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CHAPTER VII.

Massachusetts, with the Rebels in England--Proclamation against the King's Party-Hugh Peters sent to England to urge on the Rebellion-Cromwell appoints him his Chaplain, and presents him with a Commission of a Colonel in the Army-His favorite Text in Execution--The Provincials decline to use the names of the Keepers of the Liberties of England in Official Papers, or to renew their Charter-They also refuse to take part in the War between England and Holland--Conduct of the Virginians after the King's Death, contrasted with theirs-Trade with Virginia forbidden-Admiral Ascue sent to reduce the Loyalists to Obedience-Puritans of Massachusetts flatter the Parliament, and approve Cromwell's Share in the Death of the King-He offers them Jamaica, or confiscated Estates in Ireland--Reasons for declining-Arrival of the Regicides, Goffe and Whalley-Their Reception and History-Pretended Search for them-Conduct of Virginia at the Death of Cromwell, contrasted with that of Massachusetts--Extraordinary Letter of the General Court to Charles II.-The King proclaimed-People forbidden to drink his Health.

THROUGHOUT the whole period of the Civil War, which finally ended in the captivity and death of Charles I., the colonists warmly and deeply sympathized with the Puritan rebels and saintly murderers of the unhappy monarch. Some of the more zealous and active spirits returned to their native land to join in the work of the brethren, and those who anxiously watched the progress of events at a distance, gave consolation and encouragement to the volunteers who departed in this holy cause. "If thy brother entice thee to serve other gods," they said, “thou shalt surely put him to death.” For speaking lies in the name of the Lord, his father shall thrust him through when he prophesieth." But the issue of human affairs is in His hands, who alone directs them and as no one can tell what a day may bring forth, prudence dictated a simulated neutrality of conduct in their public acts. Accordingly, the following extraordinary proclamation was issued by the Governor: "Whereas the civil war and dissensions in our native country, through the seditious words and carriages of many evil-affected persons, cause divisions in many places of government in America, some professing themselves for the king, and others for the Parliament, not considering that the Parliament themselves profess that they stand for the king and

Parliament against malignant Papists and delinquents in that kingdom;

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"It is therefore ordered, that what person soever shall by word, writing, or action, endeavor to disturb our peace, directly or indirectly, by drawing a party, under pretense that he is for the King of England and such as join with him against the Parliament, shall be accounted as an offender of a high nature against the commonwealth, and to be proceeded with either capitally or otherwise, according to the quality and degree of his offense. Provided always that this shall not be extended against any merchant strangers and shipmen that come hither merely for matters of trade or merchandise, albeit they should come from any of those parts that are in the hands of the king, and such as adhere to him against the Parliament; carrying themselves here quietly, and free from railing or nourishing any faction, meeting, or sedition among us as aforesaid."

Nothing can be more impartial than the recital which applies to both sides, and nothing better calculated to effect its object, than the enacting clause, had it not been for a slight omission of one of the contending parties. Had this document ever been called in question in after days, no doubt it could easily have been shown to have originated in a mistake of the clerk, or in an error of the press.

While the civil war was in full progress, a parliamentary ordinance appointed the Earl of Warwick "Governor in Chief and Lord High Admiral of all those islands and plantations inhabited, planted, and belonging to any of his Majesty's the King of England's subjects, within the bounds and upon the coast of America," to be assisted by a council, composed of five peers, the Earls of Pembroke and Manchester, Viscount Say and Sele, Lords Wharton and Roberts, and twelve members of the House of Commons, among whom were Sir Harry Vane, late Governor of Massachusetts, Samuel Passall, one of the original patentees of that colony, Hazelrig, Pym, and Cromwell. This Board, a pretty close imitation of the late royal commission, of which Laud had been the head, was authorized "to provide for, order, and dispose all things which they shall from time to time find most fit and advantageous to the well-governing, securing, strengthening, and preserving of the said plantations, and chiefly to the preservation of the true Protestant religion among the said planters and

inhabitants, and the further spreading and advancement of the Gospel of Christ among those that yet remained there in great and miserable blindness and ignorance." They were also authorized to appoint, at pleasure, "all such subordinate governors, counselors, commanders, and officers as they shall judge to be best affected, and most fit and serviceable." But, as to any particular plantations, they might, if they saw fit, depute to them any or all of the above granted powers.

Republicanism was still further advanced in the colonies by this Board. They gave to the noted Roger Williams a charter, including the shores and islands of Narraganset Bay, west of Plymouth, and south of Massachusetts, as far as the Pequod river and country, to be known as Providence Plantation, with authority to the inhabitants "to rule themselves" as they should find "most suitable." This patent was, to all intents and purposes, a grant of independence. Similarity of religious and political sentiment, as well as gratitude for favors received, and hopes for the future, led the General Court to aid the revolutionary party in every way that was compatible with the possible contingency of a restoration. They accordingly set apart a day nominally for prayer, but, in fact, for thanksgiving, for the glad tidings from England. Three agents, at the head of whom was the notorious Hugh Peters, the pastor of Salem, were sent there "to promote the interest of reformation, by stirring up the war, and driving it on."

For this task, no man could be better qualified than Peters. Having been expelled from Cambridge, for irregularity of conduct, he became a constant frequenter of the theatres, and led a dissolute life among the actors. Mistaking disgust and satietythe inevitable consequence of debauchery-for repentance, he reformed his habits, applied himself to theological studies, and was ordained by the Bishop of London. But such is the effect of early dissipation, that the temptations of the town, increased by abstinence, overpowered him again; and, having been detected in a most flagitious offense, he fled to Holland, to avoid the punishment of the Civil and Ecclesiastical Courts. He did not quit the Church from conscientious scruples, but because he had violated his vows, and offended against the laws of both God and man. Like many others in all ages, he resorted to hypocrisy as a cloak for his guilt, and was received by the Puritans as a "brand plucked from the fire." The buffoonery of his manner,

and his singular power of modulating his voice, which he had acquired on the stage, rendered him a most popular preacher.* To these qualifications he added another of no less importance— a thorough hatred of royalty and episcopacy. His instructions from the General Court were either verbal, as being too dangerous to be recorded, or purposely destroyed after the Restoration, as they can not now be found; but their sanguinary nature appears abundantly in his trial. Such being his popular talents, and such his errand, he was welcomed by Cromwell with open arms, who created him his own chaplain, and presented him with the commission of a colonel in the army, saying, at the same time, that he always found those who excelled in prayer made the best soldiers.

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The favorite text of the colonial delegate and divine but too plainly indicated the object for which he crossed the ocean : With high praises in our mouths, and a two-edged sword in our hands, we are to execute judgment upon the heathen, and punishments upon the people; to bind their kings with chains, and their nobles with fetters of iron."

When the unhappy monarch was brought a prisoner to London, Peters was his jailer, for which office his savage temper and offensive manners were considered as the best qualifications. Whether he was one of the masked headsmen is involved in some obscurity. Mr. White Kennet says, that he was generally suspected to have been one, and a man of the name of Hulet the other. In publicly returning thanks for being permitted to share in the awful scene, he exulted, as he said, with Simeon: "Lord, now lettest Thou Thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen Thy salvation." His conduct at his own execution has been variously represented. Burnet, in his "History of his Own Times," says: "That he was the most sunken in spirits of any of the regicides. He had not the honesty to repent, nor the strength of mind to suffer for his crime. He was observed to be constantly drinking some cordial liquors to keep him from faint

In those days the hour-glass often found a place in the pulpit. In a likeness of him, prefixed to his life, he is represented as turning one, and saying to his congregation, "I know you are good fellows, stay and take another glass.

For want of excitement, Peters' zeal among his parishioners at Salem was observed to have greatly cooled before he sailed on this mission. He had suppressed the weekly lecture there, to enable him to prosecute schemes for the fisheries, and for ship-building.

ing." Equally respectable authorities say, that he met his fate with firmness and resolution. The former version has probability

so recommend it. Harrison and others were enthusiasts, who thought they were acting in obedience to the will of Heaven, of which they believed that they were the chosen instruments. However much they deluded themselves, it was at all events their firm conviction, and they had the honest support of a misguided conscience to sustain them in their last moments, while their courage as men had too often been exhibited to admit of a doubt. Peters, on the other hand, so far from having been trained in the rigid school of Puritan morals, was nurtured in profligacy, and adopted the tenets of the Congregationalists, not because he believed them, but that they afforded him an asylum when expelled from all respectable society. It is not improbable, therefore, that like most ruffians he was a coward.*

But much as the Provincials sympathized with the Parliament, and firmly as they believed that Providence had sanctioned their undertaking, and crowned their arms with success, they thought their own prayers had been equally heard, and their cause no less blessed, and that their little republic was as much their own, as the greater one was the heritage of the transatlantic saints. Accordingly, when admonished that all process in the local courts should be in the name of the keepers of the liberties of England, and that the powers then in being should be acknowledged by a renewal of their charter, they adopted the prudent course of maintaining silence and delay, as better suited to their purpose than open defiance; and continued the forms to which they had been accustomed, without too broadly asserting their rights on the one hand, or apologizing for their disobedience on the other. They observed the same reserve afterward, when Cromwell transmitted a ratified treaty with Holland as to the boundaries of New England, and the Dutch colony on the Hudson. They declined to exchange it with the governor of that province, informing him that such a formality was unnecessary, as the line indicated on it was one which they had always held, and by which they were still willing to abide.

Shortly afterward they assumed a still more decided attitude. When a rupture took place in Europe between England and

* His widow, who remained in New England, was allowed a pension of thirty pounds per annum from his friends and admirers in Massachusetts.

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