THE SECOND MISSION
After Roger Williams left for London, the towns of Portsmouth and
Newport submitted to the rule of Coddington, while Providence and
Warwick united and continued under the old charter. They held their
regular assemblies as usual, passed laws, and acted, in general, as if
there were no split at all.
Many of their proceedings are of little interest to-day, but one stands
out from the rest and deserves more than passing notice. The law
restricting slavery, under date of May 18, 1652, was one of the very
first of its kind, not alone in New England, but in the whole world.
The purchase of negroes was “a common course practiced among Englishmen
to that end they may have them for service or slaves forever” and white
men were also held in similar bondage. Now while the idea of universal
freedom was far from the thoughts of mankind in Roger Williams’ day,
the step taken by his little colony was a big stride in the right
direction. It provided that no “black mankind or white” should be made
to serve for a longer period than ten years. “And that man that will
not let them go free,” the decree went on, “or shall sell them away
elsewhere, to that end that they may be enslaved to others for a long
time, he or they shall forfeit to the colony forty pounds.”
Though Roger Williams was hundreds of miles from home at the time this
slavery act was passed, it clearly shows his influence. He was always
the friend of the oppressed and downtrodden. It is not likely that many
offenders were found after the law became a fact. Two hundred dollars
meant too heavy a fine for the poor colonist of that day to pay.
The England of Roger Williams’ second visit was as disturbed as the
England of his first trip. King Charles had paid a heavy price for
his tyrannical injustice--the loss of his head--and the real ruler
of the country was Oliver Cromwell. Backed by his well-disciplined,
well-trained, invincible army, he had swept everything before him.
During Roger Williams’ stay, he usurped even more power and was made
the Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England. It was well for
Providence Plantations that it had so influential a friend at court.
Cromwell was very gracious to the colony’s representative, frequently
having long talks with Roger Williams and asking many questions about
the Narragansett province across the sea. The Indians of that section
interested him especially. Roger Williams needed no urging to impart
all the information he could on this topic so near his heart. Yet not
even Cromwell’s friendship secured a speedy settlement of the charter
trouble.
The question was referred to the Council of State. Meanwhile, Roger
Williams kept his colony informed from time to time as to the
results of his labors. First, he wrote that the Council had given
him encouragement and had decided that the charter was binding until
further orders were issued. Next, he was able to send the welcome news
that the Coddington charter was annulled and that the towns were to
unite as formerly. As we shall see, this was more easily said than done.
Though much had been gained, the final settlement was not yet reached.
While waiting, Roger Williams had his hands full seeing to it that his
struggling province across the water was not cheated out of its rights.
For one thing, war broke out between the Dutch and English. Naturally,
this national struggle caused less important affairs to be pushed
aside for the time being. Then the friends of the charter had to fight
opposition among persons of high position and influence. So the matter
dragged on.
In one of his letters describing these drawbacks, Roger Williams did
not forget to send his love to his Indian friends. The correspondence
was not all one-sided. The people of Providence, in turn, kept Roger
Williams in touch with affairs at home. Though they did not always
appreciate the great, whole-souled man while he lived quietly among
them, whenever they were left to their own devices, they awoke to some
realization of his worth. They passed their troubles on to him and
asked his advice, as if the poor man had not already enough burdens of
his own to carry! They did not stop here. They wrote an earnest letter
asking him to accept the governorship of the colony for a year in case
the charter should be confirmed.
A more ambitious man would eagerly have grasped the opportunity thus
offered. He would have seen in it the possibility of power, influence,
perhaps riches. Not so Roger Williams. In his own humble, modest way,
he was content to go on as before, sacrificing his own interests for
those of the colony, whether repaid for his efforts or not.
Cromwell was not the only prominent man in England with whom Roger
Williams was on intimate terms. He renewed his friendship with Sir
Henry Vane and was a frequent visitor at his house--either in his
lodgings at Whitehall or at his beautiful country estate Belleau in
Lincolnshire. This tried and true friend, having lived in both old and
New England, could understand and sympathize with Roger Williams as
perhaps nobody else could. He was not only his personal friend, but
a friend of the Providence colony as well. “The sheet anchor of our
ship,” wrote Roger Williams, “is Sir Henry, who will do as the eye of
God leads him.”
John Milton was another brilliant man with whom Roger Williams
associated during this period. He was the secretary of the Council of
State and later became world-famous as the author of “Paradise Lost.”
The condition of the great man at this time was pitiable. He was fast
growing blind. He said of his affliction in after years:
“...., My light is spent
Ere half my days in this dark world and wide,
And that one talent which is death to hide,
Lodged with me useless....”
He and Roger Williams exchanged languages, Roger Williams reading to
him in Dutch and receiving in return instruction in other languages.
Roger Williams’ familiarity with other tongues than his own was truly
remarkable. We have seen how he had studied and conquered the Indian
dialects. Now during his stay in the mother country, he practiced
Hebrew, Greek, Latin, French and Dutch.
The study of languages, however, was not all that occupied Roger
Williams during the two years and a half that he awaited the triumph of
his charter. He wrote several books and pamphlets that represent some
of the best literary work of his life. It will be remembered that when
in England before, he had published a book called “The Bloody Tenent
of Persecution,” in which he voiced his views on toleration. This
was later answered by John Cotton, who, borrowing a portion of Roger
Williams’ title, added to it and called his work “The Bloody Tenent
Washed and Made White in the Blood of the Lamb.” Roger Williams could
not let the matter rest here--he was too ardent an apostle of liberty
of conscience.
So now he took the opportunity to get ready for publication a reply to
his antagonist, this time under the overwhelming heading of “The Bloody
Tenent Yet More Bloody by Mr. Cotton’s Endeavor to Wash it White
in the Blood of the Lamb.” If the controversy had been carried any
further, who knows what cumbersome and unwieldy titles might not have
been inflicted upon the reading public! Roger Williams, in referring to
the above book in its relation to Mr. Cotton’s arguments, said it had
“unwashed his washings.”
England at this period was divided on the question of toleration. There
were those who favored only partial religious liberty, others who took
the stand that Roger Williams had supported all these years--absolute
soul liberty without interference from the civil power. These
broad-minded men argued that the Jews, who had been persecuted time and
again by the rulers of England and had been excluded from the land for
several hundred years, should be allowed to live freely and peaceably
in the forbidden country.
Here was a chance for Roger Williams to strike another blow at
oppression. The despised race could have had no better champion.
Writing in their behalf, he said:
“I humbly conceive it to be the duty of the civil magistrate to break
down that superstitious wall of separation (as to civil things) between
us Gentiles and the Jews, and freely (without their asking) to make way
for their free and peaceable habitation amongst us.
“As other nations, so this especially, and the kings thereof, have had
just cause to fear that the un-Christian oppressions, incivilities
and inhumanities of this nation against the Jews have cried to Heaven
against this nation and the kings and princes of it.
“For the removing of which guilt, and the pacifying of the wrath of the
Most High against this nation, and for the furthering of that great end
of propagating the Gospel of Christ Jesus; It is humbly conceived to
be a great and weighty duty which is upon this state, to provide (on
the Jews’ account) some gracious expedients for such holy and truly
Christian ends.”
It may be that this stand taken by Roger Williams influenced Cromwell
in his later treatment of the oppressed people. Without openly
welcoming them back into England, he did, as one writer has put it,
allow them to enter by the back door.
Poverty was still a heavy handicap to Roger Williams. To raise needed
funds, he was not ashamed to turn to any kind of employment so long
as it was honorable. Thus we read of his giving language lessons to
the sons of a member of Parliament. As to his methods, they were
both reasonable and interesting. There was no forcing of dry old
set formulas upon his pupils to be learned by heart. Instead, he
substituted what would be called to-day the “natural method”--that is,
he taught those words and phrases in most common use by means of easy
conversations. Happy students, to have a teacher who thought grammar
rules a “tyranny”! So well did these lessons succeed that after Roger
Williams returned to America, he taught his own three boys in the same
way.
Once more the poor of London were his debtors. His own wants were never
of so much importance as those of his neighbors. As on the previous
visit, he helped supply the needy with fuel.
One episode of Roger Williams’ stay in London was amusing, yet pathetic
as well. All the years he had spent in New England he had not forgotten
the kind friend of his youth, Sir Edward Coke. It therefore occurred to
him, now that he was in his native land once more, to make inquiries
after the daughter of the famous judge, Mrs. Anne Sadlier. He did so in
a courteous letter, at the same time sending her one of his discourses
that had recently been printed. The good lady had the rudeness to
return it, saying that she read little beyond a few standard religious
works. That she looked upon her father’s former protegé as a dangerous
advanced thinker is shown by her saying bluntly that she believed his
“new lights would prove but dark lanterns.” In reply, Roger Williams
referred her to the volumes covering his late controversy with John
Cotton. Shocked beyond measure at the mere title “Bloody Tenent,”
Mrs. Sadlier did not attempt to read further and tartly told her
correspondent not to trouble her again. With more persistence than
wisdom, Roger Williams did write still once more. Mrs. Sadlier was
thoroughly roused by the sermon-like epistle he sent and in anything
but lady-like language, told the writer he had a “face of brass.” Poor
Roger Williams was silenced at last.
With this spirited correspondence Mrs. Sadlier left the following
memorandum: “Full little did he (Sir Edward Coke) think that he (Roger
Williams) would have proved such a rebel to God, the king and his
country. I leave his letters, that, if ever he has the face to return
into his native country, Tyburn may give him welcome.”
In spite of his busy days and the importance of the errand which was
keeping him in England, Roger Williams was very homesick at times. He
yearned to see the faces of his sons and daughters. He longed, too, for
his gentle wife--his “dear yoke-fellow”--and even proposed her joining
him over-seas in several of his letters. One of the pamphlets he
published while abroad (the one that Mrs. Sadlier rejected) was in the
form of a letter addressed to Mrs. Williams. It had been written some
time before on the occasion of her recovery from a dangerous illness
while he was absent from home working among the Indians. Though there
is more of the sermon than love-letter about it, still we find these
exquisite lines:
“My dear love, since it pleaseth the Lord so to dispose of me, and of
my affairs at present, that I cannot often see thee, I desire often to
send to thee.... I send thee (though in winter) an handful of flowers
made up in a little posy, for thy dear self and our dear children, to
look and smell on.”
Rather flowery language, perhaps, to apply to a religious tract, yet it
affords a satisfying glimpse of deep husbandly and fatherly affection.
Roger Williams finally made up his mind to return to New England,
though the charter matter was not yet closed. It was not alone thoughts
of his own immediate family that induced him to make this decision.
His larger family--his unruly, quarrelsome colonial family--needed
him quite as badly. He therefore left the interests of Providence
Plantations in the hands of Mr. Clarke and turned homeward. The
English government granted him a safe passage through Massachusetts
and, early in the summer of 1654, he landed in Boston.