On the establishment of the Company of New France, or the Hundred Associates, Protestants were entirely excluded. By its constitution no Huguenots were allowed to settle within the domain of the company. If this rule was not suggested by Champlain, it undoubtedly existed by his decided and hearty concurrence. The mingling of Catholics and Huguenots in the early history of the colony had brought with it numberless annoyances. By sifting the wheat before it was sown, it was hoped to get rid of an otherwise inevitable cause of irritation and trouble. The correctness of the principle of Christian toleration was not admitted by the Roman church then any more than it is now. Nor did the Protestants of that period believe in it, or practise it, whenever they possessed the power to do otherwise. Even the Puritans of Massachusetts Bay held that their charter conferred upon them the right and power of exclusion. It was not easy, it is true, to carry out this view by square legal enactment without coming into conflict with the laws of England; but they were adroit and skilful, endowed with a marvellous talent for finding some indirect method of laying a heavy hand upon Friend or Churchman, or the more independent thinkers among their own numbers, who desired to make their abode within the precincts of the bay. In the earlier years of the colony at Quebec, when Protestant and Catholic were there on equal terms, Champlain's religious associations led him to swerve neither to the right hand nor to the left. His administration was characterized by justice, firmness, and gentleness, and was deservedly satisfactory to all parties. In his later years, the little colony upon whose welfare and Christian culture he had bestowed so much cheerful labor and anxious thought, became every day more and more dear to his heart. Within the ample folds of his charity were likewise encircled the numerous tribes of savages, spread over the vast domains of New France. He earnestly desired that all of them, far and near, friend and foe, might be instructed in the doctrines of the Christian faith, and brought into willing and loving obedience to the cross. In its personal application to his own heart, the religion of Champlain was distinguished by a natural and gradual progress. His warmth, tenderness, and zeal grew deeper and stronger with advancing years. In his religious life there was a clearly marked seed-time, growth, and ripening for the harvest. After his return to Quebec, during the last three years of his life, his time was especially systematized and appropriated for intellectual and spiritual improvement. Some portion was given every morning by himself and those who constituted his family to a course of historical reading, and in the evening to the memoirs of the saintly dead whose lives he regarded as suitable for the imitation of the living, and each night for himself he devoted more or less time to private meditation and prayer.