he discerned his own image and resemblance in his fellow-man, and cared for his neighbor like himself. He was of a sociable nature; so that "to love and be beloved was his soul's paradise," and works of mercy were the habit of his life. Parting from affluence in England, he unrepiningly went to meet impoverishment and premature age for the welfare of Massachusetts. His lenient benevolence tempered the bigotry of his companions, without impairing their resoluteness. An honest royalist, averse to pure democracy, yet firm in his regard for existing popular liberties; in his native parish, a conformist, yet wishing for "gospel purity;" in America, mildly aristocratic, advocating a government of "the least part," yet desiring that part to be "the wiser of the best;" disinterested, brave, and conscientious-his character marks the transition of the reformation into virtual republicanism. The sentiment of loyalty, which it was still intended to cherish, gradually yielded to the unobstructed spirit of civil freedom.

England rung from side to side with the "general rumor of this solemn enterprise." On leaving the isle of Wight, Winthrop and the chief of his fellow-passengers on board the Arbella, including the ministers, bade an affectionate farewell "to the rest of their brethren in and of the church of England." "Reverend fathers and brethren," such was their address to them, "howsoever your charitie may have met with discouragement through the misreport of our intentions, or the indiscretion of some amongst us, yet we desire you would be pleased to take notice that the principals and body of our company esteem it our honor to call the church of England, from whence wee rise, our deare mother, and cannot part from our native countrie, where she specially resideth, without much sadnes of heart and many tears in our eyes; blessing God for the parentage and education, as members of the same body, and, while we have breath, we shall syncerely indeavour the continuance and abundance of her welfare.

"Be pleased, therefore, reverend fathers and brethren, to helpe forward this worke now in hand; which, if it prosper, you shall bee the more glorious. It is a usuall exercise of your charity to recommend to the prayers of your congregations the straights of your neighbours: do the like for a church spring

ing out of your owne bowels; pray without ceasing for us, who are a weake colony from yourselves.

"What we intreat of you that are ministers of God, that we crave at the hands of all the rest of our brethren, that they would at no time forget us in their private solicitations at the Throne of Grace. If any, through want of cleare intelligence of our course, or tenderness of affection towards us, cannot conceive so well of our way as we could desire, we would intreat such not to desert us in their prayers, and to express their compassion towards us.

"What goodness you shall extend to us, wee, your brethren in Christ Jesus, shall labour to repay; wishing our heads and hearts may be as fountains of tears for your everlasting welfare, when wee shall be in our poore cottages in the wildernesse, overshadowed with the spirit of supplication, through the manifold necessities and tribulations which may not altogether unexpectedly, nor, we hope, unprofitably befall us."

About seven hundred persons or more-most of them Puritans, inclining to the principles of the Independents; not conformists, but not separatists; many of them men of high endowments and large fortune; scholars, well versed in the learning of the times; clergymen, who ranked among the best educated and most pious in the realm-embarked with Winthrop in eleven ships, bearing with them the charter which was to be the warrant of their liberties. The land was to be planted with a noble vine, wholly of the right seed. The principal emigrants were a community of believers, professing themselves to be fellow-members of Christ; not a school of philosophers, proclaiming universal toleration and inviting associates without regard to creed. They desired to be bound together in a most intimate and equal intercourse, for one and the same great end. They knew that they would be as a city set upon a hill, and that the eyes of all people were upon them. Reverence for their faith led them to pass over the vast seas to the good land of which they had purchased the exclusive possession, with a charter of which they had acquired the entire control, for the sake of reducing to practice the system of religion and the forms of civil liberty which they cherished more than life itself. They constituted a corporation to which

they themselves might establish the terms of admission. They kept firmly in their own hands the key to their asylum, and were resolved on closing its doors against the enemies of its unity, its safety, and its peace.

"The worke wee have in hand," these are Winthrop's words on board the Arbella during the passage, "is by a mutuall consent, through a speciall overruling Providence, and a more than ordinary approbation of the churches of Christ, to seeke out a place of cohabitation and consorteshipp under a due forme of government both civil and ecclesiastical. For this wee are entered into covenant with God; for this wee must be knitt together as one man, allways having before our eyes our commission as members of the same body. Soe shall wee keepe the unitie of the spirit in the bond of peace. The Lord will be our God, and delight to dwell among us, as his owne people; wee shall see much more of his wisdome, power, goodness, and truthe, than formerly wee have been acquainted with; hee shall make us a prayse and glory, that men shall say of succeeding plantations, "The Lord make it likely that of New England."

After sixty-one days at sea, the Arbella came in sight of Mount Desert; on the tenth of June, the White Hills were descried afar off; near the isle of Shoals and Cape Ann the sea was enlivened by the shallops of fishermen; and on the twelfth, as the ship came to anchor outside of Salem harbor, it was visited by William Peirce, of the Lyon, whose frequent voyages had given him experience as a pilot on the coast. Winthrop and his companions came full of hope; they found the colony in an "unexpected condition" of distress. Above eighty had died the winter before. Higginson himself was wasting under a hectic fever; many others were weak and sick; all the corn and bread among them was hardly a fit supply for a fortnight. The survivors of one hundred and eighty servants, who had been sent over in the two years before at a great expense, instead of having prepared a welcome, thronged to the new-comers to be fed; and were set free from all engagements, for their labor, urgent as was the demand for it, was worth less than the cost of their support. Famine threatened to seize the emigrants as they stepped on shore; and it

soon appeared necessary for them, even at a ruinous expense, to send the Lyon to Bristol for food.

To seek out a place for their plantation, since Salem pleased them not, Winthrop, on the seventeenth of June, sailed into Boston harbor. The west country men, who, before leaving England, had organized their church with Maverick and Warham for ministers, and who in a few years were to take part in calling into being the commonwealth of Connecticut, were found at Nantasket, where they had landed just before the end of May. Winthrop ascended the Mystic a few miles, and on the nineteenth took back to Salem a favorable report of the land on its banks. Dudley and others, who followed, preferred the country on the Charles river at Watertown. By common consent, early in the next month the removal was made, with much cost and labor, from Salem to Charlestown. But, while drooping with toil and sorrow, fevers consequent on the long voyage, and the want of proper food and shelter, twelve ships having arrived, the colonists kept the eighth of July as a day of thanksgiving. The emigrants had intended to dwell together, but in their distress they planted where each was inclined. A few remained at Salem; others halted at the Saugus, and founded Lynn. The governor was for the time at Charlestown, where the poor "lay up and down in tents and booths round the hill." On the other side of the river the little peninsula, scarce two miles long by one broad, marked by three hills, and blessed with sweet and pleasant springs, safe pastures, and land that promised "rich cornfields and fruitful gardens," attracted, among others, William Coddington, of Boston in England, who, in friendly relations with William Blackstone, built the first good house there, before it took the name which was to grow famous throughout the world. Some planted on the Mystic, in what is now Malden. Others, with Sir Richard Saltonstall and George Phillips, "a godly minister specially gifted, and very peaceful in his place," made their abode at Watertown; Pynchon and a few began Roxbury; Ludlow and Rossiter, two of the assistants, with the men from the west of England, after wavering in their choice, took possession of Dorchester Neck, now South Boston. The dispersion of the company was esteemed a grievance; but it

was no time for crimination or debate, and those who had health made haste to build. Winthrop himself, "givinge good example to all the planters, wore plaine apparell, drank ordinarily water, and, when he was not conversant about matters of justice, put his hand to labor with his servants.”

On Friday, the thirtieth of July, a fast was held at Charlestown; and, after prayers and preaching, Winthrop, Dudley, Isaac Johnson, and Wilson united themselves by covenant into one "congregation," as a part of the visible church militant. On the next Lord's Day others were received; and the members of this body could alone partake of the Lord's Supper, or present their children for baptism. They were all brothers and equals; they revered, each in himself, the dignity of God's image, and nursed a generous reverence for one another; bound to a healing superintendence over each other's lives, they exercised no discipline to remove evil out of the inmost soul, except the censure of the assembly of the faithful, whom it would have been held grievous to offend. This church, the seminal centre of the ecclesiastical system of Massachusetts, was gathered while Higginson was yet alive; on the sixth of August he gave up the ghost with joy, for the future greatness of New England and the coming glories of its many churches floated in cheerful visions before his eyes. When, on the twenty-third of August, the first court of assistants on this side the water was held at Charlestown, how the ministers should be maintained took precedence of all other business; and it was ordered that houses should be built for them, and support provided at the common charge. Four days later the men "of the congregation" kept a fast, and, after their own free choice of John Wilson for their pastor, they themselves set him apart to his office by the imposition of hands, yet without his renouncing his ministry received in England. In like manner the ruling elder and deacons were chosen and installed. Thus was constituted the body which, crossing the Charles river, became known as the First Church of Boston. It embodied the three great principles of Congregationalism; a right faith attended by a true religious experience as the requisite qualifications for membership; the equality of all believers, including the officers of the church; the equality of