So perished the Puritan Commonwealth. The child of the Reformation, its life sprang from the assertion of the freedom of the mind; but this great and noble principle is fatal to the temporal power of a priesthood, and during the supremacy of the clergy the government was doomed to be both persecuting and repressive. Under no circumstance could the theocracy have endured: it must have fallen by revolt from within if not by attack from without. That Charles II. did in fact cause its overthrow gives him a claim to our common gratitude, for he then struck a decisive blow for the emancipation of Massachusetts; and thus his successor was enabled to open before her that splendid career of democratic constitutional liberty which was destined to become the basis of the jurisprudence of the American Union. CHAPTER VII. THE WITCHCRAFT. The history of the years between the dissolution of the Company of Massachusetts Bay and the reorganization of the country by William III. in 1692 has little bearing upon the development of the people; for the presidency of Dudley and the administration of Andros were followed by a revolution that paralyzed all movement. During the latter portion of this interval the colony was represented at London by three agents, of whom Increase Mather was the most influential, who used every effort to obtain the reëstablishment of the old government; they met, however, with insuperable obstacles. Quietly to resume was impossible; for the obstinacy of the clergy, in refusing all compromise with Charles II., had caused the patent to be cancelled; and thus a new grant had become necessary. Nor was this all, for the attorney and solicitor general, with whom the two chief justices concurred, [Footnote: _Parentator_, p. 139] gave it as their opinion that, supposing no decree had been rendered, and the same powers were exercised as before, a writ of _scire facias_ would certainly be issued, upon which a similar judgment would inevitably be entered. These considerations, however, became immaterial, as the king was a statesman, and had already decided upon his policy. His views had little in common with those held by the Massachusetts ecclesiastics, and when the Rev. Mr. Mather first read the instrument in which they had been embodied, he declared he “would sooner part with his life than consent unto such minutes.” [Footnote: _Parentator_, p. 134.] He grew calmer, however, when told that his “consent was not expected nor desired;” and with that energy and decision for which he was remarkable, at once secured the patronage.