America as a Religious Refuge: The Seventeenth Century Part 2

I. America as a Religious Refuge:
The Seventeenth Century

[ PART 1 ] [ PART 2 ]

PERSECUTION IN AMERICA

The Bloudy Tenent of Persecution Expelled from Massachusetts in the dead of winter in 1636, former Puritan leader Roger Williams (1603-1683) issued an impassioned plea for freedom of conscience. He wrote, "God requireth not an uniformity of Religion to be inacted and inforced in any civill state; which inforced uniformity (sooner or later) is the greatest occasion of civill Warre, ravishing of conscience, persecution of Christ Jesus in his servants, and of hypocrisy and destruction of millions of souls." Williams later founded Rhode Island on the principle of religious freedom. He welcomed people of every shade of religious belief, even some regarded as dangerously misguided, for nothing could change his view that "forced worship stinks in God's nostrils." The Bloudy Tenent of Persecution, for cause of Conscience, discussed in a Conference between Truth and Peace. . . .  Roger Williams, 1644 Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress (19) Execution of Quakers Mary Dyer (d. 1660) first ran afoul of Massachusetts authorities for supporting theological dissenter Anne Hutchinson. As a result Dyer and her family were forced to move to Rhode Island in 1638. Converted to Quakerism in England in the 1650s, Dyer returned to New England and was three times arrested and banished from Massachusetts for spreading Quaker principles. Returning to Massachusetts a fourth time, she was hanged on June 1, 1660. Mary Dyer led to execution on Boston Common, 1 June 1660 Color engraving. Copyprint Nineteenth Century Courtesy of The Granger Collection, New York (20)

Although they were victims of religious persecution in Europe, the Puritans supported the Old World theory that sanctioned it, the need for uniformity of religion in the state. Once in control in New England, they sought to break "the very neck of Schism and vile opinions." The "business" of the first settlers, a Puritan minister recalled in 1681, "was not Toleration, but [they] were professed enemies of it." Puritans expelled dissenters from their colonies, a fate that in 1636 befell Roger Williams and in 1638 Anne Hutchinson, America's first major female religious leader. Those who defied the Puritans by persistently returning to their jurisdictions risked capital punishment, a penalty imposed on four Quakers between 1659 and 1661. Reflecting on the seventeenth century's intolerance, Thomas Jefferson was unwilling to concede to Virginians any moral superiority to the Puritans. Beginning in 1659 Virginia enacted anti-Quaker laws, including the death penalty for refractory Quakers. Jefferson surmised that "if no capital execution took place here, as did in New England, it was not owing to the moderation of the church, or the spirit of the legislature."

Intolerance in Virginia In his Notes on the State of Virginia, Thomas Jefferson reflected on the religious intolerance in seventeenth-century Virginia, specifically on the anti-Quaker laws passed by the Virginia Assembly from 1659 onward. Jefferson apparently believed that it was no more than an historical accident that Quakers had not been physically punished or even executed in Virginia as they had been in Massachusetts. Notes on the State of Virginia [left page] [right page] Thomas Jefferson New York: M. L. and W. A. Davis, 1801 Rare Book and Special Collections, Library of Congress (21)

JEWS FIND A REFUGE IN AMERICA

For some decades Jews had flourished in Dutch-held areas of Brazil, but a Portuguese conquest of the area in 1654 confronted them with the prospect of the introduction of the Inquisition, which had already burned a Brazilian Jew at the stake in 1647. A shipload of twenty-three Jewish refugees from Dutch Brazil arrived in New Amsterdam (soon to become New York) in 1654. By the next year, this small community had established religious services in the city. By 1658 Jews had arrived in Newport, Rhode Island, also seeking religious liberty. Small numbers of Jews continued to come to the British North American colonies, settling mainly in the seaport towns. By the time of the Declaration of Independence, Jewish settlers had established several thriving synagogues.

Touro Synagogue Designed by Peter Harrison, constructed in 1762, and dedicated in 1763, Touro Synagogue is considered an architectural masterpiece. It is the sole surviving synagogue built in colonial America. Touro Synagogue, Newport, Rhode Island. Photograph by Jack Boucher, 1971. Copyprint, Historic American Buildings Survey, Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress (22)

Torah Breastplate A breastplate is an ornamental covering for the Torah, designed in imitation of the breastplate worn by the High Priest, as described in the book of Exodus. Breastplates, similar to the one seen here, were used in colonial synagogues. Torah Breastplate Gilt silver c. 1810 Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany Touro Synagogue, Newport, Rhode Island (24) Matza Board During the colonial period, this board was used at Touro Synagogue to prepare the dough for Matzoh (unleavened bread) used in the Passover season. Matza board Wood Eighteenth Century Touro Synagogue, Newport, Rhode Island (25)

THE QUAKERS

William Penn A youthful William Penn (1644-1718) portrayed in armor suggests that at this point in his career he may have been considering following his father into a military profession. Soon after this portrait was made, Penn became a member of the Society of Friends, one of whose fundamental tenets was the renunciation of force.  William Penn (age 22), 1666 Oil on canvas Eighteenth-century copy of a seventeenth-century portrait, possibly by Sir Peter Lely Historical Society of Pennsylvania (26) Penn's Frame of Government In his famous charter of religious liberty, William Penn pledged that all citizens who believed in "One Almighty and eternal God . . . shall in no wayes be molested or prejudiced for their Religious Perswasion or Practice in matters of Faith and Worship, nor shall they be compelled at any time to frequent or maintain any Religious Worship, Place or Ministry whatever." Pennsylvania became a reference point a century later for Americans opposing plans for government-supported religion. "Witness the state of Pennsylvania," a group of Virginians urged its House of Delegates in 1785, "wherein no such [religious] Establishment hath taken place; their Government stands firm and which of the neighbouring States has Members of brighter Morals and more upright Characters." The Frame of the Government of the Province of Pennsilvania in America, 1682 William Penn England: William Bradford, before 1689 Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress (27)

The Quakers (or Religious Society of Friends) formed in England in 1652 around a charismatic leader, George Fox (1624-1691). Many scholars today consider Quakers as radical Puritans, because the Quakers carried to extremes many Puritan convictions. They stretched the sober deportment of the Puritans into a glorification of "plainness." Theologically, they expanded the Puritan concept of a church of individuals regenerated by the Holy Spirit to the idea of the indwelling of the Spirit or the "Light of Christ" in every person. Such teaching struck many of the Quakers' contemporaries as dangerous heresy. Quakers were severely persecuted in England for daring to deviate so far from orthodox Christianity. By 1680, 10,000 Quakers had been imprisoned in England, and 243 had died of torture and mistreatment in the King's jails. This reign of terror impelled Friends to seek refuge in New Jersey in the 1670s, where they soon became well entrenched. In 1681, when Quaker leader William Penn (1644-1718) parlayed a debt owed by Charles II to his father into a charter for the province of Pennsylvania, many more Quakers were prepared to grasp the opportunity to live in a land where they might worship freely. By 1685 as many as 8,000 Quakers had come to Pennsylvania. Although the Quakers may have resembled the Puritans in some religious beliefs and practices, they differed with them over the necessity of compelling religious uniformity in society.

Quaker Meeting This undated image depicts a feature of Quaker religious practice that made early Friends so repugnant to other denominations: their insistence on equality for women, including the right--in defiance of the apostle Paul's injunctions--to speak in Meeting for Worship and to preach the Gospel.  Philadelphia: Quäkerkirche. Wood engraving from Ernst von Hesse Wartegg, Nord-Amerika, seine Stadt und Naturwunder, das Land und seine Bewohner in Schilderung. Leipzig: 1888. General Collections, Library of Congress (28) Quaker Book of Discipline This collection of "advices" on the behavior of American Quakers was a compilation of guidelines covering every aspect of Quaker life. These advices were periodically issued between 1682 and 1763 by the highest institutional authority in American Quakerism, the Yearly Meeting. This compilation appears to have been made by the Meeting itself for distribution to local Quaker meetings throughout America. Its purpose was to establish "Decency and comely Order in all our Meetings of Worship, & Plainness in the particular Members of our Society." Though often ascribed to the Puritans (who, in fact, liked bright colors and, in moderation, the good things of life), "plainness" was a Quaker ideal. A Collection of Christian & Brotherly Advices [left page] [right page] Given forth from time to time By the Yearly-Meetings of Friends For Pennsylvania & New Jersey. . . .  Manuscript volume, c. 1682-1763 Manuscript Division, Library of Congress (29) William Penn, Missive van William Penn . . . Geschreven aan de Commissarissen van de vrye Societeyt der Handelaars (Amsterdam, 1684). [Dutch translation of Penn's 1683 letter to the Free Society Traders] Rare Book and Special Collections, Library of Congress (30)

THE PENNSYLVANIA GERMANS

Baptismal Certificate This certificate features characteristic Pennsylvania German motifs.  Baptismal Certificate Pennsylvania German fraktur woodcut with watercolor, 1807 Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress (31) The Narrow Gate This Pennsylvania German illustration depicts a familiar 19th century evangelical motif of the narrow gate to Heaven and the broad and seductive road to Hell, where the devil and his minions await the self-satisfied sinner. Das neue Jerusalem Pennsylvania German fraktur woodcut with watercolor Early nineteenth century Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress (32)

The first group of Germans to settle in Pennsylvania arrived in Philadelphia in 1683 from Krefeld, Germany, and included Mennonites and possibly some Dutch Quakers. During the early years of German emigration to Pennsylvania, most of the emigrants were members of small sects that shared Quaker principles--Mennonites, Dunkers, Schwenkfelders, Moravians, and some German Baptist groups--and were fleeing religious persecution. Penn and his agents encouraged German and European emigration to Pennsylvania by circulating promotional literature touting the economic advantages of Pennsylvania as well as the religious liberty available there. The appearance in Pennsylvania of so many different religious groups made the province resemble "an asylum for banished sects." Beginning in the 1720s significantly larger numbers of German Lutherans and German Reformed arrived in Pennsylvania. Many were motivated by economic considerations.

Footwashing Many of the German sects that emigrated to Pennsylvania brought with them "primitive" Christian practices such as footwashing, seen here being practiced by the women of the Moravian Brethren. Pedilavium das Füsswaschen der Schwestern Engraving from David Cranz, Kurze, Zuverlässige Nachricht, von der, unter den Namen der Böhmisch-Mährischen Brüder Bekannt, Kirche Unitas fratrum, Halle: 1757 The Library Company of Philadelphia (33)

ROMAN CATHOLICS IN MARYLAND

Although the Stuart kings of England did not hate the Roman Catholic Church, most of their subjects did, causing Catholics to be harassed and persecuted in England throughout the seventeenth century. Driven by "the sacred duty of finding a refuge for his Roman Catholic brethren," George Calvert (1580-1632) obtained a charter from Charles I in 1632 for the territory between Pennsylvania and Virginia. This Maryland charter offered no guidelines on religion, although it was assumed that Catholics would not be molested in the new colony. In 1634 two ships, the Ark and the Dove, brought the first settlers to Maryland. Aboard were approximately two hundred people. Among the passengers were two Catholic priests who had been forced to board surreptitiously to escape the reach of English anti-Catholic laws. Upon landing in Maryland the Catholics, led spiritually by the Jesuits, were transported by a profound reverence, similar to that experienced by John Winthrop and the Puritans when they set foot in New England. Catholic fortunes fluctuated in Maryland during the rest of the seventeenth century, as they became an increasingly smaller minority of the population. After the Glorious Revolution of 1689 in England, the Church of England was legally established in the colony and English penal laws, which deprived Catholics of the right to vote, hold office, or worship publicly, were enforced. Until the American Revolution, Catholics in Maryland were dissenters in their own country, living at times under a state of siege, but keeping loyal to their convictions, a faithful remnant, awaiting better times.

Father Andrew White The "Apostle to Maryland," Father Andrew White (1579-1656), described the celebration of the first mass upon the arrival of the Arkand the Dove, "We celebrated mass for the first time . . . . This had never been done before in this part of the world. After we had completed the sacrifice, we took upon our shoulders a great cross that we had hewn out of a tree, and advancing in order to the appointed place . . . we erected a trophy to Christ the Savior, humbly reciting, on our bended knees, the Litanies of the sacred Cross, with great emotion." This is the only known seventeenth-century image of Father White. The palm trees depicted in the background reveal the artist's ignorance of conditions in Maryland. Father Andrew White Engraving by G.G. Heinsch, 1655, in Mathias Tanner, Societas Jesu apostolorum imitatrix Prague: Typis Universitatis Carolo-Ferdinandeae, 1694 Special Collections Division, Georgetown University Library (39) Piscataway Prayers Like some of their Protestant counterparts in the colonies, the Jesuits in Maryland assumed the responsibility of converting the native population to Christianity. They were quite successful, owing to men like Father White, a skilled linguist, who translated spiritual exercises into the Piscataway language. Catechism in Piscataway Indian Language [left page] [right page] Father Andrew White, from Manuale Sacerdotum, 1610 Special Collections Division, Georgetown University Library. (40) Communion Ostensorium An ostensorium, also called a monstrance, is used at Catholic communion services to display the consecrated Host. Markings on the base indicate that it was commissioned by George Thompson (fl. 1658-1663), first Clerk of Court of Charles County, Maryland, or by one of his descendants. Ostensorium Silver gilt, glass, metal, c. 1700 Georgetown University Art Collection, Washington, D.C. (38)

Maryland Act Concerning Religion In 1649, Catholics in the Maryland Assembly passed an act stipulating that no Trinitarian Christian "shall from henceforth be any waies troubled, molested, or discountenanced, for, or in respect of his or her religion nor in the free exercise thereof within this Province." Though this act was not as inclusive as similar ones in Rhode Island and Pennsylvania, which brought theists within their purview, it was another in a series of progressive measures taken by early American colonists to emancipate themselves from the European belief in enforced religious uniformity. Maryland Governour and Council (Proceedings) [page one] - [page two] - [page three] Maryland Governour and Council (Proceedings) May 1647- February 1651, including "An Act Concerning Religion," Manuscript volume Department of Special Collections, Maryland Archives, Annapolis (35) Cecil Calvert In this fanciful recreation Cecil Calvert, the second Lord Baltimore, is showing his 1649 Act Concerning Religion to the ancient Spartan lawgiver, Lycurgus. Here Calvert is depicted in a long line of civil libertarians, running from the ninth-century Saxon king, Alfred, on Calvert's left through William Penn, in the broad-brimmed hat, to Benjamin Franklin, viewing the proceedings from Heaven in his familiar fur hat. Cecil Calvert presenting to Lycurgus his Act Concerning Religion Engraving by James Barry (1741-1806), 1793 Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress (34) Catholic Church at St. Mary's City, Maryland These artist's recreations of the first free standing Roman Catholic Church in British North America are based on extensive historical and archaeological research, conducted by the staff of Historic St. Mary's City. The church was probably built in 1667 at St. Mary's City, Maryland's seventeenth-century capital. Catholic Church at St. Mary's City, Maryland, c.1670, [interior] - [exterior] Gouache on paper by Leslie Barker. Copyprint, 1997 Historic St. Mary's City, Maryland (36e-f) Catholic Religious Medals These religious medals, worn by seventeenth-century Catholic colonists in Maryland, bespeak a society spiritually administered by the Jesuits. Excavated at St. Mary's City, they represent, from left to right: St. Ignatius Loyola (on the reverse, St. Francis Xavier); "the Five saints," all canonized in 1620: St. Teresa of Avila, St. Isidore the Husbandman, and St. Philip Neri on one side, St. Ignatius Loyola and St. Francis Xavier on the other; a sacred site at Zaragosa, Spain, where the faithful believed that the Virgin appeared to the apostle St. James the Greater upon a pillar of jasper; and St. Ignatius Loyola and St. Francis Xavier side by side. Catholic religious medals [left] - [right] Metal, Seventeenth century Historic St. Mary's City, Maryland (36 a-d) Virgin Mary at St. Mary's City This white clay fragment of a statue of the Virgin Mary was discovered at St. Mary's City at the site of the home of Garret Van Sweringen, a Dutch Roman Catholic who settled in Maryland in the 1660s. A Head of the Madonna  Clay, Seventeenth century, Historic St. Mary's City, Maryland (37)

VIRGINIA

The Book of Common Prayer The Book of Common Prayer, which contains the liturgy used by the Church of England, was compiled during the reign of Edward VI (1547-1553) and revised under Queen Elizabeth I. The prayer book, used in Virginia church services, was published in all shapes and sizes. Here is a page from the large 1662 edition and the same page as it appears in a 1730 shorthand edition, with the order slightly altered. The creator of the shorthand system, James Weston, advised his readers that he had omitted the "Forms of Matrimony . . . at the Desire of the Subscribers, that the Price might be less." The Book of Common-Prayer and Administration of the Sacraments, and other Rites and Ceremonies of the Church, According to the Use of the Church of England . . . .  London: by his Majesty's printers, 1662The Book of Common Prayer in Short-Hand, According to Mr. Weston's Excellent Method . . . . London: 1730 Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress (41-42) Official Instructions on Religion This manuscript is an eighteenth-century copy of the original Virginia Company records, owned by Thomas Jefferson and sold to the Library of Congress as part of Jefferson's library in 1815. The document illustrates the Virginia Company's concern for the health of the church. It orders the settlers to offer generous financial assistance "to the intent that godly learned & painful Ministers may be placed there for the service of Almighty God & for the spiritual benefit and comfort of the people." Virginia Church Laws, 1618 Manuscript volume, Eighteenth-century copy Virginia Miscellaneous Records, 1606-1692 (the Bland Manuscript), Rare Book and Special Collections, Library of Congress (43)

Virginia was settled by businessmen--operating through a joint-stock company, the Virginia Company of London--who wanted to get rich. They also wanted the Church to flourish in their colony and kept it well supplied with ministers. Some early governors sent by the Virginia Company acted in the spirit of crusaders. Sir Thomas Dale (d. 1619) considered himself engaged in "religious warfare" and expected no reward "but from him on whose vineyard I labor whose church with greedy appetite I desire to erect." During Dale's tenure, religion was spread at the point of the sword. Everyone was required to attend church and be catechized by a minister. Those who refused could be executed or sent to the galleys. When a popular assembly, the House of Burgesses, was established in 1619, it enacted religious laws that "were a match for anything to be found in the Puritan societies." Unlike the colonies to the north, where the Church of England was regarded with suspicion throughout the colonial period, Virginia was a bastion of Anglicanism. Her House of Burgesses passed a law in 1632 requiring that there be a "uniformitie throughout this colony both in substance and circumstance to the cannons and constitution of the Church of England." The church in Virginia faced problems unlike those confronted in other colonies--such as enormous parishes, some sixty miles long, and the inability to ordain ministers locally--but it continued to command the loyalty and affection of the colonists. In 1656, a prospective minister was advised that he "would find an assisting, an embracing, a comforting people" in the colony. At the end of the seventeenth century the church in Virginia, according to a recent authority, was prospering; it was "active and growing" and was "well attended by the young and old alike."

Baptism of Pocahontas Like the other seventeenth-century British colonies, Virginia aspired to convert the native populations. The Virginia Company's instructions to its governors required them to make conversion one of their objectives. The most famous early convert was Pocahontas, daughter of Powhatan, head of the Powhatan Confederacy. Pocahontas was baptized by the Reverend Alexander Whitaker before her marriage to John Rolfe in 1614.  The Baptism of Pocahontas, 1614 Oil study for mural by John Gadsby Chapman, c. 1837-40 Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation Educational Trust (44) Jamestown Communion set Silver, 1661 The Trustees and Vestry of Bruton Parish Church, Williamsburg (45) Anglican Religious Credentials One of the handicaps faced by the Church of England in Virginia and the other American colonies was its lack of authority to ordain priests. To receive holy orders, candidates were obliged to travel to England. This was an obstacle some were unwilling to confront. As a result, the Church of England often experienced a shortage of priests in America. Among the pious young Americans who made the perilous journey was Thomas Read, a Virginian, who was ordained by Richard Terrick, Bishop of London, on September 21, 1773, at which time he also received a license to preach in Maryland. Read's ecclesiastical credentials, as well as a special, protective carrying case, which has his name etched on its front, are seen here. License and ordination papers of Anglican priest with special carrying case Vellum and metal, 1773

I. America as a Religious Refuge:
The Seventeenth Century

[ PART 1 ] [ PART 2 ]Many of the British North American colonies that eventually formed the United States of America were settled in the seventeenth century by men and women, who, in the face of European persecution, refused to compromise passionately held religious convictions and fled Europe. The New England colonies, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland were conceived and established "as plantations of religion." Some settlers who arrived in these areas came for secular motives--"to catch fish" as one New Englander put it--but the great majority left Europe to worship God in the way they believed to be correct. They enthusiastically supported the efforts of their leaders to create "a city on a hill" or a "holy experiment," whose success would prove that God's plan for his churches could be successfully realized in the American wilderness. Even colonies like Virginia, which were planned as commercial ventures, were led by entrepreneurs who considered themselves "militant Protestants" and who worked diligently to promote the prosperity of the church.

EUROPEAN PERSECUTION

Execution of Mennonites This engraving depicts the execution of David van der Leyen and Levina Ghyselins, described variously as Dutch Anabaptists or Mennonites, by Catholic authorities in Ghent in 1554. Strangled and burned, van der Leyen was finally dispatched with an iron fork. Bracht's Martyr's Mirror is considered by modern Mennonites as second only in importance to the Bible in perpetuating their faith.Murder of David van der Leyen and Levina Ghyselins, Ghent, 1554 Engraving by J. Luyken, from T. J. V. Bracht (or Thieleman van Braght), Het Bloedig Tooneel De Martelaers Spiegel. . . .  Amsterdam: J. van der Deyster, et al., 1685 Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress (1) A Jesuit Disemboweled Jesuits like John Ogilvie (Ogilby) (1580-1615) were under constant surveillance and threat from the Protestant governments of England and Scotland. Ogilvie was sentenced to death by a Glasgow court and hanged and mutilated on March 10, 1615. John Ogilvie (Ogilby), Societas Jesu, 1615 Engraving from Mathias Tanner, Societas Jesu usque ad sanguinis et vitae profusionem Militans. . . .  Prague: Typis Universitatis Carolo-Ferdinandeae, 1675 Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress (4)

The religious persecution that drove settlers from Europe to the British North American colonies sprang from the conviction, held by Protestants and Catholics alike, that uniformity of religion must exist in any given society. This conviction rested on the belief that there was one true religion and that it was the duty of the civil authorities to impose it, forcibly if necessary, in the interest of saving the souls of all citizens. Nonconformists could expect no mercy and might be executed as heretics. The dominance of the concept, denounced by Roger Williams as "inforced uniformity of religion," meant majority religious groups who controlled political power punished dissenters in their midst. In some areas Catholics persecuted Protestants, in others Protestants persecuted Catholics, and in still others Catholics and Protestants persecuted wayward coreligionists. Although England renounced religious persecution in 1689, it persisted on the European continent. Religious persecution, as observers in every century have commented, is often bloody and implacable and is remembered and resented for generations.

The Expulsion of the Salzburgers On October 31, 1731, the Catholic ruler of Salzburg, Austria, Archbishop Leopold von Firmian, issued an edict expelling as many as 20,000 Lutherans from his principality. Many propertyless Lutherans, given only eight days to leave their homes, froze to death as they drifted through the winter seeking sanctuary. The wealthier ones who were allowed three months to dispose of their property fared better. Some of these Salzburgers reached London, from whence they sailed to Georgia. Others found new homes in the Netherlands and East Prussia. Lutherans leaving Salzburg, 1731 Engraving by David Böecklin from Die Freundliche Bewillkommung Leipzig: 1732 Rare Books Division. The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations (7) A Pair of Salzburgers, Fleeing Their Homes These religious refugees flee Salzburg carrying with them religious volumes. The man has under one arm a copy of the Augsburg Confession; under the other is a theological work by Johann Arndt (1555-1621). The woman is carrying the Bible. The legend between them says: "We are driven into exile for the Gospel's sake; we leave our homeland and are now in God's hands." At the top is a scriptural verse, Matthew 24:20. "but pray that your flight does not occur in the winter or on the Sabbath." Salzburgische Emigranten [left page] [right page] Engraving from [Christopher Sancke?], Ausführliche Historie derer Emigranten oder Vertriebenen Lutheraner aus dem Erz-Bistum Salzburg, Leipzig: 1732 Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress (8) Persecution of Huguenots by Catholics The slaughter of Huguenots (French Protestants) by Catholics at Sens, Burgundy in 1562 occurred at the beginning of more than thirty years of religious strife between French Protestants and Catholics. These wars produced numerous atrocities. The worst was the notorious St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre in Paris, August 24, 1572. Thousands of Huguenots were butchered by Roman Catholic mobs. Although an accommodation between the two sides was sealed in 1598 by the Edict of Nantes, religious privileges of Huguenots eroded during the seventeenth century and were extinguished in 1685 by the revocation of the Edict. Perhaps as many as 400,000 French Protestants emigrated to various parts of the world, including the British North American colonies. Massacre Fait a Sens en Bourgogne par la Populace au Mois d'Avril 1562 . . . Lithograph in A. Challe, Histoire des Guerres du Calvinisme et de la Ligue dans l'Auxerrois, le Sénonais et les autres contrées qui forment aujourd'hui le département de l'Yonne Auxerre: Perriquet et Rouille, 1863 General Collections, Library of Congress (2) Persecution of Catholics by Huguenots In the areas of France they controlled, Huguenots at least matched the harshness of the persecutions of their Catholic opponents. Atrocities A, B, and C, depictions that are possibly exaggerated for use as propaganda, are located by the author in St. Macaire, Gascony. In scene A, a priest is disemboweled, his entrails wound up on a stick until they are torn out. In illustration B a priest is buried alive, and in C Catholic children are hacked to pieces. Scene D, alleged to have occurred in the village of Mans, was "too loathsome" for one nineteenth-century commentator to translate from the French. It shows a priest whose genitalia were cut off and grilled. Forced to eat his roasted private parts, the priest was then dissected by his torturers so they can observe him digesting his meal. Frightful Outrages perpetrated by the Huguenots in France Engraving from Richard Verstegen, Théâtre des Cruautez des Hérétiques de notre temps Antwerp: Adrien Hubert, 1607 Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington, D.C. (3) Drowning of Protestants Shown here is a depiction of the murder by Irish Catholics of approximately one hundred Protestants from Loughgall Parish, County Armagh, at the bridge over the River Bann near Portadown, Ulster. This atrocity occurred at the beginning of the Irish Rebellion of 1641. Having held the Protestants as prisoners and tortured them, the Catholics drove them "like hogs" to the bridge, where they were stripped naked and forced into the water below at swordspoint. Survivors of the plunge were shot. Massacre of the Protestant Martyrs at the Bridge over the River Bann in Ireland, 1641 Engraving from Matthew Taylor, England's Bloody Tribunal: Or, Popish Cruelty Displayed . . . . London: J. Cooke, 1772 Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress (5) Persecution of Jesuits in England In the image on the left is Brian Cansfield (1581-1643), a Jesuit priest seized while at prayer by English Protestant authorities in Yorkshire. Cansfield was beaten and imprisoned under harsh conditions. He died on August 3, 1643 from the effects of his ordeal. At the right is another Jesuit priest, Ralph Corbington (Corby) (ca. 1599-1644), who was hanged by the English government in London, September 17, 1644, for professing his faith. Die Societas Jesu in Europa, 1643-1644 [left page] [right page] from Mathias Tanner, Die Gesellshafft Jesu biss zur vergiessung ihres Blutes wider den Gotzendienst Unglauben und Laster . . .  Prague: Carlo Ferdinandeischen Universitat Buchdruckeren, 1683 Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress (6) Martyrdom of John Rogers The execution in 1555 of John Rogers (1500-1555) is portrayed here in the 9th edition of the famous Protestant martyrology, Fox's Book of Martyrs. Rogers was a Catholic priest who converted to Protestantism in the 1530s under the influence of William Tyndale and assisted in the publication of Tyndale's English translations of the Bible. Burned alive at Smithfield on February 4, 1555, Rogers became the "first Protestant martyr" executed by England's Catholic Queen Mary. He was charged with heresy, including denial of the real presence of Christ in the sacrament of communion. The Burning of Master John Rogers Engraving from John Fox, The Third Volume of the Ecclesiastical History containing the Acts and Monuments of Martyrs. . . . London: Company of Stationers, 9th edition, 1684 Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress (9) John Rogers Portrayed in New England Two centuries after John Rogers's execution, his ordeal, with depictions of his wife and ten children added to increase the pathos, became a staple of The New England Primer.The Primer supplemented the picture of Rogers' immolation with a long, versified speech, said to be the dying martyr's advice to his children, which urged them to "Keep always God before your Eyes" and to "Abhor the arrant Whore of Rome, and all her Blasphemies." This recommendation, read by generations of young New Englanders, doubtless helped to fuel the anti-Catholic prejudice that flourished in that region well into the nineteenth century. Mr. John Rogers Woodblock print from The New-England Primer Improved Boston: A. Ellison, 1773 Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress (10)

CROSSING THE OCEAN TO KEEP THE FAITH:
THE PURITANS

Puritans were English Protestants who wished to reform and purify the Church of England of what they considered to be unacceptable residues of Roman Catholicism. In the 1620s leaders of the English state and church grew increasingly unsympathetic to Puritan demands. They insisted that the Puritans conform to religious practices that they abhorred, removing their ministers from office and threatening them with "extirpation from the earth" if they did not fall in line. Zealous Puritan laymen received savage punishments. For example, in 1630 a man was sentenced to life imprisonment, had his property confiscated, his nose slit, an ear cut off, and his forehead branded "S.S." (sower of sedition).Beginning in 1630 as many as 20,000 Puritans emigrated to America from England to gain the liberty to worship God as they chose. Most settled in New England, but some went as far as the West Indies. Theologically, the Puritans were "non-separating Congregationalists." Unlike the Pilgrims, who came to Massachusetts in 1620, the Puritans believed that the Church of England was a true church, though in need of major reforms. Every New England Congregational church was considered an independent entity, beholden to no hierarchy. The membership was composed, at least initially, of men and women who had undergone a conversion experience and could prove it to other members. Puritan leaders hoped (futilely, as it turned out) that, once their experiment was successful, England would imitate it by instituting a church order modeled after the New England Way.

Richard Mather Richard Mather (1596-1669), minister at Dorchester, Massachusetts, 1636-1669, was a principal spokesman for and defender of the Congregational form of church government in New England. In 1648, he drafted the Cambridge Platform, the definitive description of the Congregational system. Mather's son, Increase (1639-1723), and grandson, Cotton (1663-1728), were leaders of New England Congregationalism in their generations.Richard Mather Relief cut by John Foster. Copyprint c. 1670 Courtesy of the American Antiquarian Society, Worcester, Massachusetts (11) Cotton Mather Cotton Mather (1663-1728), the best-known New England Puritan divine of his generation, was a controversial figure in his own time and remains so among scholars today. A formidable intellect and a prodigious writer, Mather published some 450 books and pamphlets. He was at the center of all of the major political, theological, and scientific controversies of his era. Mather has been accused, unfairly, of instigating the Salem witchcraft trials. Cottonus Matherus S. theologieae doctor regia societas Londonensis. . . . Mezzotint by Peter Pelham Boston: 1728, restrike 1860 Prints & Photographs Division, Library of Congress (12) Sermon by Cotton Mather Holograph manuscript on paper Manuscript Division, Library of Congress (13)

THE BIBLE COMMONWEALTHS

The Geneva Bible The Geneva Bible was published in English in Geneva in 1560 by English reformers who fled to the continent to escape persecutions by Queen Mary. Their leader was William Whittingham, who married a sister of John Calvin. The Geneva Bible was used by the Pilgrims and Puritans in New England until it was gradually replaced by the King James Bible. According to one twentieth-century scholar, "between 1560 . . . and 1630 no fewer than about two hundred editions of the Geneva Bible, either as a whole or of the New Testament separately, appeared. It was the Bible of Shakespeare and of John Bunyan and of Cromwell's Army and of the Pilgrim Fathers."The Bible and Holy Scriptures Conteyned in the Olde and Newe Testament.  Geneva: 1560 Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress (14)

The New England colonies have often been called "Bible Commonwealths" because they sought the guidance of the scriptures in regulating all aspects of the lives of their citizens. Scripture was cited as authority for many criminal statutes. Shown here are the two Bibles used in seventeenth-century New England and a seventeenth-century law code from Massachusetts that cites scripture.

The King James Bible The first edition of the King James Bible, also called the "Authorized Version," was composed by a committee of English scholars between 1607 and 1611. The first copy of the King James Bible known to have been brought into the colonies was carried by John Winthrop to Massachusetts in 1630. Gradually the King James Bible supplanted the Geneva Bible and achieved such a monopoly of the affections of the English-speaking peoples that a scholar in 1936 complained that many "seemed to think that the King James Version is the original Bible which God handed down out of heaven, all done up in English by the Lord himself." The Holy Bible, conteyning the Old Testament and the New London: Robert Baker, 1611 Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress (15) Seventeenth-Century Laws of Massachusetts Criminal laws in the early New England colonies were based on the scriptures, especially the Old Testament. Many civil laws and procedures were modelled after the English common law. The General Laws and Liberties of the Massachusets Colony: Revised and Reprinted [right page] [left page] Cambridge, Massachusetts: Samuel Green, 1672 Law Library, Rare Book Collection, Library of Congress (16) The Bay Psalm Book The first book published in British North America, what has become known as the Bay Psalm Book, was the work of Richard Mather and two other ministers who transformed the Psalms into verse so they could be sung in the Massachusetts churches. Shown here is one of the eleven surviving copies. The Whole Booke of Psalmes Faithfully Translated into English Metre. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Stephen Daye, 1640 Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress (17) Eliot's Algonquin Language Bible Obedient to the New Testament command to preach the Gospel to all nations, ministers in all of the first British North American colonies strove to convert the local native populations to Christianity, often with only modest results. One of the most successful proselytizers was John Eliot (1604-1690), Congregational minister at Roxbury, Massachusetts. His translation of the Bible into the Algonquin Indian language is seen here. At one time Eliot ministered to eleven hundred "Praying Indians," organized into fourteen New England style towns.