appear as if good manners, and generosity and magnanimity of spirit,
would have kept the Quakers away. Certainly, by every rule of right and
reason, they ought to have kept away. They had no rights or business
here.... Most clearly they courted persecution, suffering, and death;
and, as the magistrates affirmed, ‘they rushed upon the sword.’ Those
magistrates never intended them harm, ... except as they believed that
all their successive measures and sharper penalties were positively
necessary to secure their jurisdiction from the wildest lawlessness and
absolute anarchy.” [Footnote: _Mass. and its Early History_, p. 110]
His conclusion is: “It is to be as frankly and positively affirmed that
their Quaker tormentors were the aggressive party; that they wantonly
initiated the strife, and with a dogged pertinacity persisted in
outrages which drove the authorities almost to frenzy....” [Footnote:
_Idem_, p. 104]
The proposition that the Congregationalists owned the territory granted
by the charter of Charles I. as though it were a private estate, has
been considered in an earlier chapter; and if the legal views there
advanced are sound, it is incontrovertible, that all peaceful British
subjects had a right to dwell in Massachusetts, provided they did not
infringe the monopoly in trade. The only remaining question, therefore,
is whether the Quakers were peaceful. Dr. Ellis, Dr. Palfrey, and Dr.
Dexter have carefully collected a certain number of cases of misconduct,
with the view of proving that the Friends were turbulent, and the
government had reasonable grounds for apprehending such another outbreak
as one which occurred a century before in Germany and is known as
the Peasants’ War. Before, however, it is possible to enter upon a
consideration of the evidence intelligently, it is necessary to fix the
chronological order of the leading events of the persecution.
The twenty-one years over which it extended may be conveniently divided
into three periods, of which the first began in July, 1656, when Mary
Fisher and Anne Austin came to Boston, and lasted till December, 1661,
when Charles II. interfered by commanding Endicott to send those under
arrest to England for trial. Hitherto John Norton had been preeminent,
but in that same December he was appointed on a mission to London, and
as he died soon after his return, his direct influence on affairs then
probably ceased. He had been chiefly responsible for the hangings
of 1659 and 1660, but under no circumstances could they have been
continued, for after four heretics had perished, it was found impossible
to execute Wenlock Christison, who had been condemned, because of
popular indignation.
Nevertheless, the respite was brief. In June, 1662, the king, in a
letter confirming the charter, excluded the Quakers from the general
toleration which he demanded for other sects, and the old legislation
was forthwith revived; only as it was found impossible to kill the
schismatics openly, the inference, from what occurred subsequently,
is unavoidable, that the elders sought to attain their purpose by what
their reverend historians call “a humaner policy,” [Footnote: _As to
Roger Williams_, p. 134.] or, in plain English, by murdering them by
flogging and starvation. Nor was the device new, for the same stratagem
had already been resorted to by the East India Company, in Hindostan,
before they were granted full criminal jurisdiction. [Footnote: Mill’s
_British India_, i. 48, note.]
The Vagabond Act was too well contrived for compassing such an end, to
have been an accident, and portions of it strongly suggest the hand of
Norton. It was passed in May, 1661, when it was becoming evident that
hanging must be abandoned, and its provisions can only be explained
on the supposition that it was the intention to make the infliction of
death discretionary with each magistrate. It provided that any foreign
Quaker, or any native upon a second conviction, might be ordered to
receive an unlimited number of stripes. It is important also to observe
that the whip was a two-handed implement, armed with lashes made of
twisted and knotted cord or catgut. [Footnote: _New England Judged_, ed.
1703, p. 357, note.] There can be no doubt, moreover, that sundry of
the judgments afterward pronounced would have resulted fatally had
the people permitted their execution. During the autumn following its
enactment this statute was suspended, but it was revived in about ten
months.
Endicott’s death in 1665 marks the close of the second epoch, and ten
comparatively tranquil years followed. Bellingham’s moderation may have
been in part due to the interference of the royal commissioners, but a
more potent reason was the popular disgust, which had become so strong
that the penal laws could not be enforced.
A last effort was made to rekindle the dying flame in 1675, by fining
constables who failed in their duty to break up Quaker meetings, and
offering one third of the penalty to the informer. Magistrates were
required to sentence those apprehended to the House of Correction,
where they were to be kept three days on bread and water, and whipped.
[Footnote: _Mass. Rec._ v. 60.] Several suffered during this revival,
the last of whom was Margaret Brewster. At the end of twenty-one years
the policy of cruelty had become thoroughly discredited and a general
toleration could no longer be postponed; but this great liberal triumph
was only won by heroic courage and by the endurance of excruciating
torments. Marmaduke Stevenson, William Robinson, Mary Dyer, and William
Leddra were hanged, several were mutilated or branded, two at least are
known to have died from starvation and whipping, and it is probable
that others were killed whose fate cannot be traced. The number tortured
under the Vagabond Act is unknown, nor can any estimate be made of the
misery inflicted upon children by the ruin and exile of parents.
The early Quakers were enthusiasts, and therefore occasionally spoke and
acted extravagantly; they also adopted some offensive customs, the most
objectionable of which was wearing the hat; all this is immaterial.
The question at issue is not their social attractiveness, but the
cause whose consequence was a virulent persecution. This can only be
determined by an analysis of the evidence. If, upon an impartial review
of the cases of outrage which have been collected, it shall appear
probable that the conduct of the Friends was sufficiently violent to
make it credible that the legislature spoke the truth, when it
declared that “the prudence of this court was exercised onely in making
provission to secure the peace & order heere established against theire
attempts, whose designe (wee were well assured by our oune experjence,
as well as by the example of theire predecessors in Munster) was to
vndermine & ruine the same;” [Footnote: _Mass. Rec._ vol. iv. pt. 1, p.
385.] then the reverend historians of the theocracy must be considered
to have established their proposition. But if, on the other hand, it
shall seem apparent that the intense vindictiveness of this onslaught
was due to the bigotry and greed of power of a despotic priesthood, who
saw in the spread of independent thought a menace to the ascendency of
their order, then it must be held to be demonstrated that the clergy of
New England acted in obedience to those natural laws, which have always
regulated the conduct of mankind.
CHRONOLOGY.
1656, July. First Quakers came to Boston.
1656, 14 Oct. First act against Quakers passed. Providing that
ship-masters bringing Quakers should be fined £100. Quakers to be
whipped and imprisoned till expelled. Importers of Quaker books to be
fined. Any defending Quaker opinions to be fined, first offence, 40s.;
second, £4; third, banishment.
1657, 14 Oct. By a supplementary act; Quakers returning after one
conviction for first offence, for men, loss of one ear; imprisonment
till exile. Second offence, loss other ear, like imprisonment. For
females; first offence, whipping, imprisonment. Second offence, idem.
Third offence, men and women alike; tongue to be bored with a hot iron,
imprisonment, exile. [Footnote: _Mass. Rec._ vol. iv. pt. 1, p. 309.]
1658. In this year Rev. John Norton actively exerted himself to secure
more stringent legislation; procured petition to that effect to be
presented to court.
1658, 19 Oct. Enacted that undomiciled Quakers returning from banishment
should be hanged. Domiciled Quakers upon conviction, refusing to
apostatize, to be banished, under pain of death on return. [Footnote:
_Idem_, p. 346.]
Under this act the following persons were hanged:
1659, 27 Oct. Robinson and Stevenson hanged.
1660, 1 June. Mary Dyer hanged. (Previously condemned, reprieved, and
executed for returning.)
1660-1661, 14 Mar. William Leddra hanged.
1661, June. Wenlock Christison condemned to death; released.
1661, 22 May. Vagabond Act. Any person convicted before a county
magistrate of being an undomiciled or vagabond Quaker to be stripped
naked to the middle, tied to the cart’s tail, and flogged from town to
town to the border. Domiciled Quakers to be proceeded against under Act
of 1658 to banishment, and then treated as vagabond Quakers. The death
penalty was still preserved but not enforced. [Footnote: _Mass. Rec._
vol. iv. pt. 2, p. 3.]
1661, 9 Sept. King Charles II. wrote to Governor Endicott directing the
cessation of corporal punishment in regard to Quakers, and ordering the
accused to be sent to England for trial.
1661. 27 Nov. Vagabond Act suspended.
1662. 28 June. The company’s agents, Bradstreet and Norton, received
from the king his letter of pardon, etc., wherein, however, Quakers are
excepted from the demand made for religious toleration.
1662, 8 Oct. Encouraged by the above letter the Vagabond law revived.
1664-5, 15 March. Death of John Endicott. Bellingham governor.
Commissioners interfere on behalf of Quakers in May. The persecution
subsides.
1672, 3 Nov. Persecution revived by passage of law punishing persons
found at Quaker meeting by fine or imprisonment and flogging. Also
fining constables for neglect in making arrests and giving one third the
fine to informers. [Footnote: _Mass. Rec._ v. 60.]
1677, Aug. 9. Margaret Brewster whipped for entering the Old South in
sackcloth.
TURBULENT QUAKERS.
1656, Mary Prince. 1662, Deborah Wilson.
1658, Sarah Gibbons. 1663, Thomas Newhouse.
“ Dorothy Waugh. “ Edward Wharton.
1660, John Smith. 1664, Hannah Wright. [Footnote: Uncertain.]
1661, Katherine Chatham. “ Mary Tomkins.
“ George Wilson. 1665, Lydia Wardwell.
1662, Elizabeth Hooton. 1677, Margaret Brewster.
“It was in the month called July, of this present year [1656] when Mary
Fisher and Ann Austin arrived in the road before Boston, before ever
a law was made there against the Quakers; and yet they were very ill
treated; for before they came ashore, the deputy governor, Richard
Bellingham (the governor himself being out of town) sent officers
aboard, who searched their trunks and chests, and took away the books
they found there, which were about one hundred, and carried them ashore,
after having commanded the said women to be kept prisoners aboard;
and the said books were, by an order of the council, burnt in the
market-place by the hangman.... And then they were shut up close
prisoners, and command was given that none should come to them without
leave; a fine of five pounds being laid on any that should otherwise
come at, or speak with them, tho’ but at the window. Their pens, ink,
and paper were taken from them, and they not suffered to have any
candle-light in the night season; nay, what is more, they were stript
naked, under pretence to know whether they were witches [a true touch of
sacerdotal malignity] tho’ in searching no token was found upon them but
of innocence. And in this search they were so barbarously misused that
modesty forbids to mention it: And that none might have communication
with them a board was nailed up before the window of the jail. And
seeing they were not provided with victuals, Nicholas Upshal, one who
had lived long in Boston, and was a member of the church there, was so
concerned about it, (liberty being denied to send them provision) that
he purchased it of the jailor at the rate of five shillings a week,
lest they should have starved. And after having been about five weeks
prisoners, William Chichester, master of a vessel, was bound in one
hundred pound bond to carry them back, and not suffer any to speak with
them, after they were put on board; and the jailor kept their beds ...
and their Bible, for his fees.” [Footnote: Sewel, p. 160.]
Endicott was much dissatisfied with the forbearance of Bellingham,
and declared that had he “been there ... he would have had them well
whipp’d.” [Footnote: _New England Judged_, ed. 1703, p. 10.] No exertion
was spared, nevertheless, to get some hold upon them, the elders
examining them as to matters of faith, with a view to ensnare them as
heretics. In this, however, they were foiled.
On the authority of Hutchinson, Dr. Dexter [Footnote: _As to Roger
Williams_, p. 127.] and r. Palfrey complain [Footnote: Palfrey, ii.
464.] that Mary Prince reviled two of the ministers, who “with much
moderation and tenderness endeavored to convince her of her errors.”
[Footnote: Hutch. _Hist._ i. 181.] A visitation of the clergy was a form
of torment from which even the boldest recoiled; Vane, Gorton, Childe,
and Anne Hutchinson quailed under it, and though the Quakers abundantly
proved that they could bear stripes with patience, they could not endure
this. She called them “Baal’s priests, the seed of the serpent.” Dr.
Ellis also speaks of “stinging objurgations screamed out ... from
between the bars of their prisons.” [Footnote: _Mem. Hist. of Boston_,
i. 182.] He cites no cases, but he probably refers to the same woman who
called to Endicott one Sunday on his way from church: “Woe unto thee,
thou art an oppressor.” [Footnote: Hutch. _Hist._ i. 181.] If she said
so she spoke the truth, for she was illegally imprisoned, was deprived
of her property, and subjected to great hardship.
In October, 1656, the first of the repressive acts was passed, by which
the “cursed” and “blasphemous” intruders were condemned to be “comitted
to the house of correction, and at theire entrance to be seuerely whipt
and by the master thereof to be kept constantly to worke, and none
suffered to converse or speak with them;” [Footnote: _Mass. Rec._ vol.
iv. pt. 1, p. 278.] and any captain knowingly bringing them within the
jurisdiction to be fined one hundred pounds, with imprisonment till
payment.
“When this law was published at the door of the aforenamed Nicholas
Upshall, the good old man, grieved in spirit, publickly testified
against it; for which he was the next morning sent for to the General
Court, where he told them that: ‘The execution of that law would be a
forerunner of a judgment upon their country, and therefore in love and
tenderness which he bare to the people and place, desired them to take
heed, lest they were found fighters against God.’ For this, he, though
one of their church-members, and of a blameless conversation, was fined
£20 and £3 more for not coming to church, whence the sense of their
wickedness had induced him to absent himself. They also banished him
out of their jurisdiction, allowing him but one month for his departure,
though in the winter season, and he a weakly ancient man: Endicott the
governor, when applied to on his behalf for a mitigation of his fine,
churlishly answered, ‘I will not bate him a groat.’” [Footnote: Besse,
ii. 181.]
Although, after the autumn of 1656, whippings, fines, and banishments
became frequent, no case of misconduct is alleged until the 13th of
the second month, 1658, when Sarah Gibbons and Dorothy Waugh broke
two bottles in Mr. Norton’s church, after lecture, to testify to his
emptiness; [Footnote: This charge is unproved.] both had previously
been imprisoned and banished, but the ferocity with which Norton at that
moment was forcing on the persecution was the probable incentive to the
trespass. “They were sent to the house of correction, where, after being
kept three days without any food, they were cruelly whipt, and kept
three days longer without victuals, though they had offered to buy some,
but were not suffered.” [Footnote: Besse, ii. 184.]
In 1661 Katharine Chatham walked through Boston, in sackcloth. This was
during the trial of Christison for his life, when the terror culminated,
and hardly needs comment.
George Wilson is charged with having “rushed through the streets of
Boston, shouting: ‘The Lord is coming with fire and sword!’” [Footnote:
_As to Roger Williams_, p. 133.] The facts appear to be these: in 1661,
just before Christison’s trial, he was arrested, without any apparent
reason, and, as he was led to prison, he cried, that the Lord was
coming with fire and sword to plead with Boston. [Footnote: _New England
Judged_, ed. 1703, p. 351.] At the general jail delivery [Footnote:
_Mass. Rec._ vol. iv. pt. 2, p. 19. Order passed 28 May, 1661.] in
anticipation of the king’s order, he was liberated, but soon rearrested,
“sentenced to be tied to the cart’s tail,” and flogged with so severe
a whip that the Quakers wanted to buy it “to send to England for the
novelty of the cruelty, but that was not permitted.” [Footnote: Besse,
ii. 224.]
Elizabeth Hooton coming from England in 1661, with Joan Brooksup, “they
were soon clapt up in prison, and, upon their discharge thence,
being driven with the rest two days’ journey into the vast, howling
wilderness, and there left ... without necessary provisions.” [Footnote:
Besse, ii. 228, 229.] They escaped to Barbadoes. “Upon their coming
again to Boston, they were presently apprehended by a constable, an
ignorant and furious zealot, who declared, ‘It was his delight, and he
could rejoice in following the Quakers to their execution as much as
ever.’” Wishing to return once more, she obtained a license from the
king to buy a house in any plantation. Though about sixty, she was
seized at Dover, where the Rev. Mr. Rayner was settled, put into the
stocks, and imprisoned four days in the dead of winter, where she nearly
perished from cold. [Footnote: Besse, ii. 229.] Afterward, at Cambridge,
she exhorted the people to repentance in the streets, [Footnote:
“Repentance! Repentance! A day of howling and sad lamentation is coming
upon you all from the Lord.”] and for this crime, which is cited as an
outrage to Puritan decorum, [Footnote: _As to Roger Williams_, p. 133.]
she was once more apprehended and “imprisoned in a close, stinking
dungeon, where there was nothing either to lie down or sit on, where
she was kept two days and two nights without bread or water,” and then
sentenced to be whipped through three towns. “At Cambridge she was tied
to the whipping-post, and lashed with ten stripes with a three-stringed
whip, with three knots at the end: At Watertown she was laid on with ten
stripes more with rods of willow: At Dedham, in a cold frosty morning,
they tortured her aged body with ten stripes more at a cart’s tail.” The
peculiar atrocity of flogging from town to town lay in this: that the
victim’s wounds became cold between the times of punishment, and in
winter sometimes frozen, which made the torture intolerably agonizing.
Then, as hanging was impossible, other means were tried to make an
end of her: “Thus miserably torn and beaten, they carried her a weary
journey on horseback many miles into the wilderness, and toward night
left her there among wolves, bears, and other wild beasts, who, though
they did sometimes seize on living persons, were yet to her less cruel
than the savage-professors of that country. When those who conveyed her
thither left her, they said, ‘They thought they should never see her
more.’” [Footnote: Besse, ii. 229. See _New England Judged_, p. 413.]
The intent to kill is obvious, and yet Elizabeth Hooton suffered less
than many of those convicted and sentenced after public indignation had
forced the theocracy to adopt what their reverend successors are pleased
to call the “humaner policy” of the Vagabond Act. [Footnote: _As to
Roger Williams_, p. 134.]
Any want of deference to a clergyman is sure to be given a prominent
place in the annals of Massachusetts; and, accordingly, the breaking of
bottles in church, which happened twice in twenty-one years, is never
omitted.
In 1663 “John Liddal, and Thomas Newhouse, having been at meeting” (at
Salem), “were apprehended and ... sentenced to be whipt through three
towns as vagabonds,” which was accordingly done.
“Not long after this, the aforesaid Thomas Newhouse was again
whipt through the jurisdiction of Boston for testifying against the
persecutors in their meeting-house there; at which time he, in a
prophetick manner, having two glass bottles in his hands, threw them
down, saying, ‘so shall you be dashed in pieces.’” [Footnote: Besse, ii.
232.]
The next turbulent Quaker is mentioned in this way by Dr. Dexter:
“Edward Wharton was ‘pressed in spirit’ to repair to Dover and proclaim
‘Wo, vengeance, and the indignation of the Lord’ upon the court in
session there.” [Footnote: _As to Roger Williams_, p. 133.] This
happened in the summer of 1663, and long ere then he had seen and
suffered the oppression that makes men mad. He was a peaceable and
industrious inhabitant of Salem; in 1659 he had seen Robinson and
Stevenson done to death, and, being deeply moved, he said, “the guilt of
[their] blood was so great that he could not bear it;” [Footnote: Besse,
ii. 205.] he was taken from his home, given twenty lashes and fined
twenty pounds; the next year, just at the time of Christison’s trial, he
was again seized, led through the country like a notorious offender,
and thrown into prison, “where he was kept close, night and day, with
William Leddra, sometimes in a very little room, little bigger than a
saw-pit, having no liberty granted them.”
“Being brought before their court, he again asked, ‘What is the cause,
and wherefore have I been fetcht from my habitation, where I was
following my honest calling, and here laid up as an evil-doer?’ They
told him, that ‘his hair was too long, and that he had disobeyed that
commandment which saith, Honour thy father and mother.’ He asked,
‘Wherein?’ ‘In that you will not,’ said they, ‘put off your hat to
magistrates.’ Edward replied, ‘I love and own all magistrates and
rulers, who are for the punishment of evil doers, and for the praise of
them that do well.’” [Footnote: Besse, ii. 220.]
Then Rawson pronounced the sentence: “You are upon pain of death to
depart this jurisdiction, it being the 11th of this instant March, by
the one and twentieth of the same, on the pain of death.... ‘Nay [said
Wharton], I shall not go away; therefore be careful what you do.’”
[Footnote: Besse, ii. 221.]
And he did not go, but was with Leddra when he died upon the tree. On
the day Leddra suffered, Christison was brought before Endicott, and
commanded to renounce his religion; but he answered: “Nay, I shall not
change my religion, nor seek to save my life; ... but if I lose my life
for Christ’s sake and the preaching of the gospel, I shall save it.”
They then sent him back to prison to await his doom. At the next court
he was brought to the bar, where he demanded an appeal to England; but
in the midst a letter was brought in from Wharton, signifying, “That
whereas they had banished him on pain of death, yet he was at home in
his own house at Salem, and therefore proposing, ‘That they would take
off their wicked sentence from him, that he might go about his occasions
out of their jurisdiction.’” [Footnote: Besse, ii. 222, 223.]
Endicott was exasperated to frenzy, for he felt the ground crumbling
beneath him; he put the fate of Christison to the vote, and failed to
carry a condemnation. “The governor seeing this division, said, ‘I could
find it in my heart to go home;’ being in such a rage, that he flung
something furiously on the table. ...Then the governor put the court to
vote again; but this was done confusedly, which so incensed the governor
that he stood up and said, ‘You that will not consent record it: I thank
God I am not afraid to give judgment...Wenlock Christison, hearken to
your sentence: You must return unto the place from whence you came,
and from thence to the place of execution, and there you must be hang’d
until you are dead, dead, dead.’” [Footnote: Sewel, p. 279.] Thereafter
Wharton invoked the wrath of God against the theocracy.
To none of the enormities committed, during these years are the divines
more keenly alive than to the crime of disturbing what they call “public
Sabbath worship;” [Footnote: _As to Roger Williams_, p. 139.] and since
their language conveys the impression that such acts were not only very
common, but also unprovoked, whereas the truth is that they were rare,
it cannot fail to be instructive to relate the causes which led to the
interruption of the ordination of that Mr. Higginson, who called the
“inner light” “a stinking vapour from hell.” [Footnote: Ordained July 8,
1660. _Annals of Salem_.]
John and Margaret Smith were members of the Salem church, and John was a
freeman. In 1658, Margaret became a Quaker, and though in feeble health,
she was cast into prison, and endured the extremities of privation;
her sufferings and her patience so wrought upon her husband that he too
became a convert, and a few weeks before the ceremony wrote to Endicott:
“O governour, governour, do not think that my love to my wife is at all
abated, because I sit still silent, and do not seek her ... freedom,
which if I did would not avail.... Upon examination of her, there being
nothing justly laid to her charge, yet to fulfil your wills, it was
determined, that she must have ten stripes in the open market place,
it being very cold, the snow lying by the walls, and the wind blowing
cold.... My love is much more increased to her, because I see your
cruelty so much enlarged to her.” [Footnote: Besse, ii. 208, 209.]
Yet, though laboring under such intense excitement, the only act of
insubordination wherewith this man is charged was saying in a loud voice
during the service, “What you are going about to set up, our God is
pulling down.” [Footnote: Hutch. _Hist._ i. 187.]
Dr. Dexter also speaks with pathos of the youth of some of the
criminals.
“Hannah Wright, a mere girl of less than fifteen summers, toiled ...
from Oyster Bay ... to Boston, that she might pipe in the ears of the
court ‘a warning in the name of the Lord.’” [Footnote: _As to Roger
Williams,_ p. 133.] This appears to have happened in 1664, [Footnote:
Besse, ii. 234. _New England Judged_, ed. 1703, p. 461.] yet the name of
Hannah Wright is recorded among those who were released in the general
jail delivery in 1661, [Footnote: Besse, ii. 224.] when she was only
twelve; and her sister had been banished. [Footnote: _New England
Judged_, ed. 1703, p. 461.]
But of all the scandals which have been dwelt on for two centuries
with such unction, none have been made more notorious than certain
extravagances committed by three women; and regarding them, the
reasoning of Dr. Dexter should be read in full.
“The Quaker of the seventeenth century ... was essentially a coarse,
blustering, conceited, disagreeable, impudent fanatic; whose religion
gained subjective comfort in exact proportion to the objective comfort
of which it was able to deprive others; and which broke out into its
choicest exhibitions in acts which were not only at that time in the
nature of a public scandal and nuisance, but which even in the brightest
light of this nineteenth century ... would subject those who should be
guilty of them to the immediate and stringent attention of the police
court. The disturbance of public Sabbath worship, and the indecent
exposure of the person--whether conscience be pleaded for them or
not--are punished, and rightly punished, as crimes by every civilized
government.” [Footnote: _As to Roger Williams_, pp. 138, 139.]
This paragraph undoubtedly refers to Mary Tomkins, who “on the First Day
of the week at Oyster River, broke up the service of God’s house ...
the scene ending in deplorable confusion;” [Footnote: _As to Roger
Williams_, p. 133.] and to Lydia Wardwell and Deborah Wilson, who
appeared in public naked.
Mary Tomkins and Alice Ambrose came to Massachusetts in 1662; landing
at Dover, they began preaching at the inn, to which a number of people
resorted. Mr. Rayner, hearing the news, hurried to the spot, and in
much irritation asked them what they were doing there? This led to an
argument about the Trinity, and the authority of ministers, and at
last the clergyman “in a rage flung away, calling to his people, at the
window, to go from amongst them.” [Footnote: _New England Judged_, ed.
1703, p. 362.] Nothing was done at the moment, but toward winter the two
came back from Maine, whither they had gone, and then Mr. Rayner saw
his opportunity. He caused Richard Walden to prosecute them, and as
the magistrate was ignorant of the technicalities of the law, the elder
acted as clerk, and drew up for him the following warrant:--
* * * * *
To the Constables of Dover, Hampton, Salisbury, Newbury, Rowley,
Ipswich, Wenham, Linn, Boston, Roxbury, Dedham, and until these vagabond
Quakers are carried out of this jurisdiction. You and every of you are
required, in the King’s Majesty’s name, to take these vagabond Quakers,
Anne Coleman, Mary Tomkins and Alice Ambrose, and make them fast to the
cart’s tail, and driving the cart through your several towns, to whip
them on their backs, not exceeding ten stripes apiece on each of them in
each town, and so to convey them from constable to constable, till they
come out of this jurisdiction, as you will answer it at your peril: and
this shall be your warrant.
Per me RICHARD WALDEN. At Dover, dated December the 22d, 1662.
[Footnote: Besse, ii. 227.]
* * * * *
The Rev. John Rayner pronounced judgment of death by flogging, for the
weather was bitter, the distance to be walked was eighty miles, and the
lashes were given with a whip, whose three twisted, knotted thongs cut
to the bone.
“So, in a very cold day, your deputy, Walden, caused these women to be
stripp’d naked from the middle upward, and tyed to a cart, and after
a while cruelly whipp’d them, whilst the priest stood and looked, and
laughed at it.... They went with the executioner to Hampton, and through
dirt and snow at Salisbury, half way the leg deep, the constable forced
them after the cart’s tayl at which he whipp’d them.” [Footnote: _New
England Judged_, pp. 366, 367.]
Had the Reverend John Rayner but followed the cart, to see that his
three hundred and thirty lashes were all given with the same ferocity
which warmed his heart to mirth at Dover, before his journey’s end he
would certainly have joyed in giving thanks to God over the women’s gory
corpses, freezing amid the snow. His negligence saved their lives, for
when the ghastly pilgrims passed through Salisbury, the people to their
eternal honor set the captives free.
Soon after, on Sunday,--“Whilst Alice Ambrose was at prayer, two
constables ... came ... and taking her ... dragged her out of doors, and
then with her face toward the snow, which was knee deep, over stumps and
old trees near a mile; when they had wearied themselves they ... left
the prisoner in an house ... and fetched Mary Tomkins, whom in like
manner they dragged with her face toward the snow....On the next
morning, which was excessive cold, they got a canoe ... and so carried
them to the harbour’s mouth, threatning, that ‘They would now so do with
them, as that they would be troubled with them no more.’ The women being
unwilling to go, they forced them down a very steep place in the snow,
dragging Mary Tomkins over the stumps of trees to the water side, so
that she was much bruised, and fainted under their hands: They plucked
Alice Ambrose into the water, and kept her swimming by the canoe in
great danger of drowning, or being frozen to death. They would in all
probability have proceeded in their wicked purpose to the murthering of
those three women, had they not been prevented by a sudden storm, which
drove them back to the house again. They kept the women there till near
midnight, and then cruelly turned them out of doors in the frost and
snow, Alice Ambrose’s clothes being frozen hard as boards.... It was
observable that those constables, though wicked enough of themselves,
were animated by a ruling elder of their church, whose name corresponded
not with his actions, for he was called Hate-evil Nutter, he put those
men forward, and by his presence encouraged them.” [Footnote: Besse, ii.
228.]
Subsequently, Mary Tomkins committed the breach of the peace complained
of, which was an interruption of a sermon against Quaker preaching.
[Footnote: _New England Judged_, ed. 1703, p. 386.]
Deborah Wilson, one of the women who went abroad naked, was insane, the
fact appearing of record subsequently as the judgment of the court. She
was flogged. [Footnote: _Quaker Invasion_, p. 104.]
Lydia Wardwell was the daughter of Isaac Perkins, a freeman. She married
Eliakim Wardwell, son of Thomas Wardwell, who was also a citizen. They
became Quakers; and the story begins when the poor young woman had
been a wife just three years. “At Hampton, Priest Seaborn Cotton,
understanding that one Eliakim Wardel had entertained Wenlock
Christison, went with some of his herd to Eliakim’s house, having like
a sturdy herdsman put himself at the head of his followers, with a
truncheon in his hand.” Eliakim was fined for harboring Christison, and
“a pretty beast for the saddle, worth about fourteen pound, was taken
... the overplus of [Footnote: Sewel, p. 340.] which to make up to him,
your officers plundred old William Marston of a vessel of green ginger,
which for some fine was taken from him, and forc’d it into Eliakim’s
house, where he let it lie and touched it not; ... and notwithstanding
he came not to your invented worship, but was fined ten shillings a
day’s absence, for him and his wife, yet was he often rated for priest’s
hire; and the priest (Seaborn Cotton, old John Cotton’s son) to obtain
his end and to cover himself, sold his rate to a man almost as bad
as himself, ... who coming in pretence of borrowing a little corn
for himself, which the harmless honest man willingly lent him; and he
finding thereby that he had corn, which was his design, Judas-like, he
went ... and measured it away as he pleased.”
“Another time, the said Eliakim being rated to the said priest, Seaborn
Cotton, the said Seaborn having a mind to a pied heifer Eliakim had, as
Ahab had to Naboth’s vineyard, sent his servant nigh two miles to fetch
her; who having robb’d Eliakim of her, brought her to his master.”...
“Again the said Eliakim was had to your court, and being by them fined,
they took almost all his marsh and meadow-ground from him to satisfie
it, which was for the keeping his cattle alive in winter ... and [so]
seized and took his estate, that they plucked from him most of that he
had.” [Footnote: _New England Judged,_ ed. 1703, pp. 374-376.] Lydia
Wardwell, thus reduced to penury, and shaken by the daily scenes of
unutterable horror through which she had to pass, was totally unequal to
endure the strain under which the masculine intellect of Anne Hutchinson
had reeled. She was pursued by her pastor, who repeatedly commanded her
to come to church and explain her absence from communion. [Footnote:
Besse, ii. 235.] The miserable creature, brooding over her blighted life
and the torments of her friends, became possessed with the delusion
that it was her duty to testify against the barbarity of flogging naked
women; so she herself went in among them naked for a sign. There could
be no clearer proof of insanity, for it is admitted that in every other
respect her conduct was exemplary.
Her judges at Ipswich had her bound to a rough post of the tavern, in
which they sat, and then, while the splinters tore her bare breasts,
they had her flesh cut from her back with the lash. [Footnote: _New
England Judged_, ed. 1703, p. 377.]
“Thus they served the wife, and the husband escaped not free; ... he
taxing Simon Broadstreet, ... for upbraiding his wife ... and telling
Simon of his malitious reproaching of his wife who was an honest woman
... and of that report that went abroad of the known dishonesty of
Simon’s daughter, Seaborn Cotton’s wife; Simon in a fierce rage, told
the court, ‘That if such fellows should be suffered to speak so in the
court, he would sit there no more:’ So to please Simon, Eliakim was
sentenc’d to be stripp’d from his waste upward, and to be bound to an
oak-tree that stood by their worship-house, and to be whipped fifteen
lashes; ... as they were having him out ... he called to Seaborn Cotton
... to come and see the work done (so far was he from being daunted by
their cruelty), who hastned out and followed him thither, and so did old
Wiggins, one of the magistrates, who when Eliakim was tyed to the tree
and stripp’d, said ... to the whipper... ‘Whip him a good;’ which the
executioner cruelly performed with cords near as big as a man’s little
finger;... Priest Cotton standing near him ... Eliakim ... when he was
loosed from the tree, said to him, amongst the people, ‘Seaborn, hath my
py’d heifer calv’d yet?’ Which Seaborn, the priest, hearing stole away
like a thief.” [Footnote: _New England Judged_, ed. 1703, pp. 377-379.]
As Margaret Brewster was the last who is known to have been whipped, so
is she one of the most famous, for she has been immortalized by Samuel
Sewall, an honest, though a dull man.
“July 8, 1677. New Meeting House Mane: In sermon time there came in a
female Quaker, in a canvas frock, her hair disshevelled and loose like
a Periwigg, her face as black as ink, led by two other Quakers, and two
other followed. It occasioned the greatest and most amazing uproar that
I ever saw. Isaiah 1. 12, 14.” [Footnote: _Mass. Hist. Coll._ fifth
series, v. 43.]
In 1675 the persecution had been revived, and the stories the woman
heard of the cruelties that were perpetrated on those of her own faith
inspired her with the craving to go to New England to protest against
the wrong; so she journeyed thither, and entered the Old South one
Sunday morning clothed in sackcloth, with ashes on her head.
At her trial she asked for leave to speak: “Governour, I desire thee to
hear me a little, for I have something to say in behalf of my friends in
this place: ... Oh governour! I cannot but press thee again and again,
to put an end to these cruel laws that you have made to fetch my friends
from their peaceable meetings, and keep them three days in the house of
correction, and then whip them for worshipping the true and living God:
Governour! Let me entreat thee to put an end to these laws, for the
desire of my soul is, that you may act for God, and then would you
prosper, but if you act against the Lord and his blessed truth, you will
assuredly come to nothing, the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.” ...
“Margaret Brewster, You are to have your clothes stript off to the
middle, and to be tied to a cart’s tail at the South Meeting House, and
to be drawn through the town, and to receive twenty stripes upon your
naked body.”
“The will of the Lord be done: I am contented.” ...
_Governour._ “Take her away.” [Footnote: Besse, ii. 263, 264.]
So ends the sacerdotal list of Quaker outrages, for, after Margaret
Brewster had expiated her crime of protesting against the repression
of free thought, there came a toleration, and with toleration a deep
tranquillity, so that the very name of Quaker has become synonymous with
quietude. The issue between them and the Congregationalists must be left
to be decided upon the legal question of their right as English subjects
to inhabit Massachusetts; and secondarily upon the opinion which shall
be formed of their conduct as citizens, upon the testimony of those
witnesses whom the church herself has called. But regarding the great
fundamental struggle for liberty of individual opinion, no presentation
of the evidence could be historically correct which did not include at
least one example of the fate that awaited peaceful families, under this
ecclesiastical government, who roused the ire of the priests.
Lawrence and Cassandra Southwick were an aged couple, members of the
Salem church, and Lawrence was a freeman. Josiah, their eldest son,
was a man; but they had beside a younger boy and girl named Daniel and
Provided.
The father and mother were first arrested in 1657 for harboring two
Quakers; Lawrence was soon released, but a Quaker tract was found upon
Cassandra. [Footnote: Besse, ii. 183.] Although no attempt seems to have
been made to prove heresy to bring the case within the letter of
the law, the paper was treated as a heretical writing, and she was
imprisoned for seven weeks and fined forty shillings.
Persecution made converts fast, and in Salem particularly a number
withdrew from the church and began to worship by themselves. All were
soon arrested, and the three Southwicks were again sent to Boston, this
time to serve as an example. They arrived on the 3d of February, 1657;
without form of trial they were whipped in the extreme cold weather and
imprisoned eleven days. Their cattle were also seized and sold to pay a
fine of £4 13s. for six weeks’ absence from worship on the Lord’s day.
The next summer, Leddra, who was afterwards hanged, and William Brend
went to Salem, and several persons were seized for meeting with them,
among whom were the Southwicks. A room was prepared for the criminals in
the Boston prison by boarding up the windows and stopping ventilation.
[Footnote: _New England Judged_, ed. 1703, p. 64.] They were refused
food unless they worked to pay for it; but to work when wrongfully
confined was against the Quaker’s conscience, so they did not eat for
five days. On the second day of fasting they were flogged, and then,
with wounds undressed, the men and women together were once more locked
in the dark, close room, to lie upon the bare boards, in the stifling
July heat; for they were not given beds. On the fourth day they were
told they might go if they would pay the jail fees and the constables;
but they refused, and so were kept in prison. On the morrow the jailer,
thinking to bring them to terms, put Brend in irons, neck and heels,
and he lay without food for sixteen hours upon his back lacerated with
flogging.
The next day the miserable man was ordered to work, but he lacked the
strength, had he been willing, for he was weak from starvation and pain,
and stiffened by the irons. And now the climax came. The jailer seized
a tarred rope and beat him till it broke; then, foaming with fury,
he dragged the old man down stairs, and, with a new rope, gave him
ninety-seven blows, when his strength failed; and Brend, his flesh
black and beaten to jelly, and his bruised skin hanging in bags full of
clotted blood, was thrust into his cell. There, upon the floor of that
dark and fetid den, the victim fainted. But help was at hand; an outcry
was raised, the people could bear no more, the doors were opened, and he
was rescued. [Footnote: _New England Judged_, ed. 1703, p. 66.]
The indignation was deep, and the government was afraid. Endicott sent
his own doctor, but the surgeon said that Brend’s flesh would “rot
from off his bones,” and he must die. And now the mob grew fierce
and demanded justice on the ruffian who had done this deed, and the
magistrates nailed a paper on the church door promising to bring him to
trial.
Then it was that the true spirit of his order blazed forth in Norton,
for the jailer was fashioned in his own image, and he threw over him the
mantle of the holy church. He made the magistrates take the paper down,
rebuking them for their faintness of heart, saying to them:--
William “Brend endeavoured to beat our gospel ordinances black and blue,
if he then be beaten black and blue, it is but just upon him, and I will
appear in his behalf that did so.” [Footnote: Besse, ii. 186.] And the
man was justified, and commanded to whip “the Quakers in prison ...
twice a week, if they refused to work, and the first time to add five
stripes to the former ten, and each time to add three to them.... Which
order ye sent to the jaylor, to strengthen his hands to do yet more
cruelly; being somewhat weakened by the fright of his former doings.”
[Footnote: _New England Judged_, ed. 1703, p. 67.]
After this the Southwicks, being still unable to obtain their freedom,
sent the following letter to the magistrates, which is a good example
of the writings of these “coarse, blustering, ... impudent
fanatics:”--[Footnote: _As to Roger Williams_, p. 138.]
* * * * *
_This to the Magistrates at Court in Salem._
FRIENDS,
Whereas it was your pleasures to commit us, whose names are
under-written, to the house of correction in Boston, altho’ the Lord,
the righteous Judge of heaven and earth, is our witness, that we had
done nothing worthy of stripes or of bonds; and we being committed by
your court, to be dealt withal as the law provides for foreign Quakers,
as ye please to term us; and having some of us, suffered your law
and pleasures, now that which we do expect, is, that whereas we have
suffered your law, so now to be set free by the same law, as your manner
is with strangers, and not to put us in upon the account of one law, and
execute another law upon us, of which, according to your own manner, we
were never convicted as the law expresses. If you had sent us upon the
account of your new law, we should have expected the jaylor’s order to
have been on that account, which that it was not, appears by the warrant
which we have, and the punishment which we bare, as four of us were
whipp’d, among whom was one that had formerly been whipp’d, so now also
according to your former law. Friends, let it not be a small thing in
your eyes, the exposing as much as in you lies, our families to ruine.
It’s not unknown to you the season, and the time of the year, for
those that live of husbandry, and what their cattle and families may be
exposed unto; and also such as live on trade; we know if the spirit of
Christ did dwell and rule in you, these things would take impression on
your spirits. What our lives and conversations have been in that place,
is well known; and what we now suffer for, is much for false reports,
and ungrounded jealousies of heresie and sedition. These thing lie upon
us to lay before you. As for our parts, we have true peace and rest in
the Lord in all our sufferings, and are made willing in the power and
strength of God, freely to offer up our lives in this cause of God, for
which we suffer; Yea and we do find (through grace) the enlargements
of God in our imprisoned state, to whom alone we commit ourselves and
families, for the disposing of us according to his infinite wisdom and
pleasure, in whose love is our rest and life.
From the House of Bondage in Boston wherein we are made captives by the
wills of men, although made free by the Son, John 8, 36. In which we
quietly rest, this 16th of the 5th month, 1658.
LAWRENCE | CASSANDRA | SOUTHWICK JOSIAH | SAMUEL SHATTOCK JOSHUA BUFFUM.
[Footnote: _New England Judged_, ed. 1703, p. 74.]
* * * * *
What the prisoners apprehended was being kept in prison and punished
under an _ex post facto_ law, and this was precisely what was done. When
brought into court they demanded to be told the crime wherewith they
were charged. They were answered: “It was ‘Entertaining the Quakers
who were their enemies; not coming to their meetings; and meeting by
themselves.’ They adjoyned, ‘That as to those things they had already
fastned their law upon them.’ ... So ye had nothing left but the hat,
for which (then) ye had no law. They answered--that they intended no
offence to ye in coming thither ... for it was not their manner to
have to do with courts. And as for withdrawing from their meetings, or
keeping on their hats, or doing anything in contempt of them, or their
laws, they said, the Lord was their witness ... that they did it not. So
ye rose up, and bid the jaylor take them away.” [Footnote: _New England
Judged,_ ed. 1703, p. 85.]
An acquittal seemed certain; yet it was intolerable to the clergy that
these accursed blasphemers should elude them when they held them
in their grasp; wherefore, the next day, the Rev. Charles Chauncy,
preaching at Thursday lecture, thus taught Christ’s love for men:
“Suppose ye should catch six wolves in a trap ... [there were six Salem
Quakers] and ye cannot prove that they killed either sheep or lambs;
and now ye have them they will neither bark nor bite: yet they have the
plain marks of wolves. Now I leave it to your consideration whether ye
will let them go alive, yea or nay.” [Footnote: _Idem_, pp. 85, 86.]
Then the divines had a consultation, “and your priests were put to
it, how to prove them as your law had said: and ye had them before you
again, and your priests were with you, every one by his side (so came
ye to your court) and John Norton must ask them questions, on purpose to
ensnare them, that by your standing law for hereticks, ye might condemn
them (as your priests before consulted) and when this would not do (for
the Lord was with them, and made them wiser than your teachers) ye made
a law to banish them, upon pain of death....” [Footnote: _Idem_, p. 87.]
After a violent struggle, the ministers, under Norton’s lead, succeeded,
on the 19th of October, 1658, in forcing the capital act through the
legislature, which contained a clause making the denial of reverence
to superiors, or in other words, the wearing the hat, evidence of
Quakerism. [Footnote: _New England Judged_, ed. 1703, pp. 100, 101;
_Mass. Rec._ vol. iv. pt. 1, p. 346.]
On that very day the bench ordered the prisoners at Ipswich to be
brought to the bar, and the Southwicks were bidden to depart before the
spring elections. [Footnote: _Mass. Rec._ vol. iv. pt. 1, p. 349.] They
did not go, and in May were once more in the felon’s dock. They asked
what wrong they had done. The judges told them they were rebellious for
not going as they had been commanded. The old man and woman piteously
pleaded “that they had no otherwhere to go,” nor had they done anything
to deserve banishment or death, though £100 (all they had in the world)
had been taken from them for meeting together. [Footnote: _New England
Judged_, ed. 1703, p. 106.]
“Major-General Dennison replied, that ‘they stood against the authority
of the country, in not submitting to their laws: that he should not go
about to speak much concerning the error of their judgments: but,’ added
he, ‘you and we are not able well to live together, and at present
the power is in our hand, and therefore the stronger must send off.’”
[Footnote: Besse, ii. 198.]
The father, mother, and son were banished under pain of death. The aged
couple were sent to Shelter Island, but their misery was well-nigh done;
they perished within a few days of each other, tortured to death by
flogging and starvation.
Josiah was shipped to England, but afterward returned, was seized,
and in the “seventh month, 1661, you had him before you, and at which
according to your former law, he should have been tried for his life.”
“But the great occasion you took against him, was his hat, which you
commanded him to pull off: ‘He told your governour he could not.’ You
said, ‘He would not.’ He told you, ‘It was a cross to his will to keep
it on; ... and that he could not do it for conscience sake.’ ... But
your governour told him, ‘That he was to have been tryed for his life,
but that you had made your late law to save his life, which, you said,
was mercy to him.’ Then he asked you, ‘Whether you were not as good to
take his life now, as to whip him after your manner, twelve or fourteen
times at the cart’s tail, through your towns, and then put him to death
afterward?’” He was condemned to be flogged through Boston, Roxbury, and
Dedham; but he, when he heard the judgment, “with arms stretched out,
and hands spread before you, said, ‘Here is my body, if you want a
further testimony of the truth I profess, take it and tear it in pieces
... it is freely given up, and as for your sentence I matter it not.’”
[Footnote: _New England Judged_, ed. 1703, pp. 354-356.]
This coarse, blustering, impudent fanatic had, indeed, “with a dogged
pertinacity” persisted in outrages which “had driven” the authorities
almost to frenzy; “therefore they tied him to a cart and lashed him for
fifteen miles, and while he “sang to the praise of God,” his tormentor
swung with all his might a tremendous two-handed whip, whose knotted
thongs were made of twisted cat-gut; [Footnote: _New England Judged_,
ed. 1703, p. 357, note.] thence he was carried fifteen miles from any
town into the wilderness.” [Footnote: Besse, ii. 225.]
An end had been made of the grown members of the family, but the two
children were still left. To reach them, the device was conceived of
enforcing the penalty for not attending church, since “it was well known
they had no estate, their parents being already brought to poverty by
their rapacious persecutors.” [Footnote: Sewel, p. 223.]
Accordingly, they were summoned and asked to account for their absence
from worship. Daniel answered “that if they had not so persecuted his
father and mother perhaps he might have come.” [Footnote: _New England
Judged_, ed. 1703, p. 381.] They were fined; and on the day on which
they lost their parents forever, the sale as slaves of this helpless
boy and girl was authorized to satisfy the debt. [Footnote: _Mass. Rec._
vol. iv. pt. 1, p. 366.]
Edmund Batter, treasurer of Salem, brought the children to the town,
and went to a shipmaster who was about to sail, to engage a passage
to Barbadoes. The captain made the excuse that they would corrupt his
ship’s company. “Oh, no,” said Batter, “you need not fear that, for they
are poor harmless creatures, and will not hurt any body.” ... “Will they
not so?” broke out the sailor, “and will ye offer to make slaves of so
harmless creatures?” [Footnote: _New England Judged_, ed. 1703, p. 112.]
Thus were free-born English subjects and citizens of Massachusetts dealt
with by the priesthood that ruled the Puritan Commonwealth.
None but ecclesiastical partisans can doubt the bearing of such
evidence. It was the mortal struggle between conservatism and
liberality, between repression and free thought. The elders felt it in
the marrow of their bones, and so declared it in their laws, denouncing
banishment under pain of death against those “adhering to or approoving
of any knoune Quaker, or the tenetts & practices of the Quakers, ...
manifesting thereby theire compliance with those whose designe it is to
ouerthrow the order established in church and commonwealth.” [Footnote:
_Mass. Rec._ vol. iv. pt. 1, p. 346.]
Dennison spoke with an unerring instinct when he said they could
not live together, for the faith of the Friends was subversive of a
theocracy. Their belief that God revealed himself directly to man led
with logical certainty to the substitution of individual judgment for
the rules of conduct dictated by a sacred class, whether they claimed to
derive their authority from their skill in interpreting the Scriptures,
or from traditions preserved by Apostolic Succession. Each man,
therefore, became, as it were, a priest unto himself, and they
repudiated an ordained ministry. Hence, their crime resembled that
of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, who “made priests of the lowest of the
people, which were not of the sons of Levi;” [Footnote: Jeroboam’s sin
is discussed in _Ne Sutor_, p. 25; _Divine Right of Infant Baptism_,
p. 26.] and it was for this reason that John Norton and John Endicott
resolved upon their extermination, even as Elisha and Jehu conspired to
exterminate the house of Ahab.
That they failed was due to no mercy for their victims, nor remorse
for the blood they made to flow, but to their inability to control the
people. Nothing is plainer upon the evidence, than that popular sympathy
was never with the ecclesiastics in their ferocious policy; and nowhere
does the contrast of feeling shine out more clearly than in the story of
the hanging of Robinson and Stevenson.
The figure of Norton towers above his contemporaries. He held the
administration in the hollow of his hand, for Endicott was his
mouthpiece; yet even he, backed by the whole power of the clergy,
barely succeeded in forcing through the Chamber of Deputies the statute
inflicting death.
“The priests and rulers were all for blood, and they pursued it.... This
the deputies withstood, and it could not pass, and the opposition grew
strong, for the thing came near. Deacon Wozel was a man much affected
therewith; and being not well at that time that he supposed the vote
might pass, he earnestly desired the speaker ... to send for him when it
was to be, lest by his absence it might miscarry. The deputies that were
against the ... law, thinking themselves strong enough to cast it
out, forbore to send for him. The vote was put and carried in the
affirmative,--the speaker and eleven being in the negative and thirteen
in the affirmative: so one vote carried it; which troubled Wozel so ...
that he got to the court, ... and wept for grief, ... and said ‘If he
had not been able to go, he would have crept upon his hands and knees,
rather than it should have been.’” [Footnote: _New England Judged_, ed.
1703, pp. 101, 102.]
After the accused had been condemned, the people, being strongly moved,
flocked about the prison, so that the magistrates feared a rescue, and a
guard was set.
As the day approached the murmurs grew, and on the morning of the
execution the troops were under arms and the streets patrolled.
Stevenson and Robinson were loosed from their fetters, and Mary Dyer,
who also was to die, walked between them; and so they went bravely hand
in hand to the scaffold. The prisoners were put behind the drums, and
their voices drowned when they tried to speak; for a great multitude was
about them, and at a word, in their deep excitement, would have risen.
[Footnote: _Idem_, pp. 122, 123.]
As the solemn procession moved along, they came to where the Reverend
John Wilson, the Boston pastor, stood with others of the clergy. Then
Wilson “fell a taunting at Robinson, and, shaking his hand in a light,
scoffing manner, said, ‘Shall such Jacks as you come in before authority
with your hats on?’ with many other taunting words.” Then Robinson
replied, “Mind you, mind you, it is for the not putting off the hat we
are put to death.” [Footnote: _New England Judged_, ed. 1703, p. 124.]
When they reached the gallows, Robinson calmly climbed the ladder and
spoke a few words. He told the people they did not suffer as evil-doers,
but as those who manifested the truth. He besought them to mind the
light of Christ within them, of which he testified and was to seal with
his blood.
He had said so much when Wilson broke in upon him: “Hold thy tongue,
be silent; thou art going to dye with a lye in thy mouth.” [Footnote:
_Idem_, p. 125.] Then they seized him and bound him, and so he died; and
his body was “cast into a hole of the earth,” where it lay uncovered.
Even the voters, the picked retainers of the church, were almost equally
divided, and beyond that narrow circle the tide of sympathy ran strong.
The Rev. John Rayner stood laughing with joy to see Mary Tomkins and
Alice Ambrose flogged through Dover, on that bitter winter day; but
the men of Salisbury cut those naked, bleeding women from the cart, and
saved them from their awful death.
The Rev. John Norton sneered at the tortures of Brend, and brazenly
defended his tormentor; but the Boston mob succored the victim as lie
lay fainting on the boards of his dark cell.
The Rev. Charles Chauncy, preaching the word of God, told his hearers to
kill the Southwicks like wolves, since he could not have their blood by
law; but the honest sailor broke out in wrath when asked to traffic in
the flesh of our New England children.
The Rev. John Wilson jeered at Robinson on his way to meet his death,
and reviled him as he stood beneath the gibbet, over the hole that
was his grave; but even the savage Endicott knew well that all the
trainbands of the colony could not have guarded Christison to the
gallows from the dungeon where he lay condemned.
Yet awful as is this Massachusetts tragedy, it is but a little
fragment of the sternest struggle of the modern world. The power of
the priesthood lies in submission to a creed. In their onslaughts on
rebellion they have exhausted human torments; nor, in their lust for
earthly dominion, have they felt remorse, but rather joy, when slaying
Christ’s enemies and their own. The horrors of the Inquisition, the
Massacre of St. Bartholomew, the atrocities of Laud, the abominations
of the Scotch Kirk, the persecution of the Quakers, had one object,--the
enslavement of the mind.
Freedom of thought is the greatest triumph over tyranny that brave men
have ever won; for this they fought the wars of the Reformation; for
this they have left their bones to whiten upon unnumbered fields
of battle; for this they have gone by thousands to the dungeon, the
scaffold, and the stake. We owe to their heroic devotion the most
priceless of our treasures, our perfect liberty of thought and speech;
and all who love our country’s freedom may well reverence the memory
of those martyred Quakers by whose death and agony the battle in New
England has been won.
CHAPTER VI.
THE SCIRE FACIAS.
Had the Puritan Commonwealth been in reality the thing which its
historians have described; had it been a society guided by men devoted
to civil liberty, and as liberal in religion as was consistent with the
temper of their age, the early relations of Massachusetts toward Great
Britain might now be a pleasanter study for her children. Cordiality
toward Charles I. would indeed have been impossible, for the Puritans
well knew the fate in store for them should the court triumph. Gorges
was the representative of the despotic policy toward America, and so
early as 1634, probably at his instigation, Laud became the head of a
commission, with absolute control over the plantations, while the next
year a writ of _quo warranto_ was brought against the patent. [Footnote:
See introduction to _New Canaan_, Prince Soc. ed.] With Naseby, however,
these dangers vanished, and thenceforward there would have been nothing
to mar an affectionate confidence in both Parliament and the Protector.
In fact, however, Massachusetts was a petty state, too feeble for
independence, yet ruled by an autocratic priesthood whose power
rested upon legislation antagonistic to English law; therefore the
ecclesiastics were jealous of Parliament, and had little love for
Cromwell, whom they found wanting in “a thorough testimony against the
blasphemers of our days.” [Footnote: Diary of Hull, Palfrey, ii. 400,
401, and note.]
The result was that the elders clung obstinately to every privilege
which served their ends, and repudiated every obligation which
conflicted with their ambition. Clerical political morality seldom fails
to be instructive, and the following example is typical of that peculiar
mode of reasoning. The terms of admission to ordinary corporations were
fixed by each organization for itself, but in case of injustice the
courts could give relief by setting aside unreasonable ordinances, and
sometimes Parliament itself would interfere, as it did upon the petition
against the exactions of the Merchant Adventurers. Now there was nothing
upon which the theocracy more strongly insisted than that “our charter
doeth expresly give vs an absolute & free choyce of our oune members;”
[Footnote: _Mass. Rec._ v. 287.] because by means of a religious test
the ministers could pack the constituencies with their tools; but on the
other hand they as strenuously argued “that no appeals or other ways of
interrupting our proceedings do lie against us,” [Footnote: Winthrop,
ii. 283.] because they well knew that any bench of judges before whom
such questions might come would annul the most vital of their statutes
as repugnant to the British Constitution.
Unfortunately for these churchmen, their objects, as ecclesiastical
politicians, could seldom be reconciled with their duty as English
subjects. At the outset, though made a corporation within the realm,
they felt constrained to organize in America to escape judicial
supervision. They were then obliged to incorporate towns and counties,
to form a representative assembly, and to levy general taxes and duties,
none of which things they had power to do. Still, such irregularities as
these, had they been all, most English statesmen would have overlooked
as unavoidable. But when it came to adopting a criminal code based on
the Pentateuch, and, in support of a dissenting form of worship, fining
and imprisoning, whipping, mutilating, and hanging English subjects
without the sanction of English law; when, finally, the Episcopal Church
itself was suppressed, and peaceful subjects were excluded from the
corporation for no reason but because they partook of her communion, and
were forbidden to seek redress by appealing to the courts of their king,
it seems impossible that any self-respecting government could have long
been passive.
At the Restoration Massachusetts had grown arrogant from long impunity.
She thought the time of reckoning would never come, and even in trivial
matters seemed to take a pride in slighting Great Britain and in
vaunting her independence. Laws were enacted in the name of the
Commonwealth, the king’s name was not in the writs, nor were the
royal arms upon the public buildings; even the oath of allegiance
was rejected, though it was unobjectionable in form. She had grown to
believe that were offence taken she had only to invent pretexts for
delay, to have her fault forgotten in some new revolution. General
Denison, at the Quaker trials, put the popular belief in a nut-shell:
“This year ye will go to complain to the Parliament, and the next year
they will send to see how it is; and the third year the government is
changed.” [Footnote: Sewel, p. 280.]
But, beside these irritating domestic questions, the corporation was
bitterly embroiled with its neighbors. Samuel Gorton and his friends
were inhabitants of Rhode Island, and were, no doubt, troublesome to
deal with; but their particular offence was ecclesiastical. An armed
force was sent over the border and they were seized. They were brought
to Boston and tried on the charge of being “blasphemous enemies of the
true religion of our Lord Jesus Christ, and of all his holy ordinances,
and likewise of all civil government among his people, and particularly
within this jurisdiction.” [Footnote: Winthrop, ii. 146.] All the
magistrates but three thought that Gorton ought to die, but he was
finally sentenced to an imprisonment of barbarous cruelty. The invasion
of Rhode Island was a violation of an independent jurisdiction, the
arrest was illegal, the sentence an arbitrary outrage. [Footnote:
See paper of Mr. Charles Deane, _New Eng. Historical and Genealogical
Register_, vol. iv.]
Massachusetts was also at feud in the north, and none of her quarrels
brought more serious results than this with the proprietors of New
Hampshire and Maine. The grant in the charter was of all lands between
the Charles and Merrimack, and also all lands within the space of three
miles to the northward of the said Merrimack, or to the northward of any
part thereof, and all lands lying within the limits aforesaid from the
Atlantic to the South Sea.
Clearly the intention was to give a margin of three miles beyond a river
which was then supposed to flow from west to east, and accordingly
the territory to the north, being unoccupied, was granted to Mason and
Gorges. Nor was this construction questioned before 1639--the General
Court having at an early day measured off the three miles and marked the
boundary by what was called the Bound House.
Gradually, however, as it became known that the Merrimack rose to the
north, larger claims were made. In 1641 the four New Hampshire towns
were absorbed with the consent of their inhabitants, who thus gained
a regular government; another happy consequence was the settlement of
sundry eminent divines, by whose ministrations the people “were very
much civilized and reformed.” [Footnote: Neal’s New England, i. 210.]
In 1652 a survey was made of the whole river, and 43° 40’ 12” was fixed
as the latitude of its source. A line extended east from three miles
north of this point came out near Portland, and the intervening space
was forthwith annexed. The result of such a policy was that Charles
had hardly been crowned before complaints poured in from every side.
Quakers, Baptists, Episcopalians, all who had suffered persecution,
flocked to the foot of the throne; and beside these came those who had
been injured in their estates, foremost of whom were the heirs of Mason
and Gorges. The pressure was so great and the outcry so loud that, in
September, 1660, it was thought in London a governor-general would be
sent to Boston; [Footnote: Leverett to Endicott. Hutch. Coll., Prince
Soc. ed. ii. 40.] and, in point of fact, almost the first communication
between the king and his colony was his order to spare the Quakers.
The outlook was gloomy, and there was hesitation as to the course
to pursue. At length it was decided to send Norton and Bradstreet to
England to present an address and protect the public interests. The
mission was not agreeable; Norton especially was reluctant, and with
reason, for he had been foremost in the Quaker persecutions, and was
probably aware that in the eye of English law the executions were
homicide.
However, after long vacillation, “the Lord so encouraged and
strengthened” his heart that he ventured to sail. [Footnote: Feb.
11, 1661-2. Palfrey, ii. 524.] So far as the crown was concerned
apprehension was needless, for Lord Clarendon was prime minister, whose
policy toward New England was throughout wise and moderate, and the
agents were well received. Still they were restless in London, and Sewel
tells an anecdote which may partly account for their impatience to be
gone.
“Now the deputies of New England came to London, and endeavored to clear
themselves as much as possible, but especially priest Norton, who bowed
no less reverently before the archbishop, than before the king....
“They would fain have altogether excused themselves; and priest Norton
thought it sufficient to say that he did not assist in the bloody trial,
nor had advised to it. But John Copeland, whose ear was cut off at
Boston, charged the contrary upon him: and G. Fox, the elder, got
occasion to speak with them in the presence of some of his friends, and
asked Simon Broadstreet, one of the New England magistrates, ‘whether he
had not a hand in putting to death those they nicknamed Quakers?’ He not
being able to deny this confessed he had. Then G. Fox asked him and his
associates that were present, ‘whether they would acknowledge themselves
to be subjects to the laws of England? and if they did by what law they
had put his friends to death?’ They answered, ‘They were subjects to the
laws of England; and they had put his friends to death by the same law,
as the Jesuits were put to death in England.’ Hereupon G. Fox asked,
‘whether they did believe that those his friends, whom they had put to
death, were Jesuits, or jesuitically affected?’ They said ‘Nay.’ ‘Then,’
replied G. Fox, ‘ye have murdered them; for since ye put them to death
by the law that Jesuits are put to death here in England, it plainly
appears, you have put them to death arbitrarily, without any law.’
Thus Broadstreet, finding himself and his company ensnar’d by their own
words, ask’d, ‘Are you come to catch us?’ But he told them ‘They had
catch’d themselves, and they might justly be questioned for their lives;
and if the father of William Robinson (one of those that were put to
death) were in town, it was probable he would question them, and bring
their lives into jeopardy. For he not being of the Quakers persuasion,
would perhaps not have so much regard to the point of forbearance, as
they had.’ Broadstreet seeing himself thus in danger began to flinch and
to sculk; for some of the old royalists were earnest with the Quakers to
prosecute the New England persecutors. But G. Fox and his friends said,
‘They left them to the Lord, to whom vengeance belonged, and he would
repay it.’ Broadstreet however, not thinking it safe to stay in England,
left the city, and with his companions went back again to New England.”
[Footnote: Sewel, p. 288.]
The following June the agents were given the king’s answer [Footnote:
1662, June 28.] to their address and then sailed for home. It is
certainly a most creditable state paper. The people of Massachusetts
were thanked for their good will, they were promised oblivion for the
past, and were assured that they should have their charter confirmed to
them and be safe in all their privileges and liberties, provided they
would make certain reforms in their government. They were required to
repeal such statutes as were contrary to the laws of England, to take
the oath of allegiance, and to administer justice in the king’s name.
And then followed two propositions that were crucial: “And since the
principle and foundation of that charter was and is the freedom of
liberty of conscience, wee do hereby charge and require you that that
freedom and liberty be duely admitted,” especially in favor of those
“that desire to use the Book of Common Prayer.” And secondly, “that
all the freeholders of competent estates, not vicious in conversations,
orthodox in religion (though of different perswasions concerning church
government) may have their vote in the election of all officers civill
or millitary.” [Footnote: Hutch. Coll., Prince Soc. ed. ii. 101-103.]
However judicious these reforms may have been, or howsoever strictly
they conformed with the spirit of English law, was immaterial. They
struck at the root of the secular power of the clergy, and they roused
deep indignation. The agents had braved no little danger, and had shown
no little skill in behalf of the commonwealth; and the fate of John
Norton enables us to realize the rancor of theological feeling. The
successor of Cotton, by general consent the leading minister, in some
respects the most eminent man in Massachusetts, he had undertaken a
difficult mission against his will, in which he had acquitted himself
well; yet on his return he was so treated by his brethren and friends
that he died in the spring of a broken heart. [Footnote: April 5, 1663.]
The General Court took no notice of the king’s demands except to order
the writs to run in the royal name. [Footnote: Oct. 8, 1662. _Mass.
Rec._ vol. iv. pt. 2, p. 58.] And it is a sign of the boldness, or else
of the indiscretion, of those in power, that this crisis was chosen
for striking a new coin, [Footnote: 1662, May 7.]--an act confessedly
illegal and certain to give offence in England, both as an assumption of
sovereignty and an interference with the currency.
From the first Lord Clarendon paid some attention to colonial affairs,
and he appears to have been much dissatisfied with the condition in
which he found them. At length, in 1664, he decided to send a commission
to New England to act upon the spot.
Great pressure must have been brought by some who had suffered, for
Samuel Maverick, the Episcopalian, who had been fined and imprisoned
in 1646 for petitioning with Childe, was made a member. Colonel Richard
Nichols, the head of the board, was a man of ability and judgment;
the choice of Sir Robert Carr and Colonel George Cartwright was less
judicious.
The commissioners were given a public and private set of instructions,
[Footnote: Public Instructions, Hutch. _Hist._ i. 459.] and both were
admirable. They were to examine the condition of the country and its
laws, and, if possible, to make some arrangement by which the crown
might have a negative at least upon the choice of the governor; they
were to urge the reforms already demanded by the king, especially
a larger toleration, for “they doe in truth deny that liberty of
conscience to each other, which is equally provided for and granted to
every one of them by their charter.” [Footnote: Private Instructions
_O’Callaghan Documents_, iii. 58.] They were directed to be conciliatory
toward the people, and under no circumstances to meddle with public
worship, nor were they to press for any sudden enforcement of the
revenue acts. On one point alone they were to insist: they were
instructed to sit to hear appeals in causes in which the parties alleged
they had been wronged by colonial decisions.
Unquestionably the chancellor was right in principle. The only way
whereby such powerful corporations as the trade-guilds or the East India
Company could be kept from acts of oppression was through the appellate
jurisdiction, by which means their enactments could be brought before
the courts, and those annulled which in the opinion of the judges
transcended the charters. The Company of Massachusetts Bay was a
corporation having jurisdiction over many thousand English subjects,
only a minority of whom were freemen and voters. So long, therefore,
as she remained within the empire, the crown was bound to see that
the privileges of the English Constitution were not denied within her
territory. Yet, though this is true, it is equally certain that the
erection of a commission of appeal without an act of Parliament
was irregular. The stretch of prerogative, nevertheless, cannot be
considered oppressive when it is remembered that Massachusetts was a
corporation which had escaped from the realm to avoid judicial process,
and which refused to appear and plead; hence Lord Clarendon had but
this alternative: he could send judges to sit upon the spot, or he could
proceed against the charter in London. The course he chose may have been
illegal, but it was the milder of the two.
The commissioners landed on July 23, 1664, but they did not stay in
Boston. Their first business was to subdue the Dutch at New York, and
they soon left to make the attack. The General Court now recurred, for
the first time, to the dispatch which their agents had brought home, and
proceeded to amend the law relating to the franchise. They extended the
qualification by enacting that Englishmen who presented a certificate
under the hands of the minister of the town that they were orthodox in
religion and not vicious in life, and who paid, beside, 10s. at a single
rate, might become freemen, as well as those who were church-members.
[Footnote: _Mass. Rec._ vol. iv. pt. 2, p. 117.] The effect of such
a change could hardly have been toward liberality, rather, probably,
toward concentration of power in the church. However slight, there
was some popular control over the rejection of an applicant to join
a congregation; but giving a certificate was an act that must have
depended on the pastor’s will alone.
The court then drew up an address to the king: “If your poore subjects,
... doe... prostrate themselues at your royal feete, & begg yor favor,
wee hope it will be graciously accepted by your majestje, and that as
the high place you sustejne on earth doeth number you here among the
gods, [priests can cringe as well as torture] so you will jmitate the
God of heaven, in being ready... to receive their crjes...,” [Footnote:
_Mass. Rec._ vol. iv. pt. 2, p. 129.] And he was implored to reflect on
the affliction of heart it was to them, that their sins had provoked
God to permit their adversaries to procure a commission, under the great
seal, to four persons to hear appeals. When this address reached London
it caused surprise. The chancellor was annoyed. He wrote to America,
pointing out that His Majesty would hardly think himself well used
at complaints before a beginning had been made, and a demand that his
commission should be revoked before his commissioners had been able
to deliver their instructions. “I know,” he said, “they are expressly
inhibited from intermedling with, or instructing the administration of
justice, according to the formes observed there; but if in truth, in
any extraordinary case, the proceedings there have been irregular, and
against the rules of justice, as some particular cases, particularly
recommended to them by His Majesty, seeme to be, it cannot be presumed
that His Majesty hath or will leave his subjects of New England, without
hope of redresse by an appeale to him, which his subjects of all his
other kingdomes have free liberty to make.” [Footnote: Hutch. _Hist._ i.
465.]
The campaign against New York was short and successful, and the
commissioners were soon at leisure. As they had reason to believe that
Massachusetts would prove stubborn, they judged it wiser to begin with
the more tractable colonies first. They therefore went to Plymouth,
[Footnote: Feb. 1664-5.] and, on their arrival, according to their
instructions, submitted the four following propositions:--
First. That all householders should take the oath of allegiance, and
that justice should be administered in the king’s name.
Second. That all men of competent estates and civil conversation,
though of different judgments, might be admitted to be freemen, and have
liberty to choose and be chosen officers, both civil and military.
Third. That all men and women of orthodox opinions, competent knowledge,
and civil lives not scandalous, should be admitted to the Lord’s Supper
[and have baptism for their children, either in existing churches or
their own].
Fourth. That all laws ... derogatory to his majesty should be repealed.
[Footnote: Palfrey, ii. 601.]
Substantially the same proposals were made subsequently in Rhode Island
and Connecticut. They were accepted without a murmur. A few appeal cases
were heard, and the work was done.
The commissioners reported their entire satisfaction to the government,
the colonies sent loyal addresses, and Charles returned affectionate
answers.
Massachusetts alone remained to be dealt with, but her temper was in
striking contrast to that of the rest of New England. The reason is
obvious. Nowhere else was there a fusion of church and state. The
people had, therefore, no oppressive statutes to uphold, nor anything
to conceal. Provided the liberty of English subjects was secured to them
they were content to obey the English Constitution. On the other hand,
Massachusetts was a theocracy, the power of whose priesthood rested on
enactments contrary to British institutions, and which, therefore, would
have been annulled upon appeal. Hence the clerical party were wild with
fear and rage, and nerved themselves to desperate resistance.
“But alasse, sir, the commission impowering those commisioners to heare
and determine all cases whatever, ... should it take place, what would
become of our civill government which hath binn, under God, the heade
of that libertie for our consciences for which the first adventurers
... bore all ... discouragements that encountered them ... in this
wildernes.” Rather than submit, they protested they had “sooner leave
our place and all our pleasant outward injoyments.” [Footnote: Court to
Boyle. _Hutch. Coll._, Prince Soc. ed. ii. 113.]
Under such conditions a direct issue was soon reached. The General
Court, in answer to the commissioners’ proposals, maintained that the
observance of their charter was inconsistent with appeals; that they had
already provided an oath of allegiance; that they had conformed to
his majesty’s requirements in regard to the franchise; and lastly, in
relation to toleration, there was no equivocation. “Concerning the vse
of the Common Prayer Booke”... we had not become “voluntary exiles from
our deare native country, ... could wee haue seene the word of God,
warranting us to performe our devotions in that way, & to haue the same
set vp here; wee conceive it is apparent that it will disturbe our peace
in our present enjoyments.” [Footnote: 1665. _Mass. Rec._ vol. iv. pt.
2, p.200]
Argument was useless. The so-called oath of allegiance was not that
required by Parliament; the alteration in the franchise was a sham;
while the two most important points, appeals to England and toleration
in religion, were rejected. The commissioners, therefore, asked for
a direct answer to this question: “Whither doe yow acknowledge his
majestjes comission ... to be of full force?” [Footnote: _Mass. Rec._
vol. iv. pt. 2, p.204] They were met by evasion. On the 23d of May they
gave notice that they should sit the next morning to hear the case of
Thos. Deane et al. vs. The Gov. & Co. of Mass. Bay, a revenue appeal.
Forthwith the General Court proclaimed by trumpet that the hearing would
not be permitted.
Coercion was impossible, as no troops were at hand. The commissioners
accordingly withdrew and went to Maine, which they proceeded to sever
from Massachusetts. [Footnote: June, 1665] In this they followed the
king’s instructions, who himself acted upon the advice of the law
officers of the crown, who had given an opinion sustaining the claim of
Gorges. [Footnote: Charles II.’s letter to Inhabitants of Maine. _Hutch.
Coll._, Prince Soc. ed. ii. 110; Palf. ii. 622.]
The triumph was complete. All that the English government was then able
to do was to recall the commissioners, direct that agents should be sent
to London at once, and forbid interference with Maine. No notice was
taken of the order to send agents; and in 1668 possession was again
taken of the province, and the courts of the company once more sat in
the county of York. [Footnote: July, 1668. Report of Com. _Mass. Rec._
vol. iv. pt. 2, p. 401.]
This was the culmination of the Puritan Commonwealth. The clergy were
exultant, and the Rev. Mr. Davenport of New Haven wrote in delight to
Leverett:--
“Their claiming power to sit authoritatively as a court for appeales,
and that to be managed in an arbitrary way, was a manifest laying of
a groundworke to undermine your whole government established by your
charter. If you had consented thereunto, you had plucked downe with
your owne hands that house which wisdom had built for you and your
posterity.... As for the solemnity of publishing it, in three places,
by sounding a trumpet, I believe you did it upon good advice, ... for
declaring the courage and resolution of the whole countrey to defend
their charter liberties and priviledges, and not to yeeld up theire
right voluntarily, so long as they can hold it, in dependence upon God
in Christ, whose interest is in it, for his protection and blessing,
who will be with you while you are with him.” [Footnote: Davenport to
Leverett. _Hutch. Coll._, Prince Soc. ed. ii. 119.]
Although the colonists were alarmed at their own success, there was
nothing to fear. At no time before or since could England have been so
safely defied. In 1664 war was begun against Holland; 1665 was the
year of the plague; 1666 of the fire. In June, 1667, the Dutch, having
dispersed the British fleets, sailed up the Medway, and their guns were
heard in London. Peace became necessary, and in August Clarendon was
dismissed from office. The discord between the crown and Parliament
paralyzed the nation, and the wastefulness of Charles kept him always
poor. By the treaty of Dover in 1670 he became a pensioner of Louis XIV.
The Cabal followed, probably the worst ministry England ever saw; and
in 1672, at Clifford’s suggestion, the exchequer was closed and the debt
repudiated to provide funds for the second Dutch war. In March fighting
began, and the tremendous battles with De Ruyter kept the navy in the
Channel. At length, in 1673, the Cabal fell, and Danby became prime
minister.
Although during these years of disaster and disgrace Massachusetts was
not molested by Great Britain, they were not all years during which the
theocracy could tranquilly enjoy its victory.
So early as 1671 the movements of the Indians began to give anxiety; and
in 1675 Philip’s War broke out, which brought the colony to the brink
of ruin, and in which the clergy saw the judgment of God against the
Commonwealth, for tenderness toward the Quakers. [Footnote: _Reforming
Synod, Magnalia_, bk. 5, pt. 4.]
With the rise of Danby a more regular administration opened, and, as
usual, the attention of the government was fixed upon Massachusetts by
the clamors of those who demanded redress for injuries alleged to have
been received at her hands. In 1674 the heirs of Mason and Gorges, in
despair at the reoccupation of Maine, proposed to surrender their claim
to the king, reserving one third of the product of the customs for
themselves. The London merchants also had become restive under the
systematic violation of the Navigation Acts. The breach in the
revenue laws had, indeed, been long a subject of complaint, and the
commissioners had received instructions relating thereto; but it was not
till this year that these questions became serious.
The first statute had been passed by the Long Parliament, but the one
that most concerned the colonies was not enacted till 1663. The object
was not only to protect English shipping, but to give her the entire
trade of her dependencies. To that end it was made illegal to import
European produce into any plantation except through England; and,
conversely, colonial goods could only be exported by being landed in
England.
The theory upon which this legislation was based is exploded; enforced,
it would have crippled commerce; but it was then, and always had been,
a dead letter at Boston. New England was fast getting its share of the
carrying trade. London merchants already began to feel the competition
of its cheap and untaxed ships, and manufacturers to complain that they
were undersold in the American market, by goods brought direct from the
Continental ports. A petition, therefore, was presented to the king, to
carry the law into effect. No colonial office then existed; the affairs
of the dependencies were assigned to a committee of the Privy Council,
called the Lords of Committee of Trade and Plantations; and on
these questions being referred by them to the proper officers, the
commissioners of customs sustained the merchants; the attorney-general,
the heirs of Mason and Gorges. [Footnote: Palfrey, iii. 281; Chalmers’s
_Political Annals of the United Colonies_, p. 262.] The famous Edward
Randolph now appears. The government was still too deeply embarrassed to
act with energy. A temporizing policy was therefore adopted; and as
the experiment of a commission had failed, Randolph was chosen as a
messenger to carry the petitions and opinions to Massachusetts; together
with a letter from the king, directing that agents should be sent in
answer thereto. After delivering them, he was ordered to devote himself
to preparing a report upon the country. He reached Boston June 10, 1676.
Although it was a time of terrible suffering from the ravages of the
Indian war, the temper of the magistrates was harsher than ever.
The repulse of the commissioners had convinced them that Charles was
not only lazy and ignorant, but too poor to use force; and they also
believed him to be so embroiled with Parliament as to make his overthrow
probable. Filled with such feelings, their reception of Randolph was
almost brutal. John Leverett was governor, who seems to have taken pains
to mark his contempt in every way in his power. Randolph was an able,
but an unscrupulous man, and probably it would not have been difficult
to have secured his good-will. Far however from bribing, or even
flattering him, they so treated him as to make him the bitterest enemy
the Puritan Commonwealth ever knew.
Being admitted into the council chamber, he delivered the letter.
[Footnote: Randolph’s Narrative. _Hutch. Coll._, Prince Soc. ed. ii.
240.] The governor opened it, glanced at the signature, and, pretending
never to have heard of Henry Coventry, asked who he might be. He was
told he was his majesty’s principal secretary of state. He then read it
aloud to the magistrates. Even the fierce Endicott, when he received the
famous “missive” from the Quaker Shattock, “laid off his hat ... [when]
he look’d upon the papers,” [Footnote: Sewel, p. 282.] as a mark of
respect to his king; but Leverett and his council remained covered.
Then the governor said “that the matters therein contained were very
inconsiderable things and easily answered, and it did no way concern
that government to take any notice thereof;” and so Randolph was
dismissed. Five days after he was again sent for, and asked whether he
“intended for London by that ship that was ready to saile?” If so, he
could have a duplicate of the answer to the king, as the original was to
go by other hands. He replied that he had other business in charge, and
inquired whether they had well considered the petitions, and fixed upon
their agents so soon. Leverett did not deign to answer, but told him
“he looked upon me as Mr. Mason’s agent, and that I might withdraw.” The
next day he saw the governor at his own house, who took occasion, when
Randolph referred to the Navigation Acts, to expound the legal views
of the theocracy. “He freely declared to me that the lawes made by your
majestie and your Parliament obligeth them in nothing but what consists
with the interest of that colony, that the legislative power is and
abides in them solely ... and that all matters in difference are to
be concluded by their finall determination, without any appeal to your
majestie, and that your majestie ought not to retrench their liberties,
but may enlarge them.” [Footnote: Randolph’s Narrative. _Hutch. Coll._,
Prince Soc. ed. ii. 243.] One last interview took place when Randolph
went for dispatches for England, after his return from New Hampshire;
then he “was entertained by” Leverett “with a sharp reproof for
publishing the substance of my errand into those parts, contained
in your majestie’s letters, ... telling me that I designed to make a
mutiny.... I told him, if I had done anything amisse, upon complaint
made to your majestie he would certainly have justice done him.”...
“At my departure ... he ... intreated me to give a favourable report of
the country and the magistrates thereof, adding that those that blessed
them God would blesse, and those that cursed them God would curse.” And
that “they were a people truely fearing the Lord and very obedient to
your majestie.” [Footnote: _Hutch. Coll._, Prince Soc. ed. ii. 248.] And
so the royal messenger was dismissed in wrath, to tell his story to the
king.
The legislature met in August, 1676, and a decision had to be made
concerning agents. On the whole, the clergy concluded it would be
wiser to obey the crown, “provided they be, with vtmost care & caution,
qualified as to their instructions.” [Footnote: _Mass. Rec._ v. 99.]
Accordingly, after a short adjournment, the General Court chose William
Stoughton and Peter Bulkely; and having strictly limited their power
to a settlement of the territorial controversy, they sent them on their
mission. [Footnote: _Mass. Rec._ v. 114.]
Almost invariably public affairs were seen by the envoys of the Company
in a different light from that in which they were viewed by the clerical
party at home, and these particularly had not been long in London before
they became profoundly alarmed. There was, indeed, reason for grave
apprehension. The selfish and cruel policy of the theocracy had borne
its natural fruit: without an ally in the world, Massachusetts was beset
by enemies. Quakers, Baptists, and Episcopalians whom she had persecuted
and exiled; the heirs of Mason and Gorges, whom she had wronged; Andros,
whom she had maligned; [Footnote: He had been accused of countenancing
aid to Philip when governor of New York. O’Callaghan Documents, iii.
258.] and Randolph, whom she had insulted, wrought against her with
a government whose sovereign she had offended and whose laws she had
defied. Even her English friends had been much alienated. [Footnote:
Palfrey, iii. 278, 279.]
The controversy concerning the boundary was referred to the two chief
justices, who promptly decided against the Company; [Footnote: See
Opinion; Chalmers’s _Annals_, p. 504.] and the easy acquiescence of the
General Court must raise a doubt as to their faith in the soundness
of their claims. And now again the fatality which seemed to pursue
the theocracy in all its dealings with England led it to give fresh
provocation to the king by secretly buying the title of Gorges for
twelve hundred and fifty pounds. [Footnote: May, 1677. Chalmers’s
_Annals_, pp. 396, 397. See notes, Palfrey, iii. 312.]
Charles had intended to settle Maine on the Duke of Monmouth. It was a
worthless possession, whose revenue never paid for its defence; yet so
stubborn was the colony that it made haste to anticipate the crown and
thus become “Lord Proprietary” of a burdensome province at the cost of
a slight which was never forgiven. Almost immediately the Privy Council
had begun to open other matters, such as coining and illicit trade; and
the attorney-general drew up a list of statutes which, in his opinion,
were contrary to the laws of England. The agents protested that they
were limited by their instructions, but were sharply told that his
majesty did not think of treating with his own subjects as with
foreigners, and it would be well to intimate the same to their
principals. [Footnote: Palfrey, iii. 309.] In December, 1677, Stoughton
wrote in great alarm that something must be done concerning the
Navigation Acts or a breach would be inevitable. [Footnote: Hutch.
_Hist._ i. 288.] And the General Court saw reason in this emergency to
increase the tension by reviving the obnoxious oath of fidelity to the
country, [Footnote: _Mass. Rec._ v. 154.]--the substitute for the oath
of allegiance,--and thus gave Randolph a new and potent weapon. In the
spring [Footnote: Palfrey, iii. 316, 317; Chalmers’s _Annals_, p. 439.]
the law officers gave an opinion that the misdemeanors alleged against
Massachusetts were sufficient to avoid her patent; and the Privy
Council, in view of the encroachments and injuries which she had
continually practised on her neighbors, and her contempt of his
majesty’s commands, advised that a _quo warranto_ should be brought
against the charter. Randolph was appointed collector at Boston.
[Footnote: 1678, May 31.]
Even Leverett now saw that some concessions must be made, and the
General Court ordered the oath of allegiance to be taken; nothing but
perversity seems to have caused the long delay. [Footnote: Oct. 2, 1678.
_Mass. Rec._ v. 193. See Palfrey, iii. 320, note 2.] The royal arms were
also carved in the court-house; and this was all, for the clergy were
determined upon those matters touching their authority. The agents
were told, “that which is farr more considerable then all these is the
interest of the Lord Jesus & of his churches ... which ought to be
farr dearer to us than our liues; and ... wee would not that by any
concessions of ours, or of yours... the least stone should be put out of
the wall.” [Footnote: _Mass. Rec._ v. 202.]
Both agents and magistrates were, nevertheless, thoroughly frightened,
and being determined not to yield, in fact, they resorted to a policy
of misrepresentation, with the hope of deceiving the English government.
[Footnote: See Answers of Agents, Chalmers’s _Annals_, p. 450.]
Stoughton and Bulkely had already assured the Lords of Committee that
the “rest of the inhabitants were very inconsiderable as to number,
compared with those that were acknowledged church-members.” [Footnote:
Palfrey, iii. 318.] They were in fact probably as five to one. The
General Court had been censured for using the word Commonwealth in
official documents, as intimating independence. They hastened to
assure the crown that it had not of late been used, and should not be
thereafter; [Footnote: _Mass. Rec._ v. 198. And see, in general,
the official correspondence, pp. 197-203.] yet in November, 1675,
commissions were thus issued. [Footnote: Palfrey, iii. 322.] But the
breaking out of the Popish plot began to absorb the whole attention of
the government at London; and the agents, after receiving a last rebuke
for the presumption of the colony in buying Maine, were at length
allowed to depart. [Footnote: Nov. 1679.]
Nearly half a century had elapsed since the emigration, and with
the growth of wealth and population changes had come. In March, John
Leverett, who had long been the head of the high-church party, died, and
the election of Simon Bradstreet as his successor was a triumph for the
opposition. Great as the clerical influence still was, it had lost much
of its old despotic power, and the congregations were no longer united
in support of the policy of their pastors. This policy was singularly
desperate. Casting aside all but ecclesiastical considerations, the
clergy consistently rejected any compromise with the crown which
threatened to touch the church. Almost from the first they had
recognized that substantial independence was necessary in order to
maintain the theocracy. Had the colony been strong, they would doubtless
have renounced their allegiance; but its weakness was such that, without
the protection of England, it would have been seized by France. Hence
they resorted to expedients which could only end in disaster, for it
was impossible for Massachusetts, while part of the British Empire, to
refuse obedience at her pleasure to laws which other colonies cheerfully
obeyed.
Without an ally, no resistance could be made to England, when at length
her sovereignty should be asserted; and an armed occupation and military
government were inevitable upon a breach.
Though such considerations are little apt to induce a priesthood
to surrender their temporal power, they usually control commercial
communities. Accordingly, Boston and the larger towns favored
concession, while the country was the ministers’ stronghold. The result
of this divergence of opinion was that the moderate party, to which
Bradstreet and Dudley belonged, predominated in the Board of Assistants,
while the deputies remained immovable. The branches of the legislature
thus became opposed; no course of action could be agreed on, and the
theocracy drifted to its destruction.
The duplicity characteristic of theological politics grew daily more
marked. In May, 1679, a law had been passed forbidding the building
of churches without leave from the freemen of the town or the General
Court. [Footnote: Mass. Rec. v. 213.] On the 11th of June, 1680, three
persons representing the society of Baptists were summoned before the
legislature, charged with the crime of erecting a meeting-house. They
were admonished and forbidden to meet for worship except with the
established congregations; and their church was closed. [Footnote:
Mass. Rec. v. 271.] That very day an address was voted to the king, one
passage of which is as follows: “Concerning liberty of conscience, ...
that after all, a multitude of notorious errors ... be openly broached,
... amongst us, as by the Quakers, &c., wee presume his majesty doeth
not intend; and as for other Prottestant dissenters, that carry it
peaceably & soberly, wee trust there shallbe no cause of just complaint
against us on their behalfe.” [Footnote: _Mass. Rec._ v. 287.]
Meanwhile Randolph had renewed his attack. He declared that in spite of
promises and excuses the revenue laws were not enforced; that his men
were beaten, and that he hourly expected to be thrown into prison;
whereas in other colonies, he asserted, he was treated with great
respect. [Footnote: June, 1680. Palfrey, iii. 340.] There can be no
doubt ingenuity was used to devise means of annoyance, and certainly
the life he was made to lead was hard. In March [Footnote: March 15,
1680-1.] he sailed for home, and while in London he made a series of
reports to the government which seem to have produced the conviction
that the moment for action had come. In December he returned,
commissioned as deputy-surveyor and auditor-general for all New England,
except New Hampshire. When Stoughton and Bulkely were dismissed, the
colony had been commanded to send new agents within six months. In
September, 1680, another royal letter had been written, in which the
king dwelt upon the misconduct of his subjects, “when ... we signified
unto you our gracious inclination to have all past deeds forgotten...
wee then little thought that those markes of our grace and favour should
have found no better acceptance amoung you.... We doe therefore by
these our letters, strictly command and require you, as you tender your
allegiance unto us, and will deserve the effects of our grace and favour
(which wee are enclyned to afford you) seriously to reflect upon our
commands; ... and particularly wee doe hereby command you to send over,
within three months after the receipt hereof, such... persons as
you shall think fitt to choose, and that you give them sufficient
instructions to attend the regulation and settlement of that our
government.” [Footnote: Sept. 30. _Hutch. Coll. _, Prince Soc. ed. ii.
261.]
The General Court had not thought fit to regard these communications,
and now Randolph came charged with a long and stern dispatch, in which
agents were demanded forthwith, “in default whereof, we are fully
resolved, in Trinity Term next ensuing, to direct our attorney-general
to bring a quo warranto in our court of kings-bench, whereby our charter
granted unto you, with all the powers thereof, may be legally evicted
and made void; and so we bid you farewel.” [Footnote: Chalmers’s
_Annals_, p. 449.]
Hitherto the clerical party had procrastinated, buoyed up by the
hope that in the fierce struggle with the commons Charles might be
overthrown; but this dream ended with the dissolution of the Oxford
Parliament, and further inaction became impossible. Joseph Dudley and
John Richards were chosen agents, and provided with instructions bearing
the peculiar tinge of ecclesiastical statesmanship.
They were directed to represent that appeals would be intolerable;
and, for their private guidance, the legislature used these words: “We
therefore doe not vnderstand by the regulation of the gouernment, that
any alteration of the patent is intended; yow shall therefore neither
doe nor consent to any thing that may violate or infringe the liberties
& priuiledges granted to us by his majesties royall charter, or the
gouernment established thereby; but if any thing be propounded that may
tend therevnto, yow shall say, yow haue received no instruction in
that matter.” [Footnote: _Mass. Rec._ v. 349.] With reference to the
complaints made against the colony, they were to inform the king “that
wee haue no law prohibbiting any such as are of the perswasion of the
church of England, nor haue any euer desired to worship God accordingly
that haue been denyed.” [Footnote: _Mass. Rec._ v. 347. March 23.]
Such a statement cannot be reconciled with the answer made the
commissioners; and the laws compelled Episcopalians to attend the
Congregational worship, and denied them the right to build churches of
their own.
“As for the Annabaptists, they are now subject to no other poenal
statutes then those of the Congregational way.” This sophistry is
typical. The law under which the Baptist church was closed applied in
terms to all inhabitants, it is true; but it was contrived to suppress
schism, it was used to coerce heretics, and it was unrepealed. Moreover,
it would seem as though the statute inflicting banishment must then have
still been in force.
The assurances given in regard to the reform of the suffrage were
precisely parallel:--
“For admission of ffreemen, wee humbly conceive it is our liberty, by
charter, to chuse whom wee will admitt into our oune company, which yet
hath not binn restrayned to Congregational men, but others haue
been admitted, who were also provided for according to his majestjes
direction.” [Footnote: 1681-2, March 23.]
Such insincerity gave weight to Randolph’s words when he wrote: “My
lord, I have but one thing to reminde your lordship, that nothing their
agents can say or doe in England can be any ground for his majestie to
depend upon.” [Footnote: Randolph to Clarendon. _Hutch. Coll._, Prince
Soc. ed. ii. 277]
With these documents and one thousand pounds for bribery, soon after
increased to three, [Footnote: Chalmers’s _Annals_, p. 461.] Dudley
and Richards sailed. Their powers were at once rejected at London as
insufficient, and the decisive moment came. [Footnote: _Idem_, p. 413.]
The churchmen of Massachusetts had to determine whether to accept the
secularization of their government or abandon every guaranty of popular
liberty. The clergy did not hesitate before the momentous alternative:
they exerted themselves to the utmost, and turned the scale for the last
time. [Footnote: Hutch. _Hist._ i. 303, note.] In fresh instructions the
agents were urged to do what was possible to avert, or at least delay,
the stroke; but they were forbidden to consent to appeals, or to
alterations in the qualifications required for the admission of freemen.
[Footnote: 1683, March 30. _Mass. Rec._ v. 390.] They had previously
been directed to pacify the king by a present of two thousand pounds;
and this ill-judged attempt at bribery had covered them with ridicule.
[Footnote: Hutch. _Hist._ i. 303, note.]
Further negotiation would have been futile. Proceedings were begun
at once, and Randolph was sent to Boston to serve the writ of _quo
warranto_; [Footnote: 1683, July 20.] he was also charged with a royal
declaration promising that, even then, were submission made, the
charter should be restored with only such changes as the public welfare
demanded. [Footnote: _Mass. Rec._ v. 422, 423.] Dudley, who was a man of
much political sagacity, had returned and strongly urged moderation. The
magistrates were not without the instincts of statesmanship: they saw
that a breach with England must destroy all safeguards of the common
freedom, and they voted an address to the crown accepting the proffered
terms. [Footnote: 1683, 15 Nov. Hutch. _Hist._ i. 304.] But the clergy
strove against them: the privileges of their order were at stake; they
felt that the loss of their importance would be “destructive to the
interest of religion and of Christ’s kingdom in the colony,” [Footnote:
Palfrey, iii. 381.] and they roused their congregations to resist. The
deputies did not represent the people, but the church. They were men who
had been trained from infancy by the priests, who had been admitted to
the communion and the franchise on account of their religious fervor,
and who had been brought into public life because the ecclesiastics
found them pliable in their hands. The influence which had moulded their
minds and guided their actions controlled them still, and they rejected
the address. [Footnote: Nov. 30. Palfrey, iii. 385.] Increase Mather
took the lead. He stood up at a great meeting in the Old South, and
exhorted the people, “telling them how their forefathers did purchase
it [the charter], and would they deliver it up, even as Ahab required
Naboth’s vineyard, Oh! their children would be bound to curse them.”
[Footnote: Palfrey, iii. 388, note 1.]