distinguished himself as a soldier in many sieges and battles.
At the battle of Naseby, in 1645, he charged and defeated two
divisions of Horse, though supported by Prince Rupert who commanded the reserve: for which brilliant action the Parliament
voted him a commission as Colonel of Horse. On the 9th of
May of the following year, he received for his valiant service in
taking Banbury by storm one hundred pounds to purchase two
horses. He behaved soon after with great gallantry in the attack
on the city of Worcester, which surrendered to him on the 23d
of July. In 1647 the Commons granted him one of the manors
of the Marquis, afterwards Duke, of Newcastle.
He enjoyed the full confidence of his cousin Cromwell, who
appears to have had great influence over him, and while committing to him important trusts and conferring upon him high
offices, to have sometimes used him, perhaps more than Whalley
himself was aware, as a tool of his crafty policy.
He committed to his custody the person of the King during
his confinement at Hampton Court. Of the manner in which
he discharged the duties of this office, conflicting accounts are
given, according as the prejudices of the writers who have referred to it lean to the side of the royalists or the army. The
former charge him with coarseness and undue severity. But a
letter subsequently addressed to him by the King is his sufficient
exculpation. And yet he did not always avoid giving offence
under circumstances so conducive to irritation. Clarendon tells
us that, on one occasion, when Captain Sayers waited upon his
Majesty to give back to him the ensigns of the Order of the
Garter, which had belonged to the late Prince of Orange, and
the two were walling forward and backward together, the suspicions of Whalley were aroused to such a degree that he
stepped forward to interfere; whereupon the exasperated monarch
pushed him away and indignantly raised his cane as if to chastise him for the affront.
It has always been supposed that the escape of the King
from Hampton Court was not effected without the connivance




THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.                333
of his guardian, who induced him to make the attempt by alarming him with the stories of a design to take his life. It is
certain that on the very day of his flight Whalley read to him a
letter which he said had been secretly delivered to him, intimating that the agitators in the army had formed a design to surprise  and assassinate him.      The authorship of the letter has
been generally attributed to Cromwell, who is supposed to have
written it for the purpose of working upon the fears of the
King in order to induce him voluntarily to take a step which
would remove him out of the custody of the Parliament, and
bring him more completely into his own power.1
At the battle of Dunbar in 1650, he was associated with Monk
in command of the Foot, and having greatly contributed to the
rout of the Scottish army, he was left by Cromwell in Scotland
with the rank of Commissary General and the command of
four regiments of Horse.
After Oliver's elevation he was intrusted by him with the
government of the Counties of Lincoln, Nottingham, Derby,
WVarwick, and Leicester, with the title of Major General; in
which office he was so assiduous, that, as he himself says, he did
not leave a single vagrant in a whole county. He was representative for Nottinghamshire in the Parliaments of 1654 and 1656,
and raised by the Protector to his Upper House. He is said to
have been so fond of this honor that he threatened to cane
I If those who have suggested this explanation had examined the curious and interesting book, entitled " Cromwelliana," they would have found an extract from
Colonel Whalley's own statement in answer to a question put to him by the House
of Commons, which places the authorship of the letter beyond a question, and conilrms the suspicion as to the motives of the writer. " And whereas, Mr. Speaker,"
these are his words, " you demand of me what that letter was I showed the King the
day he went away, the letter I will show you: but with your leave I shall first
acquaint you with the author and the ground of my showing it to the King. The
author is Lieutenant General Cromwell. The ground of my showing it is this: the
letter intimates some murderous design, or at least some fear of it against the King.
When I read the letter I was much astonished, abhorring that such a thing should
be done, or so much as thought of, by any that bear the name of Christians. When
I had shown the letter to his Majesty, I told him I was sent to safeguard, and not to
murther him; I wished him to be confident no such thing should be done, I would
first die at his foot in his defence; and therefore I showed it him, that he might be
reassured, though menacing speeches came frequently to his ear, our General Officers abhorred so bloody and villainous a fact. Another reason was that I might get
a nearer admittance to his Majesty that so I might better secure him," &c.




334        THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.
Colonel Ashfield in Westminster Hall for speaking derisively of
this quasi House of Lords. The valiant Colonel, however, having set him at defiance, he prudently abstained from      executing
the menace; but went away and complained of him to the Protector Richard, who told the Colonel that unless he would ask
pardon for the offence he would cashier him for using disrespectful language to his superior officers. The Colonel, no wise
daunted, petitioned to have a fair hearing, - a demand which the
Protector could not well refuse; but himself selected the officers
to whom the case should be referred, and they, of course, decided
that the fault should be humbly acknowledged and "my Lord
Whalley's" pardon asked.      To this sentence, however, the stubborn Colonel absolutely refused to submit.1
When a proposition was made in Parliament to make Cromwell king, Whalley, notwithstanding the great obligations which
he was under to his powerful relative, and his dependence upon
him for high and lucrative offices, strenuously opposed the measure.   His name appears among the signers of the Proclamation for the succession of Richard Cromwell to the Protectorate
on the death of Oliver, the 3d of September, 1658. After the
resignation of Richard he became an object of jealousy to the
Parliament as having too much interest with the army, for which
reason they took away his command; but this, it is said, only
endeared him to the soldiers the more.
It deserves to be mentioned as an evidence of the high esteem
in which the character of Whalley was held among men of discrimination and worth, that the celebrated Richard Baxter, author
- Ludlow Memoirs, vol. ii. pp. 632, 633.
2 The fact is thus stated by several writers. I do not find any notice of Whalley's
having opposed the measure in the Parliament itself. The account given by Whitelock is as follows: " Dec. 10, 1651, Cromwell called a meeting of divers members of
Parliament, and some chief officers of the army, at the Speaker's house, and proposed to them that now, the old King being dead and his son defeated, he held it
necessary to proceed to a settlement of the Nation."..." Cromwell discovered
their inclinations for which he fished, and made use of what he then discerned. He
said he really thought that a settlement of somewhat with monarchical government in it
would be very effectual."... "Whalley said, I do not well understand matters of
law; but it seems to me the best way not to have any thing of monarchical power
in the settlement of our Government, and if we should resolve upon any, whom
have we to pitch upon "... " Cromwell put off the debate when it turned towards
making the Duke of Gloucester, the King's third son, king."




THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.       335
of the " Saints' Rest," one of the ablest ministers and most
voluminous writers of his age, who had been chaplain in his
regiment, dedicated to him one of his practical works with expressions of sincere friendship and respect. It was at the time
when he was enjoying the high offices to which he had been
promoted by his Cousin Cromwell. How singularly must the
closing words of this complimentary inscription have affected
the mind of him to whom they were addressed, if they were ever
recalled to his remembrance in the low estate to which he was
subsequently reduced! How must they have impressed him with
the uncertainty of earthly honors, as they brought forcibly to his
thought the strong contrast between the prosperous career which
his friend blindly predicted for him as the source of his trial, and
the miserable and lonely condition from which his temptations
actually arose! "Think not that your greatest trials are now
over. Prosperity hath its peculiar temptations by which it hath
foiled many that stood unshaken in the storms of adversity.
The tempter who hath had you on the waves, will now assault
you in the calm, and hath his last game to play on the mountains,
till nature cause you to descend. Stand this charge and you
win the day." 
WILLIAM GOFFE was a son of a puritanical clergyman,
Rector of Stanmore in Sussex. The political and religious excitement of the times, acting upon an ardent and somewhat restless nature, led him to exchange the quiet duties of the business
to which he had been brought up for the stirring life of a soldier.
The influences of his early education determined the direction
of his interest in the conflict between the Commons and the King.
Enlisting with enthusiasm in the army of the Parliament, he rose
by rapid gradations to a high rank. Though not liberally educated, he is mentioned in the Fasti Oxonienses as having received the honorary degree of Master of Arts. In the account
1 Baxter's Practical Works, Orme's edition, vol. i. p. 453.
In Josiah Ricroft's " Survey of England's Champions and Truth's faithful Patriots, published by Authority, London, 1647," is the following tribute to Whalley:
"I must not forget another of the valiant Commanders, Colonell Whalley, a
man of honour and of trust, who deserves as much of the King and Parliament as
the best of the Commanders in his Excellency Thomas Fairfax's army (now resident) one only excepted."




336       THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.
there given of him, it is said that he was "a frequent prayermaker, preacher, and presser for righteousness and freedom, and
therefore in high esteem in the army."  He was a devoted partisan of Cromwell, and ever ready to execute his will.   He
assisted Colonel White in forcibly ejecting the members that
were left behind of the " Little" or " Barebones" Parliament, in
1653. For this and other services he received from the Protector the honorable and lucrative post of Major General of Hampshire, Sussex, and Berks. He was a member for Great Yarmouth
in the Parliament of 1654, and for Southampton in 1656, and
was called up to the Protector's House of Lords. His name
appears, together with that of Whalley, whose daughter he had
married, in the order for proclaiming Richard Cromwell Protector after his father's death.
In Burton's " Parliamentary Diary," there is a brief and somewhat curious notice of one of Goffe's speeches in Parliament.
"J'an. 19, 1656, Sir Gilbert Pickering said, on the question of
voting an address to Cromwell, -
If it were not against the orders of the House to call upon any man
to speak, there was a very good pattern propounded to us as to the manner of addresses to his Highness, upon another occasion about three or
four months ago. I wish we might follow that way. I remember very
well what this speech was and who spoke it. It was Major General
Goffe, upon the debate about the thanksgiving for the late victory from
Spain. It was a long preachment, seriously inviting the House to a firm,
and kind of corporal, union with his Highness. Something was expressed
as to hanging about his neck like pearls, from a text out of Canticles."
5' Major General Goffe," says Burton, "tickled, I believe, by Sir Gilbert
Pickering's call, stood up and expressed his.favorable opinion of the proposed congratulation of Cromwell upon his great deliverance and desired
the Speaker to express our sense of the former deliverances of his Highness, both public and private, upon whose preservation much of ours did
depend. He then repeated something of his former preachment."
JOHN DIXWELL was. a cadet of the Dixwells of Kent, an
ancient and wealthy family, raised to the Baronetage. His elder
brother, who died in 1643, left his large estate and his children,
all minors, in his charge. A country gentleman, of independent
means, and good education, who had nothing to gain, but much
to lose by changes, every selfish interest would have induced him




THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.   337
to withhold himself from the revolutionary party, if not to take
sides against it. But his judgment and his conscience moved
him to engage in what he believed to be the cause of freedom
and of God. Enlisting in the Parliamentary army, he soon distinguished himself as a soldier and rose to the rank of a Colonel
of Foot.
He was a member of all the Parliaments of the Commonwealth, with the single exception of that called the " Little " or
Barebones." It appears from a careful and thorough copynow in the possession of his descendant, John James Dixwell,:Esq.- of every entry in the Journals of the House of Commons
in which the name of Colonel Dixwell occurs, that he was an
active and distinguished member. The frequency of his appointment on important Committees and the nature of the questions
submitted to his decision show the high consideration in which
he was held as a man of sound judgment, firm purpose, and practical ability.
He was several times chosen a member of the Council of
State from the year 1651 to 1659, and in the latter year was commissioned Lieutenant of Dover Castle.
On the 29th of May, 1660, Charles II. entered London,
amidst the acclamations of the people, to take possession of the
throne from which he had been so long excluded. In anticipation of this event, the three individuals whose career we have
thus far sketched, hastily fled from the vengeance which they
knew was in store for them if they remained in England; -
VWhalley and Goffe to America, and Dixwell first to Hanau, in
Germany, and afterwards to New England.
The two former left Westminster on the 4th of May and arrived in Boston the 27th of July; bringing testimonials from
various ministers in high esteem among their brethren here. By
the same vessel which brought them over came the news of the
King's accession. They attempted no concealment of their persons or characters; for the action of Parliament in regard to them
had not yet been promulgated. Immediately on landing they
called upon Governor Endicott who gave them a courteous welcome, and the same day proceeded to Cambridge, where it was
their intention to reside. The high rank and. social position
22




338      THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.
which they had sustained in England, together with the gravity
and dignity of their manners, secured for them general respect.
They were admitted into the best society and met with marked
attention. They attended public worship and lectures, took part
in private devotional meetings, and were allowed to partake of
the Communion.
Among those who treated them with such deference there were
undoubtedly some who like Mitchell, the minister of Cambridge,
were not fully aware, at the moment, of the exact relation in
which they stood to the laws of their country. Writing, subsequently, in his own vindication, Mitchell says, " Since I have had
opportunity, by reading and discourse, to look into that action
for which these men suffer, I could never see that it was justifiable."
The Act of Indemnity, in which Whalley and Goffe were excepted absolutely as to life and estate, reached Massachusetts in
November. It produced excitement and alarm; but was met
by the members of the General Court with a divided feeling;
some being inclined to protect the exiles at every hazard; a few
doubtful whether it might not be their duty to secure their persons; and others disposed to give them opportunity to escape, so
far as it could be done without openly conflicting with the royal
government. On the 21st of February, 1661, the Governor summoned the Assistants to advise him as to the manner of dealing
with them; but they came to no agreement. Four days after,
the refugees themselves relieved the Magistrates from embarrassment by privately leaving Cambridge under an escort
furnished by their friends, and making their way to New
Haven.
On their journey thither, which occupied nine days, they
stopped for a short time at Hartford, where they met with a kind
reception from John Winthrop, Jr., Governor of the Colony of
Connecticut, or Hartford, which had not at that time been consolidated with the Colony of New Haven. It is quite certain
that their coming to New Haven was not wholly unexpected;
at least by the Rev. John Davenport, one of the noble founders
of that Colony, and one of the ablest and most influential of the
ministers of New England, -who, it will be remembered, in his
old age removed to Boston and became a minister of the First




THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.            339
Church.1 About the time of their arrival, as if to predispose the
minds of the people in their favor, he preached a sermon which
is still extant in print, in the course of which he gave utterance
to these bold and, under the circumstances, " almost treasonable"
words:
Withhold not countenance, entertainment, and protection from the people of God- whom men may call fools and fanatics - if any such come
to you from other countries, as from France or England, or any other
place. Be not forgetful to entertain strangers. Remember those that are
in bonds as bound with them. Hide the outcasts, bewray not him that
wandereth.   Let mine outcasts dwell with thee.  Be thou a covert to
them from the face of the spoiler."
The Regicides themselves had special reason to expect friendly
treatment in New Haven.      It had long been the home of a sister
of General Whalley, the amiable wife of Rev. William      Hooke,
for twelve years Mr. Davenport's colleague; and William Jones,
whose father suffered death as one of the King's judges, had
recently come from England, and taken up his residence there.
Their reception was as cordial as they could have desired. They
took up their abode in Mr. Davenport's house, and for several
weeks held intercourse with the ministers and magistrates, with
little or no reserve. Meanwhile the King's Proclamation for
their arrest as traitors and murderers had been received at Boston, and news of its arrival followed them to New Haven. Aware
of their peril and to mislead any who might be sent to apprehend
them, they removed in open daylight to Milford, and there made
themselves known; but returned covertly at night, and for more
than a week lay secreted in Mr. Davenport's cellar, where what
purports to have been their hiding-place is still shown.
But a more serious danger was imminent. One Captain Breedon, having carried to England information that he had seen
1 In a letter from Davenport to John Winthrop, Jr., dated the eleventh day of
August, 1660 (it will be remembered that the Regicides arrived in Boston, July 27th),
he says, "The two gentlemen of great quality arrived in the Bay are Commissary
General Whalley, Sister Hooke's brother, and his son in law who is with him is
Colonel Goffe: boath godly men, and escaped persute in Engl. narrowly. I hope to
see them here after the Commissioners are gone, if not before. I might hope to see
them before, upon my letter, but I defer that on purpose that your chamber may be free
for your reception and Mrs. Winthrope's when the Commissioners meete." The
letter may be seen in Mass. Hist. Coll., vol. x., series 3.




340         THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW         ENGLAND.
them at Boston, a royal order was despatched to the Colonial
government peremptorily demanding their arrest. Endicott, to
whom it was transmitted, could do no less than appear to interest
himself to put it in execution.1 Without taking the advice of
his Council, and, as it seems, not in full accordance with the feeling of some of the Deputies, he gave Commission to two young
men who had recently come from England for purposes of trade,
Thomas Kirk and Thomas Kellond, to search throughout Massachusetts; and furnished them with letters to the Governors of
the other Colonies.
These two young royalists, strangers in the country, and sure
to excite observation wherever they should go, started immediately on the track of the fugitives.         At Hartford     Governor
Winthrop informed them that they had not long before passed
out of that town on their way to New Haven. The pursuers,
taking the same direction, on reaching Guilford, stopped at the
residence of the Deputy Governor Leete. They showed him
I Regard for truth compels the remark that there is reason to suspect the sincerity of more than one of the magistrates and principal men of the Colonies of Massachusetts and New Haven in their dealing with the Home government, and in their
statements, respecting the Regicides. Colonel Temple, in a letter dated Boston, 20th
August, 1661, to " Mr. Secretary Morice, about Goffe and Whalley," asserts, it may
be with truth, that he "had used all the diligence and industry he was capable of in
endeavors to discover and apprehend the Regicides"; but says that lie " had been informed by Mr. Pinchin (Pynchon) and Captain Lord, residents of the Southern parts,
that they are concealed there," and that he has "joyned himself" with them "in a
secret designe, only knowne to us three, to secure their persons." It is possible that
Mr. Pynchon was in earnest, but if he had been really so, it is not easy to understand
how he could have failed to discover their place of concealment at Hadley, so near
to his own residence.
Governor Bradstreet writes to the Lords of his Majesty's Privy Council, Boston,
May 16, 1680, "I understand there have been misinformacons presented to his
Majesty, and amongst others that the Inhabitants here have protected the murtherers
of his Majesties Royall Father, in Contempt of his Majesties proclamation of the 6th
of June 1660, which is manifestly untrue."
John Davenport writes to Temple, "19 day 6 m. 1661," that he had sent an
Apology to the Deputy Governor of Massachusetts to be communicated to the General Court, in which he " will finde his innocency in reference to the two Colonels,
and that of the this poore Coloney, of our Governor and Majestrates, who wanted
neither will nor Industery to have served his Majtie in apprehending the 2 Collonells,
but were Prevented and Hindered by god's overruilling Providence, which withheld
them that they could not exciqute their true Purpose therein. I believe if his
Majestie Rightly understood the Curcumstances of the Event he would not be displeased with our Majistrates, but to accquiesce in the Providence of the most high."
(Mass. Hist. Coll. 3d series, vol. xviii. pp. 328-9.)




THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.    341
their warrant and demanded to be furnished with horses for their
journey and " aid and power to search and apprehend " the refugees. A person told them that the Colonels were secreted in
Mr. Davenport's house, "and that without all question Deputy
Leete knew as much." 1 He put them off on various pretences
till after the Sabbath, which occurred on the day succeeding the
interview. Meanwhile a messenger was secretly despatched to
give timely warning at New Haven. On Monday the two
messengers set out on theirjourney; the Governor following them
at a more moderate pace. On their arrival at the capital, he
received them at the Court Chamber; when they informed him
that they had reason to believe that those whom they sought
were concealed in New Haven, and required assistance for their
arrest. He replied that he " did not believe the story; that he
could not and would not make them magistrates." They charged
him with despising his Majesty's authority, and with his willingness to connive at the escape of his traitorous subjects. He then
left them, and after a long consultation with the magistrates,
broke up the Council; declaring that they " neither would nor
could do any thing until they had called a General Court of the
freemen." 2
Thwarted at every point by the magistrates, whom they
found, as they said, "obstinate and pertinacious in their contempt of his Majesty," and, in all probability, purposely put upon
a false scent, the messengers started off for New Netherlands;
and after a fruitless search returned by water to Boston.
There can be no doubt that intelligence of the appointment of
these Commissioners, and of all their movements, had been
secretly conveyed to the fugitives; for before they had left
Boston, they had removed from the house of Mr. Davenport to
that of William Jones, afterwards Deputy Governor; and during
the conference with Governor Leete at Guilford, they were conveyed to a secluded mill, two miles to the north-west of New
Haven. From thence, after two nights, they were conducted to
a spot called Hatchet Harbor; and shortly after, to a rude covert
of large stones on the eastern side, and near the summit of West
Rock, still nearer to the town; " being supplied with food from a
1 Stiles's Judges. Hutchinson's Coll. Dr. Palfrey's Hist. of New England.
2 Report of Kellond and Kirk in Hutch. Coll. p. 834.




342      THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.
lonely farm-house in the neighborhood." Having remained in
their hiding-place a few months, occasionally showing themselves
in New Haven and elsewhere, from the honorable motive of
relieving Mr. Davenport of the suspicion of concealing them,
they took shelter in a house in Milford, where they stayed for
two years in entire seclusion.  At length, just as they were
beginning to enjoy a feeling of comparative security, and to
indulge themselves with occasional intercourse with their worthy
neighbors, the tidings reached them of the expected arrival at
Boston of Commissioners from  England with extraordinary
powers, whose coming might subject them, and their protectors
also, to new dangers. This intelligence caused them once more
to make a hasty retreat to their long since abandoned cave.
But being discovered by a party of Indians, hunting in the
woods, who might be induced by the offer of large rewards to
betray them, they took their departure for the secluded town of
Hadley, then far in the wilderness on the north-western frontier
of New England, travelling only by night. Here a shelter had
been prepared for them, under the roof of the worthy minister
of the place, the Rev. John Russell. A considerable addition
had recently been made to his house, which was now large and
double, containing many rooms and closets.  In one of the
latter in the garret, having doors opening into two chambers, the
floor boards could be slipped aside so as to admit of access to a
dark under closet, near the old-fashioned chimney; from which,
perhaps, there was originally a passage-way into the cellar. To
this secure hiding-place they could retreat, in case a search
should be made of the premises.
They reached Hadley on the thirteenth of October, 1664, no
one in the place being aware of their arrival except the family
of Mr. Russell, and one or two trusty persons among the principal inhabitants, from whom they received the kindest attention.
They were enabled, through safe hands, to keep up a correspondence with their friends in Old and New England. Their letters
dated from "Ebenezer," the name which they gave to their
several places of refuge, were often conveyed to Boston by the
representative from Hadley, Peter Tilton, -those for England
being intrusted, as we have found, to Rev. Increase Mather,
who transmitted them under cover in his own handwriting to




THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.                  343
some confidential correspondent who          could forward     them    to
their destination. Goffe wrote, occasionally, to Mather himself,
upon religious and political topics, always expressing the highest
esteem for his person and a deep sense of obligation for his
favors.1 They appear to have been kept well informed of all
important public events in both countries, and to have been
abundantly supplied with the means of subsistence. There is
reason to believe that they were occasionally visited in their
retreat by such men as Governor Leverett, Mr. Richard Saltonstall,2 and their old friend Mr. Davenport.
It is certainly a matter of surprise that their secret could have
been so well kept. The people of Hadley appear to have been
ignorant of their residence among them, and it is probable that
very few persons, even among the most intimate associates
of their protectors, had any knowledge of their place of concealment.     Governor Bradstreet in a letter to          Randolph, in
1 Among the correspondents of Goffe was Rev. William Hooke. Several of his
letters may be seen in the Mather Papers. He writes under the signature D..'ir.
Goffe's wife and children were for a time in his family.
He was Master of Arts at Oxford in 1623, and after a short ministry in Devonshire, being persecuted for non-conformity, sought refuge in New England..He
was minister of Taunton in 1637, soon after the settlement of that town, and subsequently settled at New Haven, as Mr. Davenport's colleague. After the elevation
of Cromwell- cousin of his wife, who was Whalley's sister- to the Protectorate,
and when his brother-in-law Whalley had been elevated to high office, he went back
to his native country, not because he loved New England less, but Old England
more. He probably thought that he could serve the land of his adoption better at
the Court of England, and close to the ear of its powerful ruler. He embarked for
home in 1656, and was received by Cromwell with such favor as to be appointed one
of his domestic chaplains in the royal palace of Whitehall.
Several letters from his wife, Jane Hooke, are printed in the Mather Papers. She
refers to the Regicides, to whom as well as to several poor ministers, she often sent
contributions of money and clothing. Her correspondence proves her to have been
a truly devout, amiable, and charitable woman. She deserves to be remembered
among the benefactors of New England. The only fault to be found with her letters
is the wretched spelling and punctuation.
2 Richard Saltonstall, Jr., son of Sir Richard, came to New England, with his
father, in 1630, was admitted freeman of Massachusetts, Oct. 18, 1631, and the next
year went back to England. He returned to Massachusetts in 1635, was Representative in 1636, and Assistant in 1637. He sailed again for England in 1649; again
came back, and again sailed in 1672. He was once more in Massachusetts in 1680,
and made Assistant; but left for England in 1682, and died in April, 1694. He left
fifty pounds in the hands of Edward Collins, of Charlestown, for the Regicides,
when he went to England in 1672. See the correspondence on this subject in the
Mather Papers, pp. 134, 136.




344      THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.
1684,1 says, that " Whalley and Goff were never hid or secured
here, that ever I could heare of." It would seem not only that no
one was willing to betray them, but that every one purposely
endeavored not to know where they were. Such tender compassion, and such delicate and even sacred consideration for
these hunted exiles, whose greatest crime was a desperate blow
at oppression, and who had confidingly thrown themselves
upon their protection, are among those noble traits in the
character of our Fathers, which claim honorable commemoration from their descendants, and should never fail - as, thank
God, they seldom have failed-to excite their generous emulation.
Several letters which passed between Goffe and his wife, the
daughter of Whalley, were long ago printed by Governor
HIutchinson; and others, found among the Mather Papers, have
been published in the last volume of our Historical Collections.
It is impossible for any who has a heart, to read them without
almost tearful emotion. They are full of the tenderest expressions of endearment for each other, mingled with a sublime trust
in Providence, and the most humble and docile submission.
While they give evidence of bitter and unintermitted sorrow and
loneliness, they betray no tremulousness of faith, no lack of
fortitude, no disposition to repine. No token that love could
desire of affection and longing is wanting in the language of
either, and yet not a word passes from one to the other to
weaken or dispirit, but rather to sustain and encourage. They
abound in quotations from the Scriptures, especially from the
prophetical writings, which they applied to themselves and their
cause in a manner that strikes the modern reader as extravagant,
and superstitious, if not hypocritical and almost absurd; but
which was entirely in keeping with the custom of the class of
religionists to which they belonged, and was adopted by themselves in perfect faith and guileless sincerity. They addressed
each other, respectively, as son and mother, under the names of
Walter and Frances Goldsmith. We recognize in him and
Whalley the distinctive traits of the Puritans, - an impassioned
piety, "a lofty air of manhood, deep thought and steady enthusiI Mather Papers, p. 533.




THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.   845
asm, - those same principles of stern fidelity and self-command
which ennobled the better days of the Roman republic, and have
made the men of every after era appear childish and frivolous in
comparison." And in her we are struck with those qualities which
every unprejudiced student of history admires and reverences in
the characters of the Republican matrons of England.. Making
a slight deduction for a few peculiarities derived from their religious associations, we believe, that " no age has produced a more
worthy counterpart to the Valerias and Portias of antiquity.
In their high-minded feeling of patriotism and public honor, combined with the most dutiful and devoted conjugal attachment, their
kindness and hospitality, their domestic virtue, their calm dignity,
endurance, and self devotion, there is something that makes the
Corinnes and Heloises appear small and insignificant." 
If we may believe a tradition which has come down through
the family of Governor Leverett, and which there is no good
reason for discrediting, an opportunity was at length offered to
the refugees, during their residence at Hadley, not only to repay the hospitality of their protectors, but to bring into action
once more, though but for a moment, their military skill and
prowess.
In the summer of 1676, while King Philip's war was raging,
a powerful force of Indians made a sudden assault upon Hadley. The inhabitants at the time were assembled in their
meeting-house observing a day of fasting and prayer; but, in
apprehension of an attack, they had taken their muskets with
them to the house of God. While they were engaged in their
devotions, the younger of the solitary captives, who, perhaps,
taking advantage of the absence of observers to enjoy a brief
interval of comparative freedom, may have been seated at an
open window, or walking near the house, discovered the approach
of the wily foe, and hastened to give the alarm. With the air
of one accustomed to command, he hastily drew up the little
band of villagers in the most approved military order, put himself at their head, and by his own ardor and energy inspired
them with such confidence, that, rushing upon the swarming savages, they succeeded, with the loss of only two or three men, in
1 Jeffrey, Edinb. Rev., October, 1808. Review of Mrs. Hutchinson's Memoirs
of her husband, Colonel Hutchinson.




346         THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW       ENGLAND.
driving them back into the wilderness. But when the confusion
of the fight was over, the mysterious stranger had disappeared.
It is hardly a matter of surprise that, in that superstitious age,
there should have been some among the people who, in utter
bewilderment as to the person of their deliverer and in devout
gratitude for their strange preservation, should have regarded
him as an angel sent from heaven with a divine commission for
their rescue.1
General Whalley died at Hadley, probably in the year 1676,
and was buried      behind   the front cellar-wall of Mr. Russell's
house, where his bones have since been found. There is a tradition that General Goffe, after the decease of his father-in-law,
disappeared from    Hadley, going " westward towards Virginia,"
and ended his career in total obscurity. There are also some
who insist, that though he may have died at Hadley, his remains,
together with those of Whalley, were removed to New Haven, and
deposited in two graves by the side of that of their fellow-exile
Colonel Dixwell.     To us it appears more probable that he ended
his days in the quiet and hospitable place which must have seemed
to him more like home than any other spot in this far country,
and that beneath the same friendly soil on which he had found
protection in life, his body -worn out with age and care, and
laid down in secrecy and decent sorrow by the hands that had so
long ministered to its comfort -has found even unto this day an
undisturbed resting-place.2
1 There are several versions of this story. They differ somewhat in regard to
details. That which I have followed seems as likely to be in accordance with the
facts as either of the others. Holland's Hist. Western Mass.; Huntington's Cent.
Address; Sir Walter Scott's Pev. of the Peak, &c.
2 There is a sentence in a letter from Goffe to Increase Mather, dated the 8th of
September, 1676, in the Mather Papers, in Mass. Hist. Coll., vol. viii. 4th series, p. 158,
which might lead to the inference that shortly before that time the writer had removed from Hadley to a new place of concealment. He says, "I was greatly behoulding to IIr. Noellfor his assistance in my remove to this town." This could hardly relate
to the journey of the Regicides to Hadley so long before as 1664. Besides, had
Whalley been with Goffe at the time of the removal to which he refers, he would not
have said "my removal," but our. Although this sentence had not attracted my
particular notice at the time of editing the Mather Papers, or when this lecture
was written, it has since impressed me with a belief that after the death of Whalley
— which for several reasons had been assigned to the year 1676- Gcffe did leave
Hadley for some other town, - whether New Haven, or not, I know of no means
of ascertaining.




THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.   347
In 1665, the year after their arrival at Hadley, Whalley and
Goffe were joined by that old companion in arms and in the
trial of the King, a brief sketch of whose life in England has
already been given, - Colonel John Dixwell. When or how he
had come to this country from Germany, his first place of exile, is
not known. We can readily imagine with what strong emotions
the exiles met, and with what deep and untiring interest they
talked over, during the three or four years they remained in each
other's neighborhood, the great events in which they had participated. At the end of that period, Dixwell removed to New
Haven. As he had never been traced to America there was in his
case less reason for fearing discovery. Assuming the name of
Davids and carefully concealing his true character from the public, who regarded him as, for some unknown reason, obnoxious to
the English government, he established his residence in a retired
part of the town, and soon secured the respect of the inhabitants
as a grave and quiet gentleman. He married twice; the first
wife dying a few weeks after their nuptials. By the second he
had several children; from one of whom are descended the highly
respectable Boston family which bears the name of Dixwell. He
early communicated to two or three ministers and a few other
friends the secret of his history, and before his death took care
to demonstrate his true name and character by his last will and
other certified documents. He died in March, 1689, just before
the welcome tidings of the downfall of the Stuart dynasty,
which would have caused his aged heart to leap for joy, had
reached America. A plain gravestone, with the simple inscription, " J. D. Esq, Deceased March ye 19th, in ye 82d year of his
age 1688-9," marlied the place of his interment, in that part of
the public square of New Haven which is flanked by the halls
of Yale College, and which was the ancient burial-place of the
town. In 1821, when the monuments in this ground were removed to the new cemetery in the north-west part of the city,
this grave was left undisturbed. In 1849, his descendants, with
a laudable feeling of veneration for their distinguished ancestor,
by permission of the city authorities, caused a stately and graceful monument, with an appropriate inscription, to be erected to
his memory; which is invariably pointed out by the citizens of
New Haven to the stranger as an object of local pride, of anti —




348            THE   REGICIDES SHELTERED          IN  NEW   ENGLAND.
quarian curiosity, and of universal interest.1 It is worthy of
notice that in one of the last papers subscribed by his own hand
1 The monument is of marble, about six feet high, having inscriptions on its four
sides. That on the east side is as follows:JOHN DIXWELL,
a zealous patriot- a sincere Christian,
an honest man,
he was faithful to duty
through good and through evil report
and having lost
fortune, position and home
in the cause of his country,
and of human rights,
found shelter and sympathy
here,
among the fathers of New England.
His descendants
have erected this monument
as a tribute of respect to his memory
and as a grateful record
of the generous protection
extended to him,
by the early inhabitants
of New Haven.
Erected A.D. 1849.
The inscription on the north side is as follows: —
J. D. ESQ,
DECEASED - MARCH YE
=19TH, IN YE 82D YEAR OF
HIS AGE 1688-9.
Copied from the old gravestone.
Inscription on the west side: -
Here rest the remains of
JOIHN DIIXWELL, ESQ,
of the Priory of Folkestone
in the county of Kent, England,
of a family long prominent in Kent,
and Warwickshire, and himself possessing
large estates and much influence
in his country, he espoused the popular cause
in the revolution of 1640.
Between 1640 and 1660
he was colonel in the army,
an active member of four parliaments.
Thrice in the council of state
and one of the high court which tried
and condemned King Charles the First.
At the restoration of the monarchy,
he was compelled to leave his country;
and after a brief residence in Germany,
Came to New Haven,
and here lived in seclusion,
but enjoying the esteem and friendship
of the most worthy citizens,
till his death in 1688-9.
On the south side is the Dixwell coat of arms, with the motto,
ESSE QUAM VIDERI.




THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.    349
and placed upon record in the probate office, occurs this emphatic
statement of his unabated attachment to the cause for which he
had suffered, and his unshaken confidence in the justice of his
acts in its behalf,-" Being confident that the Lord will appear
for his people and the good old cause for which I suffer, and that
there will be those in power again who will relieve the injured
and oppressed."
We have been reviewing the history of eccentric but heroic
men. Though we cannot justify the act for which they suffered,
yet who of us is disposed to charge them with the intention, or
even the consciousness, of crime? Nay, more, who of us can
even wonder that, entranced as they were by the beautiful vision
of universal liberty under the sceptre of Christ, ever floating
before their imagination, and seeming to beckon to them from
the far distant future, - which to the eye of their strong faith
appeared so close at hand, —they should have rushed forward
to realize it, forgetful of the lessons of history, regardless of precedent, scornful of danger, breaking through even lawful restraints,
hewing down with sword and axe every obstruction that blocked
the way, - thrones, tyrants, armies, hierarchies, constitutions, -
pressing on with a terrible earnestness and a frenzied enthusiasm?
If there were any gigantic hypocrites, who had joined their
ranks to make them their tools, to turn their nobler rage and invincible energy to the service of their towering ambition, the men
whose lives we have been describing were themselves too sincere
and self-devoting to connive at such deceit, or even to be suspicious of such motives. They never for one moment wavered
in their loyalty to what they assuredly believed was the most
sacred and glorious cause that could be committed by Heaven
to human hearts and hands. To the day of their death they
never faltered in the conviction that what they had done had
received the august sanction of their God, and what they had
suffered, they had suffered as martyrs to conscience, justice, and
liberty.
It would be presumptuous and ungrateful in us who are enjoying the priceless blessings of freedom at the cost of others' sacrifices, - of the heroism, the sufferings, the virtues, yes, and the
faults of our ancestors, — who are too luxuriously revelling in




350         THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW         ENGLAND.
the harvest which they sowed in agony and watered with their
blood, -to pass a cool and censorious judgment upon men like
these. They should be tried only by a tribunal of their peers.
Happy will it be for us if the worst fault that can be charged
against us by the pen of man, or by the Recording Angel, shall
be an overmastering hatred of oppression, and a too enthusiastic
and impatient endeavor to hasten the fulfilment, before His own
appointed time, of the sure and glorious promises of God.1
Our subject involves the interesting question of the attitude
of New England towards the parent country during the eventful
period to which it relates.
It is certain that the leading men in the colonies were not only
deeply interested in the political movements on the opposite
shore, but that they had no inconsiderable influence upon the
party with which they were in sympathy. Besides the fact of
their intimate personal relations and common interests, there is
sufficient evidence that they were in fiequent correspondence
with the Republicans in England, and that their assistance with
1 There are traditionary anecdotes concerning Whalley and Goffe to which I have
paid no attention, for most of them bear internal evidence of untruth; and with regard to the rest there is not sufficient ground to receive them into veritable history.
There are also traditions that two or three other Regicide Judges were secreted in
New England, in different localities, but they are undoubtedly erroneous. It is possible that there were several refugees fiom England, for other offences than connection with the King's death, who found shelter in our forests. There is a plausible
account of a person who may have been an exile for some political cause, given in a
speech by Rev. Frederic A. Whitney, at a dinner on the occasion of the celebration,
in 1840, of the two hundredth anniversary of the incorporation of the town of
Quincy, Mass. Mr. Whitney says,"Some years since I gathered from the lips of an aged citizen of Quincy, who was
remarkable for his retentive memory and exceeding accuracy in all matters of fact,
this tradition. His childhood he told me had been with those who had conversed
with this lonely exile. Within his own memory there had stood on a hillock the
humble abode of the old refugee. Here, as said tradition, under the assumed name
of Revel, he lived and died; and his funeral was honored by the attendance of his
Excellency the Provincial Governor, and of distinguished men from the neighboring
metropolis."
Those who are curious in regard to such traditions will find many of them referred
to in " Stiles's History of the Judges," together with much authentic information.
Though over enthusiastic in his admiration of the Regicides, and extravagant in his
attempts to justify and glorify their treatment of the King, and withal, somewhat
credulous, the work of President Stiles shows ability, learning, and minute research,
and is the principal source to which all who treat our subject are indebted for their
material.




THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.     351
the pen, if not with the sword, was much relied upon and
solicited. The Independents -who at the breaking out of the
civil war were a small though vigorous minority struggling for
existence, but who at its close held the destiny of the kingdom
in their hands - early looked to New England not only for the
ablest advocacy of their principles, but for the strong encouragement which the successful practical exemplification of them
afforded.
In 1642, a letter signed by about forty persons, Peers, Commoners, and ministers, - Cromwell among the number, —was
addressed to Cotton of Boston, Hooker of Hartford, and Davenport of New Haven, urging them to come over with all possible
speed to give their help " for settling the affairs of the Church."
Although neither of these ministers was persuaded to respond
to the call in person, yet the writings of Cotton and other of the
New-England clergy were published and circulated in England,
and contributed a powerful element in support of the religious
politics of their friends.
A large number of the most distinguished men in the colonies,
-among them John Leverett, Edward Winslow, and Edward
Hopkins, afterwards governors, respectively, of Massachusetts,
Plymouth, and Connecticut,- and many ministers, subsequently
went over to England to take a civil or military part in the ranks
of the revolutionary party.1 The sentiments of one, at least, of
the most eminent and useful of the New-England clergymen,
whose praise is on all our lips, the Apostle Eliot, were in entire
accordance with those by which the Regicides professed to have
been actuated. Goffe himself might have been the author of such
sentences as the following, contained in an Epistle addressed
" To the Chosen, Holy and Faithful, who manage the Wars of
the Lord against Antichrist in Great Britain:" -
"The prayers, the expectation and faith of the saints in the Prophecies
and Promises of Holy Scripture are daily sounding in the ears of the
Lord for the downfall of Antichrist and with him all humane Powers,
Politics, Dominions and Governments; and in the room thereof we wait
for the coming of the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus.... Much is spoken
of the rightful Heir of the Crown of England, and the injustice of casting
out the right Heir: but Christ is the only right Heir of the Crown of
1 Dr. Palfrey's Hist. of New England.




352         THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.
England, and of all other nations also; and he is now come to take possession of his Kingdom, making England first in that blessed work of setting up the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus: and in order thereunto he hath
cast down not only the miry Religion and Government of Antichrist, but
also the form of Civil Government which did stick fast to it."
This treatise was, by the author's permission, published in
England in 1659, though written some six or seven years before,
under the title of the " Christian    Commonwealth."        After the
restoration of the monarchy, the magistrates of the colony, hearing that the book had excited much notice and given great
offence, found it "full of seditious principles and notions in
regard to all established Governments in the Christian world,
and specially against the Government established in their native
country;" but deferred proceedings against it in order that the
author might have opportunity in the mean time to make a
public recantation. This he did, " sincerely." The magistrates
accepted his acknowledgment, and ordered the book to be suppressed.1
If the testimony of a witness in the trial of Hugh Peters for
complicity in the murder of the King is to be credited, the
Agency on which he was sent to England by Massachusetts,
together with Thomas Welde of Roxbury, and William           Hibbens
1 Mass. Hist. Coll., 3d Series, vol. ix., where a reprint of the Christian Commonwealth may be seen; Palfrey's Hist. of New England; Chalmers's State Papers, &c.
" Mr. Eliot's acknowledgment word for word.
"Boston, this 24 of ye 3d mo. 1661.
" Vnderstanding by an act of the honored Council, that there is offence taken at
a booke, published in England by others, the copie whereof was sent ouer by myself
about nine or tenn yeares since, and that the further consideration thereof is commended to this honnored Generall Court now sitting at Boston, Upon pervsall thereof
I doe judge myself to haue offended & in way satisfaction, not only to the Authority
of this Jurisdiction, but also vnto any others, that shall take notice thereof, I doe
hereby acknowledge to this honored Court.
"Such expressions as doe too manifestly scandalize the Gouernment of England
by King, Lords and Commons, as Antichristian, and justify the late Innovators, I
doe sincerely beare testimony against, and acknowledge it to be not only a lawfull
but an eminent forme of Gouernment.
"2. All formes of Ciuil Gouernment deduced from Scripture either expressly or
by just consequence, I acknowledge to be of God & to be subjected vnto for Conscience sake.
"And Whatsoeuer is in the whole Epistle or booke inconsisting herewith I doe
at once for all cordially disoune.                     JoHN ELIOT."




THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.    353
of Boston, in 1641, was not without reference to the promotion
of "the interests of reformation by stirring up the war."  There
are circumstances also connected with that mission, besides the
well-known conduct of Peters, which go to confirm such a suspicion. Dr. Palfrey intimates that "it is not owing to accident
that the instructions to the Agents have not been preserved."
All we know concerning those instructions is from the cautious
language of Winthrop, who says, amongst other things, that they
wrere sent to " congratulate the happy success there," of the Parliament in its early struggles with the King. The manuscript
papers of Welde, of which a copy is in the Library of Harvard
College, would lead to the conclusion that the ostensible objects
of the Agents, especially of Hugh Peters, were not their only,
if they were their principal, purpose.1
The tyranny of Charles I., and the hierarchy which was
allied with it, were as hateful to the majority of the colonists
here as to the friends of liberty at home. They heard with undisguised gratification of the first vigorous and promising efforts
of the Parliament in their armed resistance to the encroachments
of the Throne. To prevent the organization of a party in the
royal interest, they passed an order that "what person soever
shall by word, writing, or action, endeavor to disturb our peace,
directly or indirectly, by drawing a party under pretence that he
is for the King of England against the Parliament, shall be accounted as an offender of a high nature against this Commonwealth, and to be proceeded with either capitally or otherwise,
according to the quality or degree of their offence."
But notwithstanding their sympathies were so strongly with
the Commons, they were more than all jealous of their own
political rights, and scrupulously careful not to compromise their
independence by any appearance of subserviency to the Parliament, any more than to the King. When Charles I. had been
brought to the block, no New-England colony expressed its
formal approval of the act; nor have we any ground for believing
that it met with general favor. It is probable that while some
of the more passionate republicans were gratified, and justified
the extreme measure, the more wise and considerate spirits regarded it with disapprobation and apprehension. When a Puritan
1 See note on p. 584, vol. i., of Dr. Palfrey's Hist. of N. E.
23




354      THE REGICIDES SHELTERED IN NEW ENGLAND.
Parliament came into power, Massachusetts " carefully abstained
from any such solicitation for its favor as could be construed into
an admission of its authority." When England made Cromwell
virtually a monarch, she preserved a steady silence. When his
son Richard was elevated to the Protectorate, no public notice
was taken of the event, although the Council of State sent an
order for his proclamation. And when Charles II. was restored
to the throne, although intelligence of the fact reached Boston in
July, 1660, no proclamation was made till August of the following year. It was the settled policy of our Fathers to act with a
cautious neutrality, as it was from the first their sacred purpose
to lay the foundations of an independent State, as far and as fast
as it could be done consistently with a prudent regard to their
temporary safety and interest, and a formal respect to their
colonial obligations.
In giving a safe asylum to the Judges who had condemned
and executed their lawful, but lawless King, they acted from the
promptings of a compassionate and magnanimous spirit, which
though it may have led them to violate the letter of their political
bond, impelled them to the performance of that higher duty to
humanity to which neither their hearts nor their consciences
would suffer them to be faithless; and for their generous and
resolute fidelity to which we are constrained to give them our
honor and our love.




THE FIRST CHARTER
AND
THE EARLY RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION
OF MASSACHUSETTS.
BY JOEL PARKER.








THE FIRST CHARTER
AND
THE EARLY RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION
OF MASSACHUSETTS.
T has been regarded as a subject of complacency, that we
know our origin, and can trace our history; that while other
communities seek their early history in the mists of conjecture,
or the myths of tradition, we can trace our own, in that documentary evidence which gives the greatest degree of certainty.
To a considerable extent, this is true. And yet there are particulars, essential to a right understanding of the principles upon
which the original settlement of Massachusetts was made, respecting which there has been, and now is, such a diversity and
discrepancy of opinion, after all the discussions of two hundred
years, and after the labors of the Massachusetts Historical Society, for three quarters of a century, in collecting documents
in regard to the subject, that the Ends and Aims of the first
settlers of Massachusetts furnish the leading topic of the present
course of lectures, in the hope that the errors which have prevailed on that subject may be corrected, and the purposes and
objects of the founders of the Commonwealth may be more
clearly and generally understood.
It is not surprising that there should be misconception upon
this subject, when it is considered that the materials of the history of that time are widely dispersed, and often contradictory;
malice manufacturing misrepresentations, prejudice engendering error, and mistake and carelessness causing fact and fiction
to be so intermingled, that it is not seldom that the discovery of
truth is a laborious task.
How many persons there are in the community, who, at this
day, suppose that the celebrated so-called " Blue Laws of Con



358 CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
necticut" are the veritable legislation of the Puritan Colony there!
The fact that one of them purports to provide, that "No one
shall run on the Sabbath day, or walk in his garden or elsewhere,
except reverently to and from meeting;" and another that "No
woman shall kiss her child on the Sabbath, or on a fasting day,"
- might lead to a doubt; but all this is deemed consistent with
the spirit of the time, enforcing a strict observance of that holy
day.
How few persons know that many of these " Blue Laws " are
but the jokes of the wits and humorists of a subsequent age, for
the purpose of sport and ridicule, having no enduring existence
until Dr. Samuel Peters collecting, and probably adding to them,
inserted, in what purported to be "A General History of Connecticut," a sketch, as he said, of laws made by the independent
Dominion of New Haven, denominated "Blue Laws" by the
neighboring colonies, and never suffered to be printed!2 The
whole work has been shown to be so untruthful that the appearance of these so-called " Blue Laws " there, is of itself primd
facie evidence that they are fictitious.3
If we consider what a vast mass of contradictory material has
accumulated within the last decade, to perplex the future historian of the late war, we shall cease to wonder that much may be
done, even at the present day, by a diligent student of history,
to elucidate the ends and aims of the Puritan Fathers of
1630.
It is because of the dispersion of material, and of the contradictory opinions which have been entertained respecting the
rights, objects, and purposes of the founders of the Commonwealth, that I have deemed it not only a duty, but a pleasure, to
answer the call made upon me to add a small contribution, such
as it may be, to the present attempt of the Historical Society to
illustrate the early history of Massachusetts.
The subject assigned to me is "the Religious Legislation of
Massachusetts," -involving, of course, the inquiry how far any
1 Another may furnish Congress with a model of brevity, in making up an " omnibus bill," near the close of a session: " No one shall read Common Prayer, keep
Christmas or Saints days, make minced pies, dance, play cards, or play on any instrument of music, except the drum, trumpet, and jews-harp."
2 See Gen. Hist. Conn. 63.
3 See Prof. Kingsley's Hist. Discourse at New Haven, 1838. pp. 35, 56, 83, 104.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.    359
such legislation was lawful under the original charter,- and
this, in turn, depending upon the question, to what extent the
grantees had any right of legislation, properly so called, by the
provisions of that instrument.
Upon this question the opinions have been much at variance,
according as the charter has been regarded as instituting a corporation for trading purposes, or as the constitution and foundation of a government. That the grantees who settled here
regarded it as the latter, and acted upon that construction, is
apparent from their action at the outset, and throughout. But
those opposed to them, contended at the time, that the former
was its true intent and meaning, and historians have perpetuated
that opinion.  Minot, in his History of Massachusetts, says, —
"This charter, from  the omissions of several powers necessary
to the future situation of the Colony, shows us how inadequate the ideas
of the parties were to the important consequences which were about
to follow from such an act. The Governor, with the assistants and
freemen of the company, it is true, were empowered to make all laws, not
repugnant to those of England; but the power of imposing fines, mulets,
imprisonment, or other lawful correction, is expressly given according to
the course of other corporations in the realm; and the general circumstances of the settlement, and the practice of the times, can leave us no
doubt that this body-politic was viewed rather as a trading company residing within the kingdom, than, what it very soon became, a foreign government exercising all the essentials of sovereignty over its subjects." 
He proceeds to speak of divers laws as having been made by
the grantees, of their own motion and without any authority
under the charter, and, after referring to the force of habits and
prejudices, adds," But such was the force of these habits and prejudices, and so prone
are mankind to place unlimited confidence in their government, when unprovoked by the usurpation and abuse of power, that the people of Alassachusetts may be said to have submitted to a system of laws, by which the
freedom of action was abridged, and to have voluntarily yoked themselves
to an ecclesiastical authority, by which the rights of conscience lost, for a
time, the very principles that their emigration had avowed."
Bancroft, who aspires to be the historian of the United
States, writes,1 See Minot, p. 19.




360    CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
"The charter, which bears the signature of Charles I.,1 and which was
cherished for more than half a century as the most precious boon, established a corporation, like other corporations within the realm. The associates were constituted a body-politic by the name of the Governor and
Company of the Massachusetts Bay in New England. The administration of its affairs was intrusted to a governor, deputy, and eighteen assistants, who were to be annually elected by the stockholders or members of
the corporation. Four times a year, or oftener if desired, a general
assembly of the freemen was to be held; and to these assemblies, which
were invested with the necessary powers of legislation, inquest, and superintendence, the most important affairs were referred. No provision required the assent of the King to render the acts of the body valid; in his
eye it was but a trading corporation, not a civil government; its doings
were esteemed as indifferent as those of any guild or company in England; and if powers of jurisdiction in America were conceded, it was only
from the nature of the business in which the stockholders were to engage." -" The charter designedly granted great facilities for colonization.
It allowed the company to transport to its American territory any persons,
whether English or foreigners, who would go willingly, would become
lieges of the English king, and were not restrained'by especial name.' It
empowered, but it did not require the Governor to administer the oaths
of supremacy and allegiance; yet the charter, according to the strict rules
of legal interpretation, was far from conceding to the patentees the privilege of freedom of worship. Not a single line alludes to such a purpose;
nor can it be implied by a reasonable construction from any clause."
He says further,  "The political condition of the colonists was not
deemed by King Charles a subject worthy of his consideration. Full
legislative and executive authority was conferred not on the emigrants,
but on the company, of which the emigrants could not be active members,
so long as the charter of the corporation remained in England. The
associates in London were to establish ordinances, to settle forms of government, to name all necessary officers, to prescribe their duties, and to
establish a criminal code. Massachusetts was not erected into a province,
to be governed by laws of its own enactment; it was reserved for the
corporation to decide what degree of civil rights its colonists should
enjoy."
Again,-" The charter on which the freemen of Massachusetts succeeded
in erecting a system of independent representative liberty, did not secure
1 This, by the way, is a mistake in the outset. Charles Caesar, the Master in
Chancery, before whom Governor Cradock took the oath of office, and whose name
is appended to a certificate of that fact, at the bottom of the charter. was not
Charles I.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.     361
to them a single privilege of self-government; but left them, as the Virginians had been left, without one valuable franchise, at the mercy of a
corporation within the realm. This was so evident, that some of those
who had already emigrated, clamored that they were become slaves.'
" It was equally the right of the corporation to establish the terms on
which new members should be admitted to its freedom. Its numbers could
be enlarged or changed only by its own consent.
"It was perhaps implied, though it was not expressly required, that
the affairs of the company should be administered in England; yet the
place for holding the courts was not specially appointed. What if the
corporation should vote the emigrants to be freemen, and call a meeting
beyond the Atlantic? What if the Governor, deputy, assistants, and freemen should themselves emigrate, and thus break down the distinction
between the colony and the corporation? 2 The history of Massachusetts
is the counterpart to that of Virginia: the latter obtained its greatest liberty by the abrogation of the charter of its company; the former by a
transfer of its charter, and a daring construction of its powers by the successors of the original patentees." 3
Now   I may remark that it is quite possible Charles I. was
not very careful to scrutinize the effect of the powers which he
assumed to confer by the charter.
The lands granted (with a vast extent of territory besides,
claimed by the Crown) were, notwithstanding the glowing accounts of some navigators respecting the fisheries, deemed of
such small importance that they came very near falling entirely
under the jurisdiction of other governments, from the mere neglect of the English Government to take possession; and so far
as any direct independent action of the Crown was concerned,
such would have been their fate. The patent to the Great
Council of Plymouth, procured by individuals, probably saved
them as a British possession.
And along with this supposition of a lack of value in the territory, King Charles could not have been ignorant of the general
character, political and religious, of the proposed emigrants, and
might well have considered that it was quite immaterial what
1 These were the "old planters,"- squatters, before the charter was granted,
2 If they might do so, it would appear that the charter did secure to them some
privileges of self-government, and that they were not necessarily at the mercy of a
corporation within the realm.
3 See Bancroft, vol. i. pp. 342-345.




362   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
powers were given to the grantees, to be exercised on the other
side of the Atlantic, if thereby England would be rid of a class
of people imbued with notions of republican freedom, and likely
to be very troublesome as nonconformists, if they remained
there.
If he could have cleared his kingdom of many more of a similar character, by a like process, he would have saved his crown
and his life.
On the other hand, it is possible that the grantees were not
fully aware of the extent of the powers conferred by the charter
as they subsequently construed its provisions; but this admits
of grave doubt. We may safely infer that the original draft was
made by counsel employed by the applicants, and submitted to
the crown lawyers for examination. It is not to be supposed
that the crown officers would undertake the duty of preparing a
document which had so much of a private character attached to
it; and as it bears upon its face evidence that it was very carefully drawn up, apparently, so as to confer power without giving
offence, we can hardly make a presumption that none of the
grantees understood its full scope and effect. It is quite clear,
however, that they did not anticipate such an influx of emigration that the very success of their experiment, so far as population was concerned, should have been its overthrow in some of
its most important religious aspects.
But the question is not so much what the King, or other
persons, may have supposed respecting the subject, as what
provisions were contained in the charter.
Whatever rights the charter purported to grant, vested lawfully
in the grantees.
The title to unoccupied lands belonging to Great Britain,
whether acquired by conquest or discovery, was vested in the
Crown. The right to grant corporate franchises was one of the
prerogatives of the King. And the right to institute and to
provide for the institution of colonial governments, whether by
charter, proprietary grant, or commission, was likewise one of
the prerogatives. Parliament had then nothing to do with the
organization or government of colonies.
The confirmation, therefore, in the charter, of the grant of the
lands from the Council of Plymouth (which derived title from




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 363
the grant of James I., and which could grant the lands, but could
not grant nor assign powers of government), with a new grant,
in form, of the same lands, gave to the grantees a title in socage;
substantially a fee-simple, except that there was to be a rendition
of one-fifth of the gold and silver ores. The grant of corporate
powers, in the usual form of grants to private corporations, conferred upon them all the ordinary rights of a private corporation,
under which they could dispose of their lands, and transact all
business in which the company had a private interest. And the
grant of any powers of colonial government, embraced in the
charter, was valid and effective to the extent of the powers
which were granted, whatever those powers might be; the whole,
as against the corporation, being subject to forfeiture for sufficient cause.
The grant and confirmation of the lands, and the grant of
mere corporate powers for private purposes, were private rights,
which vested in the grantees; and which the King could not
divest, except upon some forfeiture regularly enforced. Upon
such forfeiture, the corporation would be dissolved, and all of
the lands belonging to it would revert, in the nature of an
escheat. But this would not affect valid grants previously
made by it.
The grant of power to institute a colonial government, being
a grant not for private but for public purposes, may have a
different consideration. Whether by reason of its connection
with the grant of the lands and of ordinary corporate powers, it
partook so far of the nature of a private right, that it could not
be altered, modified, or revoked, except on forfeiture, enforced by
process; or whether this part of the grant had such a public
character, that the powers of government were held subject to
alteration and amendment;-is hardly open to discussion. At
the present day it is held, that municipal corporations, being for
public uses and purposes, have no vested private rights in the
powers and privileges granted to them, but that they may be
changed at the pleasure of the government. That principle
seems to be equally applicable to a grant of colonial powers of
government; and the better opinion would seem to be, that it was
within the legitimate prerogative of the King, at that day, to
modify, and even to revoke, the powers of that character which




364 CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
had been granted by the Crown, substituting others appropriate
for the purpose.1
If the King had assumed to revoke the powers of government
granted by the charter, without substitution, or if he had imposed any other form of government, by which the essential
features of that which was constituted under the charter would
have been abrogated, it might have been an arbitrary exercise of
power, justifying any revolutionary, resistance which the Colony
could have made. But the Crown, under the then existing laws
of England, must have possessed legally such power over the
Colony as the legislature may exercise over municipal corporations
at the present day. The charter, so far as the powers of government were concerned, could not be treated as a private contract.
The charter was originally the only authority for the government of the territory embraced in it. The Council at Plymouth,
in the county of Devon, never attempted to exercise powers of
government over the Colony of Massachusetts; and there was
no compact or agreement to form a government.       The grantees
professed, in all they did, to act under the charter, and, as they
contended, according to the charter.
We are to look to the terms of the charter, therefore, and to a
sound construction of its provisions, to ascertain what rights of
legislation, religious or otherwise, were possessed by the gran.
tees.
The charter bears date March 4, 1628 [29].
From a careful examination of it, I have no hesitation in
maintaining five propositions in relation to it.
1. The charter is not, and was not, intended to be an act for
the incorporation of a trading or merchants' company merely.
But it was a grant which contemplated the settlement of a
Colony, with power in the incorporated company to govern that
1 If this distinction between public and private corporations, well settled at the
present time, was not then recognized, it is not because there has been a change of
principle since that period; but because the principles which govern these two descriptions of corporate rights were not then well developed; and hence the claim of
the Crown to power over both public and private rights, and the claims of the colonists under their charter, without any distinction between the two. When a right
application is made of this principle to the colonial history, it will show that the
complaints of the colonists of infringement of their charters were not all well
founded.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 365
Colony. - This is shown from its whole structure, in the provisions relating to government, which I shall specify particularly
under the other propositions, and moreover in the power given -
"to the Governor and Company, and their successors,""  " that it shall
and may be lawful to and for the chief commanders, governors, and
officers of the said company for the time being who shall be residents in
the said part of New England in America by these presents granted, and
others there inhabiting, by their appointment and direction, from time to
time, and at all times hereafter, for their special defence and safety; to encounter, expulse, repel, and resist, by force of arms and by all fitting ways
and means whatsoever, all such person and persons, as shall at any time
hereafter attempt or enterprise the destruction, detriment, or annoyance
to the said plantation or inhabitants, and to take and surprise by all ways
and means whatsoever, all and every such person or persons with their
ships, armor, munition, and other goods, as shall in hostile manner invade, or attempt the defeating of the said plantation, or the hurt of the
said company and inhabitants."
Here is a complete grant of the power to make defensive war,
without any order from, or recourse to, the Crown; and, of
course, according to the judgment of the company and its
officers.
2. The charter authorized the establishment of the government of the Colony within the limits of the territory to be
governed, as was done by the vote to transfer the charter and
government.
I am aware that Mr. Justice Story, in his Commentaries on
the Constitution, says, " It is observable that the whole structure
of the charter presupposes the residence of the company in
England, and the transaction of all its business there."'  But
that position cannot be maintained. I venture to say, that there
is no provision in the charter, which either expressly, or by
implication, presupposes such residence. On the contrary, if it
cannot be asserted that the whole scope of the charter comtemplates the establishment of the government within the
Colony, it will be found that it contains provisions which it
would have been next to impossible to execute, except by a
transfer of the charter and government to the place to be
governed.
1 1 Story's Com. on the Const. ~ 64.




366   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
The charter provides that there shall, or may be, four general
assemblies, which shall be styled and called the four great and
General Courts of the company, in which, in the manner there
provided, the Governor, or deputy, and such of the assistants and
freemen of the company, as shall be present, " shall have full
power and authority to choose, nominate, and appoint such, and
so many others, as they shall think fit, and that shall be willing
to accept the same, to be free of the said company and body,
and them into the same to admit; and to elect and constitute
such officers as they shall think fit and requisite, for the ordering,
managing, and despatching of the affairs of the company."
Is it possible to believe that none of the emigrants, - the
very men most interested,in the administration of the affairs of
the company, - were to be admitted as freemen, so as to have
a voice? It would seem much more probable that it should have
been intended they should form a majority.  But how were
they to attend the four General Courts, if these were held in
England?
The clauses in relation to the election and removal of officers,
and to the administration of the oaths of office, are still more
significant.
"' Yearly, once in the year," namely, the last Wednesday in
Easter term, the Governor, deputy governor, and assistants, and
all other officers of the company, were to be " newly chosen for
the year ensuing," in the General Court, or assembly, to be held
for that day and time, by the greater part of the company, for
the time being, then and there present. And in case the Governor, deputy governor, any of the assistants, or any other of the
officers to be appointed for the company, should die, or be removed (power being given to the company to remove for any
misdemeanor or defect), it was made lawful for the company, in
any of their assemblies, to proceed to a new election in the place
of the officer so dying or removed; " and immediately upon and
after such election," the authority, office, and power, before given
to the officer removed, were to cease and determine.
By another provision of the charter, the Governor, deputy
governor, assistants, and all other officers to be appointed and
chosen, were required before they undertook the execution of
their respective offices, to take an oath for the faithful perform



CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 367
ance of their duties. The Governor was to take the oath of
office before the deputy governor, or two of the assistants; and
the deputy governor, and assistants, and all other officers chosen
from time to time, were to take their oaths before the Governor
of the company.
It is readily seen that these provisions of the charter could be
conveniently executed, if the company was within the Colony,
and the government administered there.  And a very slight
examination shows how nearly impossible it would be to execute them, if the Colony was to be governed by a company in
England. In the case of the death of the incumbent of an
office, the duties of which were to be performed in the Colony,
it would take a month for the intelligence of the decease to
reach the company in England, and at least a month or six
weeks more, ordinarily a much longer time, for a notice of the
new election to reach the Colony; during which time, there
would be no regular officer to perform the duties.
Is it answered that provision could be made by law, that in
such case the duties should be performed by some other officer?
That will not apply to the case of a removal, as it could not be
known that the officer was removed, until a month or six weeks
after the removal was made, and yet the office would be vacated
at the time of the removal by the company in England; the
officer performing acts supposed to be official, but which would
be void.
The provision in relation to the oaths of office would be more
nearly impracticable. All the officers, as we have seen, whether
newly elected at an annual election, or to fill vacancies occasioned
by death or removal, were to take the oath of office before they
could execute the duties of the office; so that if the company
remained in England, and the General Courts were held there,
all the officers chosen for the managing and despatching of the
affairs of the company, who resided in the plantation, and most
of them must be there, would have' to go to England to take
their oaths of office, before they could execute their offices; or,
the Governor would be obliged to be in the plantation to administer the oaths there, after notice who were elected; and after
each annual election, the deputy governor, or two assistants,
must first administer the oath to him, before he could go to the




868   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
plantation, or if he were there, must go themselves to the plantation to find him, and administer the oath there, before he could
administer the oaths to others. Such a state of things would
furnish too great a temptation, in any but a Puritan community,
to some other oaths than oaths of office.
It has been suggested that in the clause authorizing the
General Court to make laws, there is a provision which would
authorize a law, by which other persons than the Governor,
deputy governor, or assistants, might administer oaths; and this
may be true in relation to oaths to be administered to any
officers, other than " all other officers to be hereafter chosen as
aforesaid, from time to time," by the company, although the
provision refers more particularly to laws prescribing the forms
of oaths than to the administration of them, as will be seen by a
reference to the provision itself.
If, however, it is assumed that it conferred power to make
laws for the administration of oaths by such persons as the laws
of the Colony should prescribe, it must be limited to officers
other than those chosen by the company. It could not be construed to authorize a law providing for the administration of
oaths to the Governor, deputy governor, assistants, or to " all
other officers to be appointed and chosen as aforesaid" (that is,
to all officers of the company), otherwise than according to the
special provisions of the charter already considered prescribing
before whom they should take their oaths; for, thus construed, it
would give a power to make laws contradictory to the provisions
of the charter itself, which would be a construction entirely inadmissible.
No general provision authorizing the making of laws, " for the
settling of the forms and ceremonies of government and magistracy," "for naming and styling of all sorts of officers, both
superior and inferior," for " setting forth the duties, powers, and
limits, of every such office and place, and the forms of such
oaths warrantable by the laws and statutes of this our realm of
England, as shall be respectively ministered unto them," &c.,
can operate to abrogate the special provisions which precede it;
- authorizing the election of officers, annual elections, appointments in case of death and removal, and providing that " the
newly elected deputy governor, and assistants, and all other




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.  369
officers to be hereafter chosen as aforesaid, from time to time,
shall take the oaths to their places respectively belonging before
the Governor of the company for the time being."
Who, then, were the other officers to be hereafter chosen, as
aforesaid, from time to time, respecting whom it was specially
provided that they should take their oaths before the Governor?
Certainly not merely the secretary, treasurer, and other persons,
who should be directly connected with the meetings of the company. If the King had undertaken to plant a Colony, to prescribe
the laws, and to appoint the officers; all the officers,-judges,
sheriffs, attorney-general, &c., appointed by him, would have
been officers of the Ctown. When, instead of this, he committed the planting, ruling, appointing officers, &c., to the company; the judges, sheriffs, justices of the peace, and other officers
appointed directly by the company, were officers of the company, as much so as the secretary and treasurer; and, as
such, they were among the " other officers," who were required
by the charter, to take their oaths before the Governor. Legislation providing for the administration of oaths to officers
not appointed by the company might be valid; as would be
provisions for the administration of oaths to jurymen, witnesses, &c.
If we infer that there was no supposition that the plantation
would become so large as to require a great force of officers, it
does not change the construction of the charter.
I admit that there were some proceedings which tend to show,
that the requirements of the charter in respect to oaths were
not fully understood by the members of the company generally.
At the General Court in England, on the 30th April, 1629,
Endicott, who had come over as governor of the plantation,
before the charter was granted, was elected or confirmed as
governor, and a deputy governor and council were appointed;
and it was ordered, that the Governor, deputy governor, and
council then in New England, should make choice of a secretary and other needful officers, and should frame and administer to them such oaths as they should think good. But
this was very soon after the charter was procured, and while its
provisions were imperfectly understood, as is evident from the
fact that, at the same meeting, it was ordered, that Governor
24




370   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
Endicott, or his deputy, and the council, having taken their
oaths, -
"shall have full power and authority, and they are hereby authorized, by
power derived from His Majesty's letters patent, to make, ordain, and
establish all manner of wholesome and reasonable orders, laws, statutes,
ordinances, directions, and instructions, not contrary to the laws of the
realm of England, for the present government of our plantation, and the
inhabitants residing within the limits of our plantation, a copy of all which
orders is to be sent to the company in England." 1
It is quite clear, that those who passed this vote to confer upon
the administrative government in the plantation -" by power,"
as they alleged, "derived from His Majesty's letters patent"full authority to make laws, while the company to which the
power was granted existed in England, had not an exact comprehension of the nature and character of the charter; for this vote
assumed, that the power to make laws was assignable, or rather
that it might be duplicated. Whether there were those who had
a better knowledge, but thought that some such measure was
necessary until the charter and government could be transferred,
cannot now be known.
The attempt at two governments, in a modified form, continued some time afterwards.
" It was thought fit, in making the transfer, that the government of persons should be held in the plantation, and the government of trade and
merchandise should be in England."
These proceedings occasioned the charge in the quo warranto,
in 1635, that they held two councils, - one in England, and the
other in America.
Authority was also given by the charter to the Governor,
deputy governor, or any two assistants, to administer " the oath
and oaths of supremacy and allegiance, or either of them, to all
and every person and persons, which shall at any time or times
go to or pass to the lands and premises" granted, to inhabit the
same.
Persons, not subjects, might go with the assent of the company.   Suppose there had been a disposition to administer
these oaths, and all persons had been required, in conformity
1 See Mass. Records, vol. i. pp. 38, 361, 386; Hazard's Coll., vol. i. pp. 256, 268.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.  371
with this authority, to take them: were persons proposing to
emigrate, to seek, in England, for the officers authorized to
administer them, and take the oaths before embarkation? Were
strangers,- foreigners, -expected to do so?
The absurdity of provisions intended to operate in the manner
stated, more especially in relation to removals and the administration of the oaths of office, furnishes plenary evidence that no
construction was intended confining the company to England;
and we axe led, therefore, to the conclusion, that the transfer
was not only beyond exception, but that it was perhaps contemplated by some of the parties interested, when the charter
was granted.
The intrinsic difficulty of making laws for and governing
such a colony by a corporation having its locality in England,
would seem to be so apparent as to be evidence respecting the
intent, and the true construction of the charter.
It was necessarily within the scope of the charter, that the
grantees should occupy and cultivate the lands confirmed and
granted by it, in the place where they were situated. It was
equally, if not necessarily, within its scope, to exercise the private
corporate privileges which related to those lands, in the place of
their location, -and to institute and administer the political
government, over the persons settled upon them, in the place
which they inhabited.
There is also strong extraneous evidence to show, that there
must have been a supposition, on the part of some of those concerned, that the charter and government would be transferred at
an early day. Before the charter was obtained, and, it seems probable, during the time in which efforts were making to procure it,
the grantees, under the grant from the Council of Plymouth, had
adopted measures for the settlement of the plantation. Endicott
embarked in June, 1628; arriving in September, with power to
manage their affairs, and it appears with the title of Governor.
A letter was addressed to him and others, April 17, 1629, informing them that the charter was obtained, confirming him as
governor, and joining seven persons with him as a council.
Then came the proceedings of April 30th already referred to.
The experience of less than a year may have shown the necessity of having oaths of office administered in the plantation, and




372  CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
of having the laws made where they were to be administered,
and thus have led to the orders of that date, without much
study of the charter itself, by those members of the company
who had not been actively engaged in procuring it; while those
who better understood its provisions, in view of the probable
transfer of the charter and government in a short time, did not
deem it expedient to interpose objections.
At a General Court under the charter, May 13, 1629, Cradock
was elected governor of the company for the year ensuing.1
But at a court held July 28th, " Mr. Governor read certain propositions, conceived by himself; viz., that for the advancement of
the plantation, the inducing persons of worth and quality to
transplant themselves and families thither, and for other weighty
reasons therein contained, to transfer the government of the
plantation to those that shall inhabit there, and not to continue
the same in subordination to the company here, as it now is."
Those present were desired privately and seriously to consider
of it, and produce their reasons at the next General Court, and
in the mean time to carry the business secretly that it be not
divulged.2
This was, doubtless, in connection with the negotiations with
Winthrop and others, to come over and settle. But following
so closely upon the grant of the charter, and taken in connection
with its provisions, the inference is strong, I think, that the matter had been previously agitated among some of those interested.
At a General Court held August 29th, the reasons pro and
contra having been heard, it appeared, by a hand vote, that it
was the general desire and consent of the company, that the
government and plantation should be settled in New England,
and it was ordered accordingly.3
Other evidence is derived from the fact, that no objection
appears to have been made by the King or his Council, which
strengthens the inference that the crown lawyers, who examined
the charter, must have supposed that such a movement was
probable.
Mr. Justice Story says, " The power of the corporation to make the
transfer has been seriously doubted, and even denied. But the boldness
1 Mass. Records, vol. i. p. 40.  2 Mass. Records, vol. i. p. 49.
3 Mass. Records, vol. i.. 1.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.  373
of the step is not more striking than the silent acquiescence of the King
in permitting it to take place." 
If, however, we suppose that some of his councillors, when
the charter was examined, saw that this might be done, the
wonder ceases.2
Upon petition of Sir Christopher Gardiner, Sir Ferdinando
Gorges, and Captain John Mason, growing in part, doubtless,
out of Gardiner's grievances, and in part, probably, out of the
conflict of title in the others, but representing " great distraction
and much disorder" in New England, the matter was referred
to the Privy Council, and examined by a committee, who heard
the complainants, and divers of the principal adventurers.
Whereupon, without determining certain contested matters of
fact, resting to be proved by parties that must be called from the
Colony, the Council, Jan. 19, 1632, "not laying the fault or
fancies (if any be), of some particular men, upon the general
government or principal adventurers,"3 thought fit to declare
5' that the appearances were so fair, and hopes so great, that the
country would prove both beneficial to this kingdom, and profitable to the particulars, as that the adventurers had cause to go
on cheerfully with their undertakings; and rest assured that if
things were carried as pretended wzhen the patents were granted,
and accordingly as by the patent is appointed, his Majesty would
not only maintain the liberties and privileges heretofore granted,
but supply any thing farther that might tend to the good government, prosperity, and comfort of his people there, of that
place."4 This shows, conclusively, not only that no objections
were then taken by the Privy Council to the transfer of the
charter and government, but that none were taken to the general
exercise of the powers of a colonial government, in the manner
in which the grantees were exercising them.
Winthrop, in his History of New England, referring to the
first intelligence of this proceedings says, " The principal matter
1 1 Story's Cor., ~ 65.
2 These matters are not material to the determination of the question whether
the transfer was lawfully made. But the inference that it was originally contemplated seems so strong, that I have deemed it expedient to call attention to the
facts.
3 Hutch. Coll. Papers, p. 53.
4 Hutch. Coll. Papers, p. 54; Chalm. Annals, vol. i. p. 155; Neal's Hist., p. 154.




374   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
they had against us, was the letters of some indiscreet persons
among us, who had written against the church government in England." 1 But in a subsequent paragraph, having then, it is to be presumed, received a copy, he speaks of the petition, as " accusing
us to intend rebellion, to have cast off our allegiance, and to be
wholly separate from the church and laws of England; that our
ministers and people did continually rail against the State, and
church, and bishops there," &c.  Sir Richard Saltonstall, Mr.
Humfrey, and Mr. Cradock were called before a committee
of the Council, and a hearing was had.   Winthrop says further, that"The king, when the matter was reported to him by Sir Thomas
Jermyn, one of the Council, who spoke much in commendation, of the
Governor, both to the lords, and afterwards to his Majesty, said that he
would have them severely punished, who did abuse his governor and the
plantation; that the defendants were dismissed with a favorable order for
their encouragement, being assured by some of the Council, that his
Majesty did not intend to impose the ceremonies of the Church of England upon us, for that it was considered, that it was the freedom from such
things that made people come over to us." 2
There were subsequent complaints from two classes of persons, -those who had adverse territorial claims, and those who
had experienced the discipline of the Colony. Mason was particularly active, insomuch that Winthrop appears to have been
resigned to the providence of God, which, in 1635, " in mercy,
taking him  away," terminated his efforts to overthrow  the
government.3
In February, 1633-34, on the understanding of the transportation of great numbers to  New England, among them
" divers persons known to be ill affected, discontented not only
with civil, but ecclesiastical government here, whereby such
confusion and distraction is already grown there, especially in
point of religion, as, beside the ruin of the said plantation,
cannot but highly tend to the scandal both of Church and State
here," there was an order of the King in Council to stay divers
ships then in the Thames, ready to set sail, with an order that
the masters and freighters should attend the Council, and a
1 Winthrop's Hist., vol. i. p. 100.  2 Ib., p. 103.  3 Ib., p. 187.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.   375
further order, "that Mr. Cradock, a chief adventurer in that
plantation, now present before the board, should cause the letters
patent for the plantation to be brought before this board."'
The ships were permitted to sail, on representations respecting
the commercial interests which would be affected by their detention; and it would seem     from what followed, that Cradock
answered, that the charter was in the hands of Winthrop.
Laud became Archbishop of Canterbury in 1633; and his influence may perhaps be traced in this action of the Privy
Council.  Winthrop attributes it to " the archbishops and others
of the Council;" and supposes that the intention was " to call
in our patent." 2
Shortly afterwards, on the 28th of April, 1634, a commission
for regulating plantations, was issued to the Archbishop of
Canterbury, the Lord Keeper, and others, most, if not all, of them
members of the Privy Council, giving them, among other things,
power of protection and government over the colonies planted
and to be planted, "power to make laws, ordinances, and constitutions, concerning either the State public of the said colonies,
or utility of private persons, and their lands, goods," &c.; " and
for relief and support of the clergy;" " and for consigning of convenient maintenance unto them by tithes," &c.; power to inflict
punishment on offenders by imprisonment and other restraints,
or by loss of life, or members; power to hear and determine all
complaints, whether against the whole colonies, or any governor, or officer. And then comes a clause, the intent of which
may readily be discovered from what followed.
" And we do, furthermore, give unto you, or any five or more of you,
letters patents, and other writings whatsoever, of us or of our royal predecessors granted, for or concerning the planting of any colonies, in any
countries, provinces, islands, or territories whatsoever, beyond the seas;
and if, upon view thereof, the same shall appear to you, or any five or
more of you, to have been surreptitiously and unduly obtained, or that
any privileges or liberties therein granted, be hurtful to us, our Crown or
1 Hutch. Hist., vol. i. p. 33. From the order in which these proceedings are stated
in Hubbard and Hutchinson, it would appear, that the King's expression of satisfaction was at the close of this hearing in 1633; but the dates in Winthrop's History
show that to have been the year previous. Hubbard's dates in regard to these
matters are not trustworthy.
2 Winthrop, vol. i. p. 135.




376   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
prerogative royal, or to any foreign princes, to cause the same, according
to the laws and customs of our realm of England, to be revoked; and to
do all other things which shall be necessary, for the wholesome government and protection of the said colonies and our people therein abiding."'
It appears from a recital in a subsequent order, made in 1638,
that the Commissioners, in 1634 or 1635, gave an order "to
Mr. Cradock, a member of that plantation, to cause the grant or
letters patent of that plantation (alleged by him to be there
remaining in the hands of Mr. Winthrop) to be sent over hither."
In pursuance of the project for a general governor for the
whole of New England, Gorges was directed to confer with the
Council at Plymouth, to resolve whether they would resign their
patent; and in April, 1635, the Duke of Lenox and others of
that company, supposed to be acting in Gorges' interest, presented to the Lords of the Council2 a petition, proposing to
surrender; but praying, among other things, that the patent for
the plantation of the Massachusetts Bay might be revoked.
Under the direction of the Commissioners, Sir John Banks,
the Attorney-General, brought a quo warranto to enforce a forfeiture, in 1635.  The process seems to have been founded upon
an assumption, that the company had no rights whatever.
There were fourteen allegations of usurpation; denying the
defendants' claim of title to land, their claims to be a corporation, and to have the sole government of the country, &c.;
and alleging that they made laws and statutes against the laws
of England. There was no allegation that they had unlawfully
established the government within the colony; but among the
usurpations set forth was," to keep a constant council in England of men of their own company and
choosing, and to name, choose, and swear certain persons to be of that
council; and to keep one council, ever resident in New England, chosen
out of themselves, and to name, choose, and swear whom they please to
be of that council."
Also, to have several common seals.3 There was no service in
the Colony;4 but service was made upon several of the grantees
1 Hutch. Hist. (App.) vol. i. p. 502.
2 The Commissioners for Foreign Plantations are often so called, and there is
danger of confusion, unless care is taken to distinguish their acts from those of the
Privy Council.
3 Hutch. Coll. Papers, p. 101.  4 Hutch. Hist., vol. i. p. 86.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 377
who were in England, each of whom, except Cradock, pleaded
severally that he never usurped any of said liberties, and disclaimed. Against them, there was judgment that they should
not for the future intermeddle with any of said franchises, but
should be for ever excluded from the use of the same. Cradock
appeared, and then made default; upon which there was judgment that he should be convicted of the usurpation charged, and
that the liberties, privileges, and franchises should be taken and
seized into the King's hand. The process was pending about
two years, and there was judgment of outlawry against the
rest of the patentees.1  But this judgment availed nothing.
Jones and Winnington, attorney and solicitor general, in 1678,
concurred in an opinion, "that neither the quo warranto was so
brought, nor the judgment thereupon so given, as could cause a
dissolution of the charter." 2  The particular reasons were not
stated. But we may well suppose the reason to have been, that
there was no service on the corporation, nor on any of the
members in Massachusetts, nor any legal outlawry as against
them, and judgment of seizure was rendered against Cradoch
only. The reason for this probably was, that the process of the
Court of King's Bench did not run into the Colony, because the
Court had no jurisdiction there; and there could, of course, be
no legal service there.
April 4th, 1638, the Lords Commissioners, taking into consideration that complaints grow more frequent " for want of a
settled and orderly government in those parts;" and, calling to
mind their former order to Mr. Cradock, about two or three
years since, to cause the patent to be sent over; and, being
informed by the attorney-general that judgment had been entered
in the quo warranto, ordered that the clerk of the council, attendant upon them, should, in a letter from himself to Mr. Winthrop,
convey their order; in which, "in his Majesty's name, and
according to his express will and pleasure," as they said, they
strictly required and enjoined him, or any other who had the
custody, that they fail not to transmit the patent by the return
of the ship;"it being resolved, that, in case of any further neglect or contempt by
them showed therein, their Lordships will cause a strict course to be
1 Hutch. Coll. Papers, p. 103.  2 Chalmers's Annals, vol. i. pp. 405, 439.




378   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
taken against them, and will move his Majesty to reassume into his
hands the whole plantation." 
The General Court replied, that they were much grieved that
their Lordships should call in the patent, there being no cause
known to them, and no delinquency or fault of theirs expressed
in the order; asking to know what was laid to their charge, and
to have time to answer; assuring their Lordships that they were
never called to answer the quo warranto; and if they had been,
they doubted not that they should have put in a sufficient plea;
and representing that, if the patent should be taken from them,
they should   be looked on as "runnigadoes" and outlaws,
enforced to remove to some other place, or to return to their
native country, either of which would put them to unsupportable
extremities; and that (among other evils enumerated) the common people would conceive, that his Majesty had cast them off,
and that they were freed from their allegiance, and thereupon
would " be ready to confederate themselves under a new government, for their necessary safety and subsistence, which will be
of dangerous example to other plantations, and perilous to ourselves of incurring his Majesty's displeasure." 2
These repeated calls for the patent were in fact demands for
its surrender, and they so understood.
Hutchinson says, " It was never known what reception this
answer met with.     It is certain that no further demand was
made." 3 But he is mistaken.
It appears from   Winthrop's History, vol. i. p. 298, that in
1639- the precise date is not given" The Governor received letters from  Mr. Cradock, and in them
another order from the Lords Commissioners, to this effect; that, whereas
they had received our petition upon their former order, &c., by which
they perceived, that we were taken with some jealousies and fears of their
intentions, &c., they did accept of our answer, and did now declare their
I Hutch. Coll. Papers, vol. i. p. 105. Hutchinson appends to a copy of the order
this note: "Whether the intent of this order was, that the patent should be sent
over, that the government of the colony might be under a corporation in England
according to the true intent of the patent, or whether it was that the patent might
be surrendered, is uncertain." But the quo warranto might have solved that doubt.
2 Hutch. Hist. App., vol. i. p. 507; Winthrop, vol. i. p. 269.
8 Hutch. Hist., vol. i. p. 88.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.   379
intentions to be only to regulate all plantations to be subordinate to
their said Commission; and that they meant to continue our liberties, &c.;
and therefore did now again peremptorily require the Governor to send
them our patent by the first ship; and that, in the mean time, they did
give us, by that order, full power to go on in the government of the
people, until we had a new patent sent us; and withal they added threats
of further course to be taken with us, if we failed! "
The next paragraph of the History is a curiosity, and I cannot
resist the temptation to copy it in full. It shows why Hutchinson never heard of the reception, and the further demand: -
"This order being imparted to the next General Court, some advised
to return answer to it. Others thought fitter to make no answer at all;
because, being sent in a private letter, and not delivered by a certain
messenger, as the former order was, they could not proceed upon it, because they could not have any proof that it was delivered to the
Governor; and order was taken, that Mr. Cradock's agent, who delivered
the letter to the Governor, &c., should, in his letters to his master, make
no mention of the letters he delivered to the Governor, seeing that his
master had not laid any charge upon him to that end."
The Lords Commissioners frankly admit their object, in this
last order.  They intended to bring all the plantations into
subjection under their commission. The charter stood in their
way.   They called for it, and it did not come.     Process to
enforce a forfeiture of it had failed. There was a very good
reason for this thrice-repeated demand by the Commissioners.
Their commission purported to give it to them, with authority
to revoke it, if, upon view of it, they found any thing hurtful to the
King, his crown, or prerogative royal.  The possession of it was
thus made necessary to a revocation by the Commissioners.    A
view of a copy was not sufficient. No reason is apparent why
this might not have been made otherwise. Perhaps it would
have been, if there had been apprehension of difficulty in obtaining possession.   But so it stood.     Therefore the repeated
attempts to obtain a surrender, with the threats if it was not
forthcoming.   It was important to exhibit a semblance of a
legal revocation.   There were too many complaints of the
exercise of arbitrary power in England, to render it expedient
to add others in relation to the colonies.
We have seen how the General Court disposed of the last




380   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
demand; and the King and Laud soon found other matters to
occupy their attention.
Now in all these proceedings, the character of which I have
stated in detail, I find no trace of an allegation, that " the true
intent of the patent " was, that the government of the Colony
should be under a corporation in England; and I submit, that
the omission of such an allegation was a moral impossibility,
if it had been so understood, especially as the transfer of the
charter caused the main obstacle to the efforts of the Commissioners to revoke it.
The first appearance of an official objection which I have
found, against the transfer, was in July, 1679, in the course of the
difficulties in which Randolph was so conspicuous; "when," as
Chalmers says, "the King wrote to the General Court, and required that other agents should be sent over, properly instructed;
giving as a reason, which struck at the foundation of its power,
that, since the charter by its frame was originally to have been
executed within the kingdom, otherwise than by deputy, it is not
possible to establish perfect settlement till those things are better
understood." 1 This objection is among the articles of high
crimes and misdemeanors presented by Randolph to the Committee of the Council, in 1682.2  But it finds no place in the
process in Chancery, in 1684, in which a decree was entered, that
the charter be vacated, and cancelled.3
Chalmers, in another place, states, that the Attorney-General,
Sawyer, gave it as his official opinion, "that the patent having
created the grantees and their assigns a body corporate, they
might transfer their charter and act in New England."  The
reason thus stated, is certainly not satisfactory. Chalmers adds,
that " the two Chief Justices, Rainsford and North, fell into a
similar mistake, by supposing that the corporate powers were to
have been originally executed in New England," 4-an opinion
which I have endeavored to sustain, by the terms of the charter, before I was aware of the high authority by which it was supported.
Usage is permitted to give a construction to an ancient
charter or deed, where there is an ambiguity.  Here was a
use of the powers of government under the charter, -holding
l Chalmers's Annals, vol. i. p. 408.  2 Ib., p. 462.
3 Mass. Hist. Coll. 4th Series, vol. ii. p. 246.  4 Chalmers, p. 173.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.    381
General Courts, and transacting all the business of the corporation
within the Colony, which, if unlawful, rendered all the acts
done under it during the time legally invalid,  with no objection
on the part of the Crown in that particular, although other objections were made that the corporation had transcended its powers.
If this is not strictly a " usage" within the general rule, it is a
contemporaneous construction by all parties, which is as strong,
and even stronger, evidence than usage, to give the true interpretation of an instrument. When we add to this the fact, that
in two processes to enforce the forfeiture of the charter, there is
an entire omission of any allegation that wrong had been done
in this respect, the evidence is sufficient to overcome any, even a
very grave, ambiguity.  But the fact, that there is here no ambiguity, explains the absence of all objections.
I am referred to " A copy of the docquet of the grant to Sir
Henry Rosewell and others, taken out of the Privy-seal-office, at
Whitehall," authorizing the draft of the charter; to show that it
was the intention of the Crown or Council th-at the corporation
should have its residence in England. It runs thus:"' A grant and confirmation unto Sir Henry Rosewell, his partners, and
their associates, to their heirs and assigns for ever, of a part of America,
called New-England, granted unto him by a charter from divers noblemen
and others, to whom the same was granted by the late king James, with
a tenure in socage, and reservation of one-third part of the gold and silver
ore: Incorporating them by the name of the governor and company of the
Massachusetts-Bay, in New-England, in America, with such other privileges, for electing governors and officers here in England for the said
company; with such other privileges and immunities as were originally
granted to the said noblemen and others, and are usually allowed to corporations here in England. His majesty's pleasure, signified by Sir Ralph
Freemen, upon direction of the lord-keeper of the great-seal; subscribed
by Mr. Attorney-general; procured by the lord viscount Dorchester; February, 1628. Memorandum. Their charter passed 4th March following." 1
I will admit that this is explicit enough to show that there
was an intention when that minute was made, that the corporation should have a local habitation in England.
But I remark first, that by the plainest rules of evidence,
this memorandum of the proceedings of the Council, prior to the
1 Chalmers's Annals, vol. i. p. 147.




382  CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
grant of the charter, cannot be admitted as evidence to control
or vary the provisions of this instrument, as actually drawn up,
formally executed, with the great seal annexed, and made matter
of record; or to show the intention at the time of the final execution. In the absence of all ambiguity, the intention is to be
derived only from the instrument itself.
My next remark is, that this " docquet," taken in connection
with the charter itself, and other admitted facts, furnishes most
plenary proof that the intention thus appearing, was in fact
changed when the charter was afterwards drawn and authenticated. There would be no need of another " docquet" to show
this, as the charter itself would and did show it.
The palpable difference between the terms of this memorandum
and the charter itself, in the omission of an express provision in the
charter assigning a residence in England to the corporation, can
be accounted for only on a change of intention upon that point. It
was not a matter which could have slipped out accidentally, and
the omission have escaped the scrutiny to which the charter must
have been subjected after it was prepared, and before it passed
the great seal.
Further, the docquet shows an intention at that time, to
grant such other privileges and immunities as were originally
granted to the said noblemen and others (the Council at Plymouth), and are usually allowed to corporations in England.
Here again, the great difference between the charter itself, and
the intention shown by the minutes, is palpable evidence of a
change of intention in this respect, also. It is sufficient to specify
the difference in two or three particulars.
The Council consisted of forty members, each of whom were
to be presented to the Lord Chancellor, or the Lord High
Treasurer, or the Lord Chamberlain of the Household, to take
his oath. Power was given to the President, deputy, or any two
councillors, to administer the oaths of allegiance and supremacy
to all persons who should go to the Colony of New England;
and it was made lawful for them to minister oaths as well to
persons employed by them, for the faithful performance of their
service, as to other persons, for the clearing of the truth; but
there was no clause requiring officers other than those who were
councillors to take any oath of office; and their laws, as we




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.  383
have seen, were to be as near as conveniently might be to those
of England.   The difference between the Council at Plymouth,
and the Governor and Company of Massachusetts Bay, was
substantially between an aristocratic corporation, composed of
forty noblemen and gentlemen, which was to exercise its powers
at a specified place in England, and make laws like the laws of
England, as near as conveniently might be, and which might
or might not administer oaths to persons in its employment;
and a democratic corporation of an indefinite number, which
was to hold General Courts, and might enact such laws as
should be found expedient, so they were not contrary to the laws
of the realm; which was required to administer oaths to all the
officers, in a particular mode, fo~ the faithful discharge of their
duties; and which was not restricted as to place, so that it
might set up its government either in England or on the Plantation, as it should see fit. Assuredly the docquet did not govern
the provisions of the charter.
After setting out the copy of the docquet, Chalmers proceeds, -
" In the same papers, bundle 5, page 322, there is a sketch, drawn by
Mr. Blathwayt, stating'the clauses in the charter, shewing, that it was
intended thereby that the corporation should be resident in England.'
And, indeed, the whole tenor of the patent, as well as the subsequent
conduct of the corporation, evinces the truth of that important fact.
But the following extract of an agreement, entered into at Cambridge,
the 26th of August, 1629, between Saltonstall, Dudley, Winthrop, and
other chief leaders of Massachusetts, demonstrates that truth. From
a collection of papers, made by Mr. Hutchinson, relative to the history of
Massachusetts, p. 25-6:"' We sincerely promise, to embark for the said plantation, by the first
of March next, to the end to pass the seas (under God's protection), to
inhabit and continue in New England. Provided always, that, before the
last of September next, the whole government, together with the patent
for the said plantation, be first, by an order of Court, legally transferred
and established, to remain with us and others, which shall inhabit upon
the said plantation."'
Blathwayt was contemporary with Randolph.        It seems,
therefore, that this specification of clauses was made about the
time Randolph was alleging that the government was unlawfully




384  CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
established in Massachusetts; that is to say, some forty or fifty
years after its establishment there. What these clauses were, I
am unable to say. Chalmers does not state them, and, unfortunately, I do not find them in the charter.
But the most wonderful evidence of an intention that the
corporation should be resident in England, is that derived by
Chalmers from the agreement of Winthrop and others, which
he copies, and which he says demonstrates its truth. His conclusion is to be accounted for, perhaps, by the supposition that
he understood the words, " by an order of Court," in this agreement, to refer to the Court of his Majesty, at Whitehall; whereas,
the contracting parties had reference to an order of the General
Court of the Company, such as was passed three days afterwards.
Chalmers concedes that this docquet " evinces, that what was
so strongly asserted, during the reign of Charles II., to prove
that the charter was surreptitiously obtained, is unjust."
I have considered this proposition at length; not only because
the transfer has sometimes been regarded as sharp practice on
the part of the grantees, but for the reason, already suggested,
that, if the transfer was unlawful, the whole legislation of the
company afterwards was unwarranted.     The company had
power to make laws for, and to govern, a Colony. But their
authority to do this was as a corporation; and a corporation,
having a fixed locality, cannot hold corporate meetings, make
by-laws, elect officers, and do other acts necessary to be done by
the corporation itself, except in the place where it has its legal
residence. In the absence of prohibition or limitation, it may
hold property, may trade, and perform other acts which can be
done by agents, elsewhere.
3. The charter gave ample powers of legislation and of
government for the Plantation, or Colony, including power to
legislate on religious subjects, in the manner in which the
grantees and their associates claimed and exercised the legislative power.
It granted power to the General Courts"from time to time to make, ordain, and establish, all manner of wholesome and reasonable orders, laws, statutes, ordinances, directions, and
instructions, not contrary to the laws of this our realm of England, as




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.    385
well for settling the forms and ceremonies of government and magistracy,
fit and necessary for the said plantation, and the inhabitants there, and
fbr naming and settling all sorts of officers, both superior and inferior,
which they shall find needful for that government and plantation, and the
distinguishing and setting forth of the several duties, powers, and limits
of every such office and place, and the forms of such oaths warrantable
by the laws and statutes of this our realm of England as shall be respectively ministered unto them, for the execution of the said several
offices and places; as also for the disposing and ordering of the elections
of such of the said officers as shall be annual, and of such others as shall
be to succeed in case of death or removal, and ministering the said oaths
to the newly elected officers, and for impositions of lawful fines, mulcts,
imprisonment, or other lawful correction, according to the course of other
corporations in this our realm of England; and for the directing, ruling,
and disposing of all other matters and things, whereby our said people,
inhabitants there, may be so religiously, peaceably, and civilly governed,
as their good life and orderly conversation may win and incite the natives
of the country to the knowledge and obedience of the only true God and
Saviour of mankind, and the Christian faith, which, in our royal intention
and the adventurer's free profession, is the principal end of this plantation."
4 Willing, commanding, and requiring, ordaining and appointing," that all such orders, laws, statutes, and ordinances, instructions and directions, as should be so made by the Governor,
deputy governor, assistants, and freemen, and published in
writing under their common seal, should be carefully and duly
observed, kept, performed, and put in execution; the letters
patent to be to all officers a sufficient warrant therefor, against
the King himself, and his heirs and successors.
But there was a restriction upon their legislation, religious as
well as civil.  They were to make no laws contrary to the laws
of the realm; and the question arises, What was the character
and what the extent of this restraint?
We may safely conclude that the meaning of the provision is
not that they are to make no laws different from   the common
law of England, for much of that law was entirely inapplicable
to their condition, so that they were under the necessity of
making different laws.    Laws different from, contrary to, the
laws of feudal tenure could not come within the prohibition.
The same may be said of laws relating to the peerage, and
divers other matters of more common concern.
25




386  CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
So we may be assured that it was not a prohibition to make
laws different from the statutes of England, for it was known
that it was to escape from some of those laws that they emigrated. If they could make no law which provided for a different form of worship than that which was established in England,-if they must establish that with all its concomitants,
they would hardly have crossed the Atlantic for the privilege of
voluntarily subjugating themselves by their own acts, to the
pains and penalties, and violation of conscience, to which the
acts of others would have subjected them if they had remained. Moreover, they had no bishops, - could not consecrate
any, - and no one proposed to do that for them when the charter
was granted. Laud would doubtless have been pleased to do
them that favor three or four years afterwards; but their right
of legislation, or the restraints upon it, or the removal of restraints, did not depend upon that.
The true construction of the clause is, that they shall make no
laws contrary to,- antagonistic to, —in contravention of, the
laws of the realm which extended or should extend over them,
as inhabitants of the Colony, and which were to be their paramount law.
We are thus brought to the question, whether any, and what
laws of the realm were in force in the Colony at the time of the
charter and emigration. Happily we can settle this question by
authority. It is agreed that the law of the conqueror does not
extend over the conquered country, until the conqueror pleases
to put it in force there. And although we now hold that the
title of the Crown to the greater portion of this country was by
right of discovery, it was held by the Courts of England, long
subsequent to the reign of Charles I., to be a title by conquest.
Chief-Justice Holt, in the Court of King's Bench, in the
4th of Anne, said, " The laws of England do not extend to
Virginia! being a conquered country, their law is what the King
pleases." 1 And Blackstone, lecturing as late as 1756, says,
" Our American plantations are principally of this latter sort
[conquered or ceded countries], being obtained in the last century, either by right of conquest, and driving out the natives,
(with what natural justice I shall not at present inquire), or by
1 Salkeld's Reports, vol. i. p. 666.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.         387
treaties. And, therefore, the common law of England, as such,
has no allowance or authority there." He adds, that they are
"not bound     by any    acts of Parliament, unless particularly
named." 1
Mr. Justice Story, it is true, says of the doctrine of Mr. Justice Blackstone, "It is manifestly erroneous, so far as it is applied to the colonies
and plantations composing our Union. In the charters, under which all
these colonies were settled, with a single exception [Pennsylvania], there
is, as has been already seen, an express declaration, that all subjects and
their children inhabiting therein, shall be deemed natural-born subjects,
and shall enjoy all the privileges and immunities thereof; and that the
laws of England, so far as they are applicable, shall be in force there;
and no laws shall be made, which are repugnant to, but as near as may be
conveniently, shall conform to the laws of England."2
But here is a great mistake, so far as it relates to Massachusetts. There is no provision, either in the Colony or in the
Province charter, that the laws of England, so far as they are
applicable, shall be in force there; nor that the laws of the Colony
or Province shall, as near as conveniently may be, conform to
the laws of England.
He says farther, " Now, this declaration, even if the Crown previously
possessed a right to establish what laws it pleased over the territory, as a
conquest from the natives, being a fundamental rule of the original settlement of the colonies, and before the emigrations thither, was conclusive,
and could not afterwards be abrogated by the Crown."
And in the next section, "The universal principle (and the practice
has conformed to it) has been, that the common law is our birthright and
inheritance; and that our ancestors brought hither with them, upon their
emigration, all of it which was applicable to their situation."
1 Blackstone's Corn., vol. i. p. 108.
2 Story's Corn. on the Constitution, ~ 156. - The principle that the laws of the discoverer extend overthe discovered country,without any action for that purpose, if sound
to any extent, must be subject to grave limitations. One of the reasons given why
the laws of the conqueror do not extend over the conquered country is, " because, for a
time, there must want officers, without which our laws can have no force." (Salkeld's
Reports, vol. i. p. 412.) That would certainly apply with its full force to the discoveries
in America. If the colonists had found the common law here, or had brought it with
them, it must have been packed away, until the machinery was provided to put it
in operation. Another reason, viz., that the laws of the conqueror may not be
suited to the state and condition of the conquered, is applicable, to a great extent, in
the case of settlement, under title derived from discovery.




388 CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
This allegation may be found repeated again and again, -in
judicial decisions, even, since the time of the Province charter,but it must be taken with some grains of allowance. Applied
to the early emigrants and their proceedings, it cannot be supported. As to them, there is better and more satisfactory evidence
that they did not bring the common law with them as a part of
their law, than can be derived from any inference respecting the
general principle which would govern the case, either as an ace
quisition by conquest, purchase, or discovery.
James I. having the right to govern the country either directly
or through a local government established by him, granted the
charter of the Council at Plymouth, in the county of Devon,
giving the grantees power to correct, punish, pardon, govern, and
rule, the inabitants5' according to such laws, orders, ordinances, directions, and instructions, as
by the said Council aforesaid shall be established; and, in defect thereof,
in cases of necessity, according to the good discretions of the said governors and officers respectively, as well in cases capital and criminal as
civil, both marine and others; so always as the said statutes, ordinances,
and proceedings, as near as conveniently may be agreeable to the laws,
statutes, government, and policy of this our realm of England."
The Puritans claimed title to their lands under this charter,
but not their corporate authority and privileges. Their charter
gave them power to pass laws, without any provision for the
introduction of the common law, and not even requiring that
their laws and proceedings should be as near as conveniently
might be to the laws of the realm; but providing that they
should make none contrary to the laws of the realm. The
grantees neither claimed nor recognized the common law as a
part of the laws by which they were governed. There is nothing
in their records, nor in their statutes, nor in their declarations, to
show any recognition of it as their law. It neither regulated the
rights of persons or things, nor did it furnish the rule of judicial
decision. Where a discretionary power was vested in the magistrate, he consulted the common law with an inquiry how the
case would be determined by that law, and it is quite probable
that he usually adopted it, because it is said to be founded in
right reason; and for reasons of a prudential character, it was
desirable that their proceedings should be, in the language of the




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 389
charter of the Council at Plymouth, as near as conveniently
might be, agreeable to the laws and policy of the realm. But
the magistrate was not bound by it, being at perfect liberty, if he
thought fit, to act on what he-deemed a better opinion of his own.
The claim of the colonists, that the common law was a part
of their birthright, and formed a part of their laws, came in at a
later period, after their controversies with the Crown had assumed grave proportions. It was interposed as a shield against
arbitrary power, and was doubtless founded upon the clause in
the charter securing to them the privileges and immunities of
natural-born subjects, perhaps also upon a general principle to
that effect in the absence of special provisions. It may be a
matter of curious inquiry to ascertain the precise circumstances
of its introduction and reception.
The Puritans claimed the right to pass their own laws, with
the Bible, and not the common law, as their fundamental law.
This is conclusively shown by the answer of the General
Court, in 1646, to the petition of Dr. Child and others, complaining, among other things, that they could not, according to
their judgments, discern a settled form of government according
to the laws of England.   To this complaint the answer is,"For our government itself, it is framed according to our charter and
the fundamental and common laws of England, and carried on according
to the same (taking the words of eternal truth and righteousness along
with them, as that rule by which all kingdoms and jurisdictions must
render account of every-act and administration, in the last day), with as
bare allowance for the disproportion between such an ancient, populous,
wealthy kingdom, and so poor an infant thin colony, as common reason can
afford. And because this will better appear by comparing particulars,
we shall draw them into a parallel.  In the one column we will set
down the fundamental and common laws and customs of England, beginning with Magna Charta, and so go on to such others as we had occasion
to make use of, or may at present suit with our small beginnings. In the
other column, we will set down the sum of such laws and customs as are in
force and use in this jurisdiction, showing withal (where occasion serves)
how they are warranted by our charter. As for those positive laws or
statutes of England which have been from time to time established upon
the basis of the common law, as they have been ordained upon occasions,
so they have been alterable still upon like occasion, without hazarding or
weakening the foundation, as the experience of many hundred years hath




890   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
given proof of. Therefore there is no necessity that our own positive
laws (which are not fundamental) should be framed after the pattern
of those of England; for there may be such different respects, as in one
place may require alteration, and in the other not." 1
Then follows, in lengthened columns, divers provisions of
Magna Charta and the common law, on the one side, and the
corresponding "Fundamentals of Massachusetts," on the other,
showing their similarity.
To the same effect is the statement of Edward Winslow, in
his " New   England's Salamander Discovered," published in
London, 1647, in answer to Dr. Child's' New England's Jonas
cast up at London:" —
5 As for the law of England, I honor it, and ever did, and yet know
well that it was never intended for New England, neither by the Parliament, nor yet in the letters patents, we have for the exercise of government under the protection of this State; but all that is required of us in
the making of our laws and ordinances, offices and officers, is to go as
near the laws of England as may be: 2 which we punctually follow, so
near as we can....' And however we follow the custom and practice of England so near
as our condition will give way, yet as the garments of a grown man would
rather oppress and stifle a child, if put upon him, than any way comfort
or refresh him, being too heavy for him, so, have I often said, the laws of
England, to take the body of them, are too unwieldy for our weak condition. Besides, there were some things supported by them which we
came from thence to avoid; as the hierarchy, the cross in baptism, the
holy days, the Book of Common Prayer," &c....
" As for our trials between man and man, he knows we go by jury
there as well as here. And in criminals and capitals we go by grand
jury and petty jury. And where the death of any is sudden, violent, or
uncertain, the crowner sits upon it by a quest, and returneth a verdict,
&c., and all according to the commendable custom of England, whom we
desire to follow.  But their main objection is, that we have not penal
laws exactly set down in all cases?'Tis true, I confess, neither can they
find any Commonwealth under heaven, or ever was, but some things were
reserved to the discretion of the judges; and so it is with us, and no otherwise, our General Courts meeting together twice a year, at least, hitherto,
1 Hutch. Coll. Papers, p. 199.
2 Referring, it seems, to the charter of the Council at Plymouth, which granted
to Bradford the charter of the Plymouth Colony.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.     391
for that very end, and so continuing so long as their occasions and the
season will permit: and in case any misdemeanor befall where no penalty
is set down, it is by solemn order left to the discretion of the bench, who,
next to the Word of God, take the law of England for their precedent
before all other whatsoever. And as I said before, if I would enter into
particulars, I could here set down in a line parallel, as I received it,' in
answer to the petition of Doctor Robert Child, &c., mentioned in their
book,'the fundamentals of the Massachusetts concurring with the privileges of Magna Charta and the common law of England at large.' 2
Chief-Justice Hutchinson, also, is a competent authority upon
the point, that the first emigrants did not claim the common law
as a part of their law, nor acknowledge it as having authority
with them. In a charge to the grand jury, March term, 1767,
he said," I don't know a nation in the world, that makes the distinction between
murther and manslaughter, which the English do. It was not made in this
country before the charter [Province charter]; for our forefathers founded
their laws upon the law of Moses, which makes no such distinction."
In another charge, March term, 1768, while he repeats the
statement - at that time, and since, quite common- respecting
the introduction of the common law, he is even more explicit in
his declaration, that the first emigrants did not consider themselves bound by it, and did not regard it as their law.
"Our ancestors, gentlemen, when they came over to this country,
brought with them the common law of our mother country (which is with
great propriety so called); and although their first charter bound them
down to make no laws contrary to the law of England, yet, from the
situation they were then in, and from their peculiar circumstances, they
then apprehended they had a right to adopt the judicial laws of Moses
which were given to the Israelites of old. They at that time considered,
not how crimes affected the peace and harmdny of society, but almost
always adapted their punishment to the real guilt of the criminal.....
"Upon a judgment givn a against the old'charter, the people could never
obtain so great a boon, as they thought their old charter: since, you are
sensible, they appointed all their officers, made all their laws, without
any control from home..... We stand, therefore, upon quite a different
1 He was agent for Massachusetts at the time.
2 See Mass. Hist. Coll. 3d Series, vol. ii. pp. 137-140.




392   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
footing from our forefathers, and the principle of our laws is very variant
from that which governed them under the old charter. There were
several attempts made, since our present charter, to enact laws upon the
old charter principles; but they all failed, and the laws were disallowed
in Great Britain.."
" The principle of law which now governs us, is to punish crimes, only
as they affect society." 1
But all this is not necessary to the support of my position,
that the common law, and the statute law of England in amendment of the common law, were not the laws of the realm,
contrary to which the colonists were to make no laws; for
their power to pass statutes contrary to both, has been exercised without question ever since the common law has been
recognized as in force in the Colony and in the Province;
subject, after the Province charter, to the negative of the Crown,
as provided in that instrument.
Chalmers interprets the restraint, —" You shall make no ordinances inconsistent with the connection between the territory
and the country of which it is a member;" and says further,; so a colony may adopt new customs; may abrogate that part
of the common law which is unsuitable to its new situation;
may repeal the statute law wherein it is inapplicable to its condition.  All it may change, except only the principles of its
coalition with the State, or the special regulations of the
supreme power, or great body-politic of the empire with regard
to it." - With this exposition of the clause of restraint, it would
be quite unimportant whether or not the common and statute
law of the realm extended over the Colony. Any law of the
Colony inconsistent with either would abrogate or repeal it,
without any violation of the clause of restraint.2
It may be said that the King was restrained by Magna Charta
and the Petition of Right, as well in his colonial possessions, as
in England itself.
The colonists were subject to the lawful legislation of the
mother country; and so far as that legislation was extended
over them by the force of the legislation itself, or by the legiti1 Quincy's Mass. Reports, 1761-1772. Published 1865. Pages 285, 258-260.
2 Chalmers's Annals, vol. i. p. 140.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.  393
mate power of the Crown, so far they could make no laws, civil
or religious, in contravention of it. The navigation acts extended over them; and their legislation, contrary to those acts,
was one of the allegations in the scire facias, on which the
charter was vacated and cancelled. But it was held, that the
habeas coIpus act, passed 31st, Charles II., did not extend to the
colonies, because they were not named in it.
After the clause authorizing legislation, follows a provision
that the Governor and company " and all the chief commanders,
captains, governors, and other officers and ministers" as should
by said orders, laws, &c., from time to time be employed in the
government of the said inhabitants and plantation, or in the way
by sea thither or from thence, according to the nature and limits
of their offices, -
"shall, from time to time, hereafter for ever,"-"have full and absolute power and authority to correct, punish, pardon, govern, and rule all
such the subjects of us, our heirs and successors, as shall from time to time
adventure themselves in any voyage thither or from thence, or that shall
at anytime hereafter inhabit within the precincts and parts of New England
aforesaid, according to the orders, laws, ordinances, instructions, and directions aforesaid, not being repugnant to the laws and statutes of our realm
of England as aforesaid."
The power to pardon is conclusive evidence of a grant of
political government, no such power being known in an ordinary
corporation.
It hardly seems to be within the power of language, more
completely to negative the idea that the charter constituted a
corporation mainly for the purpose of trade and traffic; or,
more clearly, to grant powers of legislation and government,
whereby the inhabitants of the Colony might be "religiously,
peaceably, and civilly governed."
Whatever Charles II. may have said about general liberty of
conscience, of which he personally made a very large exhibition
in some particulars, Charles I. and his ministers could not but
form a reasonable judgment respecting the mode and manner in
which the Colony would be religiously, as well as civilly, governed under his charter, whether he ever read it or not.
4. The charter authorized the exclusion of all persons whom
the grantees and their associates should see fit to exclude from




394 CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
settlement in the Colony; and the exclusion of those already settled, by banishment as a punishment for offences.
They were the owners of the soil; and, in the absence of conditions or limitations, the owner of such a title has an exclusive
right of possession. They were the grantees of a charter of
incorporation; and such grantees, unless there is some special
provision or circumstance controlling them, may determine who
shall be admitted to a participation in their corporate rights.
There was, here, nothing of condition or limitation in relation
to their title to the territory; and their right to judge whom they
would admit did not depend upon the general principle merely,
but was express. They were to admit such persons as they
thought fit, to be freemen.
Persons who came on their invitation, or through inducements
held out by them, or with their consent in any way, could not in
justice be sent away arbitrarily, or for any fancied dislike. In
that respect they stood like other governments; and the proprietorship of the soil, which they held out for occupation and settlement,
would not give them the right of removal as if such parties were
trespassers. Coming by consent, and obeying the laws, they
would be entitled to protection. But aside from considerations
of this kind, the power of exclusion, on fair notice not to come,
could not be made more perfect.
The King desired to limit their power of admission, so that
persons especially obnoxious or dangerous to him, should not be
harbored there, and he retained the power of exclusion to himself, by an express provision, which, however, was so limited that
he could exclude only persons who were designated by name.
It has been supposed that the provision, that all subjects of the
King and his successors who should go to, and inhabit within,
the lands granted, should have and enjoy all liberties and immunities of free natural subjects, might be regarded as evidence of
a restriction upon the right of exclusion by the grantees. But
this cannot be maintained, for two reasons. -First, because this
can be applied only to persons rightfully there, or going to, or
returning from, the territory. It could not, of course, apply to
any one whom the King had excluded by name from going
there; and if there be this implied limitation upon it, in relation
to persons excluded by the King, the same limitation must be




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.  395
implied in regard to persons excluded by the colonial government, which, as we have just seen, aside from this provision, had,
from its title, as perfect a power of exclusion as the King had
by the clause for that purpose in his favor. It would be a gross
violation of sound rules of construction, to say that this clause
was a clause of protection to persons who had no lands, and no
interest in the charter, and who were, moreover, prohibited from
coming and remaining there, by the owners of the land and the
grantees of the charter; for if it might so apply to any, it would
apply to all who should go, and the right to the land and the
corporate privileges would soon be rendered a nullity. —Second,
this clause, rightly understood, is a limitation upon the royal
authority, to the extent of its operation, and not upon the
authority of the colonists. The King will not put persons out
of the pale of English subjects,-deprive them of the privileges
of English subjects, - because they go and inhabit there. They
shall be Englishmen still. Let us see this a little more clearly,
by a citation of the provision itself.
"And, further, our will and pleasure is, and we do hereby for us, our
heirs and successors, ordain and declare, and grant to the said governor
and company, and their successors, that all and every the subjects of us,
our heirs or successors, which shall go to and inhabit within the said lands
and premises hereby mentioned to be granted, and every of their children
which shall happen to be born there, or on the seas in going thither, or
returning from thence, shall have and enjoy all liberties and immunities
of free and natural subjects within any of the dominions of us, our heirs
or successors, to all intents, constructions, and purposes whatsoever, as if
they and every of them were born within the realm of England."
You perceive that it is confined to subjects, and does not include strangers. It provides that these subjects, and their children
born there or on the passage to and from, shall have the liberties
and immunities of free natural subjects within any of the King's
dominions, as if they were born within the realm. What were the
liberties and immunities of such subjects? Certainly, not to go
and inhabit the crown lands against the will of the King, or any
lands which the King had granted, against the will of the persons to whom the grant had been made. Certainly, not to intrude themselves into any corporate rights which had been
granted to others. Persons who should go and inhabit lawfully,




396   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
should have the general rights of Englishmen as secured by
" Magna Charta," and the customs of the realm. But this did
not exempt them from any legislation, otherwise lawful, under
the charter.
5. The charter authorized the creation and erection of courts
of judicature to hear, try, and determine causes, and to render
final judgments and cause execution to be done, without any
appeal to the courts of England, or any supervisory power of
such courts.
To the express provision authorizing the establishment of all
manner of wholesome laws, statutes, and ordinances, for settling
the forms and ceremonies of government and magistracy, fit and
necessary for the Plantation, -for the settling of all sorts of officers which they shall find needful for that government and Plantation, and for setting forth their several duties and powers, —
and also to that giving full and absolute power and authority to
correct, punish, pardon, govern, and rule, I have already referred.
There is no provision in the charter for any original jurisdiction of the courts of England, over the Colony, nor for an appeal,
in any shape, to those courts. And there was no custom of
the realm, no common law, which gave any such jurisdiction.
If it were supposed that the King had power to confer jurisdiction upon the courts of England, original jurisdiction in those
courts would have been a denial of justice. And an appellate
jurisdiction, afterwards deemed oppressive in the days of the
Province, would, in the infancy of the settlement, have been next
to impossible. The fact that there was no service of the writ,
quo warranto, in 1635, within the Colony, shows very clearly that
it was understood that process did not run there.
The Lords Commissioners seem to have been careful not to
attempt a regular service of their orders within the Colony. They
were sent in letters from Mr. Meautis, their clerk, and from Mr.
Cradock, to the Governor.
Hutchinson, in stating the proceedings in 1691, when the
grant of a Province charter was under consideration, remarks,"By the old charter, it was said, they had power to imprison or inflict
punishment, in criminal cases, according to the course of corporations in
England, but that, unless capital cases be expressly mentioned, the power




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 397
would not reach them; that no power was given to erect judicatories, or
courts for probate of wills, or with admiralty jurisdiction, nor any power
to constitute a house of deputies or representatives, nor to impose taxes
on the inhabitants, nor to incorporate towns, colleges, schools, &e., which
powers and privileges had been, notwithstanding, usurped."1
But this construction, limiting all the powers under the charter, "according to the course of corporations in England," is
utterly unwarrantable. That expression occurs but once in the
charter, and follows immediately after a provision in relation to
elections. If it is not confined to "fines, mulcts," &c., in relation to that subject, no reasonable construction can extend it to
other provisions which I have cited. It would be absolutely
impossible to govern a colony in America, according to the
course of corporations in England constituted for trading or
even for municipal purposes.
Hutchinson inserts in a note the opinion of Mr. Hook, who was
consulted by Hampden in relation to the Province charter, among
other things, that the grantees under the old charter had " no
power to keep a prerogative court, prove wills, &c.; nor to erect
courts of judicature, especially chancery courts." 2 This is very
astonishing, unless we suppose that Mr. Hook, in considering the
express powers which should be inserted in the new charter, accepted the objections which had been made to the old, by Gardiner and others, without any critical examination. Certainly, the
old charter was intended to be complete for its purposes. No
addition was contemplated to be made, either by King or Parliament. How were the people to be civilly and peaceably governed, without courts? Was the power to punish and pardon
to be exercised without any judgment of conviction? What is
meant by the power granted to make laws, " as well for settling
of the forms and ceremonies of government and magistracy, fit
and necessary for the said plantation,"  " and for naming and
settling of all sorts of officers, both superior and inferior, which
they shall find needful for that government and plantation"?
The idea of a colony to be settled and governed without courts
would be preposterous.
It would seem, therefore, that the propositions which I have
stated are fully sustained without any resort to the express pro1 Hutch. Hist., vol. i. p. 415.  2 Ib., p. 111.




398   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
vision in the charter, which embodies a general principle of law
now well understood and applied in cases of doubt, to deeds
of private persons, that the charter should be construed, reputed,
and adjudged in all cases most favorably for the benefit and
behoof of the grantees.
If any thing were needed to fortify the foregoing positions, it
may be found in the fact, that, in the process and proceedings in
the latter part of the reign of Charles II. to enforce a forfeiture
of the charter, or to annul it, there was no allegation of a usurpation of power in any of these particulars; nor any alleged grounds
of forfeiture founded upon either of them.
The causes of forfeiture, as set forth in the Court of Chancery,
were, that the Governor and company assuming on themselves,
under color of their letters patent, power to assemble to make
good and wholesome laws and ordinances, not repugnant to the
laws of England, but respecting only their own private gain and
profit, assumed the unlawful and unjust power to levy money of
the subjects of the King, and, in prosecution of that power, made
laws for levying poll taxes, and duties on merchandise and tonnage; that they had passed a law providing for a mint, and the
coining of money; and another, requiring an oath of fidelity to
the government of the Colony.1
Undoubtedly, the absence of other allegations of abuse of
power under the charter is not conclusive evidence of a belief
on the part of the crown lawyers, that there were none others
which could be sustained; but there is no good reason why more
should not have been enumerated, if it was supposed that others
of a grave character existed, and a transfer of the charter and
government, or an exclusion of his majesty's roystering subjects
from inhabitancy, or any religious legislation whatever, if supposed to be unlawful, would hardly have been omitted.
I have no means at hand to determine with certainty, why this
process was instituted in the Court of Chancery, which, ordinarily, has no jurisdiction of proceedings quo warranto, and
1 The power to coin money being, at that time, not an ordinary legislative power,
but one of the King's prerogatives, the value of unusual pieces to be ascertained by
proclamation, it might well be held that the charter did not confer it. And some
of the legislation of the Colony may have been contrary to the navigation acts of the
realm. To that extent, the complaints seem to have been well founded; perhaps
somewhat further.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.     399
relieves against, rather than enforces, forfeitures.  In a "Brief
Relation of the Plantation of New England," by an unknown
author, written at London, in 1689, it is stated,"that, in the year 1683, a quo warranto was issued out against them,"that "the Governor and company appointed an attorney to appear and
answer to the quo warranto, in the Court of King's Bench. The prosecutors not being able to make any thing of it there, a new suit was begun
by a scire facias in the Court of Chancery." 1
Chalmers says of the quo warranto, "Randolph's was the ominous
hand which carried it across the Atlantic. And to give weight to the
messenger who, in Massachusetts, had little in himself, and to the proceeding, which was equally obnoxious, a frigate was ordered to transport
him thither." He says further, "' After a variety of obstructions, arising
from the distance, the novelty, and real difficulty of the business, a judgment was given for the King by the high Court of Chancery in Trinity
term, 1684, against the Governor and company in Massachusetts, that
their letters patents, and the enrolment thereof, be cancelled."
The validity of the proceedings was afterwards " questioned
by very great authority." 2
The reason why the prosecutors could not make any thing of
it in the King's Bench may have been that suggested in relation
to the former writ, that, as the process of the court did not run
into the Colony, there could be no service there.3 It may have
been that the writ did not issue against "the Governor and
company."    The colonists instructed counsel to take that exception. But if that was the main objection, it might readily
have been obviated by the issue of another writ. If so issued,
however, it would have been an admission of the existence of
the corporation, which was challenged by the allegations of
usurpation in the process in 1635.
It may be conjectured that the scire facias was brought in
Chancery on the ground, that chancery might annul the char.
ter, though out of its jurisdiction, on the same principle that it
now sometimes compels a man within its jurisdiction to give a
1 Mass. Hist. Coll. 3d Series, vol. i. p. 96.  2 Annals, vol. i. pp. 414, 415.
3 " The sheriff's" [of Middlesex, England] " principal objection why he did not
return a summons was, the notice was given after the return was past. He did also
make it a question whether he could take notice of New England, being out of his bailiwick."
- Letter of Attorney-General Sawyer. See Palfrey's Hist. New England, vol. iii. p.
391, note.




400  CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
deed transferring a title to lands lying within another government. But the cases are not alike.
No judgment of forfeiture was entered, nor any decree ordering any person to bring in and surrender the charter, or to do any
other act in relation to it. The court adjudged, that the letters
patent, " and the enrolment thereof, be vacated, cancelled, and annihilated, and into the said court restored, there to be cancelled;"
but there was no attempt to enforce the latter part of the decree.
The proceedings may have been instituted in that court, upon
the ground of an ancient jurisdiction of the chancellor to repeal
grants of the King, which had been issued improvidently. But
the assumption to enter a decree, that a charter granting lands,
and corporate powers, and powers of government, and which
had existed more than half a century, should " be vacated, cancelled, and annihilated," on account of usurpations, which, in
case of ordinary corporations, may be a subject for proceedings
by writ of quo warranto in the King's Bench,- and especially to
do this upon a writ issued to the sheriff of Middlesex, in England,
under such circumstances that there could be neither service nor
notice, -would be of itself a usurpation. And this seems to be
its true character, whatever might be the reason alleged.
If the colonial government was exercising power inconsistent
with the charter, or with colonial dependence, the true remedy
would at this day appear to have been, not by process to enforce
a forfeiture, or to vacate the charter, which, if effective, would
leave the inhabitants without any legal government; but by an
enforcement or amendment of the charter, in regard to its public
powers and character, by the Crown, from which it was derived,
or by an act of Parliament making the requisite provision for
that purpose.
The better opinion may be, that meeting with technical difficulties in the court of law, resort was had to Chancery, because
of a better assurance of speedy success.l
The proceeding appears to have been no more effective in its
character, than might have been a judgment of seizure, in a process at law; and, in fact, little better than would have been an
order of the King in Council, that the charter was forfeited,
with a revocation of its powers.  However, the decree an1 See Palf. Hist., vol. iii. 391-394.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 401
swered its purpose. The colonists were not in a situation to
contest it.1
Certain differences between this charter and the charter of
the Council established at Plymouth in the county of Devon,
have already been considered.
It may be noticed farther, as fortifying the position, that the
powers granted in the charter of Charles included a power of
exclusion, that the Great Patent to the Council provided, expressly, that the territories granted should not be visited,
frequented, or traded unto, by any other of the King's subjects,
with a provision prohibiting all the King's subjects from visiting
or trading there, unless it be with the license and consent of the
Council, upon pain of the King's indignation, and imprisonment
of their bodies during his pleasure, with forfeiture besides. And
the King condescended and granted, that he would not grant any
liberty or license to any person to sail, trade, or traffic there,
without the good-will and liking of the Council.
The provisions of the charter of Charles were so comprehensive that there was no necessity for such express exclusions.
A comparison of the provisions of the charter, with the subsequent proceedings of the Puritans, relieves them from the
charges which have been so persistently urged against them.
It has been said, that " the charter did not include any clause
providing for the free exercise of religion, or the rights of conscience." But this is a mistake. It is true that there is not, in
express terms, any such provision. It would have been most
surprising, if the King had made proclamation of any such
liberty, by a formal grant. But the power of legislation, which
included the power to legislate on religious matters, was as
plenary for that purpose, as an express grant would have been.
The "letter from King Charles II. to Massachusetts," in 1662,
asserts that "the principle and foundation of that charter
was, and is, the freedom of liberty of conscience."2  And a
letter prepared for the royal signature, by the lords of the committee for plantations, in October, 1681, not only recites that the
charter granted " such powers and authorities as were thought
1 See the Exemplification of the judgment. Mass. Hist. Coil., 4th Series,
vol. ii. p. 246.: Hutch. Coll. Papers, vol. i. p. 378.
26




402 CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
necessary for the better government of our subjects, at so remote
a distance from this our kingdom;" but adds, "nothing was
denied, which you then deemed requisite for the full enjoyment
of your property, and the liberty of your conscience, so you
would always contain yourselves within that duty which the
bonds of inseparable allegiance bind you to." 1
They did not come here to establish or provide for any general liberty of conscience.  In his very full and complete exposition of this fact, the reverend and learned gentleman with
whom I am associated, Dr. Ellis, stated that they placed a restraint - the restraint of the Bible - upon their own liberty of
conscience.  This depends upon the signification which we
give to the term conscience, which, as you know, is sometimes
used to designate the faculty by which we have ideas of sight
and wrong in reference to actions, without regard to, and perhaps in ignorance of, the precepts of the Bible, occasionally
called natural conscience; and it is sometimes used to designate
the same faculty, instructed in the Bible, receiving it as the word
of God, by which to test right and wrong, incorporating its
restraints into, and making them part of itself, - not unfrequently termed an educated or enlightened conscience. In the
former signification, which is plainly the sense in which Dr.
Ellis uses the word, the Puritans did not seek to establish liberty
of conscience even for themselves.
The charter in giving power to make orders, laws, &c., for
directing, ruling, and disposing of all other matters and things,
by which the inhabitants might be religiously governed, clearly
contemplated government in matters of religion; and government in matters of religion, in those days, meant any thing other
than liberty for every man to do what his notion of right and
wrong dictated in that matter. The grantees meant and under.
stood it, as government according to the laws of the Bible. In the
other sense of the term, conscience, that is, the faculty of distinguishing between right and wrong, instructed by the Bible,
and according to its precepts, as they understood them,- liberty
of conscience for themselves was precisely what they intended to
secure. In other words, their great object was to secure for
themselves and those who, with their principles, should associate
1 Chalmers, vol. i. p. 444.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 403
with them, the liberty to worship God according to the dictates
of their own consciences, - enlightened by the Bible.
The key to their enterprise, as thus presented, unlocks the
repository of their ends and aims, intents and purposes; and you
have the explanation and the justification of their religious legislation.
They founded a civil State, upon a basis which should support
the worship of God according to their conscientious convictions
of duty; and an ecclesiastical State, combined with it, which
should sustain, and be in harmony with, the civil government;
excluding what was antagonistic to the welfare of either.
Some one may inquire, If such was the design of the Puritan
Fathers in the establishment of their government here, why was
it not more distinctly stated and proclaimed at the time, leaving
no room for misconception afterwards? The ready answer is,
that, if a public development of all their purposes had been
made, there might have been danger of some measures to
defeat their designs, and to extinguish their hopes. The King
and his ministers must have known the general character of the
enterprise.  There was no necessity that there should be a
public proclamation of their intentions beyond what was made.
It is sufficient that there was no stratagem and no deception in
the matter. Doubtless, as the enterprise proceeded, some measures were adopted, which were not originally contemplated.
Is it asked, How it is possible that the Puritan Fathers, who
were not recluses, but many of them men of education,- men
of great intelligence in their day, - men mixing with the world,
could entertain the idea of establishing a Commonwealth,
where religion should outwardly be brought to a rigorous test of
uniformity, when they themselves were non-conformists to the
Church of England?
It may quite as well be asked, Why, with their deep religious
convictions, they should have had any doubts of success? Theirs
was a religious as well as a civil State.  The Jewish government, which was their pattern so far as it might be applicable,
existed for ages. The Papacy had, for centuries, claimed the
implicit reception of its dogmas, and unhesitating obedience to
its mandates. The Reformation denied the infallibility of the
Church of Rome, and exposed its errors; but the political govern



404  CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
ment of England, as soon as it gave support to it, exercised
a similar right of requiring conformity to the new doctrines,
and the established ordinances. The Puritans loathed the corruptions of the Hierarchy, and sought for purity of doctrine
and simplicity of worship. They had unwavering faith that
God would regard their enterprise,-their government, —and
their Church, in its unhesitating reception of His revealed truth,
in its sincere desire to learn His will, and do what was
pleasing in His sight, in its simple forms of adoration and
worship,- with especial favor. Why should they not, in the
full assurance of that faith, devoutly believe that God Himself had not only opened to them a way of escape from impending persecution; but that He had reserved this wilderness
to that time,:as the place for the establishment of that faith and
that worship on an enduring foundation? In point of fact, the
government which they established, did last for more than one
generation, on the distinctive principles of their foundation; and
left its impress on the future, in a more wide-spread liberty, not
only for our day, but for after ages.
With the design and purpose by which they were actuated,
with the deep conviction of the truth of their principles, of the
importance of their enterprise, of the sacredness of the trust
committed to them, and of their duty to use all lawful means to
secure its success,  all their legislation may be said to have
been religious legislation. They legislated in the fear of God,
and with a profound sense of their responsibility to Him; which
is more than can be said of the greater portion of the legislation
at the present day.
if, however, we take a more restricted signification, it may
well be maintained that all their legislation, which had a direct
tendency to aid in the accomplishment of their great purpose to
build up a true Church and a righteous State, each supporting
the other, was religious legislation.  All the legislation for
the enforcement of good morals, of good order in the community, was in aid of this great object, and therefore in subservience to religion.
More especially may the legal provisions for the promotion
of education be regarded as of that character.  One great
purpose of their polity was to raise up a diligent and faithful




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 405
ministry; and the college which they founded, and to which our
present Massachusetts turns with such pride, had that for one of
its objects.
It is, however, of the legislation having a more direct bearing
upon the interests of religion, that I am to speak. We know
from the character of their enterprise, what it must have been.
We know from their records, what it was.
Of course, it had reference, in the first instance, to the support
of the ministers who were settled over the different churches;
who were participators in the hardships, hopes, and labors of the
enterprise, and contributed so largely to its success.
At the first court, held Aug. 23, 1630: "Impr., it was propounaed how the ministers should be maintained."' Mr. Wilson and Mr. Phillips only propounded. It was ordered that
houses be built for them at the public charge. Sir Richard Saltonstall
undertook to see it done at his plantation for Mr. Phillips, and Mr.
Governor at the other plantation for Mr. Wilson. It was propounded
what should be their present maintenance. After specifying the quantity
of meat, malt, money, &c., it is added,' all this to be at the common charge,
those of Mattapan and Salem only excepted."1
Benedict, in his History of the Baptists, page 368, speaks of
this, as " the first dangerous act performed by the rulers of this
incipient government, which led to innumerable evils, hardships,
and privations to all who had the misfortune to dissent from the
ruling powers, in after times." And again, he says, " This was
the viper in embryo; here was an importation and establishment, in the outset of the settlement, of the odious doctrine of
Church and State, which had thrown Europe into confusion,
had caused rivers of blood to be shed, had crowded prisons with
innocent victims, and had driven the Pilgrims [he means Puritans]
themselves, who were now engaged in this mistaken legislation,
from all that was dear in their native homes."
This is certainly very unwarrantable language, in reference to
the subject-matter. Whatever we may think, or say, of subsequent events, it is a grievous misuse of the vocabulary, to term
this a " dangerous act,"' and a " viper in embryo."  On the contrary, it was the most natural, consistent, and just proceeding
that could be imagined.
1 Mass. Records, vol. i. p. 73.




403 CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
The people who adopted this measure were a small company,
who had come here with their families, their religious teachers,
and their household goods, to form a settlement.  We will
leave out of our consideration here, their expatriation, their
desire to enjoy the worship of God unmolested, and their sacrifices for the accomplishment of their purposes.  They were
religious persons, deeply impressed with the importance of
supporting the institutions of religion.  They revered their
teachers, looked to their wisdom for advice in temporal as
well as spiritual things, and were bound to provide for them a
support. If they had not done so, they would have been worse
than the infidels. What more just, what less exceptionable,
measure could they have adopted, than to assess, in such manner
as to them seemed best, a tax upon themselves for that purpose?
If they were content, there were no others who should object.
We have, I think, in the character thus ascribed by this historian to this simple and just provision for the support of their
religious teachers, the key to the difficulties which afterwards
arose between them and others, who, with different religious views,
instead of founding other settlements in the wilderness, where
they could enjoy their liberty of conscience, after their own
modes and forms, chose rather to claim a right to participate in
the privileges of the Puritans, at the same time that they placed
themselves in a very obnoxious antagonism to some of their
most cherished principles.  They intruded themselves into the
Puritan Commonwealth, set up their standard of opposition to
the principles and laws which they found there, and then complained, because the Puritans were not inclined to change their
laws for the especial accommodation of their antagonists.
I will consider this measure, as it developed itself afterwards,
when I come to the question of their right of exclusion, and the
manner in which they exercised it; my object being, just now,
to rescue this first act of religious legislation from the viperous
metaphor, which, without sufficient provocation, attempts to
fasten its fangs into it.
One of the chief accusations against the Puritans, - perhaps the greatest of all, - one which comes with a curl of the
lip, or a toss of the head, or some other significant manifestation
to make it emphatic, arises out of the connection of their




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 407
churches with the politics of the State, -a union of Church
and State, as it has been called. At an early day, they passed
a law by which none but church-members were to be admitted
as freemen, so that the right of voting in the affairs of the company, and of.the government, as established by and in the corporate body, - the right of suffrage, - was confined to persons
who were members of the Church.
Persons who care very little how many Quakers and Ranters
were hung, are very sensitive respecting the safeguards with
which the Puritans surrounded the ballot-box. Had they not
some reason for the adoption of a sure rule?
Dr. Ellis, in his first lecture, stated that there is not in Boston,
at the present day, any conceit, notion, fancy, or opinion, which
did not exist soon after the settlement of Massachusetts; but
I doubt, whether, among all the mischievous persons and all
the preposterous notions of that day, there were any persons
who maintained that there was such a thing as a natural right
of suffrage; that is, a right by nature, in every body, to participate in the government of all others, as well as of themselves;
that being the character of suffrage in a republican government.
If there were any such, certainly the Puritans were not of their
community.
WTell, undoubtedly, we should not select church-membership
as a criterion by which to determine who should have the right
of suffrage at the present day. It behooves us, however, to be
very careful that we do not adopt something much worse.
The law itself is in these words, " To the end the body of the
freemen may be preserved of honest and good men: It is ordered,
That henceforth no man shall be admitted to the freedom of this
Commonwealth but such as are members of some of the
Churches within the limits of this jurisdiction."
Can we lay our hands upon our hearts, and say, that all our
laws regulating suffrage have as wise and honest an object and
purpose as that disclosed in this enactment?
Why should the enlightened people of this day and generation denounce or censure the Puritans, because they regulated
the right to participate in the government which they founded
upon that basis?-upon a basis which, in their estimation, gave
the suffrage to honest and good men, -exceptions, of course.




408  CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
Thank God, being a church-member is not evidence that a
person has a bad character, even in New York; although there
may be exceptions which serve to show that such membership is
not conclusive evidence of a good character, even in Massachusetts.
Had not the Puritans the legal right to limit participation in
their government, in that manner? Was it morally wrong in
them to do so? Was it unjust? Was it inexpedient? Unless
we can answer some one, at least, of these questions emphatically in the affirmative, we convict ourselves, and not the Puritan
Fathers, when we set ourselves up as censors, and condemn
their legislation.
As to the legal right, in the first place! If the exposition
which has been given of the provisions of the charter has been
satisfactory, I need not add any thing upon this subject. Nothing can be more clear than their right to judge and determine
whom they would admit to the participation of the privileges
under their charter. They were expressly authorized to admit
freemen; they were not to admit all comers. They must exercise a right of selection in some manner.
Was it morally wrong to adopt their principle of selection?
With a concession of the principle that all rightful government
should be for the greatest good of the community over which it
is exercised, and that in a republican State, the question what
measures will produce the greatest good must be determined by
the majority of voices having the right of decision, I think I
might venture the proposition, that any rule of suffrage which
such majority should conscientiously determine to adopt, as that
best calculated to promote the welfare.of the whole, whatever
else might be thought of it, could not be censured as morally
wrong. But some enthusiastic advocate of universal suffrage
might, perhaps, wish to be heard on that proposition; so we
will confine ourselves to the Puritan Commonwealth.
Was it morally wrong in the grantees of the charter to determine, that the greatest good of their organization would be best
promoted by a limitation of that character? I certainly do not
suppose, that any one who has a reasonable sense respecting
moral right and wrong, will be disposed to argue that question
with me.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 409
They profess to have done it, " to the end the body of freemen may be preserved of honest and good men." They are, at
least, entitled to the credit of the motive on which they professed
to act until that motive be disproved, and there is not the first
particle of proof that they were not actuated by it. Admit
that this rule did not assure to them the association of all the
good and honest men in the community. Will any of you tell
me what criterion they should have adopted, in their circumstances, which would have given higher assurance of the accomplishment of the worthy end which they proposed to themselves?
If I should pause for a reply, I think none would be forthcoming.
Was this rule unjust?  Who at that day should impeach it
on this score? It was made by the grantees of a charter, and
those whom they had admitted as associates, prescribing for
themselves a limitation on which alone they would admit other
associates.
The charter was, as we have seen, in form, and partly in fact;
an act incorporating a company to which a large grant of land
had been made, and to which was given the power to purchase
and hold property, and the power also to plant and govern a
colony upon the territory thus granted. The charter gave them
expressly, what at this day follows as a corporate right, without any
express words, the right to admit whom they pleased as freemen of
the corporation; that is, as associates entitled to a participation
in all their rights and privileges equally with themselves. They
might have required a price for the privilege of an ownership in
the lands and a participation in the franchise of the corporation,
if they had thought proper. But money was no part of their
object in the admission of freemen, or in voting for officers.
They had not even arrived at that knowledge of the science of
government which teaches that legislators may sell their votes
in a caucus for the nomination of candidates for an office to
which they hold the power of election, and then say that there
was no bribery in that, because the nomination of the caucus
was not an election.  They might have required any other
condition of membership which to them seemed just and right.
Under these circumstances, who should advance a claim to thrust
himself into a participation of their rights and privileges? The
question answers itself. No one, unless he could say, that they




410   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
had held out to him a prospect of participation, and then refused
it. No one said that this had been done, even by implication.
The rule was adopted very soon after the settlement, and was
known and understood. If there was any such individual case,
it would not affect the principle.
Was the rule inexpedient? - is the remaining question. We
might inquire here, on what principle of right it is that we are
to judge and condemn them upon such a question. We may
judge and express our opinion whether they acted wisely for
their own interests, without assuming to censure them for their
judgment respecting a matter which, as it was then presented,
was one affecting their rights, property, and duties. - But let us
try this question also. In considering the three preceding questions, I have treated them mainly as questions of right and of
business in relation to a civil corporation. This presents itself
in the same aspect; but we must also take into consideration
the religious character of the enterprise.
And here there seems to be no possible room for doubt. It is
true that it offered some temptation to persons to join the Church
from sinister motives. Few persons, however, would venture,
for secular reasons, to enter the pale of a church so strict in its
observances; and the sure support which the churches would receive from the legislation of a General Court composed of their
own members, would greatly overbalance any danger from hypocritical members.
This restriction of the privilege of freemen to persons who
were members of the churches, is not to be regarded as evidence
of intolerance or bigotry. Of itself, it required no profession of
faith,-no creed.
For the purpose of admission to a church, a person must have
assented to the creed of that church very much as at the present
day, so far as the Church has a creed. And so, through the
operation of this rule, any person who was admitted to the privileges of a freeman, must have given his assent to the creed.
But this assent to the creed, merely, was not the reason why he
was admitted to the franchise. Somewhat more than assent to
the creed was required, in order to admission to the Church.
The candidate must be a person of good character, honest, and
of a blameless life. It was to secure a body of men, of such a




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 411
character, that this rule was adopted. And, moreover, churchmembership was not of itself the sole qualification.
The Plymouth Colony undertook to secure the same result in
a different mode. It was enacted there, that the deputies should
propound candidates to the court, being such as have been also
approved by the freemen of the town where such persons live.
Then it was required that they be propounded at a June court,
and stand propounded one whole year. And in the Revision of
the Laws of that Colony in 1671, we find that none should be
admitted as freemen but such as were, at least, twenty-one years
of age, had the testimony of their neighbors that they are of sober
and peaceable conversation, orthodox in the fundamentals of religion, with twenty pounds ratable estate, and to stand propounded a year, unless it was some person well known, or of
whom the court might make present improvement.l
Which would best satisfy the candidate for suffrage at the
present day, —the Puritan, or Pilgrim rule, - Massachusetts,
or Plymouth? - more especially when there was another law of
Plymouth by which freemen might be disfranchised, — a provision which, if it existed at the present day, and were enforced,
would cause a great exodus among the voters.- Even Rhode
Island would not admit persons whom they considered turbulent
and unruly, to ownership, or to exercise the privileges of
freemen.
Of itself, the rule did not prohibit immigration into the Colony.
Whoever chose might come, notwithstanding the adoption of this
rule. Persons ambitious of participating in the government
might be influenced by it not to come; but it would be their
ambition which prevented them in such case. Persons might
not desire to live under a government, with a religious legislation
such as might be expected from such legislators; but it would
be the desire for a larger license which prevented them. The
rule itself might be the remote cause; but another, operating
more directly upon them, would intervene, and a maxim of the
law teaches us to look to the near, and not to remote, causes, as
the ground for complaint, if there be any. The rule denied to
no one a participation in the protection which the government
offered to persons and property.
1 Plym. Col. Laws (Ed. 1836), p. 258.




412  CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
But, still farther, all the alteration which Charles II., or his
ministers, required, in respect to the right of suffrage, when, in
1662, he or they undertook to regulate the affairs of the Colony
was, that " all the freeholders, of competent estates, not vicious in
conversation, and orthodox in religion (though of different persuasions in church government) may have their votes in the
election of all officers, civil and military."l Would this rule
satisfy us better than church-membership? The duty of making
up the list of voters, on this basis, would not be an enviable one,
at this day; and an action for exclusion from the list might open
a wide field of inquiry.
The laws having for their object the conversion of the Indians
to Christianity, were part and parcel of the religious legislation
of the Colony.
The laws for the observance of the Lord's day were very strict,
and provision was early made for instructing the Indians on that
subject.
There were penalties for neglecting the worship of the churches,
disturbing the order thereof, and for reproaching the ordinances.
The law against Heresy provided, that " if any Christian within
this jurisdiction shall go about to subvert and destroy the Christian faith and religion, by broaching and maintaining any
damnable heresies," of which there followed a very respectable
catalogue, commencing with, "denying the immortality of the
soul," "every such person continuing obstinate therein, after due
means of conviction, shall be sentenced to banishment."
Persons above sixteen years of age professing the Christian
religion, might be punished for denying the inspiration of any of
the books of the Old and New Testaments.
But the introduction to the law against Heresy disclaimed all
power over the faith and consciences of men.
And in the proceedings respecting the celebrated Cambridge
Platform, the General Court declared that they could not see
light to impose any forms, as a binding rule, but gave their
testimony to it.
The Antinomian controversy was not merely a difference of
opinion upon a speculative doctrinal question, but an open attack
upon what was regarded as sound doctrine, in such a manner as
1 Hutch. Coll. Papers, p. 379.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.  413
to cause a commotion in the State, as is shown by the disarming
of the followers of Wheelwright; a measure which would not
have been resorted to, but in fear of an outbreak.
Another part of the religious legislation of the Puritans, upon
which much vituperation has been expended, and many sneers
wasted, is that regarding witchcraft.
Are we all quite sure, that there was actually no witchcraft
in the days of the Puritans?
We have, at this day, not only our rappings and tippings,
our rope-tyings and our planchettes, but we summon spirits
from the vasty deep, and, unlike those of Hotspur, they do come,
bringing with them communications from the spirit-world, which
must give us a very poor idea of heaven, if we suppose them
to have come from that quarter.
Is not the difference between this age and the former mainly
in the fact, that witchcraft with us does not come on accusation; but that our witches volunteer their manifestations, are
quite willing to display their powers, and are thus far more kindly
disposed than their predecessors, not having, as yet, taken to
sticking pins into people?
For my own part, my imagination could just as easily mount
an old woman on a broomstick, and set her careering through
infinite space, as it could get up a conversation with General
Washington about fly-traps, or with John Adams on the respective merits of hair-dyes, or some other subject of even less significance. And when I give credence to all the supernaturals
of our present time, I intend to believe also, unreservedly, in the
Salem witchcraft!
But, suppose we hold a little longer to the belief that the witchcraft of the former time was trickery and delusion; upon what
sound basis are we to single out the Puritans for condemnation?
The legislation of the Puritans in regard to witchcraft was
but the legislation of the age in which they lived, andwith their
respect for the Jewish law, they, of all people, must have had
such legislation.
In England, the law against witchcraft was enforced with as
little doubt of its existence, and of its being a proper object of
criminal cognizance, as prevailed in Massachusetts; and the executions there were much more numerous.




414  CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
Even the Plymouth Colony had its legislation against it;
and if the witches had not thought that that small community
offered too limited a field in which to exercise their vocation, I
know no reason for believing that the good people there would
not have enforced their laws against them. How should they
have done otherwise?
Only a small portion of the people of Massachusetts, however,
had any active participation in the prosecutions, and many made
grave objections to them.
The General Court appointed a special court for the trials;
and one at least of the judges of this court, and several of the
justices, were much dissatisfied with the proceedings.1 Of the
majority of the judges who were present, it may be said, that
they had the belief in witchcraft, which that most eminent and
upright judge, Sir Matthew Hale, entertained as firmly as they
did; and that they had quite as much evidence as was introduced in cases before him, in which he was instrumental in procuring convictions, on which he gave sentence of death, with a
conscientious belief that he was doing good service to God and
the State. He seems not to have wavered in this belief, to the
day of his death.
It has been suggested, that there was one physician in Massachusetts who, if his life had been spared, might, either by his
professional skill or by his wise counsels, have done something
to prevent or stay this lamentable delusion. It is a subject of
profound regret that he should have died a year before his labors
would have been so exceedingly useful. Those who were living
" gave countenance and currency to the idea of witchcraft in the
public mind, and were very generally in the habit, when a patient
did not do well under their prescriptions, of getting rid of all difficulty by saying that'an evil hand' was upon him."2  Very
convenient, indeed!
Roman Catholic priests and Jesuits were forbidden to come
within the jurisdiction.
The right of the colonial government to exclude persons
actually settled in the Colony, existed from the power to make
1 Thomas Brattle's Letter, Mass. Hist. Coll., 1st Series, vol. v. p. 75. Bentley's
Description of Salem, ib., vol. vi. p. 266.
2 Upham's Witchcraft at Salem Village, vol. ii. p. 361.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.  415
laws, constitute courts and magistrates, and punish offences.
Banishment was a recognized mode of punishment; and this was
their common penalty for grave offences against their religious
polity. It was peculiarly adapted to a Commonwealth which
was to be governed on religious principles, and to suppress the
promulgation of religious doctrines inimical to its welfare. The
Puritans desired to remove the disturbers of their peace; and
many, if not most of these, were religious controversialists.
Difficulties, which ended in sentence of banishment, for offences
against their religious legislation, arose in various ways.
You will not be shocked, I trust, if I venture the supposition
that there is nothing in the whole world on which conscience is
so sensitive, or by which it is so grievously violated, as the compulsory payment of money to be appropriated towards any thing
connected with religion.
A man pays taxes, which he knows will be appropriated to
the support of an unrighteous war for the acquisition of territory
belonging to the Indians, or to some weaker nation; for wasteful
expenditure on public buildings, or corrupt purchases for the
benefit of contractors, or for the transportation of patent medicines in the mail under the franks of members of Congress, —
he shrugs his shoulders, but his conscience is quiet. Let him
understand, however, that his tax is appropriated to the support
of a minister of the gospel, who preaches some doctrine to which
he does not assent, -be the difference but
" the division of the twentieth part
Of one poor scruple,- nay if the scale do turn
But in the estimation of a hair,"his conscience immediately takes the alarm, and he becomes the
subject of persecution.
The Puritans being satisfied with the mode of supporting
ministers by a tax, which we have seen was originally adopted
at the first meeting of the Court of Assistants in the Colony,
continued it by subsequent enactments. All inhabitants were
assessed, proportionably to all charges in Church and Commonwealth. If all the inhabitants had been as closely united
in their religious sympathies as were the first emigrants, there
could have been no objection to this, at least none of a conscientious character. But this was impossible in the nature




416   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
of things. Other emigrants came, with different tenets. It
was, of course, impracticable to exclude all such, however great
the caution might have been. Change of opinion must, also,
have caused more or less of dissent. Difference of views caused
opposition to the tax. The government disclaimed any right to
interfere with the,consciences of men, but insisted upon obedience to the law as a civil duty.  The recusants denied the
authority of the magistracy to enforce the commands of the first
table, and made speeches against it. The magistrates alleged
that this was not only unsound in doctrine, but endangered the
authority of the civil State. The recusants preached. The
magistrates banished. The recusants insisted that they were
persecuted for their principles. The magistrates averred that
they were punished for their practices.
Two questions may arise here. First, - Whether this was a
tax for the support of religious doctrines, or one for the support
of the civil State through the agency of religious teaching. If
the first, then, by its enforced collection, conscience was violated.
If the latter, then, by a refusal of payment, a rightful civil law
was defied. Second, -Whether the speeches which were made,
were the dictates of conscience, which required a testimony of
that character against the enormities of the law, - or the utterances of the mere human will, determined to gratify its own wilfulness, and, if possible, to retain the money in its own pocket.
These questions, as the lawyers would say, may be regarded
as exceedingly nice, —questions about which men may argue;
and, like the village schoolmaster, "e'en though vanquished,"
they may " argue still."
As I am not one of those who can
"distinguish and divide
A hair,'twixt south and south-west side,"
I must leave it to the casuists of the next two centuries to determine whether or not the institutions of religion may be such a
support to the civil State, that a tax, by the State, to sustain
them, can be regarded as a mere civil regulation, violating no
man's conscience, even if the money be applied to the maintenance of teachers who differ from him, —-whether or not the
religious doctrine and the civil support may be regarded as so
far distinct, that the civil magistrate may tax on the ground of




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.   417
the civil right, and the party pay without interference with the
religious right. Whatever opinions may be entertained, the
Puritans, I think, took, substantially, that distinction, and their
rule, thus stated, survived the Colony, lived through the Province,
was incorporated into the Constitution of 1780, withstood the
efforts of two Constitutional conventions for its abrogation, and
yielded at last, more than two centuries after its first introduction.
It is a matter of recent history, that a republic founded upon
a substratum of infidelity has but a short existence. The duration of one which shall disclaim the support of religious teachings, and rely upon the intelligence attendant upon universal
suffrage, and the purity derived from a universal scramble for
office, is a problem which has not yet received its solution.
But to leave the Puritans here would not be doing them justice on this subject. They have been charged with inconsistency,
and persecution, in reference to these proceedings.
Mr. Benedict, just quoted, says further of the original order
for the maintenance of the ministers, -
"From these resolutions on board this floating vessel, which by subsequent acts became a permanent law, subjecting every citizen, whatever
was his religious belief, to support the ministry of the established church,
and to pay all the taxes which the dominant party might impose for their
houses of worship, their ordinations, and all their ecclesiastical affairs, proceeded the great mistake of the Puritan Fathers. And from the same
incipient measure grew all the unrighteous tithes and taxes, the vexatious and ruinous lawsuits, the imprisonment and stripes of the multitudes who refused to support a system of worship which they did not
approve."
After other remarks of a similar character, he adds, p. 369, -
" The most charitable exposition we can give of this unpleasant subject
is, that good men with bad principles were led astray; that although they
were driven by persecution from their native land, and here intended to
form an asylum for the oppressed who should fly to them for shelter, of
every nation and of every creed; yet from the strength of habit, and the
general opinions of mankind, in that age, they dare not leave the sacred
cause to its own inherent influence; and the spirit of the times, rather
than the disposition of the men, hurried them forward to those persecuting
measures which have fixed an indelible stain on their otherwise fair
name."
27




418   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
Assuming the matter to be one involving a question of conscience, this might be true, if they intended to form an asylum
for persons of all creeds, to come and promulgate all doctrines,
even to denunciation of their own most cherished principles.
But the fact being shown to be just the reverse of all this, the
allegation of persecution fails, along with that of inconsistency.
A man persecutes nobody, by defending his own from encroachment. The lands within their chartered limits were theirs.
The government was theirs. The faith and modes of worship
were theirs. Under their grant from the Council at Plymouth
and their charter from the Crown, they secured to themselves, as
we have seen, substantially, a fee-simple in their lands, which
they could protect against all encroachments. They endeavored
to secure to themselves, also, a theologic fee-simple, so to speak,
or at least a life-estate, and they were exceedingly tenacious of
this, and more sensitive to trespasses upon it than to trespasses
upon property, in the proportion that the concerns of religion
held a higher place in their estimation than mere temporal affairs.
There was little temptation to commit trespasses upon their temporal fee. But there were other zealots besides themselves, who
were quite desirous of becoming tenants in common, at least,
if not disseisors, of their ecclesiastical fee. The attempt was
promptly met, first by warning off; and when that failed, by an
ecclesiastical action of trespass, resulting in a fine; and when that
failed, by a process of ejectment, called a sentence of banishment.
It would be but upon a very superficial view of the subject, to
say, that they had no right to do this, and that it was inconsistent with their position in England. The Puritans in England,
like others there who dissented, were mostly natives of the soil:
they had natural rights there, -a right to form their opinions
upon religious subjects, equally with all other inhabitants of that
country; an equal right to express them peaceably; a right
to adopt their creed and forms of worship, according to the
dictates of their consciences (even if the government might tax
them); and a right to the protection and support of the government, in the enjoyment of their rights and liberties. That was
their country, their home: there were their families, and their
relatives, friends, all their associations. They had no other
place in which to enjoy their rights. Members of the Church of




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.  419
England had the same natural rights, and no more. Other dissenters from her doctrines had the same rights, and no less. The
Church of England, claiming to be established by law, required
conformity to her creed and usages and forms, in matters deemed
by others essential errors; and hence violation of conscience, and
persecution.
It was open to all who might be able, to escape from this persecution. It was natural that those who attempted it should
associate for the purpose. The Puritans did so, - provided for
themselves a place of refuge in the wilderness, and obtained a
charter of government. This was emphatically for themselves
and those who sympathized with them, and not for others. The
creeds, modes, and forms of others who dissented, were as obnoxious to them as those of the Hierarchy. They were not
required by any principle of religion, or morals, or comity, or
benevolence, to provide for a theologic warfare against themselves
and their cherished opinions on the western shore of the Atlantic;
and they did not do it. They did not profess toleration. Why
should they?  With a perfect conviction that they were right,
of course others were wrong. And error was fatal! We have
as little of toleration at the present time, in relation to some other
things, and with less excuse. Others who came were bound to
respect their religious, equally with their civil, institutions. There
was no persecution in their attempt to maintain them, by the
exclusion of those who could be restrained in no other way.
No one had a right to come and set up an opposition, and
plead " conscience." That plea was open to a general demurrer.
"( What of that!"  You have no right to bring such a conscience here.
I submit that the argument is unanswerable, and a full justification of the general principle upon which the Puritans acted.
We may think their creed too narrow. There was, doubtless,
mistake, anger, error, excess, wrong, in individual cases. I seek
not to justify such things. All I claim is a vindication of
the legal and moral right of the Puritan Fathers to govern their
own Commonwealth, the child of their labors, of their prayers,
of their hopes, and of their fears also; and to exclude others, who
could not join in fellowship with them, from the enjoyment of
their privileges, without being accused of persecution.




420   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
Whether their ecclesiastical right could stand on this foundation for more than one or two generations, is another and a different question. It would, certainly, not be a very long period
before those who had been born on the soil would have as great
a right of non-conformity to the existing state of things, as the
Puritans had in England, and upon similar grounds. They had,
in fact, no theologic fee-simple, and could not transmit an inheritance in any exclusive right. They had nothing more than a lifeestate, in this respect.
But the matter was not suffered to develop itself in that way.
The theologic trespassers brought it to a more direct and speedy
issue.
The members of the Church of England seem to have left the
Puritan Fathers in the undisturbed enjoyment of their rights.
They neither sought nor were involved in any controversy with
them here, in the early settlement, unless the controversy respect.
ing the charter had that aspect.
With the exception of the Quakers, the Anabaptists were the
most prominent in this religious aggression.
In 1639, several persons were fined for attempting to gather a
small company of believers.
A law for the banishment of Anabaptists was passed in 1644,
with a preamble giving them a very bad character.1
" The heart-rending sufferings which were inflicted on John
Clark, Obadiah Holmes, and others " (so Benedict characterizes
the affair), in 1651, may serve to illustrate the spirit of the times.
Clark, Holmes, and John Crandall, "representatives of the church
at Newport," Rhode Island, came to Lynn and held a meeting
at the house of a brother, on the plea that he was too old to go
to Newport. Benedict says, " The circumstance of these men
being representatives, leads us to infer that something was designed more than an ordinary visit." Undoubtedly! They came
to do what they knew was a violation of the laws of Massachusetts.-The constable came, as might have been (probably was)
expected, broke up the meeting, arrested, and took them to the
ale-house, or ordinary, and being, evidently, a man zealous in the
faith, and doubtless supposing that the meeting-house was a more
suitable place than the ale-house for such people, - wishing also,
1 Mass. Records, vol. ii. p. 85.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.  421
probably, that they should hear a little sound doctrine,- he proposed, at dinner, if they were free, to take them to the meeting.
They replied, "We are in thy hand; and if thee will take us to
the meeting, thither will we go." But they informed him further,
"If thou forcest us into your assembly, then shall we be constrained to declare ourselves, that we cannot hold communion
with them." The zealous constable did not care for that, and so
to the meeting they went. Taking off their hats at the threshold,
when they were seated they put them on again, and Clark opened
his book and fell to reading. The constable, by order of a magistrate, took off their hats. When the preaching and praying were
over, Clark, as a stranger, stood up and desired to say a few things
to the congregation. The preacher said, we will have no objections to what has been delivered. But Clark must explain his
gesture of dissent (putting on his hat); and the explanation being,
substantially, that to conjoin and act with them would be sin, and
that he could not judge that they were gathered together and
walked according to the visible order of the Lord, he was told he
had said and done that which he must answer for, and was
silenced. Shortly after, they were tried; and, according to the
account, his defence embarrassed the judges. Clark says," At length the Governor stepped up and told us we had denied infant
baptism, and, being somewhat transported, told me I had deserved death,
and said he would not have such trash brought into their jurisdiction;
moreover he said, you go up and down and secretly insinuate into those
that are weak, but you cannot maintain it against our ministers. You
may try and dispute with them."
They were fined, and refusing to pay were imprisoned. But
Clark caught at the last remark of the Governor, as if it were a
challenge to a debate, and the next morning sent a formal acceptance, with a request that a time might be named; shrewdly prefacing it with, " Whereas it pleased this honored court yesterday
to condemn the faith and order, which I hold and practise," - so
that the dispute might be upon his faith and order. The magistrates were not to be caught in that way, but inquired whether
he would dispute upon the things contained in his sentence, &c.
"For," said they, " the court sentenced you not for your judgment and conscience, but for matter of fact and practice." Clark
replied, " You say the court sentenced me for matter of fact and




422   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
practice; be it so. I say that matter of fact and practice was but
the manifestation of my judgment and conscience, and I make
account, that man is void of judgment and conscience, that hath
not a fact and practice suitable thereunto."
The magistrates saw, doubtless, that the debate would involve
his faith and his conscience, and, if allowed, that he would gain
the opportunity which he desired, of promulgating his doctrines
under their permission, and therefore protection, and declined to
allow it. Clark's friends paid his fine, and he was discharged.
But Clark, as Benedict says, "knowing that his adversaries
would attribute the failure of it [the debate] to him," immediately on his release drew up an address, reciting, that through the
indulgency of tender-hearted friends, without his consent, and
contrary to his judgment, the sentence had been satisfied and a
warrant procured by which he was secluded the place of his imprisonment, by reason whereof he saw no call but to his habitation; yet, lest the cause should suffer, he signified that if it should
please the magistrates, or the General Court, to grant his former
request, he should cheerfully embrace it, and come from the island
to attend to it.
The magistrates replied, that they conceived he had misrepresented the Governor's speech in saying he was challenged to
dispute, adding,"Nevertheless, if you are forward to dispute, and that you will move it
yourself to the court or magistrates about Boston, we shall take order to
appoint one who will be ready to answer your motion, you keeping close
to the questions propounded by yourself; and a moderator shall be appointed also to attend upon the service; and whereas you desire you
might be free in your dispute, keeping close to the points to be disputed
or without incurring damage by the civil justice, observing what hath
been before written, it is granted; the day may be agreed if you yield
the premises."
Clark took exception to the answer, and repeated his former
motion, saying, if the General Court should accept it, and, under
the secretary's hand, should grant a free dispute without molestation or interruption, he should be well satisfied.  Benedict
says, " Mr. Clark all along kept in view the law which had been
made seven years before, which threatened so terribly any one
who should oppose infant baptism. This was the reason of his




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.    423
requesting an order to dispute in legal form." And he adds,
"Mr. Clark, therefore, left his adversaries in triumph."  Again,
"So completely was he at home in the baptismal controversy,
that he was evidently as desirous for the public discussion, as
his opponents were to avoid it."
Thus it was that Mr. Clark returned to his habitation, a "persecuted " man, who had endured "heart-rending sufferings." 1
Judging from the fact that he came willingly and knowingly;
that he was nothing loath to be forced to go to a meeting where
he should be constrained to declare his dissent; that he used
the trial to make an open defence of his doctrines; that he
was so anxious to debate the matter afterwards with the ministers, if he could have a clear field without danger of the law;
and that he finally left his adversaries in triumph; —it is at least
an open question, whether the persecution was not more in the
avoidance of the public free debate, than in the fine, and imprisonment for non-payment.    He seems in all this to have had
an eye to the things temporal, in regard to his controversy with
Mr. Coddington, perhaps quite as much as to things spiritual.2
Clark carried his complaints to England;3 and Sir Richard
Saltonstall wrote to Cotton    and Wilson, the     ministers at
Boston, -
" It doth not a little grieve my spirit to hear what sad things are reported daily of your tyranny and persecutions in New England, as that
you fine, whip, and imprison 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 punish them for such (as
you conceive) their public affronts..... We pray for you, and wish you
prosperity every way; hoped 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 practise 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. I do assure you, I have heard them pray in the public assemblies, that the Lord would give you meek and humble spirits, not to strive
so much for uniformity, as to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of
peace."
1 Benedict, pp. 371-375; Backus's Hist. of New England, vol. i. pp. 214-228.
2 See Palfrey, Hist. N. E., vol. ii. p. 359.
3 Ill News from New England, Mass. Hist. Coll. 4th Series, vol. ii. pp. 3, 27.




424   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
Mr. Cotton, answering "for Brother Wilson and self," said of Holmes,
" As for his whipping, it was more voluntarily chosen by him than inflicted on him. His censure by the Court, was, to have paid, as I know,
~30, or else be whipt; his fine was offered to be paid by friends for him
freely, but he chose rather to be whipt; in which case, if his suffering of
stripes was any worship of God at all, surely it could be accounted no
better than will-worship."...
To the other paragraph above quoted, he replied, " You know not, if
you think we came into this wilderness to practise those courses here,
which we fled from in England. We believe there is a vast difference
between men's inventions and God's institutions; we fled from men's inventions to which we else should have been compelled; we compel none
to men's inventions. If our ways (rigid ways as you call them) have
laid us low in the hearts of God's people, yea, and of the saints (as you
style them), we do not believe it is any part of their saintship. Nevertheless, I tell you the truth, we have tolerated in our churches some
Anabaptists, some Antinomians, and some seekers, and do so still at this
day. We are far from arrogating infallibility of judgment to ourselves, or
affecting uniformity; uniformity God never required, infallibility he
never granted us."'
These proceedings serve well to illustrate not only the religious
legislation and civil administration of that period, but the spirit
and temper of all parties. The Bible was the guide of the Puritans, and their law. Their legislation was founded upon it. Compelling men, therefore, to conform to their laws, was compelling
them to conform, not to men's inventions, but to God's institutions.
The proceedings in reference to the " Quakers and Ranters"
come under consideration, as a part of the religious legislation
of the Puritan Commonwealth; and notwithstanding the matter
has been discussed with great ability and research by Dr. Ellis,
in the third lecture of this course, it may be proper for me, as it
comes also within the scope of my subject, to say a few words
upon it, instead of passing it by with a mere recognition.
Polonius, along with other very good advice to his son, Laertes,
counselled him to"beware
Of entrance to a quarrel: but, being in,
Bear't, that the opposed may beware of thee."
1 See the letters entire, Hutch. Coll. Papers, pp. 401-407.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 425
The people of Rhode Island happily acted upon the first part
of this maxim, in reference to the Quakers who came among
tnem. Had the Puritans done the same, it is probable that the
nuisance would have been equally harmless in Massachusetts.
But such a forbearance would have been wholly at variance with
their principle of excluding disturbers of their peace, and with
their practice of rigidly enforcing their laws. They entered, therefore, upon the quarrel sought to be fixed upon them, with an
energy that made it apparent they were not unmindful of the
principle embodied in the latter part of Polonius's advice.
With a commendable moderation in the outset, they evinced
a rigid determination to maintain their authority. They warned,
they sent away, they fined, they whipped, they imprisoned, and
branded. When these more usual punishments failed, ears (not
many of them) were cut off. This cruel, but in England, at that
day, not very unusual, punishment was inefficient also. Then
came banishment, with a condition annexed, that a return without permission was on pain of death. And when all else was
utterly ineffectual, the penalty of death was inflicted.
The Federal Commissioners of the four colonies (Massachusetts, Plymouth, Connecticut, and New Haven), at their annual
meeting in 1656, had recommended that such persons, if any
come, should be forthwith secured or removed out of all the
jurisdictions. When, two years afterwards, it was found that
punishments of the milder character were of no avail, the
Federal Commissioners propounded and seriously commended to
the several General Courts to make a law of the precise character of that under which Massachusetts inflicted the extreme
penalty.1 In other instances, prior to this time, parties had been
banished with a like condition, and there had been no instance
of a violation of it. So it was believed would be the case in this
instance. But here was a different class of offenders,- fanatical,
or self-willed, — self-devoted to their will.  We may call it conscience, but it was conscience as defined by the Indian, " Something here [laying his hand on his breast], which says,' I won't."'
We may call it insanity; but, if insanity, it was of the same
self-willed character.
1 Palfrey, Hist. of New England, vol. ii. p. 469. John Winthrop, of Connecticut,
attached a qualification to his subscription.




426   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
It is quite possible that something of human passion may
have been excited in the magistrates of the Colony by this wanton
contempt of their right and their authority. But mischief arising
from mere contempt, - still less, resentment and passion consequent upon such contempt, - could furnish no justification for
proceeding to the last extremity. In that view the most that
could be said in extenuation would be, that there was a successful courting of martyrdom by a series of persistent efforts, and
under circumstances which rendered it next to impossible for the
government to refuse the crown.  That the Quakers, supposing
them to be sane, richly deserved any suitable punishment for disturbing the peace, is not to be doubted.
The cry of persecution of the Quakers by the Puritans has
been long and often repeated. It is within a few days, that I
saw, in a notice of a sombre work, entitled " New-England
Tragedies," this paragraph:" They [the Puritans] persecuted the
Quakers with immense zest and activity; but it cannot be
denied that the Quakers gave great provocation."
Now I take a direct issue with the first part of this allegation,
and with all other averments that the Puritans of Massachusetts
persecuted the Quakers. Let us bear in mind that it was not
for non-conformity that the Quakers were prosecuted; and let
us understand the significance of the terms we use. What is
persecution?  If we turn to the great work of our late learned
and most worthy associate, Dr. Worcester, we shall find a satisfactory definition; and tried by that standard, or by any other
entitled to regard, I maintain, without hesitation, that so far from
the Puritans persecuting the Quakers, it was the Quakers who
persecuted the Puritans. Pardon me, if I consider this somewhat in detail.
There was no pursuit either " with malignity or enmity " in
the proceedings of the magistrates, even if anger occasioned by
such persistent annoyance may have been excited. The Puritans
did not "harass" the Quakers w'with penalties."  The Quakers
harassed the Puritans, and the Puritans inflicted penalties for the
transgression of their laws, as other communities inflict penalties
for transgressions. There must be something more than this to
constitute persecution, or the tenants of our state prisons may
cry out, persecution! So again, it was not the Puritans who




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 427
" afflicted," "distressed," "oppressed," and" vexed," the Quakers,
on account of their opinions; but the reverse of all that.
Wenlock Christison, the last person upon whom sentence of
death was passed, is reported by Sewell, in his History of the
Quakers, to have said to the court, "If ye have power to
take my life from me, God can raise up the same principle of
life in ten of his servants, and send them among you in my
room, that you may have torment upon torment, which is your
portion; for there is no peace to the wicked, saith my God."
That states the truth of the matter, so far as persecution is concerned.  The Puritans had no peace, but " torment upon
torment" from the Quakers.
The only reasonable question which can arise, is, Were the
Puritans justified in the infliction of the extreme penalties?
That the Quakers harassed, afflicted, distressed, oppressed, and
vexed them, may not be a sufficient justification for that.
Was there danger to the Puritan Commonwealth, - danger
of its overthrow, - danger of the subversion of the principles
upon which it was founded?   Every other expedient to rid
themselves of the nuisance had been tried in vain; and this
punishment was denounced as the penalty for a return from
banishment, in the hope and expectation that its terror would be
effectual, and render its infliction unnecessary.
When this proved otherwise; when their principles were
denounced, their authority derided and defied, their peace disturbed, and they were dared to carry into execution their
own decrees, - if there was danger to their institutions, what
course ought the magistrates to have adopted?
The Quakers courted death, if the Puritans dared to inflict it.
They despised and rejected the mercy which would have saved
them.   Assuming that they were sane, however much we
may lament the occurrence, why should we waste our sympathies on them, if, by their proceedings, they endangered the
Commonwealth into which they intruded? It is said now, that
they were more fit subjects for an insane hospital than for any
of the punishments which were inflicted. If they were insane,
we cannot hold the Puritans responsible because we have discovered that fact two centuries afterwards.  There was no such
supposition at the time, neither was there an insane hospital.




428   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
Great odium has been cast upon the law and its administration, in the infliction of those extreme punishments, and upon
the clergy, so far as they participated. I submit, whether the
responsibility is not chargeable rather upon the lamentable state
of medical science at that time, which, while busying itself
with catnip and elecampane, millipedes and powder of baked
toads, had not discovered that there was any other form of
mental disease than that which manifested itself in a furious
derangement. How should lawgivers, judges, and jurors, or
clergymen even, ascertain the fact of insanity, — a matter so
foreign to their ordinary studies, - when the studies and diagnosis of the physician failed to perceive it. Medical science at a
much later day, under the lead of jurisprudence, has redeemed
its character.  The medical profession having left the investigation of the virtues of baked toad-powder for that of the phenomena of mental disease, the law seeks information on that
subject, in aid of its administration.
Medical testimony is heard on the question, sane or insane?
Medical experts give their opinions, and the interests of
humanity are subserved, and the cause of justice often promoted; though it must be acknowledged, that the notion of
mental derangement is carried to an extreme, when a jury finds
a defendant sane the moment immediately before, and sane
again the moment immediately following, the commission of a
very deliberate homicide, but insane at the precise moment
when the deed was committed. I admit that the Bench deserves
censure, when it fails to rebuke such a perversion of principles.
But it would be unreasonable to expect too much from a judiciary elected by a popular vote, and whose tenure of office is for
a short term of years.
Upon the question whether their institutions were endangered
by the Quakers, the Puritans are entitled to be heard.
In a humble petition and address of the General Court, presented to the King in February, 1660, it is, among other things,
said,
" Concerning the Quakers, open, capital blasphemers, open seducers
from the Glorious Trinity, the Lord's Christ, our Lord Jesus Christ, &c.,
the blessed Gospel, and from the Holy Scriptures as the rule of life,
open enemies to government itself as established in the hands of any




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.    429
but men of their own principles, malignant and assiduous promoters of
doctrines directly tending to subvert both our churches and state; after
all other means, for a long time used in vain, we were at last constrained,
for our own safety, to pass a sentence of banishment against them, upon
pain of death.  Such was their dangerous, impetuous, and desperate
turbulency, both to religion and to the state, civil and ecclesiastical, as
that, how unwilling soever, could it have been avoided, the magistrate at
last, in conscience both to God and man, judged himself called, for the
defence of all, to keep the passage with the point of the sword held
toward them.   This could do no harm to him that would be warned
thereby; their wittingly rushing themselves thereupon was their own act,
and we, with all humility, conceive a crime bringing their bloods upon
their own head." 
Assuming this representation to be true, the colonists must
stand excused.
Dr. Palfrey says, -  "Imprudently calculating on the effect of their
threats, the Court had placed themselves in a position which they could
not maintain without grievous severity, nor abandon without humiliation
and danger. For a little time there seemed reason to hope that the law
would do its office without harm to any one."
Again,-" Whether or not their imaginations had exaggerated the
original danger, it could no longer, after an experiment of more than three
years, be justly considered great."
And again, — " But among the colonies of New England, it is the unhappy
distinction of the chartered - and therefore at once more self-confident and
more endangered - colony of Massachusetts, to have been the only one
in which Quakers who refused to absent themselves were condemned to
die.  Her right to her territory was absolute, deplorable as was the
extreme assertion of it. No householder has a more unqualified title to
declare who shall have the shelter of his roof, than had the Governor
and Company of Massachusetts Bay to decide who should be sojourners
or visitors within their precincts.  Their danger was real, though the
experiment proved it to be far less than was at first supposed.  The
provocations which were offered were exceedingly offensive. It is hard
to say what should have been done with disturbers so unmanageable.
But that one thing should not have been done till they had become more
mischievous, is plain enough. They should not have been put to death.
Sooner than put them to death, it were devoutly to be wished that the
annoyed dwellers in Massachusetts had opened their hospitable drawing1 Mass. Records, vol. iv. part i. p. 451.




430   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
rooms to naked women, and suffered their ministers to ascend the
pulpits by steps paved with fragments of glass bottles." 
But if the danger of the civil Commonwealth was not extreme,
that of the religious government connected with it was imminent.   If the Quakers might contravene and defy the laws
which protected the religious institutions and worship of the
Puritans, all others might do the same. Their peculiar religious
government was thus in extreme peril. With regard to that,
the controversy was preservation or destruction; and the result
was the latter.
The infliction of the punishment of death did not avail. The
Quakers had an indomitable perseverance, and much encouragement to continue the contest. The law inflicting this penalty
had passed but by a majority of one. There was much opposition to its execution. The military guard shows the fear which
existed of an outbreak. The opposition was such that the government gave up any farther attempt to execute the extreme
penalties. The Quakers came in greater numbers, and committed greater extravagancies. The government mitigated the
penalties, and finally submitted to the intrusion. The Quakers
triumphed;-and the experiment of the Puritans,-the theologic freehold, - the Commonwealth which was to exclude unsound doctrine and practice, - failed then and there, - and, so
far as we can perceive, from that time forth, for evermore.
The civil government did not fail, the religion did not fail;
but the principle of the legal exclusion of error received a fatal
blow.
The failure was not merely because the Quakers had conquered, but by reason of the causes through which they had
conquered.
I quote from Dr. Palfrey once more, p. 482, -
" It was settled that the Governor and Company of Massachusetts Bay
were not to have the disposal of their home. They had bought it, and
paid dear for it. They had on their side that sort of rigid justice which
accredited writers recognize, when they lay down the rule that a perfect
right may be maintained at any cost to the invader. But trespassers had
come who would not be kept away, except by violent measures, which had
1 Palfrey's New England, vol. ii. pp. 474, 476, 484.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.    431
produced only a partial effect, and which the invaded could not prevail
upon themselves any longer to employ. The feeling of humanity, which
all along had pleaded for a surrender, at length uttered itself in overpowering tones."
And Sir Ferdinando Gorges, in his " Brief Narration of the
Original Undertakings of the Advancement of Plantations into
the Parts of America," published in 1658, speaking of the charter, says," By the authority whereof the undertakers proceeded so effectually, that
in a very short time numbers of people of all sorts flocked thither in heaps,
that at last it was specially ordered by the King's command, that none
should be suffered to go without license first had and obtained, and they
to take the oaths of supremacy and allegiance. So that what I long before prophesied, when I could hardly get any for money to reside there,
was now brought to pass in a high measure. The reason of that restraint
was grounded upon the several complaints, that came out of those
parts, of the divers sects and schisms that were amongst them, all contemning the public government of the ecclesiastical state. And it was
doubted that they would, in short time, wholly shake off the royal jurisdiction of the Sovereign Magistrate." 1
We can see now that it was impossible that their peculiar religious institutions, -" God's institutions," as Mr. Cotton called
them, - should be maintained for a long period against the influx
of population " conternning the public government of the ecclesiastical state" here: we can see that it would have been better,
(to use a common form of speech!, infinitely better, had they voluntarily yielded to the pressure, at an earlier day, and quietly
submitted to a modification of their religious establishment, giving
greater liberty for dissent, and more tolerance to opposition. The
civil state can hardly be said to have been in danger of overthrow.   It may not have been wise, it may not have evinced
sound statesmanship, for them to attempt to maintain their
experiment against the intrusion of the Quakers, considering the
opposition which was made to it.
If, under the existing circumstances, they saw the impending
inevitable consequences, they cannot be held excused in sacrificing
life to the end that their church polity might be vigorously enforced for a little time, only to be overthrown within a short
1 Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll., 3d Series, vol. vi. p. 80.




432 CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
period. Anger and passion, under great provocation, can afford
at best but palliation.
But, assuming that there was no danger to their civil government, the principle which lay at the foundation of their whole
government, civil as well as ecclesiastical, - the principle of
excluding what they deemed fundamental error in religion by the
civil arm, -was on trial; and if, on the other hand, they might
well believe, and did believe, that God's institutions committed
to their charge could be sustained, error excluded, their peace
preserved, and their peculiar Commonwealth maintained, by the
rigid enforcement of their laws, even unto death, the danger
which menaced their institutions from the proceedings of the
Quakers must hold them excused. On what authority shall we
pronounce that they must have seen the first, and could not have
acted upon the last, of these propositions?
Their Commonwealth was one of small beginnings. If it
could have been kept a small Commonwealth, — distinct and
independent, its religious legislation enforced as it might have
been under such circumstances, -it would, doubtless, have preserved its original constitution much longer; and with their
knowledge of the mutability of human affairs, they could not
have anticipated that it was to endure for all generations. They
were authorized originally, by the circumstances to which I have
referred, to anticipate for it a reasonable duration, and they were
men who could commit to God's providence the ordering of the
future. The extract from Sir Ferdinando Gorges' " Brief Narration " shows that they did not anticipate that the example of their
emigration would be followed by such a numerous company of
men, who, of divers sects and with divers schisms, " contemning
the public government of the ecclesiastical state, " claimed liberty,
not so much to worship God according to the dictates of their
consciences, as liberty not to worship Him at all.
There is a grave question, I think, not as yet sufficiently considered, how far writers of fiction, whether of prose or poetry,
are at liberty to represent historical personages otherwise than on
the basis of historical truth.
If the fiction be like Irving's Knickerbocker's New York, - a
burlesque so transparent that no one is for a moment misled,there is no harm done. But if the tale or poem be of that




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.  433
character that no one but an expert in history can distinguish
between the true and the false, the fact and the fiction, very
serious injury may be, in many instances will be, done to the
reputation of those who have bequeathed that reputation to
posterity, in the hope that it may be preserved untarnished.
More especially is this true, if, the prologue says, -
"the author seeks and strives
To represent the dead as in their lives."
It is well for the author of the " New-England Tragedies"
that the Puritan laws are no longer in force, else he might be
called to answer, not only for that he did"perchance misdate the day and year,
And group events together by his art,
That in the Chronicles lie far apart,"
but that he did, moreover, interpolate matter which had
neither day, nor year, nor chronicle, in point of fact, thereby
giving false impressions respecting the truth of history.
The relation of events in their order is one of the first of the
requisites of history. Not only the year, but sometimes the very
day in which a thing is done, is of the utmost importance to a
right understanding of the character of men, and of their acts
also.
It is not an immaterial matter, whether the Puritans forbore,
at last, to proceed capitally against the Quakers from their own
conviction that such a course would cause a great sacrifice of
life, and would finally fail of accomplishing their object; or
whether, thirsting for blood still, they were stopped by a "mandamus" from Charles II.,-who, by the way, had no power
to issue such a judicial writ, even if he might amend the
charter.
It may not be amiss, therefore, to state, that the last execution, that of William Leddra, took place March 14, 1661; that
Wenlock Christison, or, as the record has it, Wendlock Christopherson, who had been banished and threatened with death if he
should return, confronting the judges on Leddra's trial with, " I
am come here to warn you, that you shed no more innocent
blood," was arrested, and, after three months, brought up for
trial. Dr. Palfrey says,28




434   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
" There was an unprecedented division among the magistrates, and
they are said to have been no less than two weeks in debate." -" Christison was condemned to die; but the dreadful sentence could not again be
executed. In the mean time, the General Court had met; and the evidences of opposition to any further pursuance of this rigorous policy were
unmistakable. The contest of will was at an end. The trial that was
to decide which party would hold out longest, had been made; and the
Quakers had conquered." 1
It may be proper for me to add, that Christison, concluding
that, if he might have his liberty, he had freedom to depart, was
discharged from prison in June, 1661; that King Charles's letter,
directing "that, if there were any of those people called Quakers
amongst them, now already condemned to suffer death or other
corporal punishment, or that were imprisoned and obnoxious to
the like condemnation, they were to forbear to proceed any
further therein," and should send such persons to England for
trial, was dated Sept. 9th, of that year, and received in November. Dr. Palfrey says further: -
"The command, however, produced little effect. The resolution to
abstain from further capital punishments had been taken some months
before; though the magistrates perhaps were not indisposed to appeal to
the King's injunction, rather than avow a change of judgment on their'own part." 2
And it is of some importance to know farther, that, after a
representation from the government of the colony to the King
on this subject, his Majesty, in a letter dated June 28th, 1662,
after saying, that " the end and foundation of the charter was
ana is the freedom and liberty of conscience," and charging and
requiring that freedom and liberty be duly admitted and allowed,
so that the " Book of Common Prayer " might be used, and all
persons of good and honest lives and conversations be admitted
to the sacraments and their children to baptism, adds, -
"' We cannot be understood hereby to direct or wish that any indulgence should be granted to those persons commonly called Quakers,
whose being  A  inconsistent with any kind of government. We have
found it necessary, by the advice of our Parliament here, to make sharp
laws against them, and are well contented that you do the like there."
1 Palfrey, vol. ii. p. 481.  2 Palfrey, vol. ii. pp. 619, 520.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 435
This is the King's final judgment on the matter.1
A few days since, a leading newspaper in a neighboring State
appended to a courteous notice of this course of Lectures, a very
uncourteous paragraph respecting the founders of Massachusetts,
saying, that -
" They were simply a band of narrow-minded sectaries, animated by no
broad nor generous motives; but aiming to establish a morose and exclusive community, from which every one of broader sympathy and more
tolerant spirit should be rigorously shut out."
And then, naming three of the principal men among them, it
was said, -
"that, so far from being the promoters of a great movement, they prove,
on examination, of very moderate calibre.  They were designed for
village deacons, rather than for founders of states."
One cannot, and has no disposition to, repress a smile at language like this.
It is neither my duty nor my privilege, at this time, to enter
into a discussion respecting the statesmanship of the founders
of Massachusetts. But it lies within my province to say here
and now, that, but for the religious legislation of the founders
of Massachusetts, many persons would have come here, who,
like some of those who went to Rhode Island, were not fit for
village deacons, nor for any other honest and honorable position.
A clerical friend of mine, in a sermon last Thanksgiving Day,
referring to the Puritan Commonwealth and the disturbances
by Roger Williams and others, happily remarked, that " every
Utopia ought to be supplemented with a Narragansett."
Their experiment of founding and maintaining a civil state
upon a basis which should support the worship of God according
to the dictates of their conscientious convictions of duty, and an
ecclesiastical state combined which should be in harmony with
it, and of excluding whatever was antagonistic to its welfare,
failed in its exclusiveness; but the change was only in the
admission of the element of a more extended liberty of conscience; and of what is dignified by that name without its
1 Mass. Records, vol. iv. part ii. p. 165; Hutch. Coll. Papers, p. 379.




436   CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
vitality; with greater liberty also of action. Their failure was
partial only; their success, great and enduring.
With an intelligent appreciation of its true principles, they
laid here the foundation of civil liberty upheld by law and
restrained by law, and of a system of impartial justice.
In the " Body of the Liberties," enacted in 1641, is a prefatory declaration, that"We do, therefore, this day, religiously and unanimously, decree and
confirm these following Rights, liberties, and privileges, concerning our
Churches, and Civil State, to be respectively, impartially, and inviolably
enjoyed and observed throughout our jurisdiction for ever."
The first and second declarations following this, are, of themselves, a Massachusetts Magna Charta.
" 1. No man's life shall be taken away, no man's honor or good name
shall be stained, no man's person shall be arrested, restrained, banished,
dismembered, nor any ways punished, no man shall be deprived of his
wife or children, no man's goods or estate shall be taken away from him,
nor any way indamaged under color of law or Countenance of Authority,
unless it be by virtue or equity of some express law of the Country warranting the same, established by a General Court and sufficiently published,
or in case of the defect of a law in any particular case, by the word of
God. And in Capital cases, or in cases concerning dismembering or
banishment according to that word to be judged by the General Court."
52. Every person within this jurisdiction, whether Inhabitant or
foreigner, shall enjoy the same justice and law that is general for the
plantation, which we constitute and execute one towards another, without
partiality or delay.' 1
The main principle of these declarations is recognized in the
constitutions of the States, and of the United States. If it shall
be abandoned, and the theory substituted that the general government is to be administered according to the will of the people,
as ascertained, from time to time, by the action of Congress, civil
liberty in the United States will receive a shock, from which it
will never recover under that government.
With a profound conviction of the truth and of the vital importance of their religious principles, they achieved and secured
to themselves liberty to worship God according to the dictates
1 Mass. Hist. Society's Coll. 3d Series, vol. viii. p. 216.




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 437
of their consciences. They disclaimed again and again power
over the faith and consciences of others. If they were pertinacious in their determination that those who could not join at
least in attendance upon their religions worship, and especially
that those who placed themselves in hostility to their principles
and practice, should find their liberty elsewhere,-their efforts
to secure liberty for themselves have resulted in a larger liberty to
all others.
With the rod of a persevering industry, they smote the rock
of Massachusetts, literally lying in the wilderness; and if the
elements of prosperity existing within did not gush forth in immediate profusion, they have since flowed in copious streams to
sustain and enrich their descendants.
Let not the conclusion that the Puritans founded their State
in order that they might worship God according to the dictates
of their own consciences, without admitting others to disturb
their worship by contention about doctrines and ordinances, detract from the high estimation in which they have been held,
heretofore.
Let us not even presume to believe that they would have
effected a better work, had they attempted to provide entire
liberty for what every man, woman, and child deemed the dictates
of their several consciences.
We are not authorized to say that it would have been better
if they had founded a colony on the shores of Massachusetts,
with what we call liberty of conscience, -liberty for every one
not only to think as he pleases, which the Puritans allowed,
but liberty for every one to preach, and harangue, and vituperate,
and denounce every other one who differs and dissents from his
or her particular notion,- liberty to women to hold conventions,
and make pretty invectives against government, and liberty to
others to denounce the Constitution which is, or should be, the
organic law. All this is supposed to be safe for us. Would it
have been safe for them? On what premises shall we maintain
such a position? Nay, upon what data shall we persuade ourselves that, forming their infant settlement upon such a foundation, their Patmos would not have been turned into a Pandemonium,- that their experiment would not have proved a
disastrous failure in its very inception?




438  CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
Above all, let us not stultify ourselves by the superlative
folly of regarding the Puritans as "a band of narrow-minded
sectaries, animated by no broad nor generous motives," who
aimed "to establish a morose and exclusive community, from
which every one of broader sympathy and more tolerant spirit
should be rigorously shut out." Exclusion of the promoters of
contention is not the exclusion of persons of the broadest sympathy and the widest toleration.
Let us have a correct understanding of what the Puritans were
in their day, which will lead us to very different conclusions.
They were non-conformists.  It was their non-conformity,
religious and civil, which brought them hither, to establish the
principles of their non-conformity, in a colony to be based on the
very foundations of their non-conformity.
Thirty years after the death of John Wycliffe, the Council of
Constance condemned his opinions and writings; and decreed
that his memory should be pronounced infamous, and that his
bones, if to be distinguished from those of the faithful, should be
removed from the consecrated ground, and cast upon a dunghill.
Thirteen years subsequently, in pursuance of this sentence, his
remains were taken from their place and burned; and the ashes
were cast into the Swift, a brook which empties itself into the
Avon.
"The Avon to the Severn runs,
The Severn to the sea,
And Wycliffe's dust shall spread abroad,
Wide as the waters be."
Many of you recollect those beautiful lines. You know who
repeated them, with a reference to the blood of Kossuth, if it
should be shed by the Emperor of Russia.
Who was JohnWycliffe? A non-conformist, —" The morning
star of the Reformation," -the original and type of the nonconformists who, denying the supremacy of King and bishops,
as he denied that of the Pope, kindled the spark of civil and
religious liberty in England; who cherished and fostered it in
the wilderness, until, increasing and extending its beneficent
warmth, it shot forth such a light, that the fires of persecution
paled before its radiance.
Sneers about village deacons cannot tarnish the reputation of




CHARTER AND RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.  439
such men. Detractors may think to cast their dust upon the
waters; but, like that of Wycliffe, it "shall spread abroad, wide
as the waters be."
If the liberty which they claimed and secured, was, in their
day, confined in a great measure to themselves and their institutions; after generations have had the benefit of an expansion
of its principles into a more extended freedom.
We may reject their creed. We may regret their austerity.
But they will live in history, as they have lived, the very embodiment of a noble devotion to the principles which induced them
to establish a colony, to be " so religiously, peaceably, and civilly
governed," as thereby to incite the very heathen to embrace the
principles of Christianity.








PURITAN POLITICS
IN
ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.
BY EDWARD E. HALE.








PURITAN POLITICS
IN
ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.
i AM to treat in an hour, as I can, a subject which could be
scarcely entered upon, had the whole of this course of
lectures been devoted to it. It is a subject, as I believe, for
which we are now but beginning to collect the materials. For
the religious and political prejudices of England did a great
deal, in two centuries, to shroud in England the motives and
even the acts of the men to whom is due the English liberty of
to-day. And, on our side of the water, the complete change of
scene and circumstance has swept away most of the traditions,
and all the prejudices of the politics of the Fathers. It is not
seventy years, I think, since Oliver Cromwell's portrait still
hung as a tavern sign in Boston; and, quite up to our own times,
such names as Newbury Street and Worcester Street ought to
remind the children what kings fled before their fathers, in the
fights of Newbury and Worcester.  But, in fact, I am afraid
such memorials have availed but little. For most of us who
are men and women, while we were taught in our childhood to
weep over the sorrows of the exiles in the " Mayflower," drank
in at the same time, from fountains fed by David Hume and
Walter Scott, the notion that King Charles was a martyr, and
that his judges were crazy men. I should say it was only within
the last twenty years, that there had been fair chance for an
honest verdict as to Puritan politics, whether in this country
or in England. In that time, the service for King Charles the
martyr has been omitted by authority from the English prayer



444    PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.
book. The opening of the English State papers has given us
more light than we had before. Not that we have even yet the
complete materials for history, but the graves are giving up
their dead; and from hour to hour the lies of Clarendon and
the rest are exposed.
I can only attempt the outline of the political movements of
the founders of Massachusetts, and the Puritans of New England,-the great men who have been wisely called "the
greatest geniuses for government that the world ever saw embarked together in one common cause."
I shall be guided all along by the studies and by the philosophy of our own great historian Dr. Palfrey, from whose
crowded chapters, I find, I took unconsciously even the title
which the lecture bears. I have been indebted to his thoughtful
kindness or to his counsel, from the first moment of my life; and
it is no new experience to me, that in my enterprise of this
evening I find him my constant guide. And I have, also, the
constant advantage of the exquisite care, the range of observation and the profound discrimination, of Mr. Haven, who,
as the members of the Historical Society well know, is far better
fitted than I to enter on this theme.
I think the key to the whole story may be found in the ominous
words which King James's first House of Commons addressed
to the House of Lords immediately after he had been lecturing
them on his own prerogative, and on his intolerance to the
Puritans. "There may be a people without a King, but there
can be no King without a people."  This was comfortable
doctrine for a monarch, who, in his escape from Scotland, had
promised himself the privileges of unrestricted tyranny. Fortunately for civil liberty in England and America, in all countries
and in all times, none of the Stuarts ever learned in time what
this ominous sentence means,-not James I., the most foolish of
them; nor Charles I., the most false; nor Charles II., the most
worthless; nor James II., the most obstinate.  For eighty-six
years, however, it was the business of the Puritans of England, counselled and led in large measure, as I shall show,
by the Puritans of New England, to teach the Stuarts, and to
teach the world, that lesson. And they taught it, -that the
people is stronger than the King, and can tie the King's hands.




PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.          445
The state-craft jugglery of the closet shall not undo the knots;
the trenchant sword of battle shall not cut the cords. If the
King will learn the lessoil in no other way, he shall learn it when
he sees the headsman's axe flashing before his eyes. The people
is stronger than the sovereign; and from the people's power his
power comes. That is the lesson. There may be a people
without a King; there can be no King without a people.
I must not enter on the history of Elizabeth's reign, though
the name of Puritan. in English history belongs as far back as
the year 1550.
King James, at the age of thirty-five, came to the crown in
1603.   On his journey from     Scotland to London, just half
way from the frontier to the city, he passed through Sherwood
Forest, and entertained the day, under good conduct, in hunting
there, - the last huntsman mentioned, I think, in the series
where Robin Hood is first.    In that day's sport, he passed the
manor house of Scrooby, where William         Brewster lived,afterwards our old Plymouth Elder. At that very time our
Pilgrim Fathers met privately to worship in that house every
Sunday.    James took, very likely, a mug of ale from William
Brewster's hands, he lunched in the open air, on the bank of a
stream a little further on, and in such sylvan amusement came on
to Worsop, where he slept.1 The manor of Scrooby, Brewster's
home, belonged to the Archbishop of York. It attracted the
King's attention, so that he thought he would like it for a royal
residence, whenever he might hunt again in Sherwood Forest.
It is a little curious now to see, that the first letter written by
this Presbyterian King to the Archbishop of York, after his
arrival at his capital, was, not a discussion of theology, but a
proposal to the Archbishop to sell to him   the manor house in
1 Nichols's Progresses of King James I. The whole passage is this: -
" The 20t day being Wednesday, his Majestie rode toward Worksop, the noble
Earle of Shrewsbury's House, - at Bawtry, the High Sheriff of Yorkshire took his
leave of the King, - and there Mr. Askoth (Ayscough) the High Sheriff of Nottinghamshire received him, being gallantly appointed both with horse and man, and so
he conducted his majestie on, till he came within a mile of Blyth, where his Highness lighted and sat down on a banke side to eat and drink."
Here Nichols's note is, "Bawtry is a small market town, situated partly in the
parish of Scrooby, in Yorkshire, and partly in that of Blyth, in Nottinghamshire.
The division of the two'counties is marked by a small current of water in the yard
of the Crown inn."




446    PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.
which the Pilgrim Fathers were then secretly meeting, on the
Lord's day, for their weekly worship; and in which they continued to meet till this same Presbyterian King " harried them
out of the kingdom." The incident, trifling in itself, illustrates
very perfectly the relation between the three parties then in England. The extreme Puritans, represented by no man better
than William Brewster, were meeting in private houses for
their worship.  They were expecting grace and help from a
Presbyterian monarch.  The Bishops and Archbishops were
doubting and dreading what might come to them and theirs,
from a King who had been nursed in the school of John Knox
and Jane Geddies.   And this King-who was to arbitrate
between the parties, and to meet the hopes of one and the
fears of the other, - was thinking more of himself and his own
comfort than of the consciences of either. All this, I say,
is typified, when James I. asks Archbishop Hutton, to turn
William Brewster out of his home, that he may have a convenient hunting-lodge.1
In five years more, Brewster and the Fathers, who met to
worship in the Archbishop's manor house, were harried out of
England. James and the Church, of which the Archbishop was
the second officer, were in absolute accord, -hunting the same
game!
The first incident of his reign, around which the politics of
the time took form, was the conference of the clergy at Hampton Court for the revision of the Liturgy, in which the Puritan
and the High Church party were both represented. The King
showed at once, that he meant to throw himself into the arms of
the party which would give him most power in the State, and
could do most to place him in the position of the absolute monarchs of the Continent of Europe. Any pretensions of his
Scottish reign were swept away, like other pettinesses and
inconveniences of his Northern home. He silenced the Puritan
doctors by entering himself into the arena.
"If you aim at a Scottish presbytery, it agrees as well with
monarchy as God and the devil."  These words show the spirit
of the King's contributions to the discussion, of which Archbishop
1 The King's letter to the Archbishop comes to light in the Calendar of Domestic
Papers of his reign, edited by Mrs. Green.




PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.   447
Whitgift was pleased to say, that "undoubtedly his Majesty
spake by the special assistance of God's Spirit." It was in this
Conference that his favorite axiom, " No Bishop, no King," first
appears on the royal lips. Perhaps it suggested the more ominous axiom, which I have quoted from his first Parliament,"There can be no King without a People."
That Parliament was not summoned till the King had been on
the throne more than a year; a pestilence in London delaying
its assembly. The celebrated gunpowder plot- in which twenty
resolute men, who kept a secret for a year and a half, expected
to destroy the King, his family, the Lords, and the Commons,
and in which they came so near success -was detected just as
the session began. The reaction from that plot might have
given to James that hold on the people which, I think, he never
gained. But he did not enter into the rage against the Roman
Catholics, to whose church the conspirators belonged; and the
terrible experience prolonged only a little the "inevitable conflict" between him and his subjects.
If we trace the history of the Court, the chapters of this reign
are the histories of favorites, Carr and Villiers; of the death
of Prince Henry; of the matches proposed for Prince Charles;
and of the fortunes of the Princess Elizabeth, at one moment
the object of Protestant idolatry. The episodes in that court
history are such as closed poor Raleigh's life. If we trace the
history of the people, we find the steady growth of resistance to other authority than the authority of the law. We
find the luxury of wider and wider study of the Scripture,
passing sometimes into the fanaticism and folly of a novelty.
We trace the growth to manhood of Eliot and Hampden, Winthrop and Vane and Cromwell. Shakspeare died in 1615,
midway in the King's reign. The Colony of Virginia was
planted under the old system of colonization, 1607; and, in the
same year, the Pilgrim Fathers were driven out of England, little
knowing that they were to be the great exemplars of the success
of the new system of colonization.1 The received version of
1 It took near a hundred years for our Fathers to learn again how to establish
permanent colonies. The effort, for the sixteenth century, was made, almost always,
* by sending men alone; and in almost every instance it failed. When England borrowed from Greek experience, and from Spanish experience, and sent women with the




448    PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.
the English Scriptures was made by a commission appointed by
the King, and came into common use in England. The two
things in history which preserve the reign of James from contempt are the translation of the Bible and the settlement of
America. And I can give no better illustration of the way in
which history has been written in the past, than by saying that
in the two great English histories of this reign, by Hume and by
Lingard, the translation of the Bible is not so much as mentioned, and that Lingard does not give a word to the planting
of America. Hume only squeezes out for it a wretched page in
the midst of chapters devoted to the disgusting intrigues of
Rochester and the Countess of Essex and Buckingham and the
rest, none of whom are of any worth but for this, that they were
busily destroying the last relies of the regard which men had for
the institutions of feudal times.
The intrigues of the Court and the deep determination of the
people of England can be put face to face, however, by dragging
out from history the contemporary revelations.  William Brewster, telling of old times around his pine-knot fire in Plymouth,
filled his stage with such actors as Mary Queen of Scots,
Queen Elizabeth, King James, Raleigh, Essex, Southampton, all
of whom he must have seen, as I suppose he must have seen
William  Shakspeare.  On that Christmas season of 1620, at
the moment when John Carver and Edward Winslow were
cutting the timber for the first store-house of Plymouth, building better than they knew indeed, King James was entertaining
at his palace the embassy which first proposed the ill-fated
marriage between Charles I. and Henrietta of France. Of
the masque prepared for that royal entertainment, all that is
known is that the humor consisted in the ridicule of a Puritan.1
From the building of the store-house grew the old Colony, the
Colony of Massachusetts, the New-England confederation, the
union of the United States and the republican government and
the civil liberty of America. From the policy which united
men, homes were founded for the first time, and the nature of colonization changed.
Jamestown and Sagadahoc were the last experiments on the old theory; Plymouth,
the first on the new. The settlement at Manhattan was not so much a colony as a
trading-port.
1 The authorities may be found at length in Mrs. Green's Calendars, I have
quoted them in detail in an article in the " Galaxy" magazine for January, 1868




PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.   449
Charles and Henrietta grew the English rebellion and the
English revolution, from  that marriage came Charles II.,
James II., and Queen Mary. The two lines of history which
are thus suggested lead out from the contrast between the history
of the Court and the history of the people in the reign of King
James.
But in King Charles's time, people and King come closer, and
the history of the politics of the people is the history of the
politics of the King. Charles quarrelled with his first Parliament; and if he could have had his way, he would never have
had another. Our associate, Mr. Sabine, reminds us that the
very first question on which King and Commons broke was an
American question,- a question of the fisheries.1 For eleven
years Charles reigned as absolutely as Philip II. ever reigned in
Spain. He and his would have been glad to reign so until now,
and might have done so but that there was an English church
and an English people. Nay: do not let me, even in the accident
of expression, imply that between the church and the people
there was any distinction, if you speak of the real church and
the real people. Of that great crisis of English history, the
secret is this, that the real people of England were religious men
and women to the very bottom of their hearts; that what they
did in matters politic they did as matter of religious duty; not as
what poor James called a piece of state-craft, but as a part of
their religious allegiance to the King of kings. I believe this
profound conviction of religious duty has been the secret of all
the successful politics of the men of that race from that day to
this day. But it was a divine mystery which it was not given
to politicians like Wentworth, or formalists like Laud, or liars
like King Charles, to understand. None the less was there a fire
beneath the whole, of which the tokens were sometimes fearful
and sometimes awful. Its presence there gives to the study of
the politics to which it lent the heat, an interest, which to the
intrigues of courtiers like those of Louis, or even to the rivalries
of statesmen like those of Elizabeth, is all unknown.
It is, of course, impossible to measure by any statistics the
extent or the depth of this religious feeling or of any religious
1 Sabine's Report on the Principal Fisheries, Washington, 1853, p. 45.
29




450    PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.
feeling. It is to be observed, however, that a long series of
non-conformity on the one hand, and of what the English
Church calls pluralism on the other, left but two thousand
clergymen in the service of the ten thousand livings of England,
in Queen Elizabeth's time. Of these two thousand clergymen, nearly one thousand marked themselves as Puritan by
joining in the petition1 which, at James's accession, begged
him to amend the rubrics in favor of puritan consciences. These
figures show, that, while there were ten thousand congregations
or churches in England, but little more than one thousand of her
clergy gave even a silent acquiescence to such extravagant pretensions as those of Whitgift and Bancroft, who, in such matters,
were the predecessors of Laud. In Charles's time, the fact is
incidentally stated, that, in the mere dead-weight of property, the
Puritan House of Commons was three times as rich as was the
House of Lords. And of the House of Lords, a very considerable part held with the people as against the King. Be it always
remembered, too, that on the side of the King also, as soon as
you leave the rank of mere soldiers and mere courtiers, you are
surrounded by men and women of the purest conscience. You
meet such men as George Herbert and Owen Feltham. When
they came to the arbitrament of arms, the misfortune to the
King was that five-sixths of England were against him. And,
as I said, that which gives the terrible reality to the history, is
the truth which I think no man will question, that, on both sides,
a large proportion of the combatants were actuated by profound
religious conviction. And what saved England and America in
that crisis, was that the monarchs who wished to play the tyrant
there, found the English Church and the English people on the
other side.
The first years of Charles's reign gave no hope to the people
of England. I speak of the people in contrast from the men
and women of the Court, who were trying to hold to the methods
of feudal rule. The marriage of the King with a Roman Catholic princess had offended and affronted the Protestantism of
England. When he made war with France under the pretext
1 Thence called "the millenary petition." The spelling is important. It will be
remembered that it asked for an exemption from the surplice and other customs considered "Popish."




PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.  451
of coming to the defence of the hard-pressed Huguenots, he
conducted the war under such lead as Buckingham's; collected
his revenue under such systems as Louis and Philip would have
used; and, by the method, disgusted the English people, who
might have been interested in the cause of the war. Two years
after his reign began, Charles wanted the help of the Archbishop
of Canterbury. The Archbishop was in disgrace already, because he had refused the aid of the Church in the disgusting
intrigue-with which I will insult no man's'ears-in which
Somerset and the Lady Essex were the actors. Now, in his retirement, he refused to license the printing of a sermon, in which
a court chaplain, Sibthorpe, had laid down the doctrine that a
king might do what he pleased; and no man might say, " What
dost thou?" For this refusal, King Charles suspended him, -
the highest officer of the Church beneath himself. The act, at
this day, would disgust the most ardent lover of the Episcopacy,
as much as it then disgusted the most eager Puritan. Buckingham's disgrace on the coast of France soon followed. The
King's third Parliament was summoned, and Charles strove to
govern it by buying Wentworth, -afterwards known as Lord
Strafford, " the first Englishman," says Macaulay boldly, " disgraced by a peerage." Laud was placed at the head of the High
Commission Court. Parliament defied the King, and the King
defied them. He dissolved them; and, as I said, began to reign
for years as an absolute monarch. The Star Chamber was in its
glory, and such men as Eliot and Holles were in the Tower.
Such were the first five years of this young King's reign, -
one steady insult to the best feeling of his people. In those five
years, Rev. John White, minister of Dorchester, the founder of
Massachusetts, was, in his way, encouraging this man, who had
heard of New England, and teaching that to whom the name
had never come before. "There was a land of refuge," White
was saying to all men. And a larger and larger company of the
merchants of London, of the merchants of the other cities, and
gradually of the country gentlemen of England, were learning
that, if their battle were lost at home, it might be won in a land
where there was no bishop and no King. I make no question
that White, and those who acted with him, appealed to every
motive that was honest, that would swell the number of those




452    PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.
who would engage in the colonization movement.   I have
myself, in my poor way, in later times, acted with those who
were promoting emigration to the west of the Missouri River,
when we thought that on that emigration great principles for all
time depended. And I think therefore, that, unless men are
very different now from what they were then, men entered into
the great emigration from which we have grown with a large
variety of motive. Only I am sure, no man came here because
he loved King Charles, or because he believed in Laud's Court
of High Commission. And I am sure, that John White and
Matthew Cradock and Isaac Johnson and Richard Saltonstall
and our great leader, Winthrop, meant that the enterprise should
be controlled by men who would never give in to the tyrannies
of Charles or to the pretensions of Laud.  How well those
intentions were carried out, I have next to show.
England " grows weary of her inhabitants; so as man, who
is the most precious of all creatures, is here more vile and base
than the earth we tread upon." These are the words which
Winthrop uses, in the "Nine Reasons" which justify the new
plantation.  These reasons are passed from  hand to hand
among the men most saddened by the oppressions of the Star
Chamber, and most determined to find freedom somewhere. As
soon as Mr. Forster published his larger life of Sir John Eliot,
our President, Mr. Winthrop, in correspondence with him, discovered that the paper on Emigration there spoken of, sent by
Eliot in the Tower to Hampden in his house, was a copy of
Winthrop's " Nine Reasons."  Eliot had transcribed Winthrop's
paper, and sent it to Hampden for his study. These men, the
great leaders of the English Puritans, were thus personally
interested in the enterprise here. We knew already that it had
the support of Lord Brooke and Lord Warwick and Lord Say
and Sele. It is now certain that John Hampden is not the
Hampden who spent an early winter with our Plymouth
friends; but it is equally certain that he and Eliot were interesting themselves in our Massachusetts Colony when it sailed,
and were among those who saw how essential was this beginning to the success of their great cause. Under such auspices,
the government and charter were transferred from England to
New England, - the boldest change of base in history. In its




PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.       453
success, as I believe, the history of constitutional liberty begins.
That change was made by men who meant that their new-born
State should not be dependent, if they could help it, on the
powers which were ruling England to her ruin.1
On their arrival here, they settled the great question of bishop
or no bishop, which was one of the elements of strife at home.
They settled it by an arrangement of their churches, in the face
of all that had been asserted by Whitgift and Bancroft and
Laud.   So far as the forms of government went, they swore
their magistrates, their freemen and their people to be faithful
to the government of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts Bay;
but they alluded no more in that oath to their allegiance to King
Charles than to allegiance to King Louis or to the Pope of
Rome. The Governor and assistants only, for the first twelve
years, were sworn to be faithful to King Charles; but, so soon
as he took up arms against the Parliament, his name disappears
from the oath, long before it was disused by any one in England.
Four years only after the foundation of Boston, a rumor came
from England, that a governor-general was to be appointed by
the King.   The magistrates took counsel with the ministers;
and the ministers advised, that, if a governor-general were sent,
"' we ought not accept him; but defend our lawful possessions,
if we were able; otherwise, to avoid and protract." Two years
later, some English ship captains in our harbor intimated, that
they should be glad to see the royal colors displayed on the fort
in the harbor. They were answered, that we had not the King's
colors to show. The shipmasters offered to lend them, but it
cost a day's discussion and evident heart-burnings before they
could be displayed there; and this was done only on a nicely
drawn distinction on the King's authority in the fort and the
King's authority in the Colony. Early in the history, Endicott
cut the cross out of the colors; and from that moment till the
1 I may be thought to speak of this " change of base" with the prejudice of a
New-Englander. I am glad to quote Mr. John Forster's language, therefore. In
his letter to Mr. Robert C. Winthrop, forwarding a copy of the Eliot manuscript, he
says, " There is a new and striking interest contributed to a transaction which, more
largely than any other in history, has affected the destinies of the human race."
The Eliot draft and a draft from the State-paper office were printed in our "Proceedings," at the date of July, 1865. Another copy is in Hutchinson, and another in
" The Life and Letters of Winthrop."




454    PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.
Restoration, I think, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts had a
flag of its own. On a new rumor, that the King or the Star
Chamber proposed to extend their authority thus far, the
chronicler, who had left his home to establish here his tabernacle, undoubtedly expresses the determination of all the leaders
when he says, they would rather remove again, and establish
themselves in a " vacuum  domicilium," — a home which no
sovereign claimed, - this side the King of kings. To the valley
of the Mohawk, perhaps, or, if God guided, further west, - to
some Salt-Lake Valley, if it were needed! They meant that
men should know whether Charles's authority could go farther
in America than the shores which the guns of his ships could
command.
But there was no danger for Massachusetts. The bow had
been bent too far, and it broke. The little history which had
thus been rehearsed by a handful of zealous men, on the little
stage of Massachusetts, was to be acted out by a larger company, to whom they sent many teachers, in the England which
they feared. William Vassall, one of the Massachusetts Company, Lord Say and Sele and John Hampden, both patentees
of Connecticut, determined to bring the question of ship-money
to trial. Once more, as Mr. Sabine reminds us, the turning
question is a question of the fisheries. The ship-money built
the fleet which drove off Dutch intrusion of the English fishing
privileges.  Sir John Eliot, meanwhile, Hampden's friend and
ours, had died in the Tower. Laud had tried his hand on the
reformation of Scotland. Charles had followed up the experiment with an army; and Alexander Leslie, with his other army
of ministers, - an army which was within itself a church,
of which every corps possessed a presbytery, - drove Charles
and his army back to England.   So passed the ten years
while Winthrop and Dudley and the rest were organizing
New England into an independent State. The King had no
choice left. By his own folly, he had wriggled himself to the
corner of his board. He called, at last, a Parliament, and dissolved it. Then he was forced to call the Long Parliament;
and then, though he did not know it, the game was done.
"Sh/ah-mat, says the Persian, as he finishes on the chess-board
the game of simulated war, and the words have passed into all




PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.  455
languages. Sometimes you take the bit of crowned ivory from
the board, sometimes you leave it there. That is nothing. The
game is ended.  Shah-mat,- check-mate.  The King is dead!
In Charles's case, the King, with his knights and bishops,
hopped from square to square on their little board, for eight
short years, hoping to avoid the inevitable.  But the people
of England had the power in their hands. The Great Remonstrance, at the end of 1641, showed that the Long Parliament
understood its duty, and could do it. " If the vote had been
lost," said Cromwell, as they left the House that night, " I would
have sold all I had to-morrow, and would never have seen England more."  He meant he would have come to New England.
" O'er the deep
Fly, and one current to the ocean add;
One spirit to the souls our fathers had;
One freeman more, America, to thee."
This was not the time when Charles stopped the ships on the
Thames, when, it is said, Hampden was on board ready to
emigrate. It is fairly doubted, whether Cromwell had joined
that earlier emigration. This was four years later,- at the end
of 1641. Had Cromwell come, he would have arrived here just
before the first Commencement of Harvard College; he would
have arrived, just as the General Court was striking the name
of King Charles out of the oath; he would have arrived, just
as the short-lived standing council was disarmed; he would
have arrived, just as the position of the Lower House first came
into discussion; he would have arrived, just as the four
colonies were arranging their confederation.  At the election
day of that year, John Winthrop was chosen governor for the
first year of his third term. Would he perhaps have yielded his
seat the next year to Oliver Cromwell? Would Oliver Cromwell have been the sixth governor of Massachusetts? or would
he have led a company to Strawberry Bank, to the Connecticut
or to the Mohawk, and become himself the Protector of an infant
Commonwealth?
It was not so written.  The King tried war,-under the
impression that has more than once deceived the cavaliers of a
waning chivalry, that people who believe in precedents and
principles, who trust in prayer because they trust in God, will




456    PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.
not prove quick at fighting. At the stronghold of Nottingham,
in the Sherwood Forest, where James had hunted, Charles
displayed his banner. Two years of skirmishing advanced the
final settlement but little; and the death of Hampden and Pym
took from the Parliament the men who seemed their ablest
guides.  These two leaders were almost American except in
name, both early friends of Massachusetts, both grantees of the
charter of Connecticut.  If Lord Nugent is to be believed,
Hampden was actually on shipboard once on his way hither.
Meanwhile our Earl of Warwick, who had really secured for us
the Massachusetts charter, showed that his training for maritime
adventures stood him well in stead, in his command of the Parliament fleet, which cut off from the King any foreign resources.
At this point, the Independents of England began more distinctly to study the methods of Massachusetts. Unterrified by the
shock of arms, Parliament attempted the difficult question of
church administration. The celebrated Westminster Assembly
was convened, -hated, with good reason, by most children
of recent generations, -but, for the first years of its existence,
second only to the Long Parliament itself in its influence in
England. To this assembly, Cotton, Hooker, and Davenport,
the ministers of the first churches of Boston, Hartford, and New
Haven, were earnestly invited by leading men in England, who
dreaded the Presbyterian influence of that body.  They were
strongly tempted, I suppose, but they did not go. Hooker, for
one, felt sure that he could arrange the church system  of
America. He believed in the independence of America too
thoroughly to compromise our system by any failure in England. And, as it proved, the plans of Cotton have worked well
here to this hour.
On the question of Presbyterian Church Government, or Independency, or Congregationalism, as Cotton preferred to call
our form of it, a great deal seemed to depend. Among other
things, the alliance with Presbyterian Scotland seemed to depend
upon it.  At the outset of the civil war, there seemed no
doubt that the Presbyterian influence prevailed both in the
Parliament and the Westminster Assembly. We are to remember all along, as Lord Nugent says, that nothing has more tended




PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.  457
to cloud this history, than the use of the one word Puritan to
represent Presbyterians and Independents. When we speak of
the Puritans, as proclaiming religious liberty, in the trumpet
tones of Milton, —we mean not the Presbyterians, but the Independents. Looking back upon history, we can see that the
Presbyterians were tempted to hold that mid-way position, or
position of compromise, which seldom triumphs in revolutions
which involve a principle, -the position which the Girondists
held in France in the first revolution, and which the Parliamentary opposition in the French Chambers held in the last.
The little company of Independents steadily gained force in
Parliament and in the Assembly, which their numbers at the
outset did not seem to promise. What is of vast importance at
such a crisis, it proved that, with such leaders as Cromwell, they
were gaining the sway of the army, while the simplicity and
democracy of their system gained, for the moment at least, the
confidence of the great body of the people. In all their argument, they had always the great advantage of showing our working example of their theory. A working example is what the
Englishman or American, of Saxon lineage, always respects as
he respects no untried theory. The New-England churches were
Independent Churches; and Cromwell and Vane and Fiennes
and St. John used the tracts of Cotton and Hooker and
Norton and the other New-England ministers, as being for a
thousand reasons the best weapons in their arsenal.
In the arrangement of the churches of England, the theory
of the New-England Independents triumphed over the theory
of the Presbyterians.  I do not claim that it triumphed because of their advocacy.  I think it more safe to say, that it
triumphed, because it was an extreme opinion, and those were
extreme times.  It triumphed without any formal vote. On
the other hand, the formal votes of the Westminster Assembly
arranged the Presbyterian order, and the Presbyterian machinery
was established in London and in Lancashire. But no enactment of Parliament carried it out through England; and the
more simple statement, which made each congregation an independent church, was the statement which for the period of the
English Commonwealth prevailed in practice.
But the times had swept men beyond any mere question of
2




458    PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.
ecclesiastical arrangement. It was now a question between halfway men and men who, in President Lincoln's phrase, would
" put it through." Cromwell and his friends among the Independents had found out what I suppose the leaders of the people
find out in the beginning of all civil wars. They found out that,
in their own army, the Essexes and the Manchesters were
afraid of beating the King too well. The question of Independent versus Presbyterian, which was at first a question of church
discipline, became a question of strategy in the field, of diplomacy in negotiation, of stern practice in Parliament, and at last
in the Palace Yard. It became at last the question between the
army and the Parliament. And, in that question, the Independents, - who ruled the army, - as we know, prevailed. The
army purged the Parliament. The purged Parliament created
the High Court of Justice, for the trying and judging of Charles
Stuart. The High Court of Justice found him guilty of treason
and beheaded him. There may be a people without a King, —
there cannot be a King without a people.
I should like to discuss the question, whether their success were
the success of might, or of right, or of both together. I believe
the right conquered, when the might conquered. The Fathers
of New England thought so: I think with them. I must not
discuss that question now. I must leave it where Cromwell
left it in his letter to Hammond. Two lawful powers in England disagree as to the disposition to be made of the King.
One is the army, lawfully called, and consisting of thousands
of Christian men, who have risked, and still risk, their lives, as
witness for their sincerity.  The other is the Parliament,
chosen eight years since by the clumsy borough system of
England; of which a majority believes that the King's word
may still be taken. These two are at issue. Cromwell says
that the army is the truer representation of the people of
England.  I think he is right.  As to the question decided,
whether Charles could be believed for an instant, when his
interest required him to be false, all men know now that the
decision of the army was the true one.
If I know myself, I can speak without prejudice here. Personally, I am proud to run back the lines of my own ancestry to
Adrian Scrope who voted for the King's death, and afterwards,




PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.  459
trusting in Charles II.'s amnesty, lost his own head for trusting it.
By another line, I am proud to trace my ancestry to Mary Dyer,
the Quaker, who, at nearly the same time, was hanged by the
Massachusetts Puritans here on Boston Common, because she,
too, thought she ought to obey God rather than man. I am
proud of both these ancestors. I am as proud of one of them
as I am of the other. They teach me very distinctly the lesson
of the narrowness of Puritan presumption. But while I learn
that lesson, I learn also the lesson of the Puritan's unfaltering
loyalty to the King of kings. I think no man studies history
fairly, who does not learn one of those lessons, while he learns
the other; and, speaking for myself, if I had been called upon
to make the great decision between the people of England and
him who had had a fair chance to prove himself their king, - I
hope I should not have been daunted by the terrors which then
surrounded the mere name of Royalty. I hope I should have
meted to him justice for his every act of falsehood and of treason.
I hope I should have treated him as fairly as I would have treated
the meanest soldier in his army. So tried, I have no doubt that
Charles I. deserved death, if it were ever deserved by man from
the hand of man.
That work was the work of the English Independents. The
same men who established the Commonwealth of Massachusetts,
in this act established the Commonwealth of England. Not
that the Independents voted, without distinction, for the execution of the King; but they did mean, without distinction, to
give to the people the rule of the Commonwealth. I have no
desire to overstate the share which New-Englanders, who had
recrossed to England, had in the great issue. I say simply that
New England did, on a small scale, what England then did on a
large scale; and that the same men directed there, as had sympathized here. Here, were but ten thousand men, all told: there,
were at least a million. The population of England was at
least five millions, of whom one-fifth, I suppose, were men. To
the assistance of England, the ten thousand here lent such
men as Stephen Winthrop, Edward Winslow, John Leverett,
and Robert Sedgwick, who took the highest military rank; such
men as Desborough, Peters, Downing, and Hopkins, who took
high civil rank. And you remember it is said that of the first




460     PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.
graduates of Harvard College, the abler part always returned to
England to give there the service of their lives.'
The words "Independence" and "Independent' are now
favorite words in America. I have observed in later days that
they have found especial favor in connection with the word
" Sovereignty" in those States of this Union which fancy they
are descended from the cavaliers of England. " Independent and
Sovereign States," they say. Favorite words in America, since
a Continental Congress of the United States, led by the children
of Roundheads, proclaimed the United States to be "free and
independent."  It is well, therefore, to remember how    those
words came into the English language. They are not in the
English Bible.  They are not in Shakspeare's plays.  You read
there of Dependence. Yes. But not yet of Independency.
The word " Independency" was born when the hated Brownists
separated themselves from the Church of England. The word
6s Independent" was borrowed from their vocabulary to designate
the men who triumphed with Cromwell; and from that dictionary of the Church the word was borrowed again in 1776, when
the United States of America became an independent nation.
I must not. attempt any further details of the triumphs of the
Commonwealths of England and of New England.        I have attempted to show that their politics were at heart the same. The
leaders of the Commonwealth of England were the friends of
New England. The leaders in New England came here, with
omens which seemed unpromising, to win a success which
was denied at home.    I know no self-sacrifice in history more
loyal and gallant than that of our great governor, when he was
asked to go back to England, to take place of honor and command, in their hopeful beginnings; and when he held to the
little State in the wilderness, rather than return to the delights
1 Johnson's Memoranda are in the following words, at the date 1672:
"Ministers that have come from England, chiefly in the ten first years, ninetyfour; of which returned, twenty-seven; died in the country (New England), thirtysix; yet alive in the country, thirty-one. Ministers bred in New England, and
(excepting about ten) in Harvard College, one hundred and thirty-two, of which died
in the country, ten; now living, eighty-one; removed to England, forty-one."
(Chronological Table in New-England's Rarities, Archxol. Amer. vol. iv. p. 233.)
[p. 103 of the edition of 1672.] The Triennial Catalogue gives only one hundred
and one ministers up to 1672 in Harvard College. But all that Johnson names did
not necessarily take the degree of A.B.




PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.  461
of home and the certainty of distinction. It was that little State,
of perhaps 30,000 people, which treated almost as an equal with
the Parliament of England. In speaking of that State, the Long
Parliament speaks of commerce between "the kingdom of England " and " the kingdom of New England." To that independent
State the Parliament yielded the privilege of universal commerce,
which to all colonies of England was denied. And that independent State, in the next session of the General Court of Massachusetts, returned the international civility; and, by the first
reciprocal treaty, gave to the kingdom of England like privileges
to those which to "the kingdom of New England" had thus
been granted. To the navigation laws of that Parliament and
of Cromwell, England owes this day the commerce which
whitens every sea. To that first reciprocal treaty, New England
owed the early maritime development which has sent her ships
to every ocean.
As time has passed by, the Parliament of England has learned
that Oliver Cromwell was never sovereign in that island. In
the line of statues of English sovereigns in Parliament House,
the eye first rests upon the vacant space between the image of
Charles I. and Charles II. There is no Cromwell there! Yet, if
he were not sovereign of England for the ten years after the
royal traitor died, it would be hard to say who was. He was
not the sovereign of New England in those years. In those
years, New England knew no sovereign but her people. But'
he was the friend of New England, and the friend of her rulers.
They loved him, they believed in him, they honored him. He
represented the policy which, for ten years, triumphed in Old
England, and which has triumphed in New England till this
time.  Massachusetts is about to acknowledge her debt to
Winthrop, which she can never pay, by erecting his statue in
the National Capitol. There it is to stand, first among the
founders of America; first, where Virginia Dare and John Smith
and George Calvert, and even Roger Williams and William
Penn, are second. When that obligation is thus acknowledged,
Massachusetts may well erect in her own capitol, face to face
with Chantrey's statue of George Washington, the statue which
England has not reared, of Oliver Cromwell. It may bear this
inscription:



462      PURITAN POLITICS IN ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.
OLIVER CROMWELL.
This man believed in Independency.
He was the sovereign of England for ten years.
He was the friend of New England through his life.
This statue stands here till the England which we love, and from
which we were born, shall know who her true heroes were.




EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.
BY GEO. B. EMERSON.








EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.
T  HE subject assigned to me by the Committee of the Historical Society, is Education in Massachusetts,- Legislation and History. I shall endeavor to show, as far as I can do
it in a single lecture, what Massachusetts has done for the advancement and diffusion of education, and how she has done it.
In 1636, three, or, at the utmost, four thousand emigrants,
mostly from the mild southern counties of Old England, were
dwelling in sixteen towns and hamlets, on the sandy shores of
Massachusetts Bay. They were not yet hardened to the fierce
extremes of a New-England climate, and had suffered and were
suffering terribly from the heats of summer, the blustering chilly
winds of spring, and the cold and snow-storms of winter, in
their hastily built log-cabins, and wretched huts and hovels, no
better, often, than the wigwams of the savage Indians. They
were the most religious people under heaven; yet their only
place of worship in Boston was built with mud-walls and a
roof thatched with straw. They had been exposed to scarcity
of all kinds, sometimes nearly approaching to absolute famine.
When the large colony led by Governor Winthrop reached
Salem, in June, 1630, they found that, during the previous
winter, more than a fourth part of their predecessors had died,
and many of the survivors were ill; and, of the new-comers, a
fifth part fell victims to disease before the end of autumn.
Yet, in the first volume of the Records of the General Court,
we read," At a Court holden Sept. 8, 1636, and continued by adjournment to the 28th of the eighth month, October, 1636, the
30




466             EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
Court agreed to give ~400 towards a school or college; ~200
to be paid next year, and ~200 when the work is finished; and
the next Court to appoint where and what building."    At a
General Court held at Newtown, on the 2d of the ninth month,
1637, " The college is ordered to be at Newtown."
The people of Massachusetts at that time were poor, with all
the hardships of new settlers in a savage country, clearing up
the forests, building houses and barns and churches, enlarging
their pastures, and bringing the earth into cultivation.
Four hundred pounds sterling, then, would correspond to
82,000. This would be a grant of fifty cents for each individual
of the four thousand inhabitants, equal to a grant, at the same
rate, for each individual of the present population, say one
million two hundred and fifty thousand, of 8625,000. But it
must be remembered that a dollar then was equivalent to several
dollars now; and that Massachusetts then was one of the
poorest States in the world, and is now one of the richest, - its
valuation in 1865 being more than one thousand millions.
Considering these things, we may well conclude with Dr. Dwight,' It is questionable whether a more honorable specimen of
public spirit can be found in the history of mankind."l  The
name of the town was soon afterwards changed from Newtown
to Cambridge, "a grateful tribute to the transatlantic literary
parent of many of the first emigrants, and indicative of the high
destiny to which they intended the institution should aspire." 2
"In the year 1638," says President Quincy, " while they were only
contemplating its commencement, John Harvard, a dissenting clergyman
of England, resident at Charlestown, died, and bequeathed one-half of
his whole property, and his entire library, to the institution. An instance
of benevolence thus striking and timely, proceeding from one who had
been scarcely a year in the country, was accepted by our Fathers as an
omen of divine favor. With prayer and thanksgiving they immediately
commenced the seminary, and conferred upon it the name of Harvard." 3
What was done in the endowment of Harvard College has
been imitated a thousand times since. The beneficence of the
State has been enlarged and multiplied by the beneficence of
1 Dwight's Travels in New England, vol. i. p. 481, as quoted by President Quincy,
in History of Harvard University, vol. i. p. 8.
2 Quincy's Hist. H. U., vol. i. p. 9.  3 Id., pp. 9, 10.




LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.           467
individuals. The State gives ~400 for the founding of a school
at Cambridge; John Harvard adds ~800. The towns throughout the colony contribute according to, or far beyond, their
means; individuals with wonderful munificence. In the course
of eight years, ~269 18s. 8d. were given by the towns in the
four colonies,l for the benefit of the officers and students in the
college. Of this sum, Boston gave nearly ~85; Charlestown,
~37 16s. 2d.; Lynn, ~1. In 1654, Rev. Mr. Allen, of Dedham,
gave two cows, valued at ~9. In 1656, Richard Dana, in cotton
cloth, 9s.; a widow in Roxbury, ~1; Richard Saltonstall, ~104.
The inhabitants of Eleuthera, one of the Bahama Islands, " out
of their poverty, in testimony of their gratitude towards the
inhabitants of Massachusetts, for necessaries sent them in their
extreme want," ~124.  This shows that charity to strangers
began early in Massachusetts. The island of Eleuthera was then
farther off than Ireland or Crete is now.
In 1669, of ~2,697 5s. paid by the inhabitants in contributions
for erecting a new college building, the town of Portsmouth gave
~60 a year, for seven years; of which Richard Cutts subscribed
~2Q per annum; and Boston ~800, of which Sir Thomas Temple
gave ~100, and Benjamin Gibbs ~50; Salem, ~130 2s. 2d., of
which Rev. Mr. Higginson subscribed ~5, Mr. William Brown
~40, Mr. Edmund Batter ~20; the town of Hull, ~3 18s.; Scarborough in Maine, ~2 9s. 6d.:2 so universal was the generous
feeling towards the college.
The amount of donations in money during the seventeenth
century was ~6,134 16s. 10l. Then there were large gifts in
land and books.  The poor gave according to their ability;
Richard Harr, one great salt, and one small trencher salt; Mr.
Vane, a fruit-dish, sugar-spoon, and silver-tipped jug; Mr. Wilson,
one pewter flagon; Sir Thomas Temple, one pair of globes;
John Willet, a bell; Edward Page, one silver goblet; the farmers, gifts in corn, from many bushels down to a single peck.
One of the most remarkable things in the history of Harvard
College is the fact that, in all the constitutions of the college,
there is nothing illiberal or sectarian, nothing to check the freest
pursuit of truth in theological opinions, and in every thing else;
1 Plymouth, New Haven, Connecticut, and Massachusetts.
2 Quincy's H. C., Appendix, vol. i. p. 508.




468              EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
and this, too, while the founders of the college were severely and
strictly Orthodox, often exclusive in their own opinions, and that
their object was unquestionably to provide for the thorough education of ministers of the gospel of like views with themselves.
Whether it was that they had confidence that free inquiry would
lead others to.the same conclusions it had led themselves; or
that there were differences of opinion among them, which prevented the framing of a declaration of faith that should satisfy
all; or that they were beginning to find that a declaration of
faith, while it excluded those who honestly differed, could never
exclude hypocrites; or that they had a profound and reverent
belief that the living God would, in all future time, be near the
souls of all true and earnest men, to enlighten and guide them;
or whether it was by a special providence that we have been
secured from what has been elsewhere a plague and a snare, - we
know not: we only know that no subscription or declaration of
faith has ever been required from any officer of the college.
The device on the first seal was three open books, with VERITAS
upon them: Search for THE TRUTH everywhere; for a college or
school, the noblest and best motto possible. This was succeeded
by In Christi Gloriam,-to the glory of Christ; and this soon
after by the present motto, Christo et Ecclesice, -to Christ and
the Church.
How earnest and sincere our Puritan Fathers were in doing
all that could be fairly done to secure soundness in the faith, is
shown by the uniform character of their legislation.
In the Records of the Court for May 3, 1654, we read,"Forasmuch as it greatly concerns the welfare of this country that the
youth thereof be educated not only in good literature but sound doctrine,
this Court doth therefore commend it to the serious consideration and
special care of the officers of the college and the selectmen of the several
towns, not to admit or suffer any such to be continued in the office or place
of teaching, educating, or instructing of youth or children, in the college
or schools, that have manifested themselves unsound in the faith or scandalous in their lives, and not giving due satisfaction according to the rules
of Christ."
The conditions for admission at Harvard College, established
by President Dunster, for the year 1642 and onward, are as
follows:



LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.                     469
1. " Whoever shall be able to read Cicero, or any other such like classical
author, at sight, and, correctly and without assistance, to speak and write
Latin, in prose and verse, and to inflect exactly the paradigms of Greek
nouns and verbs, has a right to expect to be admitted into the college;
and no one may claim admission without these qualifications."
And, throughout their course, the scholars were not, within the
college limits, upon any pretext, to use the vernacular, unless
when called to deliver an oration, or some other public exercise,
in English.1
From   this it appears that the standard for admission was
higher than it has been since. I believe that, not comparatively,
but absolutely, boys were better fitted for college then than they
are now.    They had better teachers.       Few teachers at present
are able, by their own example and usage, to teach boys to speak
the Latin language readily and correctly. Few are themselves
able to read Cicero or Tacitus at sight.       A great mistake, one
of the greatest possible, has been made, in relinquishing the mode
of teaching the Latin language at that time prevalent, I believe,
in England and throughout Germany, as well as in this country. For, unquestionably, the only sure way of learning a
language rapidly, pleasantly, satisfactorily, and so as to be a
permanent acquisition, is the natural way; that is, as a spoken
language. In consequence of this change, the character of the
1 Scholares vernacula lingua intra collegii limites, nullo pretextu, utuntor, nisi
ad orationerm, aut aliud aliquod exercitium publicum Anglice habendum evocati
fuerint. (President Dunster's Laws and Rules, 1642-46, in Quincy's Hist., vol. i. p.
578).
" The learned and excellent Henry Dunster," says Dr. Palfrey, "when he accepted
this great charge" (of the Presidency of the college), "had just arrived from England, having been there a non-conformist minister, after receiving an education at
Emmanuel College, Cambridge." (Palfrey, vol. ii. p. 49.) He drew up the Laws
and Rules of the college, and probably settled the course of study, according to the
practice of the English Universities at that time. It consisted, in a large degree, of
Latin, Greek, and English, with something of Hebrew, Syriac, and Chaldee, and
also of divinity. It included Arithmetic, Geometry, Physics, Logic, Ethics, Politics,
and Rhetoric. In the Saturday afternoons of summer, lectures were given on the
nature of plants; in winter, on history. Much time was spent in discussion, and
still more in composition. ("New-England's First Fruits," in Mass. Hist. Coll., vol. i.
pp. 245-6.)
Few persons, if any, have done so much for education and discipline, in America,
as President Dunster. See many curious particulars of his life, opinions, and death,
and appearance, so far as relates to the body, two hundred and fifty years after his
death, in the second of the instructive and delightful volumes of Dr. Palfrey's History.




470            EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
professed teacher has been declining, perhaps continually, until
the beginning of this century.
In other respects, also, the boys were better fitted for college
than they recently have been.
There were no cities. The greater part of the people lived in
the country, nearly all on farms. In Boston there was little room
for farms, and not much for gardens; but many of the inhabitants had gardens and farms on the islands of the Bay and at
Muddy River, now Brookline, where their herds were kept. The
boys spent most of their time in the fields and forests and along
the rivers and the sea, hunting bears and deer, trapping foxes,
shooting wild turkeys, wild geese, and wild ducks; or fishing,
riding, driving, swimming, rowing, and sailing; or at work with
those who were laying out roads through the woods, digging
wells and ditches, making walls, and fences against the wolves,
building houses, barns, fortifications, churches, ships, mills, boats,
and ships, laying out and cultivating gardens, planting orchards,
and engaged in all the labors of husbandry. They thus became
hardened to the climate, and gained good constitutions and
health, and moreover became acquainted with natural objects,rocks and soils; animals, wild and tame, savage and civilized; the
trees and shrubs of the woods, and the flowers and herbs of the
gardens and fields; and saw the powers of water and of wind,
and felt the effects of sunshine and cold and all the forces of the
atmosphere. The elder boys belonged to the train-bands, which,
under able officers, were drilled -not over twice or thrice a week,
the law provides - to the use of the musket, the sword and the
spear. Such were their summer occupations.
In winter, they helped to clear the woods and cut down the
forest-trees, sledded the logs to the wood-pile and the timber to
the mills, and assisted at first in hewing it, afterward, in sawing it
into beams, posts, joists, planks, boards, clapboards, and shingles,
or squaring it and building it directly into houses. The winter
evenings, on those solitary farms, were probably spent in reading,- an easy and pleasant thing, before the existence of theatres,
balls, concerts, and dram-shops. And they doubtless had their
huskings and other merry-makings.
Has any system been devised to take the place of this, and
give the young man, in a higher degree, full possession of all his




LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.           471
powers and faculties of body and mind, or to give him, in the
same degree, the masculine qualities of hardy self-reliance with
cautiousness, manly courage with coolness, resolution with
patience, and power of endurance with habits of strenuous and
cheerful labor?  What better discipline have we devised or are
we devising for the drawing out and training these manly qualities?
A few men, whom we have known, have been obliged by force
of circumstances, to approach this heroic early education. And
it may be a fair question, Would Mark Hopkins, Francis Wayland, Daniel Webster, Jared Sparks, Cornelius Felton, Thomas
Hill, have been finer specimens of humanity, or even better
scholars and teachers, if they had been put, at seven, into schools,
and kept there ten months of every year, till they entered college
at sixteen, instead of giving their early years to the labors of the
farm, the forest, and the workshop?
Milton calls "a complete and generous education that which
fits a man to perform justly, skilfully, and magnanimously, all
the offices, both private and public, of peace and of war." This
primitive, heroic boyhood was not only a true preparation for the
offices of a peaceful, private life, for the duties of town officer,
magistrate, and representative to the General Court, and for
those of privates and officers, in the wars always threatening
from the Indians around, and often from the French at the North
and the Dutch on the South; but it was the best preparation for
the studies of the college, as it gave the student, for the object
of his thoughts while engaged in those studies, instead of mere
words, the facts of nature, real things and their properties and
relations.
Everybody is now ready to admit the important place which
natural and physical science should have in a liberal education;
but all are not aware that such science, to be real, must be
founded on personal observation. These boys were laying such
a foundation. A boy engaged in stoning a well, in raising
stones for a wall, or in drawing water from the well by an old
fashioned well-pole, was studying the properties of the lever. In
splitting logs, he become acquainted with the wedge; in making
roads, with the inclined plane. In helping to lay out a farm,
with a surveyor's chain and compass, so as to fix, justly and




472              EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
accurately, the bounds between neighbor and neighbor, he got
the first elementary ideas which lie at the very foundation of
geometry, and a feeling of the importance of doing justice,
at the same time. In selecting, hewing, and shaping the different trees for all the purposes of the primitive essential arts,
he became acquainted with the strength, elasticity, hardness, tenacity, and other properties, of all kinds of wood. Even in his
play, he was still at his studies. In rowing, he was studying the
lever; in sculling, the resolution of forces,-feeling as well as seeing. When he hoisted his sail by pulling at a rope passing
round a truck at the head of his mast, he was studying the element of the pulley; when, to raise the sail to the utmost, he
pulled out the middle of that rope fastened at the foot, to haul
taut and belay, he was learning the properties of the ropemachine. When, sitting in the stern of his boat, he trimmed his
sail to the varying wind, on a narrow, winding creek, or on Neponset River, or Charles, obliged often to come as near as possible to
the wind, he was studying the resolution of forces, in the most
favorable position in which they can be studied. When for the
well-pole he substituted the windlass, and with it drew water from
the well, he was learning the nature, by observing the uses, of
the wheel and axle. When he dug a ditch or assisted in building a dam and arranging a flumne and a gate for the water-power,
he was studying hydrostatics and hydraulics. Arranging the
stones for grinding corn, he was studying the combination of
wheels; and, setting the stones to grind, the centrifugal force.
The saw-mill and the wind-mill, when they were introduced,
showed him machinery in more complicated action.1
Then again, in those early days, there were no spelling-books
nor English grammars for children to waste their time upon.
The deluge of children's books had not begun. Children learned
their letters from verses in the Bible, - from those sublimest of all
sentences: " In the beginning, God created the heaven and the
earth;"' and God said, Let there be light, and there was light."
1 I perfectly well remember standing, when a child, in a still morning, on the
bank of a river, and watching a man engaged in chopping wood, at a distance, on
the other side. I heard every stroke of his axe, but I heard it some little time after
it was struck. It was my first lesson in acoustics and optics. I saw the slowness
of the motion of sound compared with the velocity of that of light.




LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.            473
Boys and girls were obliged to read the few books they had,
which were often the most excellent that we have, again and
again, till they knew them thoroughly, almost by heart. They
became, of necessity, familiar with the Gospels, with the beautiful histories of the Old Testament, the glorious poetry of the
prophets, of Job, and the Psalms, the profound wisdom of
Solomon and the divine wisdom of the apostles.1 The little
time given to the Latin language was spent in learning and
using the words essential to conversation; and in studying the
language of Cicero and Virgil, instead of the unintelligible
generalizations of grammar, what John Milton calls "the most
intellective abstractions of logic and metaphysics," so commonly
begun with at the present day.
What a pleasant way of learning a language must that have
been! - Walking about with the teacher over the farm, in the
barn-yard, and in the woods; and learning from him how to
speak, in Latin, of all they saw. How easy for persons so
taught to continue the use of the language, in college! and
how deeply fixed in the memory must all the usual forms of the
language thus become! Whoever has had the good fortune
to learn any modern language by hearing and speaking it
alone for a few years, must know how imperfect and superficial, in comparison, is the knowledge obtained from books only.
Such was the necessary but real and noble preparation for
college which was given to nearly all the boys in Massachusetts
purposing to receive the highest education of the time. Has
any thing better been yet introduced to take the place of such a
preparation? Does the vast time given to arithmetic, destined
to be never used; or the innumerable lessons in geography,
destined to be speedily forgotten; or the volumes of choice
and exquisite selections from the best and finest poetry and
prose, most of it wholly beyond the capacity of those who are to
read them, - give a better preparation? Are these an adequate
substitute for readings from the book of Nature, from the works
and word of God?
1 The English language is spoken by the common people of New England far
better than it is anywhere else. This is owing, I doubt not, to the fact, that they
have always been familiar with the Old and New Testaments, in our beautiful translation.




474              EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
In the year 1847, the President of this Society, -I heard it
from his own lips, and know that he will pardon my telling the
story,- himself a lineal descendant of John Winthrop, under
whose administration the grant I have read, and the laws
I am going to read, were passed, was sitting in the diplomatic
gallery of the House of Commons, with Sir Robert Peel, to
whom a letter from Edward Everett had introduced him, engaged
in conversation; when Sir Robert suddenly interrupted himself,
and said, "I must now leave you, as I see that Macaulay is
going to speak, and I always want to hear what he says."     He
left him; and our friend presently heard, among other good
things from Macaulay, -
" I say, therefore, that the education of the people ought to be the first
concern of a State.... This is my deliberate conviction; and in this
opinion I am fortified by thinking, that it is also the opinion of all the
great legislators, of all the great statesmen, of all the great political
philosophers, of all ages and of all nations.... Sir, it is the opinion of
all the greatest champions of civil and religious liberty in the Old World
and in the New; and of none - I hesitate not to say it - more emphatically than of those whose names are held in the highest estimation
by the Protestant Nonconformists of England. Assuredly, if there be
any class of men whom the Protestant Nonconformists of England respect
more highly than another, - if any whose memory they hold in deeper
veneration, - it is that class of men, of high spirit and unconquerable
principles, who, in the days of Archbishop Laud, preferred leaving their
native country, and living in the savage solitudes of a wilderness, rather
than to live in a land of prosperity and plenty, where they could not enjoy
the privilege of worshipping their Maker freely, according to the dictates
of their conscience. Those men, illustrious for ever in history, were the
founders of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts; but, though their love
of freedom of conscience was illimitable and indestructible, they could see
nothing servile or degrading in the principle, that the State should take
upon itself the charge of the education of the people. In the year 1642,"
[should he not have said, 1647?] " they passed their first legislative enactment on this subject; in the preamble of which they distinctly pledged
themselves to this principle, that education was a matter of the deepest
possible importance and the greatest possible interest to all nations and to
all communities; and that, as such, it was, in an eminent degree, deserving of the peculiar attention of the State."'
1 Macaulay's Speeches, vol. ii. pp. 334 and 335, ed. of Redfield, New York, 1853.




LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.                  475
That preamble is in these words:"It being one chief project of the old deluder, Satan, to keep men from
the knowledge of the Scriptures, as, in former times, by keeping them in
an unknown tongue, so, in these latter times, by persuading from the use
of tongues, that so at least the true sense and meaning of the original
might be clouded by false gloss of saint-seeming deceivers; -now, that
learning may not be buried in the grave of our fathers, in the Church and
Commonwealth, the Lord assisting our endeavors," -and here follows
the law -
" It is therefore ordered, that every township in this jurisdiction, after
the Lord hath increased them to the number of fifty householders, shall
then forthwith appoint one within their town to teach all such children as
shall resort to him, to write and read, whose wages shall be paid, either
by the parents or masters of such children, or by the inhabitants in general, by way of supply, as the major part of those that order the prudentials of the town shall appoint, provided, those that send their children be
not oppressed by paying much more than they can have them taught for
in other towns; and it is further ordered, that, where any town shall
increase to the number of one hundred families or householders, they
shall set up a grammar school, the master thereof being able to instruct
youth so far as they may be fitted for the university, provided that, if any
town neglect the performance hereof above one year, that every such
town shall pay ~5 to the next school, till they shall perform this order."'
A grammar school was then understood to be a school in
which the Latin and Greek languages were taught.
In 1683, Oct. 10, we read, " The Court doth order that whenever a town has five hundred families, it shall support two
grammar schools and two writing schools."
On June 14, 1642, the following law was passed: 2
"This Court, taking into consideration the great neglect of many
parents and masters, in training up their children in learning and labor,
and other employments which may be profitable to the Commonwealth,
do hereby order and decree, that in every town the chosen men appointed
for managing the prudential affairs of the same shall henceforth stand
charged with the care of the redress of this evil;... and, for this end,
1 Mass. Records, Nov. 11, 1647, vol. ii. p. 203.
2 I had considerable doubt, and still have, whether this law or the one of 1647
were the one referred to by Macaulay; but, as this law really has no preamble, but
only a short introduction in no degree remarkable, and, as it is almost wholly upon
the matter of apprenticeship, I have concluded that it must have been to the other
that he had reference.




476               EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
they, or the greater number of them, shall have power to take account,
from time to time, of all parents and masters, and of their children, concerning the calling and employment of their children, especially of their
ability to read and understand the principles of religion, and the capital
laws of this country, and to impose fines upon such as shall refuse to
render such accounts to them when they shall be required; and they shall
have power, with consent of any court or the magistrate, to put forth
apprentices the children of such as they shall find not to be able and fit
to employ and bring them up;... and for their better performance of
this trust committed to them, they may divide the town amongst them,
appointing to every one of the said townsmen a certain number of families
to have special oversight of. They are also to provide that a sufficient
quantity of materials, as hemp, flax, &c., may be raised in the several
towns, and tools and implements provided for working out the same." 1
Next to the law providing free public schools for all, this law
providing for the accustoming of all children to labor, and their
proper and sufficient training in some useful employment, shows
most strikingly the wisdom and forethought of these men of
Massachusetts.     The observance and      the perfecting of the
former law, and the copying of it by other States, have been an
immeasurable blessing to the world. The neglect of this latter
law has been an equally vast misfortune.2
A very large part of the poverty found now among the natives
of New England may be traced to this neglect. A great deal of
the crime has this same cause. To this neglect, more probably
than to any other cause, is due the great number of persons setting
up in business, without any skill or knowledge or experience or
any other qualifications, and soon failing; — ninety-seven per cent
in the principal street in Boston, as was found a few years ago to
have been the case for many years. To this neglect is owing that
great army of middle-men, who, even now, are preying like vam1 I have not quoted the whole of this law. It contains, at some length, farther
provisions for the certain and safe employment of children of both sexes, in things
useful to the Commonwealth.
2 My own opinion is, that the education of no girl or boy ought to be considered
finished, even so far as common schools are concerned, who has only had his mental,
moral, and spiritual faculties developed, and knowledge given, principles fixed, and
reverential habits formed. His bodily powers ought also to be exercised upon
something useful, at every step in his course. This might be done without any loss
to his intellectual nature, and with immeasurable benefit to his physical. Such an
education would make every work and duty of after life more easy and pleasant.




LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.               477
pires upon the poor in this town and this country. The present
very intelligent warden of the State Prison, Gideon Haynes,
informs me, that " of the convicts committed to this prison in
the last forty years, over eighty per cent had no trades." " I
cannot with any certainty," he adds, "say how many of that
number might have been saved by learning a trade; but from
the fact that all received, who were capable of learning, have
during the above period been taught one, and that only nine per
cent of the number have been recommitted, I am satisfied that
at least fifty per cent might have been saved by a good trade."
Those legislators sought, not only to prevent ignorance of law
and of duty by universal education, but to prevent poverty and
crime by universal intelligent industry.
A considerable portion of the inhabitants of all the large cities
of the Atlantic coast are paupers. Here we have one cause. Is
it too late to take measures to prevent much of the poverty and
crime of Massachusetts, by laws requiring every child not provided for by the wealth of his parents with a thorough and
learned education, to be brought up to some trade or other useful occupation?
A negro had been left, by one James Smith, at Portsmouth,
and been retained in bondage. In the records of the General
Court, for Nov. 4, 1646, we read, 
"The General Court, conceiving themselves bound by the first opportunity to bear witness against the heinous and crying sin of man-stealing,
as also to prescribe such timely redress for what is past, and such a law
for the future as may sufficiently deter all others belonging to us to have
to do in such vile and most odious courses, justly abhorred of all good
and just men, do order, that the negro interpreter, with others unlawfully
taken, be, by the first opportunity (at the charge of the country, for the
present), sent to his native country of Guinea, and a letter with him of
the indignation of the Court thereabouts; and, in justice hereof, desiring
our honored Governor would please to put this order in execution." 1
Such was the sublime consistency of these men. Was there
any earlier or more decided utterance against slavery and the
slave-trade than this?
If this is not a serious challenge, what is?  It should be
remembered that, at the time when this indignant protest was
1 Mass. Records, vol. ii. p. 168.




478              EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
made, every other government on earth was, apparently, altogether
indifferent to the existence and evil of slavery.   It must be
admitted that this lofty Christian tone of feeling did not last
always.   With the decay of education, this spirit of universal
liberty decayed.  Mingling with the rest of the world, the people
of Massachusetts gradually lowered their standard, and felt and
acted like the rest.  Some of them    held slaves.  The oldest
members of some of our oldest families must still remember
them. Of cruelty towards them, I know not that there is even
a tradition.1
The spirit of the laws I have read is purely republican. They
protect the children and apprentices in their right to be instructed, against the indifference or cupidity of masters and
parents, but leave it to the majority of the inhabitants of each
town to provide the means in their own way. Further, - what
was quite as essential to the accomplishment of the design of
the law, they provide a standard below which the qualifications
of a teacher in the grammar schools shall not fall.   He shall
"be able to instruct youth so far as they shall be fitted
for the university," thus bringing within the reach of all the
children of every town of one hundred families the means of
preparing themselves for the highest course of instruction then
or now   existing in the country.  Had this law continued in
operation, youth from nearly every town in the Commonwealth
would now be enjoying this privilege.2
The whole policy of the Puritan colonists in this matter
ought to fill us with admiration. In their simplicity they conceived, and in their poverty executed, a scheme which had
proved too high for the intellect and too vast for the power of
every previous potentate or people, - the hitherto unimagined
idea of universal education. Fugitives from the persecution of
the Old World, and hemmed in between the waves of a stormy
1 Those amongst us who have openly or silently sympathized with the spirit of
this law, have for many years been accustomed to hear reproaches heaped upon us,
because we allowed such disturbers of the peace as Garrison, Phillips, and May to
go unhanged. The reproach now is, that such men did not arise two centuries ago,
that this law was ever allowed to fall into oblivion, that such men as Garrison did
not live amongst us always.
2 Much of this, and several subsequent paragraphs, is taken from an article in the
"North American Review," published many years since.




LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.              479
sea and the savages of a boundless wilderness, so little were
they subdued by the hardness of their lot, that they regarded
ignorance, irreligion, and sin as the only evils, and religious
instruction, intellectual discipline, and proper employment, as
the effectual remedies.  Where shall their descendants look for
a higher example?
How it came to pass that the early colonists of New England
should form laws, for the advancement of education and the
rights of men, of such wisdom, liberality, and forecast, it is not
difficult to conjecture.  The civil, and especially the spiritual,
leaders of the first emigrations to Massachusetts were the most
highly educated men that ever led colonies. They were independent, liberty-loving Anglo-Saxons. Their leader and many
of his associates were brought up " among books and learned
men."1 They possessed, and they long continued to exert, an
influence of the highest and noblest, because of the most disinterested, kind. They intended to form a Christian Commonwealth, all the members of which should understand and obey the
laws of God and of the State. We may differ from some of their
theological opinions; we may regret that, within half a century
after the time of which we are speaking, the spirit of persecution,
which had such frightful power in Britain and in most countries
on the continent of Europe, reached and affected even them.
We may regret, while we do not wonder, that they should have
been misled by a belief that institutions and laws made for the
Jews alone, in one stage of their progress, were intended for all
mankind in every stage. But we may search the world in vain
for more conspicuous, unselfish devotion to the cause of what
they believed to be truth and the rights of humanity. Of the
ministers of the fifteen or sixteen towns in Massachusetts,2 the
greater part had been educated at Oxford or Cambridge. And
they were not educated men of an ordinary type. Archbishop
1 Robert Ryce, writing to John Winthrop, on the 12th of August, 1629, says,
" How hard will it be, for one brought up among books and, learned men, to live in
a barbarous place, where is no learning, and less civility." - See Historical Collections, 4th Series, vol. vi. p. 383.
2 Palfrey's N. E., pp. 371-2. Newberry, Ipswich, Saugus, Salem, Charlestown,
Weymouth, Newtown, Watertown, Boston, Roxbury, Dorchester, Hingham, Medford,
Concord, Dedham; and Wessagussett, now Savin Hill and South Boston, or
Mount Wollaston, now Quincy. Winnesimit, now Chelsea, belonged to Boston.




480              EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
Laud did    not meddle with ordinary, dull preachers.      He
silenced the famous preachers, - those that were distinguished
for their learning and eloquence, their character and influence.
Many of the men thus silenced came to Massachusetts. And
they came not alone: their parishioners and friends, who
loved them best, and most highly valued liberty of conscience,
and least feared the terrors of the ocean and hardships of a
savage wilderness, came with them.
Under date of Sept. 4, 1632, Governor Winthrop writes:The' Griffin,' a ship of three hundred tons, arrived... She brought
about two hundred passengers.... In this ship came Mr. Cotton, MIr.
Hooker, and Mr. Stone, ministers; and Mr. Peirce, Mr. Haynes (a
gentleman of great estate), Mr. Hoffe, and many other men of good
estates. They got out of England with much difficulty, all places being
belaid to have taken Mr. Cotton and Mr. Hooker."
Dr. Palfrey says of these men, and he knew of whom he was
speaking, -
"' In one ship came John Haynes, an opulent landholder of the county
of Essex, and three famous divines,- Thomas Hooker, Samuel Stone,
and John Cotton.  They were men of eminent capacity and sterling
character, fit to be concerned in the founding of a State.  In all its
generations of worth and refinement, Boston has never seen an assembly
more illustrious for generous qualities and for manly culture, than when
the magistrates of the young colony welcomed Cotton and his fellowvoyagers at Winthrop's table." 1
Many of these men brought their libraries with them. Of
one, John Harvard's, of two hundred and sixty volumes, we
have the catalogue.    There is not probably now     a private
library in America, of the same number of volumes, so well
selected and so valuable.  Many of the authors, such as Beza,
Chrysostom, Calvin, Luther, Bacon, and Camden, and all the
classical authors, - Homer, Plutarch, and Isocrates, Lucan,
Pliny, Sallust, Terence, Juvenal, and Horace, - are hardly less
valuable now than they were then.
Among them were the writings of Luther, who was not only
the great leader of the Reformation, and the translator of the
whole Bible into exquisite classical German, - which holds the
I Palfrey's Hist., vol. i. p. 367.




LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.                   481
same place for its beautiful language amongst the Germans
as King James's translation among the English, - but the most
able, eloquent, and strenuous advocate of the highest education
in the classical languages, in Hebrew, in History, Philosophy,
Botany, Logic, Rhetoric, Music, and the Mathematics, for those
who could afford such all education, and of schools for universal,
elementary education, which all boys should be compelled to
attend.1 And in these writings they must have read such sentences as these:"It is brutish recklessness to act merely for the present time, and to
say, as for us, we will rule now; but we care not how it shall be with
those who come after us." 2
" For the Prince of Darkness is shrewd enough to know, that, where
the languages flourish, there his power will soon be so rent and torn that
he cannot readily repair it."
" Let us bethink ourselves, that haply we may not be able to retain the
gospel without the knowledge of the languages in which it was written.
For they are the scabbard in which the sword of the Spirit is sheathed;
they are the casket in which this jewel is enshrined."
" Hence we may conclude that, where the languages do not abide,
there, in the end, the gospel must perish."
"The Sophists averred, that the Scriptures were obscure....  But
they did not see that all that was wanted, was a knowledge of the languages in which it was recorded; for nothing is more plain-spoken than
God's word, when we have become thorough masters of its language." 3
"' Had I passed my days in obscurity, and had I received no aid from
the languages towards a sure and exact understanding of the Scriptures,
I might have led a holy life, and, in my retirement, have preached sound
doctrine; but then I should have left the Pope and the Sophists, together
with the whole body of Antichrist, just where I found them." 4
1 See Dr. Martin Luther's Address to the Councilmen of all the towns of Germany, passim. Barnard's American Journal of Education, vol. iv. p. 421.
2 American Journal of Education, vol. iv. pp. 432, 433.
3 Id., pp. 434, 435.
4 See how Luther valued the work of teaching: "As for myself, if I had children,
and were able, I would teach them not only the languages and history, but singing likewise; and with music I would combine a full course of mathematics." - Id., p. 437.
" Cheerfully let thy son study; and should he, the while, even be compelled to
earn his bread, yet remember that you are offering to our Lord God a fair block of
marble, out of which he can hew for you a perfect work." - Sermon on Keeping
Children at School, p. 440.
"For my part, if I were, or were compelled, to leave off preaching, and to enter
31




482             EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
We must remember that all this was written and published
throughout Germany in 1524.
There is another thing to be taken into consideration, to
account for the wisdom of this legislation. None were chosen
to the Legislature but religious men, —men of spotless character, the best, wisest, and most trustworthy to be found,men who would naturally make the best laws they could.
From  which of these United States are the best, wisest, and
most trustworthy men now sent, and those only?   To which
Congress, within the memory of any person living, have only
men of spotless character, the best, wisest, and most trustworthy
to be found, been sent, from Massachusetts? To which branch
of which legislature of the State, to which common council of
the city, since the first, have such men and such men only been
sent?  The very thing which should always be considered a
disqualification for a place in either of these assemblies is often
the only qualification a candidate possesses, -the having some
private interest to advance therein.
This law of 1647 was the establishment and the beginning
of that great and wise system of common schools for the education of the whole people, which has been and is the honor of this
Commonwealth, and which has been spreading, and is destined
to spread, until it controls and guides the education of the whole
people, not only in every State in this country, but of all States
in every country.
From the beginning, the practice seems to have prevailed of
transacting the business of the several towns at meetings of all
the freemen. Every freeman was here naturally led to inform
himself as to all the interests of the community, and was
free to utter and urge his opinions.   These town-meetings
thus became societies for the discussion of real questions
of public interest; schools, therefore, of training in argument,
logic, and eloquence. These have continued, in all the towns,
up to the present day, and must have had vast influence
some other vocation, I know not an office that would please me better than that of
schoolmaster or teacher of boys. For I am convinced, that, next to preaching, this
is the most useful and greatly the best labor in all the world; and, in fact, I am
sometimes in doubt which of the positions is the more honorable." - Id., p. 441.




LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.                  483
in forming men to habits of thought and          enlightened discussion.1
In 1632, the inhabitants of Dorchester designated twelve of
their number to meet weekly for the consideration of public
affairs.  About the same time, Watertown chose three for the
same purpose. In 1634, the people of Boston chose " three to
make up the ten to manage the affairs of the town." 2    In 1635,
Mr. Frothingham tells us of an " order made by the inhabitants
of Charlestown, at a full meeting, for the government of the
town by selectmen." 3 This is the element of representation;
and " at the fifth General Court held in Massachusetts, twentyfour persons appeared, delegated by eight towns;'namely,
three each from   Newtown, Watertown, Charlestown, Boston,
Roxbury, Dorchester, Saugus, and Salem,' —to meet and consider of such matters as they (the freemen) were to take order in
at the same General Court;"4 and thus the government of
Massachusetts first became truly a representative government.
The leaders and first legislators of Massachusetts were unconsciously laying the foundations and shaping the laws for a
government and state of society wholly new. Every act of their
legislation is therefore of the highest interest to the student of
human progress. But as I found it impossible, in the space allowed
me, to give more than a few glimpses of the spirit and action of
their Legislature, I have selected the law founding the university,
for the highest education; that establishing common schools, for
universal education, and opening for all the path to the highest;
that which required every individual to be fitted for some
employment useful to the Commonwealth; and that which
denounced and forbade slavery.
1 Municipal government - the city - is an anomaly in a commonwealth. In all
ages it has been the natural expression of despotism. Not the people of Italy, but
the city of Rome, governed the world, as Paris has governed France. In a city the
people annually meet, not together, but in wards, and surrender their liberties to
men not always fit to govern justly; often to ambitious demagogues who have been
devoting their time to intriguing for their own advancement. Faneuil Hall was the
creation of a free town. It is almost out of place in a city. The natural tendency
of things, in a city, is shown by the present condition of New York, governed by
persons seeking, not the best interests of the people, but their own interest, - to
make themselves rich.
2 Palfrey's Hist., vol. i. p. 381.  3 History of Charlestown, p. 50.
4 Palfrey's Hist. vol. i. p. 372,




484            EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
The schoolmaster was an important person, in those early
days. Many of them were distinguished. There is room to
speak of only a few. Dr. Bentley gives us a pretty full account
of those of Salem for the first century and beyond. John Fiske
arrived in 1637. He was educated at Cambridge, in England,
and was possessed of a large property. He prepared for college
Sir George Downing, a graduate of 1642. Mr. Fiske was frequently in the pulpit in Salem, and in 1644 became pastor of
Wenham. Edward Norris succeeded Fiske, whose pupil he
had been, in 1640, and continued forty-two years.  He was
succeeded by Daniel Epes, a Cambridge graduate, who continued till 1698. He was a magistrate and a counsellor. He
was succeeded by Samuel Whitman, who was afterwards settled
in the ministry; and he by John Emerson, who had been in the
ministry, and continued in the school till 1711.1
To secure proper respect to the schoolmaster, his wife was
to be accommodated with a pew next the wives of the magistrates.2
When, in 1643, forty-eight of the inhabitants of Weymouth
determined to plant a colony in Seaconk, which they named
Rehoboth, the fifth on the list was the schoolmaster. In the
partition, by lot, of the woodland; and again, on the registry of
lands, his name had the fifth place. Yet Rehoboth was then, as
it is now, one of the small towns. It thus had one person, professionally a teacher, throughout the year. It now has schools
three months in summer and three months in winter, each of
them usually taught by a new teacher every quarter.
Ezekiel Cheever, born in 1614, came to New England in 1637;
and, the next year, went with those who founded New Haven,
began his services as schoolmaster in 1638, and continued there
with great success till 1650; when he moved to Ipswich, and
there taught with distinguished success and celebrity, making
that town rank, according to Dr. Bentley, in literature and population, above the other towns in the county of Essex.3 In 1661,
Mr. Felt tells us, his agricultural operations required a barn, and
that he planted an orchard on his homestead, thereby improving
the soil of Ipswich, as well as the souls of her children, by
1 Mass. Historical Collections, vol. vi. p. 240.  2 Id., p. 241.
3 Barnard, American Journal, vol. i. p. 304.




LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.            485
healthy manual labor. It is to be regretted, as Mr. Barnard says,
that the early practice of attaching a house, for the occupancy of
the master, with a few acres of land for a garden, orchard, and
the feeding of a cow, adopted from the Old World,1 had not been
continued in all the small towns.  It would have been the
means of securing, in each town, a permanent schoolmaster,
educated for the office. If this practice had been retained, the
lamentable decay of the schools throughout nearly all the smaller
towns might have been prevented.
In November, 1666, Mr. Cheever removed to Charlestown; and
thence, in 1670, to Boston, where his labors were continued for
thirty-eight years. He was a good scholar, and made an excellent Accidence for beginners in Latin, which continued in use
for very many years; but, if the account that Barnard gives of
his discipline is to be relied on, he was in his feelings more of a
savage than a Christian.2
There were other famous and able public schoolmasters; but
there were not enough to supply the wants of the people, and
thence the necessity of what were afterwards called " academies."
Of one or two of these only have I time to speak.
By the will of Governor William Dummer, who died in 1761,
his dwelling-house and farm at Byfield, in Newbury, were set
apart for the establishment of a grammar school, to stand for
ever on the farm. The property was given in trust, the rents
and profits to be employed in erecting a school-house, and in
support of a master; the appointment of whom was intrusted to
a committee of five Byfield freeholders, acting in conjunction
with the minister of the parish. The little school-house was built
in 1762, and Samuel Moody —the famous Master Moodywas chosen to take charge of it. He continued its master for
seventeen years, with an energy, success, and reputation which
have rarely been surpassed. Very many of those destined to be
the most distinguished men of Massachusetts in the various
walks of life, were his pupils. They learned little else but Latin;
yet the habits of promptness, independence of thought, exactness
and thoroughness, which he formed in them, made all future ac1 Barnard, American Journal, vol. i. p. 303.
2 See Life of Rev. John Barnard, as quoted by H. Barnard, American Journal,
vol. i. p. 308.




486            EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
quisitions easy, and success, in most cases, certain. The endowment was not quite sufficient to maintain the master, and fees
for tuition were found necessary. This, for some years, was
the only conspicuous school in Massachusetts; candidates for
the college being very generally prepared by the parish ministers.1
The example of Governor Dummer was followed by the
Phillipses of Andover and Exeter, in the foundation and endowment, in those towns, of excellent academies, which soon
reached the high reputation they have enjoyed up to the present
day.
Samuel Phillips, of Andover, a pupil of Master Moody, a
graduate of Harvard in 1771, an earnest patriot, a successful
man of business, made town clerk and treasurer at the age of
twenty-one, member of the Provincial Congress for four years,
from 1775; a senator from the first election under the Constitution, and onwards, except one year, when he was lieutenantgovernor, till his death; president of the Senate; and, before he
was thirty, a judge of the Common Pleas,-this honored and
honorable Judge Phillips founded Phillips Academy in Andover,
in 1777, which, the next year, went into operation under Eliphalet
Pearson.
His own share in the endowment was not large, but his influence secured $6,000 each from his father, Samuel, of North
Andover, and his uncle William, of Boston; $31,000 from his
uncle John, of Exeter, and $28,000 from his cousin William, of
Boston.
This was the first incorporated academy; the act bearing the
date of Oct. 4, 1780. One day less than six months from that
day, that uncle John announced to his nephew the incorporation
of Phillips Academy at Exeter.
The common schools and the town grammar schools continued
to decline. In the busy world of Massachusetts, men of ability
found more profitable employment; and the great truth was not
yet discovered, that women, as teachers and managers and
governors of boys even up to manhood, are often gifted, at
least as highly as men. Most of the boys were fitted for college
1 See Nehemiah Cleveland's admirable history of this school.




LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.           487
by the ministers of the gospel, among whom I have the best possible means of knowing, that the practice of teaching the elements
of the Latin language, as a spoken language, very generally prevailed as late as one hundred years ago.
Academies and private schools grew more and more numerous;
sometimes endowed by public-spirited individuals, sometimes by
grants of land from the State, often by both, and usually supported, in part, by fees from the students. In 1834, there were
more than nine hundred and fifty of these schools.  Those
under the supervision of resolute, judicious men, who knew the
value of good teaching, and how to secure it; and sometimes
others, by a fortunate accident, or a gracious Providence,-had
good teachers, and flourished. But the greater number were
very poor schools; so also were most of the town schools; and
the belief and intimate conviction that most of the common
schools were wretchedly poor, became, except amongst the most
ignorant of the teachers themselves, and the most benighted of
the people, almost universal.
The Act of 1789, up to which time the laws of which I have
been speaking continued in operation, was a wide departure
from the principle of the original law. It substitutes six months
for the constant instruction provided for towns of fifty families;
and requires a grammar teacher of determinate qualifications for
towns of two hundred families, instead of the similar requisition
from all towns of half that number of inhabitants. Still, however, far as it falls short of that noble democratic idea of the
Puritans, of providing the best possible instruction for all, it
would, if in force at the present day, render instruction of the
highest kind accessible to the children of more than two-thirds
of the towns of the Commonwealth.
By an Act of February, 1824, facetiously called, in the index
to the Massachusetts Laws, "an act providing for the public
schools," the law of 1789 was repealed; and, for all towns of less
than five thousand inhabitants, instead of a master of "good
morals, well instructed in the Latin, Greek, and English languages," a teacher, or teachers, must be provided, " well qualified
to instruct youth in orthography, reading, writing, arithmetic,
English grammar, and geography, and in good behavior."
This act was the severest blow the common-school system




488            EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
ever received; not only because it shut from the poor children,
of all but a few towns, the path which had always lain open to
the highest order of education, but because it took away a fixed
standard for the qualifications of teachers, and substituted no
other in its stead. The common schools had hitherto been as
nursing mothers to the gifted children of the indigent, who were
often raised, through them, to better opportunities, and thence
to the highest stations in society. This high duty they utterly
abandoned. The poor boy of talent who, under the former system, would have received the elements of the best education,
gratuitously, but of right, in his native town, was thenceforward
obliged to find or beg his way to a private school pr academy,
or to remain, for ever, without a learned education. The candidate for the office of teacher, being released from the necessity
of an acauaintance with the learned languages, which in most
cases implied a certain degree of cultivation and refinement, and
amenable to no rule measuring the amount of the mere elements,
which only were required, was too often found to be lamentably
deficient even in them.
The effects of lowering the standard of instruction in the
public schools became, to attentive observers, every year more
apparent. For a time, the better qualified teachers continued in
the service; but they were gradually supplanted, in many places,
by persons who, from their inferior qualifications, were willing
to do the work for a lower compensation.
In 1830, a meeting of teachers took place in Boston, which
led to the formation of the American Institute of Instruction,
intended for the mutual benefit of actual teachers. It had its
first annual meeting this year, and began its work with an Intro"ductory Address by President Wayland, of Brown University, its
first President. It was incorporated in 1831, and has continued till
the present time, to hold annual meetings in various parts of this
and other States, with addresses, lectures, and discussions, which
have brought together many actual teachers and other friends of
education from all parts of the country. Its good effects upon
the teachers have been strikingly shown in the improved character and practical nature of their lectures and discussions.
One of the subjects year after year discussed was the condition of the common schools and what ought to be and might




LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.                 489
be done for their elevation. These discussions led, in 1836, to a
Memorial to the General Court, from a committee of the Directors of the Institute, urging the importance of legislative action
for the improvement of the common schools, particularly by
raising the qualifications of the teachers, and asking for the
appointment of a Superintendent of the common schools, and
showing the ways in which he might exercise the most beneficial
influence. This was referred to a committee, but led to no immediate action.  In January, 1837, another memorial from    the
Institute was presented to the Legislature, praying that better
provision might be made for the training of the teachers of the
schools, and particularly " the instituting, for the special instruction of teachers, of one or more seminaries."
The cause of the common schools had been very ably pleaded
by J. G. Carter,1 at that time a member of the House, and earnestly and long and well advocated by our associate, Rev. Charles
Brooks, of Hingham, in lectures in many places, two of them
before the Legislature during this same session. This gentleman,
indeed, for his long, disinterested, and unpaid labors in the cause
of education, especially for his efforts to secure the establishment
of Normal schools and a Board of Education, is entitled to be
considered, more than any other individual, what he has been
called, the Father of Normal schools.2
Elisha Ticknor, father of our distinguished friend and associate, George Ticknor, was the first in Massachusetts, - so far
as I know, -to suggest the importance of an institution for the
education of teachers, which he did in 1787, in the " Massachusetts Magazine."   The next was Denison Olmsted, in 1817.
In 1823, William Russell proposed seminaries for teachers; in
1825, Thomas A. Gallaudet did the same in Connecticut; and
in 1826, Governor DeWitt Clinton in New York.         Governor
1 In Letters to the Hon. William Prescott, LL.D., on the Schools of New England, with remarks upon the Principles of Instruction, p. 123. Boston, 1824. And
Essays upon Popular Education, containing an Outline of an Institution for the
Education of Teachers, of sixty pages. Boston, 1826.
2 Mr. Brooks lectured in nearly one hundred different towns and cities, —in
every place where he was invited. By invitation of the Legislatures of M1assachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey, and
Pennsylvania, he delivered, to crowded assemblies in each, two or three lectures,
besides speaking in most of the capitals between Boston and Washington.




490              EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
Levi Lincoln, in his speech to the Legislature, June 6, 1827, earnestly recommends "measures for the preparation and better
qualification of teachers," laments their present " incompetency,"
and suggests a public " institution for -their appropriate education and discipline."  In 1827, James G. Carter asked aid of the
Legislature to establish a seminary, in vain.
In 1830, a branch of Phillips Academy in Andover was opened
for the express purpose of educating teachers, but was soon
closed.
On the 14th of January, 1837, in the Massachusetts House of
Representatives, on motion of Mr. King, of Danvers, it was
ordered that the Committee on Education be requested to consider the expediency of providing by law for the better education of teachers of the public schools. On April 14, of the
same year, on motion of Mr. Carter, of Lancaster, a bill relating
to common schools was taken up, and the House resolved itself
into a committee of the whole for the consideration thereof; and,
after some time spent therein, Mr. Speaker resumed the chair,
and Mr. Winthrop, of Boston, from the committee, reported
that the committee had had the subject referred to them under
consideration, and that the said bill, with sundry amendments
recommended by the committee, ought to pass; and the bill was
ordered to a third reading.
Mr. Carter's report was as follows: -
" The Committee on Education to whom was referred so much of His
Excellency the Governor's Address as relates to education, and to whom
was also referred'The Memorial of the Directors of the American Institute of Instruction,' and the petition of a convention of delegates from
each of the towns in Plymouth County, and who were directed by order
of the House, Jan. 14, 1837, to consider the expediency of providing by
law for the better education of teachers of the public schools of the Commonwealth, have carefully considered those subjects, and report thereon
the accompanying bill: Be it enacted, &c.:"Sec. 1. His Excellency the Governor, with the advice and consent
of the Council, is hereby authorized to appoint eight persons, who, together
with the Governor and Lieutenant-Governor, shall constitute and be denominated the Board of Education."1
1 The first members of the Board were Edward Everett, George Hall, J. G.
Carter, Emerson Davis, Edmund Dwight, Horace Mann, Edward A. Newton,
Robert Rantoul, Jr., Thomas Robbins, Jared Sparks.




LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.               491
The remainder of the act designates its duties. The common
schools were probably, at this time, at their lowest point of degradation. From what we can learn, they had, in most parts of the
Commonwealth, been gradually declining, until, by this act, the
Legislature showed its disposition to interpose and arrest their
downward progress.
The Board of Education, at its first meeting, held June 29,
1837, appointed as their secretary, Horace Mann,1 at that time
President of the Senate of Massachusetts.  Mr. Mann had been
known to the individuals of the Board as a member of one or
other branch of the General Court for the ten previous years,
and especially as the principal mover and agent in the erection
of the State Lunatic Hospital at Worcester.
He had, moreover, been recently engaged in the revision of
the laws of the Commonwealth, and had been charged, together
with another, with the supervision of the Revised Code; and was
therefore as familiar, probably, as any other individual, with the
laws, institutions, and interests of the State. Immediately on
his appointment, he gave up a lucrative practice in his profession,
and, abandoning all other pursuits, devoted all his energies, time,
and thoughts to the work he had entered upon.
The most important and one of the first acts of the Board
was the establishment of schools for the special education of
teachers.  Two Normal schools went into operation in the
course of 1839: one at Lexington, for females; the other for
pupils of both sexes, at Barre: the former, in July, under the
superintendence of Cyrus Peirce, a man long and favorably
known as a teacher, at Nantucket; the latter, in September,
under the charge of Samuel Phillips Newman, a gentleman
who had been for many years a professor, of high reputation, in
Bowdoin College.   The first of these schools was soon moved
to West Newton; and thence, after some years, to Framingharn,
where it was finally settled, at a point within a few rods of the
exact geographical centre of the State. The second was removed
1 The almost universal expectation of teachers and others interested in the subject was, that J. G. Carter would be appointed. He was far better acquainted with
the condition of education in Massachusetts, and had done, by his eloquent writings,
more than any one else in making that known to the people. Advantage has been
taken of his investigations and of his statements, but almost always without acknowledgment.




492                 EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
from  Barre to Westfield, where it now stands.       A third Normal
school, for both sexes, went into operation at Bridgewater, Sept.
9,1840, under the charge of Colonel Nicholas Tillinghast, a professor of high reputation at the Military School at West Point;1
a fourth, for females only, June 2, 1853, at Salem, under the
care of a man who had received his education as a teacher at
the Normal School in Bridgewatei.
In the establishment of each school, the inhabitants of the
town, or their friends, provided a school-house, or made large
donations for that object.     The State sustains the schools, paying the salaries of the teachers and the necessary expenses of the
school, granting aid to pupils of limited means residing at a
distance, and making appropriations for apparatus and other
helps in instruction.
All these schools are now in successful operation, and are
accomplishing vastly more than their most sanguine friends ever
dared to hope. They have greatly improved the old methods
of teaching and introduced new.       They have improved in modes
of study, in thoroughness, and particularly in the study of subjects by topics, with personal inquiry, thought, and research,
instead of servilely following     the text-book.     They have improved in the surprisingly ready use of the blackboard, upon
almost all subjects, and of real objects and other sources of
illustration; in method; and in the organization of schools and
the theory of discipline after a lofty standard. They have substituted real teaching, for the old way of hearing lessons.2
1 Mr. Tillinghast introduced into the Normal schools excellent modes of teaching
arithmetic and other branches of science, which have been greatly improved by his
pupils, and by them, directly and indirectly, introduced into the other schools. He
was extremely well qualified for his position in all respects, except one, - he was
ignorant of the Latin and Greek languages; and he felt and often said, that a person
cannot teach langtcuge without something of this attainment. He always lamented
his want in this respect; and, I believe, shortened his life by his attempt to make
up for it, when the labor necessary to carry on the school was constantly as much as
he could bear. His ignorance of Latin shortened his sleep and his life. He felt that
if he could have devoted to the study only a year or two, before he was old enough
for science, he would have far better understood every thing which he had to learn.
2 In a recent conversation with the faithful and able teacher of the school at
Bridgewater, he gave an account of his way of teaching mineralogy. A single
instance may suffice to give an idea of his method. For learning a lesson on granite,
each pupil was furnished (instead of a text-book) with a piece of the rock, and the
names of the three constituent minerals, whose properties he was to study.




LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.                     493
And, in accomplishing this, the very object of their institution,
and as a means of accomplishing this, they have been and are
teaching, in an admirable manner, all those branches of knowledge which are deemed most important for the rising generation
to be acquainted with.      The Normal schools are thus colleges
of purest character and noblest aim, perfectly suited to prepare
females for their special vocation in life, that of teaching children
from birth up, —a vocation which is really, taking all things
into consideration, the highest vocation on earth.1
No teacher, though he may have given his life to the work,
can spend an hour at one of these schools, without feeling how
much time he might have saved, and how much better and'pleasanter and more useful his whole life's work would have
been, if he could have had two years of such preparation at the
beginning of his career.2
By the exact knowledge, habits of investigation and thought,
and clear understanding given to the great numbers who have
in them been prepared to take charge of the common schools of
the State, nearly all these schools are now very much better than
they ever were before. Let any one who has any doubt upon this
subject, visit any of the schools, Primary or Grammar, of this
city, or of any town in the neighborhood.3
1 The best education for a teacher is really the best education that a woman can
receive, since it requires a thorough knowledge and understanding of whatever it is
most important for everybody to know. If better colleges are wanted for females,
they may best be had by carrying out the plan which the Board of Education
have now under consideration, -that of lengthening the course at the Normal
schools.
2 Many years ago, an officer, P. A. Silestrom, was sent by the Court of Sweden
to look at our schools. After witnessing, for two hours, the instruction given by
young ladies in the Normal school then at West Newton, he told me, "This is
worth coming across the Atlantic to see. This-is a great discovery. There are
maiden ladies in Norway who could easily be prepared to teach all the little scattered
mountain schools in that country, - schools in regard to which the government have
long been almost in despair."
3 In 1856, I went into Prussia for the express purpose of examining the gymnasia
and, more particularly, the seminaries for teachers, after the model of which our Normal schools had been formed, in consequence of the knowledge given in the Report
on them by Cousin, which had been introduced here by his correspondent, our
friend and associate, Charles Brooks. I found no difficulty in gaining admission to
them, through our minister Governor Vroom; and devoted a week to the examination of one of them in Berlin, which had been pointed out by the Minister of Public
Instruction and Religion as a fair representative of the Normal schools of Prussia.




494                EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
There is another thing which should not go without mention in
the briefest sketch of the history of Education in Massachusetts;
that is, the signal ability, intelligence, and thorough acqudintance
with every thing relating to the instruction, moral elevation, and
discipline of the schools, shown in the extracts from the Reports
of the School Committees of every part of the State, which accompany the Annual Reports of the Board of Education.
The signal success of our Normal schools, and the supervision
exercised over the common schools, have been possible only
through the existence and wise management of the School Fund,
of whose legislative history it is therefore necessary to speak.
In January, 1828, the Committee on Education, in the House
of Representatives, in a report made by the Hon.W. B. Calhoun,
declared that means should be devised for the establishment of a
fund having in view not the support, but the encouragement,
of the common schools, and the instruction of school-teachers.
In January, 1833, Mr. Marsh, of Dalton, suggested the expediency of investing a portion of the proceeds of the lands of the
Commonwealth in a permanent fund, the interest of which should
be annually applied for the encouragement of common schools.
The committee say, -' It is not intended, in establishing a school fund, to relieve towns and
parents fiom the principal expense of education, but to manifest our
I patiently heard every teacher and every class, in every study they were pursuing,
and saw the instruction given by some of the pupils to classes in the Model school.
I had kept myself acquainted with all the operations of the Normal schools in
Massachusetts, from the time when Father Peirce began with his class of three girls,
at Lexington, to the end of the school-year in 1855; and I was obliged, to my infinite surprise and gratification, to come to the conclusion, that there was not a single
point in which the Massachusetts schools were not immeasurably superior to the
Berlin. Our course of studies was better, our methods of instruction and discipline,
the intelligence and vivacity of our teachers; but the greatest difference was in the
character.of the materials out of which the future teachers were to be made. Instead
of the bright, earnest, wide-awake, intelligent Yankee girls, who formed eighty per
cent of the pupils in our Normal schools, I saw only ungainly, awkward, dull young
men, of whom it was impossible to help feeling, that most of them were there because
they were too lazy to work, and too stupid to hope to succeed in any calling which
required intelligent, thoughtful activity.
In the gymnasia, I speedily came to a different conclusion; for, while I nowhere
saw-in mathematics, in natural philosophy, astronomy, and kindred branches —
instruction given better than I had often seen at Cambridge, and in the High School
in this city, in instruction in the elements of language, and the subsequent course in
Latin, in English, in French, and especially in their own German, I was obliged to
admit that they were far beyond what I had, then, anywhere seen here.




LEGISLATION AND HISTORY.                 495
interest in, and to give direction, energy, and stability to, institutions
essential to individual happiness and the public welfare... Therefore
we recommend that a fund be constituted, and the distribution of the
income so ordered as to open a direct intercourse with the schools; that
their wants may be better understood and supplied, the advantages of education be more highly appreciated, and the blessings of wisdom, virtue,
and knowledge, carried home to the fireside of every family, to the bosom
of every child."
In February, 1834, a committee, after a very able Report, full
of most valuable suggestions, reported, by their chairman, A. D.
Foster, an Act to establish the Massachusetts School Fund:" That all unappropriated moneys. now in the Treasury, derived from
the sale of lands in the State of Maine, and from the claim of the State
on the United States for military services, be appropriated to constitute a
permanent fund for the aid and encouragement of common schools."
This, the " Massachusetts School Fund," went into operation
Jan. 1, 1835.
By an Act passed in 1854, the fund was enlarged to a million
and a half of dollars, by the transfer to the Fund of 2,944 shares
of the stock of the Western Railroad Corporation held by the
State. By a law of 1859, the School Fund is to be further increased, from the proceeds of the sale of lands in the Back Bay;1
and it has been thus increased by the addition, from that source,
of the sum of $456,930.06; making it, since the 1st of January,
1866, $2,000,000; to which sum, for the present, it is limited.
"The establishment of the School Fund," says Governor Boutwell,' was the most important educational measure ever adopted by the
government of the Commonwealth; and, in connection with the organization of the Board of Education, it has wrought a salutary change and
reformation in the character and influence of our public schools." —" With
the fund, it is possible to obtain accurate and complete returns from nearly
every town in the State. Without it, all legislation must prove ineffectual.
By the aid of the fund, all material facts are annually made known to the
State; without it, each town is kept ignorant of what its neighbors are
doing. With the fund, we have a system; without it, all is disjointed and
disconnected."2
One-half the income of this fund is annually "distributed
among the cities and towns of the State, in proportion to the
1 Twenty-fourth Report of the Board of Education: Secretary G. S. Boutwell's
Report, p. 74.                      2 Id., p. 76.




496             EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
number of children in each, between the ages of five and fifteen
years;" on condition, however, that no apportionment shall be
made to a town or city which has not sent in a report, and which
has not raised by taxation, for the support of schools, during the
previous school-year, a sum not less than one dollar and fifty cents
for each person between the ages of five and fifteen. This sum
is now increased to three dollars for each child.
From the other half of the income of the School Fund must
be paid " all money appropriated for other educational purposes,"
such as the support of the Normal schools, schools for the blind,
for the deaf and dumb, for feeble-minded persons, &c.
By the wise and careful distribution of the former half of the
fund, with its conditions, the inhabitants of the towns and cities
in the Commonwealth have been induced to raise, by voluntary
taxation of themselves, sums for the support of the schools, which
have been constantly increasing from 1837 to the present time.
The mere increase for 1867 " amounting," according to the able
secretary of the Board, " to $362,328.87; a sum added in a single
year nearly, or quite, equal to the entire amount raised by tax
in 1837." 1
The small bonus of twenty cents, or at most twenty-five cents,
for each child between five and fifteen, has been used as a lever
to induce the people to raise by voluntary taxation, every year,
from twenty-nine to forty times that sum, in all the towns of the
Commonwealth.
We were recently told, in an admirable school report, by one
of our associates,2 who is as careful in his statements as he is
eloquent in the enforcement of truth, that, in France, two and a
half millions of children are taught at a cost of over six millions
of dollars, that is, at $2.06 each child; and that, in 1856, the total
expense of primary instruction, for 3,850,000 children, was over
eight millions of dollars, or $2.07 for each child; by primary instruction being meant all instruction below that of the colleges.
In Massachusetts, in 1867, the money raised by voluntary
taxation, for 261,408 children, between five and fifteen, including
only expenses for wages, board, fuel, care of fires and schoolrooms, was $2,355,505,3 that is, $9.10 for each child; and "the
1 Thirty-first Annual Report, p. 39.  2 Rev. R. C. Waterston.
3 This money undoubtedly comes mostly from the rich, and the greatest gainers
are the poor. Yet it is voted readily, and paid most willingly. " Government can



LEGISLATION AND IISTORY.               497
amount fromn taxes, tuition, anld flunds, andl( expenlded oin publi
schools, 1)rivate schools, an(l a.cat(lem nics, (x(c lusive of tf!1  x lplsCX s
of buildings and school-books, is:t3, 1I(0,66)5.94; whichi is e(piall
to tle sunn of over 81.2 for every person in the State Ibetwe('il
five and fifteen years of age." 1
Besides these, we kno\w what larg   se sums are annually spent
in buildilgs and in school-books.
There is another work, another changle, which 1ias been silently
and constantly going on, under the guidanlce of the Boardl of
Education and the secretaries, and through llheir grealt org;lls
the Normal schools and the enlighttened exlperience of the peop)le,
not less important than any other tlat has been spoken of.'.I'he
common schools have, every year since the establishlmentl t of thel
Board, been taught and managed by a larger number of lfen;ales
than in any year before. To take only the last eleven years that
have been reported.  TLhe whole number of diftlerent persons
employed as teachers in the public schools, during the year.1856,
was 7,153, of whom 1,768 were males and 5,385 ifeales.
The whole number employed in 1867 was 7,759, of whiom
1,020 were males and 6,739 females; showing a a    (ddition, in
eleven years, to the number of female teachers, of 1,354, or 12:;3,
on an average, each year; and a diminution in i he inuliher of
male teachers of 748, or 68 a year, the number of schools having
increased in those eleven years from 4,300 to 4,838.
In the matter of compensation to female teachers, there always
has been, and still is, a deplorable disregard of propriety, right
feeling, and justice. The average wages of female teachers in
1837 were $11.38 per month; less than 83 a week. They are
now, or were in 1867, $26.44 per month, that is, $6.61 a week;
an increase of 50 cents a month each year for thirty years. But
still what a wretched pittance for such services! Absolutely
unintelligent labor, mere digging, is better paid than the intelligent, retining devotion and care of highly educated teachers.
not," as Mr. Webster said, "sulbject the property of those who have estates to at
burden for a purpose more favorable to thle poor, and more usefil to tile whole community. This is tle living fountain wliclh supplies the ever-flowing, ever-reftlresing,
ever-fertilizing stream of'public instruction and general intelligence."-). WIV:bstr-'s
Splechl in.Afssachllsetts Convention of 1820.
1 Thirty-first Annual Report of tlhe Board of Education and of tile Secretary,
lion. Joseplh White.
32




498            EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS.
One can hardly help feeling that the mnere cleaning of streets,
digging of ditches, and raising crops of potatoes and cablbagl)es,all to be forgotten ill a year,-are more implorrtant, ill tlle eyes
of the fatlers of the people, than tlle refinemelnt, elevation,.and
delicate training of their children, oln which their owIn Ialppiness,
after middle life, will depend, more tlan otn all otler causes
together.
Now, are not the legislation of Massachusetts, in regard to tlhe
School Fund and the Normal schools, and the action of the
agents of the State in carrying this legislation into efiect, in perfect keeping with that legislation of our Fathers, which, as we have
seen, is the object of praise and admiration throughout the world?
In this one particular, we have not fallen below their high standard. We have, through our Governor and Council, selected,
year after year, from all the inhabitants of the State, such persons, to form the Board of Education, as seemed best fitted, by
their wisdom, experience, and knowledge of the wants and actual
working of the schools, to take charge, without pecuniary remuneratioh, of the interests of education; and we have required the
Board " to lay before the Legislature an annual report of school
returns, and of all the doings of the Board, with such observations
upon the condition and efficiency of the system of popular education, and such suggestions as to the most practical means of
improving and extending it, as the experience and reflection of tie
Board dictate." 1
The Board have chosen to the office of secretary, who is the
organ of communication between the State, its oflicers and
representatives, and all the schools of the State, men-Horace
Mann, Barnas Sears, George S. Boutwell, Joseph White-as
signally well qualified for the office as could be found in the
State, perhaps in the world.
1 Twenty-fourth Report, sec. 3, p. 64.
Cambridge: Stereotyped tnd Printed by Joln VWion,e  Sol.