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AND RHODE ISLAND PLANTATIONS IN NEW ENLAND, IN AMERICA." This charter placed them on an equal footing with the other colonies, and led to the establishment of a friendly intercourse between them. Under it the Executive power was vested in a Governor, Deputy-Governor and ten Assistants to be elected by the freemen of the colony. The Legislative authority consisted in a General Assembly, which was composed of the Governor, Deputy-Governor, the ten Assistants, and delegates from the several towns. Newport sent six delegates to this Assembly, Providence, Portsmouth and Warwick, four, and each of the other towns two. The Governor, or Deputy, with six Assistants, constituted a quorum for the transaction of business. This General Assembly had power to enact all laws, to admit freemen, choose officers, to establish courts of justice, to punish offences, and generally to do whatever was necessary for the common defence and welfare of the colony. The most remarkable feature which distinguished this charter from those of the other colonies, was unqualified religious toleration. It was provided "that no person should be in any way molested, punished, disquieted, or called in question, for any difference of opinion in matters of religion." This is the first recognition of the right of religious liberty, which we find in the charter provisions of any of the colonies, and does honor to the memory of the monarch from whom that charter was obtained. The principle for which so many trials had been undergone, for which so many lives had been periled and so many sacrifices had been made, was at length recognized under the royal seal. It was a proud triumph for the advocates of free principles, and illustrates the progress of human improvement. Yet it has been said by way of reproach that even in

Rhode Island the right of religious liberty was soon and shamefully invaded, by persecutions against the Catholics. If we look at the subject in its true light we cannot be surprised that it was so. We observe the same hostility to have existed in all the New England colonies against both the Catholics and English Episcopalians; and in palliation of it we would simply say that it was as much an object with our Pilgrim Fathers in coming to this continent, to plant and perpetuate their own peculiar views of government, as to acquire the liberty of worshipping God according to the dictates of their own consciences. They sought civil as well as religious liberty. They had been persecuted at home by both Catholics and Episcopalians. The peculiar tenets, political and religious, of the Church of Rome as well as the Church of England, were alike hostile to them. The several parties contended for altogether different principles, and neither could reasonably be expected at that day to tolerate the other; and, however graceless or illiberal, or inconsistent, it may appear to us, who have now no such enemies to liberty to contend with, had it not been for the stern, unyielding and uncompromising devotion of our forefathers to their own views of civil and religious liberty, New England, perhaps all America, might even to this day have been under the thraldom of an ecclesiastical hierarchy or the dominion of a crown. Before we permit ourselves to reprobate the intolerance of our forefathers, we must consider the age in which they lived, the circumstances under which they acted, and that the true principles of liberty of conscience were not then as well understood, or as generally disseminated, as they are now.

Rhode Island continued under this charter down to the time of our Revolution, and it is still regarded as

the fundamental basis of the constitution of government now existing in that State. The Governor, Assistants, and Delegates, sat as one house till the year 1696, when it was enacted that the house should be divided. The Governor and Assistants constituting the Upper branch, and the delegates the Lower branch.

Such was the origin, and such as we have successively detailed them, were the general governmental relations of the principal colonies embraced in the early history of New England. Causes mostly of a similar character led to a still further division and extension of their settlements. New sects springing up among them and finding their tenets little respected, went out and planted new Townships: thousands continued daily to throng its coasts, and pour into its territories, so that within a few years, more than one hundred and twenty towns and about forty churches were planted in New England. In the year 1637 the Crown became so alarmed at the rapidity of its growth, and the increase of its population and settlements, that a special proclamation was issued, prohibiting all masters of vessels transporting any person whatever without license from the Crown, or some magistrate. Among the number of those who had prepared to embark to these shores, and were prevented by this interposition of royal authority, was the celebrated Oliver Cromwell. He had actually set sail, but the vessel in which he had embarked, meeting with contrary and tempestuous winds, was driven back into port, and thus he became the subject of this interdict. When we think of his after career-his restless spirit-his sturdy and aspiring intellect we cannot help losing ourselves in speculating upon the probable consequences to America, to mankind, had he then carried his purposes into execu

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tion. But it was his career at home, the Revolution which he accomplished in England, which gave a new complexion to the condition of the colonies in America, and tended to stamp upon them still more indelibly the political features which they had already exhibited. Under his Protectorate laws were enacted bestowing upon them the most liberal benefits; and it was under the disturbances of his administration that they took occasion to form themselves into a confederacy, which formed a bond of Union never thereafter to be broken or sundered. Here we close the history of the NORTHERN COLONY OF VIRGINIA, or NEW ENGgland, which we have made the second part of our governmental history. It cannot be that we have gone over it without interest or instruction. We have seen a wild, inhospitable and cheerless shore, converted into a cheerful, inviting and growing garden of liberty and independence. We have seen the wilderness bud and blossom like the rose, and the solitary place made glad with the voices of industry, civilization, and religion. We have seen the pure principles of liberty and religion, thrown out from among the discordant elements of civil and ecclesiastical tyranny and usurpation, without a home or a resting place; defended only by the poor, the illiterate, the despised, and the persecuted; acquiring strength and energy in the darkest hour of their peril, till they awaken the interest and the regard of the opulent, the honorable, and the powerful. We have seen how the bonds of social union are originated and how its spirit is formed in its infant state. We have seen small communities of men, planting their feeble families on an unexplored continent; we have seen these families reared and transformed into large political bodies; and * have also remarked how, as they grew, the operative

principles of republicanism have successively developed themselves. While at the same time we have discovered by what a singular and peculiar instrumentality, and influenced by what causes, the characteristic qualities of this portion of our country have been originally developed and successively acquired. The survey should awaken the ardour and nerve the energy of our devotion to institutions so wisely framed, and with so much toil, so much sacrifice, so much care, so much blood, reared by our forefathers. It should teach us to appreciate and to prize the noble heritage they have conveyed to us. Above all it should rekindle our vigilance, and excite a jealousy of all, of any doctrines be they political or religious which tend, either in theory or in thought, to undermine the foundations which they have laid.

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