Thus accomplished were many of the first planters of these colonies.--It may be thought polite and fashionable, by many modern fine gentlemen, perhaps, to deride the characters of these persons as enthusiastical, superstitious and republican: But such ridicule is founded in nothing but foppery and affectation, and is grosly injurious and false.----Religious to some degree of enthusiasm, it may be admitted they were; but this can be no peculiar derogation from their character, because it was at that time almost the universal character, not only of England but of Christendom. Had this however been otherwise, their enthusiasm, considering the principles in which it was founded, and the ends to which it was directed, far from being a reproach to them, was greatly to their honour: for I believe it will be found universally true, that no great enterprize, for the honour or happiness of mankind, was ever atchieved without a large mixture of that noble infirmity. Whatever imperfections may be justly ascribed to them, which however are as few as any mortals have discovered, their judgment in framing their policy was founded in wise, humane and benevolent principles. It was founded in revelation and in reason too: It was consistent with the principles of the best, and greatest, and wisest legeslators of antiquity.----Tyranny in every form, shape and appearance, was their disdain and abhorrence; no fear of punishment, nor even of death itself, in exquisite tortures, had been sufficient to conquer that steady, manly, pertinacious spirit, with which they had opposed the tyrants of those days, in church and state. They were very far from being enemies to monarchy; and they knew as well as any men, the just regard and honour that is due to the character of a dispenser of the mysteries of the gospel of grace: But they saw clearly, that popular powers must be placed as a guard, a controul, a balance, to the powers of the monarch and the priest in every government; or else it would soon become the man of sin, the whore of Babylon, the mystery of iniquity, a great and detestable system of fraud, violence and usurpation. Their greatest concern seems to have been to establish a government of the church more consistent with the Scriptures, and a government of the state more agreeable to the dignity of human nature, than any they had seen in Europe: and to transmit such a government down to their posterity, with the means of securing and preserving it for ever. To render the popular power in their new government as great and wise as their principles of theory, i. e. as human nature and the christian religion require it should be, they endeavoured to remove from it as many of the feudal inequalities and dependencies as could be spared, consistently with the preservation of a mild limited monarchy. And in this they discovered the depth of their wisdom, and the warmth of their friendship to human nature.--But the first place is due to