USA > Massachusetts > Anglican beginnings in Massachusetts (history of Episcopal Church) > Part 2
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The above is Bradford's account. Another picture is given in Morton's New English Canaan. Morton said that, before the brethren would allow him to be their pastor, Lyford would have first to "re- nounce his calling, to the office of the Ministery, received in England, as heretical and Papisticall, (so hee confest) and then to receive a new callinge from them, after their fantasticall invention which hee re- fused, alledging and maintaining that his calling as it stood was lawfull, and that hee would not renounce it; and so Iohn Oldham his opinion was one (on) the affirmative, and both together did maintaine the Church of England, to be a true Church, although in some particulars (they said) defective concludinge so against the Tenents there, and by this meanes cancelled theire good opinion, amongst the number of the Seperatists, that stay they must not, lest they be spies, and to fall fowle on this occasion, the Brethren thought it would betray their cause, and make it fall under censure, therefore against Master Layford they had found out some scandall; to be laid on his former corse of life, to blemish that, and so to conclude hee was a spotted beast, and not to be allowed where they ordained to have the Passover kept so zealously ; as for John Oldham, they could see hee would be passionate, and moody ; and proove himselfe a mad Iack in his mood, and as soon mooved to be moody, and this impatience would Minister advantage to them to be rid of him."12
Bishop Perry calls attention to the fact that "the only charges of immorality brought against (Lyford) were made during his espousal and advocacy of separatist views and practices, while of his career while in the 'Episcopal calling,' if we know little or nothing, we know nothing ill;" and furthermore, that the proofs of his gross immorality
11 Bradford: History of the Plymouth Plantation, 1912 ed., I., pp. 117-125. 12 Morton: New English Canaan, book III., ch. viii.
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were "readily furnished when he sought to 'set up a publick meeting aparte, on ye Lord's day,' and 'would goe minister the sacraments by his Episcopall calling.' "13
After banishment, Lyford officiated for the little company at Nan- tasket and Salem; he finally removed to Virginia. Morton states that, while still on the Bay and before going to Cape Ann, Lyford "freely executed his office and preached every Lord's day, and yet maintained his wife and children foure or five upon his industry there, with the blessing of God and the plenty of the Land, without the helpe of his auditory, in an honest and laudable manner, till hee was wearied and made to leave the country."14
Among the colonists of Robert Gorges who remained in Massa- chusetts, there was the Reverend William Blaxton, a Cambridge Master of Arts. Mr. Blaxton occupied "Shawmut," which has now become the city of Boston; there he had his cottage, his garden-plot, and his orchard. A clergyman of the Church of England, there is no record of his ministrations. He built a little house opposite Charles Town, by virtue of which he laid claim to the whole peninsula of Shawmut. By his invitation, members of the Massachusetts Company, who arrived at Mishawum (now Charles Town) under John Winthrop, commenced settling at Shawmut; hence the foundations of Boston were laid. Later the inhabitants dispossessed him; and justified their act by suggesting that he was an odd sort of man, who would not join himself with any of their New England churches. There is an account of Blaxton's sale of the land on which Boston now stands. His name is given in the first list of freemen of Massachusetts (1630).
Though doubtless an inoffensive person, Blaxton was hardly re- garded with favour by the zealous Independents. They had no desire for a Church of England minister in their midst, who refused to re- nounce his allegiance to the Establishment. Blaxton said to the Puri- tans, in explaining his refusal to unite with them :- "I came from England, because I did not like the lord-bishops; but I cannot join with you, because I would not be under the lord-brethren.15 Aware that he was no match for the overpowering zeal of the Puritans, Blaxton made no effort to assert his Anglican opinions. Johnson, in his Wonder Working Providence, stated that he retained "no simbole of his former profession but a Canonicall Coate."16 In 1634, he relinquished his holdings to the inhabitants of Boston; and received the sum of thirty pounds, each house-holder paying six shillings.17 He then went fur-
13 Perry: American Episcopal Church, I., p. 86.
14Morton: New English Canaan. Book III., ch. viii.
15Cotton Mather: Magnalia, book III.
16Johnson: Wonder Working Providence.
17 Memorial History of Boston, I., p. 85.
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ther into the wilderness, to a spot which he called "Study Hill," in the present limits of the town of Lonsdale, Rhode Island. Thus he be- came a pioneer white resident of that domain. He died May 26th, 1675; and was buried at Study Hill.18
II. THE PURITANS AND THE MASSACHUSETTS BAY COLONY
In 1629, another colony settled in Massachusetts, far more numerous and wealthy than the Plymouth settlers. Some Dorchester traders had started a fishing venture in 1623, with a permanent station at Cape Ann, in Massachusetts Bay. They had abandoned it as a failure in 1626; but had left a foreman with some cattle on the spot. One of the company, John White, incumbent of Dorchester and a man of Puri- tan leanings, saw the possibility of building on this foundation.19 White and others set forth their views in pamphlets; they were "deliberately establishing a refuge where Puritanism, and those political views which were so closely bound up with Puritanism, might flourish and react upon the religious and political life of the mother country." Six men of influence in the Puritan party obtained from the New England Com- pany a grant of land; they already possessed a fishing-station at Cape Ann. John Endicott was at once sent out to occupy and develop this station. In March, 1629, a royal charter was obtained, incorporating the Governor and Company of Massachusetts Bay. The same year, a fleet was sent out with 350 emigrants. Later the whole interest of the Company was transferred to ten persons, all concerned in the prosperity of the colony, while the management of affairs was trans- ferred to America. With that the Company, as a body distinct from the colony, disappeared. The choice of a governor fell on John Win- throp, a Suffolk squire, forty-three years old, and a graduate of Cam- bridge. Some of Endicott's settlers had already established themselves in a settlement to which they gave the name of Charles Town; and Winthrop and his company joined them. But Winthrop soon moved to Boston. Within a year, eight small settlements had sprung up around Boston Bay.20 Blaxton's negotiations with the newcomers, which resulted in the planting of Boston on his holdings, have already been noted.
While the new settlers were not actuated solely by religious motives, it is true that they were opposed to certain tendencies in the English Church; they witnessed a relaxation of moral standards, which filled
18Sprague: Annals of the American Episcopal Pulpit, pp. 1-3.
19J. A. Doyle, in Cambridge Modern History, VII., p. 15.
20 Ibid., pp. 15-16.
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them with distress, and they objected to the encouragement of ritualistic practices which savoured of a return to Romanism and they were ex- ceedingly restive under the dominance of the ecclesiastical hierarchy. As Johnson expressed it, in his Wonder Working Providence :-
"When England began to decline in Religion, like luke- warm Laodicea, and instead of purging out Popery, a farther compliance was sought not onely in vaine Idolatrous Cere- monies, but also in prophaning the Sabbath, and by Procla- mation throughout their Parish churches, exasperating lewd and prophane persons to celebrate a Sabbath like the Heathen to Venus, Baccus, and Ceres; in so much that the multitude of irreligious lascivious and popish affected persons spred the whole land with Grashoppers, in this very time Christ the glorious King of his Churches, raises an Army out of our English Nation, for freeing his people from their long servi- tude under usurping Prelacy ; and because every corner of Eng- land was filled with the fury of malignant adversaries, Christ creates a New England to muster up the first of his Forces in; Whose low condition, little number, and remoteness of place made these adversaries triumph, despising this day of small things, but in this hight of their pride the Lord Christ brought sudden, and unexpected destruction upon them."21
While Puritans, these colonists were not separatists from the Church of England. A little concession on the part of the prelates would surely have retained many in the Church, who rebelled against full conformity. John Bastwick, doctor of physick, a soldier and a controversialist, who even suffered with Prynne and Burton and was sentenced to lose his ears and pay a fine of five thousand pounds, wrote in 1646 :-
"It is well known that, in the time of the Prelates' power, the removal of a very few things would have given great con- tent to the most scrupulous consciences. For myself I can speak thus much, not only concerning the conscientious Profes- sors here in England, but the most rigid Separatists beyond the seas ; with many of which, I had familiar acquaintance at home and abroad; and amongst all that I conversed with, I never heard them, till within these twenty years, desire any other thing in Reformation but that the Ceremonies might be removed with their Innovations; and that Episcopacy might be regu- lated, and their boundless power and authority taken from them; and that the extravagances of the High Commission Court might be annihilated and made void; and that there might, through the Kingdom, be a preaching Ministry every- where set up. . .. Yea, I can speak thus much, in the pres- 21 Johnson: Wonder Working Providence, Book I., ch. 1.
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ence of God, That Master Robinson, of Leyden, the Pastor of the Brownist Church there, told me, and others who are yet living to witness the truth of what I now say: 'That if he might in England have enjoyed but the liberty of his Ministry there, with an immunity but from the very Ceremonies; and that they had not forced him to a Subscription to them, and imposed upon him the observation of them; that he had never separated from it, and left that Church."22
The Reverend John White, of Dorchester, England, who has been styled the "father of the Massachusetts Colony" and "the Patriarch of New England," was a conformist, although he was in sympathy with the Puritan party in the Church. It was he, as we have seen, who saw the possibilities of a colony of Puritans in Massachusetts and aroused interest in the project by his writings. In 1630, he wrote "The Planters Plea" (published in London that year), in which he defended the New England settlers from the imputation of non-conformity or separatism. "Some variation from the formes and customes of our church" might be hoped for or expected, White said; but he denied that the sponsors of the enterprise were "projecting the erecting of this colony for a nursery of Schismaticks." He asserted that "three parts of foure" of the planters were "able to justifie themselves to have lived in a constant course of conformity unto our church government and orders," and Governor Winthrop has "beene every way regular and conformable in the whole course of his practise." "Neither all nor the greatest part of the Ministers are unconformable."23
The Reverend Francis Higginson, for several years minister of the parish Church at Leicester, is said to have called out from the stern of the "Talbot," as he took his last view of Land's End :-
"We will not say, as the Separatists are wont to say, on their leaving England, Farewell Babylon! Farewell Rome ! But we will say, Farewell dear England! Farewell the Church of God in England and all the Christian friends there! We do not go to New England as Separatists from the Church of England, though we cannot but separate from the corruptions in it ; but we go to practise the positive part of church reforma- tion, and propagate the Gospel in America.24
Governor Winthrop and several others on board the "Arbella," signed a paper directed to their brethren of the Church of England,
22 Bastwick: The Utter Routing of the whole Army of all the Independents and Sectaries, Sig. F. 2 (Quoted as a note in Bradford: History of the Plymouth Plantation, 1912 ed., I., p. 12).
23Force's Historical Tracts, II., pp. 33-37.
24Reported in Cotton Mather's Magnalia.
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designed to remove suspicion or misconstructions and to ask their prayers.
"Reverend Fathers and Brethren :
"The generall rumour of this solemne Enterprise, where- in our selves with others, through the providence of the Almightie, are ingaged, as it may spare us the labour of impart- ing our occasion unto you, so it gives us the more incourage- ment to strengthen our selves by the procurement of the prayers & blessings of the Lords faithfull Servants: For which end wee are bold to have recourse unto you, as those whom God hath placed nearest his throne of Mercy ; which as it affords you the more opportunitie, so it imposeth the greater bond upon you to intercede for his people in all their straights, we beseech 'you therefore by the mercies of the LORD IESUS to con- sider us as your Brethren, standing in very great need of your helpe, and earnestly imploring it. And howsoever your charitie may have met with some occasion of discouragement through the misreport of our intentions, or through the disaffection, or indiscretion, of some of us, or rather, amongst us; yet we desire you would be pleased to take notice of the principals, and body of our company, as those who esteame it our honour, to call the Church of England, from whence we rise, our deare Mother, and cannot part from our native Countrie, where she specially resideth, without much sadness of heart, and many tear's in our eyes, ever acknowledging that such hope and part as wee have obtained in the common salvation, we have re- ceived in her bosome, and suckt it from her breasts: wee leave it not therefore, as loathing that milk wherewith we were nourished there, but blessing God for the parentage and edu- cation, as members of the same body, shall always rejoyce in her good, and unfainedly grieve for any sorrow that shall ever betide her, and while we have breath, syncerely desire and indeavour the continuance & abundance of her welfare, with the inlargement of her bounds in the kingdome of CHRIST JESUS.
"Be pleased, therefore, Reverend FATHERS & BRETHREN to helpe forward this worke now in hand ; which, if it prosper, you shall be the more glorious, however your judgment if with the LORD, and your reward with your GOD. It is an usuall and laudable exercise of your charity, to recommend to the prayers of your Congregations the necessi- ties and straights of your private neighbors; Doe the like for a Church springing out of your bowels. We conceive much hope that this remembrance of us, if it be frequent and fervent, will bee a most prosperous gale in our sailes, and provide such a passage and welcome for us, from the GOD of the whole earth, as both we which shall finde it, and your selves, with the rest of our friends, who shall heare of it, shall be much inlarged to bring in such daily returnes of Thanks-giving, as
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the specialties of his Providence and Goodnes may justly chal- lenge at all our hands. You are not ignorant, that the Spirit of GOD stirred up the Apostle Paul to make continuall men- tion of the Church of Philippi (which was a Colonie from Rome,) let the same Spirit, we beseech you, put you in mind, that are the Lords remembrancers, to pray for us without ceasing (who are a weake Colony from your selves) making continuall request for us to GOD in all your prayers,
"What we intreat of you that are the Ministers of God, that we also crave at the hands of all the rest of our Brethren, that they would at no time forget us in their private solicita- tions at the throne of Grace.
"If any there be, who through want of cleare intelligence of our course, or tenderness of affection towards us, cannot conceive so well of our way as we could desire, we would in- treat such not to despise us, nor to desert us in their prayers & affections, but to consider rather, that they are so much the more bound to expresse the bowels of their compassion towards us, remembering alwaies that both Nature and Grace, doth ever binde us to relieve and rescue with our utmost & speediest power, such as are deare unto us, when wee conceive them to be running uncomfortable hazards.
"What goodnes you shall extent to us in this or any other Christian kindnesse, wee your Brethren in CHRIST IESUS shall labour to repay in what dutie wee are or shall be able to performe, promising so farre as God shall enable us to give him no rest on your behalfes, wishing our heads and hearts may be as fountaines of teares for your everlast- ing welfare, when wee shall be in our poore Cottages in the wildernesse, over-shadowed with the spirit of supplication, through the manifold necessities and tribulations which may not altogether unexpectedly, nor, we hope, unprofitably befall us. And so commending you to the grace of GOD in CHRIST, wee shall ever rest
Your assured Friends and Brethren, "From Yarmouth aboard the Arbella April 7, 1630. "Io: Winthrope Gov. Charles Fines.
George Philipps. &c.
Rich: Saltonstall. Isaac Johnson. Tho: Dudley. William Coddington &c."
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III. SEPARATION OF THE PURITAN COLONISTS FROM THE ANGLICAN CHURCH
While the Puritan colonists were Church of England men and avowed their disinclination to separatism, they found on their arrival that there was a religious order already in existence; and they soon fell in line with the prevailing usage, even though it involved separation. Those who found their way to Salem were prevailed upon by Endicott and others to conform to the local system. On the 6th of August, 1629, Francis Higginson and Samuel Skelton (who had arrived on the "George," June 29th) ordained each other. This signalized the break of the Puritan colony with the mother Church.
Winthrop and his company, arriving the following year, discovered that there was a congregation already established at Salem. Scurvy and other diseases breaking out, Thomas Fuller, a physician who had been a deacon in John Robinson's church, visited the new colonists and won their confidence and gratitude. It is said that Fuller was the chief means of transforming New England's Puritanism into Congre- gationalism. At any rate, within a few weeks after the Governor and his party appeared, there started in Charles Town a separatist, non- conforming congregation-"the First Church in Boston." Then Gover- nor Winthrop, Deputy Governor Dudley, Isaac Johnson, and John Wil- son entered into a solemn covenant, "to walk in all our ways according to the rule of the Gospel, and in all sincere conformity to his holy ordinances, and in mutual love and respect to each other, so near as God shall give us grace."25 They avowed their intention "to unite into one congregation or church, under the Lord Jesus Christ, (their) head, in such sort as becometh all those whom he hath redeemed, and sanctified to himself."
Before the arrival of Governor Winthrop, Endicott had felt bound to rid the colony of some whose Anglican loyalty was considered an intrusion. Among the first patentees, there were two brothers, John and Samuel Browne, who showed their preference for the rites and customs of the Church of England, and protested against some of the practices of their Puritan brethren. An old writer tells us that "these two brothers gathered a company together in a place distinct from the public assembly, and there, sundry times, the book of Common Prayer was read unto such as resorted thither." Mr. Endicott, "taking notice of the disturbance that began to grow amongst the people by this means," convened the two brothers before him. Thereupon the Brownes accused the ministers of departing from the orders of the Church of
25 Memorial History of Boston, I., p. 114.
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England : "that they were Separatists, and would be Anabaptists, etc., but for themselves, they would hold to the Orders of the Church of England." The local ministers denied that they were either Separatists or Anabaptists; and declared that "they did not separate from the Church of England, nor from the Ordinances of God there, but only from the Corruptions and Disorders there; and that they came away from the Common Prayer and Ceremonies, and had suffered much for their non-Conformity in their Native Land; and therefore, being in a place where they might have their liberty, they neither could nor would use them, because they judged the imposition of these things to be sinful Corruptions in the Worship of God." We are told that Endicott and the Council, and the generality of the people, "did well approve of the Ministers' Answer; and therefore, finding these two brothers to be of high spirits and their speeches and practices tending to mutiny and faction, the governour told them that New England was no place for such as they; and, therefore, he sent them both back to England, at the return of the ships the same year; and though they breathed out threatenings, both against the governour and ministers there, yet the Lord so disposed of all, that there was no further inconvenience followed upon it."26
Another Puritan settler who showed no inclination to embrace the new order was the Reverend Francis Bright, who arrived with Skelton and Higginson in 1629. He moved to Meshawum before his two com- panions were ordained; and there he tried to gather a congregation. It was said that "he was a godly minister;" but it does not appear that he ever abandoned the ministry of the Church of England.27 The Reverend Ralph Smith did not seem to conform in all respects to the Salem standard ; and he was an object of suspicion. Later he ministered to the Plymouth congregation, and conformed to the principles of the Separatists.28 Thus the Puritan colony became rigidly Independent and exclusive.
The patentees in England were surprised and offended that the colonists should so suddenly and widely have departed from the Estab- lished Church. They were apprehensive of royal displeasure and of consequent harm to the secular interests which they were seeking to pro- mote.29 Letters from England expressed alarm at "some innovacions attempted by yow;" and it was suggested that "it is possible some vndigested councills have too sodainely bin put in execucion wch may
26 Morton: New England Memorial, p. 147; Perry: American Episcopal Church, I., p. 96.
27 Batchelder: Eastern Diocese, I., pp. 328-330.
28 Ibid., p. 329.
29 Dexter: Congregationalism as seen in its literature, p. 419.
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have ill construccion wth the state heere, and make vs obnoxious to any adversary."30
It is really difficult to explain the sudden change which affected the Puritans. After their avowals of loyalty to the English Church, they not only repudiated this allegiance but proceeded to a most bigoted and exclusive attitude towards those who tried to cling to the simplest Anglican usages. Probably the explanation lies in their desire for the security afforded by an alliance with the white settlers already there, as well as a recognition of the importance of agreement in fundamental matters in their precarious enterprise. They lived in a time of great religious partisanship; in fact, they were zealots themselves. Yet we are reminded that the Puritans were Anglicans, that quite a few of their number were University men, and that several of them were or- dained clergymen and had even held parishes.
Doctor Cotton Mather in his Magnalia (1702) tried to reconcile the farewell aboard the "Arbella" with the subsequent conduct of Win- throp and his company. He said :-
"First, they were able to distinguish between the Church of England, as it contained the whole body of the faithful, scattered throughout the kingdoms, though of different perswasions about some rites and modes in religion . . . and the Church of England, as it was confined unto a certain constitution by canons, which pronounced Ipso Facto, excommunicate all those who should affirm that the worship contained in the 'Book of Common-Prayer and administration of sacraments,' is unlawful, or that any of the thirty-nine articles are erroneous, or that any of the ceremonies commanded by the authority of the church might not be approved, used and subscribed; and which will have to be accursed, all those who maintain that there are in the realm any other meetings, assemblies or congregations of the king's born subjects, than such as by the laws of the land are allowed, which may rightly challenge to themselves, the name of true and lawful Churches; and by which all those that refuse to kneel at the reception of the sacrament and to be present at publick prayers, according to the orders of the church, about which there are prescribed many formalities of responses, with bowing at the name of Jesus, are to be denied the communion; and all who dare not submit their children to be baptized by the undertaking of god-fathers; and receive the cross as a dedicating badge of Christianity, must not have baptism for their children : besides an et-coetera of how many more impositions! Again, they were able to distinguish be- tween the Church of England, as it kept the true doctrine of the Protestant religion . . and the Church of England, as limiting that name unto a certain faction, who, together 30 Massachusetts Colonial Records, I., pp. 407-408.
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