and his
son chronicles of him, "That he was healthy and strong in body, vigorous
and active in spirit, thoughtful and religious from youth, esteemed for
his abilities and gifts, especially of his power of arguing; a zealous
asserter of New England liberties, with charity to others, instructive
in conversation." He represented the town of Sandwich nineteen times in
legislative councils. He had two wives; the second was Mercy, daughter
of Governor Hinckley, and Thomas was her oldest son. Governor Hinckley
was a man of superior ability, distinguished in the history of Plymouth
Colony. "He had been from first to last the associate, in weal or woe,
of its great and good men, and had lived himself chief among the
survivors to see the last chapter written in its immortal annals." His
grandmother Hinckley was a daughter of Quartermaster Smith, who came
from England. Her grandson, Thomas Prince, says of her: "To the day of
her death she shone in the eyes of all as the loveliest and brightest
for beauty, knowledge, wisdom, majesty, accomplishments and graces
throughout the colony." Governor Hinckley had seventeen children, their
names corresponding to the spirit of the times. Among them we find
Mataliah, Mehitable, Mercy, Experience, Thankful, Reliance, Ebenezer,
and Bathsheba. Thomas Prince himself, one of fourteen children, was born
at Sandwich, the first town settled on the Cape in 1687. When eleven
years old he went to his grandfather Hinckley's, and remained with him
until he entered college. Here he imbibed his taste for chronology and
his love of books. His grandfather fostered him in his youthful ambition
of founding a library, and gave him many from his own collection. During
his long life of eighty years Governor Hinckley became thoroughly
acquainted with all events of importance that had happened in the new
world, and the eager boy was fed and stimulated by companionship with
him, and all the moving spirits of the day who frequented his
grandfather's house. His early attention to religious subjects, his wide
culture, and remarkable sympathy with everything pertaining to his own
times, was the blossoming fruit instilled into him by an honorable
ancestry, who from the early part of the seventeenth century had been
consistent Puritans, and filled places of trust with honor and fidelity.

Although in the first half of the eighteenth century religious
fanaticism was on the decline in Europe it held sway still, in a
measure,