ever extenuation may be pleaded from the exigencies and newness of the colony, from the law of necessity, lest this effort in behalf of the Church of England, and these claims of the obligations of the colonists to observe its forms, should end in the subversion of the colonial liberty to worship God according to their conscience (for such was the scope of these new claims, if not the design of the claimants); whatever may be said in palliation, from their not having had time fully to free their minds from the prejudices which they had been taught in their native land; it must be confessed that in this proceeding, as in some others of a later date, the Puritan colonists acted inconsistently with their principles. But with them it was not so much a question of toleration as of the maintenance or defeat of the very design of their emigration; they were well assured that if the mal contents could succeed in their designs, they themselves would not much longer be allowed their freedom in the worship of God. The returning ships carried home such accounts from the pen of Higginson, and of others of the emigrants, as awakened deep interest among the persecuted Puritans of England. They had suffered almost beyond endurance; but they had seen no mode of escape, without running into hardships and perils that seemed almost certain destruction. Now the way appeared open; and the more so when it was determined that the charter and management of the new domains were to be transferred to America. Cotton Mather justly describes the enthusiasm raised in England when he says," Briefly the God of Heaven served, as it were, a summons upon the spirits of his people in the English nation; stirring up the spirits of thousands who never saw the face of each other, with a most unanimous inclination to leave all the pleasant accommodations of their native country, and go over a terrible ocean, with a more terrible desert, for the pure enjoyment of all his ordinances."

Before the end of 1629, a congregational Church was gathered at Plymouth in England, of which Mr. John Wareham, a famous preacher of Exeter, and Mr. John Maverick, were chosen ministers. Great preparations are made for removing to New England. Men, women and children are gathered, a chosen company; Winthrop is made governor of the new colony. In February, 1630, the good ship Lion sails from Bristol. The Mary and John leaves Plymouth on the 20th of March. On the 29th of March, Winthrop with Johnson and other leading men, in the Arabella of 350 tons, 28 guns, and 52 seamen, the Talbot, the Ambrose and the Jewel, leave the port of Cowes; the Mayflower, the Whale, the William and Frances, the Tryal, the Charles, the Success, and the Hopewell, lying at Hampton, not yet ready. Winthrop and his fleet had been informed, at the

Isle of Wight, that "ten Spanish ships, with brass guns, the least of which was thirty," were waiting to intercept them. On the 10th of April, they discover several ships bearing towards them, and "provide to fight them;" but these prove to be the remainder of their fleet from Hampton. On Saturday, the 12th of June, at two in the morning, the Arabella, admiral of the fleet, "finding her port near, shoots off two pieces of ordnance;" and descrying the Lion, which had arrived before her, "sends the skiff aboard," stands in towards the harbor, and comes to anchor. "Mr. Pierce, master of the Lion," says Governor Winthrop, "comes presently to us, but returns to fetch Mr. Endicott, who with Mr. Skelton and Captain Levit, come aboard us about two o'clock. And with them, this afternoon, the governor, with those assistants on board the Admiral, and some other gentlemen and gentlewomen," go ashore to their friends at Salem. "Many of the other people also, landing on the eastern side of the harbor, regale themselves with strawberries, wherewith the woods are everywhere in these times replenished."

Next morning, Masconomo, the Sagamore of that side of the country towards Cape Ann, comes on board the Admiral to bid him welcome. In the afternoon arrives the Jewell. Monday, June 14, the Admiral weighs, is warped into the inner harbor, and in the afternoon most of the passengers go ashore; but find the colony in an unexpected and sad condition; more than eighty having died in the preceding winter, many of the remainder being feeble or sick, and the stock of corn hardly sufficient to feed them a fortnight. The governor and principal men leave to find out a place for settlement. At Nantasket they find the ship Mary and John. The Ambrose reaches Salem before their return. The Mayflower and Whale reach Charlestown on the 1st of July; the Talbot, on the 2d; the William and Frances on the 3d; the Tryal and Charles, on the 5th; the Success on the 6th; the Hopewell comes at last; and on Thursday, July 8, they keep a public thanksgiving "throughout all their plantations, to praise Almighty God for all his goodness and wonderful works towards them."

Among these emigrants were Winthrop, Ludlow, Rossiter, Johnson, with his wife, the Lady Arabella, whose story is so touchingly remembered in all the annals of New England; Wilson, Philips, Warham, Pynchon, Bradstreet, Dudley, and many others whose honored names are yet perpetuated among the families of New England. "Some of these," says Prince, " set forth from the west of England, but the greatest numbers came from about London, though Southampton was the place of rendezvous where they took ship. These were they who first came to set up Christian Churches in this heathen wilderness."

It is not my design to trace the history of the new settlements, nor to give any further account of the gathering of the early Churches, nor of the distinguished men who labored in the work of the ministry during the early times of the New England History. Norton, Cotton, Shepard, Stone, Elliot, Hooker, Davenport; these are a constellation of names which would have distinguished any age or country in any period of the Christian Church. Nor were these alone. The seventy-seven ministers, who left England and the English Church for conscience' sake, were all choice men. Those who came over the ocean left not their superiors behind; nor has the splendor of their character, their talents, and their piety ever been eclipsed, either in Old England, or among the descendants of those to whom they ministered in the Western Wilds. They laid the foundations of learning and religion well. New England, America, the world, has already reaped, and is still to reap in larger measures, the fruits of their sagacity, their piety, and their self-denying toil. Sufferings awaited them; diseases, dangers, and death, stood thick around the devoted colonists; yet, in the words of Bancroft, "As the brightest lightnings are kindled in the darkest clouds, the general distress did but augment the piety and confirm the fortitude of the colonists. Their enthusiasm was softened by the mildest sympathy with suffering humanity; while a sincere faith kept guard against despondency and weakness. Not a hurried line, not a trace of repining appears in their records; the congregations always assembled at the stated times, whether in open fields or under the shade of an ancient tree; in the midst of want they abounded in hope; in the solitudes of the wilderness they believed themselves in company with the Greatest and most Benevolent of Beings."

The emigrations continued. The plantations and churches spread abroad. Within twelve years, about one hundred and ninety-eight ships were employed in bringing over the founders of New England, and by the good providence of God, only one of those ships miscarried by the way.

XVII.

RISE OF THE CIVIL WARS.

Charles a martyr to his own insincerity and crimes. Attempts to impose a Liturgy upon Scotland. Uproar in St. Giles'. Solemn League and Covenant. The Episcopal War Charles forced to call a Parliament. Laud impeached. Divine right of Episcopacy discussed. Smectymnuus. Irish Massacre. Appeal to Arms.

THE English Church celebrates the "Martyrdom of King Charles I." But in no sense did King Charles sacrifice his life for the cause of religion. His political crimes against the laws and the Constitution; his falsehoods and treacheries; his utter want of faith in his solemn engagements to his indignant people; these were the causes of his ruin. His people found no redress, save in arms: and when their monarch was overthrown, his known insincerity and treachery forbade them to hope for any safety but in his death. King Charles was a martyr to his own insincerity and crimes. He fell, in endeavoring to erect an absolute despotism over a free-spirited and indignant people. He had cast his life upon the die; and either his people must be reduced to slavery, or he must perish: there was no other possible alternative. But perhaps by the celebration of his "martyrdom," it is designed to intimate that he lost his life in the cause of "The Church," or (which they claim as the same thing) of Episcopacy; which High Churchmen seem to consider, as nearly synonymous with religion. How then was Charles a martyr for "the Church?" Under the covert of his authority, corruptions were introduced into its doctrines; a wide and fundamental departure was made from the original sense of its articles; its rites and ceremonies were nearly assimilated to those of Rome. The power of the prelates was greatly augmented at the expense both of the royal prerogatives and of the popular rights. Charles was one of those kings, who in this manner delight to "Give their glory to the Beast." In the reign of Henry VIII., the bishops were content to hold even their spiritual superiority over presbyters, from the civil power. But in passing sentence on Bastwick, the bishops, with the allowance of Charles, denied that they held the

jurisdiction of their courts from the king. At the instance of Laud, Charles permitted the bishops to hold their ecclesiastical courts in their own names, without the king's letters patent under the great seal. The design of this was fully to realize the idea that bishops hold their authority not from the crown, but, jure divino, from God himself. Half the business of Chancery was drawn into the hands of the bishops' officers. The king allowed the bishops to frame new articles of visitation, and to administer new oaths of inquiry. "In this manner," says Hetherington,* "the prelates became possessed of extensive jurisdiction, both civil and ecclesiastical, not only independent of the Crown and Parliament, but based upon the assumption of a divine right, which rendered them entirely irresponsible, and beyond the control of human law. Had not the spirit of liberty, civil and religious, been at that time vigilant and strong, these prelatic usurpations must have soon reduced England to a state of the most abject slavery."

For this abject devotion to the interests of an aspiring and domineering hierarchy, the prelates of the Church of England have had the address to persuade the people of that Church to forget the crimes of King Charles, and to celebrate him as a saint and martyr!

They have a further show of reason for so doing, from the fact that it was the foolish attempt of Charles to impose an Episcopacy and a Liturgy upon Scotland that roused up the civil wars, which overturned Episcopacy "root and branch," and in which the king lost both throne and life.

Freedom still breathed amid the hills of Scotland. A hierarchy had been established there, but its prelates were prelates only in name; circumscribed and watched by a jealous and undaunted people, while the ministers of the Scottish Church regarded episcopal jurisdiction as a mere mischievous usurpation.

Laud now persuaded the king that it would be a good and pious work to establish a liturgy and Episcopacy in full form over the people of Scotland. A liturgy was prepared, modelled mainly after the English, but altered and fashioned in such a way as to suit the genius of Laud, and of a cast more popish than that of England. In the office for the Lord's Supper (which was made closely to resemble a mass), the priest, taking the bread and wine into his hands, and reciting the words of the original institution of the Lord's Supper, is made to say, " WHICH

* *

WE NOW OFFER UNTO THEE THAT THEY MAY BECOME THE BODY AND BLOOD OF THY MOST DEARLY BELOVED SON; these words being printed in large capitals to mark their significance." The compilers of this liturgy were ordered to retain * London Christian Observer, April, 1843. t Hist. Assembly of Divines.