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CHAPTER IV

THE WORKING OF THE MASSACHUSETTS SYSTEM AS ILLUSTRATED BY THE CONTROVERSIES WITH ROGER WILLIAMS AND THE ANTINOMIANS

As the church and commonwealth in Massachusetts, if not one, were at least indissoluble, an attack on the foundations of the civil power might easily arouse the churches and have wide-reaching effects on ecclesiastical policy. This, it is believed, is the real lesson of the Roger Williams episode.

Next to the Bible the Massachusetts Puritans esteemed and valued their charter. It guarantied to them the possession of their lands as against all adverse claims which might originate with Gorges, Mason, or others of the New England council; it was the basis of their civil order, and by skilful use of its provisions they had been able to give such form as they desired to their institutions of government; from their reliance on it, as time advanced, proceeded not a little of the imperiousness shown by Massachusetts in its dealings with neighbors who had no charters; the last twenty years of the existence of the Puritan oligarchy was spent in defending this instrument, and when it was cancelled the Biblical commonwealth became simply a memory and an influence. None save Connecticut was in sentiment so emphatically a chartered colony as was Massachusetts. This fact, in the case of both, was intimately connected with the Puritan’s love for covenanted relations, for ascertained, limited, and guarantied rights, as well as his need of such protection as was available against the crown. These guaranties, it will be noted, he wished for himself, but viewed with indifference any proposal to extend their benefits to

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his opponents. He believed in liberty for the elect, for “men that fear God,” not in human rights as such.¹

A central fact in the career of Roger Williams as an inhabitant of Massachusetts was his attack on the claim to their lands which the colonists derived from the crown through their charter. Much of Williams’s life as a colonist was spent among the Indians. Some of the noblest aspects of his character appear in his relations with them. His usefulness to his contemporaries arose quite as much from his knowledge of Indian life and his ability to maintain friendly relations with the savages as from any other source. His first prolonged residence among them occurred in and about 1632, when he was an inhabitant of Plymouth colony. Then he began to gain that familiarity with their tongue which afterwards enabled him to write his Key into the Language of America. Though Williams was unacquainted with any but the Puritan type of culture, he was an humanitarian; he respected man as man. He also knew little of the law, and perhaps had never seen a copy of a royal charter. While in Plymouth Williams prepared in manuscript a small book or tract,² which he addressed to the governor and council of that colony and in which he denied that title to land could be derived from the king’s grant, and asserted that it must be secured by compounding with the natives. To rely upon a title derived from the crown was to commit usurpation. That there was an element of truth in Williams’s contention, the entire history of the dealings of English colonists with the natives proves. They everywhere, and especially in New England, sought to extinguish Indian claims by a form of purchase. This admitted them peacefully to joint occupancy with the natives, the Europeans taking immediate and exclusive possession of certain tracts for agricultural purposes, while the Indians continued to enjoy hunting and fishing privileges within the rest. But ownership of the soil it was impossible for

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the Indian to grant, for he had never had more than possession. Guaranties of possession against other Englishmen or Europeans he could not give. According to a general principle of law, guaranties of this kind, together with ownership of the soil, must be derived from the crown, and were transferred by means of a charter. This Williams denied.

During his first residence in Massachusetts, Williams had attracted unfavorable notice¹ by his pronounced separatism and his avowal of the belief that the secular power had no right to punish breaches of the first table of the law.² Therefore, when, on the death of Higginson, the Salem church called Williams to be its teacher, the magistrates interposed and asked them to delay till a conference could be held about it. If this was an official act of the board of assistants, it was not justified by any existing law of which we have knowledge, and it is to be regarded as one of the earliest assertions of the authority of the civil power to warn and restrain the individual churches in the interest of uniformity. Williams was not installed, and soon removed to Plymouth, where he resided for some two years. At the end of that time he returned to Salem, where he preached as an assistant of Mr. Skelton, though at first without admission to any office in the church. Thus another proof was afforded of the separatist tendency in the Salem church.

It was after his return, but before his appointment as Skelton’s successor, that Williams’s “treatise “³ on the charter was considered by the magistrates at Boston. The advice of “some of the most judicious ministers,”—Cotton and Wilson,—was taken, and they “much condemned Mr. Williams’s error and presumption.” It was ordered that he should be “convinted at the next court to be censured.” But in the meantime Governor Winthrop wrote to Endicott, who had been absent from the meeting of the assistants, to let him

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know what had been done, asking him also to induce Williams, if possible, to retract his utterances. To all concerned, including Endicott, Winthrop, and the court, Williams now returned very submissive answers, stating that he had no intention of publishing his opinions, and professing loyalty to the government. Cotton and Wilson also reported that, on further considering the book, they did not find its sentiments so evil as they at first thought. They also agreed that, if Mr. Williams would retract and take the oath of allegiance to the king, it should be passed over. We have no record of his doing either of these things, and from what we know of Williams and of the attitude of the magistrates generally toward the oath of allegiance, the inference is a probable one that neither of the conditions was exacted.

The impression is strengthened by the fact that, about a year later, information reached the magistrates¹ that Williams was again “teaching publicly against the king’s patent, and our great sin in claiming right thereby to this country.” He was also denouncing the churches of England as anti-Christian. Winthrop states that in doing this he had broken his promise”; but if the breach of an oath had been involved, the annalist would probably have so stated it. Williams was summoned to appear at the next court. But before the time for that came, Mr. Cotton² requested the magistrates to forbear civil prosecution against him till he could be dealt with in a church way, and thus convicted of his offence as a sin. This was a method of procedure in such cases of which Cotton made much in his writings, and he now had a good opportunity to apply it. At the same time he seems to have had some insight into Williams’s real nature, for he surmised that “his violent course did rather spring from scruple of conscience than from a seditious principle.” But, as we have seen, it was also Cotton’s belief, that if scruples of conscience did not vanish under admonition, they became transformed into turbulent heresy and schism, which withal was close akin to

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sedition. Just this change seems to have been wrought in the case of Mr. Williams. The gentle offices of admonition did not avail to turn him from his opinion, as they did in the case of Mr. Eliot and of others. Instead, they left him more stubborn and persistent than ever. Indeed, upon the Calvinistic system of admonition as a whole a judgment must be passed similar to that of Lord Burghley concerning Whitgift’s Articles; it was “rather a device to seek for offenders than to reform any.” When combined with the action of the civil power, it made a machine as well contrived for the manufacture of heretics as any the world has ever seen.

But another element was added to the problem before it came to the final issue. In April, 1634, the residents’ oath, to which reference has already been made, was enacted and its enforcement began. This was resorted to as an additional protection for the government in view of the influx of inhabitants and of the perils which threatened the colony from England and elsewhere. Williams was a resident, having never been admitted to the number of freemen, and hence was directly affected by the new enactment. The fact that he was not a freeman, of course, magnified his offences in the eyes of the magistrates and clergy. He naturally seemed to them like an outsider, who had come into their midst simply to make trouble. And certainly no one among the non-freemen of Massachusetts ever made himself heard so effectively as did Roger Williams.

Conscientious scruples now moved him to protest and preach publicly against the oath. His argument was that oath-taking was an act of worship.¹ Therefore a magistrate² ought not to tender an oath to an unregenerate man, for he thereby had “communion with a wicked man in the worship of God,” and caused him “to take the name of God in vain.” In April, 1635, the assistants sent for him on this count, and heard and “confuted” him in the presence of “all the ministers.” At first Endicott supported Williams, but later he “gave place to the truth.” Williams, however, again refused to be convinced. Therefore he was summoned to appear before

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the general court. But his popularity in Salem at this time is evidenced by his call, on the death of Mr. Skelton, to the office of teacher of that church.¹ At a session of the general court, which occurred in the summer of 1635, a series² of charges was presented against Williams, among which his theory concerning land titles does not appear. This would indicate that during the past few months his public utterances of an offensive nature had been confined to the question of the oath and to the right of the civil power to punish violations of the first four commandments. He was charged with teaching that the magistrate ought not to punish breaches of the first table, unless the public peace was disturbed, and that he ought not to tender an oath to an unregenerate man. Two other charges were also presented, but they were simply corollaries of the second proposition. Notice was also taken of the fact that, while Mr. Williams was under admonition, the Salem church had called him to be its teacher. After a full debate, in which the ministers, at their own desire, took part, his opinions were unanimously adjudged to be erroneous and dangerous, and the action of the Salem church in calling him to office at that time as “a great contempt of authority.” At the special request of the court the ministers also declared that he who obstinately maintained opinions whereby a church might apostatize or run into heresy without a possibility of interference by the civil power should be removed; and the other churches ought to request the magistrates so to act. It was finally resolved to give the Salem church till the next session of the general court to consider these things, and then, if it did not give satisfaction, it might expect the sentence.

From the list of charges preferred against Williams at this time it is evident that he had again been preaching about the first table of the law, a subject to which only one earlier reference appears, and that in 1631. Positive proof is therefore lacking that it played a large part in the controversy till, in 1635, its last stage was reached. Previous to this time the attack on land titles and on the oath seem to have occupied the chief attention. Substantially all the contemporary

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testimony¹ we have is to the effect that these were the chief questions at issue. But this testimony is possibly to an extent biassed, because of the desire of the Puritan leaders who gave it to prove that the banishment of Williams from Massachusetts was an act of civil justice, and not in any sense persecution. So meagre are the statements which have come down to us concerning Williams’s opinions at this time, on the relations between the civil and ecclesiastical power, that it is impossible to know exactly what stage they had reached. In the case of most men at that time the natural inference would be that experience was gradually bringing him to the point where he would be ready to affirm the total separation of the two powers. As he divulged novel opinions, one after another, he found his way blocked by the Massachusetts authorities, and himself subjected to the comfortable process of being “dealt with.” Such a discussion as that which probably occurred in the general court would, in the case of an ardent temperament like his, help to commit him to sweeping views on the subject. As such inquiries were beautifully contrived for the purpose of making heretics, it is quite possible to suppose that Williams then uttered for almost the first time in public the views which stood first in the list of charges against him. But even in that case it is necessary to remember his admission that the magistrate might interfere when the civil peace was endangered.

On the other hand it should be borne in mind that Williams was dominated more by feeling than by reason; we instinctively speak of him as a “prophet.” Such men leap at conclusions, see things as wholes rather than piecemeal. Moreover, his solution of the difficulty, as he finally reached it, was simple, one that could be quickly grasped as soon as it occurred to the mind. For the world, as it then was, Williams’s doctrine of the separation of church from state was not so much the solution of a problem as the denial of its existence. It was an attempt to cut the knot rather than to untie it. Hence it is possible to suppose that his theory was already formulated, and that, had the occasion arisen

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as early as 1631 for him to share in the founding of a commonwealth, he would have pursued the same course in the matter which was later followed at Providence. Still it is difficult to believe that, had Williams thus early reached definite views on the subject of “soul liberty,” they would have played so small a part in his controversy with Massachusetts.

However this may be, the question of the first table of the law was almost as much civil as ecclesiastical, and, the crisis of the dispute having been reached, we can see how the Massachusetts system responded to such an impact. Four years earlier it had been necessary for the magistrates to deal¹ with an elder of Watertown, because he expressed the opinion that the Roman Catholic church was a true church; but relations in that case were quickly harmonized. Now a much more difficult case was in hand. Mr. Williams had raised three serious questions, and his church supported him. The magistrates and clergy stood in united opposition to them. According to the Brownist theory of the autonomous local church, the Salem body should have been left to go its way. But this was not to be thought of; if for no other reason, because secular issues were involved, and the town could be coerced if the church could not.

Before the general court at the very session when Williams was convented, the town of Salem petitioned for a grant of land on Marblehead² neck which it claimed as rightfully its own. “But, because they had chosen Mr. Williams their teacher, while he stood under question of authority, and so offered contempt to the magistrates,” their petition was refused till proper submission was made. Thereupon the Salem church took up the matter, and set the ecclesiastical machinery in motion for the purpose of punishing the magistrates and deputies, because in their civil capacity they had done an unfair act. Williams, with the approval of the church, wrote sharp letters of admonition to all the churches of the colony, to which the members of the general court belonged, urging that they be reproved for their conduct as a “heinous sin.” This at once spread

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the debate throughout the colony. It was an appeal to the whole body of the freemen, in their ecclesiastical capacity, against the general court. It was the first serious act of opposition with which the leaders had found it necessary to deal.

Steps were at once taken by individual magistrates and elders to win over from Williams the members of his own church. In this they succeeded, and the majority resolved to abandon him rather than to abandon the other churches. When Williams learned this, he wrote a letter to his church¹ declaring that he had severed connection with the churches of the bay, and would cease to commune with his brethren in Salem if they slid not break off communion with the rest. But this made no difference, and he was left with a few followers who attended private services in his house. He even refused to pray with his own wife because she continued to attend the public assembly.

The town of Salem was brought into line by an order of the next general court that their deputies should be sent home to obtain satisfaction for the letters that had been sent, or the arguments of those who would undertake to defend them, with their names subscribed thereto.² Endicott, who had already been suspended from office because he had mutilated the colors, but who was present in the court, protested against this course in such strong language that he was committed for contempt; but later, on acknowledging his fault, he was set free. A more stringent order, however, was adopted concerning the town, to the effect that the majority of its freemen must disclaim³ the letters recently sent to the churches before their deputies could be seated. The practical effect of that was to exclude the representatives of Salem from the court during the September session.

It now remained to inflict the final penalty on Mr. Williams, who, though left almost alone, abated not a tittle of his resolution. The case came up during the session at Newtown, from active participation in which the Salem deputies had been excluded. All the ministers in the bay were

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invited to be present.¹ In addition to the opinions for which Williams was already held responsible, he was now charged with the letters to the churches complaining of injustice and oppression on the part of the magistrates, and with his letter to his own church urging it to renounce communion with all the other churches because they were full of anti-Christian pollution. Both of these letters he justified, and maintained all his opinions. He was then asked whether, after taking a month for reflection, tie would come and argue the matter before them. This offer he declined, and “chose to dispute presently.” Thomas Booker of Newtown, who till his removal to Connecticut occupied the leading place among Massachusetts divines, was then appointed to debate with Williams. Of their discussion we know nothing except a reference to a minor point, which is preserved in one of the later controversial writings of Mr. Cotton.² A large part of a single sitting was devoted to this colloquy, but without result. Mr. Hooker “could not reduce him from any of his errors.” The next morning the governor, John Haynes, summed³ up the charges, giving the first place, if correctly reported, to Williams’s views concerning land titles, the second to those concerning the oath, the third to his opinion that it was not lawful to hear any of the ministers of the parish assemblies in England, the last to his theory that the power of the civil magistrate extends only to the bodies, goods, and outward state of men. Then the sentence of banishment⁴ was pronounced against him, its words implying that it was justified by the fact that the accused had proclaimed new and dangerous opinions against the authority of magistrates, had written letters of defamation concerning bout magistrates and churches, and that he continued to defend his course of action. For these reasons he was ordered to depart out of the jurisdiction within six weeks; if he neglected so to do, the governor and

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two of the magistrates might send him out, not to return any more without license from the court.

When the date set for his departure came, he was reported to be ill. It was therefore resolved by the magistrates that he might have respite till spring. But about the beginning of winter report came that he was still uttering the opinions for which he was censured, and that he was holding meetings at his house for the purpose. He had won the adherence of about twenty persons, who would coöperate with him in the founding of a plantation in Narragansett bay, from which it was feared that the infection would spread into Massachusetts. That Winthrop, however, at that time did not fear infection from that quarter is shown by the fact,¹ related by Williams forty years afterwards, that Winthrop privately wrote him to steer his course thither, for the place was free from English claims or patents. When the messenger sent by the magistrates reached Salem, in January, 1636, for the purpose of arresting him, Williams had fled, and his connection with Massachusetts as a resident had ended.

At the meeting of the general court the following March, “it was proved . . . that Marble Neck belongs to Salem.”² Deputies from that town also took their seats. These events, together with the removal of the chief malcontents to Narragansett bay, permitted affairs to again resume their orderly course in that town. But an element of radicalism survived there, which, together with sectional feeling, repeatedly arrayed Salem with other northern towns against the magistrates and elders. Winthrop states³ that after Williams’s departure the spirit of Separatism there was so strong that the Salem church asked if it were not better for them to be dismissed to form an independent church. But this of course the magistrates and elders would not for a moment consider. In estimating the early career of Roger Williams it may be said that his one valuable idea—that of religious freedom—was the logical outgrowth of Protestantism. It was one of the tendencies which were rooted in Calvinism itself. Not only was it a fundamental tenet of Robert Browne, but

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it lay at the basis of true Independency. The Puritans of Massachusetts were in theory Independents, and had they remained true to the principle upon which their movement began, they must have welcomed the doctrine with which the name of Roger Williams is identified. But, largely under the pressure of political necessity, the Massachusetts leaders had from the beginning committed themselves to a limited or presbyterianized Independency. In order to secure unity and strength they had sacrificed freedom. Williams could truly claim that he was the one consistent and logical Independent, and that those who condemned him were the innovators. But that as a practical contention could avail nothing. Though the decision of the leaders had scarcely antedated his protest against it, and was even being formed while their controversy with him was in progress, it was held with such tenacity and was so far in harmony with their spirit and situation as to render it impossible for any one to make headway against it single-handed.

It is true that Williams did not stand quite alone in his opposition to the magistrates and clergy, but his following was small and was confined to a single locality. He was also one of the poorest of political managers, in truth almost destitute of skill in such matters. Two of the three indictments which he urged against the Massachusetts polity were flimsy and unjustifiable. By putting these forward at the outset he won for himself the reputation of an overscrupulous busybody and agitator. Had it not been for what he afterwards suffered and accomplished and for the influence which the views that he shared with other prophets of his time have had upon later generations, his place in history would be among that class, and among its most ineffective representatives. Like all pronounced individualists, he had friends, but few followers. His friends were won by his sincerity, frankness, and attractive personality. But throughout his career few of his friends stood ready to follow his lead in affairs of large practical moment. It must be admitted that in the main he received as considerate treatment from Massachusetts authorities as was possible under the conditions which then existed.

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No sooner had the magistrates and elders of Massachusetts rid themselves of Williams than they became involved in another controversy¹ and one of far greater seriousness and importance. This had its origin in the domain of theological metaphysics, but worked itself out as a political issue of the first magnitude, originating party catchwords and dividing the colony into two bitterly contending factions.

The parties to this struggle were the so-called Antinomians, who had secured control of the Boston church, and the great body of the clergy and other freemen of the colony. The leaders of the Antinomians were Mistress Anne Hutchinson, her brother-in-law, the Rev. John Wheelwright, and Governor Vane; while Mr. Cotton was for a time more or less identified with that group. The leaders of the conservatives were Governor Winthrop and Mr. Wilson, the pastor of the Boston church, and they had the assistance of all the magistrates and elders outside the chief town of the colony. Boston was in the beginning the centre of this strife, as Salem had been of that which concerned Roger Williams. Though considerably larger than Salem, it was still only a village of some two thousand inhabitants.

The trouble began with the holding of conventicles, or private meetings, chiefly at the house of Mrs. Hutchinson, a woman of marked ability who had come to the colony from England in 1634 as a follower and admirer of Mr. Cotton. She, with her husband, had been admitted to membership in the Boston church. Some time after, as a result of the wide acquaintance which she gained among the women of the village, she began to hold meetings, attended exclusively by them, at which she repeated the substance of recent sermons for the benefit of those who had been unable to attend church. She presently began to add comments and interpretations of her own. These were of a mystical and inspirationist character, which made the talks all the

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more attractive to many of her listeners. The numbers in attendance largely increased, including some of the ministers and magistrates, and even Governor Vane himself. Mrs. Hutchinson thus quickly rose to be an important public figure, and that in a community, one of whose cardinal tenets was that women should keep silence in the public assembly.

Mrs. Hutchinson’s likes and dislikes, together with her ambition, soon betrayed her into statements which set the colony aflame. For herself, Mr. Cotton, and Mr. Wheelwright—after his arrival in the colony—she began to claim a superior enlightenment of the spirit, a peculiar indwelling of the Holy Ghost which raised them above the level of ordinary preachers of the word. In her opinion, and according to the theological phraseology then in vogue, this brought them under the “covenant of grace.” All the other ministers of the colony were classed as preachers of a “covenant of works,” meaning thereby, that they lacked the inspiration, or inner light, given by the indwelling of the Holy Ghost, and were thus legalists, having to depend on the careful observance of a rigid moral and religious code. They could not rise into the true freedom of the gospel, and hence could not interpret the Bible and its mysteries aright. Their lips were not sealed.

Mr. Wilson, the pastor of the Boston church, whom Mrs. Hutchinson intensely disliked, and the clergymen of the colony with whom he was classed as a mere legalist, naturally resented the imputation. The Bible was their text-book. They considered themselves divinely appointed interpreters. They had been trained in what seemed to them to be the only true system of interpretation. To have this thrust one side, and another which, in their opinion, savored of all the extravagances of Munster put in its place, was more than could be borne. If the position of the clergy and their criteria of interpretation were discredited, the entire fabric of the church-state would collapse. Pique, self-interest, professional pride, combined to strengthen the resisting power of the clergy. The result was that the conflict was soon carried over into the domain of secular politics and was there fought out with the utmost bitterness.

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Mrs. Hutchinson early gained the adherence of all the Boston church, except Mr. Wilson, the pastor, Mr. Winthrop, the deputy governor, and a few others. Soon after Wheelwright’s arrival in the colony a blow was struck at Wilson by a proposal that the newcomer should be appointed assistant teacher. Before the time for a final vote on this arrived, a conference of the ministers¹ of the colony was held for the purpose of discussing the new views and restoring harmony, if possible, in the Boston church. Both Cotton and Wheelwright appeared and made it clear that their views on the theological questions in debate were more moderate than some to which Mrs. Hutchinson had given utterance. Nothing, however, was accomplished toward the restoration of harmony.

On the following Sunday the proposal respecting the appointment of Wheelwright came before the Boston church for final action. Winthrop then stood up alone and opposed it.² The unanswerable argument which he urged was, that the church was already well supplied with able ministers. In addition to that he deprecated the calling of one “whose spirit they knew not,” and one who seemed to “dissent in judgment.” On his referring to two doctrinal points on which Wheelwright seemed to show the Antinomian heresy, some discussion occurred in which Vane, Cotton, and Wheelwright took part. At its close Winthrop, while admitting that Wheelwright was an able and godly man, yet “seeing he was apt to raise doubtful disputations,” he could not consent to his election. Upon this the church gave way, and Wheelwright was soon after settled over a chapel instituted as a branch of the Boston church at Mount Wollaston.

When it became known that Vane’s opinions were in full harmony with those expressed by Mrs. Hutchinson, his popularity through the colony at large began to diminish. That of Winthrop, whom the Hutchinson excitement and the charge of too great lenity had thrown into the background, began correspondingly to revive. This so nettled the young governor that he began to talk of resigning and going

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home. On one occasion, with a strange outburst of tears in the presence of the board of assistants,¹ he stated that the reason he desired release from office was that he was charged with being responsible for all the dissensions which had arisen in the colony. The majority of the assistants would not have been unwilling to see him resign, and arrangements were made to hold a special court of election. But the Boston church could not afford to lose his influence. Therefore, on their interposition he remained.

Vane’s hesitating course occasioned him new troubles, because in connection with the proposed special court of election a conference between the ministers and magistrates was arranged, and that without the governor’s knowledge. It was held in December, 1636. In that conference,² Hugh Peters, who had come over with Vane and was now the successor of Williams at Salem, took the governor roundly to task because he seemed to be opposed to such conferences, because he had occasioned much strife, and had assumed the peremptory airs characteristic of young and inexperienced men. This tirade the young governor, who was present, vainly endeavored to check. After it closed Mr. Wilson “made a very sad speech” on the alienations and divisions among the brethren, which would lead to complete separation if not remedied. The cause of these troubles he found in the novel opinions which had lately appeared among them. With this view all the magistrates, except the governor and two others, agreed, and all the ministers but two. But the tone of the speech was so harsh as to seriously offend Mr. Cotton and the members of the Boston church.

Mrs. Hutchinson was also called before the ministers at the same time and place. Led by Peters³ they questioned her for the purpose of ascertaining why it was that she asserted that they taught a covenant of works. After some hesitation, she boldly reaffirmed her charge, and gave as the reason that they were not sealed, and were no more able ministers of the gospel than were the disciples before the resurrection of Christ. She even cited individuals among those present in

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illustration of the point she wished to make, while the distinction she drew between Cotton and all the rest was so marked as to draw from him a protest. The conference broke up without contributing in any way toward the restoration of harmony.

On the other hand Wilson’s speech had greatly increased the bitterness of feeling in the Boston church, and this expressed itself in an effort to formally censure the pastor.¹ Though Wilson and others affirmed that no rule of conduct had been broken, yet he was called to answer before a public meeting of the church. Then Vane “pressed it violently against him,” and so did all the congregation except Winthrop and one or two more. Cotton, the teacher, acted with the majority, though with much greater moderation, and restrained them from immediate censure on the ground that the church was not unanimous.

A debate in writing was now opened by Winthrop with Cotton, in which the deputy governor “laid before him divers failings [as he supposed] and some reasons to justify Mr. Wilson, and dealt very plainly with him.” Mr. Cotton “made a very loving and gentle answer,” but justified his course with “divers arguments.” The general discussion also engendered at this time opinions more radical than any previously uttered:² as that faith is no cause of justification, a man being justified before he believes; that the covenant of works was held forth in the ten commandments or in the letter of Scripture, while the covenant of grace was in the spirit and was known only to believers as the consequence of immediate revelation.

As this seemed to be downright inspirationism and was accepted by all the Boston church except four or five, the clergy undertook to labor directly with Cotton. They drew up sixteen points, and asked him to declare his judgment concerning them. This he did, clearing some doubts, but in other cases giving no satisfaction. The ministers then replied to his answers, showing their dissent and the grounds thereof. The ministers now publicly declared their sentiments in their own pulpits, and the discussion³ became general

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throughout the colony. The strife had now reached such dimensions that, near the close of January, 1637, a general fast was kept.

The fast day proved to be a turning-point in the struggle. Mr. Wheelwright on this occasion attended the afternoon services in the Boston church. After Mr. Cotton had finished, he was asked “to exercise as a private brother,” and preached his famous fast-day sermon.¹ Whatever may have been his reason for so doing, he took as his subject the thought which was uppermost in all minds, the covenant of grace and the covenant of works. Adopting, according to familiar Scripture usage, the figure of a battle, he spoke of the adherents of the covenant of grace as confronted by the necessity of spiritual combat, if they would not have Christ taken from them. They must put on the whole armor of God, have their swords ready, show themselves valiant, lay hold upon their enemies, kill them with the word of the Lord. But he was careful throughout to specify that he meant a spiritual not a physical combat, carried on not with carnal weapons, but with spiritual. Except for the occasion on which it was delivered, it was an ordinary, a somewhat dull, and to an extent an incomprehensible Puritan sermon. But Wilson was forced to listen to it in his own pulpit; it was by implication an arraignment of his party. It contained expressions which, if taken out of their context and sufficiently twisted by interpretation, could be made to look like seditious utterances, as if the sermon was an incitement to civil war. Before the sermon was delivered, so grave had seemed the situation that the clergy had resolved to discontinue² lectures for three weeks about the first of March, that they might meet then with the general court and “bring things to some issue.” As the ministers were called to advise the court on that occasion, it was decided to inquire into the proceedings of the Boston church against Mr. Wilson and into Wheelwright’s sermon.

On all the questions the majority of the court showed itself, from the ministerial standpoint, to be sound. One Stephen Greensmith, for saying³ that all the ministers except

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Cotton, Wheelwright, and Hooker taught a covenant of works, was fined £40, and ordered to acknowledge his fault in every church. The proceedings of the Boston church against Mr. Wilson, as well as his “sad speech” which was the occasion of it, were fully discussed. The speech was declared to have been “a seasonable advice,” and to have carried “no charge or accusation.” This was a pointed rebuke for Vane. Though probably for political reasons none of the members who had accused Wilson were at this time punished, the elders were specially consulted. They,¹ with the apparent approval of all, proclaimed and defended two principles: that no member of the court—including thereby those who were advising it—should, without its license, be publicly questioned by a church for any speech made in the court; and that on the appearance among church members of errors or heresies which were clearly dangerous to the state, the court should act without waiting for the church. The first of these was intended to meet such cases as those of Mr. Wilson, while the second would give the court the initiative against a church, like that of Boston, the majority of whose members were serious offenders.

These preliminaries having been disposed of, it was resolved to begin, in the person of Wheelwright, the attack on the leaders of the Antinomians. His fast-day sermon was utilized for the purpose. He was summoned before the general court and notes taken at the time of the delivery of his discourse were produced. He was asked if he admitted their correctness. In reply he submitted his own manuscript, and was dismissed.² Before he was summoned again the next day, a petition, signed by nearly a11³ the members of the Boston church, was presented. It requested that judicial hearings might be conducted publicly, and that they as freemen be permitted to be present; also that cases of conscience might first be dealt with before the church. Though the propriety of this act was beyond question, it was denounced by the court as unjustifiable and presumptuous, and the petition was rejected with the reply that judicial sessions of

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the court were always public, though those held for consultation and in preparation for trials were private.

The examination of Wheelwright was then begun in private. When called in he asked for his accusers, and was told that, his sermon having been acknowledged by himself and being then in court, it might proceed ex officio. This at once suggested Star Chamber and High Commission proceedings, as a result of which they had been driven out of England, and loud protest was raised on this account by some members of the court who were friendly to the accused. To this the reply was made that the term ex officio was proper, since it signified only the authority and duty of the court in such cases, and it was not proposed to examine the accused by oath or to imprison him. A question was then asked which Wheelwright declined to answer, and which his friends denounced as intended to insnare him. Upon his then refusing to answer any more questions, the secret session broke up, and the subsequent hearings were held in public.

In the afternoon of the same day, in the presence of the ministers and of a general assembly of the people, the examination of Wheelwright was resumed. It consisted in the reading of various passages from his sermon, and his justification of the same. He declared that he meant any whose manner and spirit were such as he had described under the term “covenant of works.” In thoroughly characteristic fashion, as arbiters though under the guise of witnesses, the ministers were then asked if they taught and practised what had been described as the covenant of works. The next morning all except Cotton returned an affirmative answer.

This has been rightly considered as equivalent to a verdict; but the judgment of the court had still to be formally registered. Hence it went again into secret session, and the opposing factions under the lead of Winthrop and Vane struggled over the issue for two days. At last two of the magistrates were won over to the side of the ministers¹ and the party of the clergy and magistrates triumphed. Wheelwright was voted guilty of sedition and contempt. Against the judgment as pronounced Vane protested, but the court

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refused to enter his protest on its journal. A second petition¹ was also presented by sixty members of the church of Boston, in which, in moderate and respectful language, they denied that the accused had uttered seditious doctrine or had been guilty of a seditious act. In justification of this statement they called attention to the fact that the peace had not been disturbed as the result of his sermon. This was received without objection and entered upon the records of the court. Though the conservatives had won, the struggle had been so obstinate that the sentence of Wheelwright was deferred till the next general court. The question, whether or not he should in the meantime be silenced, then came up, and, in the interest of conciliation, it was decided to commend his case to the Boston church.²

But a clear indication that the conflict was in its earlier stages appeared when it was moved that the next court, which was the court of election, should meet at Newtown. The reason for this was, that it might be free from the influence of the Antinomians who so fully controlled opinion in Boston. As means of communication then were, a removal only so far as that would be sufficient to accomplish the purpose which the conservatives intended, and it was from them that the proposal came. Though it had already become customary for the general court to meet in Boston, it was not bound by law to that place, and now, as a century and a half later, its temporary removal for political reasons to an outlying town was proposed. But Vane, seeing its object, as presiding officer refused to put the motion. Winthrop, as deputy governor, might have done it, but because he was an inhabitant of Boston, and for other reasons, he hesitated unless the court expressly commanded him to do so. Thereupon Endicott rose, put the motion, and declared it carried. In connection with the meeting of this court of election, which was held May, 1637, at Newtown, the political bearings of the controversy became evident on a large scale. Party lines were clearly drawn throughout the province. Winthrop and Vane were, in the political field, the recognized

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leaders of the two forces, and they were the candidates for the governorship. The court¹ met out of doors, and its attention was first directed to the Boston petition, which had been presented to the last court after its adverse vote against Winthrop. It was now brought again into requisition as a means of placing the Boston version of the issue directly before the freemen. But as the first business of this court was the election of magistrates, this was properly regarded as irregular. But Vane, as presiding officer, insisted that the petition should be read; Winthrop declared that it was out of order and that the hearing of petitions should be postponed till after election. In this he had the support of many others, and a heated debate ensued. Fierce speeches were uttered, angry words passed to and fro, and “some laid hands on others.” In the midst of the turmoil, Mr. Wilson climbed the trunk of the large oak which overshadowed the place of meeting, and exhorted the freemen to look to their charter and proceed to election. This appeal evoked cries of “Election! Election!” Winthrop then put the question himself, and a large majority were for election. Vane, however, still held out, and yielded only when Winthrop told him that if he would not go on, they would proceed without him.

In the election which followed, the Antinomians were totally defeated. Winthrop was chosen governor and Dudley deputy governor, while Endicott was rewarded for the evidence he had given of the abandonment of his radicalism by appointment as a member of the standing council. All supporters of the Boston heresy were also left off the board of magistracy. The reply of Boston to this act was prompt and emphatic. It had postponed the election of its deputies till after the meeting of the court. As soon as its result was learned it chose Vane, Coddington, and Hough, its defeated candidates for the magistracy, as its representatives among the deputies. This the general court considered an affront, and on the pretext that two of the freemen of Boston had not been notified, declared the election there to be invalid and issued a new warrant. To this the town responded by

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returning the same deputies a second time. The court, “not finding how they might reject them,” had to accept the inevitable, and they were admitted to their seats.

So strong was party feeling that, on Winthrop’s election, the sergeants who had attended Vane to the court, being Boston men, laid down their halberds and went home. Winthrop was forced to make use of his own servants as attendants thereafter. The levy for the expedition against the Pequot Indians was just being called out, and not a church member in Boston would serve, for the reason that their pastor, Mr. Wilson, had been selected by lot as chaplain and he was under a covenant of works. In social relations Vane became totally estranged from Winthrop, and so remained till he finally returned to England the following August. The order passed by the spring court of 1637 forbidding strangers to be harbored in the colony a longer period than three weeks without the consent of the magistrates and threatening towns with special penalties for its violation, still further irritated the Boston people, for they then expected arrivals from England which would strengthen their party, and the conservative magistrates now forbade their admission.

All the churches of the colony, save one, were now united. The civil government was entirely in the control of their members. It was possible to keep out all unwelcome intruders. The Pequot war was quickly brought to a successful end. These events prepared the way for the complete crushing out of the Antinomian heresy and the expulsion of its persistent adherents from Massachusetts. The first step which led directly to this result was the meeting of the synod¹ at Newtown in September. This was the first assembly of its kind in America, and its object was to establish criteria of orthodoxy on the disputed points and brand all divergent opinions as heretical. This would compel all to identify themselves fully with the majority or incur the necessary penalties. The departure of Vane had removed one of the most serious obstacles to success in the application of pressure. Its effect upon the position of Cotton soon

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became apparent, for he was now left practically alone among the leaders, and found it daily more difficult to maintain his independent position. Special efforts were made before the synod met to bring Cotton, Wilson, and Wheelwright to an understanding, and these bore some encouraging fruit in the case of the Boston teacher. The overwhelming conservative majority in the synod, and the fact that it early found eighty-two of the opinions of Mrs. Hutchinson and her sympathizers to be erroneous or blasphemous, confirmed him in this tendency to harmony. Cotton had not the spirit of a martyr, and while the Boston members retired from the synod and Wheelwright consistently maintained his attitude, Cotton declared that he had seen a light, and thus in good time saved himself and family from the pains of banishment. At the last session it was resolved that such meetings as those which Mrs. Hutchinson had held in Boston were “disorderly and without rule.” As Mrs. Hutchinson, Mr. Wheelwright, and the Boston church had withstood the efforts at conciliation which it was supposed had proceeded from the synod, they were now regarded as legitimate subjects of discipline under the charge of being refractory. The great practical service of the synod was, that it made Cotton ready to join in the work of discipline.

Notwithstanding the circumstances under which the general court of May, 1637, had been elected, it had showed little disposition to proceed earnestly against the Antinomians. Hence, though it was elected for a year, after the synod broke up it was suddenly¹ dissolved, and another court was elected. Of its thirty-three members, twenty-one were new men. Coddington, Aspinwall, and Coggshall, however, were returned from Boston. The new court met early in November, prepared to execute the policy of purge already resolved upon. “Finding upon consultation,”² writes Winthrop, “that two so opposite parties could not contain in the same body, without apparent hazard of ruin to the whole, we agreed to send away some of the principal.” A “fair opportunity” was presented by the remonstrance or petition which had been presented the previous March by the members of the

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Boston church, the discussion about which had occasioned such tumult at the May court. Though the modern eye can detect nothing seditious in it, yet it was now condemned as such. Aspinwall,¹ one of its signers, was not allowed to take the seat to which he was elected. Coggshall, though not a signer, because he expressed his approval of it, was also dismissed, and Boston was ordered to choose two others. Coddington, the remaining deputy, then moved that the censure on Wheelwright, and also the order respecting the admission of inhabitants into the colony, be rescinded; but this was without result. The Boston freemen at first resolved to send back the rejected deputies, but Cotton persuaded them not to do so. William Colburn and John Oliver were chosen in their places. The latter, however, was found to have signed the petition, and he was therefore not allowed to take his seat. No one was elected in his place.

Wheelwright was then called for sentence,² Winthrop presiding and acting as spokesman for the court. He was asked to acknowledge his offence or submit to judgment. He replied that he had not been guilty of sedition or contempt. Then, by the characteristic turn of argument to which reference has already been made, he was told that it was not his doctrine which was condemned, but its effect on the community. By laying the clergy and churches under a covenant of works, a party of opposition was created, things were “turned upside down amongst us”; the evil had spread to families, then to public affairs, and thus was breeding sedition. The political results, it was alleged, appeared in the attitude of Boston toward the Pequot war, while the same spirit was shown in the levy of town rates, the assignment of town lots, and in other business. The court claimed to have acted with patience, and to have sought to turn Wheelwright from his opinions, but in vain. Wheelwright, on the other hand, insisted that the seditious words in his sermon should be pointed out. The court replied that it was not necessary to do this; sedition was there by implication, in that he had tried to bring “the people of God” into discredit by laying

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them under a covenant of works. He was then sentenced to disfranchisement and to banishment, and, unless he gave security to depart before the end of the following March, he should be taken into custody. Wheelwright then declared that he would appeal to the king. He was told in reply to this that “an appeal did not lie in this case, for the king having given us authority by his grant under his great seal of England to hear and determine all causes without any reservation, we are not to admit of any such appeal . . .; and if an appeal should lie in one case, it might be challenged in all, and then there would be no use of government amongst us.” Wheelwright then abandoned his claim to an appeal, and, refusing to give security, was taken into custody. The next day he offered to give security, but would not agree to refrain from preaching in the meantime. Therefore the court declared that, if he did not depart within fourteen days, he must remain as a prisoner in the house of one of the magistrates until the court should dispose of him. Though it was now early winter, within that limit of time he turned his steps northward, and with the friends who followed him the next spring he founded Exeter, New Hampshire.

The cases of Coggshall and Aspinwall were then taken up for final action, and on the ground that the petition which they had signed was seditious and that in connection with the earlier proceedings of the court against them they had used seditious language, the former was disfranchised and banished. To Aspinwall the court expressed its opinion of his share in the Boston petition to the effect that for him, being a member of a civil body, “to stop the course of justice in countenancing seditious persons and practices against the face of authority, this made him a seditious person.” Aspinwall replied by citing a petition of Mephibosheth to David and one from Esther to Ahasuerus as precedents, but these did not avail. He then fell back on the right of the English subject to petition. The court replied that the document referred to was not a petition, but a seditious libel. When sentence was about to be pronounced, Aspinwall desired a Scripture precedent for banishment. The case of Hagar

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and Ishmael was cited, and with this, though he was inclined to cavil, he had to be satisfied.

After other similar cases had been disposed of the trial¹ of Mrs. Hutchinson, or more properly the legislative hearing in her case, was begun. Questions relating to the procedure followed in this case have been discussed elsewhere; here it is necessary to call attention to the controversial points on which the case turned. The charge against Mrs. Hutchinson was not sedition,—though every offence might easily end in that,—but “traducing the ministers.” With this were closely connected the offences of holding largely attended public meetings, and giving aid and sympathy to those who had signed the Boston petition. When at the beginning of the trial the accused was confronted with some of these charges, she asked what rule or law she had broken. The reply was, the fifth commandment, as the command to honor father and mother includes magistrates, “the fathers of the commonwealth.” Mrs. Hutchinson, taking up this forced analogy, asked if a child might not entertain and honor one who feared the Lord, even though its parent would not allow it. This she might have done in supporting Wheelwright and the petition. The court replied that this was not to the purpose. “We cannot stand to dispute cases with you now.” Winthrop then took up the subject of the weekly meetings, and asked if Mrs. Hutchinson could justify them. She replied that there were such before she came, but she did not attend them, and to save herself from the reputation of being proud she began holding her own meetings. On her citing Titus ii. 3-5, in which the apostle charged the aged women to teach the young women the rules of good conduct, Winthrop met this by the quotation of the favorite text, 1 Cor. xiv. 34-35, which commands women to keep silent in the churches, and denounced her meetings as prejudicial to the commonwealth. Mrs. Hutchinson contended that they were private prophesyings, like those of the Bereans and of Aquila and Priscilla, and the court that they were public, without valid precedent, and dangerous.

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The court next took up Mrs. Hutchinson’s charges against the ministers, which were the real source of feelings of hatred toward her. The discussion of this hinged on the report given by Peters, Welde, Eliot, and the other ministers who were present, of the statements she had made during the conference a year before at Cotton’s house, where she had declared “that there was a wide difference between Master Cotton’s ministry and theirs, and that they could not hold forth a covenant of free grace because they had not the seal of the spirit, and that they were not able ministers of the New Testament.” The ministers were questioned concerning what at that time was said. All of them agreed that the alleged statements were made in direct and harsh form.

At the opening of the session of the next day Mrs. Hutchinson stated that since going to her home she had read certain of the notes which had been taken at the time of the conference, and found “things not to be as hath been alleged.” Because of that she demanded that the ministers, who were testifying in their own cause, should be sworn.¹ This occasioned much discussion in the court, as it was considered by the leaders to be unnecessary and, in a way, a reflection on the sacred character of the clergy. The governor ruled that, as this was not a jury case, the court was at liberty to grant or reject the demand. The argument, suggested by Mrs. Hutchinson, that an oath was the end of all strife had much weight, when it was seen that many in the court would not be satisfied without it. Before, however, the oath was administered it was resolved to hear what Mrs. Hutchinson’s witnesses had to say. Mr. Coggshall, the first to be called, declared that he was present at the conference and that she “did not say all that which they lay against her.” But Peters’s rebuke, “How dare you look into the court to say such a word?” reduced him at once to silence. Mr. Leverett affirmed that she had said that they did not preach a covenant of grace so clearly as did Mr. Cotton. The Boston teacher himself was the third witness for the accused, and on their being called had taken his seat beside her.

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Now in an eloquent and diplomatic speech—decidedly superior in spirit to anything else which was said during the trial—Mr. Cotton formulated the alleged utterances of Mrs. Hutchinson at the conference¹ in such mild and negative fashion as to leave little of which the court could complain.

But at this point Mrs. Hutchinson betrayed her own cause by indiscreet words. Almost as soon as Cotton had finished, she launched out upon an account of the rise in her, during her residence in England, of the notion that she was a subject of immediate revelations. After Cotton had removed to New England and Wheelwright had been silenced, she came to Massachusetts under a revelation from God that she should hear the true gospel preached there, but should suffer persecution. This was confirmed to her by the words of the prophets which this day they saw fulfilled. But she should be delivered from their hands, as Daniel was, and a curse would follow her accusers and their posterity for the course they had pursued against her. These were just the ideas to which Mrs. Hutchinson’s enemies had been saying that her belief led, and in which lay their peril. Her utterances therefore furnished the evidence they were looking for. Special providences they believed in and utilized by the wholesale, but they stopped short at that point. Miracles and revelations, with characteristic halfway logic, they excluded. Mr. Cotton was asked what he believed to be the character of Mrs. Hutchinson’s revelations. His first answer was noncommittal. On being asked again, he turned to Mrs. Hutchinson and inquired if she expected deliverance from the power of the court by a great miracle, one that was beyond the power of nature. She finally answered that she did not expect deliverance from the power of the court, but from the “calamity of it.”

The idea of the majority, as expressed by Winthrop, now was that by a special providence Mrs. Hutchinson’s own words had condemned her. She had admitted that she had acted under pretended direct revelations, and not according to any rule of Scripture. Before she left England it had been revealed to her that the ministers of New England

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were “anti-Christian.” Such beliefs could not stand with the peace of any state. They savored of the extravagances of Munster. Therefore, after two of the ministers had testified under oath and on behalf of the whole body to the truth of what they had said concerning Mrs. Hutchinson’s utterances in the conference, with only two opposing votes she was found guilty.¹ The governor then sentenced her to banishment as “a woman not fit for our society,” she to be detained as a prisoner till the court should send her away.

Captain John Underhill, the famous Boston soldier, was then removed from office and disfranchised because he had signed the obnoxious petition. On November 20, the general court² decreed that, because of their share in the dangerous errors of Mr. Wheelwright and Mrs. Hutchinson, and the fear arising therefrom that upon some revelation they might suddenly attack those who differed from them, fifty-eight persons in Boston should be disarmed, five in Salem, three in Newbury, five in Roxbury, two in Ipswich, two in Charlestown. Still, in its endeavor to make it appear that this act was liberal and tolerant and that it proceeded wholly from care for the public peace, the court declared that it did not intend to restrict the freedom of petition, or the use, when private means failed, of any lawful public means for the reform of the court or any member of the same. Winthrop, also, in defending himself against the charges of many of the Boston church who desired to call him to account, declared that he had acted throughout for the public good, and thus had fulfilled the obligations of his official oath.

Mrs. Hutchinson, after being detained in a private house at Roxbury during the winter and subjected at intervals to arguments and questionings by the ministers, was brought to trial before the Boston church in March, 1638. The abandonment by Mr. Cotton of his Antinomian opinions and the purging to which the Boston church had been subjected had by this time reclaimed that body from its errors. The entire clergy of the colony also interested itself in this trial, and thus brought to bear upon the Boston congregation a

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force of orthodox opinion which was irresistible. In this trial the clergy were the managers and chief spokesmen, and by a form of procedure which was similar to that employed by the magistrates before the general court, they secured the conviction of Mrs. Hutchinson and her solemn excommunication. Mr. Wilson had the satisfaction of pronouncing the sentence which separated her forever from fellowship with the churches of Massachusetts.¹ Thus the arch-heretic was cast out, and when, five years later, she and several members of her family were slain by the Indians at the residence which they had finally chosen within the limits of New Netherland, the Puritans regarded the event as a special manifestation of divine justice.

By the attitude which they assumed toward the so-called Antinomian opinions the magistrates and clergy of Massachusetts definitely committed themselves to a close alliance for the purpose of upholding a system of strict orthodoxy. Tendencies which were operative when the religious test was enacted and when Roger Williams was banished, now came fully to prevail. Pressure was brought to bear from the churches united in a synod, from the clergy and magistrates in frequent conference, and from the general court as the highest expression of power in the colony, to keep local congregations and individuals alike in harmony with the doctrines and practices of the majority. From this union and resolve proceeded the body of legislation on ecclesiastical and moral subjects which has already been outlined. All parties must expressly or tacitly accept this, must yield it at least outward obedience, or leave the colony. Protest, whether by speech or action, was rigorously suppressed, and the secular power was resorted to for the purpose without hesitation. The life and thought of this colony and of other colonies, so far as its influence could be made to control them, was cast in one narrow Puritan mould, and was not allowed to escape from it. So little was there of enlightenment in New England outside the circle of ideas which the clergy imparted or controlled, that it was possible to maintain

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strict conformity for sixty years, and a type of thought which was essentially Puritan for nearly one hundred and fifty years longer. This, with the rigorous administration and political system which accompanied it, was the result of the appearance of the first learned class within the American colonies, and of its alliance with the secular authorities. But, though we consider Puritan New England to have been narrow and intolerant, we should remember that the intellectual activity which made even that possible did not exist in the other colonies till the middle of the eighteenth century.

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