Elizabeth, Mary's successor, possessed a large share of her father's imperiousness, and her energy and ability were probably unsurpassed by any monarch who had up to that time guided the destinies of England. She was purely a politique - possessed great political shrewdness but little religious interest, and her chief desire was to make religious questions subservient to political problems. While Elizabeth granted every advantage and dignity to the Established Church, and while she was opposed to Popery, her political shrewdness would not allow her to alienate her Catholic subjects by permitting them to be persecuted by the Protestants. On the other hand, she had no love for the bold stern simplicity of the Puritanical worship, and was sagacious enough to see the inevitable tendency of the doctrines set forth and maintained by the Puritans. Consequently, she allowed little leeway to those who pleaded further reformation and greater liberty. Above all else, she resolved to be supreme governor of the Church and was indisposed to tolerate non-conformity to those doctrines which to her and her advisers seemed good and proper in Church and State. Elizabeth therefore persecuted Puritans and Catholics alike, and these religious persecutions did not stop until the Church practically abandoned politics and the State theology. But Elizabeth was not able to prevent the growing spirit of dissent, even with the as

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sistance of Whitgift, archbishop of Canterbury, who was both able and willing to aid the queen in her efforts to enforce conformity under severe penalties. Several religious parties were now born. The Independents desired the complete separation of Church and State and the independence of the local congregation; others desired only to purify the form of ceremonies of the Church; and the Presbyterians desired one State Church organized after the model of the New Testament churches which they thought Presbyterian. But Elizabeth died before the controversy was settled and it was handed down to the Stuarts.

James I. was bred in the Presbyterian faith, but he was intolerant against dissenters from his wishes and opinions, whether in Church or State, and as the free opinions of the Puritans conflicted with his coveted desire to obtain the absolute irresponsible exercise of power in Church and State, he naturally conceived an intense hatred for them and their tenets. He also opposed all attempts to foist the Calvinistic system of church dogma and ritual upon the English Church. There were several particulars in which the doctrines and beliefs of the two parties differed. The Puritans claimed that the Bible was sufficient in itself as a guide to moral and religious conduct, while the Churchmen, admitting this, said that deference should also be paid to the testimony and practice of the primi

tive Church and the decisions of the first few General Councils. The Churchmen respected primitive tradition and the doctrines of the ancient fathers at which the Puritans scoffed, calling it superstition and a remnant of Popery. The latter tried to effect a reformation of the same extent to which the continental reformation had been carried, but the clergy and bishops of the Established Church strenuously opposed it. They held Episcopacy to be of divine origin and perpetual obligation; they desired to retain the ceremonies as being in the interest of truth and righteousness, and useful and edifying, but refused to allow anyone to officiate in the Church unless ordained by a bishop; but the Puritans claimed that the ceremonies marred the purity and simplicity of the Gospel and denied that it was necessary first to receive orders by the laying on of a bishop's hand before preaching the Gospel and administering the sacraments.

Not unexpectedly, therefore, the dispute gradually became more and more bitter, and as King James was, like Elizabeth, a politique, he decided that his interests would be best conserved by gaining the Establishment as an ally, their doctrines being peculiarly adapted to the furtherance of his plans for acquiring the kingly prerogative. While the Puritans were loyal to the king, they contended for a larger liberty and a greater toleration than their age was prepared to allow, and they soon became known

as being in opposition to the king. This opposition became more noticeable as their views gradually developed and took political form, because the government endeavored to enforce conformity by stringent and oppressive legislation.*

*This very brief resumé of the Reformation in England can of necessity give only the slightest indication of the vast changes of thought that occurred during the century. The reader should, in order more thoroughly to understand the times, consult works which cover the entire field both thoroughly and carefully, such as Bishop Spaulding, The Protestant Reformation; Fisher, History of the Reformation (1893); Gardiner, The Puritan Revolution; Newman, Manual of Church History (1903); Walker, The Reformation (1900); Eggleston, "The Rise and Development of Puritanism," in his Beginners of a Nation, pp. 98140; the Church histories by Fuller, Heylyn, Burnet and Dixon; Burch, England under the Tudors; the volumes by Gairdner and Frere in Hunt and Stephens, Church History; Gairdner, Henry VII.; Bacon, Henry VII.; histories of England by Lingard (1854-55); Froude (1870); and Green (1879 and 1884); J. S. Brewer, History of the Reign of Henry VIII. to the Death of Wolsey (1884); Froude, The Divorce of Cath

erine of Aragon (1891); A. F. Pollard, Henry VIII., England under Protector Somerset, and Cranmer; Mason, Thomas Cranmer (1898); Todd, Cranmer (1861); Hook, Thomas Cranmer, in Lives of the Archbishops (1868); Creighton, Wolsey and Queen Elizabeth; Lives of Wolsey by Cavendish (1641), G. Howard (1824), C. Martin (1862) and Taunton (1900); Gasquet, The Eve of the Reformation (1892); Gairdner, The Fall of Cardinal Wolsey, in Transactions of the Royal Historical Society (1899); Gairdner's article in the Dictionary of National Biography; Stone, Mary I., Queen of England; the life of Mary by Strickland in Lives of the Queens of England (new ed. 1864-65); Jessop, Queen Elizabeth, in Dictionary of National Biography; Beesley, Queen Elizabeth; Cambden, History of Queen Elizabeth (1622); Wright, Queen Elizabeth and Her Times (1838); A. B. Hinds, The England of Elizabeth; Corbett, Drake and the Tudor Navy, and Successors of Drake; D'Ewes, Journals of All the Parliaments of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth (1682); Bruce (ed.) Letters of Elizabeth and James VI. (1849);

.

Nevertheless, the Puritans, notwithstanding the hardships of their position, were divided among themselves. Some desired to remain in the Church of England to effect a more complete reformation, but others, repudiating alike the Episcopal and Presbyterian systems, contended that the differing congregations of believers should be absolutely separate and independent and that they had the right, in themselves and unrestricted by any human authority, to frame a form of Church governinent such as they deemed would conform to the Scripture.* The former body were called Non-Conformists, while the latter section of the Puritan party was termed Separatists or Independents, though it had also become known as Brownists, from the

Strickland, Life of Elizabeth, in Lives of the Queens of England; Samuel Hopkins, The Puritans and Queen Elizabeth; R. Gardner, The First Two Stuarts (1876), and History of England from the Accession of James I., to the Spanish Marriage (1863-69); Aikens, Memoirs of the Court of King James the First (1822).

"There was gradually developed among the Puritans a sect or division which boldly pushed the questions at issue to their ultimate and legitimate solutions; which threw off all connection with the Established Church, rejected alike the surplice and the bishops, the Prayer-Book and the ceremonies, and, resting upon the Bible, sought no less than to restore the constitution of the Christian Church to the primitive simplicity in which it was first instituted. These Separatists, as they were called, put in practice their theoretical opinions by the formation of churches in which the members were the source of all power, and controlled its administration, and, in a word, applied to ecclesiastical organizations principles, which, if introduced into civil governments, would produce a pure democracy.”— W. M. Evarts, Heritage of the Pilgrims, p. 16; the New England Society Oration for 1854.

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name of one of their leaders, Robert Brown. This body still continued to exist in the north of England, but because of severe measures on the part of the government many of them had fled to Holland where they established a Congregational Church at Amsterdam, in the hope that there they would be allowed to worship as they saw fit.* Those who remained in England banded together under the leadership of Elder William Brewster, who occupied a large mansion at Scrooby, in Yorkshire, belonging to the bishop of York. Among the congregation of the church established by Brewster was William Bradford, afterward governor of New Plymouth, and John Robinson was invited to become pastor.†

The position of those who remained in England was not of the best, however, and Robinson's congregation therefore decided that they would follow the example of the others and emigrate to Holland. Bradford speaks much of the oppressions to which they had been subjected, both ministers and people, and there can be little doubt but that attempts were about to be made to put down the church. Whatever these attempts might be, they would be construed into acts of ecclesiastical oppression by those who deemed the maintenance

* Eggleston, Beginners of a Nation, p. 141 et seq.; Bancroft, vol. i., pp. 194-198.

See Steele, Chief of the Pilgrims; Life and Times of William Brewster (1857); Doyle, English Colonies in America, vol. ii., pp. 27-32; Eggleston, pp. 149-158.

There was, however, some opposition to their departure. The largest party, in which were Bradford and Brewster, intended to embark at Boston in Lincolnshire, and they had made a secret contract with a captain of a Dutch vessel to receive them on board his ship as privately as possible, but the captain acted in a treacherous manner by giving secret information to the magistrates of Boston of the intentions of the emigrants. Therefore, after the emigrants had come aboard and were, as they thought, about to sail, the officers of the port climbed over the side of the vessel and removed them and their goods to the town. The emigrants were also subjected to the indignity of being thrust into jail without ceremony.* Some were afterward sent back to their homes, but others, among whom was Brewster, were confined for many months in the

Bancroft, vol. i., pp. 199-200.

the

prison at Boston. This circumstance disheartened a great many of the congregation and they remained in England, but the larger part persevered in their intentions to find a place where they might worship in freedom, and finally succeeded in meeting together at Amsterdam. For the next twelve years congregation was located in Holland, being joined by a constant stream of disappointed persons from England who embarked for the country where all were permitted to worship according to the dictates of their consciences. According to contemporary writers this accession of persons of opposite faith turned the country into "a cage of unclean birds," a common harbour of all heresies," and "a great mingle mangle of religion."* Among those to join Robinson's church after it had left England were Edward Winslow and Captain Miles Standish.t

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Before long disputes and controversies arose among the congregation at Amsterdam and finally became of such an acrimonious nature that Robinson felt that it was to the interest of all to remove his congregation to Leyden, which was done in 1609. There they lived for a number of years in amity and concord, but still they did not feel at ease as they were

* Steele, Life of Brewster, p. 161; J. G. Palfrey, History of New England, vol. i., pp. 47-50; Eggleston, Beginners of a Nation, pp. 159-167.

Doyle, English Colonies in America, vol. ii., pp. 36-37; Fiske, Beginnings of New England, pp. 68-76.

not in their native land and could not exercise the rights belonging to free Englishmen. Being naturally averse to losing their birthright and having an eye to the temporal advantages which might accrue from emigrating to the New World, they turned their attention toward a scheme for planting a colony there. In a letter to Sir Edwin Sandys, they say that they are "Well weaned from the delicate milk of our mother country, and inured to the difficulties of a strange land," and thus they were well fit to undertake a colonizing expedition.

They first applied to the Dutch government for permission to emigrate to New Netherland and for aid in establishing a settlement, but they failed to secure the desired aid.†

"It has been customary first to assume that the Puritan migration was undertaken in the interests of religious liberty, and then to upbraid the Puritans for forgetting all about religious liberty as soon as people came among them who disagreed with their opinions. But this view of the case is not supported by history.

The notion that they came to New England for the purpose of establishing religious liberty, in any sense in which we should understand such a phrase, is entirely incorrect. If we mean

by the phrase 'religious liberty' a state of things in which opposite or contradictory opinions on questions of religion shall exist side by side in the same community, and in which everybody shall decide for himself how far he will conform

to the customary religious observances, nothing could have been further from their thoughts."Fiske, Beginnings of New England, pp. 144–145.

See Brodhead, History of the State of New York, First Period, pp. 124-125. Palfrey says that the Dutch "made them liberal offers, but to found a colony for Holland would have been a deviation from one of the objects they had in view.”— History of New England, vol. i., p. 53. See also Fiske, Dutch and Quaker Colonies in America, vol. i., pp. 107-111.

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They therefore debated between themselves as to whether they would go to Guiana, then famed for its wealth, or to Virginia, but finally they decided on the latter place. Virginia had, however, been settled by Episcopalians and in that colony it was required that there be a public profession of adherence to the Church of England, in default of which several severe penalties were provided. The Puritans therefore sent two influential members of the church (Robert Cushman and John Carver) to England to endeavor to make terms with the Virginia Company on a basis of liberty of conscience to themselves, in case they should decide to settle in Virginia. Fearing opposition from the king and the high church party, they drew up seven articles known as the "Leyden Articles" setting forth their attitude toward the civil power.* The Virginia Company was desirous. of attaching so valuable a body of emigrants to the Virginia colony, and they therefore endeavored to obtain for the Puritans through their own influence with the heads of the Church and State an assurance of toleration, but in this they were unsuccessful. Brewster himself, therefore, shortly afterward went to England to obtain as favorable a patent as he could. In the autumn of 1619 this was readily granted by the Virginia Company, although the patent given Brewster

*For which see Doyle, English Colonies in America, vol. ii., pp. 37-39; Bancroft, vol. i., p. 201.