The ministers got together in secret session and decided that Anne Hutchinson must be subdued. She was a usurper upon their preserve, a trespasser and an interloper. Fear was the rock upon which they split. And I am not sure but that fear is the only rock in life's channel. Mrs. Hutchinson had told them that sermons, prayers and hymns were mere "works," and that a person could do all that they demanded and still be a thief and a rogue at heart, and that this close attention to conduct meant eventual hypocrisy. On the other hand, if your mental attitude was right, your conduct would be right. "Even though it is wrong?" asked the Reverend Mr. Wilson. And Anne Hutchinson replied, "Aye, verily." "Then you say that you can commit no sin?" "If my heart is right, I can not sin." "Is your heart right?" "I am trying to make it so." "Then you can commit any act you wish?" "Whatever I wish to do will be right, if my heart is right." "But suppose, now--" and here these clergymen asked questions which no gentleman ever asks a lady. These men had a fine faculty for misunderstanding, misinterpreting, and misrepresenting other people's thoughts. John Cotton tried to pour oil on the troubled waters by explaining that the idea of a Covenant of Grace was general, and to make it specific was unjust and unreasonable. Then they turned on Cotton and said, "So, you are one of them?" Anne Hutchinson was ordered not to speak in public. She still held meetings at her own house, and claimed she had the right to ask her friends to her home and there to talk to them. She it was who instituted the Boston Thursday Lecture, which was taken up by John Cotton and carried by an apostolic succession to the crowning days of its success, when Adirondack Murray reigned supreme. Mrs. Hutchinson spoke to all the women the house would hold. The Colony was divided into two parts: those who believed in a Covenant of Grace and those who held to a Covenant of Works. John Cotton seemed to be the only clergyman of the eight who realized that both sides were right. Anne Hutchinson quoted him, told what he had said in England, as well as here--and then John Cotton had to defend himself. He did it by criticizing her, and then by accusing her of taking his words too literally. He feared the mob. The breach widened--he denounced her. Winthrop was against her, and Cotton saw defeat for himself if he longer stood by her. She was a good woman, but she must be suppressed for the good of the Colony. With the consent of Cotton, and Wilson, his colleague, these two men, being joint ministers to the Boston church, made formal charges of heresy against her.