This latter community was frequently subject to divisions and disputes, on those points of faith and discipline that each party regarded as all-important, but on the carrying out of which they could not agree; and a certain spirit of intolerance had already begun to show itself among them, which, in later times, ripened into actual cruelty and persecution.
The first instance of any display of this unchristian spirit with which our narrative is concerned, was the treatment of a young clergyman, named Roger Williams, who came over to New England several years after the emigration of the Pilgrim Fathers, when the renewed oppression of the Puritan ministers, by the English bishops, drove many of their number to seek a refuge in America. In the same year also arrived John Elliott, a man whose name is deservedly remembered and respected in New England, as standing conspicuous for zeal and virtue. So great and so successful were his labors among the native heathen, and so eminent were his piety and his self-denying charity, that he has been well named the _'Prince of Missionaries'_ and 'the Great Apostle of the Indians.'
The arrival of these holy and zealous--though somewhat eccentric--men, and of several others equally resolved to maintain the freedom of their religious views and practices, tended greatly to strengthen and establish the emigrants; and also added considerably to their comfort, as every settlement became provided with regular and authorized ministers of the gospel, and could enjoy all those religious privileges from which they had been so long debarred. But it must also be confessed that it became the source of much dissension and party feeling, and led to that display of bigotry and intolerance that eventually disgraced the Christian profession of the men of Massachusetts.[*]
[Footnote: The cruel fate of Mary Dyer, the Quaker, who was condemned to death by Governor Endicott, at Boston, is a lamentable instance of the narrow-minded and cruel policy of the rulers of that community. She was banished from the state, but 'felt a call' to return and rebuke the austerity of the men of Boston, and reprove them for their spiritual pride. She was accompanied by two friends, William Robinson and Marmaduke Stevenson, and all three were seized, imprisoned, and, after a summary trial, were sent to the gallows. The two men were executed; but at the moment when Mary Dyer was standing, calm and resigned, with the rope around her neck, expecting to be launched into eternity, a reprieve arrived, and the victim was released. But it was only for a little time. She was again banished; and again returned, as if to seek her fate. A second trial took place, and she was again condemned. Her husband, who knew not of her return to Boston until it was too late, appeared before the magistrates, and pleaded with all the eloquence of affection and anguish. But he wept and prayed in vain. His young and lovely wife was led to the scaffold, where she met her fate with a pious and even cheerful resignation; but her blood has left a dark stain on the history of the Church of Boston, that no time will ever efface. This dreadful event occurred about forty years after that period of which we are now treating.]