On the 28th of July, 1629, while Winthrop and his friends were debating their removal to New England, Mathew Cradock, a wealthy and liberal merchant, who held the office of governor, or, as we should say, president, of the Massachusetts Company, read in a "general court" or meeting of the company "certain propositions conceived by himself," as it is carefully recorded. He proposed "that for the advancement of the plantation, the inducing and encouraging persons of worth, quality and rank to transplant themselves and families thither and for other weighty reasons"--reasons which probably it was not thought best to spread upon the records, but which were the core of the whole matter--for these reasons Cradock proposed to "transfer the government of the plantation to those that shall inhabit there," and not to continue it in subordination to a commercial company in London. The sorrows of the Virginia colony under the administration of Sir Thomas Smyth and the disagreements between the Pilgrims and their "adventurers" in London had taught a wholesome lesson. Three years earlier Sir Francis Wyatt, the best of all the early governors of Virginia, had set forth in an elaborate report that the principal cause of the "slow proceeding of the growth of the plantation" was that the government had been divided between England and Virginia. Massachusetts escaped from this embarrassment. X. [Sidenote: Evolution of the Mass. government.] [Sidenote: Hubbard, chap. xviii.] [Sidenote: Note 7.] The evolution of the Massachusetts government may now be traced through its several stages. A company was formed, partly of Dorchester men, but chiefly of residents of London. This company secured a patent to lands in Massachusetts Bay from the Council for New England. The patentees intended both a commercial enterprise and a Puritan settlement. They sent Endecott, one of their number, as agent or superintendent, with a company of servants and others, to prepare the way for the migration of other patentees. In March, 1628, they secured a liberal charter from the king, which gave them the right to establish in Massachusetts a government subordinate to the company. The plan was to settle a government in the form rendered familiar by that of the Virginia Company. The Massachusetts Company in London sent a commission to Endecott as governor on the place, subject to the orders of the company in England. A council of assistants was associated with him, but there was as yet no provision for giving the people a voice in the government. [Sidenote: The change of plan.]