Page:Readings in European History Vol 2.djvu/390

 352 Readings in European History like to attain unto, under the wings of a foreign state. Which consideration, forasmuch as it gave the first rise to the flour- ishing plantations of New England, since erected, we shall, in the. first place, take a little notice of the occasion that led thereunto. Notwithstanding the bright and clear rays of the gospel light that began to dawn and diffuse themselves throughout the whole hemisphere of the English nation, promising an hopeful day of reformation to arise upon them after the long night of antichristian darkness, in the glorious reign of our English Josiah, King Edward VI, and Queen Elizabeth of blessed and famous memory, yet were not all that had oppor- tunity to sit under the shadow of their royal authority so well satisfied with every part of that so happy and hopeful reformation by them begun as to rest contented, without strenuous endeavors to shape and mold the business of church discipline more to the primitive pattern. Therefore sundry of them, having wearied themselves with their private contrivements all the whole reign of Queen Elizabeth, and finding little hope of bettering their condition under her successor, resolved to try if change of air would not afford a remedy to the distemper at last, to their griev- ances and burdens they labored under at home. Divers, therefore, of that persuasion that had about the year 1602 entered into a private covenant, first in the north of England, then in the Netherlands anno 16 10, to walk with God and one with another, according to the best and primitive patterns (as they conceived) of the word of God, finding the low and watery situations of that country as unwholesome and infec- tious to their bodies and national views of the place danger- ous for their minds, by reason of bad example, as that of their own country uncomfortable for their purses and estates : by reason of opposition, they at last projected the transporting themselves and their families into America. Here follows William Perm's letter to Robert Turner concerning the grant of the province of Pennsylvania from Charles II (1681).