USA > Massachusetts > The history of Massachusetts, the colonial period. 1492-1692 v. I > Part 5
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The position of the parties to this contest-both of whom were probably equally sincere - was not eminently calculated to beget feelings of urbanity ; and coarse pleas-
1 Burnet, 2. 582 ; Whitelock, 226.
" Prince, 231 ; Hallam, 109.
' Stat. at Large, 13 Eliz., c. 12.
4 Robertson, lib. 10. § 7, 8; Per- sons, 242, 244, in Hallam, 116 ; Ma- cauly, 1. 57.
القارة
43
THE BITTER SPIRIT OF CONTROVERSY.
antry and bitter invective perpetually exasperated the vio- CHAP. II. lace of controversy. If Martin Mar Prelate - that 1558 vizored knight - is censured for his ribaldry, and for the to profanity of his wit, the churchlings who replied to him were 1581. guilty of similar excesses. Theological gladiators have ₱ never been fastidious in their choice of epithets, and the ruder the jest or the more trenchant the sarcasm, the more pleasure such sallies have usually excited. On neither side was there a superabundance of courtesy or charity. It was an age of insane religious intolerance; the vocabu- liry of vituperation was utterly exhausted ; and the spirit of detraction exulted in affixing the stigma of disgrace upon those it denounced as heretics and apostates. Both sides were faulty, and, so far as an intemperate zeal is concerned, one is as amenable to censure as the other. If the Puritans, to wash their skirts, cast the odium of their sins upon their opponents of the English Church, they, in their turn, will cast the odium of their sins upon the old Church of Rome. The leaven of error was by no means purged out from the most advanced Protestant minds, nor even at the present day has it disappeared from all. We blame, therefore, the Puritans as well as the Anglican - Church; and the best atonement which can be made for such excesses, is for Christians of the present day to lay aside bitterness and malignant invective, and display, in their dealings with each other, and in their sectarian con- troversies, more of that charity which is the chief of the graces, and the purest ornament of the character of the Christian.
It must not be forgotten, however, in defining the position of Puritanism in the reign of Elizabeth, that the contro- versies which convulsed the kingdom, and threatened almost to banish from the world the gentleness of the gospel, were not wholly confined to the tippet and the surplice, the square cap and the liturgy. The Puritans were the har-
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44
AIMS OF THE PURITANS.
CHAP. bingers of a political as well as of a moral revolution. II. They aimed not only to restore Christianity to its primitive 1558 to simplicity, purging the church of the corruptions of ages,
1581. but they aimed also to overthrow the idea, then the main pillar of the prerogatives of royalty, that we should obey men rather than God. Doubtless the ultimate tendency of their views was to republicanism rather than to monarchy. They would yield, in religion, nothing arbitrarily to the temporal sovereign. It was their motto that, in church matters, God's word was the guide. And though they can- not be properly accused of open disloyalty, it must at the same time be acknowledged that their loyalty did not extend so far as to approbate the doctrine of passive obedience. And because the Church and the State were considered one and inseparable, and the unity of the former was deemed the safety of the latter, non-conformity was persecuted on the plea of necessity. This is the true secret of the oppo- sition of the English Church to Puritanism and Independ- ency. This Church, like that of Rome, had virtually assumed its own infallibility. It had driven down the stakes which were never more to be removed. It had interwoven the hierarchy with the whole temporal constitu- tion of the realm. It had built up a system midway between Puritanism and the despotism of the Catholic Church. And the test of loyalty was undeviating conformity to the canons of the Church, and implicit obedience to the mandates of the Crown. The Church was yet in its infancy, surrounded by subtile foes. The State was trembling upon the verge of revolution. And the instinct of self-preservation prompted persecution of all who refused to put forth their hands to aid in supporting the ark of the Lord and the supremacy of the Crown.1
1 The language of the Queen, in Eng., 4. 279; Camden, in Kennet, her Speech at proroguing the Par- 503; D'Ewes' Journal, 328 ; Robert- son, lib. 10. § 5, note. liament, in 1585, confirms the state- ment of the text. See Parl. Hist.
45
PERSECUTION OF THE PURITANS.
If this, however, was the policy of the government of CHIAP. II. England, -and that it was who will deny ?- it was the natural result of such a policy to beget, on the part of the 1558 to 1581.
Puritans, an attachment equally strong to the peculiarities of their religious system ; and upon their removal to America, the same principle of self-defense prompted the caution which was used in laying the foundations of their infant commonwealth, to guard it with jealous watchfulness against the aggressions and encroachments of Episcopacy, which they had learned to mistrust, and to build up a community evelusively of their own faith, as in England non-conformity was neither tolerated nor allowed. In England, Puritans could not enjoy the full privileges of Churchmen, because. of their non-conformity. They were as sincere in their dis- sent from that Church, as the Church was sincere in its own professions and practices. And the same reasoning which condemns the policy of the Puritans, condemns with equal severity the policy of the Anglican Church. We say not that either was right, absolutely and fully ; but we do say that, in our estimation, Puritanism, notwithstanding its errors and its early excesses, contained the seminal princi- ples of true religious toleration ; and that, as experience enlightened the judgment of the professors of that faith, and as circumstances sanctioned the adoption of a more liberal policy, measures were promptly taken to initiate so desirable a reform, and the world is now reaping the fruits of Puritan iconoclasm and asceticism.
But to return to the history of Puritanism in England. For several years following the accession of Elizabeth, and especially while the attention of the Queen was particularly turned to the suppression of Popery, in which she was essentially aided by the Puritans, there was no extensive secession from the National Church. Yet before all fears of the Romish ascendancy were removed by the death of Queen Mary, the laws against non-conformity were zealously
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46
RISE OF SEPARATISM.
CHAP. brought to bear in a different direction ; and the Puritans, II. though as a body they made no strenuous objections to the lawfulness of ecclesiastical government, when they found that persecution continued to oppose them, that reform was hopeless, and that rule or ruin was the motto of the day, sent forth a party of stern, intrepid, and uncompromising · spirits, who, unawed, but baited into an almost savage stub- bornness and hostility, refused longer to commune with a Church many of whose ceremonies were reprobated, and whose government had become odious, intolerant and op- pressive.1
A few separate congregations were formed so early as 1567 ;2 in 1570 Cartwright entered the field ;3 and in 1572 the "first born of all presbyteries" was established at Wandworth in Surrey.4 But it was not until nine years 1581. after, that opposition to Episcopacy and its concomitants reached its culminating point. A new sect then made its appearance, at first called Brownists, from Robert Brown, its earliest advocate, who had been a preacher in the dio- cese of Norwich, and who was descended from an ancient and respectable family in Rutlandshire. He was educated at Corpus Christi, Cambridge ; was a schoolmaster in South- wark; then a lecturer at Islington ; and finally a preacher, inveighing against the ceremonies and discipline of the Establishment, and asserting the highly democratic and peculiarly unpalatable doctrine of the independency and complete jurisdiction of every church in its own affairs.5
From his subsequent apostasy, his followers very properly refused to be called by his name, and were known as Sepa-
1 Parl. Hist. Eng., 4. 260, 353. 3 IIallam, 113; Ncal, 1. 114.
2 Strype's Parker, 242; Strype's Grindal, 114-16; Fuller, 2. 81; Cot- ton's Way., 3, 4; Baillie's Dissua- sive, 13; Robinson's Justification, 50; Neal, 1. 104-9; Hallam, 111; Bradford, in Chron. Pil., 443.
4 Fuller, 2. 103; Neal, 1. 126; Prince, 233.
5 Neal, 1. 119, 149 ; Baillie's Dis- suasive, 13.
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47
STATE OF RELIGIOUS PARTIES.
ratists, or Independents.1 But questionable as was his sin- CHAP. rity, and inconstant as were his professions, so congenial~
II. were the doctrines he taught to the views of the people that !!. easily succeeded in gathering a large congregation ; and after its dispersion and his own defection, the seed which had been scattered so rapidly grew, that Sir Walter Ra- 152. liegh, in a speech in Parliament, computed the number of separatists or " Brownists " at twenty thousand.2
There were now at least four claases or parties in religion in England : - the Catholics, who adhered to the Church of Rome ; the members of the English Church ; the Puritans ; and the Separatists or Independents. Of the third class were the founders of the Massachusetts Colony, and to the fourth belonged the settlers at Plymouth. The former-the Puritans- were simply non-conformists. Connected with the National Church, they questioned chiefly the propriety of some of her observances. They submitted to her authority so far as they could, and acknowledged her as their "mother" in all matters of doctrinal concern. Their clergy were educated at her colleges, and ordained by her bishops ; the laity were connected with her by many of the dearest ties ; and up to the date of their removal to America, they made no open secession from her communion, and had liberty been allowed them, they would probably have continued in the land of their nativity, and in the bosom of the Establish- ment.3
The Plymouth colonists were not of the National Church. Years before their expatriation they had renounced her communion, and formed churches of their own. Between them, however, and the Massachusetts colonists, the differ-
' It has long been the fashion to stigmatize, by way of reproach, as Brownists, all the early settlers of New England; but the injustice of this proceeding will, we think, be evident to every candid mind. See Cotton's
Way. of Cong. Churches Cleared, 5; Bradford, in Chron. Pil., 416, 444.
" D'Ewes' Journal, 1. 517.
3 Cotton's Way., 13 ; Baillie's Dis- suasive, 21; Neal, 1. 244 ; Revolu- tion in N. Eng. Justified, 5.
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48
THE CHURCH OF THE PILGRIMS.
CHAP. ences which existed were in matters of policy rather than in II. articles of faith ; and on arriving in the New World, apart from the influences of their native land, and under circum- stances of a far different character, a few years intercourse assimilated their views and cemented their union.1
. Such was the origin of Puritanism and Independency ; and though, in the history of both these sects, as well as of the English and the Romish Churches, we shall find much intolerance displayed, the result of this contest for greater individualism in religious affairs has been, to induce watch- fulness of all encroachments upon the rights of conscience ; and happy changes have followed in all Protestant com- munities where these rights are respected and secured'.
We must now pass to the history of the church of the 1592. Pilgrims. So carly as 1592, a church was gathered at London, of which Francis Johnson was chosen pastor, and John Greenwood became the teacher ; but this church being broken up by the authorities, and its teacher imprisoned, the pastor, with a portion of his flock, escaped to Holland, and settled at Amsterdam, where for many years they con- tinued to abide.2
A few years later another church was gathered, "to the north of the Trent," in a rural district "near the joining borders of Nottinghamshire, Lincolnshire, and Yorkshire." This was the church of the Pilgrims, which, though first established at Gainsborough, was afterwards formed into two bodies, and the junior ordinarily met for public worship at the house of William Brewster, well known as the Elder of the church at Plymouth. This eminent man, so famous
1 Robinson's Apology, passim ; Winslows's Hypocrisy Unmasked,ed. 1646 ; Bradford, in Chron. Pil., 390, 415, 427 ; Baillie's Dissuasive, 32, 33, 55, 56, 59 ; Cotton's Way, 17; Hunter's Founders, 163-78.
% Cotton's Way, 6; Baillie's Dis- suasive, 14, 15; Bradford, in Chron.
Pil., 24. 424, 445-7; Stow, 765; Brandt, Hist. Ref., 1. 479; Neal, 1. 198, 242-3; Prince, 104, 235. The learned Henry Ainsworth, "a man of a thousand," is said to have accompanied this church to Holland, and to have been connected with it as teacher.
49
THE CHURCH AT SCROOBY.
in the annals of the Plymouth Colony, is supposed to have CHAP. been born in Suffolk, England, in 1560, or 1564. Having re -~
II. ceived in early life a suitable education, he became a student at Cambridge, and afterwards an attache to William Davison, Esq., a polished courtier of the reign of Elizabeth, her Secre- tary of State, and her Ambassador to Holland, whither Mr. Brewster accompanied him, " being esteemed rather as a son than a servant." Withdrawing from public life when his employer was displaced, Mr. Brewster received an appointment before April, 1594, as Postmaster at Scrooby, April, in Nottinghamshire, and there resided until his removal to 1594. Holland, faithfully discharging the duties of his office, and devoting himself zealously to the interests of the church with which he was connected. 1
The location of this church, and the history of its patron, have been involved for years in more or less obscurity ; but recently, through the successful researches of the Rev. Joseph Hunter, Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London, and an Assistant Keeper of Her Majesty's Records, many new facts have been brought to light, whose im- portance we cannot too highly appreciate. It may now be considered as satisfactorily proved, that the Church of the Pilgrims was first gathered at Gainsborough, and after- wards at Scrooby, in that part of Nottingham known as "the Hundred of Basset-Lawe," a mile and a half south of the market town of Bawtry, on the borders of York, and only a short distance from the verge of Lincolnshire.
Scrooby, at present, is an obscure agricultural village, with few objects of interest beside its church ; but anciently it was a place of much more note, and was surrounded by
1 See Bradford's Life of Brewster, in Chron. Pil., Chap. xxvii .; but especially, Rev. Joseph Hunter's "Founders of New Plymouth," pub- lished at London, in 1854, pp. 53-
68. Comp. also, Cotton's Way, 4; Morton's Mem. ; Hubbard, 43 ; Bel- knap's Biog., Art. Brewster ; and 4 M. H. Coll., 1. 64-7.
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50
MINISTERS OF THE SCROOBY CHURCH.
CHAP religious houses even before the Reformation. Situated
II. near the high road from York to London, it was, on tha:
account, a convenient resting place for the Archbishops o: York in their journeys to the metropolis ; and lying near the celebrated Hatfield Chace, it was, on that account, & favorite resort for the enjoyment of field-sports. It was the frequent residence of Ap. Savage, in the reign of Henry VII. ; it was for many weeks the abode of Cardinal Wol- sey in his disgrace ; and it was the rendezvous of the Earl of Shrewsbury and his contingent, when he joined the army of the King assembled to oppose "the Pilgrimage of Grace."1 In the reign of Elizabeth the manor was aliena- ted by Ap. Sandys, and settled upon his son Sir Samuel Sandys; and thenceforth it became a private possession. sometimes inhabited by the Sandyses themselves, and some- times occupied by tenants. Mr. Brewster was its tenant at the time he dwelt there as Postmaster of the village .-
Gov. Bradford has left us the names of two ministers. formerly Puritans, who seceded from the National Church. and resided at or near Scrooby : - John Smith, " a man ci able gifts and a good preacher," and Richard Clifton, "a grave and reverend preacher, who by his pains and dili- gence had done much good, and under God, had been & means of the conversion of many."3 Mr. Smith was the pastor of the church at Gainsborough, which is supposed to have been gathered before that at Scrooby ;4 but lacking the spirit of gentleness which the gospel commends, he seems to have been in favor with few of his cotempo raries. Mr. Clifton, who was born at Normanton, Derby-
1 Sce Stow, 574:
2 Hunter's Sketch, in 4 M. H. Coll., 1. 54-7, and his " Founders of New Plymouth," 16-26, 139, 140; Leland's Itinerary, 1. 35, ed. Hearne; Dugdale's Eng. and Wales Delin., 1369.
453; also Baillie's Dissuasive, 15- For fuller notices of Smith, se: Brooks' Lives of the Puritans ; Brad- ford, in Chron. Pil., 450; Hun- ter's Founders, &c., 32-5 ; Neal, 1. 243, note.
4 Smith's Parrallels, &c .; IJu !.. $ Bradford, in Chron. Pil., 22-3, ter's Founders, 33.
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51
JOHN ROBINSON.
Mir, about 1553, is supposed to have been the person who, CHAP. .: 1585, was instituted to the vicarage of Marnham, near II. Newark upon Trent; and in July, 1586, he is known to have had charge of the rectory of Babworth, in the heart of Basset-Lawe. 1 Forsaking the Established Church, ho became pastor or teacher of the church in Brewster's house, after its separate organization, accompanied that church in its exile to Holland, and died at Amsterdam in 1616.2
The most noted of the seceding ministers, however, whose name is connected with the history of the Pilgrims, was John Robinson, who, even by' Baillie, -no friend to his views, -is called "the most learned, polished, and modest spirit" that ever separated from the Church of England. 3 Of the parentage and carly history of this cele- brated man, nothing is certainly known. He was probably born in Nottingham, or Lincolnshire, in 1575, and at the age of seventeen, is supposed to have entered Corpus Christi, Cambridge, 4 and on completing his term at the University, he proceeded to Norfolk, and in the neighborhood of or at Norwich, commenced his labors in the National Church. 5 But his scruples respecting the ceremonies of this Church being immovably fixed, he omitted or modified them in his parochial labors. This subjecting him to annoyance, he was temporarily suspended from his clerical functions ; and after applying unsuccessfully for the Mastership of the Great Hospital, or for a building to be secured to him by lease in which he might officiate, he withdrew entirely from the Church, and became an open seceder ; - not as " the victim of chagrin and disappointment," as has been ungen-
1
1 Hunter, 42.
2 Hunter, 44, from Records in the Clifton Family Bible. See also, Bradford, in Chron. Pil., 453; and
* 4 M. H. Coll., 1. 61. 8 Dissuasive, 17. See also Cot- ton's Way, 7.
4 4 M. H. Coll., 1. 113-14 ; Hun- ter, 92-3.
5 Neal, 1. 244; Hanbury, Mem. Indep's, 1839, vol. 1. 185, et seq. ; 4 M. H. Coll., 1. 73, 74, 115, note ; Hunter, 94-96.
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52
ROBINSON JOINS THE CHURCH AT SCROOBY.
CHAP. erously insinuated,1 but " on most sound and unresistall II. convictions ;" for it required at that time no ordinar; courage to avow one's self a separatist, when persecution. if not death, was the doom of all dissidents. 2
Proceeding to Lincolnshire and Nottingham, he there found a body of men who, "urged with apparitors, pur- suivants and the Commission Courts," met for worship as often as they could escape the Argus eyes of their persecu- tors ; - somewhat, perhaps, like the Covenanters of Scot- land, who,
" Long ere the dawn, by devious ways, O'er hills, through woods, o'er dreary wastes they sought The upland muirs,"
knowing the dangers to which they were exposed. These holy men, " whose hearts the Lord had touched with heavenly zeal for his truth," and who, notwithstanding all the opprobrium which has been cast upon them, we must 1602. still believe were animated by a fervent picty, had already constituted themselves into a church, by solemn covenant with the Lord and with each other, "to walk in all his ways, made known or to be made known unto them, according to their best endeavors, WHATEVER IT SHOULD COST THEM." 3
----
Secretary Morton is the only early writer who gives the date of the establishment of this church; and if that date is correct, and if the statement of Mr. Hunter is also cor- rect, that the church at Gainsborough is older than that at Scrooby, 4 the church now gathered was probably located at Gainsborough ; Mr. Smith and Mr. Clifton were associated in its oversight ; and Mr. Robinson may have joined them in 1604.5
1 Pagett, Heresiog., 63, cd. 1655 ; Dr. J. Hall, Works, vol. 9.
2 Hunter, in 4 M. H. Coll., 1. 117. 8 Bradford, in Chron. Pil., 21; Morton's Mem., 1, ed. 1669; Prince,4.
5 Mem. Robinson, in 4 M. H. Collections, 1. 118. Mr. Hunter, Founders, &c., 96, thinks he took the office assigned him in the Basset- Lawe Church, in 1606 or 1607.
Hunter's Founders, &c., 33.
53
CHARACTER OF THIS CHURCH.
But if the first church was gathered at Gainsborough, CHAP. " in regard of distance of place these people became two
II. distinct bodies or churches," 1 that at Gainsborough continu- ing under the oversight of Mr. Smith, and that at Scrooby being organized under Mr. Clifton, with whom Mr. Robin- son remained as an assistant ; and this event probably took place early in 1606.2
Such was the origin of the churches at Gainsborough and Scrooby. That at Scrooby, though it seems to have been second in point of time, is first in importance in the history of the Pilgrims; for here the choice and noble spirits who planted New England learned the lessons of truth and liberty. Here, under the faithful ministrations of their excellent teachers, they were nourished and strengthened to that vigorous fortitude and manly endurance, which braved all dangers and conquered all obstacles. Here, breathing the air of spiritual freedom, they acquired that courage which enabled them to sacrifice home and its charms, and expatriate themselves to distant lands, rather than abandon their principles, or yield to what they regarded as an unrighteous encroachment upon their ecclesiastical privileges. 3
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It will be noticed that Mr. Robinson appears upon the 1603. stage at about the date of the accession of James I., the greatest pedant that ever sat upon the English throne. Educated a Presbyterian of the school of Knox, and pro- fessing a sincere and sacred regard for that Church, this
1 Bradford, in Chron. Pil., 22.
" We base this upon the state- ment of Gov. Bradford, in Chron. Pil., 24, who says they " continued together about a year " before un- dertaking the removal to Holland. But Mr. Hunter, Founders, &c., 41, 53, who agrees in assigning the year 1606 as the date of the organization of this church, seems to represent
its distinct beginning as taking place after the removal of Mr. Smith's Church to Holland, which he thinks was in 1604. See, however, note 1, p. 57, and comp. Bradford, in Chron. Pil., 22, who speaks of the two churches as co-existing before the removal of Smith.
3 Mem. Robinson, in 4 M. H. Coll., 1. 120.
5*
54
HYPOCRISY OF JAMES I.
CHAP. Prince had twice subscribed the " solemn league and cove- II. nant,"-in 1581, and in 1590.1 At the General Assem- bly in Edinburgh, in the latter year, standing with his bon- net off and his hands lifted to heaven, he blessed God that he was "king of such a kirk, the sincerest kirk in the world," and condemned the service of the English Church as an " evil said mass." "I charge you," he added, " I charge you, my good ministers, doctors, elders, nobles, gentlemen, and barons, to stand to your purity, and to exhort the people to do the same; and I, forsooth, so long as I brook my life, shall maintain the same."2 Even on Apr. 3, leaving Scotland to take possession of the English Crown, 1603. he gave public thanks in the kirk on the Sabbath, and affirmed that, "as God had promoted him to a greater power, he must endeavor to establish religion and take away corruption in both the countries ;" and that he had " so settled both kirk and kingdom in that state which he intended not to alter anyways, his subjects living in peace." 3
Such declarations naturally excited the hopes of the Puritans. But alas ! the "Scotch mist" was soon dis- pelled ! James was a dissembler. It was the failing of his life that his word was no bond. Arbitrary, capricious, tyrannical and unprincipled, he trampled upon the most solemn oaths, and seemed never better pleased than when torturing or anathematizing the victims of his vengeance. 4 Jan. 14, Hence at the Hampton Court Conference, - that supremely 1603-4. ridiculous farce, and compound at once of both kingcraft and priestcraft, -the Monarch, showing clearly like his predecessors, that his favorite religion was that which most
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