These several plantations continued, for many years, to live on good terms with the natives, and were generally well supplied with provisions, in consequence of their advantages for fishery. They constituted distinct civil communities, after the most perfect model of freedom, but were unable to preserve their peculiar organization, on account of the intrusion of disaffected individuals, from the colonies of Massachusetts and Plymouth, and the constant influx of other emigrants. They were too weak thus to stand alone, and, after suitable negociations on the subject, they came under the jurisdiction of Massachusetts, in 1641, on the condition of enjoying equal privileges with the people of that colony, and having a court of justice maintained among themselves. This union continued nearly forty years, and was followed by the greater increase and security of the colony.[13] The rise of the colony of RHODE ISLAND commenced in the expulsion of Roger Williams from Massachusetts. He was a minister of the Gospel at Salem; but, holding tenets that were obnoxious to the people there, and being unwilling to renounce them, after friendly remonstrance and dealing, he was ordered to quit the jurisdiction of Massachusetts. He accordingly took his exile thence, and traveling, with his few followers, as far as the present town of Rehoboth, he sat down there; but, being within the jurisdiction of Plymouth, Governor Winslow, out of courtesy to the government of Massachusetts, desired Mr. Williams to leave that place. The latter, then crossing the Pawtucket river, came to the spot which, in acknowledgment of God's merciful providence to him in his distress, he called 'Providence.' He purchased the lands of his plantation of the Indian owners, became the father of the colony, and, for a period, appeared to have combined, in his person, the principal powers of government. Times of scarcity occurred in the Providence plantation, as in most of the other colonies in North America, and the followers of Mr. Williams were saved from famine only by the products of their forests and rivers. No personal resentment seems to have arisen between Mr. Williams and Governor Winthrop, from the proceedings which led to the founding of the new settlement. All the several colonies remained at peace, and cultivated friendship with each other.