6. Among that division of the non-conformists called Puritans was a little congregation at Scrooby, a town in north England. The pastor was John Robinson, wise, kind, dignified, scholarly; and his helper in church work and government was Elder William Brewster, a college man who had served at the royal court. For the rest, the congregation were mainly Bible-reading farmers, who wished only to live in peace according to Bible teaching. Royal servants were watchful, and an open church was out of the question; but every Sunday they met for service wherever they could, sometimes in Elder Brewster's big house, sometimes out-doors, anywhere so that they might listen to their beloved pastor. During the week they worked their farms, thinking and talking of the iniquities of the Catholics, the impurities of the Episcopalians, the hard ways that beset the Puritans, and the righteous God who looked down upon it all to record and avenge. 7. Quiet as such a simple church in a corner of England must have been, it was not left undisturbed. Priests of the dominant church and officers of the civil service soon pounced down with the demand that the Puritan farmers stop all this "new-fangledness," and return to the ways of the loyal church. John Robinson's people, however, had no notion of giving up their new-fangledness. They possessed a full share of English obstinacy, and, backed in it by their consciences, were not likely to surrender at once. So their troubles began. They were hunted and persecuted on every side. Some were clapped into prisons, others had their houses beset and watched night and day, and hardly escaped their hands, and the most were fain to fly and leave their houses and habitations and the means of their livelihood. 8. What shall we do? thought the distressed farmers. We can not live in such persecution. We will have to go away. Give up? Indeed, no! We shall not belie our consciences for any man. Since God is behind us, we _will not_ conform. And, under opposition and injustice, Puritan lips set themselves rigid, Puritan hearts closed against the persecutors, strong reaction from the beautiful ceremonies and graceful living that could hide such unbrotherliness became almost worship of unloveliness and hardship. In after years the lives of their descendants were shaped into a narrow severity, not drawn from the sweetness and light of the gospel which they read, but from the bitter fountains of their early sufferings and wrongs.