up in prison, others had their houses besett and watcht night and day, and hardly escaped their hands; and the most were faine to flie and leave their howses and habitations, and the means of their livelehood. Yet these and many other sharper things which affterward befell them, were no other then they looked for, and therfore were the better prepared to bear them by the assistance of Gods grace and spirite; yet seeing them selves thus molested, [7] and that ther was no hope of their continuance ther, by a joynte consente they resolved to goe into the Low-Countries,1 wher they heard was freedome of Religion for all men; as also how sundrie from London, and other parts of the land had been exiled and persecuted for the same cause, and were gone thither; and lived at Amsterdam, and in other places of the land. So affter they had continued togeither 1 The Low Lands (Pays Bas) were the territory of the archdukes, and in 1608 did not enjoy religious freedom, and had not for many years, the Catholic church being the recognized church. After the truce of 1609 the Catholic counter reformation was so vigorously carried on in that realm that heresy almost disappeared. Bradford uses the term Low Countries in a more general meaning. See p. 36, infra. * This movement of the persecuted to Holland began soon after the executions of Barrow, Greenwood, and Penry, in 1593. Johnson reached Amsterdam in the autumn of 1597, and in that short interval of four years the earlier immigrants appear to have been so embroiled with the Reformed churches of Holland, as to be obliged to seek shelter outside of Amsterdam, at Kampen and at Naarden. It is supposed that in their reforming zeal they wrote "libels and scandalous attacks" upon those churches, and so incurred the penalty of banishment. Dexter, The England and Holland of the Pilgrims, 422, 427. Since 1569 the States-General allowed liberty of conscience to both the Reformed and the Roman Catholic, and since 1578 freedom of worship for all, even for the Anabaptists, was the policy of Amsterdam. As the protestants were good handicraftsmen and very industrious in manufactures, the cities gained by this toleration. Amsterdam was an "University of all Religions; . . . its the Fair of all the Sects; . . . their Republick is more to them than Heaven; and God may be more safely offended there than the States-General." Dutch Drawn to the Life (1664), 48. "I confesse that Holland hath been a cage to these unclean birds [Separatists and others], but the reason is evident, the civil State there walking in the corrupt principles of carnall Policy, which cannot be blessed with finall successe, doth impede the exercise of Church Discipline in its most principall parts; these last fourty years that Land hath not been permitted to enjoy more General Assemblies then one [Dort, aboute a year, and kept their meetings every Saboth, in one place, or other, exercising the worship of God amongst them selves, notwithstanding all the dilligence and malice of their adverssaries, they seeing they could no longer continue in that condition, they resolved to get over into Holland as they could. Which was in the year. 1607. and. 1608. of which more at large in the next chap[ter]. 1618-19], and how great Service that one did towards the purging of the much corrupted Church, and calming the greatly disturbed State, all their friends in Europe did see and congratulate, while their foes did grieve and envy it." Baylie, Dissvasive from the Errours of the Time, 8. Scaliger, who wrote a few years before the religious refugees came from England, rather frowned upon the excessive freedom allowed. "In this country, as in Venice, everything is allowed, provided that nothing is done or said against the government. They tolerate all sorts of people here except Antitrinitarians: these were suffered here for a certain time, but were expelled by the Orders. There are good people in Holland; but there is not a country in the world in greater need of Divine Chastisements." Scaligerana (ed. 1695), 197. Brereton, some twenty-six years later recorded, that no man was persecuted for religion, nor scoffed at, be he never so zealous. Travels, 70. gickair upon it should seeme that he inali tone, Freccomendis by Some personmis to his maisters fertice only for this use, guhairin only be also gwhat life hach Seraid him, & chairfore he wolde ud be asted in quebat company, & Shipp he went out of englande, & the gorce he shipped at the lyte questions, wolde beasted anent the forme of his returne, as for these tromper. Wares founde upon him, the Signifacation & use of everie one of thaime wolde be khowin, & Juhar I have observid in thaim, the beanume will show you, nou laske, je remember of the crewallie willanouse pasqua that rayled upon me for the nance of briffaine, if I remember rick in spate some thing of harwest & prophecied my destruction about thee tyme, ye maze think of this, for it is lyte to be the laboure of Suched des pensate fellow as this is, if he will not other wayes confeffe the ginting tor tours are to be first usid unto him, & fic per gradus ad ima tendiew; ? So god sreide youre goode worker LETTER OF KING JAMES I 2. Chapter Of their departure into Holland and their troubles ther aboute, with some of the many difficulties they found and mete withall. B Anno 1608. EING thus constrained to leave their native soyle and countrie, their lands and livings, and all their freinds, and famillier aquaintance, it was much; and thought marvelous by many. But to goe into a countrie they knew not (but by hearsay) wher they must learne a new language, and get their livings they knew not how, it being a dear place, and subjecte to the misseries of warr, it was by many thought an adventure almost desperate, a case intolerable, and a misserie worse then death. Espetially seeing they were not aquainted with trades nor traffique (by which that countrie doth subsiste) but had only been used to a plaine countrie life, and the inocente trade of husbandrey.1 But these things did not dismay them (though they did some times trouble them) for their desires were sett on the ways of god, and to injoye his ordinances; but they rested on his providence, and 1 An examination of the Puiboken der Stadt, 1567-1617, in the Amsterdam archives gave marriages and occupations of one hundred and eighteen English residents in that city. The callings are summarized in Dexter (The England and Holland of the Pilgrims, 431). It is conjectured that the earlier migration, coming from London and its vicinity, contained a larger proportion of artisans than did the later migrations under Smyth and Clyfton. Of the Pilgrims Dexter says: "Not many were of 'gentle blood.' Few seem to have been land owners. They had not even that expansion of the faculties apt to be bred by the aims and risks of commerce. In the main they were plain farmers whose names, excepting in a line or two upon the parish parchments at birth, marriage and burial, seldom went upon record. Hence the difficulty, after three hundred years, of identifying them precisely." The England and Holland of the Pilgrims, |