h of England, positive denials
were opposed--the profession of Winthrop with his company and chaplains
on leaving England, the positive statement of the "Patriarch of
Dorchester," and that of Deputy Governor Dudley, who went to
Massachusetts with Winthrop, and wrote to the Countess of Lincoln the
year after his arrival, denying that any innovations had been made. To
all this the complainants had only to oppose their own words--their
papers having been seized. They were overwhelmed by the mass of
authority arrayed against them. But though they were defeated for the
time, they were not silenced; and the following two years were
productive of such a mass of rumours and statements, all tending to
prove the Church revolutionary and Church proscriptive proceedings of
the Massachusetts Corporation, that the King and Council found it
necessary to prosecute those inquiries which they had deferred in 1632,
and to appoint a Royal Commission to proceed to Massachusetts Bay and
inquire into the disputed facts, and correct all abuses, if such should
be found, on the spot. This was what the Massachusetts Bay persecutors
most dreaded. As long as the inquiry should be conducted in London, they
could, by intercepting papers and intimidating witnesses, and with the
aid of powerful friends in England--one or two of whom managed to retain
their place in office and in the Privy Council, even when Charles ruled
without a Parliament--with such advantages they could laugh to scorn the
complaints of the persecuted, and continue their proscriptions and
oppressions with impunity. But with a Royal Commission sitting on the
spot, these acts of concealment and deception would be impossible. They
therefore changed their ground; they now denied the right of the King to
inquire into their proceedings; they invoked, as was their wont, the
counsel of their ministers, or "Elders," who preached warlike sermons
and gave warlike advice--"to resist if they were strong enough;" but if
not strong enough to fight, "to avoid and delay." For the former purpose
they forthwith raised L800 to erect a fort to protect the entrance of
their harbour, and organized and armed companies; and in pursuance of
the latter, they delayed a year even to acknowledge the receipt of the
Royal orders to answer the charges preferred against them, and then,
when a more imperative and threatening Royal demand was sent, they
pleaded for another year to prepare for their defence, and thus "av