The period of success in planting Virginia had arrived; yet not till
changes in European politics and society had molded the forms of
colonization. The Reformation had broken the harmony of religious
opinion; and differences in the Church began to constitute the basis of
political parties. After the East Indies had been reached by doubling
the southern promontory of Africa, the great commerce of the world was
carried upon the ocean. The art of printing had been perfected and
diffused; and the press spread intelligence and multiplied the
facilities of instruction. The feudal institutions, which had been
reared in the middle ages, were already undermined by the current of
time and events, and, swaying from their base, threatened to fall.
Productive industry had built up the fortunes and extended the influence
of the active classes; while habits of indolence and expense had
impaired the estates and diminished the power of the nobility. These
changes produced corresponding results in the institutions which were to
rise in America.
A revolution had equally occurred in the purposes for which voyages were
undertaken. The hope of Columbus, as he sailed to the west, had been
the discovery of a new passage to the East Indies. The passion for gold
next became the prevailing motive. Then the islands and countries near
the equator were made the tropical gardens of the Europeans. At last,
the higher design was matured: to plant permanent Christian colonies; to
establish for the oppressed and the enterprising places of refuge and
abode; to found states in a temperate clime, with all the elements of
independent existence.
In the imperfect condition of industry, a redundant population had
existed in England even before the peace with Spain, which threw out of
employment the gallant men who had served under Elizabeth by sea and
land, and left them no option but to engage as mercenaries in the
quarrels of strangers, or incur the hazards of "seeking a New World."
The minds of many persons of intelligence and rank were directed to
Virginia. The brave and ingenious Gosnold, who had himself witnessed the
fertility of the western soil, long solicited the concurrence of his
friends for the establishment of a colony, and at last prevailed with
Edward Maria Wingfield, a merchant of the west of England, Robert Hunt,
a clergyman of fortitude and modest worth, and John Smith, an adventurer
of rarest qualities, to risk their lives and hopes of fortune in an
expedition. For more than a year this little company revolved the
project of a plantation. At the same time Sir Ferdinando Gorges was
gathering information of the native Americans, whom he had received from
Waymouth, and whose descriptions of the country, joined to the favorable
views which he had already imbibed, filled him with the strongest desire
of becoming a proprietary of domains beyond the Atlantic. Gorges was a
man of wealth, rank and influence; he readily persuaded Sir John Popham,
Lord Chief Justice of England, to share his intentions. Nor had the
assigns of Raleigh become indifferent to "western planting"; which the
most distinguished of them all, "industrious Hakluyt," the historian of
maritime enterprise, still promoted by his personal exertions, his
weight of character, and his invincible zeal. Possessed of whatever
information could be derived from foreign sources and a correspondence
with eminent navigators of his times, and anxiously watching the
progress of Englishmen in the West, his extensive knowledge made him a
counselor in every colonial enterprise.
The King of England, too timid to be active, yet too vain to be
indifferent, favored the design of enlarging his dominions. He had
attempted in Scotland the introduction of the arts of life among the
Highlanders and the Western Isles, by the establishment of colonies; and
the Scottish plantations which he founded in the northern counties of
Ireland contributed to the affluence and the security of that island.
When, therefore, a company of men of business and men of rank, formed by
the experience of Gosnold, the enthusiasm of Smith, the perseverance of
Hakluyt, the influence of Popham and Gorges, applied to James I. for
leave "to deduce a colony into Virginia," the monarch, on the tenth of
April, 1606, readily set his seal to an ample patent.
The first colonial charter, under which the English were planted in
America, deserves careful consideration.
Appleton and Company, New York.