The Baptists early appeared in New England, but it was not until 1665 that Massachusetts permitted their organization into churches, and not until 1700, only eight years before the Saybrook Platform, that Cotton Mather wrote of them, "We are willing to acknowledge for our brethren as many of them as are willing to be acknowledged." In her dislike of them, Massachusetts had the full sympathy of Connecticut. And it was with great dissatisfaction that the authorities of the latter colony saw these dissenters, early in the eighteenth century, crossing the Rhode Island boundary to settle within her territory. Accordingly, in 1704, the General Court of Connecticut refused them permission to incorporate in church estate. When in the following year, in spite of the legislature's refusal, they organized a church at Groton under Valentine Wightman,[b] the Assembly proceeded to inflict the full penalties of the law. While the Baptists had cheerfully paid all secular taxes, they had made themselves liable to fines and imprisonments by their refusal, on the ground of conscience, to pay the ecclesiastical ones, and, as they continued to refuse, fines and imprisonment and even flogging became their portion. Governor Saltonstall, mild in his personal attitude toward the three other groups of dissenters, thoroughly disapproved of the Baptists, seeming to fear their growing influence in New England and their increasing importance in the mother country. He believed in a policy of restriction and oppression toward the mere handful of them that had settled within his jurisdiction. Apart from the main body of the Baptists, there were in Connecticut a number of Seventh-day Baptists and Rogerine Baptists or Rogerine Quakers. There were a very few of them,--not more than a dozen in 1680.[c] Setting aside the earliest persecution of the Quakers, these Rogerines were the first dissenters to fall under the displeasure of the Connecticut authorities. They were the first to be systematically fined, whipped, and imprisoned for conducting themselves contrary to the laws for the support and honor of the Connecticut Establishment. For this reason, though they were weak in numbers and often an exasperating set of fanatics, they deserve a hearing. Their persecution began about 1677, while these people were chiefly resident in New London and the Seventh-day men were mostly members of the Rogers family. Later, the Rogerines spread to Norwich and Lebanon and their immediate vicinity.