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CHAPTER III

RELATIONS BETWEEN CHURCH AND COMMONWEALTH IN MASSACHUSETTS

The chief features of the governmental system of Massachusetts, the typical representative of the corporate colony, have now been described. It was a complete and well-rounded whole. It sufficed for all the purposes of the colony without the interposition of any outside power whatsoever. The executive in its organization was as self-contained as was the legislature. The structure itself, as well as the process by which it was developed, suggest independence, the resolve on the part of its architects to go their own way in paths hitherto untrodden. The prime cause of this is to be found, as already indicated, not in political or economic forces, but in the religious motive. The founders of the Puritan commonwealth of New England were in a preëminent sense self-conscious. It is true that they brought with them to the new world law and institutions of government to which they had been accustomed at home. In common with the settlers of the other colonies, they were also subject to the influence of frontier life and of comparative isolation upon a remote continent. But in addition to that they were advocates of a definite religious system, which they came to the new world to put into practice. That this was their purpose they never lost an opportunity to declare. So important did this system seem to them that they made all interests, social and political, contribute to its maintenance and advancement. From it originated the motive which led them to transfer the government of the colony into New England and to renounce forever trade and land speculation as a corporate function. Relations with the home government, intercourse with the neighboring colonies, conduct toward immigrants, the

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bestowment and withdrawal of citizenship, the political and social life of town and commonwealth, were ultimately determined by their bearing on the supreme question—the maintenance of the Puritan system of belief. Said the general court in its first letter to Charles II: “This viz. our liberty to walke in the faith of the gospell with all good conscience according to the order of the gospell, . . . was the cause of our transporting ourselves, with our wives, our little ones and our substance, from that pleasant land over the Atlanticke Ocean into this vast and waste wilderness, choosing rather the pure Scripture worship, with a good conscience, in a poore, remote wilderness, amongst the heathens, than the pleasures of England with submission to the impositions of the then so disposed and so far prevayling hierarchie, which we could not do without an evill conscience.”¹

Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion was the chief religious and political text-book of the English Puritans. In the light of Calvin they interpreted the Bible, and from his standpoint they viewed the history of the early church. When circumstances made them a political party, the courses of policy which they followed were consistent with the principles and practice of the Genevan reformer.

From the Latin Fathers Calvin drew the doctrine of the sovereignty of God, and he followed it relentlessly to its conclusion. The Bible, containing the law of God, was to be accepted as an authority from the utterances of which there was no appeal. To the commands of Christ and the apostles, therein set forth, the strictest obedience must be given.² At the same time full validity was claimed for precedents drawn from the Mosaic system. Calvin would banish everything which thrust itself between the soul of the individual worshipper and God. According to his conception the church was a community of believers, by which the commands of God were obeyed in the preaching of the word and the administering of the sacraments, and to which no persons

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should find admission until their piety had been subjected to rigorous tests.¹ The life of each member was constantly exposed to the scrutiny and criticism of others. The strictest discipline, too, was enforced. All were compelled to prove, so far as by human evidence it was possible, that they were the elect of God.

The organization of such a church could hardly fail in theory to be democratic. Christ was regarded as the sovereign of the church, and under him the clergy was an official class, a ministry, whose authority came from the church itself.² To the church Christ committed the power of the keys. Its members, united by covenant, chose the ministry and inflicted excommunication. But the possession of these powers by the congregation must not lead to disorder or anarchy. Instead, freedom of thought and practice must be limited, and power necessary to effect this must be bestowed on the clergy. In this way a strong aristocratic tendency was introduced, which, if the progress of the system were resisted, might become predominant.

According to this system an organic connection existed between church and state. It was the duty of the church to create a perfect Christian society, and of the state to furnish the necessary external conditions. Though the sphere of the church was far higher and the issues toward which it labored were loftier and more permanent than those of the state, they could not be reached without the assistance of the civil power. Hence Calvin defended governments against the assaults of Antinomians, declaring that lawful magistrates were divinely commissioned, that their work was a part of the plan of Providence, and that to resist them was to attack the sovereignty of God. But on the other hand, since religion is the basis of public morality, the state needs the support of the church, for from the teachings of the latter comes the moral health without which successful government is impossible. In the name, then, of public order and for the security of property, Calvin would have the state punish idolatry, blasphemy, and a long series of offences against religion. Viewed from one standpoint, his doctrine

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implied separation of church from state, yet over against this stood the necessity of their indissoluble union. Neither could survive without the support of the other. This idea seemed to open the way toward toleration, but it was speedily closed again by the necessity of suppressing all deviation from a strict moral and religious code. The church assumed supreme control over opinion. The tendency toward rationalism was checked by the demand that allegiance be sworn to the text of Scripture as interpreted by unchanging canons of criticism. Finally, the tendency toward democracy in ecclesiastical and civil government was counterbalanced by the necessity for the maintenance of order and authority. The more aristocratic phases of this system were reproduced by the Presbyterians of England and Scotland; the more democratic by Robert Brown and his followers, the Separatists. An intermediate position¹ came to be occupied by the Puritans of New England.

The settlers of Massachusetts left England just as the Puritans were becoming a political party. A Separatist church, as will be explained in a subsequent chapter, was already in existence in Plymouth. Higginson, Skelton, and Bright, the three ministers whom the company had sent to Salem, had been appointed members of the local council and were thus given a part in civil affairs.² It is well known that the Rev. John Davenport, already prominent among the young clergymen of London who inclined to non-conformity, was a member of the Massachusetts company and was consulted about questions respecting which his opinion would carry weight. The teaching of religion and good morals and their enforcement were recommended in the letters of the company to Endicott. These all are indications that the clergy were to bear a prominent part in the development of this colony, though suggesting little more than what occurred in the early history of Virginia.

According to the credible tradition reported by Cotton Mather,³ Higginson, on leaving England, declared that they went, not as separatists from the church but only from its

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corruptions, and that their purpose was “to practice the positive part of church reformation, and propagate the gospel in America.” This was a proclamation of nonconformity, and the meaning of the phrase, “positive part of church reformation,” it was left to events to reveal. Because of certain doings of the ministers on the outward voyage which they considered irregular, John and Samuel Brown, members of the council and men of standing among the colonists, after their arrival at Salem, gathered a company apart and had the Book of Common Prayer read to them. This establishes the fact that it was not used in the religious meetings at Salem. A spirited controversy followed between the Browns and the ministers, in which the latter had the support of Governor Endicott and the colonists. Finding that the speeches of the two brothers tended to “mutiny and faction,” the governor told them that “New England was no place for such as they,” and sent them home on the returning ship. Their case, together with the damages which they claimed to have suffered, was referred to committees of the company, but what decision was reached we are not told.¹

With the organization of the church at Salem, in July and August, 1629, the nonconformity of the colonists, respecting which the Browns complained, blossomed out into practical Independency or Separatism. The congregation met on July 6, and, after listening to a prayer and sermon, chose Skelton as its pastor, and Higginson, who was already in orders, as its teacher. Higginson and three or four of the gravest men laid their hands on Skelton’s head and prayed. Then Higginson was set apart for the work of the ministry in the same way by his colleague. Thereupon Higginson drew up a confession of faith and church covenant, “according to the Scripture,” and copies of this were delivered to thirty persons. Invitation was also sent to Plymouth to send messengers, or, as they would now be called, delegates. On August 6 the congregation met again. The ministers prayed and preached, and thirty persons, by assenting to the covenant, associated themselves together as a church. Then the ministers were ordained by imposition of hands of some

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of the brethren selected by the church. Governor Bradford and others, coming by sea from Plymouth, were delayed by unfavorable winds, and hence did not arrive until the services had been in progress for some time; but they gave the Salem church the right hand of fellowship¹ and wished it all success in its beginnings. We have the express testimony of Endicott to the fact that Dr. Fuller of Plymouth, who the previous spring had been ministering to the sick at Salem, had convinced him of the biblical authority for the Separatist or democratic model of church polity. This fact, together with the natural influence of removal from England into a new continent whither the arm of the bishops could scarcely reach, accounts for the change which we see so quickly wrought in Salem. The expulsion of the Browns proves that Endicott at least intended that the newly organized church should not be disturbed by any Anglican rival.

When Winthrop and his fellow-voyagers left England, more formal and elaborate expression was given to the affection with which the mother church was regarded by them.² “We desire,” wrote they, “you would be pleased to take notice of the principals and body of our Company, as those who esteem it our honor to call the Church of England, from whence we rise, our dear mother: . . . ever acknowledging that such hope and part as we have obtained in the common salvation, we have received in her bosom and sucked it from her breasts.” A fervent desire for her welfare and enlargement was expressed, while her prayers were sought on behalf of the enterprise which the colonists had undertaken. Of the sincerity of this utterance we have no reason to doubt, but in connection with it notice should be taken of the equally ardent conviction, expressed by Winthrop in his Modell of Christian Charity, that something of more than ordinary importance to the religious world was to result from the settlement of Massachusetts. White, the Puritan minister of Dorchester, said with some

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truth, in the Planter’s Plea, that under the new conditions in America both religious and political differences might arise.

Under the liberty which circumstances afforded, the Salem model was substantially followed in the founding of all the local churches planted about Massachusetts bay as the result of Winthrop’s migration. Still it is true that among most of those bodies the spirit of Separatism was less strong than in Salem. Rev. George Phillips, who became pastor of the church at Watertown, expressly disclaimed the validity of his episcopal ordination. In the covenant which was adopted by the members of his church, all idolatry, superstition, human traditions, and inventions were renounced.¹ Election and imposition of hands were resorted to in filling the offices of the church at Charlestown, but the latter ceremony was accomplished, says Winthrop,² with the protestation that it was only a sign of election and not of an intent that the teacher, Mr. Wilson, should renounce his English orders. The same forms were resorted to in organizing the Boston church, though no mention is made of the protestation.³ All followed the same general model. The description given by Thomas Lechford,⁴ of the method of gathering churches which was followed about 1640, confirms what has been said.

He says that a convenient or competent number came together publicly and confessed their sins and professed their faith. Then they entered into a church covenant “to forsake the Devill and all his works, and the vanities of the sinfull world, and all their former lusts, and corruptions they have lived and walked in, and to cleave unto and obey the Lord Jesus Christ, as their only Priest and Prophet, and to walk together with that Church, in the unity of the faith, and brotherly love, and to submit themselves one unto another, in all the ordinances of Christ, to mutuall edification and comfort, to watch over and support one another.” This was the essential step in the process; the adoption of the covenant—which was really a social compact—made them a visible church. After it had been adopted, officers were

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elected, and on a later day were ordained or installed in their places. In the Platform of Church Discipline,¹ which was adopted by the New England churches in 1649, a church is defined as “a company of people combined together for the worship of God.” As it was the covenant which made the children of Israel “a church and people unto God,” so among the Puritans it was through it alone that “members can have church-power over one another mutually.”²

The principal officers of the local body were the pastor, teacher, and ruling elder. Of these the special work of the first named was practical exhortation to right living; that of the teacher was the inculcation of doctrine.³ But these functions were often confounded or united in the hands of the same person. The ruling elder was always a layman, and though by no means to the exclusion of the pastor and teacher, he was still the regular administrative officer of the church. He summoned and dismissed the congregation,⁴ coöperated in the admission and excommunication of members and in the ordination of officers, prepared business for the church meetings and presided over the same, watched the conduct of members, and admonished those who needed it; when called for, he visited the sick and guided the church “in all matters whatsoever pertaining to church administrations and actions.”

The majority of the Massachusetts Puritans continued for a time to affirm, especially in their writings and on public occasions, that they still held communion with the Church of England. Thomas Dudley affirmed this, and, with others, strongly deprecated being called a Brownist.⁵ One of the first acts of Roger Williams, which provoked sinister opinions concerning him, was his refusal to join with the church at Boston,⁶ because its members would not publicly declare their repentance for having communed with the churches of England while they lived there.

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Frequently the elders, in explaining or defending their course to English critics, repeat the statement that they have separated only from the “corruptions” of the English Church, meaning its polity and ritual; but they could listen to the preaching of the gospel by its clergy. New England clergymen, when revisiting England, doubtless did this. It was stated, probably with truth, that those who believed in episcopacy as the only true system attended the churches of New England without molestation so long as they kept their opinions to themselves.¹ It was only occasionally insisted by a congregation that a candidate for its pulpit should renounce his orders.

But on the other hand, as time passed, actual communion with English churches ceased. From the first the New England Puritans had renounced two of the most essential parts of the Anglican system, episcopacy and the ritual. The connection which they maintained with the civil power was far different in form from that which existed in England. With the successful progress of the Civil War, it became unnecessary to keep up the pretence of communion from motives of policy. Soon after that date the New England church system was completed, and references to the English Church, except as a rival or hostile body, disappear. Thus all pretence of ecclesiastical connection with Anglicanism ceased, and New England became in that domain practically independent of the mother country.

The ministry was the only learned or professional class then in New England. They were men whose characters and attainments alone would have given them great influence in such communities; but the fact that they and the magistrates were fully agreed that the main object of the colony should be to uphold the Puritan faith and to form a society in harmony therewith greatly increased their power. Believing that their form of church government was of divine origin, they nurtured, expanded, and defended it in sermon and treatise. Cotton, Hooker, Richard Mather, Eliot, and Davenport led in the discussion, which lasted for a quarter of a century. All the ministers took some share in it. Careful

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expositions of their polity as a whole were composed under the authority of the clergy and sent to England. In these apologies and treatises the process of forming the individual church was described in the greatest detail. The obligations arising from the covenant were analyzed with the greatest scholastic ingenuity. The election of ministers and elders by the congregation, and the powers of each, were dwelt upon at equal length. Finally, the theory of censure and excommunication, the punitive power of churches, was elaborated. They never tired of repeating the idea of Robinson, that in the visible church there is an aristocratic; and a democratic element,—namely, the officers and the congregation. In the decision of any question both of these elements should have a voice, but the elders should have large discretionary powers for the discipline and guidance of the whole. Thus a position was accorded them similar to that claimed by the magistrates in civil affairs. Both church and commonwealth possessed a moderately aristocratic organization. Soon also it was found that cooperation between the local congregations was necessary. Plans for a federal union were discussed until, partly under the pressure of necessity, they took shape in the calling of occasional synods. These were usually, if not always, attended by delegates from all the four Puritan colonies, and thus helped to perfect among them a network of ecclesiastical relations.

The founding of Harvard College, mainly for the training of ministers and common missionary operations, developed these relations. The synods adopted a common creed and platform of discipline, and expressed the consensus of the churches upon important theological questions. Though the influence of the clergy was great, this was in essence a federal-republican system of church government, the elements of which were derived both from the Mosaic and the apostolic systems. Precedents were drawn freely from both, but, as will appear, the spirit shown in the administration of the system was more Jewish than Christian.¹

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The theory of the New England clergy concerning the power of the magistrates and the relation between church and commonwealth was thoroughly Calvinistic. On theoretical as well as legal grounds, they and the magistrates were in agreement on these points. In the Model of Church and Civil Power,¹ written probably by Richard Mather and sent, with the approval of the other ministers, to the Salem church during the controversy with Roger Williams, they argue that the power of the magistrate, while conferred by the people, “is limited by the only perfect rule and word of God.” “As all free men are only stewards of God, they may not give the magistrate power over these things as they please, but as God pleases.” By the same rule, in their opinion, was the legislative power of the representatives of the people limited. It was necessary to go back of the simple will of the legislator to find the reason of laws. A right reason, or full justification of them, could be found only when they expressed the will of God. Here we have the idea of the Biblical Commonwealth, or democracy regulated and modified by the necessity of upholding a divinely ordered ecclesiastical system. That was what the clergy conceived the corporate colony to be; it was what Winthrop also had in mind when he wrote his Modell of Christian Charity.

The corporate form of colonial government was brought into existence in order that this ideal might be realized. The legal precedents of such a state as a matter of course would not be drawn exclusively from England, but also from Geneva and the ancient polity of the Jews. It was held that such laws from the Mosaic code as were found useful were obligatory in New England and should be put in force.²

In the writings of the clergy, state and church are considered as distinct in the sense that they work for different

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objects and are controlled by different persons. The end of the state is to preserve “external and temporal peace,” and that of the church to “maintain internal and spiritual peace.” Both are to be guided by the rules of the word. The church is to promote holiness, and thus is to be the bulwark of the commonwealth. The commonwealth in return is to give “free passage” to the gospel. This it must do by divinely ordered laws concerning religion. It must punish sedition, contempt of authority in the church, heresy, blasphemy, slander, and similar offences, though in most cases not until the offender had been “dealt with in a church way.” The magistrates should also compel all to hear the word, encourage people to join the church, and disperse all irregular assemblies, because they “destroy the peace of the churches” and dissolve the continuity of the state. They may also compel those who hear the word to support its ministers, and establish and control schools for furnishing the church with educated pastors. It is their duty also to reform the corrupted worship of God, and to defend with the sword the pure worship. Still they have no authority to interfere in the election of church officers, to perform any ecclesiastical functions, or to establish anything but a pure form of worship. Finally, all freemen should be church members and magistrates should be chosen expressly from them.

Such was the statement in theoretical form of what in Massachusetts was fully carried into practice. To such an extent was the distinction between church and commonwealth a formal one, that under the stress of circumstances it might be lost sight of and the two become practically identified. If in Massachusetts the ecclesiastical did not so completely, overmaster the political as in Geneva, it was because the resistance to the policy of the clergy was not so great. As it was, however, until about 1660 the theocratic element distinctly predominated. Every public question had its religious bearing, and in many cases that aspect attracted the chief attention. The magistrates, with an occasional exception, were orthodox, and the ministers could usually count upon a majority among the deputies. The course of legislation

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and practice which resulted from this union of the civil and ecclesiastical powers will now be traced.

The religious test of 1631, to which extended reference has already been made, limited active citizenship in the colony to church members. In 1660 the general court declared that only those could be freemen who were in full communion with the churches.¹ The test continued in force in the form in which it was enacted until 1664.² Then, under pressure from the home government, an obscurely worded act was passed which modified it as follows: All Englishmen presenting certificates signed by a minister or ministers of the place where they lived that they were orthodox in religion and not vicious in life, and also certificates under the hands of the selectmen of the place, or a majority of them, that they were freeholders and were ratable at a single country rate to the sum of ten shillings, or that they were in full communion with some church, being also twenty-four years of age, householders and settled inhabitants, might apply to the general court for admission as freemen. The certificates required were of such a nature and came from such sources that the act made practically no change in the system. It in fact was not changed so long as the first charter existed. According to the court lists, the total number of freemen admitted up to 1674 was 2527.³ This was probably about one in five of the adult male residents during that period. It thus appears that the test cut deeply and excluded from active citizenship the great majority of the men of the colony. A freeholder franchise probably would have been much less exclusive. The consideration of this fact brings into distinct relief the aristocratic tendency of the Puritan church-state system.

The suffrage in town meeting was not strictly confined to freemen. In 1635 it was enacted that only freemen should vote in those meetings on measures of necessity and authority, as the receiving of inhabitants, laying out of lands, and the like. This implied that non-freemen might vote on other questions.

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It appears that in some cases church members, in order to avoid the burdens of office-holding, neglected to apply for admission as freemen. By acts of 1643 and 1647 it was provided that all who were pursuing that course should be dealt with by the churches and be made to fulfil their civil obligations.

A review of the laws which specify the support, direction, and control given by the civil power to the churches will illustrate anew the intimacy of relations between them. An incident of this was the union of the churches themselves into a compact body. In 1635 the elders were asked to prepare an order of discipline, and to consider how far the court might interfere to preserve the uniformity and peace of the churches. In 1636 the power of the magistrates over the institution of churches was first asserted. It was declared that the board would approve of no churches thereafter organized, unless the magistrates and elders of the majority of churches had been previously informed and approved thereof. No person who was not a member of a church thus approved should be admitted as a freeman. The passage of orders for the taxation of all inhabitants for the support of the clergy and worship began with the founding of the colony and was regularly continued.

In the Body of Liberties, which was an enactment by the civil power, the conditions under which churches might be formed were comprehensively stated. It was therein provided that all people of God in the colony, who were orthodox in judgment and not scandalous in life, might gather themselves into a church estate, “provided they do it in a Christian way, with due observation of the rules of Christ revealed in his word.” Every congregation was also to have liberty to use the ordinances of God according to the rules of Scripture; and to elect and ordain its officers, provided they were able, pious, and orthodox.” It will be noted that on every side the freedom of the church was limited by the necessity of conforming to the word of God.

In the act of 1646,¹ calling the second synod that was held in Massachusetts, the general court expressed itself at some

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length on the relations between the civil and ecclesiastical power. It asserted the right to sanction the correct form of government and discipline, when these were established by the churches. It also made no question of its right “to assemble the churches or their messengers upon occasion of counsell, or anything which may concern the practice of the churches.” Still, because all church members were not clear on this point, the court, instead of commanding them to assemble, expressed the desire that they would meet at the time and place and for the purpose stated in the act. It also expressed its sorrow at the departure of the churches from uniformity of belief and practice respecting the baptism of infants whose parents were not church members, and in reference to other points. For this reason it desired the clergy to continue the sessions of the synod until a uniform plan of government and discipline had been adopted. When completed, this should be transmitted, through the governor or deputy governor, to the general court, that it might give the system its approval if found agreeable to the word of God. The synod met at Cambridge and completed its labors in 1647.¹ They were embodied in the Cambridge Platform of Discipline, to which reference has already been made. In October, 1649,² the general court commended this document to the churches of the commonwealth for their consideration, and desired a return from them at the next session. Owing to the delay of some of the churches and the presentation of objections by some, final action³ was not taken till October, 1651. Then the court expressly approved of the Book of Discipline, “that for the substance thereof it is that wee have practised and doe believe.”

In the Cambridge Platform the clergy claimed⁴ the support of the civil power as fully as ever the Jewish priesthood did. It was declared that the magistrate should “improve his civil authority for the observing of the duties commanded” in both tables of the law. The object of his activity was not only to secure peace, righteousness, and honesty in society, but godliness as well. Like the judges and kings

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of the Hebrews, several of whom were cited as examples, the magistrates were to put forth their authority in matters of religion. Idolatry, blasphemy, schism, heresy, the venting of corrupt and pernicious opinions, open contempt of the word preached, profanation of the Lord’s day, disturbance of the public worship, and similar offences were to be punished by civil authority. These provisions leave no sphere of church activity free from the possibility of interference by the civil power.

Naturally, then, Sabbath legislation and legislation against blasphemy, drunkenness, games, showy apparel, and all forms of immorality appear prominently in the Massachusetts statute book. In the Body of Liberties blasphemy and the worship of any but the true God appear in the catalogue of capital crimes. By an act of 1646¹ blasphemy was again expressly made a capital offence. In 1653 playing in the streets, uncivilly walking in the streets or fields, travelling from town to town, going on shipboard, frequenting taverns and other places to drink, or misspending the time in other ways on Sunday were forbidden on the penalty of fine or whipping. In 1658 similar penalties were attached to these offences² if committed on Saturday nights or on Sundays after dark. But the evil against which these laws were directed continued, especially drinking in taverns on Saturday and Sunday nights, and repeatedly orders were issued against it.³

In 1646 appears the first act against heresy.⁴ In the preamble to this law the distinction between violating the conscience and suppressing notorious impiety, universally in vogue at the time among Anglicans as well as Puritans, is suggested, and thus an attempt is made to remove it from the category of persecuting acts. Whether the distinction was a valid one or not may be inferred from the list of heretical opinions given in the act itself. They were the denial of the immortality of the soul, of the resurrection of the body,

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of sin, of atonement through the death of Christ, of the morality of the fourth commandment, of the baptism of infants, of the ordinance of magistracy or of the magistrates’ authority to punish breaches of the first Table. Those who held these opinions and tried to induce others to adopt them should be banished. In 1651 the titles of the books of the Old and New Testaments were recited, and the denial that these were the infallible word of God was declared to be punishable with a fine of £50 and whipping with not more than forty strokes. Particular forms of heresy, as Antinomianism, Anabaptism, and Quakerism, were denounced and punished as they appeared in the colony. In 1641¹ an act was passed, as severe as any on the English statute book, for the punishment of Catholic priests who might be found in the colony. In the mode of treatment prescribed for them it foreshadows the later legislation against Quakers.

The laws also prove not only that the proclamation of false doctrine was forbidden, but that the preaching of the truth was encouraged and commanded. Attendance at church was compulsory, and by the act of 1646 a fine of five shillings was imposed for every absence. Disturbance and interruption of public services, contemptuous behavior toward the word or its messengers, were forbidden² by various acts and penalties. The system of providing for the regular public support of the ministry was extended in 1654 by a law requiring each town to provide a house for the minister’s use. At the same time the county courts were ordered, when informed that a town was delinquent in the support of its minister, to issue a warrant to the selectmen to levy a special rate for the purpose. The general court declared in this act that it was its intention to secure an honorable allowance for the ministry. In 1658 the general court declared that it was the duty of the Christian magistrate “to take care that the people be fed with wholesome and sound doctrine.” Therefore it ordered that no one should regularly preach or be ordained as a teaching elder, with whose doctrine or practice any two churches, or the council of state, or general court, declared

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their dissatisfaction. In 1660 the general court,¹ in further pursuance of its duty to secure an able and faithful ministry, required that the county courts should carefully execute its orders about the maintenance of the ministry, the purging of towns from ministers of vicious life or heterodox beliefs, and procuring faithful laborers in their places; that rates for the support of the clergy be regularly levied; and that the aid of the grand juries be invoked for these ends. In the performance of this function the general court sometimes took counsel with individual churches, as with a Boston church² in 1652. In 1656 the general court advised that a council be called to heal divisions in the church at Ipswich.³ In 1657 the court interfered to settle a controversy between the churches of Salisbury⁴ and Haverhill. The same course was pursued in the case of the church at Wells⁵ in 1660 and in several other instances. The great controversies, in which the colony as a whole became involved, also furnished striking examples of the same thing.

The civil power not only supported the churches in these manifold ways, but it claimed and received great help in return. The moral support given by the clergy to the government was continuous, save when the civil power in the hands of Vane sought to discredit the great body of the ministers. In times of crisis the clergy were always in the forefront, rousing all to support the government. As their reliance for the suppression of heresy and schism was on the secular arm, so they did all they could to strengthen it. Special providences without limit were cited as encouragements to action or warnings against dangers and mistakes.

As we have had occasion repeatedly to notice, when cases of importance came before the magistrates or the general court, the advice of the clergy was sought and almost invariably followed. The clergy in an extra-legal capacity acted as a board of referees on important questions of legislation, judicature, and practical policy. With the

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exception of Winthrop, they were the chief expounders of the public law and policy of Massachusetts, and their utterances are among the most valuable and authoritative we have. They were consulted about relations with the Indians and with the mother country. Their advice was sought on the question of the distribution of power between the magistrates and the deputies. They prepared elaborate statements respecting the form of the Massachusetts government and the relations of its several parts. To clergymen was assigned the task of preparing the first draft of laws for the colony. Sermons, whether delivered before the general court or elsewhere, might at any time have a political bearing, and convey direct political instruction. Like the ecclesiastics of the middle age, the ministers of New England were statesmen and political leaders. No affair of government was indifferent to them. They helped to uphold the church and commonwealth against threats of attack by the home government, the efforts of Gorges and Mason, the complaints and agitations of schismatics. They coöperated in forming the New England Confederacy. They gave their active support to a system of common and higher education, and to the other social institutions which contributed to that self-denying and heroic, but cheerless, Puritan life. With the magistrates they acted as censors of the press, and when a book, pamphlet, or sermon appeared,—like some by Roger Williams, Pynchon, Saltonstall, John Eliot,—which advocated doctrines or policies about which there was doubt, it was referred to them for examination. Upon their report hung the decision whether it should be allowed to circulate or be suppressed. With the magistrates, they constituted for half a century the governing class of Massachusetts—the oligarchy which shaped its policy and growth. As at Geneva, the result was a narrow, forced, and one-sided development.

That in a community of this type persecution would be resorted to as a means of suppressing unwelcome opinions, goes without saying. That, moreover, the range of ignored or prohibited opinions was incomparably wider than the circle of tolerated beliefs, is a fact equally apparent. The

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meagre output of the press in Puritan New England consisted almost wholly of books on religion. The same is true of the works relating to those colonies which were published in England. Literature, art, morals, save as they were related to the accepted dogmatic system, were as closed books. Science as yet had no existence. The only history for which they cared was that of the Hebrews, of the early church, and of some of the reforming sects. Though the divines, and possibly now and then a magistrate, could read the language of Plato and Aristotle, philosophy had no place even in their imaginations. It is true that most of these conditions the New Englanders shared with the people of the other colonies, but the intensity of the mental activity of the Puritan in certain lines makes the narrowness of his horizon all the clearer. It is fair that he should be in a measure held responsible for defects which would not be noticed in a merchant, an Indian trader, a planter, or an indented servant. We wonder when a young man of university training and possessed of the general intelligence of John Winthrop, Jr., writes to his father, after a tour on the European continent,¹ “For myself, I have seen so much of the vanity of the world, that I esteem no more of the diversities of countries than so many inns, whereof the traveller that hath lodged in the best, or in the worst, findeth no difference when he cometh to his journey’s end.” Too much contemplation of the world to come made many of the best minds of that generation as insensible to the real glories of the world that now is as any peasant could well be.

The only opinions likely to be expressed in New England which would meet with disapproval were those which affected in some way the religious system of the colonies or their political security. They might relate to conduct or to belief. From the utterances of the Puritan leaders, and particularly of John Cotton in his controversy with Roger Williams, and of John Norton in the controversy with the Quakers, we know what their theoretical views were concerning the way in which erroneous opinions should be dealt with. They were of such a nature that practically no room

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was left for the expression of dissent. The essentials of the faith and the foundations of the political system were in no case to be attacked. The idea of essentials was very indefinite, and might be stretched by the Puritan to cover nearly the whole body of his faith. The interests of public order might also be invoked to silence outspoken opposition to less important doctrines. Individuals who were found to hold and express heretical views should be admonished by some persons in authority. The process of admonishing, which was very characteristic of the Calvinistic system, was called in the speech of the time “dealing” with the offender, and was resorted to as soon as possible after symptoms of heresy made their appearance. Dissentients, who had been sufficiently admonished and still remained unconvinced, were said to have become wedded to their errors, and were sources of evil against whom the community must be protected. Their mouths must then be closed. Thus the only opportunity really granted for the utterance of dissenting opinions was that during which the person who held them was subject to admonition. According to Cotton,—and he was not alone in his opinion,—the punishment of the persistent heretic was not persecution. The argument used to show this was that the presentation of the truth by admonition must convince the conscience of error; but the corrupt will then interposed and caused the unbeliever to hold out stubbornly against the truth. Consequently, if the magistrate took him in hand, it could not be said that he was persecuted, because that term is applied only to the constraining of the conscience. Say rather that he was punished as a “culpable and damnable” person, a turbulent heretic and schismatic.¹ According to this argument and to many of the utterances of the time, the free expression of novel or heretical opinions was closely

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akin to sedition or rebellion, and the punishment of it was not persecution, but the infliction of the appropriate penalty for a crime. Heresy could hardly exist in the abstract, but as soon as uttered became concrete, and as such begat social evil and corrupted the state. Though the church might initiate proceedings, presently the magistrate must be called in to remove the offenders, as the Jews banished unclean persons from the congregation.

The mass of the inhabitants of Massachusetts, the agricultural laborers, farmers, small traders, those who, because they were not members of the churches, appear simply as residents, did not differ materially in character or ambitions from the settlers in the other colonies. A large proportion also of the church members may be supposed to have been easy-going, commonplace people, seeking no outlet for their energies except that which their own occupations or neighborhoods afforded. Politically these were either altogether or largely without significance. They were the hull and ballast of the colony craft, not in any sense the steering or propelling apparatus. If freemen, they served in the militia during war, voted for deputies to the general court, or might share in sending a proxy to the court of election. When the colony was profoundly moved by some controversy or menaced by some peril, they contributed to the volume of opinion which gathered and in a way to the expression or action which might follow. But with these things their influence over affairs of the jurisdiction ended. In the local and family records of the time the activity of the ordinary freemen can be traced in faint and broken lines; but the non-freemen have left scarcely a memorial behind. Save in a few conspicuous instances, they are mutes, as much so as the slave population of an ancient city republic. That which was peculiar and significant in the Puritan colonies of New England was contributed by the active freemen, at whose head stood the magistrates and clergy. They sketched the plan of the colonies and filled it out in action. The fact that Massachusetts passed at a single bound from the status of a plantation to that of a corporate colony was due to their devising skill. In the towns they were as much the

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leaders as in the commonwealth at large. The reproduction in New England of the Biblical commonwealth was their work. It was the jewel, the preservation of which enlisted all their care and energy. The faith and practice of the churches was the feature of the system which they chiefly esteemed. The civil authority was developed and organized mainly for the purpose of protecting the church. The two together then became the object of perpetual care. The regeneration of the world seemed to these men to depend on the maintenance of this system; to their minds it held a place in the scheme of redemption second in importance only to the Jewish commonwealth and the apostolic church. It was a constant and chief object of divine care. Its friends might ever expect special divine favors, and its foes, or those who were indifferent to it, equally marked evidences of the displeasure of God. They were a light set on a hill for the illumination of the nations.

But the possibilities that this enterprise, on which the leaders had so passionately set their hearts, might be shipwrecked or come to nothing, were numerous. These arose not from the mere fact that church and commonwealth were closely joined in Massachusetts, or that the secular power was pledged to support the spiritual by all means at its command. Such a relation, in the world as it then was, was the rule rather than the exception. But the difficulty lay in the form under which the union was effected, and the circumstances attending its origin and perpetuation. Whatever might be the assertions of the Puritan leaders, their policy, considered as a whole, was a most pronounced declaration of independence toward the English Church. The removal of the colony government to New England implied an equally strong determination to escape as far as possible from the restraints of the English government. The scheme therefore had no friends among the ruling classes in the mother country, or, one may say, in Europe at large. But in this connection we are more concerned with the possible foes of the Puritans in their own household. They had been dissenters in England, and one form of dissent, especially in those times, was likely to occasion the birth of

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numerous other forms. So novel was the Puritan experiment that other dissenters might easily claim equality of rights with it. Even adherents of ancient faiths might appear to be dangerous schismatics if transplanted into Massachusetts. The Puritans could not fall back on antiquity as a justification for their exclusiveness; and, being the rulers of a mere colony, and weak at that, they must scrutinize every appearance of evil and, if possible, smother it at the very beginning. The leaders must be equally alert to discover attacks on the civil and ecclesiastical order,—for both were vulnerable,—and crush them if possible. Assaults on the one might easily imperil the other, and hence clergy and magistrates must cooperate in defence of both. The admission of persons into the colony who might betray its interests, the silencing or removal of declared critics and enemies, their conduct and whereabouts after discipline, the possibility of their corresponding with the enemies of the colonies in England, or of their founding rival colonies near by, all these and many other things must be the objects of constant attention on the part of the Puritan oligarchy, if its experiment was to escape ruin. Necessarily then Massachusetts, and to a less extent the other Puritan colonies, were under a sort of perpetual state of siege. To say nothing of external foes, group after group of malcontents sprang into existence within its own borders, or forced their way in from outside, from whose malign influence the leaders considered it necessary that the colony should be purged. Our inquiry, in its next stage, will be directed toward the controversies which, originating in the way that has been suggested, agitated Massachusetts during the first thirty years of its existence. A detailed history of them will not be attempted, for many such are accessible elsewhere. Neither will they be studied exclusively for their own sake, but an effort will be made to use them as illustrations of the working of the Puritan state-church system.