"The first Church meeting after my settlement was in August 4, 1713, in the meeting-house. It was occasioned by the notoriously scandalous life of James Penniman, a member of the Church, though not in full communion. The crimes charged upon him and proved were his unchristian carriage towards his wife, and frequent excessive drinking. He behaved himself very insolently before the church when allowed to speak in vindication of himself, and was far from discovering any signs of true repentance. He was unanimously voted guilty and laid under solemn admonition by the Church." The next entry is one of eight years later, and reads as follows:-- "1721. Samuel Hayward was suspended from the Lord's supper by the Brethren for his disorderly behaviour in word and deed, and his incorrigibleness therein." Up to this time it had been the custom of the Braintree church that any person "propounded" for membership should, before being admitted, give an oral or written relation of his or her religious experience,--a practice in strict accordance with the usage then prevailing, with perhaps a few exceptions, throughout Massachusetts.[6] The record, under date of December 31, 1721, contains the following in relation to this:-- "Dr. Belcher's son Joseph, junior Sophister, [admitted.] He made the last Relation, before the brethren consented to lay aside Relations. "Because some persons of a sober life and good conversation have signified their unwillingness to join in full communion with the Church, unless they may be admitted to it without making a Public Relation of their spiritual experiences, which (they say) the Church has no warrant in the word of God to require, it was therefore proposed to the Church the last Sacrament-day that they would not any more require a Relation as above said from any person who desired to partake in the Ordinance of the Lord's Supper with us, and after the case had been under debate at times among the brethren privately for the space of three weeks, the question was put to them January 28 1721/2 being on a Lord's Day Evening in the Meeting-house, whether they would any more insist upon the making a Relation as a necessary Term of full communion with them? "It passed in the negative by a great majority." Two months later the case of James Penniman again presented itself. It was now nearly nine years since he had been solemnly admonished; and on the 4th of April, 1722,--