Prohibiting all Masters of ships to bring in of your Brethren among you who were not prohibited your selves and themselves from coming in on such a Penalty Which leads me to the next Particular viz. The Sufferings by this your Law And accordingly say you a Law was made and Published Answ This Law is put as the Port or Entrance into this Scene of Blood and Cruel Sufferings and the very Publication of it Enters it and shews the Spirit by which it was made and the Ground on which it went and poor Nicholas Upshall a VVeakly Old Man of your Town of Boston bore the Brunt of it For he hearing it proclaimed and being grieved at the heart for your sakes and the Countries that such a thing should be done which he looked upon as a sad fore-runner of some heavy Judgement gave his Dissent Which ye took so ill at his hands that though he was a Member of your Church and of good Repute among you for a man of a sober and unblamable Conversation and though in much tenderness and love he spake to you the next day when ye had him before you desiring you to take heed lest ye should be found fighters against God and some sudden Judgement follow it on the Land which was the Counsel which wise Gamaliel gave the chief Priests and Pharisees and which they received at his hands and it would have been your Wisdom so to have done Yet you fined him twenty pounds which ye Enacted I 'le not bate him one groat said your cruel Governour John Endicot and three pounds more by another Court for not coming to your Meetings and this after he was Imprisoned and into Prison ye cast him and banish him ye did out of your Jurisdiction allowing him but One Moneths space of which the time of his Imprisonment was part for his Remove neither regarding his old years who had scarce a Tooth in his head to eat his meat and bread and cheese and other Sustenance was scraped into a spoon when he received it nor the weakness of his Body nor the state of his aged Wife and Children which were amongst ye nor the season of the year it being in the beginning of Winter which with you is very cold and he might have perished therein as some have done in passing but from Town to Town though but of Three Miles distance but Out he must go and when he was departed into Plimmouth Patent Jurisdiction which was the next adjacent the Governour thereof One Bradford since dead to help on the matter hearing of his coming for after your Pipe danced that Plantation as will appear by and by in the Cruelties that Ensue which they inflicted on the Innocent issued forth a Warrant that none of Sandwitch whereunto he was come should Entertain the poor Man which not Availing for their hearts were more tender then to cast him Out such an Aged Man in time of VVinter he sent for him to Plimmouth by a special Warrant which was Twenty Miles distant but he not being able to go and writing to him that if he perished his Blood would be required at his hands through the Moderation of some of the then Magistrates he was permitted to stay till the Spring but then was he banished thence who there had done nothing but came into their Jurisdiction for a little shelter in the VVinter Season to Rhoad Island and this so earnestly prest in the early time of the year that he was like to have been cast away in his going thither A Piece of Cruelty able to soften a heart of Flint and Draw it into teares at the sence thereof and which drew such Compassion from a Sagamore or Indian Prince That he told the Old man if he would live with him he would make him a warm house calling him Friend and further he said VVhat a God have the English who deals so with one another about the VVorship of their God Or words to that purpose But from you it drew no Relentings but the spirit of Iniquity having got over you it hardned ye the more by how much the more you were Exercised therein yea upon this very Old Man as in its place I shall shew and by and by make manifest Even the Sea-Monsters draw forth their Breast and give suck to their Young but the Daughter of my People is become Cruel like the Ostrich in the VVilderness Thus Entred as I have said this Scene of Blood and what follows answers unto it For the Eight aforesaid viz. Christopher Holder Thomas Thirstone John Copeland VVilliam Brend Mary Prince Dorothy VVaugh Sarah Gibbens and Mary VVeatherhead who were Committed before this Law was made and kept close Prifoners for the space of about Eleven Weeks the very Day that Nicholas was cast into Prison as aforesaid were they by vertue of this Law conveyed on board a Ship the Ship they came in and sent for England and Nicholas came into their Room Which Prison ye have supplied with the bodies of the Saints and Servants of Jesus for the most part ever since scarce One taken Out but some One or other put into his Rome of which in its Place But how came Nicholas Upshall to be concerned in a Law for Strangers who was an Inhabitant In a Law for Quakers so called who was a Member of your Church In a Law for Masters of Ships who shall bring into your Jurisdiction any People that are called such and for any such People who themselves shall come into your Jurisdiction when as he is neither Master of a Ship nor brought in any such nor came in but is an Inhabitant a Freeman of Boston How comes he to Suffer and to have inflicted upon him a Punishment above the Penalty of the Law How came those Eight to be sent away the Day after the Publication of a Law and by Vertue thereof who were imprisoned before the Law was made These things would be Enquired into and how Repugnant they are to the Lawes of England Declaration Notwithstanding which by a Back door they found Entrance and the Penaltie inflicted on themselves proving insufficient to restrain their Impudent and insolent obtrusions was increased by the losse of the Eares of those who offended the second time Which also being too weak a defence against their Impetuous Frantick Fury necessitated us to endeavour our security and upon serious Consideration after the former Experiments by their incessant Assaults a Law was made That such Persons should be banished upon pain of Death according to the Example of England in their Provision against fesuites Which sentence being regularly pronounced at the last Court of Assistants against the Parties above-named and they either returning or continuing presumptuously in this Jurisdiction after the time limited were Apprehended and owning themselves to be the Persons banished were sentenced by the Court to Death according to the Law aforesaid which hath been Executed upon two of them Answer As the former was the Entrance
week and told them it should be executed on the second day of the week following and which on the second day he Executed accordingly with much Cruelty on the Strangers viz. on Humphry Norton and John Rouse who by that time were had there as by and by I shal shew and William Leddra of Barbados aforesaid and Thomas Harris of Barbados of whom I have spoken with Fifteen cruel Lashes a piece laid on at Once with the Threefold-corded Whip as aforesaid so adding Five to the First Number of Ten as aforesaid Which Bloudy Cruelty so moved the Inhabitants of Boston and so affected them to see New stripes and the addition of Three each time to be made on the Old sores much unlike the Mercy of the Dogs to Lazarus who licked his sores not made more And some of the Old sores were upon them when they came to be whipt the second time who were whipt a fortnight before I say it so affected them that they paid the Charge required for them which was about Six or Seven pounds as they usually did as to all that were in Prison that they might be set free But as for You This you added and did that it might be made appear and the hand of the Lord was in it to suffer it to be so how One ye were with and approved of the Jaylor's Deed though because of the Cry of the People and the fear of Bloud ye seemed to the contrary This is another Experiment of the Penalty inflicted which ye say proved insufficient But as for the Inhabitants then in Prison upon whom Ye made this Law as on Strangers without Distinction and this after they were Prisoners both Strangers and Inhabitants and executed it on the Strangers though made after they were Prisoners and notwithstanding they sent you a Paper wherein they declared That they could not work for You or hire Conduct the things for which ye detained them in Prison for they had suffered your Law before for Coming into the Country which ye made them more cruelly to suffer for than for the Breach of your Law for that it was against their Consciences having not broken or transgressed any Law of God or wholsom Law of the English Nation I say to the Inhabitants though they made ready their Backs for the Post and were putting off their Cloaths to receive the like as their Brethren ye did nothing And now as to them viz. Samuel Shattock Lawrence Southick Cassandra his Wife Josiah their Son Samuel Gaskin and Joshuah Buffum whom I have been constrained promiscuously to touch at because they have been intermixed with Others in their Sufferings They were at a Meeting with as many more of their Neighbours and Friends as made up Twenty or upwards at Nicholas Phelps his house a little off Salem about Five Miles in the Woods with the said Two Friends William Brend and William Leddra waiting on the Lord Unto which one Batter a bloudy man and a Commissioner of your own came and a Constable with him and required them to assist the Constable a most Unreasonable Demand those two being their Friends and they all in the same Condition had he had power so to demand them which they refusing he having neither a Warrant nor a Constables-staff of Office he went his way after the using of some Violence to the Strangers but the next week the Court sitting he gave their Names into the Court who caused them to be Apprehended for so small a Matter and kept them in Prison in a Neighbours house Two dayes from their Own till the latter end of their Session and then had the aforesaid before them and accused them for being from their Publick Meetings and at a Meeting by themselves and with their Enemies so they accounted the Servants of the Lord who came in Love to them as being moved of the Lord and their great business was to prove them such as are called Quakers It was demanded by one of them How they might know a Quaker Simon Broadstreet one of the Magistrates answered Thou art One for coming in with thy Hat on He replyed It was a Horrible thing to make such Cruel Laws to whip and cut off Ears and burn through the Tongue for not putting off the Hat Then they charged them with Blasphemy and said That they held forth Blasphemies at their Meetings One of them desired them to make any such thing to appear if it were so and that they might be convinced and told them they might do well to send some to their Meetings that they might hear and give account of what was done and spoken and not conclude of a Thing they knew not Said Major General Denison of whose Cruelty I have much to say in this Relation If ye meet together and say any thing We may conclude that ye speak Blasphemy a bad Speech from a Judge whose Place is not to accuse any either truly or falsly much less to draw Unrighteous Conclusions from his own spirit and then to prosecute them without Law or Equity as hath been this Denison's manner and of Others so to do but to judge according as Witness doth present Secundum Allegata Probata according to the Things alleaged and proved as is the Law of England So to Prison they were had and the next morning sent away to Boston viz. those Six as aforesaid that were Inhabitants and the said Two Strangers as Felons and Murderers and there put into the House of Correction apart from the Two Strangers whom the Jaylor had put into the Common Jayl and in a close Room provided on purpose to bow them as aforesaid that they might not come together and this in the heat of Summer from their Husbandry and Tillage which it was the season of the year for them to follow The VVarrant bore Date July 1. 1658. And indeed these Cruel Proceedings so sunk down into the hearts of many of Salem that they withdrew more and more from your Publick Meetings though they knew they should suffer upon which the Court then entred them into Pay at Five Shillings a Week each that abstained by an Old Law made in 1646. as aforesaid which they cruelly Extorted as they did the other Fines of Forty shillings each hours entertaining of such a one as ye call a Quaker and Ten shillings a time for being at Meetings of their Own with the rest of the Penalties as Occasion presented yea even from the Women whose Husbands came to your Meetings to the Value of some Scores of Pounds from first to last on the Poor Inhibitants of Salem whose Cattel ye let them keep all the hard Winter till the Spring that so they might consume their own Fodder and then took them with other Acts of Cruelty too long to mention So that what by long and sore Imprisonments from their Houses and Callings and Business and Relations in the heat of Summer and the cold of Winter and Cruel Whippings and Beatings
and Fines and Amercements and Searchings and Huntings and such like as I shall shew more particularly by and by Their Lives as to men became worse than Death and as Living Burials though they thought not any thing too much nor their Lives too dear as anon will be made manifest for the Truth and the Testimony of it The next day after W. Brend was so used and layd for dead Humphry Norton on whom the sence of Blood lay much and the Weight thereof pressed him sore for several days and cried in him so that he travailed Night and Day with his Friend John Rous came to Boston where in your Meeting House on your Lecture day notwithstanding the Cry of the Town of your Cruelty and Blood and the speaking of some to the said Humphry that if he loved his life he should depart the Town for otherwise he was but a Dead man they having been looking for him some Moneths which could not hinder them nor all the World such was the sence and weight upon them they appeared and having heard the Earth speaking and the Grave uttering her voice and Death feeding Death through your Painted Sepulchre John Norton Humphry Norton stood up and said after the other had ended Verily this is the Sacrifice which the Lord God accepts not for whilst with the same Spirit that ye sin ye Preach and Pray and Sing that Sacrifice is an Abomination to the Lord Whereupon yea before he had spoke out all these words but all these words he spake he was haled down and both of them had out and in the same fury had before ye and H. Norton ye charged with Blasphemy for those words he had spoken They spake to you to Act according to the Law of God or the Wholesome Laws of the English Nation and spare them not But neither of these ye would come nigh Then they Appealed to England and to the chief Magistrate there or whom he should appoint to whom they said they would freely refer their Case which they did once and again thereby to leave you without excuse but neither would ye yeild to this but slighted and disregarded such their Appeal Your Governour and Deputy Governour with one lip saying No Appeal to England No Appeal to England with other words of Dirision and sorthwith sentenced them to be whipt though charged with Blasphemy and to John Rous ye gave smooth words seeking to ensnare him because of Your knowledge of his Father Lieutenant Colonel Rous of Barbadoes who formerly lived amongst Ye of whom some of You then spake but he knowing Your Deceit and Wickedness and Cruel usuage of the Innocent and seeking by close Rooms and Denial of Food for several days together to Consume and strangle them he required in the audience of the People convenient Food for their money Or otherwise if they perished their Blood would be upon you This ye could not well deny before the People who had heard of much of Your Cruelty in this kind and who were likely to have risen up against Ye should Ye have denied it so Ye granted this when Ye could not help it to the breaking of Your Law but the seventh day of the week following this being the fifth Ye broke their Bodies in Revenge thereof with Ten Cruel stripes a piece according to Your wonted Cruelty and then tendred them to depart if they would hire a Convoy which they not doing for as to the Lord they could not who moved them thither Ye detained them there the week following and then Whipt them Fifteen stripes Each with the same Cruelty as before by vertue of the Law aforesaid of Five to be added to the Ten and to the Five Three each time they should be whipt and to be whipt twice a Week upon their old sores with the rest of their Brethren of which I have spoken Now about Three Weeks after the said Court at Salem the Court sate again at which several of the Inhabitants were presented for not coming to Meetings and the Law read for Five shillings a Week for them as should refuse each to pay for not Comming and many were listed under that Pay which ye Exacted when ye pleased but as for the Six aforesaid they were continued still in your Prison at Boston and no Course taken for their Release neither was it so much as offered them upon the Suffering of your Law to go home paying the Fees as ye used to do to the Strangers which Occasioned a Paper to be sent by them to the Court in these Words This to the Magistrates at Court in Salem Friends WHereas it was your Pleasures to Commit us whose Names are underwritten to the House of Correction in Boston although the Lord the Righteous Judge of Heaven and Earth is our Witness that we had done nothing worthy of Stripes or of Bonds and we being Committed by Court to be dealt withall as the Law provides for Forreign Quakers as ye please to tearm us and having some of us suffered your Law and Pleasures now that which we do expect is that whereas we have suffered your Law so now to be set free by the same Law as your manner is with strangers and not to put us in upon the account of one Law and Execute another Law upon us of which according to your own manner we were never convicted as the Law expresses If you had sent us upon the account of your new Law we should have expected the Goalers Order to have been on that account which that it was not appears by the Warrant which we have and the Punishment which we bare as four of us were Whipt among whom was One that had formerly been Whipt so now also according to your former Law Friends Let it not be a small thing in your Eyes the exposing as much as in you lies our families to Ruine It 's not unknown to you the Season and the time of the Year for those that live of Husbandry and what their Cattle and Families may be exposed unto and also such as live on Trade We know if the Spirit of Christ did dwell and rule in you these things would take impression on your spirits What our lives and conversations have been in that Place is well known and what we now suffer for is much for false Reports and ungrounded Jealousies of Heresie and Sedition These things lie upon us to lay before you As for our parts we have true Peace and Rest in the Lord in all our Sufferings and are made willing in the Power and Strength of God freely to offer up our Lives in this Cause of God for which we suffer Yea and we do find through Grace the Enlargements of God in our Imprisoned state to whom alone we Commit our selves and families for the disposing of us according to His Infinite Wisdom and Pleasure in whose Love is Our Rest and Life From the House of Bondage in Boston wherein we are made Captives by the
Constable of the Town of Salem was the next who made such search and was so eager in it that he took an Ax and broke open the Door of a House wherein they were met who might have had it opened if he would have staid and took their Names and sent them in by the Advice of the said Hathorne as the said Constable said to the Court at Ipswitch which sat shortly after whereunto Four of them were summoned for it was not usual with them to deal with too many at once lest the People should take notice and three of those whom the Constable so brought viz. Samuel Shattock Nicholas Phelps and Joshuah Buffum for the fourth viz. Anne Needham she was in Childbed and could not be brought the Court kept much ado especially about their Hats that being the only Character ye could make of such a One as ye called a Quaker and upon which you proceeded for other ye proved none They waited for their Charge to know what it was and wherefore they were sent for thither and it was for not coming to your Meetings and for meeting by themselves contrary to your Law And Simon Broadstreet put Questions to them about the Trinity and Christ's Body c. They were glad of this Opportunity to clear themselves before the People for those of them who were sent to Boston viz. those of the Six aforesaid knew not for what it was yet thither were they sent and there were they whipt and detained as aforesaid since which time they had not Opportunity to speak with those that sent them Who punish'd them by a Law made against a cursed Sect of Hereticks as the Law expresses them that speak and write Blasphemous Opinions whose Doctrines as it saith are Diabolical c. When as no such thing was proved against them Nor were they tried upon one Question thereabouts but did deny such People as the Law expresses or that they were such a People And this they judged to be very hard and to be wrong dealing with them That under colour of a Law they should be proceeded with contrary to and against all Law Answer was made That they appeared so by their Hats and Company and that they might appeal now they knew well enough that themselves should be of the Court of Appeal which was to You So They appealed You must do it by Petition said the Court which they could not but Justice they desired and no Mercy according to their Law and so spake and required them again to Prove them to be such as the Law expresses The Hat was brought up again Then let it be Recorded so said they That we have been thus punished for not putting off the Hat But this the Court would not Still they required Evidence to prove them such Blasphemers Hereticks and holding such Diabolical Doctrines or of being such a Cursed Sect as the Law speaks by which they were punished Brend said so and so said the Court and that they did own it None of us heard it said they for none of us were there yet VV. Brend said nothing to them but what was savory and Truth and if he had he should have heard of it and they would have produced it no doubt to satisfie the People who were so troubled about his Suffering but as to the absent men may say any thing and they were so kept in the Wisdom of God as not to heed it and to give them and it was reasonable enough and turn'd a Lie upon them viz. In saying they owned what he said when none of them were there and they were bold enough in it thus to put it in charge to the Mens faces who witnessed against them No other Answer Then the Court put Questions to them whereby to clear themselves and Daniel Denison was Chief in it Evidence said the Prisoners Produce your Evidence We desire nothing but a fair Tryal the Priviledges of Men We are not afraid nor ashamed to declare what we hold whether before the Court or elsewhere and offered it before all the People But first said they we desire to have a fair Tryal before a Jury of Twelve Men according to Law by Proof and Evidence as to what ye have done to us till which We shall not answer It being an Unreasonable thing said they for the Magistrates to be both Accuser and Judge So said they Ye may accuse us of Sodomy and Murder or any other Crime and execute your Law causlesly upon us But this the Court denyed contrary to the Law of England and in the express breach of Magna Charta and of Your Charter and instead of proving any thing against them or producing any thing in order thereunto except some Questions to gain something out of their own Mouths wherewithal to accuse them which they answered not They were sentenc'd to pay Each of them Ten shillings apiece for being at Meetings by themselves and Five shillings each for not being at Yours that is to say Samuel Shattock and Nicholas Phelps for being at Two such Meetings and absent twice from Yours Thirty shillings apiece and Joshua Bussum for Once of each Fifteen shillings and for being Quakers as they said but proved them not so that is to say such as the Law makes so and qualifies to the House of Correction to answer the Law Who were not proved to have transgressed it and were denyed a Tryal when they demanded it as aforesaid according to the Law of England and the Country and yet now were made to suffer as Breakers of that Law as they were before such Monstrous Illegallity and Great Injustice was never heard of And Daniel Denison told them in scoffing sort after all these Punishments and what they had suffered before unto which they were sentenc'd and thus illegally too that they had left off being Doctors of Divinity and were turned Lawyers when they spake in their Own Case like Men of Understanding Thus making a Mock of their Sufferings for which he will have his Reward But more speech they were denyed after the Sentence was past without a Tryal and with the Denying of it which the Court rose up to consider of and then sat down and Gave Only they had the Liberty so much to say as to bid the People take notice That they could not have Justice And so they were had to Prison upon account of your Third Law and there dealt with contrary to Law by receiving Ten stroaks apiece at One time with a knotted-Cord-Whip within half an hour after who were not tryed by the Law and who had received your Law before and yet were not tryed and so were not to be whipt again by your own Law but otherwise to be proceeded with as that Law provides as aforesaid What Heaps of Injustice and Illegalities are here altogether by your own Law So your Laws are but Covers for your Cruelty Who so to deal with these People ye had determined and therefore so
be kept at work in the House of Correction till they put in Security by two sufficient men that they shall not any more Vent their hateful Errors who were convicted of none nor of venting nor use their sinful Practices who feared the Lord and did nothing but in obedience to Him Or shall depart this Jurisdiction at their Own charge And if any of them Return again then each such Person shall incur the Penalty of the Laws formerly made for Strangers which they had not transgressed I say though they escaped the loss of their Ears that is to say the Two Men as I have said for the VVoman ye cruelly whipt with Ten stripes the Penalty of that your Law which ye say in this concern'd them not yet ye kept them in Prison upon the Account of the said Law for Strangers when that Law for Strangers did not concern them and so they were wrongfully Imprisoned and detained and not set at Liberty till you had made a Fourth Law viz. That of Banishment upon Pain of Death and so those Three with Three more of the Inhabitants of which more in its place Ye banish'd the Father Mother and Son with either of whom No Proceedings have been had according to Law And Katherine Scot of the Town of Providence in the Jurisdiction of Rhoad Island a Mother of many Children one that had lived with her Husband the space of Twenty years of an Unblamable Conversation and a grave sostor ancient Woman and of good Breeding as to the outward as Men account coming to see the Execution of the said Three as aforesaid whose Ears ye out off and saying upon their doing of it privately and keeping her and others from coming in who desired to see it That it was evident they were going to act the Works of Darkness or else they would have brought them forth Publickly and have declared their Offence that others may hear and fear Ye Committed to Prifon though she was moved of the Lord so to do and to come and bear Testimony and gave her Ten cruel stripes with a Threefold-corded-knotted VVhip with that Cruelty in the Execution as aforesaid to others on the second day of the Eight Month 1658. Though ye confessed when ye had her before you That for ought ye knew she had been of an Unblamable Conversation and though some of you knew her Father and called him Mr. Marbery and that she had been well bred as among Men and had so lived as Men account and that she was the Mother of many Children yet ye whipt her for all that and moreover told her That ye were likely to have a Law to hang her what bloody words do ye wrap out if she came thither again To which she answered If God call us wo be to us if we come not and I question not but He whom we love will make us not to count our Lives dear unto our selves for the sake of his Name To which your Governor John Endicot replied and with what wickedness may be judged And we shall be as ready said he to take away your Lives as ye shall be to lay them down as what follows makes manifest viz. Your Law of Banishment upon pain of Death which this leads me unto VVhich also viz. that of cutting off Ears being too weak a Defence against their Impetuous Frantick Fury necessitated us to endeavour our Security and upon serious Consideration after the former Experiments by their incessant Assaults A Law was made that such Persons should be banished upon Pain of Death according to the Example of England in their Provision against Jesuites Answ The Consideration of what I have already said as to your Laws and the Grounds of them and the Cruelties sustained by the Innocent though it be enough to lay you on the Ground with all sober and unbyassed People and to make you appear to be the worst of Men as you are of those who pretend themselves Christians and though on this foot I need not add further weight to this Matter it being so comprehensive of it self Yet in regard you have cut out my way and by adding Blood unto Bonds Whippings Cutting off Ears c. laid a Necessity upon me to bring upon You the Blood of the Innocent as you have their other Sufferings And because ye seem to lay the stress of your Proceedings upon the Example of England in their Provision against Jesuites and so seem to bottom what you have done as to the Lives of these People thereupon for so are your words viz. According to the Example of England in their Provision against Jesuites I shall there put you to it and if ye there cannot hold as You will see ye cannot by and by then ye will fall into Blood as you are into the rest of the Sufferings of the Innocent Thus then The Law of England in its Provision against Jesuites is laid upon these Grounds or Considerations First That the Pope pretends unto a Supream Right over all Nations and Kingdoms in things Civil and Religious as the Successor of Peter Secondly That by Virtue of this his Supremacy he may Excommunicate Princes Absolve Subjects from their Obedience Arm Subjects against their Princes Change their Dominions Degrade their Royalties Pull down as he pleaseth Thirdly That the Jesuites or those of the Order of Jesus as they Blasphemously term it are the Sworn Servants of the Pope and are sent out by him into all Nations to Exert this his Authority and to hold forth his Dominion Fourthly That in Order hereunto The men of that Order or Jesuites so called have come into England and have sought by Vertue of the Supremacy aforesaid to Draw Subjects from Obedience to their Princes Levy Arms Plot Contrive Raise Rebellions yea to Murder their Princes And this Ex Officio Virtute Ordinis by Virtue of their Order or Office Fifthly That the Pope hath taken upon him to Excommunicate Princes in England To Absolve their Subjects from Obedience unto them to Change Altar Pull down and Set up as he pleaseth Sixtly That the Jesuites so called have been hereof Convicted and to have wrought in Order hereunto as the Principal Emissaries Seventhly That the Nation of England hath oft-times Endured and Suffered Conflicted with and Travelled through much Blood and War Trouble and Misery to the Breaking of the Peace thereof and the Hazarding of its Government to a Forraign Vassallage because and by Reason hereof In Consideration of All which and that the English Nation is Naturally Obliged to its Right and lawful Prince against all Forreign Invasion or Obtrusion and that the Men of the Order aforesaid are Obliged Virtute Ordinis Officii By their Order or Office to the Contrary and have come into England and many of them English who have gone beyond the Seas and received Orders of the Pope as aforesaid and have so been proved through a long Tract of Time Therefore it Provides as in the said Act
should Occasion such a Law to Pass and said If he had not been able to go he would have Crept upon his hands and his knees rather than it should have been but it would not be granted the miscarriage being as was said by reason of One Russel formerly of Bristol in Old England and One Collins of Misticke not standing to it and being wrong in the Vote which I mention that their Names may Remain who were for and against it For how ever it may be thought yet this shall stand a witness against them unto all Generations for such a wicked Law and the Blood of the Innocent may not be forgotten Yet a great Difference there was and the Court broke up and the Twelve aforesaid resolved to Enter their Dissents under the Law it being also so Repugnant to the Laws of England to put to death without Jury than which there is nothing more Repugnant which the Magistrates seeing and how such a number of Dissents would weaken their Law Admitted this Addition to the Law viz. To be tryed by a special Jury and all this Tryal when it came to it was but Whether they were Quakers which they Judged by their Coming in Covered and that they had been in the Country before and suffered the Law and had been Banish'd as I shall anon make appear not of any particular principle or matter of Fact by a Legal Conviction more than aforesaid from first to last and a Court of Assistants which consists of Seven Magistrates at the least This being according to a standing Law of the Countrey Viz. That none be sentenc'd to Death or Banishment but by a special Jury and a Court of Assistants which the other was against as it was against the Law of England as I have said So this reconcil'd the matter and but onely the Two former Entred their Dissents as aforesaid and the Law passed and ye proceeded thereupon as I have said and followed it hard in the Execution as ye did in the Making and Your Priests set ye on from whom it proceeded and no Consideration of the Age of Lawrence and Cassandra nor of their Family on whom ye had layd hands nor the State of the Rest nor of their Wives Children Relations Families nor of their Estates which had suffered much in their many long and fore Imprisonments some of them Ten Weeks at a time and some Twenty in the chief time of the Summer when they should have been at Liberty to look to their Hay and Grass and Provisions for the Winter to keep their Cattle from starving and their Families from perishing Nor the State of Buffum's Father who was a weakly Aged Man and had neither Son nor Servant to help him but the said Joshua nor the Season of the Year then it being the Spring and a time for them a little to look out for the Preservation of what was left that they might not be utterly destroyed nor their being so sorely Whipt some of them Twice Each and some Four times all which they told the Court being Convicted of nothing but for not coming to your Meetings and for Meeting by themselves for which you were satisfied upon their Goods according to your Law As they sent you notice in a Paper to this Purpose viz. That seeing the chief offence ye had against them was the not putting off the Hat They desired to know if their Punishments had not been sufficient for their Offences as some of them had been twice Imprisoned Ten weeks and twice Whipt One had been Twice Imprisoned and Four times Whipt Three had been Twice Imprisoned and Whipt and the last time kept Prisoners Twenty weeks the chief time of all the Summer such as lived on Husbandry Their Hay and Harvest lying on the spoil and nothing to charge them with but their Meetings on the First Dayes of the week by themselves and their not coming to Your Meetings and not putting off their Hats for the Two former of which Your Law was satisfied on their Goods I say none of these Considerations nor such like though they were very tender to hearts that had any softness no nor of your Governor being Struck in the Court of Commissioners at the end thereof when they sought to have this Bloody Law passed the Rest of the Collonies So that for some Weeks he could not go home to his Own House which was but a little ways from it but lay in a Tavern from his Own Habitation who strove so much and Rich. Bellingham with him to Banish others But his heart being hardned Pharaoh's instead of Considering he was in a great Rage against them and poured forth what his fury and wicked Spirit could bring forth and told them They all deserved to be hang'd and that they were Blasphemers and Hereticks who had never any such thing proved against them as hath been said when they desir'd it and to be tryed for that purpose He said That they worshipped another God looked to be saved by another Christ then they did who Worship no other God but him of whom are all things and look to be saved by no other Christ than him by whom are all things and Say what ye will we will not believe you a hard case indeed and manifests that in him Judgement was turned Backward and Equity could not Enter But the Just Lord sees it And ye all were without Bowels of Compassion and would not hear them your Governor seeming as if he loathed their Persons but Banish them ye did upon pain of Death after ye had appointed them to depart the Jurisdiction by the Court of Election in the Moneth called May as aforesaid which they did not and ye gave them but a fortnights time to depart and when after sentence was given some of them who intended for England desired that they might have leave to take shipping at Boston to pass for England their being never another Convenient harbour in that Colony out of which to Pass Ye were so shut up in your Bowels that ye would not grant that but your Governour said Beware you are not here after the Eight day of June which was about Fourteen days after so they were constrained viz. Samuel Shattock Nicholas Phelps and Josiah Southick who were for England to take the opportunity that presented in Four days after to pass to England by Barbadoes having but Four dayes time of Remove So they passed for England and Lawrence Southick and Cassandra to Shelter Island a place near where shortly after in three days of each other they both died leaving their Blood on your heads which the Lord will Visit when He comes to make Inquisition for Blood and Joshua Buffum to Rhoad Island and you sat down to Eat and to Drink and rose up to Play Over the Ruines of the Innocent Now when ye had not as yet sentenc'd them as aforesaid they asked your Governour what it was ye sought for of them The Honour of God or
same ground as did this Magistrate but these things I spare being so plain and manifest So they passed away in the Moving of the Lord to Rhoad Island after they had been twenty four Weeks Prisoners in your Slaughter-House at Boston that is to say Joseph Nicholson twenty four Weeks and his Wife eighteen And after they had received your Cruelty as to her Life who might have perished in her Travil as aforesaid but this was the thing ye desired as to her and the rest as your Words and Deeds have made manifest so that it might be with safety to your selves which was your wariness indeed not that it was your Love to those People whom ye sought to Destroy but therein had not your Wills though ye have been suffered to put some of them to Death that what ye would do and what was in your hearts might be made manifest And eight more when Joseph and his Wife passed from Boston were in Prison who by Your bloody Law were in condition of Banishment upon Pain of Death so to root them out This being the often Expression of some of you That they or you must give way and why can't ye Live together seeing ye were made of One Blood and to breath in one Ayre and the Bishops might with as much Justice have used the same Argument as you And your M. General Denison often said in Court as I have alledged That they and you could not well live together Your minds are very great that would swell bigger than the Ordinance of the God of Heaven who hath made mankind to dwell on all the face of the Earth and that at Present the Power was in your hands but Know ye how long it will be Wisdom would have tought ye had ye kearkened unto it to have done by Men Whilst ye are in Power as ye would have done to your selves when ye are Out and as it was not done unto you when ye were under who even now are under another Jurisdiction and the rest must fend off as I have said said he So mind your State and how ye have given Law against your selves You should have been absolute first had ye been wise Men and made your selves so viz. Independant from England as your Action bespoke your Mind in making it Death Directly or Indirectly to seek the Alteration of Your Government which was upon the endeavouring of some by Petition to England to have their Grievances redrest before any of the People called Quakers came into Your Jurisdiction whom You used at Your pleasure and to prevent them formed this Law that all things might be secure in your hands and so far ye proceeded further That neither Oliver nor his Son Richard were Proclaimed Protectors not that Ye liked them not but that ye thought them so much your Friends as that by the Indulgence of them ye might get clear of England though ye pretended something else viz. the Danger of some Body who which that some Body was it may be judged And One of your Priests said by such as Endeavoured by Petition to England to have Redress That if they had their due they should be led up Windmil-Hill that is to the Gallows in plain English to be Hanged For on Windmil-Hill stood the Gallows at Bostow And some of the said Petitioners were taken and Imprisoned and Fined in great summes of Mony for so doing As Doctor Child Samuel Maverick David Yeal and others that were Merchants whom ye Sought to find out viz. the Petitioners by putting some to an Oath in the Nature of that Ex Officio to accuse any but themselves which one of them resolving not to take and yet afterwards doing was so tormented in his Spirit that he died miserable And this is something of the Provision ye have made against your Dependency on England and upon which none durst from that time upon their Lives Petition to England for Redress of any Grievance whatsoever And this is the Tyranny under which doth lie the People of New-England and upon Account of this Appeals to England have been denied of which I have spoken Now this was upon a Petition wherein they desired to be ruled according to the Laws of England and that they might have the Liberty of English men or else they intended to Petition to Enland which was put into the Court at Boston where it kindled a great fire against the Petitioners and most of the Pulpits rang of it see how the Priests are in all Places the Trumpeters of Rebellion whose Interest as it appears is to be severed from England and to make some of them Examples that is to hang them the Magistrates were set on by the Priests and the said Priest for One. So they made their Law as aforesaid And Richard Bellingham your Deputy Governor who deserves not to be named amonst men Who when in England in that day of the Bishops hid himself under a Bed for fear of an Appariter but is now thus Cruel to the Innocent said to the said Joseph and his Wife after that ye had pronounced on them the Sentence of Banishment upon Pain of Death That their Law was too strong for them and that they should be Hanged assuredly if they should be taken again after Banishment in which he lied for they were before you several times after their said Banishment and the time Limited was expired and yet they were not Hanged as they were whom ye had already put to Death but the Lord delivered them out of your hands and that they would take a Course with his wife hereafter which was after she should be delivered for she was great with Child when she was Banisht and this was said when ye Banisht her And Your Goaler Rejoyced when he met Joseph as he was in the Way to the Prison after his Banishment Telling him That he viz. the said Joseph was come again to see whether the Gallows would hold him as he rejoyced at the sight of some other Friends who were sent to Prison for that purpose of which I have spoken And it was boasted in Court That ye had men in Armes to maintain your Laws and to defend your selves And what Laws are they Against Conscience or for Religion and what Religion is it which Men in Armes must maintain and against whom are your Armes Those who do not resist you and who are few in Number a few Men and Women What Defence is this If Men in Armes should come to try you Would you thus maintain it I could never find that cruel men dare much to sight Such a Generation of Blood-thirsty men Ravening after the Prey after Blood the Blood of the Innocent who have been Ancient in your Cruelty and have long been filling up your measure who as soon as you had escaped the hands of those you feared in England gotten large Farmes about you you sat down at Rest and then soon began to
look on it as a breach of a Rule to slight and undervalue Authority and I said that Paul gave Festus the title of Honour though he was a Heathen I do not say these Magistrates are Heathens I said then when the man was on the Ladder who looked on me and called me Friend and said Know that this day I am willing to offer up my Life for the Witness of JESUS Then I desired leave of the Officers to speak and said Gentlemen I am a stranger both to your Persons and Country and yet a friend to both and I cryed aloud For the Lord's sake take not away the man's Life but remember Gamaliel's Counsel to the Jews If this be of man it will come to nought but if it be of God ye cannot overthrow its but be careful ye be not found fighters against God And the Captain said Why had you not come to the Prison The Reason was because I heard the man might go if he would and therefore I called him down from the Tree and said Come down William you may go away if you will Then Capt. Oliver said it was no such matter and asked What I had to do with it and besides bad me to be gone And I told them I was willing for I cannot endure to see this I said And when I was in the Town some did seem to sympathize with me in my Grief But I told them that they had no Warrant from the Word of God nor President from our Country nor Power from his Majestie to hang the Man I rest Your Friend Thomas Wilkie To Mr. George Lad Master of the America of Dartmouth now at Barbados THE END * The Common Law gives no such Libertie but requires a Man to choose the Particular unto which he will stand but the Civil and Proceedings of State allows and uses it upon a particular Salvo in the first Exhibition and not afterwards Mary Fisher Ann Austin the Fifth Moneth 1656. Mary Prince Sarah Gibbens Mary Weatherhead Dorothy Waugh Christopher Holder Thomas Thirstone William Brend John Copeland The Seventh day of the Sixth Moneth 1656. Robert Lock Nicholas Upshall Richard Smith Simon Kempthorne Mary Fisher Anne Austin * John Hall William Ames John Higgins Samuel Fisher John Stubbs Samuel Fisher * Christopher Brickhead * William Salt * Christopher Brickhead * John Perrot John Love * John Perrot John Love Samuel Fisher John Stubbs Mary Fisher Mary Prince * Samuel Fisher John Stubbs John Perrot John Love John Perrot John Love Mary Fisher Thomas Thirstone Josiah Cole Thomas Chapman * Thomas Thirstone Nicholas Upshall Christopher Holder Thomas Thirstone John Copeland William Brend Sarah Gibbens Dorothy Waugh Mary Weatherhead Mary Prince Nicholas Vpsh 29th of the 6th Month Mary Clark John Clark a Merchant-Taylor in London Christopher Holder John Copeland 21 day 7th month 1657 23 day 7th month 1657 Samuel Shattock Law Southick and his Wife Richard Dowdney Lawrence Southick Cassandra his Wife Josiah their Son * 3d day 12th Month 1657. Edw. Harnet and his Wife Another aged Family William Shattock First Month 1658. John Burton Josiah Southik John Small Sarah Gibbens Dorothy Waugh 13th 2d Moneth 1658. 1. d. Moneth 1658. Horred Gardner 11th 3d. Moneth 1658. * Mary Staunton Sarah Gibbens Dorothy Waugh Thomas Harris of Barbadoes 19th day 5th Month 1658. William Brend William Leddra Law Southick Cassandra his Wise Josia their Son Sam Shattock Joshua Buffum Sam Gaskin * 2d day 5th Month 1658. Will. Brend Will. Leddra Samuel Shattock Sam. Gaskin Josh Buffum Cassandra Southick Law Southick Josiah his Son William Brend William Leddra VVilliam Brend Humphry Norton John Rouse Will. Leddra Tho. Harris Sam. Shattock Lawrence Southick Cassandra his Wife Josiah their Son Joshuah Buffum Samuel Gaskin July 1. 1658. Humphery Norton John Rous. Appeal to England denied in open Court Lawrence Cassandra Josiah Southick Nicholas Phelps Samuel Shattock Nicholas Phelps Joshua Buffum Anne Needam A Tryal of 12. men according to the Law of England and of that Country when demanded denyed The People called upon to bear witnesse that they could not have Justice Dan. Denison's account of the Reason of your Proceedings so illegally against those People with such Cruelty 27th day 8th Month 1658. A Tryal by 12 men again demanded of the Court General or by the Court Gen. according to Law Such a Tryal denyed by the Court General Simon Broadstreet The Hat made a Character of One called a Quaker when no Principle or Practice could be had upon which they are put to Death The First of this Nature that the Eaâ—â—â— hath heard of Priest Chansey Divinity the Master of your Colledge and Way to Put Men to Death after the nature of Wolves indeed then he must go for one and bear the Penalty who to be one hath so manifested himself Twelve more had before the Court at Salem of the Inhabitants thereof and fined 40 l. 19 sh for Absenting from your Meetings Fines to the value of 100l or upwards laid by that Court William Marston of Hampton 8th Moneth 1658. A Horrible Cruelty 6th Moneth 1658. Christopher Holder Jo. Copeland John Rous 25. Sixth Month 1658. Christop Holder Joh. Copeland John Rous their Ears cut off 7th of the 7th Month 1658. 10th 7th Mon. 1658. * Dan. Denisons second Speech demonstrating their Resolution to root out those People because they were the stronger Another Solemn Appeal in Case of their Ears made to England and Denyed 16th of the Eight Month the Execution done Executions of Punishment as to Whipping and losse of Limb c. done in Private contrary to the Law of England and of God which orders them that are truly so that is Punishments to be otherwise that all may hear and sear And which is like to Justice which seeks no Corner And the Bishops cut off the Ears of W. Prynne Henry Burton and Dr. Bastwick in the Palace-yard at Westminster and upon a Scaffold before the People though it was done by Order of the Star-Chamber Lawrence Southick Cassandra Josiah Cassandra Southick Katherine Scot. 2d day 8th Month 1658. Lawrence Cassandra Josiah Southick Samuel Shuttock Nicholas Phelps Joshua Buffum Banished 3d. Month 1659. Some of the Passages of Proceedings in the procuring and passing that Law of Banishment upon Death Capt. Edward Hutcheson Capt. Thomas Clark a Merchant of Boston Enter their Dissents under the Law of Banishment upon pain of Death The Court of Deputies oposite to the Passing of the Law The Court of Magistrates for it of these Two as of Two Houses is the Court General made up Provision in the Law as to Death without Tryal of a Jury The Court of Deputies oppose it The Priests set it on * The Law pass'd for Life without Jury in the Court of Deputies by One Vote Thirteen for it The Speaker and Eleven against it Deacon Wozell sorely troubled that his Absence should occasion such a Law to pass To be tried by a special Jury added to
the beginning But the Righteous God will fill to you again yea double in the Cup that ye have filled and ye shall surely have your Reward Therefore deceive not your selves for as you have sown so shall ye reap as you have done so shall it be done unto you and ye shall know that I am the Lord when I have taken Vengeance upon You and rendred unto you according to your Deeds Then shall you see and be ashamed for your Envy at My People Shame shall cover you who have said unto them Where is now the Lord thy God and ye shall be a Perpetual Desolation the Mouth of the Lord of Hosts hath spoken it who also will do it and perform it in its season and the time is near Now as to the Sufferings What were they and your House of Correction that ye make so slight of them and say of them which proving Insufficient The First Two that came Over after this your Law were Anne Burden and Mary Dyar her whom ye afterwards put to death after that ye had reprieved her of which in its place The One's business was viz. Anne Burden's to gather up some Debts in the Country her Husband being dead who was a long Inhabitant therein for the maintenance of her and her children who had lived about Sixteen years in Boston and those parts and was unblamable before them with whom she lived Nor had ye any thing wherewithal to charge her now but that she was a Plain Quaker as Richard Bellingham said and that she must aside your Law who came for her Debts Mary Dyar's to pass that way to Rhoad Island having before she arrived there no knowledge of what ye had done These Two ye imprisoned and kept close Prisoners that none might come at them and though William Dyar came for his Wife from Rhoad Island after he heard that she was there and in Prison yet ye suffered him not to have her until he became bound in a great Penalty so great was your fear not to lodge her in any Town of your Colony nor to permit any to have speech with her an unmanly thing in her Journey But as for Anne Burden ye held her to it and when she was very sick in Prison ye suffered not her Friends to come and visit her Yea your Jaylor shut her up in a close Room in the heat of Summer upon the Visit of Two Friends at the Window as they came from your Meetings And as for her Debts though some Tender-hearted People were moved to look after them whilst she was in this Restraint and had procured to the value of about Thirty Pounds of it and desired that she might have her Liberty when ye sent her away to pass to England by Barbados because the Goods so gathered for that part of the Debt were not fit for England which was so reasonable that you seemed at first as if it might be if any Voluntarily would receive her for that ye could compel none so to do but He that brought her thither and they upon this seeming Liberty of yours had procured such a Passage Yet ye suffered her not to go but most unreasonably compell'd the Master of the Ship that brought her thither to carry her back for England without any of her Goods with her nor had she so much as One Penies-worth of her Husband's except to the Value of Six shillings which an honest man sent her upon an old Account whilst she was in New-England but ye returned her Empty to her Fatherless Children though they were born in the Country and after that ye had kept her there for the space of about Twelve weeks close Prisoner and put her to the charge of her abiding there and going back and when the Master of the Ship asked who should pay for her Passage Ye advised him to take so much of her Goods as would answer it which he refusing to do so wicked a thing and rather trusting to her Honesty of which he was perswaded that she would not let him be a loser though he could not compel her to pay seeing she went not of her own will and which she paid him in London upon that Account ye let him go And when he that had the first trust from her husband with the Estate was to convey what was gathered to Barbados after she was gone Ye stopp'd to the value of six pounds ten shillings of it for her Passage who so went upon her own and paid it in London aforesaid and of seven shillings for Boat-hire to carry her on Sihpboard though the Master proffered John Endicot your Governour to carry her in his own but Richard Bellingham your Deputy-Governor would not but sent her with the Hangman in a Boat that he had prest and of Fourteen pounds for the Jaylon to whom she owed nothing and as for the rest she heard of some that was sent to the Barbados by the honest man that stirred to have it in but of him that was intrusted she neither heard when nor what nor hath she any thing of it come to her hands 25th of the 2d Month 1660. to relieve her and her Children and as for the Remainder of the Estate left in the Country which should have been a Livelihood for her and hers and for which she came what is become of it she knoweth not nor cannot go over to Enquire without a Prison And this is your Mercy your way to pay Debts your Tenderness your Regard to the Widow and the Fatherless your Justice and the Execution of your Laws when the Reason of your Law hath no place And for this Expect that ye shall have your Reward from Him who is the Father of the Fatherless and the Husband to the Widow who is no Respecter of Persons but will render to every man according to his works Mary Clark is the next whose tender Body being a Mother of Children and having a Husband in England whom she left being moved of the Lord to come unto you ye unmercifully tore with Twenty stripes of a Whip with Three Cords laid on with fury after she had delivered her Message to you which she had from the Lord which ye turned your backs upon and said Ye would not hear like those Proud men to whom the Prophet Jeremiah spake in the Word of the Lord. So she turned her Back to you and ye smote it as aforesaid and having detained her Prisoner about Twelve weeks after in the Winter season ye turned her out of your Jurisdiction Who now is not And this is your House of Correction and the beginning of the inslicting of the Penalty which ye say was Insufficient Christopher Holder and John Copeland are the next who being moved of the Lord to go to Salem a Town in your Colony and speaking a few words viz. Christopher Holder in Your Meeting after the Priest had done was haled back by the hair of the head and his Mouth violently stopp'd with
This being tendered they will not take it and then we must adde more force to the Law and that is If any man refuse or neglect to take it by such a time shall pay Five pounds or depart the Colony VVhen the time is come they are the same as they were Then goes out the Marshal and fetcheth away their Cows and other Cattel Well another Court comes They are required to take the Oath again They cannot Then Five pounds more On this Account Thirty five head of Cattel as I have been credibly informed hath been by the Authority of our Court taken from them the latter part of this Summer and these People say If they have more right to them than themselves Let them take them Some that had a Cow only some Two Cows some Three Cows and many small Children in their Families to whom in Summer time a Cow or two was the greatest Outward Comfort they had for their subsistance A Poor Weaver that hath Seven or Eight small Children I know not which he himself lame in his Body had but two Cows and both taken from him The Marshal asked him what he would do he must have his Cows The Man said That God that gave him them he doubted not but would still provide for him To fill up the Measure yet more full though to the further emptying of Sandwitch Men of their outward Comforts The last Court of Assistants the first Tuesday of this Instant the Court was pleased to determine Fines on Sandwitch Men for Meetings sometimes on First Dayes of the Week sometimes on other dayes as they say They meet ordinarily twice in the week besides the Lords Day One Hundred and Fifty pounds whereof W. Newland is Twenty four pounds for himself and his Wife at Ten shillings a Meeting W. Allen Forty six pounds some affirm it Forty nine pounds The poor VVeaver afore spoken of Twenty pounds Brother Cook told me One of the Brethren at Barnstable certified him that he was in the Weavers house when Cruel Barloe Sandwitch Marshal came to demand the Sum and said he was fully informed of all the Poor Man had and thought if all laid together it was not worth Ten pounds VVhat will be the End of such Courses and Practices the Lord only knows I heartily and earnestly pray that these and such like courses neither raise up among us nor bring in upon us either the Sword or any devouring Calamity as a Just Avenger of the Lord's Quarrel for acts of Injustice and Oppression and that we may every one find out the Plague of his own heart and putting away the Evil of his own Doings and meet the Lord by Entreaties of Peace before it be too late and there be no Remedy Our Civil Powers are so exercised in things appertaining to the Kingdom of Christ in matters of Religion and Conscience that we can have no time to effect any thing that tends to the Promotion of the Civil Weal or the Prosperity of the Place But now we must have a State-Religion such as the Powers of the World will allow and no other A State-Ministry and a State-way of Maintenance And we must worship and serve the Lord Jesus as the World shall appoint us we must all go to the Publick Place of Meeting in the Parish where he dwells or be presented I am informed of Three or Four score last Court presented for not coming to Publick Meetings and let me tell you how they brought this about You may remember a Law once made called Thomas Hinckley's Law That if any neglected the Worship of God in the Place where he lives and sets up a Worship contrary to God and the Allowance of this Government to the publick Prophanation of Gods Holy Day and Ordinance shall pay Ten shillings This Law would not reach what then was aimed at Because he must do so and so that is all things therein expressed or else break not the Law In March last a Court of Deputies was called and some Acts touching Quakers were made and then they contrived to make this Law serviceable to them and that was by putting out the word and and putting in the word or which is a Disjunctive and makes every Branch to become a Law So now if any do neglect or will not come to the Publick Meetings Ten shillings for every Defect Certainly we either have less Wit or more Money than the Massachusets For for Five shillings a day a man may stay away till it come to Twelve or Thirteen pounds if he had it but to pay them And these men altering this Law now in March yet left it Dated June 6. 1651. and so it stands as the Act of a General Court they to be the Authors of it Seven years before it was in being And so you your self have your part and share in it if the Recorder lie not But what may be the Reason that they should not by another Law made and dated by that Court as well effect what was intended as by altering a word and so the whole sence of the Law and leave this their Act by the date of it charged on another Courts account Surely the chief Instruments in the business being privy to an Act of Parliament for Liberty should too openly have acted repugnant to a Law of England but if they can do the thing and leave it on a Court as making it six years before the Act of Parliament there can be no danger in this And that they were privy to the Act of Parliument for Liberty to be then in being is evident That the Deputies might be free to act it They told us That now the Protector stood not engaged to the Articles for Liberty for the Parliament had now taken the Power into their Own hands and had given the Protector a new Oath Only in General to maintain the Protestant Religion and so produced the Oath in a Paper in writing Whereas the Act of Parliament and the Oath are both in one Book in Print So that they who were privy to the One could not be ignorant of the Other But still all is well if we can but keep the People ignorant of their Liberties and Priviledges then we have liberty to Act in Our own Wills what we please We are wrapped up in a Laborynth of Confused Laws that the Freemens Power is quite gone and it was said last June-Court by one That they knew nothing the Freemen had there to do Sandwitch-men may not go to the Bay lest they be taken up for Quakers William Newland was there about his Occasions some Ten dayes since and they put him in Prison Twenty four hours and sent for divers to witness against him but they had not Proof enough to make him a Quaker which if they had he should have been whipt Nay they may not go about their Occasions in other Towns in our Colony but Warrants lie in Ambush to apprehend and bring them
Order sent on horseback by your Deputy Governor Richard Bellingham to have him thither and thither he was had and there Committed and his Wife with him after she was Delivered and was come thither and both of them ye had before you after ye had Condemned Mary Dier the second time to Death even that very Day and in the time that ye had Mary Dier to the Execution and in which she was Executed ye had them both before ye again to see if the terror that might have been in such a thing could have frighted them But the Power of the Lord in them was above you all and they feared not your Fears nor were afraid of your Threats but boldly stood it out with you in his Eternal Power as did also Mary Dier first and last as I have Declared and bad you do it when ye told them of the thing that is to say of putting of them to Death thinking to fear them but yet ye could not do it though fain ye would and your Desire was so to do and your Wills for which you shall Answer as if ye had shed their Blood for it was in your heart so to do and there ye Murdred them but you feared the Consequence they coming to Sojourn among you as Free-born English and you denying of them their birth-right and instead of admitting them to live amongst ye which you could not deny they having not done any thing whereby to cut them off from such their Priviledge having Imprisoned them and Banish'd them upon Pain of Death as aforesaid and in that Barbarous manner with the greatest hard-heartedness halled him from his Wife when she was in Travel in Order to put him to Death and which might have cost her in that condition according to men her Life also and of the Little One with which she was in Travel to bring it into the World Such Inhumanities as these and Cruel Workings England hath not heard of to have been before done in any of her Jurisdictions for to have destroyed them all ye thought Father Mother and Infant at once but could not by this way nor dared by the other because of your Own Necks should ye have done it So ye set them at Liberty who over all your heads Departed your Jurisdiction in the Will of God having tried you to trie the rest and to Plimmouth Patent they went where VVinlock Christison had been Imprisoned and Suffered twenty seven cruel Stripes on his naked body at one time laid on with Deliberation so was the word of the Magistrates who stood to see it in the Cold Winter season who bad the Jaylor so to do and to lay it on hard who laid it on as hard as he could and then Rob'd him of his Wastcoate though in that Cold time of the year he was to pass through hardship in going through a Wilderness and of his Bible which the Jaylor took for Fees Who came about Midnight much in Drink the night before and had them away though his Demand was but five Shillings So Depriving him of the Scriptures as your Jaylor did some of those that came to you of which I have spoken and then turned him out in the Morning in the Cold having not Cloathes sufficient left him by you to keep him from it after ye had kept him without food from the time of his said Cruel Whipping to his said turning out as he was five Days upon his first Commitment not suffering him to have any for his Money nor letting others to supply him but stopping up the very holes to hinder any supply the Jaylor saying when he stopt them up that at such places he might be supplied with Provisions and keeping it so until he asked them VVhether they meant to Starve him And the Power of the Lord was in it and constrained them to allow him Provisions of three Pence a day for five weeks such as the Jaylor would give him who took away his Waste-coat and Bible as aforesaid as Blood-thirsty Barloe rob'd him of his two other Coats and Hat and bag of Linen worth upwards of four pounds when he Apprehenden him at Sandwitch a little after he came thither from your Prison in Boston after ye had Banish'd him upon Pain of Death and kept him fourteen Weeks and two Days there in the coldest time of the Winter season and committed his two Friends of Salem that came with him to Boston And thus was he Whipt and thus was he Rob'd and thus was he turned out after that Tho. Prince the Governor and Magistrates had caused him to be tied Neck and Heels for speaking for himself in the Court most Cruel Tyranny who denied him Satisfaction for his Goods Robb'd by Barloe as aforesaid when he was had to the Whipping Post and with much adoe had obtained so much Moderation of the Governour as to hear him thereabouts such was their Rage in Whipping of him who said in Answer That he must first pay for his Preaching this is the Justice of the men of Plimmouth Patent in place to do Justice Theeves and Robbers and Abettors of such In stead of causing Satisfaction to be made and causing the Innocent cruelly to suffer who demand Satisfaction even by the hand of them who Commited it on them which God will Reward who is near to render unto them according to their Deeds and all this matter was but for coming into their Jurisdiction when he was banished out of yours Was ever the like hardheartedness heard of or Barbarous Cruelty I say Joseph Nicholson and his Wife being thus turned out of your Jurisdiction and denied to Sojourn there and dealt with as aforesaid were to demand it of Plimmouth Patent This another Habitation of Cruelty and Persecuting the Just and thither they came and Demanded to Sojourn in that Jurisdiction but neither there could they be admitted the same Spirit ruling in Plimmouth Patent as in Boston and so the Magistrates caused them to understand when they told them That if they had turned them away at Boston they would have nothing to do with them how exactly do they Write after your Coppy And his Wife had much to do with them and they threatened to Whip her if they had ever a Cage and send her away and One of them said That if she had not been a Witch she could not have known that he that was with his son was a Priest whom by the Spirit of the Lord she knew to be such and so spake to him thus doth the blind World judge of the Revelation of the Spirit by which the Prophet Ahijah knew when the Wife of Jeroboam came in disguise to him and he said Come in thou Wife of Jeroboam why feignest thou thy self to be another And by which the Prophets knew and foretold things to come and Jeroboam might have said had not he been a Witch he could not have told that it was his Wife when she came to him so disguised on the very