Note (in a note) — Chapter VI

[189] In a Boston town meeting, held January 21, 1684, to consider the King's declaration, the Rev. Increase Mather, who was then President of Harvard College, and had for twenty years exerted more influence upon the public affairs of Massachusetts than any other man for the same length of time, delivered a speech against submission to the King, which he miscalled "the surrender of the Charter." He said, among other things: "I verily believe we shall sin against the God of heaven if we vote in the affirmative to it. The Scripture teacheth us otherwise. That which the Lord our God hath given us, shall we not possess it? God forbid that we should give away the inheritance of our fathers. Nor would it be wisdom for us to comply. If we make a full and entire resignation to the King's pleasure, we fall into the hands of men immediately; but if we do not, we still keep ourselves in the hands of God; and who knows what God may do for us?" The historian says that "the effect of such an appeal was wholly irresistible; that many of the people fell into tears, and there was a general acclamation." (Barry's Colonial History of Massachusetts, Vol. I., pp. 476, 477.)

It is not easy to squeeze as much extravagance and nonsense in the same space as in the above quoted words of Increase Mather. Where was the Scripture which taught them not to submit complaints of their fellow-colonists to their King and his Council, the highest authority in the empire? Both Scripture and profane history furnish us with examples almost without number of usurpers professing that the usurpation and conquest they had achieved was "that which the Lord our God had given" them, and which they should "possess" at all hazards as if it were an "inheritance of their fathers." The "inheritance" spoken of by Mr. Mather was what had been usurped by the rulers of the colony over and above the provisions of their Charter against the rights of the Crown, the religious and political liberties of their fellow-colonists, and encroaching upon the lands of their white and Indian neighbours. Then to submit to the King and Council was to "fall into the hands of men immediately," but to contest with the King in the Courts of Chancery or King's Bench was to "keep themselves in the hands of God," who, it seems, according to Increase Mather's own interpretation, judged him and his adherents unworthy of retaining the "inheritance" of the Charter, the powers and objects of which they had so greatly perverted and abused. The King had expressly declared that the prosecution against the Charter would be abandoned if they would submit to his decision in regard to what had been matters of complaint and dispute between them and their fellow-colonists and Sovereign for more than fifty years, and which decision should be added to the Charter as explanatory regulations, and should embrace nothing affecting their religious liberties or local elective self-government. They refused, and lost their Charter; Rhode Island and Connecticut submitted, and even resigned their Charters, and were afterwards authorized to resume them, with the privileges and powers conferred by them unimpaired, including the election of their Governors as well as legislators, etc.