After the Restoration, however, they felt bound to bestir themselves in political affairs, and in June 1661 their general court sent a petition to Charles II., asking him to confirm their liberties, explaining to him that they were his faithful subjects "who did hither transport ourselves to serve our God with a pure conscience, according to His will revealed, not a three days' journey as Moses, but near three thousand miles into a vast howling wilderness, inhabited only by barbarians." They concluded their petition in the quaintest words, saying that if only the King will grant their wishes, "we say with him, it is enough, our Joseph (or rather) our Charles is yet alive."[110] The poverty of the Plymouth brethren about this time is evidenced by their lack of funds necessary for the renewal of their charter in 1665; and also in the fact that the people were not able to maintain scholars for their ministers, "but are necessitated to make use of a gifted brother in some places."[111] Nevertheless in this same year they are computed to have had a fighting force of 2500 men; and on two later occasions (1676 and 1690) they were strong enough to make strenuous but ineffectual attempts to obtain a charter from the Crown. The little colony that has perhaps the proudest of all positions in American history was finally, in 1691, merged in its more arrogant and pushing neighbour Massachusetts, and the land of the Pilgrim Fathers lost its identity. Just as Puritanism had been the cause of the foundation of New Plymouth, so it was in the case of Massachusetts. Lord Macaulay has pointed out that "the Puritan was made up of two different men, the one all self-abasement, penitent gratitude, passion; the other proud, calm, inflexible, sagacious."[112] The first type represented New Plymouth, where Puritanism was distressed, and where its followers struggled manfully but were self-abased. Massachusetts, on the other hand, resembled the second type; here Puritanism was vigorous; the upholders of the belief were aggressive, strong, determined, and pushing. Thus the two colonies were not only different in character, but for that very reason were destined to differ in prosperity.