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A CHAPTER OF AMERICAN CHURCH HISTORY.

By Epwarp D? Netz1,
Macalester College. Minneapolis, Minnesota.

TWENTY-EIGHT miles from Guanahani, or San Salvador,
memorable as the place where the feet of Christopher Columbus
first trod the earth of the Western Hemisphere, is the island
of Kleuthera.

In a monthly magazine, published in Philadelphia, just one
hundred years ago, a writer who had lately visited it, describes
a cave he saw on the north side of the island, in a rocky ridge,
not far from the coast. Its entrance was on a level with the
main land, in the form of an arch about fifty feet in height,
and its length was about three hundred and fifty. The lofty
roof had apertures for air and light, through which the
luxuriant vines and shrubbery of the Bahamas had intruded.
Near the center of the cave was a large irregular rock, in which
steps for ascent had been cut; surrounding it were great stones
which served as seats, and not far distant was a mahogany
monument, on three sides of which were inscriptions to the
memory of “ James Seymor, who was born in Bermudas in the
year 1640, in the month of October, on the sixth day, and died
in the year 1650, upon the tenth of September.”

To those who prize a free Church in a free State, the caves
of Hleuthera have a history, in some respects as interesting as
the catacombs of Rome were to the Christians of the early cen-
turies. Hither the first Independent Church of the Somers
Island or Bermudas retired, to avoid annoyance.

From its earliest settlement, Bermudas contained some who
were not satisfied with certain expressions of the Book of
Common Prayer, and some practices of the Church of England.
Among the passengers wrecked in the “Sea Venture” with
Newport, Gates, and Somers, in July, 1609, was Stephen Hop-
kins, ‘ta fellow,” says an old chronicle, ‘‘who had much knowl-
edge in the Scriptures,” and upon Sundays, read the Psalms
and Chapters for the good chaplain Richard Buck. Others of
the same ship were also considered “‘sectaries in points of
religion.”— Sins isan a i a a at Stiles peek ababaespseilanis
. RO Ce eRe erm CN sat ERR Do Che ee Sei ed
nes oh es alg. ee Si kA a So od ee
Bie en as ie

472 A Chapter of American Church History. [July,

George Keth or Keith, a Scotchman, came in 1612, with the
first Governor of the Island, and soon after Lewis Hewes or
Huches, both “preachers of the word.” Keith, before the
landing of the Puritans at Plymouth, with his wife and son
removed to Virginia, and in 1624 was living at the settlement
now called Hampton. Hewes remained, and was one of those
who in 1620 did not conform to the Book of Common Prayer,
and with whom the Governor compromised by allowing the
“Liturgy of Guernsey and Jersey, wherein all those particulars
they so much stumbled at were omitted.” The next year,
Hewes returned to England, and published a narrative, entitled
‘A plaine and true relation of the goodness of God toward the
Sommer Islands, written by way of exhortation, by Lewis
Hughes, Minister of God’s word.” The volume was a thin
quarto, and the relation occupied eleven pages, and thirteen
were devoted to a catechism, prayers, and exhortations. In
1638, the Warden of St. George’s Prison, Southwark, com-
plained against him for five years of non-conformity, and he
was dismissed from preaching, but his pen was not idle, and
in 1640 appeared a quarto of forty pages, with the title ‘“ Cer-
tain Greevances well worthy the serious consideration of the
Right Honorable and High Court of Parliament. Set forth by
way of a dialogue between a Country Gentleman and a Minister
of God’s Word, for the satisfying of those that doe clamour
and maliciously revile them that labour to have the errors of
the Booke of Common Prayer reformed.”

As early as 1623, a Scotchman sat in the legislative assem-
bly, a minister of the Gospel, named George Stirk. With the
exception of a visit to England, he was in charge of Southamp-
ton parish until his death, and his sympathies were with the
Puritans of England. Roger Wood, the Governor of the
Island, writing about the clergy, used these words: ‘“ Here
they may use their discretion in God’s ordinances, for we are
grown so poor that no Bishops will look after us. We have
homilies set to read in our churches which are the same as
were printed in King Edward's days, which I am enjoined to
cause be read, so that we change for the worse, having the
works of the most famous divines in great plenty, as means of
grace much to be preferred, before those old homilies.”bide Sos ee eee cee aT

1879.] A Chapter of American Church History. 473

In the year 1626 another Scotchman, of more than ordinary
experience arrived, named Patrick Copland, sometimes spelled
Copeland and Coapland. Harly in 1612 he had sailed as Chap-
lain of the ship Dragon for the Hast Indies, and in 1614
returned to the Thames in the same vessel. In the transactions
of the Hast India Company of London, under date of August
19, 1614, is the following: ‘The Indian youth brought home
by Captain Best, and taught by Mr. Copland to read and write;
to be sent to school and instructed in religion, that hereafter
he may be sent home to convert some of his nation.”

In 1616 Mr. Copland suggested that his pupil should be
publicly baptized “as the first fruits of India,” to which Arch-
bishop Abbott assented, and on the 22d of December O. S. the
rite was administered in St. Denis Church, London, by Dr.
John Wood, and the Bengala had received the name of Patrus
Papa, or Peter Pope, which it is said was selected by King
James, that odd compound of cant, coarseness, and sottishness.
Copland and his pupil sailed for India early in the year 1617,
in the “ Royal James,” and on the second day of December,
near the Isle of Java, he preached a sermon on board that ship,
in view of an approaching conflict with the Dutch, in the pres-
ence of Sir Thomas Dale, late Governor of Virginia, and other
captains of the Hnglish fleet. In 1621, while the “ Royal
James” was on the homeward voyage, Copland took up a col-
lection for the benefit of the Virginia plantation, which the
London Company set apart for the building of the first free
school in the United States at Charles City, on the banks of the
James River. On Thursday, April 22, 1622, he preached
before the Virginia Company in the old Bow Church, and his
discourse was published with the title of ‘“ Virginia’s God be
thanked ;’ and on the 8d of July, was elected Rector of the
projected college at Henrico, near Richmond, Virginia, for the
conversion of the infidels, and also pastor of the tenants of the
college lands.

A few days after he preached in Bow Church, a ship arrived
in the Thames, with a tale of horror which spread lke wild-
fire through the streets of London; the listening to which
made the “ hair of the flesh to stand up,” and froze the hearts
of those who had been devising good things for Virginia. It

Se ee474 A Chapter of American Church History. [July,

was announced that nearly half of the inhabitants of Virginia
had been suddenly attacked and killed by the savages.

The destruction of the inhabitants at Henrico on the 22d of
March, 1622, and the charter of the Virginia Company in
June, 1624, having been declared null and void by the Chief
Justice of England, Copland’s plans for the education of
Indian children in Virginia were frustrated.

He determined however to migrate to Bermudas, where he

had been told

‘ The isle is full of voices,

Sounds, and sweet airs that give delight and hurt not.”
By the London proprietors he and Rev. Bellingham Morgan
were appointed ministers, and on March 21, 1625-6 to the
Governor of Bermudas they wrote: ‘We have likewise pro-
vided and sent by this ship, two ministers, namely Mr. Cope-
land, and Mr. Morgan, and we pray you, see them settled in
such tribes, which are unprovided. We have agreed with Mr.
Copeland, to receive his salary here, in money being 100 marks,
per annum.” ‘The Governor was also informed that Mr. Cop-
land desired that there may be ‘‘a free school erected for the
bringing up of youth in literature and good learning,” and the
letter adds: “‘ We pray you to be a furtherer of Mr. Copeland
in that he hath a great desire that the youth may be catechized
in the grounds of religion, which is so good a work we do very
well approve of.”

Before the 20th of November, 1626, he had reached Bermu-
das, and on that day, asa member of the Governor's Council,
he moved that a free school be erected.

At a later period a Governor, ‘a doubting Thomas” as to |
free schools, wrote to London that Mr. Copland “having pur-
chased land here, he hath builded thereupon, and will not
remove to any part of the world from thence. He hath a pro-
ject, to erect a free school here, and train up children to be
preachers, to send abroad, to convert the Indians, and for that
purpose, hath written to Scotland for one or two able scholars
to instruct them in philosophy and divinity, and so to make
them preachers, but where these children are, I yet know not,
for we have but few, and peradventure their parents haying
educated them, will not send them, amongst the savages, to

IL sath elite ieee pee enc Ea ean aRe ee ee

1879. ] A Chapter of American Church Flistory. 475

turn them to the faith, who will understand them as well as the
wolf did St. Francis when he turned them into civility, but Sir,
these Scottish scholars desire to know their maintenance
before they will undertake the journey, and I commend them
for it. And to deal plainly and truly, I do desire not to have
any more of the nation amongst us, but will prevent it while I
can, [when] I know England abounds in learned men.”

When Governor Berkeley of Virginia thanked God they had
no free schools, he expressed the views of Governor W ood,
who wrote: ‘Mr. Copeland thinks the Company will give all
their common land to build a free school. I wish we had
ministers contented to preach the Gospel, and let this Free
School alone until we are free from debt. These works of
ostentation and supererogation make great show and noise
abroad. I assure you if men could transport themselves as
they desire, it would leave but few to be taught and brought
up in a free school in this place.” Abbott, Archbishop of
Canterbury, died in August, 1633, and the next month, Laud
was raised to his place, and his unhappy influence was felt in
the distant isles of the sea. The Governor of Bermudas
wrote in 1634 to William Ames, the great scholar and divine,
associated with Hugh Peters at Rotterdam, inviting him to
settle there, not having then heard, how in the preceding
November, he had breathed his last breath, upon the bosom of
his fiery colleague, who soon after became the pastor at Salem,
then a fighting Chaplain under Fairfax and Cromwell, and
alter the accession of Charles the Second, was executed. His
letter contained the following :—

‘“As there is a supposition that you intend to come for
New England, and Mr. Peters, .... let me desire you to
leave that resolution and come to the Burmoodaes, where
you are most entirely beloved and reverenced. We have
but two ministers, both Scotish men, the one is called Georg.
Stirk, who is very learned, but I fear not long lived. He
hath all your works that are extant. .... The other, Mr.
Patricke Coapland, who hath traveled long, twice to the Hast
Indies, and now settled himself here, having purchased five
shares of land on which he hath builded and disbursed £1,000
sterling 0 2% We are also far more secure from the hia-

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476 A Chapter of American Church EMistory. (July,

rarchicall jurisdiction than New England is, for noe great prel-
ate will leave his pontifical palace to take his journey to live
upon a barren rock. And all our islands are not wortha bish-
opricke, and there are many men of great wealth and estates, and
almost whole congregations gone with their pastors where they
build towns and call them according to those from whence they
come, as Boston, Yarmouth, &. Ours is a most holsome air,
that suiteth every creature in these islands; theires is a cold cli-
mate full of severitie . . . . when they have well settled them-
selves they must be brought under the Archbishop of Canter-
burie, and have a suffragan sent to reduce them into the fould
of their old shepheards; for the King will not be quit of his
subjects wheresoever they live under his laws and obedience.
All this discourse I relate to divert you from any thoughts to
seek liberty that way.”

The letter concludes with an offering of a ‘ parcel of pota-
toes for Mrs. Ames.’*

The next year Hugh Peters, A.M., of Cambridge College,
left Rotterdam, and came to Salem, Massachusetts, and about
the same time, there arrived at Bermudas, a man ‘ most emi-
nent,” John Oxenbridge, who had been dismissed the year be-
fore, from his tutorship in Magdalene College, Oxford, on
account of Puritanism. His wife, whose maiden name was
Jane Butler, was as zealous as he, and during the seven years
he remained, his influence upon the other ministers was very
great.

In 1642, both Peters and Oxenbridge returned to England
and were active against the royalist party. Shortly before the
death of Peters, he said to a friend who attended his execution,
‘Return straightway to New England, and trust God there.”
Oxenbridge, who during the Cromwellian period had been
Fellow of Eton College, in 1662, was silenced for non-con-
formity, and after spending some years in Surinam and the

* On the 11th of May, 1637, the widow of the great divine, Joane Ames, of
Yarmouth, aged fifty, expressed her desire to pass for New England, with her
three children, Ruth, aged eighteen, William and John. William became a stu-
dent at Harvard, and his mother lived and died at Cambridge. He graduated in
1645, and after a few years was settled in England. In 1651 he preached in
St. Paul’s Cathedral, before the Mayor and Aldermen of London. He died A. D.
1689.

a TI TTTMigs

179, | A Chapter of American Church Eistory. 477

West Indies, in 1670 became the pastor of the first church in
Boston, and in 1674 died in that city, “trusting God.”

While Oxenbridge was preaching in Bermudas, his col-
league, whom he termed “ Father Copland,” wrote an inter-
esting letter dated December 4, 1639, to Governor Winthrop
of Boston, who had sent twelve New England Indians to be
trained, who had been left, however, at another island, in
which he states: “If they land safely here, I would have had
a care of them to have disposed them to such honest men as
should have trained them up in the principles of religion, and
so, when they had been fit for your plantations, have returned
them again, to have done God some service, in being instru-
ments to do some good upon their countrymen.”

He continues with a narration of the method of the Jesuits
and Dutch in the East Indies in teaching the native children
their language, and the traders’ children the Malaya dialect,
both in the same school together, and then remarks: “TI have
now in my study a Popish catechism imprinted in Naugasack,
in the Italian letter and Japan tongue. With this practice of
the Jesuits in perverting, and of the Dutch in converting Indi-
dians, I acquainted the Earl of Southampton, and the Gov-
ernor of the Virginia Company, Sir Edwin Sandys, and the
Council of Virginia, who liked well of it, and gave order to
Sir Francis Wyatt, their then Governor in Virginia, to follow
this practice, but in a better manner..... If it be followed
by your preachers and schoolmasters, through God’s blessings
upon their labors, I doubt not many of -your heathen may be
gained to the Christian faith. . . . . I have sent you a small
poesie of our Preacher’s whom the Lord hath taken to himself,
He hath left behind him a hopeful son of his own name, who
is reasonable well entered in the Latin tongue. If there be
any good school and schoolmaster with you, I wish with all
my heart that he might have his education with you rather
than in old Eneland..... If you send us any more of your
captive Indians, I will see them: disposed of here to honest
men; or if you send me a couple, a boy and a girl for myself,
I will pay for their passage, so they be hopeful.”

Before Oxenbridge returned to England, Nathaniel White,
who had been a minister at Knightsbridge, near Westminster,

2

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478 A Chapter of American Church £hstory. [July,

and William Goulding, a young man, advocated his sentiments
in the parishes of Bermudas, aud taught his catechism called
“Milk for Babes.”

Richard Norwood, an old resident, eminent as surveyor and
school teacher, opposed to the innovations of Laud, and a
Presbyterian in sympathy, refused to attend these catechisings
and sent a complaint to William Pryme, the celebrated mem-
ber of Parliament, which was printed.

In Paget’s parish, on the afternoon of the 31st of January,
1643-4, White, Goulding, and Copland, standing together in the
body of the church, did publicly renounce their ministry in the
Church of England, and then formed an Independent Church,
which, on the 15th of the following May, elected White as
Pastor, Goulding as Elder, and Copland as Deacon. Beach, an
aged schoolmaster, describes the religious condition of the
island, at this time, in these words: “The next thing was, a
day in a week, at noon, for two hours space, to catechise youth
and children, when a simple catechism, set out by one Mr.
Oxenbridge, son to Dr. Oxenbridge of London, who, with his
wife especially, was the first ground-work of this faction; who
in time, before it came to any perfection, departed from us, but
left the cursed seed or fruit of their faction behind them.
They being gone, this Mr. White, as chief, takes in hand to
accomplish this business, which with another as forward, but
better seen in it themselves, one Mr. Golding, a young man, but
well learned in schismatical science, if not worse, joins together,
labours with, and overcomes an ancient man, My. Copeland by
name, and then, on all hands, with unanimous consent, join
their forces for erecting and establishing this their church, and
then instead of catechizing youth, they would catechize ancient
people, young and old of both sexes.” The next year a peti-
tion was read in the House of Commons from the Independents
of Bermudas, which declared that the Divine Providence had
led them to a remote isle, being fugitives, on account of their
non-conformity and the persecution of the Episcopal party,
and asked that they might be permitted to worship without
molestation in their own way, pledging themselves ‘“ to be sub-
ject in their lives and estates to every civil power for con-
science sake.”

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1879. ] A Chapter of American Church History. 479

The prayer of the petitioners was granted, and on October i,
1645, it was ordered, “that the inhabitants of the Somer
Islands, and such others as shall join themselves unto them,
shall, without any molestation or trouble, have and enjoy the
hiberty of their consciences in matter of God’s worship, as well
as in those parts of America, where they are now planted, as in
all other parts of America, where hereafter they may be
planted.”

The Harl of Warwick, as Admiral of the English Planta-
tions, with Sir Henry Vane, and others of the Committee on
Plantations, on the 3d of November, did issue a command to
all Governors and other officers, “to suffer them quietly,
peaceably and freely to worship God,” and if they should
“ think fit to remove or transplant themselves to any other parts
of America to afford them all necessary help as they will
answer the contrary and the high contempt of the power and
authority of Parliament.”

The Royalists of London who were members of the Ber-
mudas Company, were displeased with the action of Parliament,
and appointed a new Governor who was a royalist. Although
a majority of the Councillors were Independents, Burgesses
were elected who spurned the ordinance of 1645, and enacted
that no Independent minister should preach or hold civil office.

Captain Sayle and others in sympathy with the Independ-
ents, now sent out vessels to discover some isle to which they
could retreat. William Reyner, the Sheriff of Bermudas, an
old resident, and an Independent, writes to Governor Winthrop
of Massachusetts, on the 31st of March, 1646, that they had
sent two vessels to the Bahamas, to discover some place where
they could be free from “the Bermudian imbitterment,” and
that one of these had never been heard from, and that the
other returned the summer before without finding a desirable
retreat.

In the fall of 1646, Captain Sayle and the minister Gould-
ing were in Boston, on their way to England, to present the
grievances of the Independents to Parliament, and the Ber-
mudas proprietors. During their absence the venerable Cop-
land, now nearly eighty years of age, was charged with using
‘‘ deluding words in his sermon or exposition, to some people

Pe a oa eee eeee as ae ee

480 A Chapter of American Church History. (July,

which gathered to the mill on Sunday, the 25th of July,
1647, which tended to the dishonour of God, and the dispar-
agement of Governor and Council.” The Council Record
says: “In tender regard to the weakness and age of the said
Mr. Coapland, and in regard of his long sortinned services in
these islands, it is ordered that the said Mr. Coapland be con-
fined a prisoner to his own house.”

During his confinement, like Paul the Apostle he wrote
letters to his friends. He sends one ‘To the right worshipful
Mr. Winthrop, Governor of Boston, and of the precincts belong-
ing thereunto,” which was dated “From George’s Prison,
Christ’s School, this last of the 7th mo., 1647.”

In this he alludes to the death of Winthrop’s wife and his
own: “I could condole with you for your losse, and my
owne,* but that Iam not willing to renew your grief and my
owne.” He also writes of the Church: ‘‘Calling to mind what
some years ago you wrote to myself, to stir me up, to set upon
the way of God in this island, it pleased the Lord that in the
government of Capt. Sayle, Mr. White, Mr. Golding and my-
self being solicited by our then Governor to bestow a lecture
upon the island on the week-day because we could not accom-
modate all by preaching on the Lord’s day. Entering upon
consideration of Capt. Sale’s motion we yielded to his request
upon condition, he would give way to us, to hold out to the
people the way of the churches in the New Testament, which
he willingly yielded unto, though as yet he is not a member
(his wife being): since which time we have met with much
opposition, both in the government of Capt. Foster, and also
since our present Governor, Capt. Tho’s Turnor, his being sent
to us, from our Company.”

Governor Sayle while in London succeeded in forming a
company for the settling of one of the Bahamas Islands, and
obtained a patent from Parliament allowing to each settler
entire liberty of conscience in matters of worship. He sailed
from England in a ship provided with supplies and a few

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* Copland had a daughter living in 1634 as this sentence from a letter of Gov-
ernor Roger Wood shows: ‘Mr. Coapland would have sent unto Aberdeinne for
a Scotesman to have beene a schoolmaster, but I verily think his project is to
have such a one to marry a daughter hee hath, and at his death to conferre his
estate upon him.”

AEE NOR DLE SBM BITE AS OLS DPE les EREacer ore ene oe

1879.] A Chapter of American Church history. 481

colonists, and reached Bermudas in October, 1647, to find that
Pastor White and others were not comfortable. His wife
Margery was presented to the Grand J ury the month of his
arrival for not attending the services of the parish church.
During his stay he plead before the authorities who were
now Presbyterian, for toleration to the Independents, stating
“that in the city of London, the Episcopal ministers did preach,
the Presbyterians did preach, and the Independents did teach,
and where the Presbyterians taught he could never find above
a half-score people.’’*

In a short period Sayle, taking on board of his ship the aged
Copland, and about seventy others connected with the Inde-
pendent Church, sailed for the Bahamas group. A passenger
who had come over in the ship from London, named Butler, con-
tended, after they embarked, that by the charter, each man
could serve God in his own way, and his way was by playing
the viol. In this freak he was sustained by some foolish ones,
and there was a division, after landing upon one of the Bahamas.
Syle, with Copland and the sober portion of the colonists, left
their demonstrative neighbors, to seek another refuge, and were
wrecked on Hleuthera. While their lives were spared, they
lost their supplies and were obliged to subsist upon the birds
of the air, the fruits of the earth, and the fish of the sea, until
Capt. Sayle built a small vessel out of the timbers of the wreck
and obtained assistance from friends in Bermudas and Virginia.

W hile in Virginia he urged upon the Puritans of Nansemond
that they should remove from the persecution of Governor
Berkeley, and their pastor Thomas Harrison who in later years
was the Chaplain of the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and
preached a funeral sermon in Christ Church, Dublin, upon the
death of Oliver Cromwell, visited Boston, in October, 1648,
and consulted with the pastors of the vicinity as to the expe-
diency of his flock migrating to Eleuthera. The proposal was
not approved of, and after this the Virginians moved to the
shores of the Chesapeake Bay, where the capitol of Maryland
now stands, and the next year secured the passage of an ‘‘ Act
concerning religion” which has become celebrated in history.

* Bancroft in Hist. U. S., Cent. edition, vol. i, page 509, erroneously supposes
that Sayle was a Presbyterian.

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482 A Ohapter of American Church History. [July,

Pastor White, who had been charged with treason, “ appealed
to Cesar,” and requested permission of the Bermudas Council
to go to England to answer the accusation, which was reluc-
tantly granted. His case was examined by the Bermuda Com-
pany on the 27th of June, 1648, and he was fully acquitted.
In 1646, Prynne published at London “‘ A Fresh Discovery of
some Prodigious New Wandering Blazing Stars and Firebrands
styling themselves New Lights.” To this, while in England,
White replied in a work of one hundred and seventy pages,
the title page to which, after the bad taste of the age, was a
libellum, a little book in itself.

It reads

“Truth gloriously appearing
from under
The sad and sable Cloud of Obloquie
or
A Vindication

of the Practice of the Church of Christ in the Summer Islands, in an apologetical
Answer unto some Letters and Papers lately sent from the Summer Islands by
Richard Beake and W. Norwood, lately published by Master Prynne in his First
Discovery of some prodigious New Wandering, Blazing-Stars, wherein the truth
and that Church are much reproached, also a discovery of the Aforesaid Mr.
Prynne his Fidelity, Credulity, Temerity, Want of Brotherly Charity, in receiving,
believing, glossing, and publishing them. As also his Partiality, Fallacy (if not
Falsity) in manageing and inhansing them: and last of al! his malignity, in exas-
perating the high and honorable court of Parliament against them, before they
have been heard speak for themselves, upon the naked report of Sons of Belial.
and enemies capital, Thorow both of which do run (as is hoped) good satisfaction
as concerning the model of that Church-way at this time much controverted,
touching the way of worship, very commonly misunderstood, very falsely inter-
preted, but very truly called Independent.”

“Licensed and printed according to order, Published not for offence, but De-
fence, by Nath. White, Bachelor of Divinity, and Pastor of the Church of Christ,
at Summers Islands.”

William Goulding, who had returned from England, on
August the 27th, made a will, in which he speaks of himself as
a ‘minister of God’s word, and of the gospel of Jesus Christ
being at this time sick and weak in body through a long and
wasting sickness.”

On the 30th of January, 1648-9, Charles the First was
beheaded, but it was several months before the intelligence
reached Bermudas, and the royalists were indignant and vin-
dictive. They said on July 5, 1649, to the Governor and1879.] A Chapter of American Church History. 483

Council: “We upon sufficient grounds, reports and circum-
stances are convinced that our Royal Sovereign, Charles the
First is slain, which horrid act we detest, and unwilling to have
our conscience stained with the breach of the oath to our God,
and to avoid falling into a premunire, acknowledge the high
born Charles, Prince of Wales to be the undoubted heir appar-
ent.”

On the 21st of August the Council withdrew all protection
from those who did not conform to the ecclesiastical laws of
Kngland, and the next month Nathaniel White was impeached
as a enemy to the King and country. The Independents
remaining in Bermudas now began to make preparations to
go to Hleuthera.

The first winter of the exiles on the wild isle of the sea was
one of suffering. When Governor Winthrop and others in
Boston heard of their distress, a collection was taken up for
their relief, among the churches of that vicinity, amounting to
about £800 sterling. Supplies were purchased and placed in
a small, hired vessel in charge of James Pen and Abraham
Palmure. They sailed from Boston on the 18th of 3d mo.
O. 8S. (June) 1650, and reached Eleuthera on the 17th of the
next month.

Scottow, the aged Boston merchant, in his “‘ Narrative of the
Massachusetts Colony,” quaintly alludes to the aid of the New
England Puritans to their suffering brethren. He writes:
“They served God in houses of the first edition, without large
chambers, sealed with cedars, and painted with vermillion, a
company of plain, pious, humble and open hearted Christians
called Puritans.

‘When news was brought hither that the Church at Bermu-
das was banished thence, into a desolate island and full of straits,
forthwith they sent a vessel of good burthen to them fully
laden with provisions of all sorts, each striving who would be
forwardest in so good a work, which supply came unto them,
when as all the meat in their barrels, and oil in their cruise was
spent and it was brought on the Lord’s day, as their faithful
pastor had finished his exhortation from Psalm 23, To trust
upon the Lord Jehovah, their Shepherd who would not suffer

his flock to want.”SS ee eS

484 A Chapter of American Church History. [July,

A committee of three was appointed to express the apprecia-
tion of the sympathy of the Massachusetts churches, and they
gave in return, for the benefit of Harvard College then in its
infancy, ten tons of Braziletto wood, “to avoid that foul sin of
ingratitude so abhorred of God, so hateful to man.” ‘The ves-
sel arrived in Boston on the 6th day of 6th month, bringing
among others the daughter of the deceased minister George
Stirk, to visit her brother George who had been a student of
Harvard; a son of Nathaniel White, the Pastor of the Church,
and Mr. Stephen Painter, a zealous layman, one of the original
members of the Independent Church of Bermudas, who had
been sent to England at the same time as Pastor White, on an
accusation of high treason, and was acquitted.

James Seymour, who died at the age of ten years in 1650,
and to whose mahogany monument allusion has been made,
was probably the son of Florentio Seymour, a friend and execu-
tor of Pastor William Goulding.

The aged Copland passed to the “ better land” before the
year 1655, and probably at Hleuthera, his spirit departed.

Upon the 4th of October, 1652, a ship left the Bermudas
with letters of recall for the pastor Nathaniel White. The
time when he left Hleuthera has not been ascertained. A
letter from the London proprietors, dated Sept. 21, 1674
addressed to the Governor of Bermudas, has the following:
‘“ Whereas we formerly ordered that Mrs. White, the widow of
Mr. Nathaniel White should enjoy the Gleabe during her life
time, and we being since certified of her death, do order,” ete.
Ata meeting of the English Council of State; on the 23d of
December, 1656, the case of about sixty persons on Eleuthera
Island, who had suffered much hardship, was considered, and
the following March the ship John brought from there to
Bermudas Captain Sayle, his wife and three children, and
thirteen other passengers.

For several years some of the Independents remained at
Hleuthera, and in the summer of 1668, being in great distress,
their Bermudas friends sent to them a vessel of supplies.

Residence at the Bermudas was no longer unpleasant, as the
non-conformists had increased after the severe acts of Charles
the Second.1879. ] A Chapter of American Church History. 485

The Rev. Sampson Bond, once active for the King, came
from England in 1668, began to teach that the Book of Com-
mon Prayer was a Mass Book, and that the words used by a
god-father and god-mother in the order for infant baptism were
blasphemy. A Rev. Henry Vaughan, who had succeeded to
the parish of his father who had graduated at Oxford or Cam-
bridge, also sympathized with non-conformists. Anderson in
his history of the Colonial Church quotes the following from a
letter of the Governor of Bermudas: “I received a letter
directed to ye first Clergyman in Bermudas; by ye seal I sup-
pose it came from my Lord Rishop of London. None would
receive it, except old Wm. Righton, formerly a preacher
here, now turned lawyer, a tayler by trade, and a long time
servt. to Hugh Peters. Hee would have open’d it, saying
it belong’d only to him, but I would not permit him.

‘ Qur Parish when Mr. Vaughan returned from England, did
expect hee should have read ye Common Prayer, and adminis-
tered ye Sacrament of ye Lord’s Supper ;—few in ye Island
know what it is, more than by relating of aged people who
formerly liv’d in England, and not to have flung off his cononi-
cal gown, and after a chapter read by a silly clerk, and a
Psalm sung so irreverently, to step into ye Pulpit.”

On the 26th of July, 1669, a commission was issued to Wil-
lam Sayle, the founder of Eleuthera, as Governor of Carolina.

In the Constitution prepared for this new colony by the cele-
brated philosopher John Locke, it was provided “That any
seven or more persons agreeing in any religion shall constitute
a church or profession, to which they shall give some name to
distinguish it from others.”

Upon the 26th of February, the ship Caroline which had
come from England with colonists, sailed from Bermudas with
Governor William Sayle, who was to preside over the new
colony north of Florida, upon the Atlantic coast. After
several days the vessels reached the vicinity of Beaufort, and
from there sailed up the Ashley River and three ship loads of
colonists landed on the first high land, and formed the nucleus
of the commonwealth of South Carolina.

Governor Sayle after a few months was taken sick and died,
but the principle of a free church, under no State control, fortepohiseien: ‘
. Ry '

£7 naam oon thas antcammppegaetc te

486

A Chapter of American Church History.

  

(July,

 

which he so earnestly contended, has lived, and the voice he
raised, has found an “ Echo beyond the Mexique Bay.”
Andrew Marvell, just before he became Assistant Latin
Secretary of State under John Milton, had been tutor of a lad
in whom Cromwell was interested. In a letter to the Protec-
tor, he writes relative to his pupil, that he had taken care “to
examine him several times in the presence of Mr. Oxenbridge.”
No doubt Marvell’s conversations with Oxenbridge led to the
composition of his poem on Bermudas containing the oft-quoted

lines:

“What shall we do but sing his praise

That led us through the watery maze,
Unto an isle so long unknown,

And yet far kinder than our own?
Where he the huge sea-monsters wracks,
That lift the deep upon their backs,

He lands us on a grassy stage,

Safe from the storm, and prelate’s rage.
x * * * *
He cast (of which we rather boast)
The Gospel’s pearl upon our coast
And in these rocks, for us, did frame
A temple, where to sound his name,”Prin
ara sPRE ae ne ee epee

CX GOL bh1 871