Ievves in America, or, Probabilities that the Americans are of that race. With the removall of some contrary reasonings, and earnest desires for effectuall endeavours to make them Christian. / Proposed by Tho: Thorovvgood, B.D. one of the Assembly of Divines. Thorowgood, Thomas, d. ca. 1669. 1650 Approx. 358 KB of XML-encoded text transcribed from 93 1-bit group-IV TIFF page images. Text Creation Partnership, Ann Arbor, MI ; Oxford (UK) : 2008-09 (EEBO-TCP Phase 1). A94301 Wing T1067 Thomason E600_1 ESTC R206387 99865547 99865547 117792 This keyboarded and encoded edition of the work described above is co-owned by the institutions providing financial support to the Early English Books Online Text Creation Partnership. This Phase I text is available for reuse, according to the terms of Creative Commons 0 1.0 Universal . The text can be copied, modified, distributed and performed, even for commercial purposes, all without asking permission. Early English books online. (EEBO-TCP ; phase 1, no. A94301) Transcribed from: (Early English Books Online ; image set 117792) Images scanned from microfilm: (Thomason Tracts ; 92:E600[1]) Ievves in America, or, Probabilities that the Americans are of that race. With the removall of some contrary reasonings, and earnest desires for effectuall endeavours to make them Christian. / Proposed by Tho: Thorovvgood, B.D. one of the Assembly of Divines. Thorowgood, Thomas, d. ca. 1669. [42], 136, [4] p. Printed by W.H. for Tho. Slater, and are be to [sic] sold at his shop at the signe of the Angel in Duck lane, London : 1650. Annotation on Thomason copy: "May. 6.". Reproduction of the original in the British Library. Created by converting TCP files to TEI P5 using tcp2tei.xsl, TEI @ Oxford. Re-processed by University of Nebraska-Lincoln and Northwestern, with changes to facilitate morpho-syntactic tagging. 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Users should bear in mind that in all likelihood such instances will never have been looked at by a TCP editor. The texts were encoded and linked to page images in accordance with level 4 of the TEI in Libraries guidelines. Copies of the texts have been issued variously as SGML (TCP schema; ASCII text with mnemonic sdata character entities); displayable XML (TCP schema; characters represented either as UTF-8 Unicode or text strings within braces); or lossless XML (TEI P5, characters represented either as UTF-8 Unicode or TEI g elements). Keying and markup guidelines are available at the Text Creation Partnership web site . eng Jews -- Early works to 1800. Lost tribes of Israel -- Early works to 1800. Indians of North America -- Early works to 1800. 2007-03 TCP Assigned for keying and markup 2007-05 Apex CoVantage Keyed and coded from ProQuest page images 2007-06 Jonathan Blaney Sampled and proofread 2007-06 Jonathan Blaney Text and markup reviewed and edited 2008-02 pfs Batch review (QC) and XML conversion Ievves in America , OR , PROBABILITIES That the AMERICANS are of that Race . With the removall of some contrary reasonings , and earnest desires for effectuall endeavours to make them Christian . Proposed by THO : THOROVVGOOD , B. D. one of the Assembly of Divines . CANT . 8. 8. We have a little sister , and she hath no breasts , what shall we doe for our sister in the day when she shall be spoken for ? MAT. 8. 11. Many shall come from the East , and from the West , and shall sit downe with Abraham , and Isaac , and Jacob in the Kingdome of Heaven . Aethiopes vertuntur in filios Dei , si egerint paenitentiam , & filii Dei transeunt in Aethiopes si in profundum venerint peccatorum : Hieronym . in Esai , London , Printed by W. H. for Tho. Slater , and are be to sold at his shop at the signe of the Angel in Duck lane , 1650. TO THE HONOVRABLE Knights and Gentlemen that have residence in , and relation to the County of Norfolk , Peace , from the God of Peace . WHen the glad tidings of the Gospels sounding in America by the preaching of the English arrived hither , my soule also rejoyced within me , and I remembred certaine papers that had been laid aside a long time , upon review of them , and some additions to them , they were privately communicated unto such as perswaded earnestly they might behold further light ; being thus finished , and licenced also to walke abroad , as they were stepping forth , that incivility charged upon Chrysippus occurred , that he dedicated not his writings to any King or Patron , which custome presently seemed not onely lawfull , but as ancient as those Scriptures where Saint Luke in the history of the Acts of the Apostles applies himselfe to Theophilus , Act. 1. 1. And Saint Iohn to the Elect Lady , so named , some thinke , or for her graces so entituled , I was easily induced to follow this fashion , and my thoughts soone reflected upon you , Who are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , as well as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , lovers of God , and choice men of your Countrey . I may be censured for this high , generall , and ambitious dedication ; but I doe freely publish my own utter unworthinesse : t is true , my respects and love be very much to you all , and my native soile , yet in this I doe not drive any private designe , I looke beyond my selfe , at your honour , the honour of the Nation , yea the glory of God , and the soule-good of many millions that are yet in darkenesse and out of Christ ; By you is the following tract communicated to the world , I wish , and pray , that the designe bespoken in it may be cordially furthered by you , and all that read or heare thereof ; t is like you will finde in the probabilities so many Iudaicall resemblances in America , that as it was said of old , 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , either Plato writes like Philo the Iew , or Philo is become Platonicke ; so the Jewes did Indianize , or the Indians doe Judaize , for surely they are alike in many , very many remarkable particulars , and if they bee Iewes , they must not for that be neglected ; visible comments indeed they are of that dismall Text , Thou shalt become an astonishment , a proverbe , and a by-word to all Nations , &c. Deut. 20. 37. and so they are every where to this day : what more reproachfull obloquy is there among men , then this , Thou art a Jew ? Oh the bitter fruits of disobedience ; and t is high time for us Gentiles to lay up that example , in the midst of our hearts , Pro. 4. 21. remembring alwaies , because of unbeliefe they were broken off , and , if God spared not the naturall branches , take heed lest hee spare not thee . Rom. 11. 21. It was a suddaine sentence , Tam viles inter Christianos Iudaei , ut inter mundum triticum mures , Jewes are as bad and vile among Christians , as Mice in cleane wheate ; for glorious were their privileges , and we have a share in some of them , that last especially — of whom concerning the flesh Christ came , who is God over all , blessed for ever , Rom. 9. 4 , 5. and for another thing they have highly merited our regard — To them were commited the Oracles of God , Rom. 3. 9. The holy Scriptures were concredited to them , and they have faithfully preserved them for us , and conveyed them to us : Former times indeed found cause to exterminate them these dominions , I say nothing for such their reintroduction , which must be with sacred and civill cautions , that the svveet name of our dearest Lord be not blasphemed , nor the Natives robbed of their rights , but when will Christians in earnest endeavour their conversion , if the name of Jevv must be odious everlastingly ? I speak for their Gospelizing , though some suspect they are never likely to come again under that covenant , as if the Liber repudii , the bill of divorce mentioned by the Prophet did put them away from God for ever , Esa . 50. 1. as if they should return to their Spouse no more , but that there is for them a time of love , and that they shall be grafted in , Rom. 11. 23. is manifested afterwards upon Scripture grounds ; and if the period of their wandering be upon its determination , and their recovery approching , how may wee rejoyce in the returne of that Prodigall ? It is meet that wee should make merry and be glad , for our brother that was dead is reviving againe , Luk. 15. 32. How should wee beg for them that God would poure upon them the spirit of grace and supplication , that they may looke upon him whom they have pierced , and mourne for him as one mourneth for his onely sonne . Zach. 12. 10. Or if the lost Tribes are not to be found in America , of whatsoever descent and origination the poore Natives be , if they finde the Lord Christ , and the Nov-angles be the Wisemen guiding them unto their peace , great cause shall wee have to lift up the high praises of our God in spirituall exultation ; how should wee cast our mite into this treasury , yea our Talent , our Talents , if wee have them ? for certainely the time is comming , That as there is one Shepherd , there shall be one Sheepfold . Io. 10. 16. It is true , our owne Countrey in many respects stands in need of helpe , wee are fallen into the last and worst times , the old age of the world , full of dangerous and sinnefull diseases , Iniquity is encreased , and if ever , if to any people , the saying of that Torrent of Tullian eloquence ( so Ierome calls Lactantius ) be applicable , it is to poore England , that is not onely in the gall of bitternesse , but in the very dregs of error and ungodlinesse , Ideo mala omnia rebus humanis ingravescunt , quia Deus hujus mundi effector ac gubernator derelictus est , quia susceptaesunt , contra quam fas est impiae religiones , postremo quia ne coli quidem vel à paucis Deus sinitur . But , O my soule , if thou be wise , be wise for thy selfe , Pro. 9. 12. and give mee leave to say to you as Moses to his Israell , Onely take heed to your selves , and keepe your soules diligently , Deut. 4. 9. make your calling and election sure , 2 Pet. 1. 10. and because you are the children of faithfull Abraham , command your children and families that they walke in the waies of the Lord , Gen. 18. 9. and let who will serve themselves , follow lying vanities , and set up their owne lusts ; let every one of us say and do as Ioshua , I and my house will serve the Lord , Josh . 24. 15. And not onely serve the Lord with and in our housholds , but in furthering the common good of others , and t is considerable God is pleased to owne publique interests , though in civill things with the name of his owne inheritance . But this is the sinne , this is the misery of these times , All seek their owne , not the things of Iesus Christ . Even regulated charity may beginne at home , it may not , it must not end there , it is the onely grace that is sowne on earth , it growes up to heaven and continues there , it goes with us thither , and there abides to all eternity , and t is therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , greater then faith and hope , not from continuance onely , but its extensivenesse , it delights to be communicative , it reacheth an hand of helpe one way or other to every one that needs , though at never so great a distance ; after the cloven tongues as of fire had warmed the affections of the holy Apostles , they had so much love to soules that they forgat their fathers house , discipled all Nations , and preached the Gospel to every creature , Their line went through all the earth , and their words to the ends of the world , that former known world , the same spirit hath warmed the hearts of our Countreymen , and they are busie at the same worke in the other , the new-found world ; For behold a white horse and he that sate on him had a bow , and a Crown was given unto him , and hee went forth conquering , and to conquer ; so the Lord Christ shall be light to that world also , and Gods salvation to the ends of the earth . Britain hath woon the Gospel-glory from all other Countries , not onely imbracing it with the formost , as old Gildas testifieth , but it was the first of all the Provinces that established Christianity by a law saith Sabellicus , our Lucius was the first Christian King that Annales make mention of , and venerable Bede out of Eutropius declareth that Constantine the first Christian Emperour , was created to that dignity in this Island , & Sozom. l. 9. c. 11. saith that so were Marcus & Gratian also ; But Constantine brought further honour to the Nation & Religion : For the Saxon Bede , and Ponticus Virunnius affirme expresly , that Constantine was born in Britaine ; after this , ingemuit orbis videns se totum Romanum , All the world wondred after the Beast , & groaned under the Papall servitude , and our K. Henry the eight was the first of all the Princes who brake that yoke of Antichrist : but neerer yet to our purpose ; The Inhabitants of the first England , so Verstegan calls that part of Germany whence our Ancestors came hither with the Saxons and Iutes , derive their Christianity from Iewry , Ad nos doctrina de terra Iudaeorum per sanctos Apostolos , qui docebant gentes , pervenit , as that great linguist , learned , and laborious Mr Wheelocke hath observed , and translated out of the old Saxon Homilies , t is but just therefore lege talionis , that we repay what we borrowed , and endeavour their conversion who first acquainted us with the eternall Gospell , and if it be probable that providence honoured this Nation with the prime discovery of that New World , as is intimated hereafter , it is true without all controversie , that from this second England God hath so disposed the hearts of many in the third , New England , that they have done more in these last few yeares towards their conversion , then hath been effected by all other Nations and people that have planted there since they were first known to the habitable world , as if that Prophesie were now in its fulfilling ; Behold , I will doe a new thing , now it shall spring forth shall ye not know it ? I will even make a way in the Wildernes and rivers in the desart , &c. When our Ancestors lay also in darkenesse and the shadow of death , Gregory wrote divers Epistles to severall Noblemen and Bishops , yea and to some Kings and Queenes of France and England , these Sir H. Spelman that famous Antiquary , your noble Countreyman , and of alliance to divers of you , calls epistolas Britannicas , which are also mentioned afterwards ; in these he gives God thankes for their forwardnesse to further the worke of grace , and desires earnestly the continuance of their bountifull and exemplary encouragement of such as were zealously employed in that Soule-worke , and that is one of the two businesses entended in the following discourse , which begs your assistance in your Spheres , and cordiall concurrence to promote a designe of so much glory to the Lord of glory . This is no new notion , or motion , all the royall Charters required the Gospellizing of the Natives ; and in the beginning of this Parliament there was an Ordinance of Lords and Commons appointing a Committee of both , and their worke was , among other things , to advance the true Protestant Religion in America , and to spread the Gospell among the Natives there ; and since , very lately , there is an Act for the promoting and propagating the Gospell of Iesus Christ in New-England . I wish prosperity to all the Plantations , but those of New-England deserve from hence more then ordinary favour ; because , as by an Edict at Winchester , about eighth hundred yeeres since , King Ecbert commanded this Country should be called Angles-land , so these your Countreymen of their owne accord , and alone , were , and are , ambitious to retain the name of their owne Nation ; besides , this England had once an Heptarchate , and then your Countrey was the chiefe of that Kingdome called Anglia Orientalis , and these are the neerest of all the seven to you in name , Nov-angles , East-angles ; I pray that you would be nearest and most helpefull to them in this most Christian and Gospel-like designe , which I leave with you , and two or three Petitions at the throne of grace for you ; one is that of Moses , Yee shall not doe after all the things that wee do heare this day , every man whatsoever is right in his owne eyes , but that ye walk by rule and not by example ; this is an age much enclining to Enthousiasmes and Revelations ; men pretend to externall and inward impulses , but wee must remember , though wee had a voice from heaven , yet having the Scriptures wee have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a more sure Propheticall word , whereunto yee doe well that yee take heed , as unto a light , that shineth in a darke place , untill the day dawne , and the day starre arise in your hearts ; here is a comparison , even with an heavenly voice , which must vaile and submit to the written word , because poore mankind may easily be deluded by him , who among his many other wiles and depths can transform himself into an Angel of light . Againe , my prayer for you is , that in the wofull concussions and commotions of these daies , your selves may stand firme and unmoveable : You have seene the waters troubled , and the Mountaines shaken with the swelling thereof , Oh , that you may say , in and with holy Davids sense , though an host should encampe against me , my heart shall not feare , though warre should rise up against me , in this will I be confident ; this ? and what is it , but ver . 1. The Lord is my light and my salvation , whom shall I feare , the Lord is the strength of my life , of whom shall I be afraid ; even heathens have said much and done much towards that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , magnanimity and patience , but Christians have an higher prospect , they looke above the terrors of men , and they doe not feare their feare ; for as Stephen through a showre of stones , they can see the heavens open and the Sonne of man sitting at the right hand of God ; nihil crus sentit in nervo , si animus sit in caelo , they are not so much affected with what they feele , as with that they believe , because we walk by faith and not by sight . And oh , that these strange mutations may perswade us all , all the daies of our appointed time to waite , untill our change come , even that change which never , never can again be changed ; these are the last times and yet a little while , yea 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , yet a little , little while , and hee that shall come will come , and will not tarry , his fan is in his hand , and he will throughly purge his floore , and gather the wheate into the garner , but will burne up the chaffe with unquenchable fire . The ungodly shall not stand in the judgement , for all faces shall then be unmasked , and every vizard shall be plucked off , The Lord will then bring to light the hidden things of darknesse , and will make manifest the counsels of the heart , and then every one that hath done well , shall have praise of God. The Lord God of our mercies fit you for his appointment , stablish you in every good word and worke , and keepe you from evill , that you may give up your account with joy , and not with griefe ; and now I commend you all , and all that love that appearing of our Lord , unto the word of his grace , which is able to build you up , and to give you an inheritance among all them that are sanctified ; such is the serious and unfaigned devotion for you , of him who willingly subscribes himselfe , Your most humble servant in our dearest Lord , THO : THOROWGOOD . JEWES IN AMERICA , OR Probabilities that the Americans be Jewes : From Part. 1. Six severall conjectures . Generall Introduction . Chap. 1. 1. Conjecture . Their own acknowledgement . Ch. 2. 2. Rites and customes in both alike , Common ceremonies such , Chap. 3. and solemn . Ch. 4. 3. Their words and manner of speech , as the Iewes , Chap. 5. 4. Their man-devouring . Ch. 6. 5. They have not yet been Gospellized . Ch. 7. 6. Their calamicies , as 28. Deut. Ch. 8. Part 2. Some contrary reasonings removed . 1. In the Generall . Ch. 1. 2. Particularly , How , 1. The Jewes should get into America . Chap. 1. 2. So few empeople that great part of the world . Ch. 3. 3. Become so predigiously barbarous . Chap. 4. Part. 3. Earnest desires for hearty endeavours to make them Christian . 1. To the Planters . 1. Cause of their removall . Chap. 1. 2. Hope of the Natives Conversion . Chap 2. 3. Directions to it . Chap. 3. 4. Cautions about it . Chap. 4. 2. To the English there . 1. In behalfe of the Planters , aspersions wiped off . Chap. 5. & 6. 2. Towards the Natives conversion . 1. Motives . Chap. 7. 2. Helps . Chap. 8. 3. Encouragements from our Countrymens pious endeavours there . Ch. 9. 4. And the successe thereof upon the Indians . Ch. 10. The Preface to the READER . BOna domus in ipso veistbulo debetagnosci saith Austin , the portall commonly promiseth somewhat of the house it self , and prefaces be as doors that let in the Reader to the Booke , and bespeake much of the intention of the writer ; you are in some measure prepared already by the foregoing Epistle , with the forefront , and first page : Marsilius Ficinus said of his booke De triplici Vita . Esca tituli tam suavis quam plurimos alliciet ad gustandum , The title will invite some to further enquiry ; it is in mans nature to be well pleased with novelties , thence later times have had good leave to correct former mistakes . It was written with confidence long since , that the shee Beares did licke their informe litter into fashion , that the young Viper thrusts its Dam out of the world to bring it selfe into it , and that the Swan sings its owne dirige at his dying , all which be sufficiently confuted by after experiences , famous varieties of this sort be daily produced to view , those are curious enquiries into common errors by Doctor Browne . It was said of one contort in body , but of a fine spirit , Animus Galbae malè habitat , It was a bad house for so good an Inhabitant ; many thought so and worse of Richard the third , King of England , till those late endeavours to rectifie him and his readers . that Geographia Sacra is an exact and accurate worke , in respect of the subject and materials , the scattering of Nations at the building of Babel , and it may puzzle some mens thoughts , that hee should know so well the places of their dispersion so long since , and yet wee continue ignorant what is become of Gods owne first people , which shall be recovered to him againe , and have not been missing so many yeeres . The Trojans , though now no Nation , live yet in the ambitious desire of other people , clayming from them their descent : The Jewes , once the Lords owne peculiar people , are now the scomme and scorne of the world ; Florus calls their glory the Temple , Impiae gentis arcanum ; Democritus another Historian said they worshipped an Asses head , every third yeere sacrificed a man , &c. Others speake spightfull things of them , and their pettigree ; only the Lacedemonian King , in that Letter whereof you have a copy , 1 Macab . 12. 20. &c. tells Onias the High Priest . It is found in writing that the Spartans and Jewes are Brethren , and come out of the generation of Abraham . The originall indeed of the Jewes is assuredly knowne to themselves and all Christians ; Wee have no such evidence for any other people that have now a being ; there is nothing more in the darke to the inhabitants of the severall parts of this earth , then their owne beginnings , and t is thus in Countries of along time knowne to each other , and yet in such disquisition they cannot affoord one another almost any light or help ; no wonder therefore that the Originall of the Americans is in such uncertaine obscurity , for their very name hath not been heard of much more than one hundred and fifty yeares , t is a wonder rather that so great a part of the world should be till then Terra incognita , notwithstanding the ambition , curiosity , and avarice of mankind carried him into a greedy inquisition after all places and corners where men and beasts abode , or any commodity was to be found : Hieronimus Benzo in his Nova novi orbis Historia , so often hereafter mentioned , professeth , that above all things concerning the Americans , his great designe was to finde out what thoughts they had of Christians ; touching the Countrey it selfe in the Topography and other particulars , besides divers mentioned in the following discourse ; some have of late done excellently that way : that t is no part of my businesse , which , next to the desire of their conversion to Christ , was , and is , to aske whence they came ; and that they be Judaicall , I have laid together severall conjectures as they occu●●… in reading and observing , to stirre up and awaken more able inquisitors , to looke after the beginning , nature , civilizing , and Gospellizing those people , and to cast in my poore mite towards the encouragement of our Countreymen in such their pious undertaking ; and though some men have spoken meane things of them in reference to their labours that way , as if they had been negligent therein , such men consider not I feare , how long their Countreymen have been wrastling with divers difficulties , and busily employing their minds and time in providing outward accommodations for themselves in a strange land , they remember not the naturall perversenesse of all mankind to spirituall things , nor with what counterworkes Satan doth oppose the underminers of his Principalities , nor how he hath broken the language of the Natives into severall tongues and dialects to impede their conversion , nor how the Novangles have themselves been broken into divers ruptures , lest they should be at leasure to further the enlargement of Christs Kingdome upon the spoiles and diminution of his ; this was in the purpose of their hearts at first , and now to their comfort they do abundantly see that the Natives are a docible people , who for their contempt of gold & silver , and for some other reasons , have been deemed bruitish , and almost irrationall ; but to what is after written it may be mentioned in this place , that in Mexico they were observed to be wise and politique in government , to the admiration of Christians , yea they were not ignorant in those parts of letters and writing , though in a different fashion from others : Acosta did observe , the Jewes write from the right hand to the left , others from the left to the right , the Chinois or East-Indians write from the top to the bottom , & the Mexicans from the bottome to the top , the Reformed Dominican in his new survey of the West-Indies , tells of a Town as he travelled , called Amat Titlan , a Towne of Letters , and of very curious Artifices of their Citizens , of Goldsmiths worke and otherwise , their ingenuity , cunning and courage is marvelously manifest in their leading a Whale as big as a mountaine , with a cord , and vanquishing him in this manner ; by the helpe of their Canoes or little Boats , they come neare to the broad side of that huge creature , oand with great dexterity leape upon his necke , there they ride as on horsebacke , and thrust a sharpe stake into his nosthrill , so they call the hole or vent by which they breathe , he beats it in with another stake as forcibly as hee can , the furious Whale in the meane time raiseth Mountaines of waters , and runnes into the deep with great violence and paine , the Indian still sits firme , driving in another stake in o that other passage , so stopping his breath , then hee goes againe to his Canoe , which with a cord hee had tied to the Whales side , and so he paesseth to land ; the Whale running away with the cord , leaps from place to place in much pame till hee gets to shoare , and being on ground , hee cannot move his huge body , then a great number of Indians come to the conquerer , they kill the Whale , cut his flesh in pieces , they dry it , and make use of it for food , which lasts them long , thus plainely verifying that expression , Psal . 74. 14. Thou breakest the heads of Leviathan in pieces , and gavest him to be meat to the people inhabiting the Wildernesse : When , or where , or by whom is this thus done , but by these ? who will not now desire , and willingly lend his helpe to cover their naked bodies , and cloath their more naked soules with the Gospel , who , and who alone have so litterally fulfilled that Scripture of our God ? But let me commend three other things to thy consideration , that thy affections may bee warmed towards thy Countreymen , and they receive encouragement in the planting of themselves , and the Gospel among the Natives . First , they may be preparing an hiding place for thy selfe , whoever , whatever now thou art , thou mayst be overtaken by a tempest , and stand in need of a shelter , and where canst thou be better for sweetnesse of aire and water , with the fertility of the soile , giving two wheate harvests in one yeare in severall places , yea in some , three , saith P. Martyr , and Books generally speake of that Land as of a second Canaan : and for New-England you may believe the relation of a very friend there to his like here , who mutually agreed upon a private character , that the truth might be discovered without deceit or glozing , and thus he wrote to him whom he entirely loved . The aire of this Countrey is very sweet and healthfull , the daies two houres shorter in Summer , and two houres longer in Winter then they be with you , the Summer is a little hotter , and the Winter , a little colder , our grounds are very good and fruitfull for all kind of corne , both English and Indian , our cattell thrive much better here then in Old England , Fowle encrease with us exceedingly , wee have many sweet and excellent springs , and fresh Rivers , with abundance of good Fish in them ; of a very truth , I believe verily , it will be within a few yeares the plentifullest place in the whole world , &c. I might proclaime , saith Lerius , the Inhabitants of that Land happy , meaning the Natives , if they had knowledge of the Creator ; so that as parents intending to marry their Daughters well , extend themselves in what they may to encrease their portion , and make way for their preferment , our heavenly Father hath dealt thus with these Americans , enriching them with Gold , Silver , good aire , good water , and all other accommodations for use and delight , that they might be the more earnestly wooed and sought after . And yet further , as he commended his house offered to sale , that it had good neighbours , if thou beest driven thither , goe chearefully , for thou goest to thine owne Countreymen , from one England to another , New England indeed , witnesse that experimented asseveration of him worthy of credit , who having lived in a Colony there of many thousand English almost twelve yeares , and was held a very sociable man , speaketh considerately , I never heard but one oath sworne , never saw one man drunke , nor ever heard of three women adulteresses , if these sinnes be among us privily , the Lord heale us , I would not be understood to boast of our innocency , there is no cause I should , our hearts may be bad enough , and our lives much better . And yet they have more abundantly testified their pious integrity in serious endeavours to propogate Gospel-holinesse , even to those that be without , their godly labours Christianizing the Natives must be remembred to their praise , they have had long and longing preparative thoughts and purposes that way , and as Saint Paul once to his Corinthians , 2. 6. 11. they have seemed to say O Americans , our mouth is opened unto you , our heart is enlarged , you are not straightned in us , be not straightned in your owne bowels , and now for a recompence of all our endeavours to preach Christ unto you , we aske no more , but be ye also enlarged with gladnesse to receive the Lord Jesus Christ : their active industry in this kind with the successe is now famously visible in severall discourses , which whosoever shall read will be sufficiently contented in his spirituall and outward well-wishings to his friends , both of this Nation and the Natives , for the Gospel runs there and is glorified : and here I crave leave to speake a word or two to the Military Reader , the late English American traveller , dedicating his observations upon his journeys of three thousand three hundred miles within the maine Land of America , to the Lord Fairefax , speakes knowingly to his Excellency , that with the same paines and charge that the English have been at in planting one of the petty Islands , they might have conquered so many great Cities , and large territories on the Continent as might very well merit the title of a Kingdom ; he shewes further , that the Natives have not onely just right to the Land , and may transferre it to whom they please , but that it may easily be wonne from the Spaniards , and that for these three reasons among the rest . 1. The Spaniards themselves are but few and thinne . 2. The Indians and Blackamoores will turne against them , and so will 3. The Criolians , that is , the Spaniards borne in America , whom they will not suffer to beare office in Church or state ; Looke Westward then yee men of Warre , thence you may behold a rising Sunne of glory , with riches and much honour , and not onely for your selves , but for Christ , whom you say you desire above all , and are delighted to honour : In yonder Countries , that the following leaves speake of , non cedunt arma togae , the pen yeelds to the pike , the first place of honour is given to the profession of armes , and therefore in Mexico the Noblemen were the chiefe souldiers ; thus you may enlarge not onely your owne renowne , but the borders of the Nation , yea the Kingdome of the King of Saints . We have all made covenants and professions of reformation at home , with promises to propagate the Gospell of our deare Lord among those that remaine in great and miserable blindnesse , how happy were it for them and us , if this England were in such a posture of holinesse and tranquility , that all opportunities might be imbraced to advance its territories abroad ; In the interim I could wish with the most passionate , and compassionate of all the holy Prophets , Oh that my head were waters , and mine eyes a fountaine of teares , that I might weep day and night for the sinnes , and for the slaine of the daughter of my people , Oh that I had in the wildernesse , &c. Ier. 9. 1. 2. Our Countrey is justly called our mother , whose heavy groanes under multiplied miseries be heard from all places , whose bowels doe not sympathize with her , and yerne over her , who is not unwilling or ashamed to gather riches or honour from her rents and ruine ; the Heathen Orator spake affectionately , our parents are dear to us , and so be our children , alliances and familiars , but the love of our countrey , comprehends in it and with it all other dearnesses whatsoever ; and in another place , Omnes qui patriam conserverunt , adjuverunt , auxerunt , certum est esse in caelo , t is certaine they are all in heaven that have been lovers and conservators of their Countrey ; and when heathenish Babylon was the place of Israels exile , they are commanded by God himselfe , to seeke the peace of the City whether they were carried , and pray unto the Lord for it , Jer. 29. 7. It is recorded to the honour of Mordecai , that he sought the wealth of his people , Esth . 10. 3. the contrary to this entailes ignominy to men and their posterity , by the book of Gods own heral dry , Esa . 14. 20. Thou shalt not be joyned with them in buriall , because thou hast destroyed thy land , and slaine thy people , the seed of evill doers shall never be renowned ; for that Judge judged righteously : In a civill warre there is no true victory , in asmuch as he that prevaileth is also a loser . But I returne , and reinvite to peruse these probabilities , and if they like not , because they are no more but guesses and conjectures , yet the requests I hope shall be listened unto , for they aime at Gods glory and mans salvation , and nothing else ; and surely the poore Natives will not be a little encouraged to looke after the glorious Gospel of Christ , when they shall understand that not onely the English among them , but wee all here are daily sutors for them at the throne of grace , so that we may say as Paul to the Romans , 1. 9. God is our witnesse , whom wee serve with our spirit in the Gospel of his Sonne , that without ceasing wee make mention of them alwaies in our prayers ; Mr. Elliot whose praise is now through all our Churches , 2 Cor. 8. 18. deserves publique encouragement from hence , besides those sprinklings of an Apostolicall spirit received from heaven , by which in an high and holy ambition he preacheth the Gospell where Christ had not been named , Rom. 15. 20. such another 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , like-minded soule-lover is not readily to be found , that naturally careth for their matters , Phil. 2. 20. regarding the Indians as if they were his owne charge and children , and as God hath furnished him with ministeriall and spirituall abilities for the worke . I wish that he and his com-Presbyters and companions in that labour , might be supplyed with all externall accommodations , to further the civilizing , and Gospellizing of the Americans . And now me thinks I heare thee say also , Oh that the day breaking of the Gospel there , might be the way of Saints , even the path of the just , as the shining light that shineth more and more unto the perfect day , Pro. 4. 18. and oh that all our Nation here and there , would forbeare all other strivings , being ashamed and afraid lest their woefull quarrels be told in Gath , and published in the streets of Askalon , to the prejudice of the Gospels progresse here and there and every where ; Erasmus felt what he said of the differences in his time , Tragaediae Lutheranae mihi ipsi etiam calculo molestiores , and who laments not the wofull tearings of our Nation ? who bewailes not to see the breakings of the sheepfold ? who mournes not to heare the strange bleeting of the flocks ? and what soule is not grieved for the great divisions of England ? and let me wish once more , Oh that all who love the Lord Jesus in sincerity , would study to speake the same things , and that all would be perfectly joyned together in the same minde , and in the same judgement , 1 Cor. 1. 10. converting all their tongue-combats , and pen-contentions into an earnest contending , that the faith once delivered to the Saints ( Jud. 3. ) might be preserved whole , holy , and entire among themselves , and be with like holinesse and integrity communicated to the Indians , that doe now so much hunger and thirst after that righteousnesse of our most deare Lord and Master Christ ; let us all with our tongues , purses , pens , counsels , and prayers , promote this worke of God with one shoulder and consent : there be among us here that have had this in their daily devotions more then twenty yeares , which is mentioned to no other end but from desire to call in thy helpe also ; I will take leave by commending to thy practice the imitation of learned and holy Theod. Beza in his daily prayer for the Iewes , Lord Iesus thou dost justly avenge the contempt of thy selfe , and that ingratefull people is worthy of thy most severe indignation ; but , Lord , remember thy covenant , and for thy names sake be favourable to those miserable wretches , and to us the most unworthy of all men , unto whom thou hast vouchsafed thy mercy , bestow this goodnesse also , that we may grow in thy grace , that we be not instruments of thy wrath against them , but rather , both by the knowledg of thy word , and by the examples of holy life , we may , by the assistance and vertue of thy holy Spirit , reduce them into the right way , that thou maist once be glorified of all Nations and people for ever , Amen . An Epistolicall Discourse Of Mr. IOHN DVRY , TO Mr. THOROWGOOD . Concerning his conjecture that the Americans are descended from the Israelites . With the History of a Portugall Iew , Antonie Monterinos , attested by Manasseh Ben Israel , to the same effect . SIR , IAm bound to thank you for the communication of your booke , which I have read with a great deale of delight and satisfaction ; for the rarity of the subject , and the variety of your observations thereupon , which you have deduced with as much probability to make out your theme , as History can afford matter : I did shew it to another friend of great judgement and ingenuity , who was so taken with it , that he said he would have it to be coppied out at his cost , if you would not publish it to the world , which hee and I have resolved to importune you to doe : for although at first blush , the thing which you offer to be believed , will seeme to most men incredible , and extravigant ; yet when all things are laid rationally and without prejudice together , there will be nothing of improbability found therein , which will not be swallowed up with the appearance of contrary likelyhoods , of things possible and lately attested by some to be truths : whereof to confirme your probable conjectures , I shall give you that information which is come to my hands at severall times in these late yeares , which you , ( if you shall thinke fit ) may publish to the world , as I have received them , which to the probability of your conjectures adde so much light , that if the things which I shall relate be not meere fictions ( which I assure you are none of mine , for you shall have them without any addition , as I have received them ) none can make any further scruple of the truth of your assertion ; but before I come to particulars , I shall tell you of some thoughts which are come upon this occasion into my minde , concerning Gods way of dealing with mens spirits for the manifestation of his truth and wisdome to those that seeke after it ; and concerning the wonderfull contrivances by which he brings his counsell to passe beyond all mens thoughts : I have observed , and every one that will take notice must needs perceive , that the spirits of men in reference to spiritual matters , whether divine or humane ( by humane , I meane all matters of science and industry depending upon judgement and sagacity ) are distinguishable into two kinds , the one are stedfast to some principles , and the other are unstable ; this distinction in divine matters is clear , from 2 Pet. 3. 17. Jude , ver . 3 , 4 , 6 , 12 , 13 , 17 , 18 , 20 , 21. and in humane matters wee need none other proofe but daily experience . Againe , these that are stedfast to their principles , will be found of two sorts ; some are led in an ordinary common way and rest therein , admitting of nothing further then what they have attained unto ; some ( though they doe not undervalue the ordinary waies which in their owne kinds are usefull and necessary , yet they ) aspire to something more then ordinary and rest not where they are , they believe that both in humane and divine matters , there is , as long as we are in this life , a plus ultra , and that we never ought to rest in seeking after the advancement of learning and the increase of knowledge , till wee shall come to see the Father of lights face ro face ; the different inclinations of these three sorts of men in the world , leading them to different courses and straines in their proceedings , and these begetting divers encounters amongst them wherein they disagree , and know not how to right matters towards one another for mutuall content and edification , are the causes of all our strife and confusion in all affaires , as well of Religious as of civill concernment ; nor is it possible to be free from the disorders and distempers , which make the life of mankinde uncomfortable in this kind , and full of vexation , till God hath removed those that fall away from their owne stedfastnesse out of the earth , which will not come to passe till hee hath filled the earth with the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea ; till hee hath brought us all that are stedfast unto true principles , and that walke by rules , unto the unity of the faith and knowledge of the sonne of God , unto a perfect man unto the measure of the stature of the fulnesse of Christ : which things because they are clearely promised , wee may expect shall come to passe , but till then we shall be carried differently about with severall winds of doctrine , and ensnared in our owne ignorance by the cunning craftinesse of men who lie in waite to deceive ; for the unstable are either wickedly set to worke changes upon those that are setled for ends of their owne , or weakely carried up and downe through the uncertaine apprehensions of things differently represented unto them , sometimes one way and sometimes another ; so that between the motions of mens spirits subtilly unstable tending to unsettle others , and weakely stable susceptible of any unsettlement from others , all our changes and disorderly carriages , both in divine and humane affaires doe arise ; when either those that have no principles of truth to walke by , study lies to puzzle those that pretend to walke by rules , or those that have true principles vary from one another in their degrees of understanding , and in their manner of applying the same to advance knowledge , and to make discoveries of Gods manifestation of himselfe ; for as these motions meet with one another in opposite courses , and men led thereby , stand by one another in disproportionat frames , or justle one another out of their places for contrary ends ; so all our confusions and revolutions of Churches and States , and therein of scientificall straines , and of practicall undertakings , arise differently in the world : here then is a threefold diversity in acting , the changeable and moveable disposition of the one sort , is made to try the stability of the other two , and those that are setled in an ordinary way , are tryers to those that are led forth to something that is extraordinary ; and those that upon allowed principles do rationally bring forth something more then ordinary , try the ingenuity of the other two , how farre they love truth for it selfe ; So that each of these puts his neighbour to the triall of his property , and constraines him to manifest the nature of his way , how farre it is , or is not from God : And although every thing which is beyond the ordinary straine , is liable to be censured and contradicted by men of ordinary apprehensions . who condemne for the most part as extravagant and ridiculous whatsoever is not levell with their capacities ; yet I am inclined to believe , that there is alwaies something of God in all men , that are led forth by extraordinary motions , namely when their spirits doe not reject the common true principles , and yet are raised above them , to apprehend conclusions and inferences which are not common ; and when their affections are regularly constant to their workes , and their undertakings pursued with sobriety in the feare of God , then I conceive that God hath put upon them a speciall stampe and character of his vertue , by which he doth fit them for some designe and service whereunto he hath raised them . I have observed this in very many men of publike spirits , most commonly they have bin laught at by others for going out of the common road-way of acting ; whether to make good some opinions , which others never dreamt of , or to doe some businesse which others have thought impossibilities to be effected ; ( I say ) I have observed , that when they have been led forth with modesty , without selfe conceitednesse and vanity , and when they have prosecuted their enterprises with remarkable perseverance , that God hath made them one way or other remarkably instrumentall and usefull towards their generation for the advancement of his worke , which is the reformation of this world , and the restauration of all things by the kingdom of Iesus Christ , whereunto all extraordinary gifts , and the unusuall leadings forth of mens spirits are preparatives . I could instance in severall men which I have known , and doe know abroad and at home , of severall professions , whose studies and endeavours have been lookt upon as whimsies and extravagancies by the road-way-men of that profession ; and yet I am perswaded that they are led and acted by that Spirit which leadeth the children of God in all truth ; and because other men otherwise rationall and observant , ( who though not altogether destitute of the spirit , yet are not raised above the ordinary pitch ) do not know the drift of the spirit of these ; therefore these are lookt upon by them as men of odde conceits : I have seen some of the great Rabbies of our times , heretofore much scandalized at the proposals and undertakings of Mr Comenius ; but it hath pleased God to assist him so with grace , and support him with constancy in his way , notwithstanding many trialls and temptations ; that he hath been able during his ownelife , to see the usefulnesse of some of his endeavours , whereof a more full account will be given to the world very shortly . I could speake of others , whose attempts , though not so apparantly successefull during their life , yet no lesse usefull in their kind , and which in due time , will prove the grounds of great advantages and discoveries unto posterity , although in the generation where their lot is fallen to live , they have not been believed nor received . Gods way to dispence grace is not according to outward appearances , and for this cause , the multitude doth not entertaine the instruments thereof with due esteem , nor the meanes by which it is offered to the world with respect , because they come in a homely dresse , and without the affectation of any shew ; neverthelesse wisdom at all times is justified by her children , and there take notice of her paths , and trace the counsell of God therein , for they can see that Gods waies and counsels reach from end to end , and that he comprehends in his aime both that which is past , and that which is present , and that which is to come in future ages ; so that in the conclusion of all , he will make it appeare , that the unusuall motions of his servants , which the world have disesteemed and counted foolishnesse , have been the extraordinary worke of his Spirit in them , whereby he doth convince the world of sinne , of righteousnesse , of judgement : of sinne , because the testimony which they bore to the truth was not received ; of righteousnesse , because they who served their generation faithfully with the righteous use of their talent in the midst of scorners , are justly taken away from an unthankfull generation and the evill day , to rest from their labours , that their workes may follow them ; and of judgement , because the selfe conceited pride and partiality of the wise and prudent of this world , shall be judged and condemned by the worke of his spirit , when he shall bring all the effects thereof together to make out his compleate designe against the world , and by the conjunction of the seemingly scattered parts which his servants have acted upon their stages , produce the new frame of a perfect Scene , the catastrophe whereof shall make up a building fit for the kingdom of his Son. I am fallen upon these thoughts , and acquaint you thus with them , partly to support mine owne spirit against the contradictions which I meet withall in the way wherein God hath set me , for the constant prosecution of peace and truth without partiality amongst my brethren ; partly to apologize for the drift of your spirit , whereby I perceive you have been led these many yeares in some of your studies ; for it is very evident to me , that you have sought after a matter , which to most men will seem incredible , rediculous and extravagant ; and to tell you the truth , before I had read your discourse and seriously weighed matters , when I thought upon your theme , that the Americans should be of the seed of Israell , it seemed to me somewhat strange and unlikely to have any truth in it ; but afterward when I had weighed your deduction of the matter , and lookt seriously upon Gods hand in bringing into those parts of the World where the Americans are , so many religious professors , zealous for the advancement of his glory , and who are possessed with a beliefe from the Scriptures , that all the Tribes of Israell shall be called to the knowledge of Jesus Christ , before the the end of the world : and when I had recollected and laid together some other scattered and confused thoughts which at several times I have received , partly from the places of Scripture , which foretell the calling of the Jewes , and their restitution to their owne land , together with the bringing back of the ten Tribes from all the ends and corners of the earth , partly from some relations which I had heard a few yeeres agoe concerning the ten Tribes , which the Jewes here in Europe had given out ; and partly from the observations of Gods way , which he seemes to make by all these changes , and the dissolution of the States and Empires of the world , towards some great worke , and extraordinary revolution which may shortly come to passe : all which things when I had called to mind and represented unto my selfe , I was so far from derogating any thing from that which you have conjectured concerning the American Indians ; that I beganne to stand amazed at the appearances of the probabilities which so many waies offered themselves unto me , to make out and confirme the effect of that which you have said : And then I begun also upon another account , to wonder at the strangenesse of Gods conduct over your spirit , that he should have set you a worke twelve or more yeeres agoe , after the search of such a matter , by historicall observations , whereof then so few , and almost no footsteps at all were extant to be traced , and whereof now , of a suddaine , the world is like to be filled with such evidences , that it wil be an astonishment to all that shall heare of it , and lay it to heart ; and that all who have any ingenuity will be constrained to confesse , that indeed there is a God who ruleth in the earth , and that he hath ordered the affaires of the Nations by an universal providence , to bring to passe his own counsels , and that the things which hee hath revealed by his word , should in the latter times be accomplished ; for to my apprehension , this will be the great benefit of these discoveries ; namely , that the mouths of Atheists will be stopped , and convicted of irrationality and foolishnesse : For when it shall appear to all men undeniably , that the transmigration of Nations , and the affaires of this world , have not been carried hitherto by meere chance , or by the craftinesse of humane counsels , or by force ; but by the wisdome of a Supreame conduct , who hath ordered all things from the beginning towards an end which hath been foreknown , and to a designe foretold . ( I say ) when this shall appeare , and that in the midst of all these changes and confusions , there is a conduct over-ruling the force of man , and disappointing the councels of the crafty ; then the eyes of all men will be upon the Lord , and God alone will be exalted in righteousnesse , and the Holy one of Israell in judgement : For seeing it is evident that the ten Tribes of Israell have been as it were lost in the world neare about the space of two thuusand yeeres , if now they should againe appeare upon the stage , first as it were in another world by themselves , and then afterward speedily come from thence hither to the land of their ancient inheritance , where they shall be joyned to their brethren the Jews ( which is clearly foretold by the Prophets shall come to passe ) if ( I say ) those things should now begin to come to passe , what can all the world say otherwise , but that the Lords counsell doth stand , and that he hath fulfilled the words spoken by his Servants the Prophets concerning Israel ; that although all the sinfull kingdoms of the Nations shall be destroyed from off the face of the earth , yet that the house of Jacob shall not be utterly destroyed , but shall be corrected in measure , for loe I will command ( saith God by the Prophet ) and I will sift the house of Israell among all Nations , like as corne is sifted in the sieve , yet shall not the least graine fall upon the earth . These Prophecies must needs be fulfilled , if there be a God in heaven who hath foretold them , and when he shall make this his word good unto Israell , he will thereby make it undeniably apparent , that it was he himselfe and none other who did foretell it : and that it is also none but hee who brings the worke about beyond all humane appearances , according as he did foretell it : and by all this he will shew to all the world , that which he oft-times repeates by the Prophet Isaiah , that he alone is the Saviour , and that there is none besides him , Isa . 45. 5 , 6 , 15. till the end . The destruction then of the spirituall Babylon by the restauration of Israel , shall make out this to all the earth , that God alone is the Lord over all , and the Saviour of the people that put their trust in his name . Now the appearances which offer themselves unto me , that these Prophecies are towards their accomplishment , are many , which now I shall not insist upon , ( perhaps God will direct me to declare them in due season more fully then now I can intend ) but I shall onely mention that which I find to be a confirmation of your conjecture , leaving it to your owne discretion , what use you will make of it . First then I shall impart unto you some stories which I heard five or six yeeres agoe , when I was in the Low Countries , concerning the ten Tribes ; and then I shall adde some information concerning the state of the Iewes in our Europaean and Asiaatique worlds , which I have learned at other times by some providences which God hath offered unto mee ; and upon the whole matter I shall leave you to your further conjectures , by that which I shall guesse at . The first story which I heard was at the Hague , a person of chief quality about the Queen of Bohemia , and one of her Counsell , and a discerning godly man , and my speciall friend told me , that the Jew ( a Jeweller residing ordinarily at the Hague ) whom I knew , had been there at Court , and with great joy had told , that they of his Nation had received from Constantinople Letters , bringing to them glad tidings of two speciall matters fallen out there ; the one was , that the Grand Seignior had remitted the great taxes which formerly had been laid upon the Jewes of those parts , so that now they were in a manner free from all burthens , paying but a small and inconsiderable matter to that Empire ; the other was , that a messenger was come unto the Jewes who reside neere about the Holy Land , from the ten Tribes , to make enquiry concerning the state of the Land ; and what was become of the two Tribes and the half which was left in it , when they were transported from thence by Salmanasser . This Messenger was described to be a grave man , having some attendance in good equipage about him . He told them that the people from which hee was sent were the Tribes of Israel , which in the daies of Hosea the King , were carried captives out of their owne Land by the King of Assyria , who transported them from Samaria into Assyria and the Cities of the Medes ; but they being grieved for the tronsgressions which caused God to be angry with them , they tooke a resolution to separate themselves from all Idolaters , and so went from the Heathen where they were placed by Salmanassar , with a resolution to live by themselves , and observe the Commandements of God , which in their owne Land they had not observed : in prosecuting this resolution , after a long journey of a yeere and six moneths , they came to a countrey wholly destitute of inhabitants , where now they have increased into a great Nation , and are to come from thence into their owne Land by the direction of God ; and to shew them that hee was a true Israelite , hee had brought with him a Scroule of the Law of Moses , written according to their custome . The Gentleman who told me this story , as from the mouth of the Jew , said that it brought to his mind fully ( by reason of the agreement of circumstances almost in all things ) the story which is recorded in the Second Booke of Esdras , which is called Apocrypha , Chap. 13. ver . 40. till 50. which will be found a truth if that Messenger came and made this Narrative . This was the first story ; and not long after viz. Within the space of five or six moneths , a little before I came from the Low Countries , I was told of a Jew who came from America to Amsterdam , and brought to the Jewes residing there ▪ newes concerning the ten Tribes ; that hee had been with them upon the border of their Land , and had conversed with some of them for a short space , and seen and heard remarkable things whiles he stayed with them , whereof then I could not learn the true particulars ; but I heard that a Narrative was made in writing of that which he had related , which before I went from Holland last , I had no time to seeke after , but since the reading of your Booke , and some discourse I have had with you about these matters , I have procured it from the Low Countries , and received a Copie thereof in French , attested under Manasseh Ben Israel his hand , that it doth exactly agree with the originall , as it was sent me , the translation thereof I have truly made without adding or taking away any thing ; and because I was not satisfied in some things , and desired to know how farre the whole matter was believed among the Jewes at Amsterdam , I wrote to Manasseh Ben Israel , their chiefe Rabbi , about it , and his answer I have gotten in two Letters , telling me that by the occasion of the Questions which I proposed unto him concerning this adjoyned Narrative of Mr. Antonie Monterinos , hee to give me satisfaction , had written insteed of a Letter , a Treatise , which hee shortly would publish , and whereof I should receive so many Copies as I should desire : In his first Letter dated Novem. last , 25. he saies that in his treatise he handles of the first inhabitants of America , which he believes were of the ten Tribes ; moreover , that they are scattered also in other Countries , which he names , and that they keepe their true Religion , as hoping to returne againe into the Holy land in due time . In his second Letter , dated the twenty three of December , he saies more distinctly thus : I declare how that our Israelites were the first finders out of America ; not regarding the opinions of other men , which I thought good to refute in few words onely : and I thinke that the ten Tribes live not onely there , but also in other lands scattered every where ; these never did come backe to the second Temple , and they keep till this day still the Jewish Religion , seeing all the Prophecies which speake of their bringing backe unto their native Soile must be fulfilled : So then at their appointed time , all the Tribes shall meet from all the parts of the world into two provinces , namely Assyria and Egypt , nor shall their Kingdome be any more divided , but they shall have one Prince the Messiah the Sonne of David . I do also set forth the Inquisition of Spaine , and rehearse divers of our Nation , and also of Christians , Martyrs , who in our times have suffered severall sorts of torments , and then having shewed with what great honours our Jewes have been graced also by severall Princes who professe Christianity . I prove at large , that the day of the promised Messiah unto us doth draw neer , upon which occasion I explaine many Prophecies , &c. By all which you see his full agreement with your conjecture concerning the Americans , that they are descended of the Hebrewes : when his booke comes to my hand , you shall have it God willing . In the meane time I shall adde some of my conjectures concerning the Jewes which live on this side of the world with us in Europe and Asia ; these are of two sorts or Sects , the one is of Pharisees , the other of Caraits , the Pharisees in Europe and Asia are in number farre beyond the Caraits , they differ from one another wheresoever they are , as Protestants doe from Papists ; for the Pharisees , as the Papists , attribute more to the Authoritie and traditions of their Rabbies and Fathers , then to the word of God ; but the Caraits will receive nothing for a rule of faith and obedience but what is delivered from the word of God immediately : and their name imports their profession , that they are readers of the Text , or Textuaries , for so the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 you know when it relates to bookes and writings , is to be rendred . These two Sects are irreconcilably opposite to each other , and as the Papists deale with Protestants , so do the Pharisees with the Caraits , they persecute and suppres them and their profession by all the meanes they can possibly make use of : Nay as Mr Ritangle ( of whom I have all the informations which I know concerning the Caraits ) tels me , the hatred of the Pharisees is so fierce against their opposites the Caraits , that they have Anathematized them so , as never to be reconciled unto them ; insomuch , that it is counted unlawfull so much as to speake to any of them , or to any that belongeth unto them , but at the distance of foure cubits at least ; their Bookes and all things belonging to them , are avoided as things abominable and to be abhorred ; nor will the Pharisees , although the Caraits should become penitent , and desire to be joyned to their Congregations , and renounce their owne way , admit of them as a Caraite reconciled unto them : but the Caraite must first become a Christian , a Mahumetan , or an Idolater , before he can be admitted to joyne with them , that it may never bee said that a Pharisee was reconciled to a Caraite , or that a Caraite is become a Pharisee . As their principles and affections are thus different , so are their opinions , and the course of their life extremely opposite ; the Pharisees are full of superstitious imaginary foolish conceits , and thalmudicall questions and nicities in their Sermons and Bookes ; the Caraits are rationall men that take up no doctrines but what the Scriptures teach , by comparing one text with another : The Pharisees have wild and extravagant fancies concerning the Messiah and his reigne ; but the Caraits have true grounds of spirituall and raised thoughts concerning the Messiah and his Kingdome , little different from that which the better sort of Christians truly believe , and professe of these misteries . The Pharisees in their Sermons insist upon nothing but their traditions and ceremonies , and foolish curiosities ; but the Caraits insist onely upon necessary and profitable duties , teaching the way of Godlinesse and honesty , to bring men from the outward forme to the inward power and spirituall performance of divine worship . As concerning their course of life , the Pharisees live every where by a way of trading & usury , which is destructive to those with whom they have commerce ; but the Caraits abhor that way , as pestilent unto humane societies , and betake themselves to trades , and manufactures , to become husbandmen , and servants in the places where they live , and to serve as Souldiers under the Magistrate , who doth protect them . This being the state and difference of these two Sects , ( as he who in Asia and some part of Europe hath been above twenty yeers conversant with them , and a Doctor in their Synagogues , hath informed me ) I shall acquaint you with my Conjectures concerning the event of our present troubles in the world over all , and the revolution of the Jewish state , which are these ; that it is not unlikely to me that the issue and effect of these changes which now are wrought , and afoot to bee wrought in the world , ( wherein the highest powers are shaken , and a generall distresse is brought upon all the Nations of the earth ) will be a breaking of the yokes of tyranny and oppression , under which not onely the Jewes every where groan , but with them most of the Gentiles , or rather all of them that are under an arbitrary power of absolute Potentates , and superstitious selfe-seeking teachers ; that the breaking of these yokes is already a great way advanced . First , in the Easterne China Empire by the invasion of the Tartarians . Secondly , in the Northerne and Easterne Mahometane Empire , by the changes brought upon , and likely to fall out in the Ottoman house and line ; and by the liberty which of late hath been granted to the Jewes , not onely from taxes , but of repairing to Jerusalem , and having Synagogues there , which heretofore was utterly prohibited . Thirdly , in the Westerne , which is called the Roman or German Empire , by these late troubles , and the assistance which the King of the North the Swede , hath given to Protestants to maintaine their liberty : All the power of these yokes must yet further be broken in the Supreame and Subordinate Ministers thereof ; in respect of the whole bodies of these Empires , and of the particular Kingdomes and States which resort under the same ; for all Nations by the light of naturall reason , but chiefely those , whom the Gospel hath enlightned , and prepared in a measure , to apprehend the hope of the glorious liberty of the Sonnes of God , will more and more every where resent their priviledge and right to a freedome , from which they have been restrained , by the mistery of iniquity in spirituall and corporall matters ; and when the grounds of righteous order , of impartiall love to mankinde , and of common preservation , shall breake forth at last , and be taken notice of in the midst of these confusions and great troubles which fall upon all sorts of men ; then the Jewes will come and appeare in their owne ranke , and for their own interest , they will by others be respected ; for their interest will be upon the dissolution of the Mahometan , to resist and oppose the Spanish Monarchy , that it may not propagate it selfe Eastward , and Southward , beyond the Mediterranean Sea ; and that the Inquisition by which they have been so cruelly persecuted , may be every where abolished ; but above all things , kept out of the holy Land and their beloved City Jerusalem : If then there should be any transactions ( as it is said there is like to be ) between the Ottoman house and the house of Spaine about the Holy Land , the Jewes who are now at some liberty there , and begin from all parts of the Earth to lift up their eyes to looke thitherward , will quickely resent it , and finde their interest to be the enjoyment of their owne inheritance ; and to helpe them to it , they will finde assistance from all Christians that are not slaves to superstition and tyranny , and that assistance and favour which by such Christians will be given them , may in Gods hand be a meanes to open the Pharisee his eyes , to see somewhat in Christianity , from which he hath been hitherto blinded , by reason of the prejudice which the Idolatry of the Papall Sea , and the Spanish Inquisition hath begotten in him . As for the Caraits , God hath so ordered it , that the greatest bodies of them are in the Northerne parts of the World , by which the ten Tribes , if ever they come to the Holy Land , are like to come ; there be some few in Russia , some in Constantinople , some in Alcair , some in Persia , and some in other places of Asia and of Africa ; but Mr Ritangle told me that their chiefe bodie is amongst the Asiatique and European Tartarians , who now appeare upon the stage as beginning to be conquerers . For besides that which they doe fully possesse in China , they have tasted somewhat of a victorious progresse of late in Poland , and they are the next pretenders to the Ottoman Crowne , if the line faile , which is like to be : their rising and dissipation abroad from their owne centers to their circumferences towards neighbour Nations , will weaken them at home ; and if then , when they are not strong within their owne bounds , and by their invasions have weakened their neighbours Southward on ; God call the ten Tribes to march toward the place of their inheritance : the Caraits their brethren will be leaders of them on their way , and so their march may be , as Manasseh Ben Israel saith , to make their Rendezvous in Assyria ; and on the other side , the Jewes that are Pharisees , may make their Rendezvous from Arabia and other neighbouring places , and out of all Europe into Egypt ; that so when the Shunamite shall returne ( as it is said in the Canticles , chap. 6. ver . 13. ) the world may looke upon her , and may see in her the company of two Armies , which both shall look towards Jerusalem . Then will the great battaile of Harmageddon be fought , whereunto all these troubles and changes are but preparatives : then shall the sword of the Spirit , the word of God , prevaile mightily over the spirits of all men ; the two edges thereof on the right hand and on the left , will cut sharpe , and pierce to the dividing asunder of soule and spirit , and of the joynts and marrow , and to the discerning of the thoughts and intentions of the heart : and when this sword shall be thus powerfull in the hands of his Saints , ( the true Protestants with the one troope , and the true Caraits with the other ) then shall be fulfilled the Prophecie of the Psalmist , that vengeance shall be executed upon the Heathen , and punishments upon the people ; that their Kings shall be bound with chaines , and their Nobles with fetters of iron ; and that the honour due to all Saints shall be given them , to be made executioners of the judgement written in the word of God against them . We know not how neare these things are at hand , let us therefore be watchfull , and put on the armour of light , to be ready , when the Bridegroome comes , to goe with him in our wedding garment , having our lamps burning , and provision of oile , into the wedding chamber . And to this effect , the Lord teach us to be diligent , to be found of him in peace , without spot and blamelesse , that in the midst of these fightings and confusions , we may not be found as many are , smiting their fellow servants , eating and drinking largely of the spoile of those that are spoiled , and being drunken with the passions of malice , entertained for the revenge of injuries , or of covetousnesse and ambition , prosecuted for self-interests : and with this prayer I shall commend you to the grace of God , and rest , Your faithfull friend and fellow labourer in the Gospel of Christ . J. DURY . St Iames , this 27 Ian. 1649 / 50. Iewes in America , OR , Probabilities that the Americans are Jewes . CHAP. I. IT hath been much , and many times , in severall mens thoughts , what Genius devoted our Countrey-men so willingly to forsake their Friends , and Nation , exposing themselves by voyages long and perillous to so many inconveniences , as are to be encountred with by Strangers in a forraigne and unchristian land ; some were hastened by their dislike of Church Government ; other perhaps were in hope to enrich themselves by such Adventures ; and 't is like , divers of them did foresee those Epidemicall Calamities , now for so many years oppressing this forlorne Nation , following thereupon Solomons Counsell , A prudent man foreseeth the evill , and hideth himselfe , &c. Prov. 22. 5. Or else those pious soules by a divine instinct , might happily bee stirred up to despise all hazards , that the Natives for their temporall accommodations might bee spiritually enriched by the English , and though this was little seen at first in the endeavours , at least the successe of many gone thither , yet who can tell but supreme Providence might then dispose mens hearts that way , themselves not discerning that influence ; even as Cyrus promoted the cause of the Jewes , he knew not why , nor whence , Esa . 45. 4 , 5. Upon confidence that the Gospell of Christ shall be revealed in the midst of that yet most Barbarous Nation , the next desire was , if possible , to learne the Originall of the Americans , and by observations from Printed Books , and written Letters , and by Discourse with some that had travelled to , and abode in those parts severall years , the probability of that opinion as yet praeponderates , that the Westerne Indians be of Jewish race . a R. Verstegan proves the Saxons to be Germans , because their speech is alike , the names of persons and things sometimes agree , and the Idols of them both are not different ; Bodine b mentioneth 3 Arguments ( b ) , by which the beginnings of People are discoverable , the faire and true dealing of Historians , the comparing of Language , with the description of the Countrey , such helps have assisted also in this enquiry : Grotius c conceiveth these Americans to have come out of Europe , passing from Norway into Iseland , thence by Friesland into Greenland , and so into Estotiland , which is part of that Western Continent , hee is induced to that opinion from the names and words of places and things in both sounding alike : but Io. de Laet d abundantly disproves this Conjecture , which yet the Governor of the Dutch Plantation e there told Mr. Williams was his judgement : Some others take them f to be a remnant of those Canaanites that fled out of that Land when the feare of Israel approaching thither fell upon them , Iosh . 2. 9. Others thinke g it most probable , that they are Tartars , passing out of Asia into America by the straights of Anian . Emanuel de Moraes h willingly believes them to be derived from the Carthaginians and Jewes ; from which latter that they be descended , these following Conjectures are propounded to Consideration . CHAP. II. The first Conjecture that the Americans are Jewes . THE Indians doe themselves relate things of their Ancestors , a suteable to what we read of the Jewes in the Bible , and elsewhere , which they also mentioned to the Spaniards at their first accesse thither ; and here the Speech of Myrsilus b occurred as observable : if we would know , saith hee , the Antiquity and Originall of a Nation , there is more credit to be given to the Natives and their Neighbors , than to strangers , and Caesar c concluded the Britons to be Gaules , because that was the affirmation of them both . P. Martyr d tells at large , how Muteczuma the great King of Mexico in an Oration made to his Nobles and People , perswading subjection to the King of Spaine , minds his Countrey men , that they heard from their fore-fathers , how they were strangers in that land , and by a great Prince very long agoe brought thither in a Fleet , They boast their Pedigree from men preserved in the Sea by God himselfe , that God made one man , and one woman , bidding them live together and multiply , and how in a Famine hee rained bread for them from Heaven , whō in a time of drought also gave them Water out of a Rock : many other things , themselves say were done for them , such as the Scriptures relate concerning the Israelites at their comming out of Aegypt , as , their Peregrination many yeares , the Oracles they received , their Arke of Bulrush , wherein Vitzi-Liputzli was included , of the Tabernacle the Ark e carried by foure Priests , and how they pitched their Tents according to its direction , and who seeth not saith Malvenda f much probability that the Mexicans are Iewes , how could they else report the manner of their comming into the promised Land ; they affirme there is one chiefe God , who hath been from all eternity , by whom the lesser Gods were made , who became Assistants in the Fabrick and Government of the World , as some of the g Rabbins also called the Angells Con-Creators with God , to whom the Lord did say , Let us make man in our Image , &c. Gen. 1. 26. The Indians judge the Sunne , Moone and Starres to be living creatures , a thing a so avowed in the Jewish Talmud h , shewing it to be a thing easie enough for the Heavens to declare the glory of God , Psalme 19. 1. seeing they have understanding soules as well as men and Angels ; they i say of themselves , that they be strangers , and came from another Countrey . M●●●…s k before named doth not onely averre that many learned men in Brasile take the Natives to be Jewes , but that they themselves , taught by a most ancient Tradition , acknowledge their fore-fathers to be of that linage ; and Peter Martyr l hath from them also such a kinde of assertion : And now whereas some conceive the ten Tribes to be either shut up beyond the m Caspian Mountaines , whence they could not get out , though they begged leave of Alexander the Great , yet the way was made miraculously unpassable against them , as the same Comester relateth : Others suppose n them to be utterly lost , and if once so , 't is probable in the opinion of some that they are to be found in America ; o Acosta acknowledgeth this to be the judgement of divers , to which he is not onely adverse himselfe , but endeavours to answer their Arguments , as will be shewd hereafter ; to these conjectures of the Natives , let this Chapter bee concluded with the judgements of two others , that have reason for what they say , the first is p Emanuel de Moraes , forespoken of , affirming those of Brasile to be Judaicall : First , because those Brasilians marrie into their owne Tribe and Kindred . Secondly , Their Manner is also to call their Uncles and Ants , Fathers and Mothers . Thirdly , they are given much to mourning and teares in their Funerall solemnities : And last of all , they both have Garments much alike . The next is Master q R. Williams , one of the first , if not the first of our Nation in New England that learned the Language , and so prepared towards the Conversion of the Natives , which purpose of his being knowne , hee was desired to observe if hee found any thing Judaicall among them , &c. He kindly answers to those Letters from Salem in New England , 20th of the 10th moneth , more than ten yeers since , in hac verba . Three things make me yet suspect that the poore natives came from the southward , and are Jewes or Jewish quodammodo , and not from the Northern barbarous as some imagine . 1. Themselves constantly affirme that their Ancestors came from the southwest , and thither they all goe dying . 2. They constantly and strictly separate their women in a little Wigwam by themselves in their feminine seasons . 3. And beside their God Kuttand to the south-west , they hold that Nanawitnawit ( a God over head ) made the Heavens and the Earth , and some tast of affinity with the Hebrew I have found . CHAP. III. Second Conjecture . THe rites , fashions , ceremonies , and opinions of the Americans are in many things agreeable to the custome of the Jewes , not onely prophane and common usages , but such as be called solemn and sacred . Common and prophane Customes in both alike . 1 The Indians a weare garments fashioned as the Jewes , a single coate , a square little cloake , they goe barefoot : if you should aske a man of Brasile what vestment would please him best , he would answer presently , b a long cloake the habit of the Jewes , and this may seem no light consideration to such as minde Seneca's c confidence , that the Spaniards planted themselves in Italy , for they have the same kind of covering on their heads , and shooes for their feet . 2 They constantly d annoint their heads , as did the Jewes also , Luk. 7. 46. 3. They doe not onely pride themselves with eare-rings e but their noses are borcd also , and have jewells hanging on them , which they call Caricori , like that is read , Esa . 3. 20 , 21. 4. In all India f they wash themselves often , twice or thrice in the day , and the women in Brasile ten times saith Lerius g and the Jewes were frequent in this , Mar. 7. 3 , 4. Io. 2. 6. 5. They delight exceedingly in dancing , h men and women , yea and women apart by themselves ; and so they did in Israell . Exod. 13. 20. 1 Sam. 21. 11 , 12. and thus especially after victories i and overthrows , of enemies , which is found also , Iud. 11. 34. Iud. 21. 21. 23. & 1 Sam. 18. 6 , 7. 6. As the Jewes were wont to call them fathers and mothers , that were not their naturall parents , so k the Indians give the same appellation to Unkle and Aunts . 7. In America they eate no swines flesh l t is hatefull to them , as it was among the Jewes , Levit. 11. 7. Esa . 66. 15. 8. They wash m strangers feet , and are very hospitall to them , and this was the known commendation of old Israell . 9. The Indians compute their times by nights n an use which Laet o confesseth they had from the Hebrews ; they reckon by lunary rules , giving the same name to their moneths they do to the Moon , Tona . 10. Virginity is not a state praise-worthy among the Americanes p and it was a bewaileable condition in Iury , Iud. 11. 37. 11. The Natives q marry within their owne kindred and family , this was Gods command to his people , Num. 36. 7. 12. The Indian women r are easily delivered of their children , without Midwives , as those in Exod. 1. 19. 13. They wash their infants newly born s and this you finde also , Ezek. 16. 9. 14. In faeminine seasons they put their women in a Wigwam by themselves , ( t ) for which they plead nature and tradition ; another writes expresly such kind u of purification they have as had the Jewes . 15. The widdow marrieth w the brother of the deceased Husband , which was also Moses law , Mat. 22. 24. 16. Dowries for wives are given x by the Indians , as Saul enjoyned David , 1 Sam. 18. 25. 17. The husband hath power y over the adulterous wife , to turne her away with disgrace , they have also other causes of divorce , as was in Israel , Mat. 8. 19. 18. They nurse their owne children , z even the Queenes in Peru , and so did the mothers in Israel . 19. The husbands come not at their wives till their children be weaned , ( a ) such an use is read Hos . ●8 . and at Pera if they be forced to weane them before their time , they call such children Ainsco , i. e bastards . 20. Among the Indians b they punish by beating , and whipping , and the Sachims if they please , put offendors to death with their owne hands , and secretly sometimes send out an executioner , as Mark 6. 27. 2 Cor. 11. 25. 21. If a Brasilian wound another , c he must be punisht in the same part of his body , and with death , if the other die , for they also answer an eye for an eye , &c. as the law was . Deut. 24. 19. 22. When the master of the family dieth , he is buried in the middle of the house , d with his jewells , and other things he delighted in ; the Spaniards were often made rich by such sepulchars , and Iosephus e tells of much treasure laid up even in Davids grave . 23. The Indians are given much to weeping , f their women especially , and at burialls ; this was in fashion among the Jewes . Ier. 19. 17. Famous for this they were among the old heathen . 24. Balsamum g was peculiar to the Jewish Countrey , and thought to be lost long agoe saith Pliny ; h if it were , t is now found againe in America . 25. Their Princes and Governours whom they generally call Sachims , Sachmos , Sagamos , i are no other but heads of families , as it was of old in Israel . Num. 7. 2. 26. The Indians have their Posts k and Messengers that were swift of foot , whom they dispatcht upon their affaires , and they ran with speed , and such were among the Jewes . 2 Sam. 18. 24 , 26 , 27. CHAP. IV. Sacred and solemne rites and customes alike . A Costa a affirmes the Americans to have ceremonies and customes resembling the Mosaicall . 1. Circumcision b is frequent among the Indians , which some not observing , have thereupon denyed them to be Judaicall , and Io. de Laet c is forced to acknowledge such venereous people have somewhat like to circumcision occasioned by their lasciviousnesse ; but daily d experience declareth that they have indeed upon them this Judaicall badge . Herodotus e averreth the Colchi for this to be of the Aegyptian race , and that the Phenicians and Syrians of Palaestina learned from them that rite ; and though some have judged the Tartars to be Jewes , because circumcised , others f yeeld not to this , because they were Mahometans by Religion , and from them received that custome ; but these people have cut off their foreskinne time out of minde , and it cannot be conceived whence they had this ceremony , but that it is nationall . And though the fore mentioned g writer endeavours much to prove , that there is no circumcision among them , and that some other people be so handled , whom none yet ever imagined to be Judaicall , but that of Ier. 9. 26. is not so fitly I thinke cited for his purpose ; and Grotius tells him h confidently , we have so many witnesses that the Americans be circumcised , as it becomes not a modest man to deny it ; and among the rarities brought from those quarters , Pancirollus i speakes of stony knives , very sharpe and cutting , and his Illustrator k H. Salmuth , shewes that the Jewes of old did use such in their circumcisings , knifes of stone , which Sacrament omitted fourty yeeres in their travell , is revived by Gods command to Ioshua 5. 2. Make thee sharp knives , cultros petrinos ; Arias Montanus reads , cultros lapideos in the vulgar Latine , but the Septuagint doth not only mention those rocky knives , but adds , taken from a sharpe rocke , as if the allusion also were to Christ , the Rocke , that doth circumcise our hearts ; Lerius l affirmes he saw some of those cutting stones or knives at Brasil . 2. The Indians worship that God m they say , who created the Sun , Moon , and all invisible things , who gives them also all that is good . 3. They knew of that floud which drowned n the world , and that it was sent for the sin of man , especially for unlawfull lust , and that there shall never be such a deluge againe . 4. It is affirmed by them o neverthelesse that after many yeers , fire shall come down from above and consume all . 5. They beleeve the immortality of the soule , and that there is a place of joy , p another of torment after death , whither they shall goe that kill , lie , or steale , which place they call Popogusso , a great pit , like the expression , Num. 16. 33. and Rev. 19. 1 , &c. but they which do no harme shall be received into a good place , and enjoy all manner of pleasure . 6. The Americans have in some parts an exact form of King , Priest , q and Prophet , as was aforetime in Conaan . 7. Priests are in some things among them , as with the Hebrewes , r Physitians , and not habited as other men , and in Tamazulapa there be vestments kept like those Aaroniticall robes of the High-priest . 8. The Temples wherein they worship , s sing , pray , and make their Offerings , are fashioned and used as with the Jewes ; at Mexico they were built foure square , and sumptuous , as Ezek. 40. 47. 9. The Priests have their Chambers t in the Temple , as the manner was in Israel . 1 Reg. 6 ▪ 7. 10. They had places also therein u , which none might enter into but their Priests . Heb. 9. 6 , 7. 11. In their worship of Viracoche w , and the Sun , &c. they open their hands , and make a kissing sound with their mouthes , as Iob 31. 27. 12. They had almost continuall fire before their Idols , and took great care lest the x fire before the Altar should dye , they call that the Divine Harth , where there is fire continually , like that in Leviticus 6. 9. 13. None may intermeddle with their Sacrifices but the Priests , y who were also in high estimation among them as they were among the Jewes . 14. Every Noble-man in Mexico z had his Priest , as Israel had the Levites within their gates . 15. In their necessities a they always sacrificed , which done , they grew hopefull and confident . 16. They burnt Incense , b had their Censars , and cake Oblations , as Ier. 7. 18. 17. The first fruits of their Corne c they offered , and what they gat by Hunting and Fishing . 18. At Mexico and some other places d they immolate the bodies of men , and as the Jewes of old , saith P. Martyr , did eate of their Beasts so sacrificed , they feed on mans flesh so offered . 19. In all Peru they had but one Temple , e which was most sumptuous , Consecrated to the Maker of the world ; yet they had foure other places also for Devotion , as the Jews had severall Synagogues , beside that their glorious Temple . 20. The Idols of America f were Mitred , in a manner , much as Aaron was . 21. A yeare of Jubile g did they observe , as did Israel also . 22. Lerius tells a story of them , h much like that of Apocryphall Bel , and the Dragon , and his Priests . 23. In their Idoll services they i dance and sing , men and women , almost as Miriam , with Timbrells , Exod. 15. 20. and then they offer bread , as it is in Malac. 1. 7. 24. They have hope of their bodies k resurrection , and for that cause are carefull in burying their dead ; and when they saw the Spaniards digging into Sepulchers for gold and silver , the Natives entreated them not to scatter the bones , that so they might with more ease be raised againe . 25. The Indians make account the world shall have an end , but not till a great drought come l , and as it were a burning of the aire , when the Sunne and Moone shall faile , and lose their shining ; thence it is ▪ that in the Eclipses of those two greater Lights , they make such yellings and out-cries , as if the end of all things were upon them . CHAP. V. The third Conjecture . THE Americans words and manners of speech , bee in many things consonant to those of the Jewes , a Seneca hath that other reason , perswading that the Spaniards planted in Italy , because they both speake alike ; and as Volaterrane b for his Countreymen , so some suppose the Greeks long since mingled with the Brittans , because we still have divers words of Graecian Idiome . For this reason c Caesar judged the British to bee Gauls , in that the Cities of both the Nations were called by the same names . Giraldus Cambrensis derives his Countreymens Originall from Troy , because they have so many Trojan names and words amongst them ; Oenus , Resus , Aeneas , Hector , Ajax , Evander , Eliza , &c. and Grotius d therefore imagines that the Americans came from Norway , because they have many words the same with the Norwegians . It is then considerable to our purpose , how in this the Jewes and Indians be alike . 1. The aspirations of the Americans have e the force of consonants , and are pronounced by them not as the Latines and some other Nations , but after the manner of the Hebrewes . 2. The name of that great City Mexico f is observed in sound and writing to come very neare unto that name of our deare Lord , Psalme 2. 2. Meschico , and Mexico in their Language is a g Spring , as of our Master and Messiah ; the day spring that from on high hath visited us . Luk. 1. 78. 3. The Ziims mentioned Esa . 13. 21. and 34. 14. are h supposed to bee wicked Spirits , deluding Mankinde , as Hobgoblins , Fairies , &c. Such are the Zemes among the Indians so often spoken of by i Peter Martyr , these they call the Messengers of the great God ; every King among them hath such a Ziim or Zeme , and from them came those Predictions constantly current among them , of a cover'd Nation that should spoyle their Rites . 4. Acosta marvailes much k at the Indians , that having some knowledge that there is a God , yet they call him not by any proper name , as not having any peculiar for him , a Relique it may be of that Judaicall conceit of the non-pronuntiable Tetragrammaton . 5. T is very remarkable that Escarbotus l tells , how he heard the Indians often perfectly use the wvrd Hallelujah ; at which hee marvailed the more , because hee could not at all perceive that they had learned it from any Christian ; and this is with like admiration recorded m by the describer of Nova Francia . 6. In the Island of St. Michael or Azores , which belongs to America , saith n Malvenda , certaine Sepulchers , or Grave-stones are digged up by the Spaniards , with very ancient Hebrew Letters upon them , above and below , thus above , 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Why is God gone away ; and beneath this Inscription 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hee is dead , know God , which words seem to have a woefull enquiry of Gods departure from them , with a comfortable Declaration of his dying for them , together with an incitation to know him . 7. Very many of their words are like the Hebrew , which our Novangles o have observed , and in the general attested : A more serious disquisition into their Language would conduce much to finde out their descent , and helpe exceedingly towards their Conversion ; and if it be said , the Jewes were ever tenacious of their Language , which p Elias Levita saith , they changed not in Aegypt , but if they be now in America , all in a manner is lost . 'T is fit then to consider , that in all Nations , in two or three Ages there is a great alteration in their Tongues ; the words of the League between the Carthaginians and Romans in fifty yeares space , sayth q Polybius , were so uncouth , and little knowne , that they could scarce bee understood ; and r Keckerman sheweth , ( r ) that the German language in almost as short a time received the like mutation , and our Saxon Ancestors translated the Bible into English as the Tongue then was , but of such antique Words and Writing , that few men now can read and understand it , which waxing old , and hard , it was againe Translated into newer words , saith Arch-Bishop s Cranmer , and many even of those words are now strange and neasie to us ; in such suddaine Change of Language universally , wee need not wonder , that so little impression of the Hebrew Tongue remaines among them , if the Indians be Jewish ; but wee may marvaile rather , that after so many yeares of most grosse and cursed blindnesse , and having no commerce , nor converse with other Nations , that any the least similitude thereof should be left . CHAP. VI. The sixth Conjecture . THis which followeth next , at first sight , will appeare a Paradox rather than a Probability , that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Americanorum , the Man-devouring that is in America ; for what an inference may this seem to bee ; there bee Carybes , Caniballs , and Man-eaters among them , therefore they be Jewish ? But let it be considered , Among the Curses threatned to Israel upon their disobedience , wee read Levit. 26. 29. Yee shall eate the flesh of your Sonnes and of your Daughters , &c. So Deut. 28. 53. Which Predictions , according to common supposalls , seeme to be fully verified in the Famine mentioned , 2 Kings 6. 28. and Lament . 4. 10. and those words are spoken of things then done and past ; but the Prophet Ezekiel , that lived about the same time , speakes in the future tense of some new , and till then unheard of calamity , but such as should bee common afterward ; I will doe in thee that I never did before , for in the midst of thee the Fathers shall eat their Sons , and the Sons their Fathers , &c. Ezek. 5. 9 , 10. Before indeed , and at the Romans beleaguering Ierusalem , Women did eate their Children , but there is no relation of Fathers and Sonnes devouring one another , though this be foretold , and as a thing easily to bee taken notice of , a Iosephus in that last siege tells but of one Woman eating her childe , and 't is like there was no other , because the whole City was astonish'd at the newes , and the seditious themselves did abhorre it ; yea and when the Romans heard thereof in their Campe , it exceeded credit at first , and their Generall comforted himselfe against that most inhumane and hideous fact , by remembring he had often proffered them peace , and they had as often wilfully refused it ; but that Prophet foretells an infelicity without parallel , both de praeterito , and de futuro ; I will doe in thee that I never did before , neither will I ever doe the like , Verse 9. And it should be a publick and notorious calamity , for in the midst of thee the Fathers should eate their Sonnes , and their Sons their Fathers , Ver. 10. Words implying , yea expressing more than wee can read was done , either when the Chaldees or Romans begirt their City : And the glosse of St. Ierome b strengthens this conjecture ; When the Fathers , saith he , did eate the Sonnes , or the Sonnes their Fathers , is not related in any History , and yet it was to be done openly in the midst of them , and as it were in the sight of the Sunne . But if the Jewes bee planted in that Westerne World , we shall soone find the accomplishment of that Prophecie from Heaven , for c there be Caniballs and Man-eaters in great multitudes ; some whose trade is Homo cupium , & Homo capium , hungring and hunting after Mans flesh , and devouring it , whose greedy bellies have buried Millions of them , these Carybes are scattered all the Countrey over , the Mauhacks are such , and so neare they are , or were to some of our d Planters , that finding an Englishman , they eate one part of him after another , before his face , while he was yet alive . If it be said , they eate none but strangers , or enemies , not Fathers their Sonnes , & à contra , f Peter Martyr removes that scruple , by affirming , if they want the flesh of Foes and Forraigners , they eate then one another , even their owne g kinred & allies , as he writes that added the Centons to h Solinus . If it be objected , those Caniballs are of a different Nature and Nation from the rest , Peter Martyr answers that also , supposing all the Inhabitants to bee of one stock , because they use all one and the same kind of Bread , every where called Maiiz , and their Cymbae Uni-ligneae , their Canoes and Boats are in all places alike , and as i those Western Nations generally call their Boats Canoes , and their Bread Maiiz , so their common word for wine is Chichia , for swords Macanas for Kings Caciques . And if the Americans bee Jewish , the Spaniards have yet in another sense fulfilled that Prediction of Ezekiel , for their owne Bishop k Bartholomeus de las Casas writes , how they tooke Indians 10000 , sometimes 20000 abroad with them in their Forragings , and gave them no manner of food to sustaine them , but the Flesh of other Indians taken in Warre , and so Christian-Spaniards set up a shambles of mans flesh in their Army ; children were slaine and roasted , men were killed for their hands and feet sakes , for those they esteemed the onely delicate parts : this was most hideous and most barbarous inhumanity , the Tidings whereof was soone carryed through the Land , and overwhelmed the Inhabitants with Horror and Astonishment . CHAP VII . Fifth Conjecture . THE people that have not yet received the Gospell of Jesus Christ are Jewes , but the Americans have not yet been gospelized ; and here three things come to consideration . 1. All other nations at first received the Gospell . 2. The Jewes before the end of the world shall be converted . 3. These Indians have not yet heard of Christ . 1. As the Scripture foreseeing that God would justifie the Gentiles through faith , preached before the Gospell unto Abraham , saying , in thee shall all the Gentiles be blessed , Gal. 3 , 8. Gen. 12. 2 , 3. 18. 8. In like manner the glorious Gospell was soon conveyed to them , soon after the comming of Christ , even before the death of the Apostles ; holy David spake of this promulgation , when he said , Psal . 19. 1. The Heavens , i. e. the Apostles did declare the glory of God , &c. For the fourth , Their line is gone out into all Lands , and their words into the end of the world , is applied by Saint Paul to this very purpose , Rom. 10. 18. It was the command of their Master , Goe teach all Nations , &c. Mat. 28. 19. and preach the Gospell to every creature , Mar. 16. 15. and they gave hereto most willing obedience , which we must have believed , though it had not bin so exactly recorded in undoubted ecclesiasticall Histories . There we read often a that they divided the world into 12 parts , every Apostle accepting that which fell to his lot ; but first they compiled the Creed , called therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Collation , saith Cassian , b who was Chrysostomes Scholar ; because that which was at large expressed in the severall volumes of the Bible , was by them briefly contracted into that forme ; and to this he applieth that of the Apostle , Rom. 9. 28. a short worke we read it now , but of old it was rendred , verbum abbreviatum a short word , a short rule , to which all of them were to conforme their doctrine , and the fifteenth of Iuly was afterwards , and is still celebrated by c some Christians , in memory of their thus going to Gospellize the world ; and it is called Festum divisionis Apostolorum : yea and the place is yet shewed to Travellers at this day , d where they are said to assemble upon this occasion . Very e many ancient writers , historicall and others , f agreeing with Vigilius in this , Authenticum symbolum quod Apostoli tradiderunt ; and a little before he blameth some for venting such doctrines , as were neither g delivered by the Prophets , nor had the authentique authority of the Apostles Creed , and yet suppose it dubious whether that Symboll be indeed of Apostolicall constitution ; and that they did not so divide the world to further their worke , which is so confidently avouched by the ancient , together with the Countries where each of them had their portion ; yet we are sufficiently assured such was their commission , which they pursued with exactnesse and successe ; so that in their life time by their diligence the whole earth was enlightned : Thus Saint Paul tell his Romans , 1. 8. Their faith was published through the whole world ; the same is said to the Collossians also , 1. 6. and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is used in neither place , lest curiosity should restraine it to the Roman World , but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , is the former expression , and the latter is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the whole and every part of the world ; and is it not considerable , as the injunction was , preach the Gospell to every creature , as was before remembred from Saint Marke , 16. 5. So Saint Paul avoweth that in his time it was preached to every creature , Col. 1. 23. such was then the use of that word ; the name creature was especially given to man , the chiefe of all creatures below . And this is unanimously acknowledged by the next writers , Ignatius h thought to be that little child called by Christ Mat. 18. 1. hath this expression 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , There i is one Church which the Apostles setled from one end of the earth to another in the bloud of Christ , by their sweat and labour . Tertullian k in the following Century affirmes that the Gospel in those very first times went beyond the Roman Monarchy , even to us Britons ; and l Eusebius sheweth how the doctrine of salvation by divine power and cooperation , was carried into all the world : and Iulius Firmicus Maturnus m professeth that in his time 1300 yeeres since , there was no Nation under Heaven , East , West , North , or South , unto whom the Sunne of the Gospel had not shined ; and not onely in all the Continent , but in every Island saith Greg. Nissene ; Thus n Bernard also , and others ; for when the Jewish fleece was dried up , all the world saith Ierome o was sprinkled with that heavenly dew . 2. The Jewes before the end of the world shall be converted to Christianity ; this truth is to be found in the Old and New Testament , and hath bin the constant beliefe of the faithfull in every age . The children of Israell shall remaine many daies without a King , and without a Prince , &c. Hos . 3. 4. yet Ver. 5. afterward they shall convert , and seeke the Lord their God , and David their King , i. e. Christ the Sonne of David the King of his Church , thus Zephan . 3. 8 , 9 , 10 , 11. Zach. 12. 10 , 11 , &c. and some predictions in that Evangelicall Prophet Esay . Saint Paul applies to this very purpose , Rom. 11. 26 , 27. from Esa . 59. 20. & 27. 9. yea and our common Master Christ telleth us , Ierusalem shall be trodden under foot of the Gentiles , untill the time of the Gentiles shall be fulfilled , Luke 21. 24. So Saint Paul , when the fulnesse of the Gentiles is come in , all Israell shall be saved , Rom. 11. 25. Some by Israell here would understand , Israell according to the spirit , that is , the Elect from all the Nations : but all along the Jewes and Gentiles are spoken of as distinct people according to the flesh , so all Israell shall be saved , that is , p a very great and numerous company , or many from every tribe , as we use to say genera singulorum , not singuli generum , or all the elect of them ; for when their heart shall be turned to the Lord , the veile shall be taken away , 2 Cor. 3. 16. Ancient Christians have subscribed to this ; In the end of the world saith Ierome q the Jewes receiving the Gospel , shall be enlightned , thus Augustine r , Gregory s , Bernard t , Primasius u , this was , this is the common opinion of Christians . Coepitah his , defertur ad hos , referetur ad illos w Nostrafides , & erunt submundi fine fideles . 3. The third consideration hath a twofold branch . 1. The Americans have not , but 2. shall be acquainted with Christianity : and to the first all are not of this mind that the Indians have not heard of the Gospell : for x Osiander speaking of Vilagagno , and his planting there in Brasil , writes confidently , without doubt those people received the Gospel of Christ by the preaching of the Apostles 1500 yeeres since , but they lost it againe by their unthankfulnesse ; and Malvenda y allegeth some conjectures that Christianity might have been among them , but these are so few , and so forced , that himselfe supposeth them rather satanicall suggestions , illusions , and imitations , than remembrances indeed of the Gospell . There be z some records where every one of the Apostles planted the faith of Christ , in what Nations and Kingdomes , but they are all silent touching this part of the world , which indeed was not knowne till of late ; yea some a conceive , they had no being at all in former ages , and that there was not so much as land or earth in those places ; however questionlesse they be but of late discovery ; for though some b will have America to be those Atlantique Islands mentioned by Plato , others that the Phaenicians arived thither more than 2000 yeeres since , and some further improbable conjectures there be , 't is concluded neverthelesse by many judicious and observant men , that it was never heard of in this world , till c Christopher Columbus of Genoa brought newes thereof about 1590. when then , or by whom should they be made Christians ? is it credible there should be no records thereof in the Annalls of any Nation ? Could so great a part of the world become Christians , without any whispering thereof to any other ; is it likely that all Gospel impressions should be utterly obliterate among them ? all the light thereof quite extinguished ? and not so much as the least glimpse thereof remaine ? as is also acknowledged by him d that hath written and observed so much of these nations . 2. Seeing they were never yet enlightned , without question they shall be , for the Gospell of the Kingdome must be preached every where for a witnesse to all Nations , Mat. 24. 14. Surely so large a part of the world shall not alwaies be forgotten : Is it imaginable that the God of mercy , who is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , a lover of soules , Wisd . 11. 23. should suffer so great a portion of mankind everto remaine in darknesse , and in the shadow of death ? Is it credible or fit to be believed , that the wisdome of the Father who taketh his solace in the habitable parts of the earth , and his delight is to be with the children of men , Prov. 8. 31. should have no compassion of such an innumerable multitude of soules ? The earth was inhabited e by degrees , from the place where Noahs Ark rested they went as the Sunne , from the East , and so planted themselves forward ; and the progresse of the Gospell saith f Eusebius , was in the same manner , and for this there is more than allusion in Psal . 19. 5. compared with Rom. 10. 18. That Westerne part of the world was last inhabited , and it shall heare of Christ also in due time , as certainely as there be people to receive him , for he shall be salvation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to the last end of the earth , Act. 13. 47. And the Americans have a tradition among themselves , g that white and bearded Nations shall subdue their Countries , abolish all their rites and ceremonies , and introduce a new religion . CHAP. VIII . The sixth Conjecture . THE Americans calamities are suitable to those plagues threatned unto the Jewes , Deut. 28. Such a comment upon that terrible Scripture is not any where to be found , as among the Indians , by this also it will appear probable that they be Jews : and here three things shall be touched upon . 1. The Jewes were a very sinfull people . 2. The Indians were and are transcendent sufferers . 3. In that way 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 litterally , as was threatned to the Jewes . 1. The Jewes were grand offenders ; a Galatinus mentions sonre of their enormous transgressions , with their ensuing vengeances . 1. The selling of Ioseph into Egypt , where themselves were kept afterward in an iron furnace , and dwelt a long time in an house of bondage . 2. Their first rejection of the Messiah , typified in David , 2 Sam. 20. 1. which was punished by the Assyrians . 3. The sacrificing of their owne children to Idols , and murthering the Prophets that deterred them from such abominations , he calls their third great offence , for which the Babylonian captivity fell upon them . 4. Their fatall and most grievous crime was the denyall of the Holy one , and the just , with desire that a murtherer should be given them , Act. 3. 14. and this brought upon them , first the tyranny of the Roman conquest , and then all those hideous and horrid tribulations that presse and oppresse them to this day . 2. The Natives of America have endured the extremities of most unspeakable miseries : They are a Nation saith Lerius b cursed and forsaken of God , and the men of Spaine to their other cruelties added that most abominable reproach , these Barbarians are c dogs , unworthy of Christendome ; t is too true they were so used by them , as if they had bin such or worse , they did so weare them up with labour , that they became weary of their lives , the poore creatures chusing rather to die any kind of death , than to live under such bloody Masters and Monsters ; they scared the Indians into woods , where the men and women hanged themselves together , and wanting instruments sometimes for such selfe execution , they helped one another to knit their long locks about the branches of trees , and so cast themselves downe headlong , their owne haires being their halters ; and thus many thousands of them ended their daies with most lamentable yellings and out-cries ; their intestine violences and injuries among themselves were woefull by rapine , warre , and sacrificings of one another , many d thousands of them have been immolated in one day at Mexico ; but their sufferings by the spaniards exceed not onely all relation , but beliefe , and surely the savages could not have outstripped the Spaniards in barbarous savagenesses , if those Infidells had gotten the upper hand of these Christians ; a very prudent Cacique saith Benzo e , that was neere an hundred yeeres old , reported freely , that when he was young , a very strange disease invaded those countrys , the sick commonly vomited many filthy wormes , such a wasting plague he said followed this calamity , that we feared none of us could survive it : and a little before your comming we of Iucatana had two cruell battailes with the Mexicans , in which above one hundred and fifty thousand were slaine , but these were all light and easie vexations , in respect of those terrible examples of intollerable insolence , avarice , and cruelty , exercised by your selves upon us ; thus he : we read , when the Prophet of God foretold Hazael , the evill bee should bring upon Israel Hazael said , Is thy servant a dog that he should doe this ? 2 King. 8. 13. But the Spaniards did more evill things to the Indians , and shewed themselves with shame to be worse than dogs , witnesse that bloody Bezerill , though not so bloody as his Master Didacus Salasar f , who set that his Mastiffe upon an old woman , employed by himselfe , as he feigned with letters to the Governour , who seeing the cruell curre , by his more cruell Masters setting on , with open mouth comming upon her , falls to the ground , bespeaking him in her language , sir dog , sir dog , I carry these letters to the Governour , holding up to his view the seale , be not angry with me , sir dog , the Mastiffe as decalmed by that begging posture and language , abates his fiercenesse , listes up his leg , and besprinkles the woman , as dogs use to doe at the wall : the Spaniards that knew well his curstnesse at other times , saw this with astonishment , and were ashamed to hurt the woman , that so cruell a dog had spared . 3. The Indian sufferings have runne so parallell with those threats , Deut. 28. as if they had been principally intended therein also . Was Israel offending to be calamitous , in all places , towne and field , at home and abroad , &c. The poore Indians g for their gold and labour , were by the Spaniards hunted out of all places , corners and Islands , as if the end of their discovery had been indeed to make a full end , and a totall devastation of the American Nations . Against the sinning Jewes it was said , Cursed shall be the fruit of thy body , &c. vers . 18. The pestilence shall cleave unto thee , &c. The Lord shall smite thee with a consumption , &c. ver . 21 , 22 , 35 , 29. Strange diseases have destroyed the Natives , as the histories of those countries doe relate ; their cruell task-masters the Spaniards , did so much overburthen them with load and labour , that the h cohabitation of man and wife did cease : seven thousand infants of Cuba did perish in three moneths space , their mothers worne out with toyling had no milk to give them . The Lord said , He would smite Israeel with blindnesse , madnesse , and astonishment of heart , and thou shalt grope at noone day , as the blind gropeth in darknesse , &c. ver . 28. 29. And woefull indeed is the veile of ignorance that is come over the Natives i ; they imagined the Island Hispaniola to be a living creature , eating and digesting like a monster : that vast sea-den or hollow place which they call Guacca-jarima , is the voider of its excrements , a fancy like that antique fable of the Demogorgon lying in the wombe of the world , whose breath causeth the flux and reflux of the sea : the darke part of the Moone k they take to be a man throwne thither , and tormented for incest with his owne sister , whose eclipse they guesse to be caused by the Sunnes anger ; those responsalls of the aires reverberation , which we call eccho , they suppose to be soules , wandring thereabouts . How were those poore creatures astonish'd , when they saw themselves torne by l Spanish dogs , whose Masters would borrow quarters of Indians , men and women , for their hounds , and as commonly expose them to such a kind of death and buriall , as if men and women had bin made for dogs meate ? how were they affrighted when the feare of Spanish cruelties provoked fathers , mothers , children , to hang themselves together ? that Bishop knew of two hundred and more so perishing by the tyranny of one Spaniard . No m marvaile therefore if when the Fryer told Hathuey , the Cacique , of heavens happinesse , and the torments of hell , and hee understanding upon enquiry that the Spaniards dying went to heaven , because they were Christians , let my lot saith he fall in hell rather than with that most cruell people . God said of the Jewes , They should be oppressed and spoyled evermore , ver . 29. thou shalt betroth a wife , and another shall lie with her , ver . 30. you shall be left few in number , though yee were as starres for multitude , &c. ver . 62. And these Americans were made by the Spaniards every where and every way miserable , without any helpe or reliefe : Barthol , las Casas upon fourty two yeeres sight of their suffering , sympathized so much with them , that he represented the same to King Philip , in hope to obtaine for them some favour and mercy , but he little prevailed . One of them boasted of his care to leave as many Indian women as he could with child , that in their sale he might put them off to his better profit : from n Lucaios to Hispaniola , about seventy miles , dead carkases were cast so abundantly into the sea , that they needed no other direction thither ; and wee know it for truth , saith hee , that Countreys longer than all Europe and a great part of Asia , by horrid cruelties were destroyed , and more than twenty Millions of the Natives perished ; o yea in Hispaniola alone , scarce one hundred and fifty , of two millions were left alive . In another place hee professeth their tyranny was so cruell and detestable , that in fourty six yeeres space they caused , he verily believed , more than fifty millions of them to pay their last debt to nature ; for I speak , saith hee , the truth , and what I saw : they dealt with the poore Indians , not as with beasts , hoc enim peroptarem , but as if they had bin the most abject dung of the earth : and is this the way saith Benzo to convert Infidels ? Such kindnesse they shewed to other places also , Cuba , Iamaica , Portu ricco , &c. It was said against Israell , Cursed shall thy basket be , and thy store , ver . 17. the fruit of thy land , the encrease of thy cattle . ver . 18. all shall be devoured by enemies and other Nations , &c. ver . 30 , &c. For very much is said of their suffering in riches and honour &c. And the Spanish Christians that brake into America shewed themselves so covetous of their treasure , that the Natives with wonder said p surely gold is the Spaniards God ; they broiled noble Indians on gridirons , to extort from them their hidden wealth , giving no respect at all to their Caciques or Kings . Memorable in q many respects is the History of Attabaliba the great King of Peru , who being conquered and captivated by Francis Pizarro , redeemed his liberty by the promise of so many golden and silver vessels , as should fill the roome where they were so high as one could reach with his hand , and they were to take none away till he had brought in the whole summe ; expecting thereupon according to covenant his freedome and honour , he dispatched his officers and servants with great care and diligence , and did faithfully performe his bargaine , in bringing that vast heape of treasure together ; but they resolve neverthelesse most impiously to murder him , though with many arguments and tears he pleaded for his life , desiring sometime to be sent unto Caesar , then expostulating with them for their perfidiousnesse and falsehood , but neither words nor weeping , nor their owne inward guilt could mollifie those hard hearts , they sentence him to death by a rope , and the cruell execution followed ; but r Benzo observed a miraculous hand of vengeance from heaven upon all that gave consent thereto : so that as Suetonius s records of Caesars stobbers , Nullus corum sua morte defunctus est , every one of them found that consultation and contrivance fatall ; Almager is hanged , Didacus his sonne is slaine by Vacca de Castro , the Indians kill Iohn Pizarro at Cusco , who fell upon Fryar Vincent also of the green valley , and slew him with clubs in the Isle Puna , Ferdinandus Pizarro was sent into Spain , where he consumed his daies in a prison , Gonsallus Pizarro was taken by Gasca and hewen in pieces , and Francis Pizarro that was the President , and gave judgement , died an evill death also , being slaine by his owne Countrey men in that strange land ; so just was God in avenging so perfidious a regicide and King-murder , so ominous was their presumption against the honourable , vile swine-herds sentencing so great a King to so foule a death : those , are his words , in whom , and his interpreter t , he that please may read further , those murderers were base in birth and life , and they instance in despicable particulars . It were endlesse to mention all the parallels that the Spaniards have drawne upon the poore Indians , according to the threats of God upon the sinning Jewes , Deut. 28. 43 , The stranger that is within thee shall get up above thee very high , and thox shalt come downe very low . 48. Thou shalt serve thine enemy in hunger , and thirst , and nakednesse , and in want of all things , and he shall put a yoake of iron upon thy necke till he have destroyed thee . 59. The Lord will make thy plagues wonderfull , &c. 61. And every plague which is not written in this Law will the Lord bring upon thee , untill thou be destroyed . Their Kings and Caciques were no more regarded by them than the meanest , they enthralled all the Natives in most woefull servitude and captivity ; their sufferings have bin most wonderfull , such as the Book of the Law hath not registred , nor any other record ; they spared no age nor sex , not women with childe ; they laid wagers who could digge deepest into the bodies of men at one blow , or with most dexterity cut off their heads ; they tooke infants from their mothers breasts and dash'd their innocent heads against the rockes ; they cast others into the rivers with scorne , making themselves merry at the manner of their falling into the water ; they set up severall gallowses , and hung upon them thirteen Indians in honour they said of Christ and his twelve Apostles : And yet further the same Bishop mervailes at the abominable blindnesse and blasphemy of his Countrymen , impropriating their bloudy crimes unto God himselfe , giving him thanks in their prosperous tyrannies , like those thieves and Tyrants he sayth spoken of by the Prophet Zachary , 11. 5. They kill , and hold themselves not guilty , and they that sell them say , Blessed be the Lord , for I am rich . And now if all these parallels will not amount to a probability , one thing more shall be added , which is the dispersion of the Jewes , t is said , The Lord shall scatter thee among all people , from one end of the earth , even to the other , &c. Deut. 28. 64. The whole remnant of thee I will scatter into all winds , Ezek. 5. 10 , 12 , 14. & Zach. 2. 6. I have spread you as the foure winds of heaven . Now if it be considered how punctuall and faithfull God is in performing his promises and threats mentioned in the Scripture of truth , wee shall have cause to looke for the Jewes in America , one great , very great part of the earth ; Esay had said , 1. 8. The daughter of Syon shall be left as a lodge in a garden of Cucumbers , and as Helena u found it in her time , pomorum custodium an Apple-yard ; so w Cyrill affirmeth in his daies it was a place full of Cucumbers ; Ieremies prophecies of Babylons destruction , even in the circumstances thereof , are particularly acknowledged and related by Xenophon x , The Lord had threatned to bring a Nation upon Israell swift as the Eagle flieth , Deut. 28. 49. Iosephus y saith this was verified in Vespatians Ensigne , and the banner of Cyrus was an Eagle z also , as the same Xenophon relateth ; and if the Jewes bee not now , never were in America , how have they been dispersed into all parts of the earth ? this being indeed so large a portion of it ; how have they bin scattered into all the four windes , if one of the foure did never blow upon them ? Much more might be said of their sufferings from the Spaniards , whom the barbarous Indians thereupon counted so barbarous and inhumane , that they supposed them not to come into the world like other people , as if it were impossible , that any borne of man and woman should be so monstruously savage and cruell ; they derived therefore their pedigree from the wide and wild Ocean , and call'd them a Viracocheie , i. e. the foame of the Sea , as beeng borne of the one , and nourished by the other , and poured upon the earth for its destruction . b Acosta indeed gives another interpretation of that word in honour of his Nation , but other c writers unanimously accord in this ; and d Benzo confidently averreth , that the conceit and judgement of the Indians touching the originall of the Spaniards , is so setled in them , that none but God himselfe can alter their minds herein ; for thus saith hee they reason among themselves , the winds tumble downe houses , and teare trees in peeces , the fire burnes both trees and houses , but these same Viracocheies devoure all , they turn over the earth , offer violence to the rivers , are perpetually unquiet , wandering every way to finde gold , and when they have found it , they throw it away at dice , they steale , and sweare , and kill , yea and kill one another , and deny God : yea these Indians in detestation of the Spaniards , he saith , doe execrate and curse the sea it selfe for sending such an intractable , fierce , and cruell a generation into the earth : But thus have wicked sinnes drawne woefull punishments , threatned to the Jewes , and suffered also by these Americans , wherein the more hath bin spoken , not onely to deter all Christians from such inhumane barbarities , but to provoke the readers every way to compassionate such transcendent sufferers , the rather because as Canaan of old was Emanuels land , Hos . 9. 3. the holy land , Zach. 2. 12. and the Jewes were Gods peculiar people , so these surely are either a remnant of Israell after the flesh , or else God will in his good time incorporate them into that common-wealth , and then they also shall become the Israel of God. Part Second . Some contrary reasonings removed , and first in the generall . CHAP. I. THere be some that by irrefragable arguments , they suppose , evince and overthrow all conjectures that the Americans be Jewes : Apocryphall Esdras in Historicalls may be of some credit , and that sentence of his by many is applyed to this very purpose ; and these very people , the ten tribes led away captive by Salmanasar , tooke this counsell among themselves , that they would leave the multitude of the Heathen , and goe forth into a farther Countrey , where never man dwelt , that they might there keepe their statutes , which they never kept in their owne land , and they entred into Euphrates , by the narrow passages of the river , for through that Countrey there was a great way to goe , namely of a yeere and an halfe , and the same Region is called Arsareth , &c. 2 Esdr . 13. 40. &c. a Acosta is of opinion that these words thus produced by many , make in truth against this conjecture , and that for two reasons . 1. The ten Tribes went so farre to keepe their statutes and ceremonies , but these Indians observe none of them , being given up to all Idolatries : And is this at all consequent , such was their purpose , therefore the successe must be answerable ? is it likely they should be so tenacious in a farre and forraigne land , that never kept them in their owne , as the next words expresse ? His second Argument is of like force , for t is not said , that Euphrates and America be contiguous , or places so neere one the other , muchlesse that the entries of that River should stretch to the Indies ; but hee tells of a very long journey taken by them , suitable to the places of their removall , and approach , which was to a Countrey where never man dwelt , and what Countrey could this be but America ? all other parts of the world being then knowne and inhabited : Besides there hath bin a common tradition among the Jews , and in the world , that those ten tribes are utterly lost ; in what place are they then like to be found if not in America ? for they shall be found againe . Some conjectures that they came from Norway , and be of that nation , have bin mentioned , with the improbability also thereof ; and now lately T. Gage sets forth his new survey of the West Indies , his long abode there , and diligent observation of many , very many remarkable passages in his travells ; there I hoped to read somewhat of their originalls , and finde him b affirming that the Indians seeme to be of the Tartars progeny , his reasons are , 1. Quivira and all the West side of the Countrey towards Asia is farre more populous than the East next Europe , which sheweth these parts to be first inhabited ; but if the meaning be , the nearer Tartary the more populous , therefore they came from thence , its falls in with the third reason . 2. Their barbarous properties are most like the Tartats of any ; this argument militates with more force for their Judaisme , to which many of their rites be so consonant , both sacred and common , as hath been said . And thirdly the West side of America , if it be not continent with Tartary , is yet disjoyned by a small straite ; but the like may be said of some other parts , that they be or may have been neer some other maine lands , and so by that reason of some other race and extract . 4. The people of Quivira neerest to Tartary , are said to follow the seasons and pasturing of their cattell like the Tartarians ; this particular , a species of the generall , delivered in the second reason , is there glanced upon , but all he saith of this nature , and others with him , are so farre from weakening our conjecture , that they may be embraced rather as friendly supports thereunto , if others have guessed right that conceive the Tartars also themselves to be Jowes . Mathew Paris c , no meane man in his time , was of that opinion ; in his famous history he mentions it as the judgement of learned men in that age , it is thought the Tartars , quorum memoriaest detestabilis , are of the ten Tribes , &c. Yea and of latter times Dr Fletcher d a neere neighbour to them while he lived among the Russes as Agent for Queen Elizabeth , supposeth the same , and giveth divers probable arguments inducing him thereto : the names of many Townes in Tartary the same with those in Israell , Tabor , Ierico , Chorasin , &c. They are circumcised , distinguished into Tribes , and have many Hebrew words among them , &c. for hee addeth other probabilities ; yea and the same M. Paris e shewes that the Jewes themselves were of that mind , and called them their brethren of the seed of Abraham , &c. There was another transmigration of them when Vespatian destroyed Ierusalem ; their owne , and other Histories speake little thereof : it might be well worthy the endeavours of some serious houres to enquire after the condition of that Nation since our most deare Saviours Ascension ; a strange thing is reported by themselves , and of themselves , and with such confidence f that t is in their devotion . It saith when Vespatian wan Ierusalem , he gave order that three ships laden with that people might be put to Sea , but without Pilot , oares , or tackling , these by windes and tempests were woefully shattered , and so dispersed , that they were cast upon severall coasts ; one of them in a Countrey called Lovanda , the second in another region named Arlado , the third at a place called Bardeli , all unknown in these time , the last courteously entertained these strangers , freely giving them grounds and vineyards to dresse , but that Lord being dead , another arose that was to them , as Pharaoh to old Israell , and he said to them , he would try by Nabuchodonosors experiment upon the three young men , if these also came from the fire unscorch'd , he would believe them to be Jewes , they say Adoni-Melech , most noble Emperour , let us have also three daies to invoke the Majesty of our God for our deliverance , which being granted , Ioseph and Benjamin two brothers , and their cosin Samuell , consider what is meet to be done , and agree to fast and pray three daies together , and meditate every one of them a prayer , which they did , and out of them all they compiled one which they used all those three daies and three nights ; on the morning of the third day one of them had a vision upon Esa . 43. 2. which marvelously encouraged them all : soone after a very great fire was kindled , and an ininnumerable company of people came to see the burning , into which they cast themselves unbidden without feare , singing , and praying till all the combustible matter was consumed , and the fire went out ; the Jewes every where published this miracle , and commanded that this prayer should be said every Monday and Thursday morning in their Synagogues , which is observed by them to this day saith Buxtorsius : In this narration if there be any truth wee may looke for some confirmation thereof from America . But that there be no Jewes in those parts , Io. de Laet endeavours otherwise to evince ; as 1. They are not circumcised , therefore not Jewes ; but their circumcision hath been made so manifest , that this reason may well be retorted ; they are circumcised , therefore they be Jewes . Againe the Indians are not covetous , nor learned , nor carefull of their Antiquities , therefore they are not Judaicall ; in which allegations if there be any strength , it will be answered in the examination of those three following scrupulous and difficult questions . 1. Whence and how the Iewes should get into America . 2. How multiply , and enpeople so great a Continent , so vast a land . 3. How grow so prodigiously rude and barbarous . CHAP II. Answer to the first Quere , How the Jewes should get into America . THE Jewes did not come into America , as is feigned of Ganimed a , riding on Eagles wings , neither was there another Arke made to convey them thither , the Angels did not carry them by the haires of the heads , b as Apocryphall Habakuk was conducted into Babylon , these were not caught by the Spirit of the Lord and setled there , as Saint Philip was from Ierusalem to Asotus , Act. 8. 5. They were c not guided by an Hart , as t is written of the Hunns , when they brake in upon the nearer parts of Europe d , Procopius reports of the Maurisii , an African Nation , that they were of those Gergesites or Jebusites spoken of in the Scriptures , for he had read a very ancient writing in Phaenician Characters thus , 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , i. e. We are they that fled from the face of the destroyer Iesus the sonne of Nave ; and so the Septuagint names him , whom wee call the sonne of Nun , and as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 formerly , 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was not in those daies of such odious signification : It may be said these might passe from the parts of Asia into Lybia by land , but the Jewes could not so get into America , which is thought by some to be very farre distant on every side from the Continent ; e Acosta therefore supposeth the Natives might come at first by sea into that maine land , alledging some experiments to that purpose , but in the next Chapter he judgeth it more probable , whosoever the inhabitants be , that they travelled thither by land ; for though some few men happily by tempests , might be cast on those shores , yet it is unlike , so large a part of the earth by such mishaps should be replenished . F. Cotton ( f ) , it seemes was puzled with this scruple , therefore in his memorialls he propounded to the Daemoniaque that Interrogatory , Quomodo animalia in insulas , &c. Quomodo homines , how got men and other creatures into those Islands and Countries . Acosta g subscribes at length to the sentence of St. Austin h for the entrance of Beares , Lions , and Wolves , that they arrived thither , either by their owne swimming , or by the importation of curious men , or by the miraculous command of God , and ministration of the Angels , yet his i finall determination is , and he lived seventeen yeeres in that Countrey , America joyneth somewhere with some other part of the world , or else is but by a very little distance separated from it . And it may yet be further considered , the scituation of Countries is much altered by tract of time , many places that were formerly sea , are now dry land saith Strabo k , a great part af Asia and Africa hath bin gained from the Atlantique Ocean , the sea of Corinth was drunk up by an earthquake , Lucania by the force of the water was broken off from Italy , and got a new name ; Sicily saith l Tertullian , the sea gave unto the m earth the Island Rhodes ; Pliny n mentions divers places , Islands long since , but in his time adjoyned to the Continent , and the sea hath devoured many Townes and Cities , that were anciently inhabited ; that Vallis Silvestris as the Latin translation renders , Gen. 14. 3. or of Siddim , i. e. Laboured fields , as t is in Hebrew , was certainely a vaile of slime-pits in the daies of Abraham and Lot , ver . 10. which very place about foure hundred yeeres after , was a sea , the salt sea , ver . 3. Between Thera and Therasia an Island suddenly appeared , saith o Eusebius , and the sea perhaps hath broken into some places , and of one made a double Island ; all Ages and Nations tell of the water and the Earth , how they gain one from the other : and thus some p have conjectured , that our Brittaine since the floud , was one Continent with France , for the distance between them , at Callis and Dover is but small , about twenty foure miles , and the cliffes on both sides are like each other , for length and matter , equally chalk and flinty , as if art , or suddaine violence had made an even separation . Thence Hollinshead writes confidently , because Lions and wild Bulls were formerly in this Island , that it was not cut from the maine by the great deluge of Noah , but long after ; for none would replenish a Countrey with such creatures for pastime and delight . And if these be no more but conjectures that America was once united to the other world , or but a little divided from it , time and the sea two insatiable devourers have made the gap wider : But the question is not in what age , before , or since the Incarnation of our Lord the Jewes tooke their long journey , and planted there ; but how the way was passable for them : Malvenda q speakes confidently that they might come into Tartary , and by the deserts into Grotland , on which side America is open ; and Mr Brerewood r assures us that the North part of Asia is possessed by Tartars , and if it be not one Continent with America , as some suppose ; yet doubtlesse they are divided by a very narrow channell , because there be abundance of Beares , Lions , Tigers , and Wolves in the Land , which surely men would not transport to their owne danger and detriment , those greater s beasts indeed are of strength to swimme over Sea many miles , and this is generally observed of Beares : and t Herrera saith , the inhabitants of the West Indies came thither by land , for those Provinces touch upon the Continent of Asia , Africa , and Europe , though it be not yet fully discovered , how , and where the two worlds be conjoyned , or if any sea doe passe between them , they are straites so narrow , that beasts might easily swimme , and men get over even with small vessells ; Our Countrey man Nich. Fuller u gives in his suitable verdit for the facile passing into Columbina , so he calls it from the famous first discoverer , saying , from other places they might find severall Islands not farre distant each from other , and a narrow cut at last through which passengers might easily be conveyed ; and Acosta w tells that about Florida the land runs out very large towards the North , and as they say joynes with the Scythique or German Sea ; and after some other such mentionings , he concludes confidently , there is no reason or experience that doth contradict my conceit , that all the parts of the Earth be united and joyned in some place or other , or at least , approach very neere together , and that is his conclusive sentence . It is an indubitable thing , that the one world is continued , and joyned with the other . CHAP. III. Answer to Question 2. How such a remnant should enpeople so great a part of the world . THE whole Countrey of Jewry , whence wee would have it probable that the Americans came , is not above one hundred and sixty miles long , from a Dan to Beersheba , and the breadth is but sixty miles , from Ioppa to Iordan , in St. Ieromes account , who knew it so well ; and how some few Colonies , as it were removing from thence should multiply into such numbers , that so large a Countrey should be filled by them , is a scruple that hath troubled some considering men . America in the latitude of it is b is foure thousand miles ; and Bishop Casa's c hath said already , that the Spaniards in his time had forraged and spoyled Countries longer then all Europe , and a great part of Asia ; it seemes incredible therefore that the Incommers , who were but few in comparison , as a little flocke of Kids , should so marvelously spread into all the Westerne World ; for the Americans before that Spanish devastation , filled all the Countrey . But this will not seeme so difficult , if former examples be taken into consideration ; d some have made speciall observation of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 such as had many children ; t is much that Acosta e writes of one of the Inguas or Kings of Peru , that hee had above three hundred sonnes and grandchildren ; t is more that Philo Iudeus f tells of Noah the Patriarke , who lived , hee saith , to see twenty foure thousand proceeding from him , all males , for women were not numbred . We use to say , Rome was not built in one day ; and indeed Eutropius g speaking of the Empire of that City , saith , at first none was lesse , but in its increment it exceeded all others by many degrees , so that he who reades the story thereof , reads not the acts of one people , but of all Nations saith Florus h ; yea and Seneca i looking on Rome in its minority , and her immense magnitude afterward , is amazed thereat ; this one people saith he , how many Colonies did it send into all Provinces , he writes of numerous encreases from other Cities also , as Athens and Miletus , but it will be nearer to our purpose to observe , how small the number of Israell was at his first discent into Egypt , how short a time they tarried there , what cruell waies were taken to stop their encrease , and yet how much , and how marvelously they multiplied , and then it will not be strange , that a farre greater number , in a longer time should or might grow into such vast multitudes . And for the first t is most certaine , all the soules of the house of Iacob which came into Egypt were seventy . Gen. 46. 27. T is true also , though not to all so manifest , that the time of their abode in Egypt was about two hundred and fifteen yeers , and not more ; at first appearance indeed it seems to be otherwise , because wee read , Exod. 12. 40. The sojourning of the children of Israell who dwelt in Egypt , was foure hundred and thirty yeeres , but the Septuagints addition is here remarkable 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 . They dwelt in Egypt and in the Land of Canaan , they and their Fathers , foure hundred and thirty yeeres , and this is one of those thirteen mutations that the seventy Interpreters made ; when at King Ptolomes appointment they translated the Scripture into Greeke , which they said was done rightly by them , for Israell was indeed in Egypt but two hundred and ten yeeres , which collection they make from k the numerall letters of that speech of Iacob . Gen. 42. 2. ו / 6 ד / 4 ר / 200 and there be many impressions in the Scripture , evidencing that their abode in Egypt was according to this computation . Saint Paul first taught this high point of Chronology , where and how the account must begin , namely at the time when the promise was made to Abraham , for the Law was foure hundred and thirty yeeres after , Gal. 3. 16 , 17. God bidding Abraham get out of his owne countrey , &c. Gen. 12. 1. makes a Covenant with him , ver . 2. 3. and Abraham was then seventy five yeeres old , ver . 4. Isaac is borne twenty five yeeres after , Gen. 21. 5. Iacobs birth is sixty yeeres after that , Gen. 25. 26. Iacob was one hundred and thirty yeeres old when hee went downe into Egypt , Gen. 47. 28. which together make two hundred and fifteen yeeres , and two hundred and fifteen yeeres after they came all out of Egypt ; for when the foure hundred and thirty yeeres were expired , even the selfe same day departed all the Hosts of the Lord out of the land of Egypt , Exod. 12. 41. The computation of Suidas l in the margent is consonant hereunto ; and how these seventy in the space of two hundred & fifteen yeers did encrease , is next to be declared , which is also plainly expressed , ver . 37. They tooke their journey from Rameses to Succoth , about six hundred thousand men on foot , beside children , so great a multiplication of so few in so short a time , may easily convince the possibility of a far greater augmentation from a beginning so vastly different , and the continuance so much surmounting . The Spaniards first comming into America was about the yeere one thousand foure hundred and ninety : the great dispersion of the Jewes immediately after our Saviours death at the destruction of Ierusalem , was more then fourteen hundred yeeres before , and their former importation into the City of the Medes was seven hundred and fourty yeeres before that ; if therefore upon either of the scatterings of that Nation , two thousand or fourteen hundred yeeres , or lesse then either number be allowed for the encrease of those that were very many before , such multitudes will not be miraculous : besides , in all that time no forraign power did breake in among them ; there were thence no transplantations of Colonies , no warres did eate up the inhabitants , but such light battailes as they were able to manage among themselves , in all that long time they did encrease and multiply without any extraordinary diminution , till that incredible havocke which was made by the Spanish invasions and cruelties . CHAP. IV. Answer to the third Quaere , about their becomming so barbarous . IF such a passage through Tartary , or some other Countrey for them were granted , and the probability of so numerous multiplication acknowledged , the perswasion will not yet be easie , that Jewes should ever become so barbarous , horrid and inhumane , as bookes generally relate of these Americans . Villagagno a writing of the Brasilians to Master Calvin , speakes as if he had bin uncertaine at first whether he were come among beasts in an humane shape , so stupid he found them and sottish beyond imagination : But here every reader may take occasion to bemoane the woefull condition of mankinde , and into what rude , grosse , and unmanlike barbarities we runne headlong , if the goodnesse of God prevent us not . Wee marvaile at the Americans for their nakednesse , and man-devouring , we cannot believe the Jewes should be given over to such barbarity : But in our own Nation the Inhabitants were anciently as rude and horrid , 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , saith Herodian , the Britons knew not the use of apparell , lest their cloathing should hide the severall formes and figures of beasts and other creatures which they paint , and imprint upon their bodies ; and Hierome saith , when he was a young man , he saw the Scots , Gentem Britannicam humanis vesci carnibus , and that even here of old were Anthropophagi , is averred by Diodorus Siculus , and Strabo . And to what hath bin said of the Jewes formerly , shall here be added . It seemes strange to us if they be Jewes , they should forget their religion , and be so odiously idolatrous , although after so many yeeres ; but , if the Scripture had not spoken it , could it have bin believed of this very people , that they should fall so often into such foule offences , as , if circumstances be considered , have no parallell . Israel , when but newly delivered out of Egypt , by many signes and wonders , with severall evident and miraculous impressions of Gods Majesty and power ; yet in six moneths space all is forgotten , they make unto themselves a God of their owne , attributing unto it all their deliverance , and say , These be thy Gods O Israrael which brought thee out of the land of Egypt . Exod. 32. 4. which base Idoll of theirs had not it s nothing , till they were all come out safe thence ; who can sufficiently wonder that those very people who saw and heard those terrible things mentioned , Exod. 19 , & 20. which forced them to say but a while before to Moses , Talke thou with us , and wee will heare , but let not God talke with us , least wee die , Exod. 20. 19. Yea God himselfe seems to admire at this , and for this to disowne them , telling Moses , Thy people which thou hast brought out of the land of Egypt , they are soon turned out of the way , &c. Exod. 32. 8. It may seeme past beliefe any of Iacobs race should be so unnaturall as to devoure one another , as is frequent among these Indians ; and would it not bee as much beyond credit , if the Scripture of truth , Dan. 10. 21. had not asserted it , that these sonnes of Iacob in former times when they had Priests and Prophets among them , and the remembrance of Gods justice and mercy was fresh in their minds , That they should then offer their sonnes and daughters unto devills , Psal . 106. 36. as they did in the valley of Hinnom , 2 King 23. 10. smiting b on the Tabrets while their children were burning , that their cry could not be heard ; t is not impossible therefore that the Jews should be againe overwhelmed with such savagenesses and inhumanity ; nor improbable neither , if to what hath bin said three other things be added . 1. The threats of God against them upon their disobedience , Deut. 28. where be words and curses sufficient to portend the greatest calamity that can be conceived to fall upon the nature of man , as hath already bin in severall things declared ; and M. Paris c so answers the objection , that the Tartars are not Jewish , because they know nothing of Moses Law , nor righteousnesse , &c. If when Moses was alive , saith he , they were so stubborne and rebellious , and went after other Gods , they may be now much more prodigiously wicked , even as these Americans , being unknowne to other people , confounded also in their language and life , and God so revenging their abominations . 2. The ten Tribes in their owne land were become extreamely barbarous , renouncing all almost they had received from Moses , Ezek. 36. 17. & 2 King. 17. their captivity is mentioned , and the sinfull cause thereof , more then abominable Idolatries ; and they were not onely guilty of wicked , but even of witlesse impieties : God forbad them to walke after the customes of the Nations , Deut. 4. 8. and yet , as the Heathen in all their Cities , they built high places , making Images and groves upon every high hill , and under every green tree , and made their sonnes and daughters to passe through the fire , using witchcraft and enchantment , &c. 2 King. 17. 8 , 9. This was their religion and wisdome while they were in their own Countrey , and they were no better in the land of their captivity ; for it may be , they had not there the books of the Law , nor any Prophets among them , because t is said againe and againe , They left the commandments of their God. And if it seeme unlikely , that the Jewes being in America should lose the Bible , the Law , and ceremonies , then let the Prophesie of Hosea be remembred , where t is foretold , that the children of Israel shall remaine many daies without a King , and without a Prince , and without a Sacrifice , and without an Ephod , and without a Teraphim , Hose . 3. 4. Yea and before that time there was a lamentable defection of religion in Israell . While they were in their owne land , for a long season they were without the true God , and without a reading Priest , and without Law , 2 Chron. 15. 3. yea and as Chrysostome d affirmes that the Book of Deuteronomy had been lost along time among Christians , and was lately recovered from dust and rubbish a little before his daies ; so t is most certaine that in Iosiahs reigne , Hilkiah the Priest found the Booke of the Law in the House of the Lord , which when the King heard read unto him , hee was astonisht , as at a new and strange thing , and rent his clothes , 2 King , 22. 8. &c. and this was the Booke of the law of the Lord given by Moses , 2 Chro. 34. 14. which was then little knowne or regarded among them , ver . 24 , 25. &c. But thirdly , the stupor and dulnesse of Israell was even admirable , when our Saviour came into the world , for they give no credit to their owne Prophets read in their Synagogues every Sabbath , the Shepherds publish what they received from the Angells concerning Christ , Luk. 2. 17. Simeon proclaimes glorious things of Jesus , and they will not heare , ver . 25. Wise men came from the East to Ierusalem enquiring and discoursing , but still they apprehend not ; yea they shut their eyes against all the marvailes that Christ performed among them , such as would have convinced not onely Tyre and Sidon , but even Sodome and Gomorrha : the heavenly Sermons of the Sonne of God wrought upon stones , harlots , publicans and sinners , but those Jewes remaine inflexible against all , and at his death they still continue seared and stupified ; the veile of the Temple is rent , the earth did quake , the stones were cloven asunder , and the graves did open , but their hearts are shut up still ; yea and at his resurrection there was a great earthquake , the Angel of the Lord comes downe from heaven , his countenance is like lightning , for fear of him the keepers become as dead men , Christ riseth againe in glory , and the watch shew the High Priests all these things , they are hereupon convinced , but they will not b● convinced ; for they take counsell together , and with mony hire the souldiers to say , the disciples stole away his body while they slept ; if it be therefore well considered of what dark & darkned condition the Israelites were in these times , how many yeeres have passed since , what meanes they have had to increase their rudenesse and incivility , and irreligion ; no way , commerce , or means left to reclaime them , it will not seem so strange if they be wholly barbarous , seeing also the vengeance of God lies hard and heavy upon them for their injustice done to his Sonne , nam crucifixerunt e salvatorem suum & fecerunt damnatorem suum , saith St. Austin , they crucified their Saviour , and made him their enemy and avenger . It is no marvaile then , supposing the Americans . to be Jewes , that there be so few mentionings of Judaicall rites and righteousnesse among them ; it may be , and is , a wonderfull thing rather , that any footstep or similitude of Judaisme should remaine after so many ages of great iniquity , with most just divine displeasure therupon , and no possibility yet discerned how they should recover , but manifest necessities almost of praecipitation into further ignorance , grossenesse and impiety ; the losse of which their customes and ceremonies , in so great a measure , in time may prove advantagious towards their conversion , seeing they cannot be obstinate maintainers of Mosaicall Ordinances , the love and liking whereof and adhesion to them , was ever a prevailing obstacle to the knowing Jewes , and that is a consideration tending directly to the last part , and particular , and will helpe , I trust , to encourage us who are already desirous , not to civilize onely the Americanes , 〈◊〉 even to Gospellize and make them Christian . Part Third . Humble desires to all , for hearty endeavours in all , to acquaint the Natives with Christianity . CHAP. I. To the Planters , and touching the cause of their removall hence . THis discourse will be directed to the English planted there , and our selves at home ; concerning the former , three or foure things may be minded . 1. Cause of their removall . 2. Hope of the Natives conversion . 3. Directions to it . 4. Cautions , and some other additions . Deep considerations , without doubt , and mature , were in those that hence transplanted themselves into that other part of the world , but quo jure , by what right and title they could settle in a forraigne land was surely none of their last enquiries . Io. Bodin a reckons five reasons why Colonies may be planted in other Regions . 1. Expulsion from their own native Countrey . 2. Increase of inhabitants upon a land . 3. Want of necessaries at home , and unseasonable times . 4. Desire to preserve and enlarge their owne territories . 5. Favour to prisoners and captives . The ampliation of the Kingdome of Christ was expected here as a motive in vaine ; but I finde it elsewhere among our Novangles , and it shall be mentioned in due place : for those are causes why men goe out of their owne land , but for the jus and right of setling in another they say nothing . When the Bishop De las Casas had set forth his tract of the Spanish cruelties committed in the Indies , some guilty persons he supposeth suborned Doctor Sepulveda , the Emperours Historian , to undertake their patronage , which he did in an elegant and rhetoricall discourse , endeavouring to prove , that the Spanish wars against the Indians were just and lawfull , and that they were bound to submit unto the Spaniards , as Ideots to the more prudent ; but he could not obtaine leave to print a booke so irrationall and unchristian . Their more plausible plea is , that Columbus was first employed by them to discover some of those parts ; but the same offer was before tendred to this our Nation , and the King thereof ; yea and the English were as early in that very designe as the Portingales , for our b Chronicles shew that Sebastian Gabat or Cabot , borne at Bristol , was employed by King Henry the seventh , and he with some London Merchants , adventured three or foure ships into those New-found lands , Anno one thousand foure hundred ninety eight ; and it cannot be doubted , but they had made some former sufficient experiments , before that their so confident engagement : Thence t is affirmed by others c , that the English were there before Columbus , and about the yeere d one thousand five hundred and two , three of those Natives were brought unto the King , they were cloathed in beasts skinnes , did eate raw flesh , spake a language none could understand , two of those men were seen at the Court at Westminster two yeeres after , cloathed like Englishmen . But wee of this Nation have yet a more ancient claime , three hundred yeeres before Columbus , in the time of Henry the second , Anno Dom. one thousand one hundred and seventy ; when Madoc ap Owen Gwineth did not onely discover the Countrey , but planted in some part of Mexico , and left Monuments of the Brittish language , and other usages , taken notice of by the Spaniands , since their arrivall thither . Mr. Herbert e in his travailes doth not onely remember this , but sheweth it to have bin mentioned by many worthy men of late , and ancient times , as Cynwic ap Greue , Meredith ap Rhice , Gul. Owen , Lloyd , Powell , Hackluit , Davis , Broughton . And Purchas . l. 4. c. 13. p. 807. But yet more particularly , Dr Donne f allowes that as a justifiable reason of mens removall from one place to another , publique benefit ; Interest Reipublicae ut re sua quis bene utatur , every one must use his private for the common good : and if a State may take order that every man improve what he hath for the benefit of the Nation where he lives , then , interest mundo , all mankinde may every where , as farre as it is able , advance the good of mankinde in generall , which not being done by the Natives there , others are bound , at least have liberty to interpose their endeavours , especially , when by divine providence one land swells with inhabitants , and another is disempeopled by mutuall broiles , infectious diseases , or the cruelty of Invaders , all which have helped to sweepe away the Americans , while the English in the meanetime did multiply in such manner and measure , as they could scarcely dwell one by another ; and because man is commanded more than once to bring forth , multiply , and fill the earth , Gen. 1. 28. 9. 1. he may well therefore , and justly looke abroad , and if he finde convenient and quiet habitation , he may call the name of that land Rehoboth , because the Lord hath made him roome , Gen. 22. 26. That is also a lawfull cause of setling in other lands , when a right therein is acquired by purchase , as Abraham bought of Ephron the field of Machpelah , Gen. 22. 17. And thus Paspehai h one of the Indian Kings sold unto the English in Virginia land to inhabit and inherit ; and when Mr Williams of late i called upon our Planters in New England to be humbled for making use of the Kings Patents , for removing hence , and residing there , he is well answered among other things , that they had those lands from the Natives by way of purchase and free consent . Againe , the Territories of strangers may be possessed upon the donation and fore-gift of the naturall Inhabitants , as Abimelech said to Abraham , behold the land is before thee , dwell where it pleaseth thee , Gen. 20. 15. and Pharaoh said to Ioseph , in the land of Goshen let thy father and brethren dwell , Gen. 47. 5 , 6. So in Virginia King k Powhatan desired the English to come from Iames Town , a place unwholsome , and take possession of another whole Kingdome , which he gave them ; thus the surviving l Indians were glad of the comming of the English to preserve them from the oppression of the next borderers ; and surely divine providence making way , the care of emprovement , the purchase from the Natives , their invitation and gift , some , or all these , may satisfie the most scrupulous in their undertaking , or else what will such our inquisitors say to maintaine the right of their owne inheritances ? The English invaded the Britons the ancient inhabitants of this Island , and crowded them into the nooke of Wales , themselves in the meane time taking possession of the fat of this Land , by what right , or by what wrong I dispute not , saith m Crantzius ; but such in those daies were the frequent emigrations of people to seeke out new habitations . To these that other expression of the eloquent Deane n may be added , accepistis potestatem , you have your Commissions , your Patents , your Charters , your Seale from that soveraigne power upon whose acts any private subject in civill matters may rely ; and though our forenamed Country-man seemeth to slight the Pattent of New-England , as containing matter of falsehood and injustice , that o imputation also is sufficiently removed by Mr Cotton in that his answer before mentioned . And yet further , the desire and endeavour to plant Christianity there , will fortifie the former reasons , and sufficiently vindicate the transplantation of people , this p seales the great seale saith that Doctor , authorizeth authority , and justifies justice it selfe , and Christians may have learned this from our deare Master Christ , who coasted the Countrey , and crossed the seas q saith Chrysologus , not to satisfie humane curiosity , but to promote mans salvation ; not to see diversities of places , but to seeke , and finde , and save lost mankinde . And if such be the aime of our Nation there , we may with more comfort expect and enjoy the externalls of the Indians , when wee pay them our spiritualls , for their temporalls , an easie and yet most glorious exchange , the salvation of the salvages , to the hope of the one , the like sound of the other may give encouragement ; but that is the next consideration . CHAP. II. Hope of the Natives conversion . SAint Paul enforced himselfe to preach the Gospell where Christ was not yet named , Rom. 15. 20. such is the condition of that forlorne Nation , a good subject to worke upon , and if so good an end be propounded , the successe by divine blessing will be answerable : and though the Countrey hath been knowne more than a Century of yeeres to Christians , yet those that came first among them , minded nothing lesse than to make them such . Benzo a relates abundantly how the Spaniards laid the foundation of their endeavours in bloud , their Fryers and religious persons at first instigating them thereto . That Christian King indeed gave them leave to subdue the Caniballs , but they destinate all the Nations to bitter bondage , proceeding therein with so much rigour and severity , that the Dominicans are constrained at length to complaine thereof to the Pope Paul the third , imploring from him a Bull for the reinfranchisement of the Indians , which they obtained , and brought into Spaine , and presented it to Charles the fifth , who made them free to the griefe and losse of some of the Grandees , whose wealth and grandour consisted most in slaves ; they were most prodigiously libidinous b also , contracting upon themselves most foule and pernicious diseases , that loathsome lust first brought into this world , the filthy and infectious contagion , now so much spoken of . Their covetousnesse was notorious also , the Indians scorned them for it , and for their sakes abominated the name of Christianity ; and when they tooke any c of the Spaniards , they would bind their hands , cast them upon their backs , and poure gold into their mouths , saying , Eate , O Christians , eate this gold : Yea their lives were generally so odious , and opposite to godlinesse , that the same writer professeth , their scandalous conversation deterred the Americans from the Gospell ; they did indeed teach some children of their Kings and Nobles , to read , and write , and understand the principles of Christianity , which they acknowledged to be good , and wondered that the Christians themselves so little practised them ; and thus one of them bespake a d Spaniard , O Christian thy God forbids thee to take his name in vaine , and yet thou swearest upon every light occasion , and forswearest ; your God saith , you shall not beare false witnesse , and you doe nothing else almost but slander , and curse one another ; your God commands you to love your neighbour as your selfe , but how are the poore injured by you ? how doe you cast them into prison , and fetters , that are not able to pay their debts ? and you are so farre from relieving needy Christians , that you send them to our cottages for almes , spending your meanes and time in dice , thefts , contentions , and adulteries : He tells also of an Indian Prince , that was very apt and ingenious , he attained to a very good measure of learning and knowledge in religion , and was hopefull above others in both ; but about the thirtieth yeere of his age , he deceived the expectation of friends , and became extremely debauched and impious , and being blamed for his bad change , his excuse was , since I became a Christian I have learned all this , to sweare by the name of God , to blaspheme the holy Gospell , to lie , to play at dice ; I have gotten a sword also to quarrell , and that I may be a right Christian indeed , I want nothing but a concubine , which I intend also shortly to bring home to my house ; And Benzo further addes , when himselfe reprehended an Indian for dicing and blaspemy e , hee was presently answered , I learned this of you Christians , &c. And if it be said , Benzo was an Italian , and laies the more load upon the Spaniards , as no friend to that Nation , Bartholomeus de las Casas f one of their owne , and a Bishop also , is as liberall in telling their faults , as hath been in part mentioned already ; the Natives indeed are capable and docible , but these other tooke no care to lead them unto godlinesse , either by word or example ; but this , saith that Spanish Bishop , was the manner of their gospelizing them ; In the night they published their edict , saying , Oyee Caciques and Indians of this place , which they named , wee let you all know , that there is one God , one Pope , one King of Castile , who is the Lord of these lands , come forth therefore presently and doe your homage , and shew your obedience to him ; so in the fourth watch of the night the poore Indians dreaming of no such matter , men women and children were burnt in their houses together : He affirmeth againe , they regarded no more to preach the Gospell of Christ to the Americans , than if they had bin dogs , and their soules to perish with their bodies ; he tells further of one Colmenero , who had the soule-care of a great City , being asked what he taught the Indians committed to his charge , his answer was , he cursed them to the Devill ; and it was sufficient if he said to them , per signin santin cruces , by the signe of the holy crosse . The Spanish instruction then , it is evident , was the Natives destruction , and not so much a plantation as a supplantation , not a consciencious teaching , but a Lion-like rather devouring of soules ; their errors may warne and rectifie us , yea and sharpen our edge , seeing these poore Indians be not indocible , and shall be converted ; and be they Jewes or Gentiles , as there is much rudenesse and incivility among them , so many hopefull things have bin observed of them ; and as Aristotle said of the humane soule at its first immission , it was a new planed table , The Americans in like manner saith P. Martyr g , are capable , and docible , mindelesse of their owne ancient rites , readily believing and rehearsing what they be taught concerning our faith ; Acosta h declares them not onely to be teachable , but in many things excelling many other men , and that they have among them some politique principles admired by our wisest statists ; their naturall parts and abilities were visible in that their whale-catching and conquest mentioned i already , yea they are saith Benzo k , very apt to imitate the fashion of the Christians ; if wee kneele at our devotion , they will kneele also ; if wee reverently lift up our hands or eyes at prayer , they will do the like : Lerius l writeth severall observable things , of their aptnesse and capacity , that they be quickely sensible of their owne blindnesse , easily deterred from lying and stealing ; they told us , m saith he , that very long agoe , they could not tell how many Moones since , one came among them cloathed and bearded like unto us , endeavouring to perswade us unto another kinde of Religion , but our Ancestors would not then heare ; and if wee should now forsake our old usages , all our neighbours would scorne and deride us ; hee found them of tenacious memories , if they heare but once one of our names , they forget them no more : and as hee walked in the woods upon a time with three of those Brasilians , his heart was stirred up to praise God for his workes , it was in the spring of the yeere , and bee sang the hundred and fourth Psalme , one of them desired to know the reason of his joy , which when he had mentioned , with the meaning also of the Prophet , the Indian replyed , Oh Mayr , so they call the French , how happy are you that understand so many secret things , that are hidden from us ! And when the Natives of Virginia o heard Mr Harriot speake of the glory of the great God , shewing them his booke , the Bible , many of them touched it with gladnesse , kissed , and embraced it , held it to their breasts , and heads , and stroaked their bodies all over with it , and in p Guiana they desired Captaine Leigh to send into England for instructors , and one of them was so well taught , that he professed at his death , he died a Christian , a Christian of England . But the q Sunne-rising of the Gospel with the Indians in New England , with the breaking forth of further light among them , and their enquity after the knowledge of the worlds Saviour , &c. hath been abundantly discovered by our Brethren there of late , to our very great rejoycing , and for the encouragement of them and others . To what hath been said , let me adde what some r suppose they read foretold concerning the Americans accesse to Christ , out of Philip. 2. 10. At the name of Iesus every knee shall bow , of things in heaven , things on earth , and things under the earth , i. e. Heavenly things , Saints already converted , earthly , such of the knowne world as the Apostles were then labouring to Gospellize , under the earth , that is , the Americans which are as under us , and as Antipodes to us , and live as it were under , beneath , in the lower parts of the world ; for it is not like hee should speake of the corporally dead , their bodies not being under , but rather in the earth , & inferi , infernus , doe not alwaies meane Hell , and the place of the damned , but the regions as under us sometimes , that be opposite to us , as that Epistle , said to be brought by a winde from the upper to the nether world , had those words first , Superi inferis salutem , wee above the earth wish health to them under it ; and thus the captive Indians s told the English Planters : Wee therefore seeke your destruction , because wee heare you are a people come under the world to take our world from us . Others finde their conversion praefigured in that threat , Mat. 25. 30. Cast the unprofitable servant into utter darknesse , those tenebrae exteriores , outward darknesses t are regiones exterae , the outer and forraigne nations in the judgement of Remigius ; and some conceive the same to be fore-signified by the Prophet Obadiah , ver . 20. The captivity of Ierusalem shall possesse the Cities of the South . i. e. of America , so situate , or , the dry cities , that Countrey being much under the Torrid Zone ; Acosta u confidently applyeth thus this text , as some others doe that of Esa . 66. 19. Fredericus Lumnius w in his booke Devicinitate extremijudicii , findes or makes divers other Scriptures look this way , upon that ground , three sorts of people should be in the Church of Christ at severall times , Jewes formerly , Christians now , and these Indians afterwards ; he citeth Hilary thus understanding that parable of the talents , the possessor of five is the Jew , hee that had two talents is the Gentile , then knowne , hee that received one , a people all carnall and stupid ; and according to this triple time of the Church , and order of believers , hee expoundeth other Scriptures , Zach. 13. 8. Mat. 13. 3. and the three Watches , Luk. 12. 38. and craving pardon of his rashnesse , or rather fidei nescientis mensuram suam , of his faith not knowing its owne measure , hee further allegorizeth the former parable , The Jewes had one Talent , the ancient and present Christians two , Law and Gospell , and the servant to whom five Talents were given , by which hee gained other five , is the Indian and American nation , last in time converted , and called after others into the vineyard ; but it shall be more abundant in obeying the Gospell , more fervent in charity , more zealous of good workes , and therefore Malvenda x will have those to be the dry Cities before mentioned out of Obad. ver . 20. Because they shall so much thirst after the Gospell ; for that younger sister of the foure , saith y one of her friends in this England , is now growne marriageable , and daily hopes to get Christ to her husband by the preaching of the Gospel . Comines z said of the English that they were much addicted to , and taken with Prophecies and predictions , I believe that is incident to all Nations , Some even among these have foretold of the mutation of their rites , and religion , as hath b●●… mentioned , and in reference to their Gospelizing a a divine and propheticall Poet hath printed his thoughts hereof in severall particulars . Religion stands on tiptoe in our land , Ready to passe to the American strand ; When height of malice , and prodigious lusts , Impudent sinning , witchcrafts , and distrusts , The markes of future bane , shall fill our cup Vnto the brim , and make our measure up ; When Sein shall swallow Tiber , and the Thames . By letting in them both pollute her streames ; When Italy of us shall have her will , And all her Calendar of sins fulfill , Whereby one may foretell what sins next yeer Shall both in France and England domineer , Then shall Religion to America flee , They have their times of Gospell even as wee : My God , thou dost prepare for them a way , By carrying first from them their gold away , For gold and grace did never yet agree , Religion alwaies sides with poverty ; Wee thinke wee rob them , but we thinke amisse , Wee are more poore , and they more rich by this ; Thou wilt revenge their quarrell , making grace To pay our debts , and leave our ancient place , To goe to them , while that , which now their Nation But lends to us , shall be our desolation , &c. Here is a sad prognosticke for this England , but a joyfull calculation for America , longing , thirsting America ; and if such be their ripenesse and desire , wee should also make haste to satisfie them , The harvest there is great , and the Regions are already white thereto ; the laborours indeed are few , t is more then time that the Lord of the harvest were more earnestly intreated to send , to thrust forth labourers into this Harvest : they that have gone into those parts have not all had a care of this , the harvest of soules : It was indeed the profession of Villagagno , and the purpose surely of Peter Richiers , and Will. Charter Pastors , and others from Geneva , Anno , one thousand five hundred fifty six , to publish the Gospel there , and they were very serious therein , yea and Lerius , b one of them , believes they had bin successefull also , if that Apostate Governour had not become a most cruell persecutor of the Reformed Religion in that strange land , where he most barbarously murthered three of those his owne Countrey men , and the aforesaid Lerius piously took care that their Martyrdom should be commemorated by Io. Crispin in his History ; and though these were not so happy in that holy attempt , others have not been , will not be discouraged in such a worke ; a worke worthy of the choicest diligence of those that professe the glorious Gospel in sincerity , who have had also many and manifold experiments of divine favour in their severall preservations , directions , and accommodations ; and because their friends ( with praise to God , and thanks to them for what is done and declared already ) desire to know more of those their pious and blessed endeavours , Let me adde a third consideration , Wishes of furtherance and direction in such great and gracious employments , which shall be , I hope , and pray , as a spurre to more able advisers to bring in every one somewhat or other towards the erecting of a Tabernacle for our God in America . CHAP. III. Directions towards the conversion of the Natives . SOme give violent counsell here , presuming they find it in that parable , Luk. 14. 23. compell them to come in ; but judicious a Austin calls this Amoris , non timoris tractum , not a force of feare , but of love , producing the example of a sheepe following the shepherd holding a green bough in his hand ; and t is the sentence of a serious Historian b among the Gentiles , such are worthy of pitty not hatred , that erre from the truth , for they doe it not willingly , but being mistaken in judgement , they adhere to their first received opinions ; and the Saints in the first times never thought outward compulsion a fit meane to draw on inward assent . The Evangelicall Prophet foretold this , They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountaine saith the Lord , Esa . 65 last . And our most deare Lord himselfe saith , The sonne of man is not come to destroy mens lives , but to save them , Luk. 9. 56. Saint Iames derives the pedigree of that wisdome which hath bitter envying and strife , though it be but in heart , though it may rejoyce and thinke highly of it selfe , yet its parentage is from that Cerberus of iniquity , the world , the flesh , and the devill , Jam. 3. 15. But regenerated Saints delight surely in that wisdome which is from above , and that is first pure , then peaceable , gentle , easie to be intreated , full of mercy , &c. Jam. 3. 17. Full of mercy , no roome therfore for violence and cruelty ; and the holy men of the next ages were children of this wisdome . 'T is not Religion , saith Tertullian c , to compell Religion , which ought to be introduced by perswasion , not force ; for even sacrifices of old were expostulated from willing mindes ; our Church hath nothing to doe with murther , and bonds . d Athanasius never committed any man to a Goaler , saith hee himselfe in his Apology ; and againe , the truth is not to be preached with swords , and darts , and Armies , but by reason and Arguments , which finde no place among them whose contradiction is requited with suffering , banishment , and death : the Ancient Christians abound with mentionings of this kind ; It is said indeed of e Charles the great , that conquering the Saxons , he commanded them to embrace Christianity , and that he dealt in such a manner with the Hungarians , and some others ; yea and though there be that speake the like of Constantine , yet Eusebius f writeth confidently , he wished all , commanded no man to be a Christian , and for this Orosius g commends him , that he shut up the Pagan Temples , but offer'd no violence to mens persons . The Devill indeed , because he is no friend to truth , comes with axes and hatchets , but our Saviour is gentle , and with a sweet voice saith , Open unto me my sister , my love , &c. Cant. 5. 2 , 5. and if they open , he enters , if not , he departeth , saith Athanasius in the fore-cited place . Foure things did especially assist in the first coverting of people to Christ , besides those miraculous helps ; and if they be now conscienciously practised , God will shew himselfe mervellous in his blessing . 1. Language , the necessity thereof was visible in those cloven tongues as of fire , the history whereof wee read Act. 2. 1. &c. Men must learne the speech of the Natives , that dealing by Interpreters must needs be difficult , tedious , and not so successefull ; Meinardus h of old first gained the tongue of the Livonians , and then became an happy instrument of their conversion ; and i Chrysostome did the like with the Scythians ; and the French Colony k propounded and promised the same course at their first planting in America , as they certified Mr Calvin in their letters ; and the English in l Virginia labouring to bring the Natives to Christianity , were woefully impeded therein by the ignorance of their language , which defect in themselves they did both acknowledge and bewaile . 2. Labouring in the word was required and practised , Mat. 28. Act. 20. 18. and passim Preachers should be appointed with all diligence to instruct the Indians ; for men are begotten to Christ by the word of truth , Jam. 1. 18. The Iberians m received the first inckling of the gospell by a Christian maid-servant that was a captive among them ; and they sent afterwards unto Constantine the Emperour for Preachers ; the old Indian told the Spanish priest n complaining of their aversenesse to the Gospell , The lawes of Christ wee confesse are better than ours , but wee cannot learne them for want of teachers , wherein he spake the truth , the very truth saith Acosta , to our very shame and confusion . 3. The piety and holinesse of those Apostolicall Christians was exceeding and exemplary , by which as well as by their preaching they woo'd and wonne Kingdomes and people to Christianity ; their enemies could find no other fault in them , but that that they were Christians : our deare Masters generall command was universally practised , the light of their holy lives did shine to Gods glory , and the benefit of others ; thus Victor Vticensis o sheweth that Caprapicta was converted as well by the piety and godlinesse , as by the preaching of the Africans ; as on the other side the impiety of the Spaniards deterred the Americans from the Gospell . 4. Blessing was fetched downe from heaven by prayer , this was their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , their only worke in a manner , prayer and ministration of the word , Act. 6. 4. Thus p Socrates reporteth , that after seven daies fasting and supplication the Burgundians were Christianized ; so Crantzius q tells of those northern Nations that by prayer and preaching they prevailed to bring many other people to Christ : If men doe now worke with these tooles , the building will goe up apace , the foundation being laid in the honour of God by the conversion of those that yet remaine in the shadow of death . ; in all which some furtherance might be found , by knowing and observing the dispositions , fashions , and customes of the Natives , which would also in a good measure be understood by serious converses with them , and by severall bookes that from severall places upon severall occasions have been written of them ; and to all let be added studious industry , that some Indian children be taught Christianity , and trained up to such abilities that they may have skill to instruct their own Countrey men . It was Gregories counsell to further the conversion of our Countreymen here , they should buy English children and youths of seventeen or eighteen yeeres , that might be educated in Gods service , and helpful this way . The Franciscan that had been so many yeeres among them , and learned two of their languages , and used much diligence in this worke in his way , told Benzo r , that of necessity such a course must be taken to Gospellize them , all other endeavours would be fruitlesse and labour in vaine ; and that writer s sheweth how those of Peru were well contented to deliver their young ones to be taught in Christianity ; and surely their Fathers and Countrey-men would sooner listen unto them than unto strangers . And in all these the good counsell of the holy Apostle must be remembred , walke wisely toward them which are without , Colos . 4. 5. not onely in watchfulnesse and care to prevent all dangers from them , but in the most pious wisdome of winning soules , Prov. 11. 30. by setting before them in practise also the examples of every grace and vertue , with the perfect hatred of all vice and ungodlinesse ; and let me have favour here to commend 3 or 4 cautions . CHAP. IV. Cautions . 1. TAke heed and beware of cruelty , the God of mercy hates nothing so much , saith a Theophilact as unmercifulnesse ; the badge of Christ is clemency , his livery love ; by this it shall be knowne that you are my Disciples , saith our deare Master himselfe , if yee love one another , Ioh. 13. 35. Other mens followers were known by their garments and colours , but charity and love made the first Christians famous over all the old heathen world , but in the new World the Spaniards die was not so black as bloudy , and the Indians called them b Yares , i. e. devills , so little humanity , as they conceived , was visible among them . The same Bishop , when he made an whole book of the Spanish cruelties which he saw executed by them on the Indians , protesteth it was his opinion , that hee scarce mentioned one of a thousand of their tyrannies ; and more than once or twice he averreth , that they allwaies grew from bad to worse , and exceeded themselves in their diabolicall doings . Nothing is more odious to this day than their name in those Countries ; for where ever the spanish Christians displayed their banners saith Benzo c , they imprinted upon the Natives by their horrid cruelties , eternall monuments of implacable hatred towards them ; but the faire , civill , and gentle deportment of our Nation to the Natives , hath already wonne much upon them , as is acknowledged by a d forraigne pen. 2. Take heed and beware of covetousnesse , t is our sweet Saviours own ingeminated command , Luk. 12. 15. happy shall the Natives be , and we also , if they find our conversation without covetousnesse , Heb. 13. 5. that they may see and say , the Englishmen seeke not ours , but us , and us , not to make us slaves to themselves , but fellow servants to Christ our common Master ; they saw the Spaniards so guilty of this e evill , that they conceived them to adore no other God but gold , the observation of which fetched from f Benzo that pious exoptation , I wish to God , saith hee , wee were no more addicted to earthly things than they , the name of Christian would be glorious were it not for our covetousnes ; the Spaniards indeed tell faire stories , some of them , as if their sole desire had been to Christianize the Natives , when indeed all their endeavour was to satisfie their lust and avarice ; and Acosta g himselfe cannot deny but that his Countreymen did commit many great outrages for gold and silver ; but where those metalls were not to be found , they made no stay , continued not in such places ; and Benzo h is large in producing their frequent and suddaine removes upon this occasion , and he tells that the Bracamorians are unsubdued by the Spaniards to this day , not so much because they are a warlike people in their kind , but especially by reason of their poverty and indigence . 3. Take heed and beware of complying with them in any of their rites and ceremonies , if we intend they should indeed come out of Egypt , let not an hoofe be left , as Exod. 10. 25. let them have Christian religion purely , without blinding or blending ; the wisdome of the flesh must not here be heard , wee must listen to no other but the counsell of the Spirit . It was l good advice the godly Bishop and martyr Hooper gave to King Edward the sixth and his honourable privy Councellors , As yee have taken away the Masse from the people , so take from them her feathers also , the Altar , vestments , and such like as apparell'd her : there hath not doubtlesse , been any one thing so powerfull in begetting and maintaining doctrinall quarrells in Christendome , as the unhappy complication with nations and people in some of their supposed tollerable rites at their first approaching to Christianity ; the Pagans of old , saith Rhenanus m , were relieved by the mutation of some things in their religion , whose universall abolition had irritated , if not totally scared them from us ; and Acosta n concurres with him in this matter , even in reference to the Indians : How this policy prevailed at first in the Church was long ago observed , and it became the lamentation of latter times , when men were more tenacious of humane superstructures , than of the fundamentalls laid by Jesus Christ , the shell and shadow of Gentile ceremony is yet more carefully hunted after by the Man of Rome , than the most solid and substantiall truths of the Gospel ; pitty it is , that sense and eyedazlelings should prevaile more than divine verities , that abundance of good things should breed surfets , and yet it will ever be thus , where there is want of care and spirituall exercise at home , and but cold endeavours to promote piety and godlinesse abroad . 4. Take heed and beware of all and every ungodlinesse , not onely for your owne sakes , but that the sweet name of our God be not blasphemed among the Nations , Rom. 2. 24. Holy examples are a nearer way to righteousnesse than verball precepts and instructions ; the Indians may , even without the word , be won to the truth by a godly conversation , as St. Peter speaketh in the like case , 1 Pet. 3. 1. a corrupt life is a violent argument perswading to evill ; the Americans were scared from Christianity by the scandalous iniquities of the Spaniards . The evil example of one ungodly Christian did more hinder the Indians conversion , than an hundred of their religious could further it , * he saith it , who saw what he spake , for they are verily perswaded that of all the Gods in the world , the Spaniards God is the worst , because hee hath such abominable and wicked servants . Benzo i tells of a confabulation himselfe had with an old Indian , who in serious discourse said unto him , O Christian ! what kind of things be Christians , they exact Mayz , Honey , Silke , an Indian woman for a concubine , they require gold and silver , Christians will not worke , they dice , blaspheme , &c. when I replyed , evil Christians onely doe such things , not such , as be good , his answer was ready , but where are those good Christians ? I could never yet see one of them ; and not this American onely , but a Franciscan Fryer publickly affirmed , that not a Priest , nor Monke , nor Bishop in all India , was worthy of the name of a good man ; Didacus Lopez k in his Epistle to the Bishop of Guattimala , saith , the Christians were so prodigiously wicked , that they were odious not onely to heaven and Angells , but even to the earth , and devills ; doe you believe saith hee , the Indians will become Christians , when your selves are not so but in name onely , and in title ? surely those silly nations will sooner be perswaded to good by the example of one daies conversation , than by an whole yeers preaching ; for to what purpose doe wee strew among the people odoriferous roses with our tongues and language , if we sting and vex them in the meane time with the thornes of our wicked doings . But our Countrey men take care to follow the aforementioned injunction of the holy Apostle , Col. 4. 5. they walke righteously , or as in our old English it was , in right wisenesse , so they called righteousnesse , towards them without ; and so their charter on earth , as well as those letters patents from Heaven , wills that the English be so religiously , peaceably , and civilly governed , as their good life and orderly conversation may winne and incite the Natives of the Countrey to the knowledg and obedience of the onely true God and Saviour of mankinde , and the christian faith , which in our regall intention and the Adventurers free profession , is the principall end of this plantation . And let these words be understood , as awakenings to those of our Nation there , and our selves also , that wee all labour mutually , and from our hearts , to propagate the Gospell there , because wee , who eate every man of his owne vine , and of his owne figtree , and drinke every man water out of his own cisterne , Esa . 36. 16. should witnesse our thankfulnesse unto God , for these favours , by sympathizing affections towards our brethren there , and the Natives . CHAP. V. To the English here , and first in behalfe of the Planters there . THey should have our hearts and love for many reasons , How many felicities did they forsake , both of the right hand , and of the left , in respect of estate , friends , and the comfort of their owne native soile ? It was said by the Prophet , Weepe for him that goeth out , for hee shall returne no more to see his owne Countrey , Jer. 22. 20. besides , that dulcis amor patriae , how many hazards did they runne into by dangerous and tedious sea-voyages ? they were exposed to divers certaine inconveniences , not only in regard of externalls , change of aire , diet , &c. but change of men especially , having little security , because they were in daily dread of Indian trechery , which might then fall upon them , when they supposed it most remote ; they have also left more roome at home , of which wee were wont to have more need than company , which encreased so fast , that wee were ready to extrude one another ; and by them we have more strength abroad , because transplanted colonies a be domestique fortifications , though they have been invented sometimes , and used to abate popular undertakings , but I meane it in the Roman interpretation , the Nations where they fix , are reduced by degrees to their fashions , lawes , and commands : yet some have unnaturally followed those our Countrey men with reproaches , accounting them so base , as not worthy to be set with the dogs of their flocke , as one to them applyed that of Job 30. 1. To the Westerne Plantation indeed , at first men of meane condition generally resorted , but soon after people of better ranke followed ; divers of good families , and competent estates went into Virginia , and setled in some Islands thereabouts , but because those of New-England pretended more to Religion than the rest , they are more loaden with uncivill language , but most injuriously ; for the transplanting Novangles were many of them severally eminent , some of noble extract , divers Gentlemen descended from good Families ; their first Charter mentions three Knights , among other men of worth ; and it seemes their example , or somewhat else was like to prevaile with many others of no meane condition , so that eleven of the then Privy Counsell directed their letters in December , one thousand six hundred thirty foure , to the Warden of the Cinque ports , taking notice that severall persons went over with their families , and whole estates , forbidding subsidy men , or of the value of subsidy men to be imbarqued without speciall licence and attestation of their taking the Oaths of Supremacy and Allegiance , submission also to the Orders and discipline of the Church of England : And three yeeres after , viz. one thousand six hundred thirty seven , a proclamation issued from the King to the same purpose , and in the same words . Others instead of affections and hearts , sling darts after them , and say , they are gone out from us indeed , but they were not of us , 1 Joh. 2. 19. neither liking our doctrine nor governement . Yet surely they differ not at all from us in Religion , witnesse our owne confession and their profession ; and for the first , our learned men have continually acknowledged the Puritans to consent with them in Doctrinalls , Archbishop Sands b in his Sermon before Queene Elizabeth more than once asserteth this , We have here saith he , to praise our God , that in publique doctrine touching the substance of religion wee all agree in one truth , the greater pitty it is we should so much dissent in matters of small importance , in rites and circumstanees ; the Puritanicall errors did not at all oppose any part of our Religion , but it continued most sound even to the dying day of that most renowned Princess , saith he that c analysed our thirty nine Articles , and so printed them by authority ; and King Iames d averreth the like of his Scottish Puritans , We all God be thanked agree in the grounds , and after his reception of this Crowne , hee calls e the English Puritan a Sect rather than a Religion ; and in his Declaration against Vorstius f hee joyneth his Churches of great Britaine with those of France and Germany , opposing them all against Vorstius , Bertius , and the Arminians ; Notwithstanding the Disciplinarian quarrell saith g Bishop Andrewes , we have the same faith , the Cardinall is deceived , or deceiveth , in using the word Puritans , as if they had another Religion differing from that publiquely professed , and this hath been the unanimous asseveration of English Bishops , and other learned Divines , as were easie abundantly to declare . But themselves have spared us that labour , by their constant acknowledgement thereof ; Mr. Rogers h in his forecited Analysis , produceth their owne writings to this purpose , and what one of them can be named that refused subscription to those 39 Articles in reference to matters of Doctrine ; Mr. Browne t is thought , went as farre astray as any here , yet I have seen his owne i hand declaring at that time his allowance of all those Synodicall Articles ; and lest any should imagine the Novangles differing from us in dogmaticall truths , besides many , very many printed bookes testifying their concurrence with us herein , beside divers private Letters , that subscribed by the Governour and principall assistants sufficiently manifests their judgement and affection , wherein they desire to be accounted our brethren , and implore our prayers ; adding , howsoever our charity may have met with some discouragements through the misreport of our intentions , or through disaffection , or indiscretion of some among us , for wee dreame not of perfection in this world , yet would you be pleased to take notice of the principall and body of this Company , as those that are not ashamed to call the Church of England our deare Mother , and cannot part from her without teares in our eyes , but shall ever acknowledge that such part and hope as we have obtained in the common salvation , we received it in her bosome , and sucked it from her breasts , &c. From South-Hampton . Iohn Winthrop , Governour . Rich : Saltonstall . Tho : Dudly , &c. CHAP. VI. THere is another in jaculation that hath gone current among many , that the Puritane of old and New-England is Antimonarchicall , the former is sufficiently cleared by that Bishop , who hath left this testimony , a Presbyterio lis est cum Episcopis , cum Rege nulla est , or if that be not enough , King Iames b in this is an irrefragable Assertor , The Puritans do not decline the oath of Supremacy , but daily take it , never refused it ; and the same supremacy is defended by c Calvin himselfe . And in New-England Mr. Williams d seemed in other things to be extravagant , yet thus he writes to this point : For the Government of the Common-wealth from the King , as supreme , to the inferiour and subordinate Magistrates , my heart is on them , as once Deborah spake : and as the Governours and assistants doe themselves take the oath of Allegiance , so they have power by their Charter to give the same to all that shall at any time passe to them , or inhabite with them ; But , Tempora mutantur , and it may be t is with them , as with us , & nos mutamur in illis . And t is further said , that their Ecclesiastique government , is not onely opposite to the ancient Episcopacy of the land , but to the discipline of the other Reformed Churches , even that which the Covenant calleth for : it may be worth our consideration , that as there was a time when forraigners reformed were not so opposite to our Bishops , but those Divines e thought well of them , willingly-gave to them Titles of Reverend Fathers , and Illustrious Lords ; and in their publique convenings , f spake of that Government with good respect , and the valedictory Epistle of Mr. Cotton , to the then Bishop of Lincoln , full of respective expressions , is yet to be seen , So the Bishops then were not such Antipresbyterians , Caecus sit , saith g Bishop Andrewes to P. Moulin a Presbyter , qui non videat stantes sine ea Ecclesias , ferreus sit , quisalutem cis neget , nos non sumus illi ferrei , Let him be blind that seeth not Churches consistent without such an Hierarchy , let him be accounted iron-hearted that shall deny them to be in a way of salvation , we are not such iron-hearted men , yea and severall reformed Congregations of severall Nations have not onely been tollerated , but much refreshed under the Bishops of London , Norwich , Winchester , &c. These times have widened all differences every where , even among such as are or should be one in covenant ; how are disaffections increased , divisions heightened , which have not only wofully abated christian love , but miserably augmented iniquities of all sorts ? many being scrupulously curious about mint and annis , having little respect in the meane time to faith , righteousnesse , and the more weighty things of the law ; and here may be taken up the lamentation of Erasmus h , bemoaning himselfe exceedingly , that he had in bookes cryed up , libertatem spiritus , liberty of the spirit , which I thinke this age would call liberty of conscience , I wished thus saith hee , a diminution of humane ceremonies , to that end , that divine truths and godlinesse might be enlarged , Nunc sic excutiuntur illae , ut pro libertate spiritus succedat effraenis carnis licentia , and he doth justly call it carnall licenciousnesse , for the Spirit of our God , Gal. 5. 20. names contentions , seditions , heresies , &c. workes of the flesh , which being but lately sowne , have strangely growne up and multiplyed , so that a forraigne penne hath to Englands shame printed it thus to the world , i Anglia his quatuor annis facta est colluvies , & lerna omnium errorum , ac sectarum , nulla à condito orbe provincia tam parvo spatio tot monstrosas haereses protulit atque haec , Episcoporum tempora intra sexaginta annos non nisi quatuor sectas protulerunt , & eas plerunque in obscuro latentes , &c. For I had rather bewaile than reveale the nakednesse of the Nation , I had rather stirre up my owne soule and others to piety , and peace , oh , when will men lay aside all bitternesse , and wrath , and anger , and clamour , and evill speaking , with all malice ; and instead thereof be kinde one to another , tender-hearted , forgiving one another , as God for Christs sake forgave you , Ephes . 4. 32. I wish there were a law to forbid all needlesse disputes , I wish that it and those other severall lawes were put in execution impartially , so that all men by all meanes were provoked to godlinesse , that would preserve from every error , for God is faithfull that hath promised , If any man will doe the Fathers will , he shall know the doctrine whether it be of God , Joh. 7. 17. Hearty endeavours for holinesse in our owne persons , and those related to us , would take away the occasions of many unkind controversies , for the Kingdome of God is not meate or drinke , this or that government , or any such externalls , no further then they serve to promote righteousnesse and peace , and joy in the Holy Ghost , Rom. 14. 17. and this is the best way to shew our obedience unto Christ , for hee that in these things serveth Christ is acceptable to God , and approved of men . ver . 18. When our Countreymen planted themselves first in America , the name of Independency was not knowne ; hee indeed that lately hath wrote k of the state of the Churches in England , drawes so the scheme that our Novangles are thus become Independents , but with the epithete of orthodox . Schema sectarum recentium , Puritani Presbyteriani , Angli . Scoti . Erastiani , sive Colemaniani . Independentes , sive Congregationales . Orthodoxi Novo-Anglici , Londinenses . Pseudo-Independentes , sive Fanatici . Anabaptistae , Quaerentes , Antinomi , & mille alii . And for our Novangles it cannot be denyed , but many of them well approve the Ecclesiastique government of the Reformed Churches , as of old , communi Presbyterorum consilio Ecclesiae regebantur , they desire it were so now ; and some of them in New England are amazed at the manner of our gathering of Churches here : thus one writeth l that had bin a long time a Pastor among them ; What more ungodly sacrilege , or man-stealing can there be than to purloine from godly Ministers the first borne of their fervent prayers , and faithfull preachings , the leven of their flocks , the encouragement of their soules , the crowne of their labours , their Epistle to heaven ? If men will needs gather Churches out of the world as they say , let them first plough the world , and sow it , and reape it with their owne hands , & the Lord give them a liberall harvest . He is a very hard man that will reape where he hath not sowed , and gather where he hath not strowed , Mat. 24. 25. and if I mistake not , such kind of unkind and hard dealing was practised here in England even in popish times , what meanes else that Canon among the Saxon Councells m , Vt sacerdotes aliorum parochianos ad se non alliciant , how like this lookes to that I leave to the judgement of others , but these be the words of that rule , Let no Presbyter perswade the saithfull of the Parish of another Presbyter to come to his Church , leaving his owne , and take to himselfe those tithes ; but let every one bee content with his owne Church and people , and by no meanes doe that to another , which he would not should be done to himselfe , according to that Evangelicall saying , Whatsoever yee would that men should doe unto you , doe yee the same to them ; but whosoever shall walke contrary to this rule , let him know hee shall either lose his degree , or for a long time be detained in prison . I shall by and by speake more to this on their behalfe , now adde onely , that as many in New England approve of the discipline of the other Churches Reformed , and some of them sufficiently dislike the way and manner of our Church gathering here , so all of them have now seen by experience the necessity of Synods : For in their great storm of late that was so like to wracke all , the meanes to settle it was as strange as the disease , so he writes that was an eye , and eate witnes , They that heretofore slighted Synods , and accounted of them as humane inventions , and the blemish of those Reformed Churches that made use of them , are now for the preservation of themselves enforced to make use of that meanes which in time of peace they did slight and contemne ; the Synod , saith he , being assembled , much time was spent in ventilating and emptying of private passions , but afterwards it went on and determined with such good successe , that in token thereof , hee saith , wee keepe a solemne day of thanksgiving , as there was cause , and the two men most different in opinion , were selected for the publike exercise , wherein they behaved themselves to admiration , the Acts and conclusions of the Synod , &c. I would further aske , if the Independent government , so farre as it is congregationall , be not as rigidly Presbyterian as any ; sure I am , unkinde they are not to the other Presbyterians , Mr Winslow is an irrefragable testis herein , who mentions some there that are in that way , and knowne to be so , yet never had the least molestation or disturbance , but have and finde as good respect from Magistrates , and people , as other Elders in the congregationall way ; yea divers Gentlemen of Scotland , that groaned under the late pressures of that Nation , wrote into New England to know whether they might freely be suffered to exercise their Presbyteriall government , and it was answered affirmatively they might ; and yet further none of them here or there , that continue true to their first principles , differ at all in fundamentalls and doctrine from the other Presbyterians , and t is not unlike , but when God shall enlarge their borders , they will finde it needfull to approach yet neerer to the way of other Reformed Churches in their discipline : And there is of themselves , that upon observation of their former very great danger , have left their judgement , with which I will conclude this Chapter : An excellent way they have , meaning their Ecclesiastique government , if Pastors and people would ever be of one opinion , but when they shall come to be divided into as many opinions , as they are bodies , what will the sequell be ? and I see little probability of subsistence , where Independency yeelds matter of divisions , but no meanes to compound them . CHAP. VII . To our selves , in behalse of the Natives towards their conversion . IT is the unfeigned desire of every pious soule , that God would please to guide and blesse some holy and happy hand , in taking up the differences that are growne up among those that are named by the sweet name of Christ , that all who love the Lord Jesus in sincerity , would also sincerely love one another ; that mutuall forces were conjoyned to promote the glory of our common Master , not onely every man in his owne person , family , place , and Countrey , but by apprehending all opportunities to publish the eternall Gospell of our Lord even to those other ends of the earth . Gregory the great a did willingly encourage himselfe in his desire to Christianize our Ancestors the Saxons from hints of his owne observation , for seeing children of beautifull feature offered to sale in the market at Rome , as then the manner was , hee sighed within himselfe , and said , when he understood they were not Christians , Alas that the Prince of darkenesse should possesse such faire and lightsome countenances ; enquiring further after their names , Angles , they have Angels faces indeed said hee , and t is meet all diligence be used that they be as the Angels of God in Heaven ; when hee asked of what Province they were , it was answered Deiri , or Deira , for so was then that b seventh Kingdome called , Northumberland , in the time of the Saxons , Dei ira eruti saith hee , being made Christians they shall be delivered from the wrath of God ; and upon demand , hearing that their Kings name was Aelle , he said Allelu jah , and praises to God must be sung there : In this worke if that may be any invitation , we have the like allusions , the whole Countrey is called the New world in the generall , and particularly there is New Spaine , New France , New Netherland , New Scotland , New England , why should not there be solicitous endeavours that all the Natives of that New World , should be made a world of New creatures ; and if upon occasion and enquiry the Inhabitants be called Barbarians , such were we our selves in the common acceptation of the word , being neither Jewes nor Greekes ; if Salvages , t is a name of hope that they are a salvable generation , and shall in due time be partakers of the common salvation ; their complexion indeed is darke and duskish , as t is made after birth , but their soules are the more to be pittied , that yet bee in a farre more unlovely hue , even in the suburbs of that darkenesse , that blacknesse of darknesse , which is so terrible to thinke of : It was Gregories desire that Hallelu-jahs should bee sung to and for the English , then heathen , the Christian English may observe and wonder at that very word of frequent use among the Indians , as hath already been mentioned ; finally there is a constellation or starre , called the crosse , peculiar to that Countrey , saith Acosta c , and it is so named because foure notable starres make the forme of a crosse , set equally , and with good proportion , a good omen I wish it may be , and that a starre may leade them also to their Saviour , that Christ may be made knowne to them , and his peace through the bloud of his Crosse , Col. 1. 20. To which employment wee have likewise other perswasions , besides what hath been formerly sprinkled here and there . 1. The necessity of the poore Natives require this care , who stand so much in need of spirituall bread , and so few prepare to breake it to them , they yet walke in the vanity of their minde , having their understanding darkned , being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them , &c. Eph. 4. 17. &c. and the lesse sensible they be of their owne forlorne condition , the more sollicitous should others be to acquaint them therewith , together with the way of their deliverance . When d Austin the Monke came hither among the Saxons to preach the Gospell , King Ethelbert opposed him not , but said I cannot so easily forsake my owne Religion , and embrace theirs that is new ; yet seeing these strangers are come so farre and bring that to us which they esteem most excellent , wee will use them kindly , they shall want nothing for their work : And surely were the Americans but a little civiliz'd , they would by degrees understand their owne miserable estate , and themselves would then bespeake further enlightning ; yea this is already in some of their fervent desires , e as hath been intimated also formerly . 2. Christians have a care of this for Christ their Masters sake , good subjects wish the ampliation of their Soveraignes honour , and how glad should wee bee when the kingdome of darknesse is empaired , and there be continuall accresses to the Kingdome of Gods deare Sonne , Col. 1. 14. T is our daily prayer , Hallowed be thy name , divulged , and made glorious all the world over , wee cannot better improve our interest and power , then by being active & industrious instruments thereof ; wee endeavouring as much as wee may that the Kingdoms of this world may become the Kingdomes of the Lord , and of his Christ , Revel . 11. 15. Non est zelus sicut Zelus animarum f , this zeale for soules carries in the wombe thereof glory to God , and honour to the zealots themselves , Dan. 12. 3. and unutterable comfort and benefit to them that are warmed thereby , Iam. 5. 20. and their debtors in this verily we are , if the words of another Apostle be with a little mutation applyed hither , for if wee be made partakers of their carnall things , our duty it is also to minister unto them in spirituall things , Rom. 15. 17. 3. The severall Patents to severall Planters call for this endeavour , such was that first granted to the Virginians by King Iames , it intended principally the propagation of the Christian faith ; the like is to be read in the Patents and confirmations made by him and King Charles to others . And in the beginning of this Parliament , that Honourable Committee of Lords and Commons were appointed chiefely for the advancement of the true Protestant Religion , and further spreading of the Gospell of Christ among the Natives in America . Yea and in the Charter to Mary-land , the pious zeale for the spreading of the Gospel is first mentioned , and what ever suggestions be made , or aimes otherwise , there is a speciall proviso against the pr ejudice , or diminution of Gods holy and truly Christian Religion , and the allegiance due to the Kings Majesty , his heires , and successors ; it is not well then if Romish designes have been mannaged there , injurious to Religion , and offensive to our other Plantations , but herein stands the force of this Motive , the mutuall and interchangeable Pact and Covenant of Donor and Receiver is in all those Charters and Patents the conversion of the Natives . 4. I finde another encouragement from a Doctor lately lapsed into popery g , yet professing his willingnesse to returne upon Protestants successes this way ; for he deemes it improbable , that ever they should convert any Nation , or so much as any one single person , except some poore wretch or other , whom feare or gaine will drive , or draw to any thing ; but if ever the historicall relation of Gods wonderfull workings upon sundry of the Indians , both Governours and common people , in bringing them to a willing and desired submission to the Ordinances of the Gospell , and framing their hearts to an earnest enquiry after the knowledge of God the Father , and Jesus Christ the Saviour of the World ; I say if ever those discourses come to the Doctors view , hee may once againe change his minde , how ever the happy progresses of our Countrey men in that worke , if they be knowne and well considered of by the Papists themselves , they may be carried to admiration , expectation , and it may be further . 5. The honour of our Nation may be another argument to this undertaking , that as to Charlemaine of old h the Saxons owe their Christianity , and those of Phrysia , Dithmarse and Holsatia , the Vandalls also and Hungarians : It will be glorious for the Chronicles and Annalls of England , that by the meanes of this Nation the Nansamonds were brought to the true and saving knowledge of Jesus Christ , and so were the Sasquehannockes , Wicomesses , Conecktacoacks , Massachuseuks , Mouhacks , Aberginians and others ; Thus will the renowne of the English name and Nation , ring over all the Westerne World. Gregory complaines more then once , that those Angles our Ancestors were willing to become Christians , but the Priests of France refused to give help and instruction . The Britons also refused to joyne with Austin here in his preaching to the Saxons , not out of pride and contempt as Beda i reporteth , but for that those people , invited hither as friends , became their onely enemies , driving them from their possessions , which themselves invaded as their owne , but these Indians give harbour to our Nation , whose faire and free accomodating of our Countrey men hath fully purchased to themselves all the spirituall favour wee and they are able to afford them , of which , when they also become sensible , honour will redound to this England , not onely from ours there , who professe truly , if they prosper , we shall be the more glorious , but the Natives enlightned by us will returne hither the tribute of their abundant thankfulnesse . And that every one of us may be cordiall coadjutors of our Countrey men in this most glorious undertaking , let me endeavour to warme the affections of the English there , and at home , by proposing a trafficke in a threefold stock for the promotion of this designe . CHAP. VIII . Further helpes to this worke . THe first of these is already going , the stocke of prayers , both hence and thence on that behalfe to heaven , and not now in a vision , as to St. Paul once , there stood a man and prayed him , saying , Come over into Macedonia and helpe us , Act. 16. 9. but the Natives begin to be really sensible of their spirituall necessities , and call earnestly for that bread , and our countrey men desire the assistance of their brethren here in many respects , all their Letters earnestly bespeak us in this , and O that we did heartily answer them in our constant and fervent prayers , in reference to this worke . There was indeed of late a generation of men , though extreme lovers of that Lethargy , yet forgate to be in charity with all men , they were content in their Letany to pray it would please God to have mercy upon all men , yet deemed it piacular to pray for the Novangles ; The Directory guides otherwise , even by name advising to prayers for those Plantations in the remote parts of the World. 2. This worke would be much prospered by a stocke of wise and constant correspondence mutually betwixt Old and New England in regard of this businesse , what progresse is made in the worke , what meet to bee done for its furtherance , &c. Such communication of counsells would marvelously encourage and quicken the Americans conversion . The French were spoiled of this help and intercourse from Brasil , by the Governour a Villagagno's Apostacy to Popery , and t is not credible , but if the poore Indians were made to understand that all the Nation of England were thus solicitous with God , and among themselves , in all industrious endeavours to recover them from their sinfull and lost condition by nature , but they would looke up also , and in earnest cooperate with them , and say also it may be , as was in the precedent Chapter mentioned of our Saxon King , who said , those Preachers should be kindly dealt with , and want nothing for their worke ; yea somewhat like to this was long since spoken of by b Colonchi one of the Princes of Peru , when he was invited to be a Christian , his answer was , Sir I am old and unfit to forsake the rites and lawes of my Ancestors , but take my children as you will , and teach them what you please , they are young , and can more easily apply themselves to your customes , and instructions . 3. And a stock of money must be remembred , which in some sense , is as it were the soule of this worke ; the Poet said truly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ▪ If wee meane the Indians shall be Gospellized , they must first be civilized , who are yet a very wild Olive , both by nature and life , they must bee weaned from idlenesse , and hunting , and nakednesse , they must be perswaded to labour , planting , learning , arts , and manufacture , that they may get cloathing , they must be taught to build for their owne habitations , for meeting houses or Churches on the Lords dayes , Schooles must be erected for instruction of their youth at other times , books of all kinds , tooles and instruments of all sorts must be provided , many and necessary materialls towards this structure may be easily mentioned , but are not so easily purchased : If our Countrey men there have for their owne comfort and subsistance , t is little lesse then a miracle , all things considered , and a wonderfull mercy , it cannot be expected , that they should be able to adde considerable supplie towards all the forenamed particulars , and other emergent needfull occasions , though there be that can beare them record , that to their power , yea and beyond their power , they are willing of themselves as the Apostle said of his Macedonians , 2 Cor. 8. 3. I crave leave therefore to pray every Christian reader with much entreaty to take upon him the fellowship of ministring to this worke , that you may abound in this grace also , that I may use to you the same holy Apostles words ; Chrysostome d desirous to plant the Gospel in Phaenicia , stirred up many godly men , and devout women , by their liberality to contribute towards those endeavours . Yea and here let it be remembred , that as Gregory commends Queen Brunechild of France , and Queen Adilberga of Kent , for their charitable furtherance of this worke , the gaining of soules , the first Gospellizing of our Saxon Ancestors ; So some pious Christians among us of both sexes , have shewed much bounty this way , encouraging and exampling others : The Spanish bookes relate strange things of their zeale in this kinde , and one e whom wee may credit tells us , that America hath foure Arch-Bishops , thirty Bishops , and many other houses as they call them of Religion , and if it be said their lot fell into the golden part of that world , and out of their superfluities they might well spare very much , t is very much indeed , and yet t is f somewhat more that the same writer observeth how the King of Spaine maintaines the lists and bonds of Missionaries , Priests , Fryers and Jesuits , that are continually transported into America , hee provides for every of them ten yeeres , and that to this day , and shall the children of this world in this also be wiser then the children of light , Luk. 16. 8. shall they be enlarged for the promoting of themselves , and their abominable superstitions , and shall not wee be as forward in that which directly aimes at the glory of Christ and the good of souls , as St. Paul saith of his Thessalonians , that they were examples to all that believed in Macedonia and Achaia , 1 Thes . 1. 7. I trust the liberality of some will invite and open the hands of many to be very forward in this worke , for the administration of this service , will not onely supply their wants , but will be abundant also by many thanksgivings unto God , 2 Cor. 9. 12. And I hope to heare once of a liberall collection and benevolence to be advanced in every Parish and Congregation of the land , to be put into safe hands , and such profitable employment , as may indeed further the reering up of a Christian Tabernacle in America . And while these papers were thus in their framing , an Act , before mentioned , for propagating the Gospell of Iesus Christ in New England , declareth much forwardnesse towards a nationall contribution in reference to this worke , and the disposall thereof to be according to the desires of those that have bin most industrious that way , and good care , I trust will be taken that the monies run into the right channel ; and for the better gale and conduct , the two Universities Cambridge & Oxford , have affectionately expressed their Christian longings that this soule-businesse may obtain all possible furtherance , in their Letters to their reverend and deare Brethren the Ministers of the Gospell in England and Wales , the Divines of London are desired also in their sphere cordially to act in this common cause of the Gospel , that no obstruction be left in the way of this most glorious endeavour , why should any then bee straightned in their owne bowells , why should not all learne willingnesse to this worke , by reading , considering , and practising what we find the old Jewes did in a like case , Exod. 35. CHAP. IX . The Novangles religious care to advance Piety and Learning . IT hath been laid and left at the doores of those whom some call Independents here in this England , that they have shewed little love to others going astray , and that their zeale hath been wanting against those blasphemies and heresies that have manifestly dishonoured the most sweet and holy name of God , Father , Son , and Spirit . Our booke tells us of a a good man in former times when hee was accused of lust , pride , &c. He said , I confesse I am a sinner , and I beseech you pray for me , but when they laid heresie to his charge , his heart was hot within him , his zeale was inflamed , and hee said , Haereticus non sum , & hoc vitium nulla patientia possum aut vole dissimulare , hoeresis enim separat hominem a Deo , & adsociat Diabolo : alienatus a Christo non habet Deum , quem oret propeccatis suis . T is not for me to judge any , every one shall stand or fall to his owne Master , Rom. 14. 4. but I would remember my selfe and others of his zeale , who said b fateor in causa fidei etiam vitam negligendam ; I finde this grace very warme and working in our Novangles , for whom I have some few words more to mention in this particular , that my readers may be invited to thinke well of them , to doe well to them , and for them , or for the poore Indians rather , or rathest for Christ himselfe , who shall have honour from us all , if wee all by communication of counsells , prayers , purses , and every other way endeavour the furtherance of their conversion to our Lord Jesus ; and to procure our cordiall conjunction with our brethren there in this , I shall transcribe some things out of their owne late printed booke of the lawes and liberties concerning the inhabitants of Massachusets , by which their love to truth , godlinesse , peace , and learning will be evident , together with their liberall and enlarged care to propagate the eternall Gospell of our Lord among the Natives . At the title of haeresie , c this is the preface . Although no humane power be Lord over the faith and consciences of men , and therefore may not constraine them to believe or professe against their consciences , yet because such as bring in damnable heresies , tending to the subversion of the Christian Faith , and the destruction of the soules of men , ought duly to be restrained from such notorious impiety , it is therefore ordered and decreed by this Court : That if any Christian within this jurisdiction shall goe about to subvert and destroy the Christian Faith and Religion , by broaching or maintaining any damnable heresie , as denying the immortality of the soule , or the resurrection of the body , or any sinne to be repented of in the regenerate , or any evill done by the outward man to be accounted sinne , or denying that Christ gave himselfe a ransome for our sinnes , or shall affirme that wee are not justified by his death and righteousnesse , but by the perfection of their owne workes , or shall deny the morality of the fourth Commandement , or shall endeavour to seduce others to any the heresies aforementioned , every such person continuing obstinate therein after due meanes of conviction shall be sentenced to banishment . 1646. And before d having said , that the open contempt of Gods word , and the messengers thereof is the desolating sinne of civill States , &c. It is therefore ordered , and decreed , That if any christian , so called , within this jurisdiction , shall contemptuously behave himself towards the word preached , or the messengers thereof — either by interrupting him in his preaching , or by charging him falsely with any error , which he hath not taught , or like a son of Korah cast upon his true doctrine , or himselfe , any reproach — every such person or persons ( whatsoever censure the Church may passe ) shall for the first scandall be convented and reproved openly by the Magistrate at some Lecture , and bound to their good behaviour , and if a second time they breake forth into the like contemptuous carriages , they shall either pay five pounds to the publique treasury , or stand two houres openly upon a blocke or stoole foure foot high on a Lecture day with a paper fixed on his breast , written in capitall letters , AN OPEN AND OBSTINATE CONTEMNER OF GODS HOLY ORDINANCES , that others may feare and be ashamed of breaking out into the like wickednesse . 1646. There be some in this England that account it piety and Religion to speake evill of Christs Ministers , and cast off his Ordinances ; now blessed of God from heaven and earth be our Novangles , Magistrates , Ministers , and people that have so seasonably witnessed against these abominations . They are great lovers of peace and government , these therefore be their words in another place ; e For as much as experience hath plentifully & often proved that since the first-rising of the Anabaptists about an hundred yeeres past they have bin the Incendiaries of Common-wealths , and the infectors of persons in maine matters of Religion , and the troublers of Churches in most places where they have been , and that they who have held the baptizing of infants unlawfull , have usually held other errors or heresies together therewith ( though as heretiques use to doe they have concealed the same untill they espied a fit advantage and opportunity to vent them by way of question or scruple ) and whereas divers of this kinde have since our comming into New-England appeared amongst our selves , some whereof , as others before them , have denyed the Ordinance of Magistracy , and the lawfulnesse of making warre , others the lawfulnesse of Magistrates and their inspection into any breach of the first Table , which opinions , if connived at by us , are like to be increased among us , and so necessarily bring guilt upon us , infection and trouble to the Churches , and hazard to the whole Common-wealth : It is therefore ordered by this Court and authority thereof , that if any person or persons shall either openly condemne or oppose the baptizing of infants , or goe about secretly to seduce others from the approbation , or use thereof , or shall purposely depart the Congregation at the administration of that Ordinance , or shall deny the Ordinance of Magistracy , or their lawfull right , or authority to make warre , or to punish the outward breaches of the first Table , and shall appeare to the Court willfully and obstinately to continue therein , after due meanes of conviction , every such person or persons shall be sentenced to banishment . 1644. And that wee may discerne how worthy they are that wee should doe all the good wee can for them , for they love the nation where they inhabite , and are very serious in preparing them for one husband , to present them a pure virgin unto Christ , 2 Cor. 11. 2. Severall therefore are their decrees in order to their conversion . f 1. Every Towne shall have power to restraine all Indians from prophaning the Lords day . 1633. 1639. 1641. 2. The English shall not destroy the Indians corne , but shall help them to fence in their grounds . 3. Considering one end in planting these parts was to propagate the true Religion unto the Indians , and that divers of them are become subjects to the English , and have engaged themselves to be willing and ready to understand the Law of God ; It is therefore ordered and decreed , that such necessary and wholesome Lawes which are in force , and may be made from time to time , to reduce them to civility of life , shall be once in the yeer ( if the times be safe ) made knowne to them , by such fit persons as the generall Court shall nominate , having the helpe of some able Interpreter . 4. Considering also that interpretation of tongues is appointed of God for propagating the truth ; It is therefore decreed that two Ministers shall be chosen every yeer , and sent with the consent of their Churches ( with whomsoever will freely offer themselves to accompany them in that service ) to make knowne the heavenly counsell of God among the Indians , and that something be allowed them by the Generall Court to give away freely to those Indians whom they shall perceive most willing and ready to be instructed by them . 5. They decree further that no Indian shall at any time Powaw , or performe outward worship to their false gods , or to the devill , and if any shall transgresse this law , the Powawer shall pay 5 l. the procurer 5 l. &c. 1646. Their love to learning also is meet to be remembred , and encouraged , wherein they have g observed a chief project of that old deluder Satan to keepe men from the knowledge of the Scriptures , as in former times keeping them in an unknowne tongue , so in these latter times by perswading from the use of tongues , that so at least the true sense and meaning of the originall might be clouded with false glosses of saint-seeming deceivers , and that learning may not be buried in the graves of our forefathers in Church and Common wealth , the Lord assisting our endeavours , It is therefore ordered by this Court and authority thereof , That every Township encreasing to the number of fifty housholds , shall appoint one within their Towne to teach all such children as shall resort to him , to write and read , whose wages shall be paid either by the Parents or Masters of such children , or by the Inhabitants in generall by way of supply , as the major part of those that order the Prudentialls of the Towne shall appoint , and where any town shall encrease to an hundred families or househoulders , they shall set up a Grammer school , the Masters thereof being able to instruct youth so far , as they may be fitted for the University , and if any town neglect this above a yeere , every such Towne shall pay five pound per ann . to the next such Schoole , till theyshall performe this order . 1647. And an Academy or University is not onely in their aime , but a good while since they had more than begun well , and therefore wee read these words in another h part of their lawes , Whereas through the good hand of God upon us there is a College founded in Cambridge in the County of Middle sex , called Harvard College , for incouragement whereof this Court hath given the sum of four hundred pounds , and also the revenue of the Ferry betwixt Charles Towne and Boston , and that the well ordering and mannaging of the said College is of great concernment ; It is therefore ordered by this Court , &c. Then follow directions for the President and Commissioners to establish orders and dispose gifts , &c. 1636. 1640. 1642. Mr. Coleman that was Erastianly principled , preached publikely that except some other way be found to keepe up learning , our Universities will be but uselesse places , and learning it selfe an unnecessary thing ; for under this notion of Independency , Weavers and Tailors may become Pastors , so that if some stop be not , the issue may be , that one may binde his sonne Apprentice to a Cobler , and at seven yeeres end he may go out a free Minister , &c. But our Brethren of New England wee see have other principles and practises , and notwithstanding that they went out as exiles hence , m extra anni solisque viam — yea as Iacob of old with his staffe onely passed over Iordan , and suddenly became two bands , Gen. 32. 10. These ventured upon the wide and wild Ocean with poore and small provision , and how great how many are the mercies that our God hath shewed unto his servants there , that they are not onely furnished themselves with necessaries of all sorts , and have made large steps in an Academicall way , having Acts , Degrees , and Commencements according to the commendable fashion of England , as their own words are ; The theses at their Commencements disputed upon have been printed severall yeeres at Cambridge in New England , and thence dispersed here ; but they have also industriously furthered by their godlinesse , gentlenesse , and good orders , the conversion of a miserable people that have lien so long in darkenesse . To warme the affections of the English here , to raise all our hearts and endeavours to joyne all possible forces here and there in this soule-worke , the next chapter is added . CHAP. X. The successe of the Novangles in Gospellizing the Indians . THE Reader here shall have a Breviate inviting him to peruse those larger discourses , printed on purpose to raise our hearts in lifting up the high praises of God , that hath given this grace unto men . First Treatise . FOure of the English , having sought God , went among the Indians , Octo. 28. 1646. to make knowne the things of their peace , they were conducted into the principall Wigwam of Waaubon , their chiefe minister of justice , who like another Cornelius , Act. 10. 24. had called together many men , women , and children to hear and learne , they began with prayer in English , not for want of language , but to shew them the duty was sacred , and that wee might agree together in the same heart-sorrowes for them , even in that place where God was never wont to be called upon : It was an affecting spectacle , after prayer , to see a company of forlorne outcasts diligently attending upon the word of salvation , which in the space of an houre and a quarter discovered to them the grounds of Religion , repeating , expounding , and applying the ten Commandements , then preaching Jesus Christ the onely meanes of recovery from sinne and wrath , perswading them to repentance for severall sinnes which they live in . Wee next asked them if they understood what was spoken , which they affirmed with many voices , and then wee desired to know if they would propound any questions to us , for their further satisfaction , and this they did , but not such curiosities as some others of them had done before , as , what was the cause of thunder , of the ebbing and flowing of the sea , of the wind : no , the wisdome of God directed them to aske , How wee may come to know Iesus Christ ? one of them after wee had answered , said , hee was praying in his Wigwam to Christ that hee would give him a new heart , but another Indian interrupted him , saying , hee prayed in vaine , because Christ understood not what Indians speake in prayer , as not being acquainted with their language , his question therefore was , Whether Iesus Christ did understand the prayers of Indians ? another demanded , if English men were once so ignorant of Christ as themselves ? and how can there be an image of God , seeing it is forbiden in the second Commandement ? If the father be bad , and the child good , will God be offended with that child ? for t is said in the second commandement , hee will visit the sinnes of the fathers upon the children ? How is all the world become so full of people , being all were once drowned in the floud ? Wee then asked them three questions . 1. If they did not desire to see God , and if they were not tempted to thinke there was no God , because they could not see him ? some of them replyed they did indeed desire to see him , but we had taught them that could not be , yet they believed , though their eyes could not see him , hee was to be seen with their soules within . 2. Wee asked if it were not strange to them there should be but one God , yet this God should be in Massachusets , Conectacut , Quimipenik , in old England , in this Wigwam , in the next , every where ? It is strange one of them said , as all else is we hear preached ; yet they thought it might be true that God was so big every where . 3. Whether they did not finde something troubling them within after the commission of sinne , as murther , adultery , theft , lying , &c. they confest the trouble , but could not tell what to say to it , he therefore that first spake to them concluded with a dolefull description ( as far as his language permitted ) of the trembling condition of every soule that dies in sinne , and shall be cast out of favour from God. Having thus spent three houres , wee asked them if they were not weary , they said no , wee resolved to leave them with an appetite ; the chiefe of them seeing us conclude with prayer , desired to know when wee wou'd come againe , wee appointed the time , gave the children some Apples , and the men what was at hand , they asked more ground to build a Towne together , which wee liked well , and promising our furtherance for them at the Generall Court , wee departed with many welcomes from them . November 11. 1646 , Wee came againe to the same Wigwam , there was a greater concourse , and seats provided for us , wee began againe with prayer in English , and then catechized the younger sort , wee asked them onely three questions in their own language . 1. Who made you and all the world ? 2. Who shall save you from sinne and hell ? 3. How many commandements hath God given you to keepe ? The Preacher then proceeded , Wee are come to bring you good newes from the great God , and to shew how evill men may come to be good , and be happy while they live , and goe to God when they die ; then in familiar descriptions hee set forth God to them in his glorious power , goodnesse and greatnesse , shewing what his will was , and what he required , even of the Indians , in the ten Commandements , and how angry God was for any sinne , yet that hee sent Christ to die for their transgressions , and to pacifie God by suffering in their roome , if they did repent and believe the Gospell , and that hee would love the poore Indians if now they sought God , threatning wrath against all such as stood out and neglected so great salvation , &c. In hearing these things about sinne , and hell , and Christ , one of them shewed much affliction , desiring to conceale his griefe ; about an houre thus spent , wee desired them to propound some questions , and the first was by an old man , If it were not to late for such an old man as hee to repent and seeke after God ? which cleared , 2. They demanded , How the English came to differ so much from the Indians in knowledge , seeing at first they had all one father ? 3. Being satisfied in this also , they said , How may wee come to serve God ? which being answered , their fourth question was , Why the sea water was salt , and the land water fresh ? and their fifth , If the water be higher then the earth , why did it not overflow it ? a Philosophicall answer was given to this , and they conferred much among themselves about these questions , but night hasting wee desired them to proceed , thereupon one of them said , If a man hath committed adultery , or stollen goods , and the Sachim doth not punish him , and hee restore the goods , is not all well , will no punishment come from God , as if restitution made God amends ? this answered , wee asked two things . 1. What doe you remember of that spoken to you the last time wee were here ? after some speech among themselves , one of them said , They did much thank God for our comming , and the things they heard were wonderfull to them ; then Secondly wee said , Do you believe the things we tell you , and that God is Musquantum , i. e. very angry for the least sinne in your thoughts , or words , or works ? they said yes , and we spake further of the terrors of God against sinners , and his mercy to the penitent , seeking after Christ ; night being almost come , considering the Indians desired to know how to pray , and thought that Christ did not understand their language , one of us therfore prayed in their tongue above a quarter of an houre , divers of them holding up eyes and hands , and one of them hung downe his head , with his rag before his eyes , which when hee had wiped , hee held up his head againe , yet such was the power of God upon his heart , that hee hung downe his head againe , covered his eyes , wiping them and weeping abundantly , till prayer was ended , then hee turned to a corner of the Wigwam , and wept more by himselfe , which one of us perceiving , spake encouraging words , hee then wept more and more ; when he came out of the Wigwan , wee spake to him againe , hee then fell into more abundant weeping , like one deepely affected , so as wee could not forbeare weeping over him also ; wee departed greatly rejoycing for such sorrowing . And while I am transcribing this , I know not whether first , to pitty the poore Natives in their spirituall distres , or sympathize with the English in their holy compassion , or praise God more for discovering to the Indians their lost condition by n●ture , or that hee hath made our Countreymen so industrious in recovering them out of it ; however I cannot but remind my Reader of the relators observations hereupon , at least some of them . 1. That none of them slept sermon , nor derided Gods Messengers ; Woe to those English that are growne bold to doe that which Indians will not , heathen dare not . 2. There is need of learning in Ministers , who preach to Indians , much more preaching to gracious Christians , these had sundry Philosophicall questions which could not have bin answered without some knowledge of the Arts ; worse than Indian ignorance hath blinded their eyes , that renounce learning as an enemy to Gospel ministeries . At a third meeting it did appeare that the Indians notwithstanding discouragements from other Indians , did encrease in their desires after the word , and propounded more questions . What is the meaning of the word Humiliation , so often heard of by them in our Churches ? 2. What a spirit is ? 3. Whether they should believe dreames ? 4. How the English know God so much , and they so little ? Being satisfied in this , they desire a place for a Town . A day or two after Wampas a wise Indian offered his own sonne , and three more Indian children , to be trained up by us , saying they would grow wicked at home , and never know God , hee with two other young lusty Indians tendred their service to dwell in some of our families , they are two of those weeping Indians , and they are received into two of the Elders houses , where one of them confessed his former adulterous life , and feared that God would never looke upon him in love ; upon our declaring the greatnesse of that sinne , yet hope of pardon through repentance and faith in Christ , hee wept bitterly ; the other then present also confessed his like guiltines , & brak out into great mourning , wherein they both continued above halfe an houre . An English youth occasionally lodging in Waaubons Wigwam the third night of their hearing , assured us he instructed his company in the things he heard , and prayed among them . While the generall Court was considering where to lay out a towne for the Indians , they consulted about lawes for themselves . 1. If a man be idle a week , at most a fortnight , hee must pay five shillings . 2. If a man unmarried lie with a woman unmarried hee shall pay twenty shillings . 3. If a man beat his wife his hands shall be tied behind him , and he severely punish'd . 4. If a womans haire hang loose , or cut as a mans , she shall pay five shillings . 5. If a woman goes with naked breasts she shall pay two shillings six pence . 6. All men that weare long locks shall pay five shillings , &c. They were desirous to know the name of their Town , it was said Noonanetum , i. e. rejoycing , because the English rejoyced at their desires to know God , and God did rejoyce at it ; this pleased them much . The two honest Indians told us that Waaubon and the rest used these expressions in prayer , Take away Lord my stony heart , another , O Lord wash my soule , another , Lord lead me when I die to heaven . December 9. The children being catechized , and that of Ezechiel touching the dry bones opened , they offered their children to be instructed by us , complaining they had nothing to give us . We propounded sundry questions to them , and one of them being asked what was sinne , said , a naughty heart , another old man complained of his feares , he purposed to keepe the Sabbath , yet he was afraid whether he should goe to hell or heaven , another complained of other Indians reviling and calling them rogues for cutting off their lockes , for since the word hath wrought upon them , they discerne the vanity of their pride in their hair , of their owne accord therefore they cut it modestly . Second Treatise . THE awakening of these Indians raised up a noise round about , a Sachim from Concord side came to Noonanetum to an Indian lecture , where the Lord spake so to his heart , that hee desired to cast off his sinnefull courses , &c. some of his men opposed him therein , he called the chiefe of them about him , and spake to this effect , That they had no reason at all to oppose the way of the English for their good ; while you lived after the Indian fashion , what did the Sachims for you ? onely sought their owne ends out of you , taking away your skinnes , kettles , and Wampam at their pleasure , but the English care not for your goods , onely seeke your good , &c. Upon this they desired Mr Elliot should come among them and preach , and they framed to themselves certaine lawes for their more religious and civill government . 1. Abusers of themselves by wines or strong liquors shall pay for every time 20 s. 2. There shall be no more Powawing , the penalty 20 s. 3. They desire to be stirred up to seeke God. 4. And understand the wiles of Sathan . 5. And detest them . 6. That they may improve their time better . 7. A lyar shall pay for the first fault 5 s. for the second 10 s. for the third 20 s. 8. Against stealing . 9. Having more wives than one . 10. Against pride . 11. For paying their debts to the English . 12. Observing the Lords day , prophaners of it pay 20 s. 13. VVeare their haire comely as the English , offenders pay 58. 14. None grease themselves as formerly , penalty 5 s. 15. Set up prayer in their VVigwams , before also , and after meate . 16. Adultery punish'd with death . 17. So wilfull murther . 18. Not come to an English mans house without knocking . 19. VVhosoever beates his wife shall pay 20 s. &c. Most of these Indians set up prayer morning and evening in their families , before and after meate , keep the Lords day , cut their haire , minister what edification they can one to another , manifesting great willingnesse to conforme unto the English fashions . March , 3. 1647. At the Lecture in Noonanetum , wee saw some Indian women well affected , and considering how unmeet it is for women to aske questions publikely , they were desired to acquaint their husbands privatly therewith , or the Interpretor , the first was propounded by the wife of one VVampooas , VVhether said she doe I pray when my husband prayeth , if I speake nothing as he doth , but I like what he saith , and my heart goes with it ? The wife of one Totherswampe proposed this , VVhether an husband should doe well to pray with his wife , and yet continue in his passions and be angry with her , &c. An aged Indian complained of an unruly sonne , asking what should be done with him , when hee will not heare Gods word , though his father command him , nor forsake his drunkennesse . An aged Indian told us openly , that the very things which Mr Elliot taught them of God and his Commandements they have heard some old men speake , &c. and many of them have now this apprehension among them , that their forefathers did know God , but after this they fell into a great sleepe , and when they did awaken they quite forgate him . Another Indian told his dreame , that about two yeeres before the comming over of the English , one night hee could not sleepe a good while , then he fell into a dream , thinking he saw a great many men come into those parts cloathed as the English now are , a man rose up among them all in blacke , with a thing in his hand , which hee now sees was all one Englishmans booke , hee stood upon a higher place than the rest , on one side the English , and a great many Indians on the other , he told all the Indians that God was Moosquantum or angry with them , and would kill them for their sinnes , whereupon himselfe hee said stood up , and desired to know of the blacke man what God would doe with him , and his Squaw , and Papooses , but hee would not answer him a first time , nor a second , till hee desired the third time , and then hee smiled on him , and said , Hee and his Papooses should be safe , God would give unto them Mitchen , i. e. victualls , and other good things , and so he awakened . At Noonanctum the Indian men women and children , especially upon the Lecture daies , are clad partly by the gift of the English , and partly by their owne labour . Iune , 9. the first day of the Synods meeting at Cambridge , the morning spent in a preparative Sermon to that worke , in the afternoone there was a great confluence of Indians from all parts , to heare , Mr Elliot out of Ephe. 2. 1. shewed them their miserable condition out of Christ , dead in trespasses and sinnes , pointing unto them the Lord Jesus who onely could quicken them . They then propounded questions . What Countreyman Christ was ? How far that place from them ? Where Christ was now ? How they might lay hold on him ? And where being now absent from them ? The English Magistrares , Ministers , and people , were much affected at what they saw and heard . An Indian brake out into admiration , that God should looke upon them that had bin so long in darknesse ; Me wonder saith he at God , that hee should thus deale with us . That winter many questions were propounded . Why some so bad that they hate those that would teach them ? A Squaw said , might she not goe and pray in the wood alone , when her husband was not at home , because she was ashamed to pray in the Wigwam before company ? To what Nation Iesus Christ came first , and when ? If a man should be inclosed in iron a foot thicke and thrown into the fire , what would become of his soul , would it come forth thence ? Why did not God give all men good hearts ? How long is it before men believe that have the word of God made knowne unto them ? How they should know when their faith and prayers bee good ? Why did not God having all power , kill the devill , that made all men so bad ? If we be made so weake by sinne in our hearts , how can wee come before God and sanctifie a sabbath ? They propounded three cases about the Sabbath . In the exercises , besides prayer for a blessing , Mr. Elliot doth four things . 1. He catechizeth the children and youth , by which the aged learne . 2. He preacheth out of some Scripture plainely and briefely . 3. If there be cause , admonition follows . 4. They aske us questions and we answer them . Some cases and admonitions are there mentioned . 1. Wampoonas upon a light occasion beat his wife , for this hee was brought before the Assembly , where the quality of the sinne was opened , as against Gods command , cruelty to his owne body , &c. hee turned his face to the wall and wept , hee was so penitent and melting , that all forgave him , but the Indians would have his fine notwithstanding his repentance , which he paid also willingly . Another case of was of Cutshamaquin a Sachim , who had a son fourteen or fifteen yeeres old , hee was drunk , and behaved himselfe disobediently against his father and mother , they rebuked him , but he despised their admonition , hee was brought before the Assembly , stood out a long time , though his father for his example confessed his owne faults , the young man still persisted , divers of us called upon him to acknowledge his offence against his parents , and entreat their forgivenesse , yet he refused ; the Indians also affectionately put him on , divers spake one after another , and some severall times , at last hee humbled himselfe , confessed his sinne , and asked forgivenesse of his father , taking him by the hand , at which his father burst into teares , he did the same to his mother , who wept also , as did divers others , and many English wept also , the house was filled with weeping , wee went to prayer , all the time thereof the Sachim wept so abundantly , that the boord hee stood upon was all dropt with his teares . Some questions were after this propounded . An old Powoow asked , Why we had not taught them to know God sooner ? Another said , Before he knew God he was well , but since I have knowne God and sin , I finde my heart full of sin . Whether their children goe when they die , because they have not sinned ? If any of them shall goe to heaven , seeing their hearts are so full of sin , especially Nanwunwudsquas , mad after women ? If they leave Powawing and pray to God , what shall they doe when they are sicke , having no skill in Physick ? What shall we say to such Indians as oppose our praying unto God , and believing in Christ , what get you say they by this , you goe naked still and are as poore as we , our corne is as good as yours , and we take more pleasure then you , &c. They bring their cases to Mr. Elliot . A Law is now among them against gaming , other Indians demand their old debts , which they refuse to pay because it was a sinne to play , and they must not pay such sinnefull debts . They tooke it to heart when Mr. Elliot told them he was afraid they were weary and cooled in their love to religion , and enquired when they did heare and pray aright , how they might know when they were weary of them , what time it might be before the Lord might come and make them know him , &c. some other cases were moved by them . A man before hee knew God had two wives , the first is barren , the second brought forth sweet children , which of these must hee put away ? if the former , they offended God , if the latter , they illegitimate their owne deare children ? And , a Squaw leaves her husband , commits adultery with remote Indians , heares the word , repents , and returnes to her husband still unmarried , is not he bound to receive her ? An old widdow Squaw said , if when men know God , God loves them , why then are any afflicted after they know him ? Mr. Elliot preaching upon Ephes . 5. 11. Have no fellowship , &c. They asked what Englishmen thought of him ; because he came among the wicked Indians and taught them ? Another said , Suppose two men sin , one knowes it , the other doth not , will God punish both alike ? Againe , If a wise Indian teach good things to other Indians , should not he be as a father or brother to such ? One Tutaswampe prayed at the buriall of an Indian child , with such zeale , variety of gracious expressions , and abundance of tears , that the woods rang with their sighs and prayers , the Englishman that heard him , said , hee was ashamed of himselfe and some others , that have had so great light , but want such good affections . Third Treatise . THat woman that propounded the first question according to appointment by another man ( 2. Treatise , p. 6. hujus p. 4. ) moved this also . When my heart prayeth with my husband praying , is this praying to God aright ? This woman kept at home , learned quickly to spinne well , held her children to labour , after she submitted to the Gospel her life was exemplary , she died of a sicknesse taken in childbed ; Mr. Elliot visited her severall times , prayed with her , asked her about her spirituall estate , she said she still loved God though he made her sicke , and was resolved to pray unto him as long as she lived , and to refuse Powawing , shee believed God would pardon all her sinnes , because Jesus Christ dyed for her , that God was well pleased in him , that she was willing to die , believed shee should goe to heaven , and live happy with God and Christ ; of her owne accord she called her children , and said to them , I shall now die , and when I am dead , your grandfather , grandmother , and Unkles , &c. will send for you to live among them , and promise you great matters , but I charge you doe not believe them , live not among them , for they pray not to God , keepe not the Sabbath , commit all manner of sinnes , and are not punisht ; but I charge you live here , for they pray to God , his word is taught , sins are supprest , and punish'd by lawes , therefore I charge you live here all your daies , she died , and it fell out as she said . T is observed many other Indians would come in , but they have neither tooles nor skill to sence in their grounds , if the word were constantly taught , government exercised , encouragements for the industrious , with meanes to instruct them in letters , trade and labour , as building , fishing , flax , hemp , &c. many well-minded Indians would thus be drawne together . Mr. Elliot stirres up the Ministers to learne the language , and assist in the worke , there is nothing else to invite but the good of soules , not so much as meate , drinke , and lodging to be had among the Indians , but such as wee must carry with us , beside what wee give away to them , &c. Severall questions they then propounded . Doth the Devill dwell in us , as we dwell in an house ? When God saith honour thy Father and thy Mother , doth he meane three Fathers , our Father , our Sachim , and God ? When a soule goes to heaven what doth it say ? And what saith a wicked soule when it comes to hell ? Why did Christ die in our steads ? Why must we love our enemies , and how shall we do it ? How doth Christ redeeme and deliver us from sin , when every day my heart thinkes I must die , and goe to Hell for my sins , what shall I doe in this case ? How long was Adam good before he sinned ? If two families dwell in one house , one prayeth , the other doth not , what shall they that pray do to them that pray not ? Now the Indians desire to go to heaven , what shall we doe that we may goe thither when we die ? How shall I bring my heart to love prayer ? Doe not Englishmen spoile their soules to say a thing cost them more than it did , and is it not all one as to steale ? I see why I must feare hell , and do so every day , but why must I fear God ? If I reprove a man for sin , and he answer why do you speak thus angerly , Mr. Elliot teacheth us to love one another , is this well ? If a wife put away her husband because he will pray to God and she will not , what must be done in this case ? May such women as pray to God , marry those that do not pray to God ? If my wife doth some worke on the night before the Sabbath , and on the Sabbath night also , is it a sin ? If I do that which is a sin , and know it not to be a sin , what will God say to that ? Whether is faith set in my heart or in my minde ? Why have not beasts a soule as well as man , seeing they have love , anger , &c. as man hath ? Why doth God punish in hell for ever , man doth not so , but after a time lets out of prison againe ? What is faith ? How shall I know when God accepts my prayers ? How doth Christ make peace betwixt God and man , what is the meaning of that point ? In wicked dreames doth the soule sin ? Doth the soule in heaven know things done here on earth ? If my heart be full of evill thoughts , and I repent and pray , and a few houres after it be full againe , and I repent and pray againe , and after this it be full of evill thoughts again , what will God say ? What force of wicked men is lawfull , and what not ? What if a Minister weare long haire , as some other men do , what will God say ? Why doth God so hate them that teach others to commit sinne ? If a man will make his daughter marry one she doth not love , what will God say ? &c. There be sundry of them begin to enquire after Baptisme and Church Ordinances , and Mr. Elliot with consideration speakes solemnly not suddenly , nor lightly , but before the Lord , As I apprehend , saith he , in my conscience , were they but in a setled way of civility and government , cohabiting together , and I called , according to God , to live among them , I durst freely joyne into Church fellowship with them , and could find out at least twenty men and women in some measure fitted of the Lord for it . That Indian that was Mr Elliots Interpreter , and first taught him words , was joyning himselfe to the Church of Dorchester , and the very day of this writing was the day for the triall of that Indian in order to his admission , and this was 2. of the 12. 1648. Since which time these labourers with the Lord have not been idle in this Vineyard , they are digging , and fencing , and gathering out the stones thereof , and planting it with the choisest vine , &c. Esa . 5. 2. and though some informations of their happy endeavours have unhappily miscarried , there be other passages that have arrived hither , to give us assurance that they wax not faint in that Gospel worke , they are not indeed yet printed , but I have obtained leave to give the Reader a little taste thereof , for as we here long to understand what further foot steps be made , so the discoveries thereof will in due time and better manner be recommended . Mr Elliot in the beginning of the last spring prepared for his journey among the Indians , to a great fishing place upon Merimak , and hired an Indian to mark trees , and pilot him thither , which he did , with the helpe of some Indians , they passed by other of the Natives , who had heard of his preaching , and were very glad of his comming that way , but sicknesse prevented him at that time ; howbeit upon his recovery , he went to another place call'd Pantuket , where from all parts they meet , there he asked them if those Indians were desirous to pray to God , and when they said yea , he demanded how many desired it , they answered Wamee , i. e. all . The chiefe Sachim of this place had heard him before , and now shewed great affection to him , and the word of God , using many arguments to perswade him to tarry among them , saying , his comming but once a yeere did them little good , it was as if one should come and throw a fine thing among them , and they like it well , but cannot tell what is within , whether something , or nothing , but if it be opened and they see it precious , they should believe it , &c. Another Indian learning from Mr. Elliot that hee had five sonnes , asked him if they should all teach the Indians to know God , as he did , which when hee affirmed , the other was well pleased , and Mr. Elliot himselfe much encouraged , for hee had often dedicated them in his prayers to that service of the Lord , desiring no better preferment for them , than to be fitted for that worke , hee endeavours therefore with that smal meanes he hath to traine them up in learning , and God will I doubt not raise up some liberall hearts and hands to assist him therein . This summer hee was making another journey , but in regard of some quarrells among the Indians , the Church was doubtfull at first of his going , which when the Nashaway Sachim heard , he took twenty men armed after their manner , and was his guard , with many other neerer Indians , so much do they hunger after instruction ; this was a long journey into the wildernesse of sixty miles , it proved very wet and tedious , so that hee was not dry three or foure daies together night nor day , but the Lord upheld him and his company in strength and health . One of the Indians would needs know of Mr Elliot the reason why they that pray to God , love the Indians so doing , more than their owne Brethren , and when the rest of them said they all found it so in their hearts , this gave him occasion to discourse to them of the unity of the spirit . They propounded questions . If a man know Gods word , but believe it not , and yet teach others , is that good teaching , and if others believe that teaching , is that good believing ? And when Mr. Elliot asked them How they could tell , when a man knoweth Gods word , and doth not believe it , they answered , When he doth not in his practise answerable to that he knoweth . If I teach on the Sabbath that which you taught us , and forget something , is that a sin ? What should I pray for at night , what at morning , and what on the Sabbath day ? What is true repentance , and how shall I know when it is true ? How must I waite on God ? When I pray for a soft heart , why is it still hard ? Can one be saved by reading the booke of the creature ? When such die as never heard of Christ , whither do they go ? VVhat is the meaning of the name Hebrews , why doth God say he is the God of the Hebrews ? If one purpese to pray , and die before that time , wither goeth his soule ? Doth God know who shall repent and believe , and who not ? why then did God use so much meanes with Pharaoh ? VVhat meanes that , Blessed are they that mourne ? VVhat meaneth lifting up hands to God ? VVhat anger is good , and what is bad ? If a child die before he sin , whither goeth his soule ? If one that prayes to God sin , like him that prayes not , is not he worse ? And while they discoursed of this , and about hating of wicked persons , one of them said , they must love the man and doe him good , but hate his sin , &c. For I will not forestall but prepare the publication of those other remarkeable occurrences ; and now ex pede Herculem , when this little of those many matters worthy of observation , is seen together , none will call it a day of small things , Zach. 4. 10. Shall we call this a day of small things ? Shall not those poore Natives in New England rise up in judgement against Old England and condemne it ? they at once or twice preaching of the Law and Gospel , repent , and weepe , and pray , and heare , and most earnestly enquire after God ; but wee , when the Sunshine of truth hath been so long cleare among us , degenerate into those very sinnes which they abandon and detest , and with indignation say , get ye hence , Es . 30. 22. They willingly forsake their Powawing , and inchantments ; but the devill is broke loose among us , and many desire commerce with those that have familiarity with him . The Indians set a mulct upon those women that tie not up their haire , that goe with naked breasts , what would they say , what would they doe , if that sex were as immodest as some in this Nation , bepainted , bedaubed , debauched , not more with spots in their faces , then stains in their glory , if Christianity be to them any honour ? The Indians weare their haire comely as the English , and punish those that doe otherwise ; there be among us that would account it piacular it should be said of them that in the least they looke Rome-wards , yet like those locusts having the faces of men , they have haire as the hair of women , Rev. 9. 8. grace is pleased to borrow that from nature , if a man have long haire , it is a shame to him , 1 Cor. 11. 14. Those Natives surely will rise up in judgement with the men of this generation and condemne them ; they pray in their families morning and evening , and upon other occasions , they sanctifie the sabbath ; wee have those among us , that scoffe and scorne these practises of piety , and call the practisers thereof Duty-mongers . The Indians desire publique meetings , and delight in the places where God is worship'd and his word is taught ; but there be those in this England that make it a great piece of religion to divide and separate , though God himselfe would not have us forsake the assembling of our selves together , as the manner of some is , Hebr. 10. 25. The Indians asked Mr. Elliot , if any teach us good things should wee not love him as a father , or a brother ? but t is now among some esteemed a signe of grace , and a badge of holinesse , to despise their teachers , as if that Scripture of truth were never againe to be fulfilled . They mocked the Messengers of God , and despised his words , and misused his Prophets , untill the wrath of the Lord arose against his peaple , till there was no remedy , 1 Chron. 36. 16. But many other be the sad symptomes of our Englands defection and danger , and our God hath made himself many waies marvelous in New-England , Wee cannot call it a day of small things , Or if at first it was like a little cloud arising out of the sea as a mans hand , 1 King. 18. 44. certainely it carried with it a a sound of abundance of raine , ver . 41. even that raine that commeth downe from heaven and returneth not thither but watereth the earth , and maketh it bring forth and bud , that it may give seed to the sower , and bread to the eater ; Gods word hath not returned unto him void , it hath accomplished that which he pleased , and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I send it , Es . 55. 10 , 11. Now the blessing of the God of Iacob be upon them and their endeavours , even the blessing of Iacob upon Ioseph , the God Almighty help them and blesse them with blessings of heaven above , blessings of the deep that lieth under , Gen. 49. 25 , 26. That God by their meanes may say to the North give up , and to the South keepe not backe , bring my sonnes from farre , and my daughters from the ends of the earth , Esa . 43. 6. so from the uttermost parts shall we hear songs , songs of praise , even glory to the righteous , 24. 16. and not onely glory to the Lord our righteousnesse , but those that winne many to this righteousnesse shall shine as the starres for ever and ever , Dan. 12. 3. and not onely hereafter in that heaven of heavens , but this shall bee told as Englands memoriall , in present and succeeding generations , and those American Nations especially shall call them blessed ( Mal. 3. 12. ) yea the blessings of them that were ready to perish , will come upon them , Job 29. 13. for they have done worthily in Ephrata , and are famous in Bethelem ( Ruth 4. 11 ) and when they be indeed sensible of this great mercy , they will not onely say , thanks be unto God for this unspeakeable gift , 2 Cor. 9. 15. But they will long to require this kindnesse to the English also : and as of old almost all Nations receiving from Ierusalem the first meanes of their . Christianity , expressed their gratefull mindes by their charitable beneficence upon all occasions to those that dwelt there , this began in the Apostles daies , Act. 11. 19. Rom. 15. 26. Those of Macedonia and Achaia distributed to the poor Saints at Ierusalem , so it was the use till Ieromes k time , that all the Churches of the Gentiles sent collections to the Christians at Ierusalem , because they all from thence received first the glad tidings of the Gospel ; where the same Christ is preached , there will be the like Christian affections , which likewise will be demonstrable upon every possible opportunity . Gregory in severall Epistles , not lesse then twenty foure , to the great personages of those times , shewes much zeale in this kind , sometimes encouraging them , afterwards commending them for their assistance afforded to that glorious worke , the first conversion of our Countreymen . Nothing more shall now be added but the praise and practise of n Albertus the Arch-Bishop of Hamburgh , who tooke upon him a resolution to visit in his owne person all the Northerne Provinces , not leaving so much as any one Island unbenefitted by his preaching ; when all things were prepared , and his attendants chosen , and shipping ready , hee was diswaded by Zueno King of Denmarke , who told him those people would sooner be instructed by men of their owne Nation , who were best acquainted with the rites , manners , and language thereof ; the Arch-Bishop hereupon dealt earnestly with others to that purpose , and made them most willing to the work , for there was not a man among them whom hee had not encouraged , and by his bounty hee warmed their zeale in publishing the Gospell , frequently repeating that sentence of our Saviour , The harvest indeed is great , but the labourers are few , pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest , that hee will send forth labourers into his harvest , Mat. 9. 37. 38. Finally as David to Solomon in the bulding of the Temple , 1 Chr. 22. 16. I wish it were effectually spoken to , and by all the English here and there , Vp and be doing , and the Lord will bee with you . The Relation of Master ANTONIE MONTERINOS , translated out of the French Copie sent by MANASEH BEN ISRAEL . THE eighteenth day of Elul , in the yeere five thousand foure hundred and foure from the creation of the World , came into this City of Amsterdam Mr Aron Levi , alias , Antonie Monterinos , and declared before me Manassah Ben Israell , and divers other chiefe men of the Portugall Nation , neer to the said City that which followeth . About two yeeres and an halfe agoe , the said Monterinos going from the port of Honda in the West Indies , to go to the Government of Papian in the Province of Quito , did hire some Mules of a certaine Indian Mystique , called Francis du Chasteau , in which company , together with other Indians , went a certaine owner of Mules who was also called Francis , whom all the Indians named Cacique , to whom it fell out , passing over the mountaine Cordecilla , in a day of great winde and raine , that their carriages fell to the ground , whereat the Indians being grieved , as also at the evill weather , they begin to complaine of their ill fortune , saying that they deserved all that , and more also for their sinnes , which the said Francis hearing answered , that they should have patience , that shortly they should have rest ; whereunto they answered that they deserved it not , having used the holy people so ill , and the most noble of all the Nations in the world ; but contrariwise that all the cruelties which the Spaniards had used against them did befall unto them for the expiating of that sin ; after they were gone a little while , they stopt upon the Mountaine to rest , and passe the night season , at which time the soresaid Monterinos did take out of a box some few biskets , some cheese and sweet-meates , and offered some to the soresaid Francis , saying to him , take this though thou dost speake evill of the Spaniards , whereunto hee answered , that he had not told the halfe of the hard usage which they received from that cruell and inhumane Nation ; but that after a short space they should see themselves avenged upon them by a hidden Nation : after these discourses between them , Mr Monterinos arrived at the Town of Cartagena in the Indies , where he was taken by the Inquisition and put in prison ; one day praying unto God , hee uttered these words , Blessed be the name of Adonay , that hee hath not made me an Idolater , a Barbarian , an Ethiopian , nor an Indian ; and pronouncing the name of Indian hee reproved himselfe , saying the Hebrewes are Indians ; and then comming againe to himselfe said , am not I a soole , how can it bee that the Hebrewes should be Indians ? the same fell out the second and third day , making the same prayer and giving the same thankes unto God , whence hee gathered that that fancie did not come to him by meere chance , remembring also that which passed between him and the aforesaid Indian ; so that hee tooke an oath hee would so informe himselfe of the whole matter , that hee should know the truth , and that comming out of prison hee should instantly seeke the Indian , and would bring to his minde the discourse which they had together , to obtaine by that meanes the satisfaction of his desires . Being then come out of prison by the goodnesse of God , he went to the forenamed Port of Honda , where hee had so much good lucke that hee found instantly the foresaid Indian , to whom he made his application , and brought into his memory the discourse which they had upon the Mountaine , whereunto he answered that he had not forgotten it , which Monterinos hearing , said that he would goe a journey with him , to which hee answered that hee was ready to doe him service : So the said Monterinos gave him three Pataques to buy some provision ; whiles then they followed their journey and talked together , the said Monterinos at last discovered himselfe unto the said Indian , and told him in these words , I am an Hebrew of the tribe of Levi , my God is Adonay , and all the rest are nothing but mistakes and deceites ; whereat the Indian being somewhat surprized , did aske him the name of his predecessors , whereunto hee did answer that they were called Abraham , Isaac , Iacob and Israel , which the Indian hearing , did aske of him whether hee had none other Father , hee said yea , and that hee was called Lodwick of Monterinos ; but the Indian being not well satisfied as yet , said these words unto him , on the one side I did rejoyce at that which thou hast said unto me , and on the other I am resolving to disbelieve thee , because thou canst not tell mee who were thy Fathers , whereunto the said Monterinos answered with an oath , that the thing which hee said was truth , having spent some time in questions and answers , and the Indian being wearied at the matter said to him , art thou not the sonne of Israell , to which he answered , yea , which the Indian having heard said , make an end then of thy speech , for certainly thou didst put me in such a confusion that I would have been perplexed at it all my life time ; nevertheles let us rest a little and drinke , and then follow on our discourse . After a little space , the Indian said unto him , if thou hast the courage and boldnesse to follow me , thou shalt know all what thou desirest , but I tell thee before hand thou must go a foot and eate roasted Mayz , and do that which I shall bid thee ; the said Monterinos answered , that hee would not at all transgresse his orders ; the day following which was Monday , the Indian came to the said Monterinos , and bid him take out all that which he had in his pockets , put on his Alpergatas ( these are a certaine sort of shooes which the Indians weare ) and take this staffe and follow him , which the said Monterinos did , leaving his cloake and his sword and all what hee had , and so they followed on their way , the Indian carrying on his backe three measures of roasted Mayz , two ropes , the one made with knots and an hooke with two teeth to climbe up by the Mountaine , and the other untied , to be made use of in the Marshes and passages of Rivers ; with a little Axe and the Alpergatas ; they went then after this manner the whole weeke till Saturday on which they rested , and returned to follow their course the whole Sunday and Monday ; on Thursday about eight of the clocke they came to a River as broad as the Duero in Spaine , and the Indian said unto him thou shalt here see thy Brethren , and making a flag of two peeces of Cotten cloath which were their girdles , made a signe , after which they saw a great smoake , and in a moment afterward the same signe with another flagge ; and it was not long after that they saw in a Boat comming to them three men and one woman , which being arrived to the banke of the River , the woman leapt a shoare , and the men tarried in the Boate , which after a long discourse which shee had with the Indian , which the said Monterinos could not at all understand , went back to the Boate , and told the three men all that shee had heard of the Indian , which came instantly out of the Boate ( having alwaies lookt with attention upon him , viz. the said Monterinos ) and did embrace him , and the woman did the like ; after this one of the three men went backe againe to the Boate , and the other two together with the woman did stay there ; which comming neer unto the Indian hee did prostrate himselfe at their feete , and they received him with demonstrations of civility and affection , and begun to talke with him ; after a little while the Indian said to Mr Monterinos , be not amazed , and doe not believe that these men will tell thee a second thing , before thou hast well understood the first ; the two men instantly put him between them , and told him the verse following in Hebrew out of Deut. Chap. 6. vers . 4. Semah Israel Adonay Elohim Adonay Ehad , Heare O Israel the Lord our God is one Lord ; and hee informing himselfe of every thing by the Indian Interpreter , and learning to say it in the Spanish tongue , the two men told him that which followeth , putting a little space of time between one sentence and another . 1. My Fathers are called Abraham , Isaac , Iacob and Israel , and they named them all foure with three fingers , and then they added Reuben , making a sign with foure fingers . 2. All such as will come and dwell with us we will give them lands . 3. Ioseph dwells in the mids of the sea , making a signe with two fingers shut , and afterwards dividing the same into two parts . 4. Wee shall all one day speake together , uttering with the mouth ba , ba , ba , and shall come forth as the earth had brought us forth . 5. Wee shall goe out from hence shortly ( speaking hastily ) some of us to looke out , and to make water , and saying these words , they winked with their eies and thrust their feet to the ground . 6. A Messenger shall go . 7. Francis shall say somewhat more , making a signe with the fingers , that it would be a little . 8. Give us time to make our selves ready , and shaking their hand on all sides , said with their mouth , and with their hands , stay not long . 9. Send 12 men , making a signe that all shall have beards and be able to write . These discourses being all ended , which lasted all that day , they came backe and told him the same Wednesday and Thursday , not adding a word more thereunto . And Monterinos being wearied , that they answered him nothing to that which hee asked , and that they would not permit him to passe the River , did draw neere the Boate in a dissembling way , and would have cast himselfe therein to goe to the other side , but they thrust her from the shoare with a staffe , and the said Monterinos falling into the water hee was in danger of being drowned , because he could not swimme ; the men cast themselves suddenly into the water , and drew him out , and shewing themselves angry , said unto him , doe not think that thou wilt bring to passe thy purpose by force ; which the Indian declared unto him , and they shewed unto him by signes and words . Notice is to be taken that the Boat for the space of those three daies did not at all stay in one place , but four men went and foure other came , which all of them said the same nine things which we have mentioned , being all the men who during that time came to see him , about 300 more or lesse . These men are somewhat burnt with the Sunne , some of them weare their haire to their knees , some others shorter , and others as wee use to weare it , faire bodies , good countenances , well made of foot and leg , with a linnen about their heads . Moreover the said Mr Monterinos declared , that going from that place on Thursday at night with a great deale of provision which they brought to him , he tooke his leave of them , having been entertained by them , during the three daies which he staied there ; and having shewed him how they enjoyed all things which the Spaniards have in the Indies , aswell of meates as of other things needfull for the life of man. Being come the same day to the place where they had lien the night before , Mr Monterinos said to the Indian , Francis , thou dost know that my Brethren said unto me that thou shouldest tell me something , therefore I pray thee tell it now to satisfie my desire , whereunto the Indian said , I shall tell thee what I know , if thou wilt not anger mee , and shall relate unto thee the truth so as I have heard it from my Ancestors , but if thou dost vex me ( which I apprehend , perceiving thee to be so speculatif ) thou wilt oblige me to tell thee lies ; so then I beseech thee take onely heed to what I shall say unto thee . Thy Brethren the sonnes of Israel were by divine providence brought into these Countrys , God doing many miracles for them , which thou wouldst not believe , if I should tell them to thee as I have heard them of my Fathers ; Wee Indians went into those Countries and made warre against them , and did use them worse then the Spaniards doe us : Afterwards by the command of our Mohanes ( these are their Sorcerers ) wee went as Souldiers towards those parts where thou hast seen thy Brethren , to wage warre with them , and of all those that entred there , not one came backe againe alive ; wee made a great Armie , and entring into his lands , all fell downe dead , so that not one escaped ; at last wee raised another Army , for the making of which the Countrey was dispeopled wholly , so that none but old men , women and children remained therein , which came to an end as the former had done ; which those who remained alive , and were not gone to that warre perceiving , said , that the Mohanes had deceived them and were the cause of the death of their Fathers , for which they deserved to be put to death , having then killed many of them , those that remained alive did intreat them to hearken to them , and they would discover to them all the truth of that which they knew , which having gotten leave , declared that which followeth . The God of these sonnes of Israel is the true God , all that is written in his stories is true , they shall be Lords of all the world in the latter end , a people shall come hither which will bring many things to you , and when the land shall be well provided , these sonnes of Israel shall goe out of their habitations , and shall become Lords of all the earth as it was theirs before , if you will be happy joyne your selves to them . The Indian having made an end to relate the prediction of the Mohanes , followed on his discourse after this manner , My Fathers were Caciques , and there are yet four of them . These 5 Caciques then having heard what the Mohanes had foretold , as if they had been some of the Sages of the Hebrewes , came and tooke their habitation neere that place , to see if they could get acquaintance with some of thy Brethren . They satisfied their desire after a long time by the intercession of an Indian woman : because thy Brethren would never speake to our Fathers , and he of us that went into their Lands , did fall downe dead , and none of thy Brethren did passe over to us ; we therefore made a League with them , by the meanes of that woman , under these conditions . First , that five men , sonnes to five Caciques or their successors , should come to visit them every seventy Moones , and that none should come with them . Secondly , that the man to whom the secret was to be declared , should be three hundred Moones old , and that nothing of this should be revealed to him in a place inhabited , but only in the open field , and when it should be revealed , that it should be in the company of all the Caciques ; thus then ( said the Indian ) wee keepe this secreet amongst us , for the great reward which wee hope , for the innumerable services which wee have done to thy Brethren . Wee cannot go to see them , but from seventy to seventy Moones , if no new thing fall out ; there hath not been any in my time except thy arrivall which they have so much desired and waited for . I finde no more but three new things according to my reckoning ; the first , the arrivall of the Spaniards in these Countries , the second that Ships arrived in the South sea , and the third is thy arrivall . Of all three they have greatly rejoyced , for they say that the Prophecies do come to passe . Moreover the said Monterinos declared , that afterward hee came to Honda , where the said Indian did bring to him three Indian young men , not telling him their names , till hee told him that hee might speake freely with them , seeing they were his companions , whith whom hee was in league , and that the other namely the fift was old , and for that cause was not able to come . The three Indians did imbrace him affectionately , and asked him of what Nation hee was ; to whom hee answered , that hee was of the Hebrew Nation , of the Tribe of Levi ; and then they imbraced him the second time , and said to him , Thou shalt see us one day , and shalt not know us , wee are thy Brethren by a speciall favour which God hath shewed us , and having saluted him they went away : the Indian Francis bid him also farewell , and that hee went to speak with his Brethren in the company of the other Caciques . As concerning this Countrey , wee have all the Indians at our command , and when wee shall have made an end of these cruell Spaniards , wee shall goe and draw you out of the slavery wherein you are , if it please God ; which he will permit , because his word cannot faile . Finis . Laus Deo. I Manasseh Ben Israel underwritten , beare w●tnesse , that this present paper hath been coppied with the whole truth of the originall , and that the Author Monterinos is a vertous man , and separate from all manner of worldly interests ; and that hee swore in my presence that all that which he declared was a truth . MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL . J. DVRY Received this at London , 27 of Novem. 1649. The Reader is entreated with his pen to amend these mistakes of the Presse . IN the Epistle Dedicatory , remove the note at the bottome of the Margin in the third page of ( b ) to the second line of the next page . Page 5. line 12. read Comestor . p. 16. l. 19. r. and uneasie . p. 18. l. 3. r. è contra . p. 21. 1. Witekind in the margent . p. 21. l. 16. r. they were . p. 22. l. 23. r. Maternus . p. 24. l. 19. r. records indeed . p. 32. l. last . r. thou . p. 49. l. 28. r. Israel was . p. 50. l. 8. adde , should so farre , and so suddenly degenerate . p. 6. l. 32. r. converting . p. 76. l. 31. r. for our , the. p. 80. l. 20. r. your charity . p. 93. l. 13. r. Leitourgy . and l. 15. r. pray that . p. 93. l. 15. r. holy Spirit . Our books tell us . p. 107. l. 30. r. too late . p. 118. l. 11. r. hujus . p. 113. p. 126. l. 4. r. 16 , &c. p. 136. l. 12. r. their lands . Notes, typically marginal, from the original text Notes for div A94301-e180 D. Laert. p. 381. D. Heins . in 2. Jo. Hesych . φ Io. Maj. Hist . Scot. l. 4. c. 9. Sixt. Sen. Bib. S. l. 2. R. p. 97. Wollet . Comp. Theol. p. 197. Part. 1. T. 1. Ep. p. 105. lib. 5. c. 8. Nehem 3. 5. 2 Sam. 20 19. Phil. 2. 21. 1 Cor. 13. last . Act. 2. 1. Psa . 19. 4. Revel . 6. 2. Esa . 49. 6. De excid . Brit. In Bal. Cent. p. 23. Hist . l. 1. c. 8. p. 25. Rev. 13. 3. C. 5. 123. Not. in Bed. Hist . p. 257. Par● . 3. Esa . 43. 19. K. Theodoric . Theodob●rt , Clotharius , Qu. Brunechild of France , and to Aldibert and Aldiberga of England . Concil . p. 71. Holinsh . Chro. part . 1. p. 15. Kent , Mercia , West-Saxons , Northumberland , East-Angles , East-Saxons , South-Saxons . Deut. 12 8. 2 Pet. 1. 19. 2 Cor. 11. 14. Psal . 46. 3. Psal . 27. 3. 〈◊〉 8. 12. Act. 7. 56. Tertull. 2 Cor. 5. 7. Job . 14. 14. 1 Joh. 2. 18. Heb. 10. 37. Mat. 3. 12. Psal . 1. 5. 1 Cor. 4. 5. 2 Thes . 2. 17. 3. 3. Heb. 13. 17. Tim. 4. 8. Act. 20. 32. Notes for div A94301-e2630 De Doct. Chr. l. 4. Longa , San● Caele●us , Apolog. ad finem . Oblect . Acad. c. 21. Pseud . Epidem . Mr Bucks Hist . Hist . Rom. Tac●tus . Id●os ab Ida. l. 5. Plut. Symp. c. 9. Suidas in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 . l. 2. c. 18. p. 248. Io. de Lact descriptio Am●ric . dedic . Carolo R. Britan. Mr. Castel , Mr. Gage , &c. I l. p. 37. l 6. c. 9. Mr Gage p. 182 p. 50. &c. Acost . l. 3. c 15. Gage survey . p. 85. 1 ▪ 5. 139. P. 153. 245. Letter of A. C. 1635. p. 168. Plutar. Themist Sim. C , p 61. Mr. Gage . Mr Gage pref . & p. 139 , & 10 Acosta . Hist . l. 6. c. 26. Cic. de Offic. Somn. Scip. Sir Io. Dod● . Hist of Princi . of Wales . p. 23. Ep. p. 819. In Rom. 11. 18 Notes for div A94301-e4050 Esa . 11. 9. Eph. 4 13. Eph. 4. 14. Isa . 2. Ezec. 34 & 37. Jer. 3● . & 46. Amos. 9. Micha . 4 &c. Jer. 30. 10 , 11. Amos. 9 ▪ 8 , 9. 2 King. 1● . This narrative so attested and translated , is at the end of this Book . Psa . 149 7 , 8 , 9. Notes for div A94301-e5150 a Restitut . c. 2. b Met. Hist . c. 9. c Dissertat . de Orig. Gent. Americ . d Not. ad istam Dissert . e Key of the Language of Amer. Pref. f Lerius Hist . Brasil . p. 231. g Laet Descr . Americ . Mr. Gage . h apud Laet in Grot. Dissertat . Part. 1. p. 216. a Pet. Mart. Decad. aliique . b In Boroso . l. 6. c In Bodin . Meth. p. 493. d Ib. p. 353. Mort. N. Canaan . p. 49. Malvend●r de Anti●…ri p. 155. e Acosta . Hist . l. 7. c. 4. f Vbi supra . g Aquin. in Gen. 1. h Arr. ag . Br. p. 343. i Pet. Mart. p. 353. k Laet. in Grot. p. 219. l ibid. m Comestor Hist . p. 137. & 169. n G. Sands . Trav. p. 146. o Hist . l. 1. c. 29. p Apud 10. de Laet. part . 1. p. 217. q Letter . a Acosta . l. 1. c. 23. b Lerius . Vbi supra . c De cons●at . ad Helvid . c. 8. d Mr Will. Key ▪ preface . e Benzo . p. 6. & 50. Acosta . l. 7. c. 17. f Benzo . p. 193. g Id. p. 94. 107 h Id. p. 107. 109 i Nova Francia . p. 221. k Jo. de Laet. p. 217. l Mr Will. Key prospect of N. E. p. 95. m Benzo . p. 117 222. Lerius . p. 256. 258. Laet Descr . of America . p. 545. n Lerius . p. 225 P. Mart. p. 314. 478. o Nat in Grot. p. 37. p Acosta . p. 57 q Id. p. 569. Laet. p. 317. and descrip . Amer. p. 470. r Capt. Smith . p. 31. Laet Descr . Amer. p. 479. s Lerius . p. 236. Mr Will. Key pref . p. 7. & u Nova Fran. p. 236. w P. Mart. p. 526. x Mr Will. Key . y Lerius . p. 234 Acosta . l. 5. c. 27 z 46. Laet des . Amer. p. 479 Mr Will. Key . p Lerius p. 236. b Mr Will. Key . p. 139. c Lerius p. 241. d Benzo . p. 168. 291. 39. Acost . l. 5. c. 8. e Antiq. l. 7. c. 12. f Lerius . p. 266. 267. Benzo . 396 Laet des . Amer. p. 545. 642. g Benzo . p. 222. Acost . l. 4. c. 28. h l. 12. c. 15. i Laet Descr . Amer. p. 75. k Acost . l. 6. c. 10. 17. a Hist . l 5. c. 27. b Id. de procur . Ind. Sal. p. 6. 45 c In Grot. part . 1. p ▪ 45. d P. Mart. p. 175. 290. 293. 296. 300. e l. 2. p. 143. f Dr Helin Geo. p. 662. Laet. ibid. 127. g Id. p. 128. h In Laet p. 2. p. 59. i Tit. 1. de No viter repet is , Cultellos Lapideos quidvis secantes ▪ k p. 135. l p. 191. m Mart. p. 524 n Id. p. 444. Lerius . p. 220. Acost . l. 6. c. 19 o Id. de procur . Ind. Sal. p. 68. p Benzo . p. 396 Relation of Maryland . p. 33. Cap. Smith . Lerius . p 223. Acosta . p. 345. q Mr Will. Key . p. 100. r P. Mart. p. 418. 473 521. 529. Godwin of the Esseni , in Jewish Antiqu . Malvend . de Antichristo . p. 153. s Capt. Smith p. 120. Acosta . l. 5. c. 13. Pet Mart. p. 350. t Id p 351. u Id. p. 314. w Acost . p. 339 x Id. l. 5 : c. 16 ▪ 6. 24. y Id. l. 5. c. 14. z Ibid. l. 5 c. 8. a Pot. Mart. b Relat. Mar. Land. p. 169. Acost . 5. 16. c Pot , Mart : p. 522. 351. d Ibid. e Laet. Descr . Amer. p. 398. 434. f Malvenda . p. 169. g Id. ibid. & Acost . Hist . l. 5. c 29. h Id. p. 269. ] i Benzo . p. 113 , 114. cum tympano . k Cento ad Solin . p. 256. Benzo . p. 403 , and Hist . of Peru. l Benzo ubi sup . & Solin . Cent. ibid. a Idem genus ca'cementi , & verba quaedam . Vbi supra . b l. 30. p. 323. c Vbi ante . Descr . Cambr. p. 266. d In Laet. part . 1. p. 30. e Pet. Mart. p 248. Laet. ibid. p. 186. f Malvenda p. 169. g Gag . Survey . p. 46. h Jerem in loc , i p. 88. 93 , 94. &c. k Hist . l. 5. c. 3. l Lact. Descr . Amer. p. 53. 164. m p. 164. 172. n p. 154. o Mr. Will. Key Pres of N. E. p. 91. p Pref. to Chaldean Diction . q Bodin . Meth p. 494. r Syst . Phys . s Pref. to the old English Bible . a Josph . de Bello Judaico . l. 7. e. 8. b In Ezek c. 5. c P. Mart. p. 206. Lerius . Benzo . alii . d Prosp . of N. Eng. part . 2. Naucler . Chr. part . 2. p. 519. f p. 275. g In fine . p. 188. h p. 55. i Benzo . p. 120. k Crudelit . Hispan . p. 50. a Socrat. l. 1. 15 Ruffin Tripartit . &c. Discessuri ab invicem Apostoli normam praedicationis in commune constituunt . Cypr. de Symb. Ap. b De Incarn . l. 6 ▪ c. 3. c Witek land de Sphaera . d G. Sands tra . e Socrat. ubi ante . Ruffin in Symb. & Hist . l. 1. c. 9. Tertul. de vel . virg . l. 1. c. 1. Regula quidem fidei una omnino est sola immobilis . & inreformabilis . Clem. Ep. ad Jacob. quam Latin. fecit . Ruffin . Ambr. Ser. 138. Aug , de T. 119. f Disput . p. 21. g Ibid. h Ep. ad Philadelph . p. 4. i Niceph. l. 2. c. 35. k Britannorum inaccessa Romanis loca Christo patuerunt . ad v. Iud. c. 7. l Hist . l. 2. c. 3. m De error . profan . relig . n De consid . l. 2. o In Math. & T. 1. Ep. p. 103. p Willet de Vocat . Iud. Malvend de Antichristo . q In Mat. 24. In Hos . 2. In Joh. 4. Mic. 2 : r De Civit. D. l. 18. c. 28. & 20 , 21. s Mor. l. 35. c. 9. t In Cant. ser . 39. u In Apoc. mei p. 31. w Sum. Raymundi . p. 81. From the Jewes our faith began , To the Gentiles then it ran , To the Jewes returne it shall , Before the dreadfull end of all . x Epit. Cent. 16 part . 2. y p. 169. z Doroth. Synop. Hieron . Catal. Socrat. l. 15. Ruffin . l. 1. c 9. Euseb . aliique a Salmuth . in Pancirol . de Noviter Repert . c. 1. p. 7. b Bocha . Geo. Sac. p. 716. c Acost . Benzo . Pet. Mart. Lerius . &c. d Io. de Laet in Grot. part : p. 71. e Bucholz Chro. mei p. 136. f De Vit. Constant . l. 2. c. 65. g Pet Mart. Decad. p. 95. &c. 244. Malvenda . ibid. a De Arcan Cathol . Vent . ▪ c. 24. p. 282. b Lerius p. 230. c Benz● p. 77. 111. 167. d Surius in Append . ad Naucler . p. 775. e P. 222. f Ovied . Hist . Ind l. 16. c. 11. in Benzo . p. 295 g Casa , Benzo , alij Historici passim . h Iidem . i Pet. Mart : p. 506. Guacca Regio , jarima podex . k Id. p. 525. l Casa . p. 100. m Casa . p. 24. n Id. p. 60. o Benzo . p. 111. Id. ib. p. 7 & 8 p Casa . p. 12. 22. 29. 54. q Benzo . p. 285. r p. 289 , &c. s c. 89. t Benzo . 179. 311. 315. &c. Casa . p. 19. 11. Id. p. 57. u Tripartit . Hist . l 2. c. 18. w Catech. 16. p. 263. x Cyropaid . passim . y De B. Judaica l. 3. c. 57 ▪ z Vbi supra . 7. p. 501. a Lerius . p. 152. alijque Cent. ad Solin . p. 218. b Hist . l. 7. c. 22. c Lerius , alij . d p. 405. 406. Notes for div A94301-e13070 a Acost . l. 1. c. 9 b Gages survey . p. 73. c M. Parisad An. 1240 mei p. 732. & 756. d In M. S. e Vbi supra ▪ f Buxtors . Synag . Iud. c. 9. mei p. 231 : In Grot : a Hygin . Astron . b Bel , & Drag . c Agathias Hist . m p. 142. d In Euagr. l. 4. c. 18. e l. 1. 19. Tract . P. Cott. g Vbisupra . h De C. D. l. 16. c. 7. i Idem . k Geograp . l. 1. l Apol. c. 39. m Aelian . Var. Hist . p. 455. n l. 2 c. 89 91. o Chro. Anno 46 p Verst●g . c. 4. Lamb. Peramb . p 18. Chron. 1. pars . p. 225. q Ibid. r In 10. de Laet. p. 126. s Ibid. p. 116. t Ibid. & p. 25. u Miscellan . Sacr. l. 2. c. 4. w Hist . l. 7. c. 3● & . l. 1. c. 20. a T. 3. Ep. p. 69 ▪ b Lerius . p. 169. c Ante p. hujus 24. n. d Versteg . p. 188. e Hist . l. 6. c. 22 ▪ f Qu. in Gen. & Comest . c. 37. g Hist . l. 1. h Prolog . ad l. 1 i de Consolat ad Helv. c. 7. k Ben. Gor. p : l In Voce 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 . l Suidas thus computes the four hundred and thirty yeeres of Israels being in Egypt , and the land of Canaan : From Abrahams going into Charran to Isaacs birth , yeers 25 Thence to Iacobs Nativity . 60 From him to Levi. 87 From Levi to Caath . 45 From Ceath to Amram . 63 From Amram to Moses . 70 From Moses to their Exodus , and going out . 80 Summe 430 yeeres ▪ a Ler. Hist . pre p. 8. f. In Sev. p. 83. T. 2. Ep. p. 75. Lib. 6. Geor. l. 4. b Hier. in loc . c Vbi supra . d Chrisost . in 1 Cor. 2. m. p. 218. e In Io. Tr. 4. Notes for div A94301-e16310 a Meth. Hist . p. 522. Casas . p. 134. &c. b Stow ad An. 1501 , & 1502. c Purchas . l. 4. c. 13. d Stow. Ibid. e L. 3. p. 360. f Sermon to Virginia Planters . An. 1622. p. 20. 26. h Declara . of Virginia . p. 11 ▪ i Mr Cott. ans . p. 27 , &c. k Declara . of Virgin. Vbi supra . l Mr Cot. Ibid. m Metrop . 129. n Ibid. o Ib. Mr Cott. p Ibid. q Ser. 16. init a Benzo . p. 76. 77. passimque . b Id. p. 11. &c. c Id. p. 100. 104. 248. &c. d Id. ibid. &c. e Id. p. 251. f Casas . p. 27. 101. 115. g p. 100. 104. h Hist . l. 6. c. 1. i Epist . before . k p. 32. 444. l Presat . p. 38. m Id. p. 221. 225 m Id. 230. 248. 301. &c. o Cap Smith . p. 11. p Book of that Planta . Anno 1632. p. 12. q Treatises thereof . r Malvenda ubi supra . p. 150. s Cap. Smith . p. 63. t Barradus . T. 2. l. 8. c. 4. u De nat . Nov ? Orb. l. 1. c. 15. w p. 85. 93. &c. x Malvenda ubi supra . P. 154. y Ho. Sta. p. 194. z Hist . l. 1. a Herberts sacr . Poems . p. 190. b Lerius . p. 62. 300. 338. a In loc . b Agathias . l. 1. c Ad Scap. init . d Apolog. 2. p. 300. 450. e Crantz . l. 1. c. 7. l. 2. f De Vit. Const . l. 2. c. 55. g Hist . p. 100. h Tripartit ▪ l. 10. c. 5. i Vit. per G. Patriark . k Ep. p. 439. l Cap. Smith . p. 20. 37. &c. m Sozem. l. 2. c. 6. n Hist l. 6. c. 25 o p. 388. p l. 7. c. 30. q Vbi supra . p. 16. Lib. 5. Ep. 10. r Benzo . p. 256. s Id. p. 390. a In Math. 16. b Casas . p. 66. p. 35. p. 34. 99. c p. 11. d Io. de Lact. Descr . Amer. pref . e Casas . p. 22. f p. 118. g Hist . l. 4. c. 2. h p. 204. l Ep. before ferm . in Jona . m In Tertul. p. 103. n Hist . l. 6. c. 28 Cas . ●●ud Hist . p. 116. Id. ibid. i l. 2. c. 16. k Benzo . p. 257. Charter . a Clapmar arcan . Reip. p. 52. 40 Caroli . b Serm. p. 81 , 82. &c. c Rogers pref . p. 19. d Pref. Basil . Dor. e Parlia . spe ? Anno. 1603. f His workes . p. 358. g Res . ad Apol. p. 28. h Rogers passim . i M. S. a Resp . ad Apol. p. 29. b King Iames workes . p. 340. c Institut . l. 4● c. 20. d Letter 20 ▪ of the 10 moneth . 1635. Charter . e Calvis . Beza . Gualt . alii . f Epit. Cent. 16. p. 185. 285. & concil . Dordrac . g Andr. Posthu . p. 176. h ●…p . p. 749. i Honor. Reg. Commentar . Dautisci . 1647. k Idem ibid. Hieron . Tit. l Simp. C. p. 42 m Sir H. S. p Panang . p. ●92 . A discourse of New England not printed . Relat. of proceagainst Sa. Gort . p. 99. Discourse before mentioned . a In Bed. Ecclesiast . Hist . l. 2. c. 1. b Lambard Peramb . of Kent . p. 5. c Hist . l. 1. c. 5. d Malmbs . p 1. and Beda . l. 1. c. 25. e Daybreak● &c. f Greg. M. g Dr. Vane lost sheepe . p. 186. h Crantz . Met. p. 405. 8. 12. Lib. 5. Ep. 58. 59. i Hist . l. 2. c ▪ 7. a Lerius , Hist . praef . b Benzo . p. 390. c Hesiod . Op. & Di. l. 2. d Theodor. hist . l. 5. c. 29. Lib. 9. Ep. 56 , 57. e Gage survey of America . p. 81. f Id. p. 3. a Agathon in Doroth. Doctr. & vita patrum . b Erasm , Ep. 6. c p. 24. d Tit. Ecclesiasticall . p. 19. 20 e Tit. Anabaptists . p. 1. f Tit. Indians . p. 28. 29. g Tit. Scheels . p. 47. h Tit. College . p. 12. Sermon at Westm . in Ann. 1646. Iuly , 30. è Iob. 11. 22 m Stat. Eccles . Brit. praeface . Day breaking if not the Sun-rising of the Gospel with the Indians in New-England . Printed for Fulk Clifton , on New Pish . street hill . 1647. page . 1. & 2 : p. 3. Questions of the Indians . p. 4. p. 5. p. 6. Questions to them . p. 7. Second comming . p. 8. p. 9. Questions . p. 10. p. 11. p. 12. p. 13. A weeping Indian . p. 14. Observations . p. 17. Third meeting Novemb. 26. ●… Questions . p. 19. p. 20. p. 22. Indian Lawes . p. 23. Indian prayers Fourth meeting . p. 24. p. 25. The clear sun-shine of the Gospel upon the Indians , &c. by Mr. Shepheard . 1648. p. 3. Orders made by divers Sachims , at Concord , 1646. p. 5. p. 6. p. 7. Indian womens Questions . p. 8. p. 9. p. 10. An Indians dreame . p. 11. Indian Questions . p. 13. p. 19. p. 20. Indian cases and admonitions , of one beating his wife . p. 21. Or an unruly son recovered . p. 22. p. 23. Prayer . p 24. Questions . p. 25. Indian cases . p. 27. p. 33. p. 34. p. 35. p. 37. The glorious progresse of the Gospel among the Indians , &c. published by Mr Winslow , 1649. An Indian woman living and dying Christianly . p. 6. p. 7. p. 8. p. 10. Indian Questions . p. 20. Letter to Mr Winslow . 18. of the 8. 1649. Day break . p. 22. Cleare Sun-shine . p. 5. 2 Treatis . p. 35 ▪ k T. 2. Ep. p. 126. Lib. 4. Ep. 52. l. 5. 10. 152. &c. n Crantz . Metrop . l. 5. c. 18. Notes for div A94301-e27170 Elul is the first moneth of the Jewish yeere answering to our August and to some part of September .