no priestly intervention between the redeemed soul and its divine Redeemer. It was simply "the communion of the saints;" the free and loving fellowship of those whom Christ had made "kings and priests unto God;" the spontaneous association of believers for united worship, for mutual helpfulness in holy living, and for strength to labor or to suffer in the service of God. CHAPTER XVIII. ATTEMPTS OF NATIONALISM AGAINST THE PILGRIM CHURCH. THE success of the few exiles who had migrated from Leyden to America was beginning to take effect in England. For a long time there had been in English minds the hope and the scheme of a colonial empire beyond the ocean. Capital and labor had been lavishly expended in Virginia; and the settlements there, after many disasters, were just beginning to have some appearance of prosperity. But the attempt, simultaneous with the founding of Jamestown (1607), to establish a colony in North Virginia, afterward named New England, had failed in less than a year, though magnificently patronized. Weston's more recent attempt had been more ignominiously unsuccessful. Such failures made the success of the settlement at Plymouth more conspicuous.1 Sir Ferdinand Gorges, who had always been the life of King James's "Council for New England," was encouraged to hope that the dominion which the royal charter had given to that council might soon become something more than a name. Hitherto the imperial powers of that august body had been chiefly productive of fruitless attempts to impose tribute on the fishing vessels which resorted to the coast; but while Plymouth was struggling through its third sum 1 Captain John Smith, in his “New England's Trials,” 1622, had briefly described the beginning and already hopeful progress of the Plymouth colony. The same year there was published the invaluable document commonly cited as "Mourt's Relation," but identified and republished by Young ("Chronicles of the Pilgrims," p. 109, sq.) as "Bradford and Winslow's Journal," with a preface by George Morton. Cushman's "Sermon," with a glowing preface, descriptive of New England and inviting emigration, is of the same date. Winslow's "Good News from New England" was published in 1624. mer (July, 1623), there came into its harbor a ship with a captain on board, "who had a commission to be Admiral of New England." About two months later, Captain Robert Gorges, son of Sir Ferdinand, came with a commission to be Governor-General of the country. Arriving "in the bay of the Massachusetts with sundry passengers and families," he attempted to make another beginning at the place which Weston's men had so recently forsaken (Sept., 1623). The plan for a general government over all the territory granted to the Council for New England acknowledged the existence and in some sort the autonomy of Plymouth, inasmuch as the governor of that colony for the time being was to be, by virtue of his office, one of the Governor-General's council. But, on the other hand, it seems to have assumed that the ecclesiastical authority which prescribed and controlled the religion of England was to have the same sway in New England. Accordingly, the great Council took care for the religious welfare of the expedition led forth by Governor-General Gorges. There was in his suite a chaplain, who was not only charged with the care of souls in the renewed plantation at Wessagusset, but was also expected to have some sort of superintendence over the Separatists of Plymouth. He found, however, no opportunity of asserting his jurisdiction; nor does he seem to have had any disposition to do so. Gorges, "not finding the state of things here to answer his quality and condition," returned to England (1624) after the experience of one winter in the country which he had undertaken to govern. Planting colonies in such a wilderness was not the agreeable employment which he, the son of Sir Ferdinand, “being newly come out of the Venetian war,” had hoped for. His departure was, in effect, the breaking up of his attempted colony. Some of the people whom he had brought followed him to England; others went to Virginia; a few "remained and were helped with supplies " from Plymouth. Among the few was the chaplain, whose conduct in relation to the Plymouth people seems to have been such as po gave them no offense. He was a man of culture and of etic sensibility. Enamored of the natural beauty which he saw in New England, he recorded his observations on the country in a Latin poem which, with a free translation of it into less polished English verse, seems to have been his chief employment here.1 After another year, he also returned to England (1625), his office at Wessagusset having become a sinecure. Bradford says of him, as if with an unconscious smile, "He had I know not what power and authority of superintendency over other churches granted him, and sundry instructions for that end; but he never showed" his commission " or made any use of it (it should seem he saw it was in vain); he only spoke of it to some here at his going away." So ended that attempt to introduce Nationalism, or the national-church theory of Christianity, into New England. The Separatists of Scrooby, the exiles of Leyden, the Pilgrims of the Mayflower, had brought with them a theory which permitted neither king nor parliament to rule in the Church of Christ. For them the wilderness and solitary place were beginning to be glad, and it was not in the book of God's decrees that the system which had driven them 1 That bi-lingual poem was published after the author's return to England. It may be found entire in the first series of the Mass. Historical Society's Collections, i., 125-139. He thus describes he "ground-nut," so often mentioned by Bradford and Winslow, the Apios tuberosa of the botanists: "Vimine gramineo nux subterranea suavis Serpit humi, tenui flavo sub cortice pingui Et placido nucleo nivei candoris ab intra Melliflua parcos hilarans dulcedine gustus Donec in æstivum Phoebus conscenderit axem." In English: "A ground-nut there runs on a grassy thread into banishment should follow them hither. Apparitors and pursuivants, acts of uniformity and bishops' prisons, commissary courts and High Commission, found no entrance on this side of the ocean, though so gentle and genial a man as William Morrell had been sent to prepare the way for them. Another attempt against Separatism in New England was already in progress from a very different quarter. Before the coming over of Gorges with his planters of a new colony, and with his state-church chaplain, the Pilgrims were aware of disagreements and complaints among the Adventurers, though Weston was no longer a partner in the Company. For that reason the friendly letter which came to them by the Anne, with thirteen names of the Adventurers subscribed, was the more welcome, especially because of the regard which it expressed for their "old friends" and their pastor still detained at Leyden.' But the full significance of that letter became painfully apparent when Winslow returned from his mission in England (March, 1624). He came in the ship Charity, which brought supplies for the colony,2 together with some passengers whose names will appear in our story. By the same vessel came letters which, even without his report of what he had himself observed, revealed the fact that among the Adventurers there was a strong and active party adverse to the Pilgrim church. James Sherley, one of the Adventurers, and "a chief friend of the colony," wrote to his "most worthy and loving friends," and explained to them the difficulties which had embarrassed "the setting forth of this ship:" "We have some among us who undoubtedly aim more at their own private ends, and at the thwarting and opposing of some here and other worthy instruments of God's glory elsewhere" (referring especially to Leyden and to Robinson), "than at the general good and the furtherance of this noble and laud 2 1 Ante, p. 386, 387. 'He brought three heifers and a bull, the first beginning of any cattle of that kind in the land, with some clothing and other necessaries." |