Rhode Island, as well as Connecticut, received a charter of the most liberal character from Charles. Ever the advocate of the enfranchisement of the mind, they had pleaded, in 1658, with the English Commonwealth, “that they might not be compelled to exercise any civil power over men’s consciences, which,” urged they, “we judge no less than a point of absolute cruelty;” and again, addressing the restored monarch, they besought that they might be enabled “to hold forth a lively experiment that a most flourishing civil state may stand, and best be maintained, with a full liberty of religious concernments.” And Charles listened to their request; and Clarendon himself seconded it, and that noble charter, more liberal even than that of Connecticut, was granted, which Roger Williams says, “startled his majesty’s high officers of state, who, against their will, signed it, fearing the lion’s roaring.” And Rhode Island, as Roger Williams had prayed might be the case, became a secure home for liberty of conscience. “No person within the said colony,” it was enacted, “at any time hereafter shall be anywise molested, punished, disquieted, or called in question for any differences in opinion in matters of religion; but that all and every person may at all times hereafter freely and fully have and enjoy his and their own judgments and consciences, in matters of religious concernments.” There was no restriction here as regarded Jesuits or Pagans; the spirit of this charter was broader even than that of Maryland, which, disregarding distinction of sect and party, still required belief in Christ. It is a grand lesson to the narrowsouled religionist, whether he be Episcopalian or Calvinist, who deals damnation freely to all who differ from him, that in two states, the one founded by a Catholic, the other by the holders of every kind of heresy, the noblest principles of Christianity, _forbearance_ and _love_, were alone acknowledged as the true foundations of religion. [Illustration: BAXTER PRESENTING THE CHARTER OF RHODE ISLAND.] The liberty thus granted, spite of the assertion that quakerism fled from the Rhode Island colony because it was tolerated there, caused quakerism to have there its first home in the New World. Governor Coddington joined the society and died a member of it. The yearly meeting of the Quakers was held at his house till his death; and the first meeting-house of that body was built at Newport, on Rhode Island. George Fox himself, in 1672, visited his “Friends” there, and committed to them “the firm support of the good of the people.” The creative power of good in the colony he declared to be the instruction of all the people in their rights; “you are the unworthiest men upon earth,” added he, “if you do lose the liberty wherewith Christ hath made you free in life and glory,”—for he and his early Friends regarded Christianity, taken in its own broad and catholic spirit, as the great emancipator of the human race.