so as he went mourning and languishing daily; yet, attending to the means, and not giving over prayer, and seeking counsel, &c. he came at length to be freed from his temptations, and to find comfort in God's promises, and so, being received into the congregation, upon good proof of his understanding in the things of God, he went on cheerfully in a Christian course, falling daily to labour, as a servant, and as a younger brother of his did, who was no whit short of him in the knowledge of God's will, though his youth kept him from daring to offer himself to the congregation.'-Upon this occasion it is not im 1 Conjecture would confidently apply this anecdote to the writer's own family; for such minute relation could only be expected from a party. The 66 younger brother" was, no doubt, Deane, born March, 1622—3. Stephen, the governour's son, chiefly alluded to in the text, was, on 16 of this month, received as a member of the church. By his wife, Judith, he had, as I learn from Boston Records, two children, Stephen, born 7 November, 1644, and John, 24 May, 1646. They, probably, both died young. He went to England, as will be seen in the sequel of this History, either in the latter part of 1645, or in 1646, whence he did not return, I believe, but for a short period. I find a power of attorney from him to his brother John, 20 July, 1653, and a deed of 28 February, 1654-5, both executed here. He had before been a deputy, and was exposed in England to suit, because he had been recorder of a court, which gave an unsatisfactory judgment in the case of Alderman Berkley. In England he got forward in military and political life. He commanded a regiment, was a member of parliament in Oliver's time, for Scotland, as by letter of George Monk, 30 August, 1656, in Thurloe's State Papers, V. 366, appears; and, being a gentleman of sobriety, was much trusted by the protector. Roger Williams, in a letter to Gov. John of Connecticut, 21 February, 1655-6, gives him the news from England, "Your brother succeeds Major General Harrison." This was the exquisite enthusiast, who troubled Cromwell so much with his anticipation of a kingdom of the saints. He died early; for in our Registry of Deeds is one of 20 May, 1659, to John Leverett, from Judith in England, therein styled "relict of Stephen Winthrop.” I had supposed, when I wrote the note for his brother John, that the royal gratitude had been expressed to Stephen for assisting the preparation for the great change of 1660, knowing his influence so short a time before the restoration, and therefore postponed to this place the introduction of the following curiosity : BRUSSELLES, 6 or 8 April, 1660. I HAVE SO good information of the many good offices you have done for me, that I cannot doubt but you will continue the same affection, till you have perfected the work you have begun, which, you may be most assured, will be accompanied with such an acknowledgment from me, that all the world shall take notice of the sense I have of your kindness, and how great an instrument you have been in promoting the happiness of your country. I have no more to ask of you, but to proceed in the same way and method your own understanding suggests to you, and that you will believe I will always be Your affectionate friend, CHARLES R. pertinent (though no credit nor regard be to be had of dreams in these days) to report a dream, which the father of these children had at the same time, viz. that, coming into his chamber, he found his wife (she was a very gracious woman) in bed, and three or four of their children lying by her, with most sweet and smiling countenances, with crowns upon their heads, and *blue ribbons about their leaves.* When he awaked, he told his wife his dream, and made this interpretation of it, that God would take of her children to make them fellow heirs with Christ in his kingdom. [Large blank.] Satan bestirred himself to hinder the progress of the gospel, as, among other practices, appeared by this: He stirred up a spirit of jealousy between Mr. James, the pastor of Charlton, and many of his people, so as Mr. Nowell, and some others, who had been dismissed from Boston, began to question their fact of breaking from Boston, and it grew to such a principle of conscience among them, as the advice of the other ministers was taken in it, who, after two meetings, could not agree about their continuance or return. [Large blank.] One Mr. 2Morris, ensign to Capt. Underhill, taking some 66 The foregoing is folded in the common style of letters, but not superscribed, though it bears the royal signet on its wax. It has been since labelled, Regis Angliæ Epistola," and in another place, by a different hand,' "King Charles II. Letter to Gov. Winthrop." This letter, which is wholly in the king's hand-writing, has been preserved in the Winthrop family; but, the envelope being lost, it cannot be known to whom the honour was addressed. I now presume it was to John, the governour of Connecticut. As he had not been absent from New England, the service rendered must have been here, and the acknowledgment is, therefore, more honourable to him and to the sovereign. 1 It is to be regretted, that any jealousy arose in the infant church of Charlestown; yet if Nowell and others doubted the propriety of their separation from the brethren of Boston, we may ascribe their dissatisfaction to finding their pastor to be a man of less useful talents or amiable temper than had been expected. Few in the present age would attribute such a misfortune to the agency of Satan, who has been, says Jortin, "charged with many things, which perhaps he never did." But in our indictments for capital offences, we retained, until very recently, the absurd allegation, being moved and seduced by the instigation of the devil." 66 2 Richard Morris was a person of some consequence in the colony, and probably accompanied Winthrop in the fleet; for he and his wife early became members of the Boston church, being Nos. 64 and 5. He was in the military service, when a body of men, or at least of officers, was kept in pay, in 1632 and 3, as appears from the original account of William Pynchon, the treasurer, and became a deputy in the general court of March, 1635-6, I presume from Roxbury. Being unhappily of that party in religion, which distaste in his office, requested the magistrates, that he might be discharged of it, and so was, whereby he gave offence to the congregation of Boston, so as, being questioned and convinced of sin in forsaking his calling, he did acknowledge his fault, and, at the request of the people, was by the magistrates chosen lieutenant to the same company, for he was a very stout man and an experienced soldier. April 1.] Order was taken for ministering an oath to all house keepers and sojourners, being twenty years of age and not freemen, and for making a survey of the houses and lands of all freemen. Notice being sent out ||of|| the general court to be held the 14th day of the third month, called May, the freemen deputed two of each town to meet and consider of such matters as they were to take order in at the same general court; who, having met, desired a sight of the patent, and, conceiving thereby that all their laws should be made at the general court, repaired to the governour to advise with him about it, and about the abrogating of some orders formerly made, as for killing of swine in corn, &c. He told them, that, when the patent was granted, the number of freemen was supposed to be (as in like corporations) so few, as they might well join in making laws; but now they were grown to so great a body, as it was not possible for them to make or execute laws, but they must choose others for that purpose: and that howsoever it would be necessary hereafter to have a select company to intend that work, yet for the present they were not furnished with a sufficient number of men qualified for such a business, neither could the commonwealth bear the loss of time of so many as must intend it. Yet this they might do at present, viz. they might, at the general court, make an order, that, once in the year, a certain number should be appointed (upon summons from the governour) ||to|| favoured Wheelwright and his sister, Mrs. Hutchinson, he signed the petition in favour of the preacher, about which great controversy arose a few years after; and the legislature, 20 November, 1637, had ordered him, with the other dangerous schismaticks, to be disarmed, as in the history of that time will appear. On 6 September of next year, Col. Rec., I. 227, informs us, "Lieut. Morris had leave to depart, (having offended in subscribing the petition or remonstrance,) being advised to forbear meddling with our people in the matters of opinion, least they be farther dealt with; and was advised not to sit down within our limits, and was wished to warn the rest not to sit down within our limits." From this banishment, so gently expressed, for signing a memorial to the court eighteen months before, I know not that he returned. His retreat was Exeter, where, with many of his persecuted brethren, he formed the association, 4 October, 1639, which is preserved in Hazard, I. to revise all laws, &c. and to reform what they found amiss therein; but not to make any new laws, but prefer their griev ances to the court of assistants; and that no assessment should be laid upon the country without the consent of such a committee, nor any lands disposed of.1 1 No country on earth can afford the perfect history of any event more interesting to its own inhabitants than that which is here related. Winthrop seems to have spoken like an absolute sovereign, designing to grant a favour to his subjects, by admitting them to a representation at court. Such was the origin of most of the assemblies, in other nations, of delegates of the people, by whom some influence of the majority is imparted to the government. The enlargement of this kind of civil liberty to that perfect measure, enjoyed in Great Britain and our country, may be traced, with tolerable distinctness, for about five hundred years; but its commencement is very dimly discerned through the mists of antiquity. A long controversy on the origin of parliaments is indeed now at an end; but it terminated with a general acquiescence in that opinion, which assigned their beginning to nearly the same motives as our general courts of deputies. A natural inquiry arises, what induced this concert among the several towns to send deputies, or why the NOTICE mentioned in the text was given? Since nothing can be found in the Records, previous to this meeting of the deputies, the answer must be left to conjecture; and perhaps no conjecture can be more satisfactory, than that the assistants were become weary of the exercise of all the powers of government, and desired others to participate in the responsibility. For this, however cautious the language of our author, it appears to me very evidently designed. The very humble powers, he proposed that the representative should receive from his constituent, it is hardly necessary to add, were immediately transcended; and the assembly, as it ought, was ever afterwards by itself thought competent to the enaction of any regulation for the publick welfare. It seems proper to transcribe here the earliest mention in our Colony Records, I. 115, of any representation, other than that to raise a publick stock, of which ample notice is heretofore taken, in pages 70, 76: "It was further ordered, that it shall be lawful for the freemen of every plantation to choose two or three of each town, before every general court, to confer of and prepare such publick business as by them shall be thought fit to consider of at the next general court; and that such persons as shall be hereafter so deputed by the freemen of [the] several plantations, to deal in their behalf in the publick affairs of the commonwealth, shall have the full power and voice of all the said freemen derived to them for the making and establishing of laws, granting of lands, &c. and to deal in all other affairs of the commonwealth, wherein the free men have to do, the matter of election of magistrates and other officers only excepted, wherein every freeman is to give his own voice." This is one of the first acts of the representatives. The proceedings of this first general court of delegates, 14 May, 1634, begin on the preceding page, in the margin of which are the names of twenty-four persons, who were, I have no doubt, deputies from only eight towns, being not two, as the text has it, but three for each town. As the occasion is so interesting, it may be agreeable to the reader to have here inserted the names of the FIRST representatives of Massachusetts, in the same order as in the Record: “MR. GOODWIN, MR. Spencer, MR. TALCOTT; MR. FEAKES, Mr. Brown, MR. OLDHAM; MR. BEECHER, MR. PALMER, ROBERT MOULTON; MR. COXEALL, EDMOND QUINSEY, CAPT. JOHN UNDERHILL; JOHN JOHNSON, WILLIAM HEATH, MR. ALCOCK; MR. ISRAEL STOUGHTON, WILLIAM FELPES, GEORGE HULL; CAPT. TURNER, MR. WILLIS, Mr. Edward 3.] The governour went on foot to Agawam, and, because the people there wanted a minister, spent the Sabbath with them, and exercised by way of prophecy, and returned home the 10th. 20.] John 1Coggeshall, gentleman, being dismissed from the church of Roxbury to Boston, though he were well known and The TOMLINS; MR. HOLGRAVE, MR. CONANT, FRANCIS WESTON." Having taken a copy of the names of members in the first twenty-two courts, I may add, that the places in the lists are filled without regard to rank of the person, or age of the town. Hingham stands at the top as often as Salem; and those of the same town are not always written next to each other, though so much regularity is commonly found. Perhaps they were often entered by the secretary, as they came in to take their seats. At the courts in May, September, and November, 1637, all the Boston members are named last. This, I presume, was a punishment of their heresy, and regret, that it was not the only punishment. The ninth town, that sent deputies, was Ipswich, on 4 March next; and the right was extended to Weymouth at the court, 2 September following. Hingham members appear 25 May, 1636. In September after one from Newbury is found among the representatives; and in April following Concord has a place. 1 This gentleman was of high consideration, represented Boston in the first, second, third, sixth, seventh, eighth and ninth courts, in the Records of which his name is sometimes written by the secretary, as it was probably pronounced, Coxeall. He was elected for the twelfth, but, with Aspinwall, as we find, Col. Rec. I. 202, "affirming that Mr. Wheelwright is innocent, and that he was persecuted for the truth, was in like sort dismissed from being a member of the court, and order was given for two new deputies to be chosen by the town of Boston." Perhaps the ceremony, mentioned in the text, would have been dispensed with for himself; but his wife and a maid servant, Ann Shelley, were received, at the same time, from the neighbouring church, as I learn from the Records of our own. In general, communicants from other churches were received, in early times, with the same liberality as now prevails. At the same court from which he was expelled, 2 November, 1637, "being convented for disturbing the publick peace," he " was disfranchised, and enjoined not to speak any thing to disturb the publick peace, upon pain of banishment." He was exiled in March following, and retired with his blameless associates to Rhode Island, which they had just before purchased from the natives. In that peaceable settlement he became an assistant, and, in 1647, presided over the colony with a spirit of heterodox charity. See Callender, 30, 42. His son I presume to be the clerk of the general assembly of that colony in 1676. 2 Hist. Coll. VII. 112. Descendants in a right line remain to this day. In 1817 one was a representative in Massachusetts from Somerset, bordering on the state of Rhode Island; and, from some neighbouring ports, several masters of ships of this name have of late years been noticed. |