THE PERIOD OF BEGINNINGS
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Old England, those that govern the whole plantation have both lands and children.” But in fact the founders of Massachusetts were aiming at something different, at founding a community which should itself be independent of English connection, and yet this was the policy which the Imperial Charles found himself aiding and abetting. That the Colony was intended to promote certain definite views may be gathered from the instructions sent out to the Governor Endacott. Among them it is directed that persons who may prove “ not conformable to their government ” or otherwise disagreeable shall not be suffered “to remain within the limits of the grant,” but be shipped to England.
Considering the case of the Massachusetts Bay Company and the subsequent grant of Maryland to Lord Baltimore, it is impossible to resist the conclusion that colonial history has been largely written under the influence of English experiences. In the stock books on the subject, the Stuart kings stand as the embodiment of bigotry and intolerance. Professor Seeley on the other hand has remarked that their Colonial Policy was one of toleration. How far it may have been so consciously, at least in the case of the two first Stuart kings is doubtful, and an exception must in any case be made of the few years during which that policy was directed by Archbishop Laud. In the patents to Sir H. Gilbert and Sir W. Raleigh, in the clause as to government, are found the words, “ and not against the true Christian faith or religion now professed in the Church of England.” In the Virginia Charters no mention is made of the Church of England, while, in the 1609 Charter, the Oath of Supremacy is enforced, with a view to prevent such passing, as were suspected of the Church of Rome. It is true that in the Royal Instructions of 1606 the Christian religion was to be preached amongst both colonists and savages, according to the doctrines and rites of the Church of England, and penalties were to be incurred by the withdrawing of people from this religion, but this did not involve intolerance towards Nonconformists, so long as the Nonconformists themselves did not attempt to convert other people. When
Religious
toleration.