But to return to the persecutions of Massachusetts. “The union of church and state,” says Bancroft justly, “was fast corrupting both; it mingled base ambition with the former; it gave a false direction to the legislation of the latter. The creation of a national, uncompromising church led the congregationalists of Massachusetts to the indulgence of the passions which had disgraced their English persecutors. Laud was justified by the men whom he had wronged.” If Roger Williams and Anne Hutchinson, whose views and opinions were comparatively calm and conventional, called forth the vehemence of reprobation from the churches of Massachusetts, what mercy or forbearance could be expected for the fanatical, early Quakers, whose zeal almost approached to insanity? None. In July, 1656, two quaker preachers, whose names, to use their own phraseology, “according to the flesh,” were Mary Fisher and Ann Austin, arrived at Boston. No law as yet existed against the Quakers; but under the statutes of heresy their trunks were searched, and “though no token could be found on them, but of innocence,” their books were burned by the hangman and their persons examined for signs of witchcraft. After five weeks’ close imprisonment, they were thrust out of the colony; together with eight others who arrived during the year. Mary Fisher, nothing daunted by her reception among the Christians, turned her views toward the Turks, and proceeded alone to Adrianople, where she delivered to the grand Sultan the message which she believed entrusted to her by heaven. The Turks, more Christian than the New England Christians, deemed her insane, and she went through their army “without hurt or scoff.”