12. After a trial, Williams was condemned for heresy and banished. In
mid-winter he left home and became an exile in the forest. For fourteen
weeks he wandered through the snow, sleeping on the ground or in a
hollow tree, living on parched corn and acorns. He carried with him a
private letter from the good Governor Winthrop, and the Indians showed
him kindness. Wandering from place to place, in June of 1636 he became
the founder of Rhode Island by laying out the city of PROVIDENCE.
13. In 1634 a representative form of government was established in
Massachusetts. The restriction on the right of suffrage was the only
remaining bar to free government in New England. During the next year
three thousand new immigrants arrived. It was worth while to come to a
country where the principles of freedom were recognized.
14. New settlements were now formed at a distance from the bay. One
company of twelve families marched through the woods to some open
meadows sixteen miles from Boston, and there founded Concord. Another
colony of sixty persons pressed their way westward to the Connecticut
River, and became the founders of Windsor, HARTFORD, and Wethersfield.
15. The banishment of Roger Williams created strife among the people
of Massachusetts. The ministers were stern and exacting. Still, the
advocates of free opinion multiplied. The clergy, notwithstanding their
great influence, felt insecure. Religious debates became the order of
the day. Every sermon was reviewed and criticised.
16. Prominent among those who were accused of heresy was Mrs. Anne
Hutchinson, who desired the privilege of speaking at the weekly
debates, and was refused. Indignant at this, she became the champion of
her sex, and declared that the ministers were no better than Pharisees.
She called meetings of her friends, and pleaded with fervor for the
freedom of conscience. The doctrines of Williams were reaffirmed with
more power and eloquence than ever.
17. The synod of New England convened in August of 1637, and Mrs.
Hutchinson and her friends were banished from Massachusetts. A large
number of the exiles wended their way toward the home of Roger
Williams. Miantonomah, a Narragansett chieftain, made them a gift of
the island of Rhode Island; there, in 1641, a little republic was
established, in which persecution, for opinion's sake, was forbidden.
[Sidenote: =Harvard College Founded.=]
18. In 1636 the general court of the colony passed an act appropriating
between one and two thousand dollars to found a college. Newtown was
selected as the site of the proposed school. Plymouth and Salem gave
gifts to help the enterprise; and from villages in the Connecticut
valley came contributions of corn and wampum. In 1638 John Harvard,
a minister of Charlestown, died, bequeathing his library and nearly
five thousand dollars to the school. To perpetuate his memory, the new
institution was named HARVARD COLLEGE. At the same time the name of
Newtown was changed to Cambridge.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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