CHAP. Versy should be settled; the order against Anabaptists X. was likewise left unrepealed; and, notwithstanding 1646. strong opposition from the friends of toleration in Nov. 4. Boston, it was resolved to convene a synod to give counsel on the permanent settlement of the ecclesiastical polity. At length the general court assembled for the discussion of the usurpations of parliament, and the dangers from domestic treachery. The elders did not fail to attend in the gloomy season. One faithless deputy was desired to withdraw; and then, with closed doors (that the consultation might remain in the breast of the court), the nature of the relation with England was made the subject of debate. After much deliberation, it was agreed that Massachusetts owed to England the same allegiance as the free Hanse Towns had rendered to the empire; as Normandy, when its dukes were kings of England, had paid to the monarchs of France. It was also resolved not to accept a new charter from the parliament, for that would imply a surrender of the old. Besides, parliament granted none, but by way of ordinance, which the king might one day refuse to confirm, and always made for itself an express reservation of "a supreme power in all things." The elders, after a day's consultation, confirmed the decisions. "If parliament should be less inclinable to us, we must wait upon Providence for the preservation of our just liberties." The colony then proceeded to exercise the independence which it claimed. The general court replied to the petition in a state-paper, written with great moderation; and the disturbers of the public security were summoned into its presence. Robert Childe and his companions appealed to the commissioners in MASSACHUSETTS RESISTS THE LONG PARLIAMENT. 441 X. England. The appeal was not admitted. "The char- CHAP. ter," he urged, "does but create a corporation within the realm, subject to English laws."-" Plantations," 1646 replied the court, "are above the rank of an ordinary corporation; they have been esteemed other than towns, yea, than many cities. Colonies are the foundations of great commonwealths. It is the fruit of pride and folly to despise the day of small things." To the parliament of England the legislature remonstrated with the noblest frankness against any assertion of the paramount authority of that body. "An order from England," say they, "is prejudicial Dec. to our chartered liberties, and to our well-being in this remote part of the world. Times may be changed; for all things here below are subject to vanity, and other princes or parliaments may arise. Let not succeeding generations have cause to lament and say, England sent our fathers forth with happy liberties, which they enjoyed many years, notwithstanding all the enmity and opposition of the prelacy, and other potent adversaries, and yet these liberties were lost in the season when England itself recovered its own. We rode out the dangers of the sea; shall we perish in port? We have not admitted appeals to your authority, being assured they cannot stand with the liberty and power granted us by our charter, and would be destructive to all government. These considerations. are not new to the high court of parliament; the records whereof bear witness of the wisdom and faithfulness of our ancestors in that great council, who, in those times of darkness, when they acknowledged a supremacy in the Roman bishops, in all causes ecclesiastical, yet would not allow appeals to Rome. "The wisdom and experience of that great council, CHAP. the English parliament, are more able to prescribe X. rules of government and judge causes, than such poor 1646. rustics as a wilderness can breed up; yet the vast distance between England and these parts abates the virtue of the strongest influences. Your councils and judgments can neither be so well grounded, nor so seasonably applied, as might either be useful to us, or safe for yourselves, in your discharge, in the great day of account. If any miscarriage shall befall us, when we have the government in our own hands, the state of England shall not answer for it. "Continue your favorable aspect to these infant plantations, that we may still rejoice and bless our God under your shadow, and be there still nourished with the warmth and dews of heaven. Confirm our liberties; discountenance our enemies, the disturbers of our peace under pretence of our injustice. A gracious testimony of your wonted favor will oblige us and our posterity." In the same spirit, Edward Winslow, the agent for Massachusetts in England, publicly denied that the jurisdiction of parliament extended to America. "If the parliament of England should impose laws upon us, having no burgesses in the house of commons, nor capable of a summons by reason of the vast distance, we should lose the liberties and freedom of English indeed." Massachusetts was not without steadfast friends in the legislature of England; yet it marks an honest love of liberty and of justice in the Long Parliament, that the doctrines of colonial equality should have been received with favor. "Sir Henry Vane, though he might have taken occasion against the colony 1 1 Winslow's New England's Salamander, 24. MASSACHUSETTS RESISTS THE LONG PARLIAMENT. 1 443 X. for some dishonor, which he apprehended to have been CHAP unjustly put upon him there, yet showed himself a true friend to New England, and a man of a noble and 1647 generous mind." After ample deliberation, the committee of parliament magnanimously replied, "We encourage no appeals from your justice. We leave you with all the freedom and latitude, that may, in any respect, be duly claimed by you."2 Such were the arts by which Massachusetts preserved its liberties. The people sustained their magistrates with great unanimity; hardly five-and-twenty persons could be found in the whole jurisdiction to join in a complaint against the strictness of the government; and when the discontented introduced the dispute into the elections, their candidates were defeated by an overwhelming majority.3 The harmony of the people had been confirmed by the courage of the elders, who gave fervor to the enthusiasm of patriotism. "It had been as unnatural for a right New England man to live without an able ministry, as for a smith to work his iron without a fire." The union between the elders and the state could not, therefore, but become more intimate than ever; and religion was venerated and cherished as the security against political subserviency. When the synod met by adjournment, it was by the common consent of all the Puritan colonies, that a system of church government was established for the congrega 1 Winthrop, ii. 248 and 317. 2 Hutchinson, i. 136-140, is confused and inaccurate. Was it from ignorance? His errors are repeated by Chalmers and Grahame. The inquirer must go to the original authorities Colony Records; Hutchinson's Collection, 188-218; Winthrop, ii. 278-301, and 317-322; N. E.'s Jonas cast up at London, in 3 Winthrop, ii. 307. CHAP. tions. X. 1650 to 1655. The platform retained authority for more than a century, and has not yet lost its influence. It effectually excluded the Presbyterian modes of discipline from New England. The jealousy of independence was preserved in its wakefulness. The Long Parliament asserted its power over the royalist colonies in general terms, which seemed alike to threaten the plantations of the north; and now that royalty was abolished, it invited Massachusetts to receive a new patent, and to hold courts and issue warrants in its name. But the colonial commonwealth was too wary to hazard its rights by merging them in the acts of a government of which the decline seemed approaching. It has been usual to say, that the people of Massachusetts foiled the Long Parliament. In a public state-paper, they refused to submit to its requisitions, and yet never carried their remonstrance beyond the point which their charter appeared to them to warrant.2 1651. After the successes of Cromwell in Ireland, he voluntarily expressed his interest in New England, by offering its inhabitants estates and a settlement in the beautiful island which his arms had subdued. His offers were declined; for the emigrants already loved their land of refuge, where their own courage and toils had established "the liberties of the gospel in its purity." Our government, they said among themselves, "is the happiest and wisest this day in the world." 1651 to 1654. The war between England and Holland hardly disturbed the tranquillity of the colonies. The western settlements, which would have suffered extreme misery from a combined attack of the Indians and the Dutch, 1 Result of a Synod, &c. See ton Mather is diffuse on the subject also Winthrop and Hubbard. Cot- 2 Hutchinson, i. App. viii. |