congregation in Southwark, which was the original starting-point of a society now living and flourishing. In 1616 Henry Jacob became pastor of this church, followed by John Lathrop, who came to America in 1634, and was settled over the church in Scituate. The Southwark church was until recently under the charge of Rev. John Waddington, who for many years has been assiduous in his efforts to trace back the current of Pilgrim history. Francis Johnson, soon after the organization of his church, was banished from England, and became pastor of a banished church in Amsterdam, and there “caused the same books which he had been an instrument to burn to be new printed and set out at his own charge.” But in this onward movement of Separatism it may be asked, what was the attitude of Puritanism? It must not be supposed, because Separatists were Puritans, that Puritans were Separatists, or that there was the slightest sympathy or friendship between the two. The Separatists pushed to the extremes of reform, and denounced those who tarried by the way. The Puritans, loyal to the Church establishment, while protesting against objectionable forms, were waiting for their correction in conformity with law, and the Separatists found no opponents more vigorous or hostile than those within their ranks. In the Parliament of 1593, in which the Puritan element predominated in the Commons, the most direct and positive law was enacted which the Separatists encountered in the whole history of their persecutions. In that Parliament the spiritual lords, who held the control in the Upper House, sent down to the Commons an act imposing the severest penalties on all Nonconformists, which the Puritans succeeded in so far modifying as to exclude themselves from its operation, and to substitute for the Separatist the punishment of banishment. Up to that time persecutions had been conducted under a forced construction of the act of 23 Elizabeth, intended, when enacted, to apply to papists only, which made writing or speaking against the bishops the same as seditious matter against the Queen. The odium incurred by the bishops in consequence rendered, in their opinion, a new law necessary, which should have a direct application to that class of recusants, who in the progress of time had become more dangerous than the papists to the stability of the Church. It has been claimed, in defense of the Puritans, that this act was a compromise with the House of Lords, and really substituted in behalf of the Separatists the milder punishment of banishment for that of a felon’s death. But it was really no compromise at all. The new law was a direct and positive enactment, purporting to explain, but not repeal, the old law. The old law remained in force, and would have been as potent as ever if the Queen and the bishops had seen fit to use it as an instrument of persecution.