it cannot reforme all the evills of this kind because it will bee a great difficulty to finde out profitable employments for all that will want which way we should helpe our selves by tillage I know not wee can hardly depasture sewer Rother beasts then we doe seeing we spend already their flesh and hides and as for sheepe the ground depastured with them doth or might set on worke as many hands as tillage can doe If we adventure the making of linnen cloth other soiles are so much fitter to produce the materialls for that worke their labour is so much cheaper the hindering of Commerce in trade likely to bee so great that the undertakers of this worke would in all probability bee soone discouraged Nay the multiplying of new Draperies which perhaps might effect more then all the rest yet were in no proportion sufficient to employ the supernumeraries which this Land would yeeld if wee could bee confined within the bounds of sobriety and modesty seeing it may bee demonstrated that neere a third part of these that inhabite our Townes and Cities besides such spare men as the Country yeelds would by good order established be left to take up new employments We have as much opportunity as any Nation to transport our men and provisions by Sea into those Countries without which advantage they cannot possibly be peopled from any part of the world not from this Christian part at least as all men know And how usefull a neighbour the sea is to the furthering of such a worke the examples of the Graecians and the Phaenicians who filled all the bordering coasts with their Colonies doe sufficiently prove unto all the world Neither can it be doubted but the first Planters wanting this helpe as Abraham in his removing to Charran first and to Canaan afterwards must needs spend much time and indure much labour in passing their famlies and provisions by Land over rivers and through Woods and Thickets by unbeaten pathes But what need Arguments to us that have already determined this truth How many severall Colonies have wee drawne out and passed over into severall parts of the West Indies And this we have done with the allowance encouragement high cōmendation of State perhaps not alway with the best success who knowes whether by erring from the right scope Questionlesse for want of fit men for that imployment and experience to direct a worke which being caried in an untrodden path must needs be subject to miscariage into many errours Now whereas it hath beene manifested that the most eminent and desirable end of planting Colonies is the propagation of Religion It may be conceived this Nation is in a sort singled out unto that worke being of all the States that enjoy the libertie of the Religion Reformed and are able to spare people for such an employment the most Orthodoxe in our profession and behind none in sincerity in embracing it as will appeare to any indifferent man that shall duly weigh and recount the number and condition of those few States of Europe that continue in the profession of that truth which we imbrace CHAP. IIII. That New-England is a fit Country for the seating of an English Colonie for the propagation of Religion NOT onely our acquaintance with the soyle and Natives there but more especially our opportunity of trading thither for Furres and fish perswade this truth if other things be answerable It is well knowne before our breach with Spaine we usually sent out to New-England yearely forty or fifty saile of ships of reasonable good burthen for fishing onely And howsoever it fals out that our New-found-land voyages prove more beneficiall to the Merchants yet it is as true these to New-England are found farre more profitable to poore Fishermen so that by that time all reckonings are cast up these voyages come not farre behind the other in aduantage to the State No Countrey yeelds a more propitious ayre for our tempor then New-England as experience hath made manifest by all relations manie of our people that have sound themselves alway weake and sickly at home have become strong and healthy there perhaps by the drynesse of the ayre and constant temper of it which seldome varies suddenly from cold to heate as it doth with us So that Rheumes are very rare among our English there Neyther are the Natives at any time troubled with paine of teeth sorenesse of eyes or ache in their limbes It may bee the nature of the water conduceth somewhat this way which all affirme to keepe the body alwaies temperately soluble and consequently helps much to the preventing and curing of the Gout and Stone as some have found by experiēce As for provisions for life The Come of the Countrey which it produceth in good proportion with reasonable labour is apt for nourishmēt agrees although not so well with our taste at first yet very well with our health nay is held by some Physitians to be restorative If wee like not that wee may make use of our owne Graines which agree well with that soyle and so doe our Cattle nay they grow unto a greater bulke of body there then with us in England Vnto which if wee adde the fish fowle and Venison which that Country yeelds in great abundance it cannot be questioned but that soile may assure sufficient provision for food And being naturally apt for Hempe and Flax especially may promise us Linnen sufficient with our labour and woollen too if it may be thought fit to store it with sheepe The Land affords void ground enough to receive more people then this State can spare and that not onely wood-grounds and others which are unfit for present use but in many places much cleared ground for tillage and large marshes for hay and feeding of cattle which comes to passe by the desolatiō hapning through a three yeeres Plague about twleve or sixteene yeeres past which swept away most of the Inhabitants all along the Sea-coast and in some places utterly consumed man woman childe so that there is no person left to lay claime to the soyle which they possessed In most of the rest the Contagion hath scarce left alive one person of an hundred And which is remarkable such a Plague hath not been knowne or remembred in any age past nor then raged above twenty or thirty miles up into the Land nor seized upon any other but the Natives the English in the heate of the Sicknesse commercing with them without hurt or danger Besides the Natives invite us to sit downe by them and offer us what ground wee will so that eyther want of possession by others or the possessors gift and sale may assure our right we neede not feare a cleare title to the soyle In all Colonies it is to bee desired that the daughter may answer something backe by way of retribution to the mother that gave her being Nature hath as much force and founds as strong a
the light It cannot be denyed but the life of man is every way made more comfortable and afforded a more plentiful supply in a large scope of ground which moves men to bee so insatiable in their desires to joyne house to house and land to land till there be no more place exceeding I grant therein the measure and bounds of Iustice and yet building upon a principle that nature suggests that a large place best assures sufficiency as we see by nature trees flourish faire and prosper well and waxe fruitfull in a large Orchard which would otherwise wither and decay if they were penned up in a little nursery either all or at best a few that are stronger plants and better rooted would encrease and over-top and at last starve the weaker which falls out in our civill State where a few men flourish that are best grounded in their estates or best furnished with abilities or best fitted with opportunities and the rest waxe weake and languish as wanting roome and meanes to nourish them Now that the spirits and hearts of men are kept in better temper by spreading wide and by pouring as it were from vessell to vessell the want whereof is alleaged by the Prophet Ieremy as the cause that Moab setled vpon his lees and got so harsh a relish Ier. 48. 11. will bee euident to any man that shall consider that the husbanding of unmanured grounds and shifting into empty Lands enforceth men to frugalitie and quickneth invention and the setling of new States requireth justice and affection to the common good and the taking in of large Countreys presents a naturall remedy against couetousnesse fraud and violence when euery man may enjoy enough without wrong or injury to his neighbour Whence it was that the first ages by these helpes were renowned for golden times wherein men being newly entred into their possessions and entertained into a naked soile and enforced thereby to labour frugality simplicity and justice had neither leisure nor occasion to decline to idlenesse riot wantonnesse fraud and violence the fruits of well-peopled Countryes and of the abundance and superfluities of long setled States But that which should most sway our hearts is the respect unto Gods honor which is much advanced by this worke of replenishing the earth First when the largeness of his bounty is tasted by setling of men in al parts of the world wherby the extent of his munificence to the sonnes of men is discovered The Psalmist tells us that God is much magnified by this that the whole earth is full of his riches yea and the wide sea too Psal. 104. 24. 25. And God when hee would have Abraham know what he had bestowed on him when he gave him Canaan wills him to walke through it in the length of it and in the breadth of it Gen. 13. 17. Secondly Gods honour must needs bee much advanced when together with mens persons religion is conveyed into the severall parts of the world and all quarters of the earth sound with his praise and Christ Iesus takes in the Nations for his inhenitance and the ends of the earth for his possession according to Gods decree and promise Psal. 2. 8. Besides all that hath beene said seeing Gods command and abilities to performe it usually goe together we may guesse at his intention and will to have the earth replenished by the extraordinarie fruitfulnesse that hee gave to mankinde in those first times when men manifested their greatest forwardnesse for the undertaking of this taske which seemes to bee denyed to the latter ages and peradventure for this reason among others because the love of ease and pleasure fixing men to the places and Countreyes which they finde ready furnished to their hand by their predecessors labours and industry takes from them a desire and will of undertaking such a laborious and unpleasant taske as is the subduing of unmanured Countreyes Objection But it may be objected if God intended now the issuing out of Colonies as in former ages hee would withall quicken men with the same heroicall spirits which were found in those times Which wee finde to be farre otherwise Although the strong impression upon mens spirits that have beene and are stirred up in this age to this and other Plantations might be a sufficient answer to this objection yet we answer further Answer It s one thing to guesse what God will bring to passe and another thing to conclude what hee requires us to undertake Shall we say that because God gives not men the zeale of Moses and Phineas therefore hee hath discharged men of the duty of executing judgement It is true indeed that God hath hitherto suffered the neglect of many parts of the world and hidden them from the eyes of former ages for ends best knowne to himselfe but that disproves not that the duty of peopling voyd places lyes upon us still especially since they are discovered and made knowne to us And although I dare not enter so farre into Gods secrets as to affirme that hee avengeth the neglect of this duty by Warres Pestilences and Famines which unlesse they had wasted the people of these parts of the world wee should ere this have devoured one another Yet it cannot be denyed but the neare thronging of people together in these full Countreyes have often occasioned amongst us ciuill Warres Famines and Plagues And it is as true that God hath made advantage of some of these Warres especially which have laid many fruitfull Countreyes wast to exercise men in these very labours which employ new Planters by which he hath reduced them to some degrees of that frugality industry and justice full states of unnecessary multitudes or of replenishing wast and voyd Countries they have a cleare and sufficient warrant from the mouth of God as immediately concurring with one speciall end that God aimed at in the first institution thereof But seeing Gods honour and glory and next mens Salvation is his owne principall scope in this and all his wayes it must withall bee necessarily acknowledged that the desire respect unto the publishing of his name where it is not knowne and reducing men that live without God in this present world unto a forme of Piety and godlinesse by how much the more immediately it suites with the mind of God and is furthest caried from private respects by so much the more it advanceth this worke of planting Colonies above all civill and humane ends and deserves honour and approbation above the most glorious Conquests or successefull enterprizes that ever were undertaken by the most renowned men that the Sunne hath seene and that by how much the subduing of Satan is a more glorious act then a victory over men and the enlargement of Christs Kingdome then the adding unto mens dominions and the saving of mens soules then the provision for their lives and bodies It seemes this end in plantation hath beene specially reserved for this later end of the world seeing
relation betweene people and people as betweene person and person So that a Colonie denying due respect to the State from whose bowels it issued is as great a monster as an unnaturall childe Now a Colonie planted in New-England may be many wayes usefull to this State As first in furthering our Fishing-voyages one of the most honest and every way profitable imployment that the Nation undertakes It must needes be a great advantage unto our men after so long a voyage to be furnished with fresh victuall there and that supplyed out of that Land without spending the provisions of our owne countrey But there is hope besides that the Colonie shall not onely furnish our Fisher-men with Victuall but with Salt too unlesse mens expectation and conjectures much deceive them and so quit unto them a great part of the charge of their voyage beside the hazard of adventure Next how serviceable this Country must needs bee for provisions for shipping is sufficiently knowne already At present it may yeeld Planks Masts Oares Pitch Tarre and Iron and hereafter by the aptnesse of the Soyle for Hempe if the Colonie increase Sailes and Cordage What other commodities it may afford besides for trade time will discover Of Wines among the rest there can be no doubt the ground yeel ding naturall Vines in great abundance and varietie and of these some as good as any are foundin France by humane culture But in the possibilitie of the serviceablenesse of the Colonie to this State the judgement of the Dutch may somewhat confirme us who have planted in the same soyle and make great account of their Colonie there But the greatest advantage must needes come unto the Natives themselves whom wee shall teach providence and industry for want whereof they perish oftentimes while they make short provisions for the present by reason of their idlenesse that they have they spend and wast unnecessarily without having respect to times to come Withall commerce and example of our course of living cannot but in time breed civility among them and that by Gods blessing may make way for religion consequently and for the saving of their soules Vnto all which may bee added the safety and protection of the persons of the Natives which are secured by our Colonies In times past the Tarentines who dwell from those of Mattachusets bay neere which our men are seated about fifty or sixty leagues to the North-East inhabiting a soile unfit to produce that Countrey graine being the more hardy people were accustomed yearely at harvest to come down in their Canoes and reape their fields and carry away their Corne and destroy their people which wonderfully weakened and kept them low in times past from this evill our neighbourhood hath wholy freed them and consequently secured their persons and estates which makes the Natives there so glad of our company Objection 1. But if we have any spare people Ireland is a fitter place to receive them then New-England Being 1 Nearer 2 Our owne 3 Void in some parts 4 Fruitfull 5 Of importance for the securing of our owne Land 6 Needing our helpe for their recovery out of blindnesse and superstition Answere Ireland is well-nigh sufficiently peopled already or will be in the next age Besides this worke needs not hinder that no more then the plantation in Virginia Bermudas S. Christophers Barbados c. which are all of them approved and incouraged as this is As for religion it hath reasonable footing in Ireland already and may easily be propagated further if wee bee not wanting to our selves This Countrey of New-England is destitute of all helpes and meanes by w ch the people might come out of the snare of Satan Now although it be true that I should regard my sonne more then my servant yet I must rather provide a Coate for my servant that goes naked then give my sonne another who hath reasonable clothing already Objection 2. But New-England hath divers discommodities the Snow and coldnesse of the winter which our English bodies can hardly brooke and the annoyance of men by Muskitoes and Serpents and of Cattle and Corne by wilde beasts Answere The cold of Winter is tolerable as experience hath and doth manifest and is remedied by the abundance of fuell The Snow lyes indeed about a foot thicke for ten weekes or there about but where it lies thicker and a month longer as in many parts of Germany men finde a very comfortable dwelling As for the Serpents it is true there are some and these larger then our Adders but in ten yeares experience no man was ever indangered by them and as the countrey is better stored with people they will be found fewer and as rare as among us here As for the wilde beasts they are no more nor so much dangerous or hurtfull here as in germany and other parts of the world The Muskitoes indeed infest the planters about foure moneths in the heat of Summer but after one yeares acquaintance men make light account of them some fleight defence for the hands and face smoake and a close house may keepe them off Neither are they much more noysome then in Spaine Germany and other parts nay then the fennish parts of Essex and Lincolne-shire Besides it is credibly reported that twenty miles inward into the Countrey they are not found but this is certaine and tried by experience after foure or five yeares habitation they waxe very thinne It may be the hollownesse of the ground pected in New-England but competency to live on at the best and that must bee purchased with hard labour whereas divers other parts of the West-Indies offer a richer soyle which easily allures Inhabitants by the tender of a better condition then they live in at present Answer An unanswerable argument to such as make the advancement of their estates the scope of their undertaking but no way a discouragement to such as aime at the propagation of the Gospell which can never bee advanced but by the preservation of Piety in those that carry it to strangers Now wee know nothing sorts better with Piety them Competēcy a truth which Agur hath determined long agoe Prov. 30. 8. Nay Heathen men by the light of Nature were directed so farre as to discover the overflowing of riches to be enemie to labour sobriety justice love and magnanimity and the nurse of pride wantonnesse and contention and therefore laboured by all meanes to keepe out the love and desire of them from their well-ordered States and observed and professed the comming in and admiration of them to have beene the foundation of their ruine If men desire to have a people degenerate speedily and to corrupt their mindes and bodies too and besides to tole-in theeves and spoilers from abroad let them seeke a rich soile that brings in much with little labour but if they desire that Piety and godlinesse should prosper accompanied with sobriety justice and love let them choose a Countrey such as this
tooke Fish good store and much more then she could lade home the overplus should have beene sold and deliuered to some sacke or other sent to take it in there if the Voyage had beene well mannaged But that could-not be done by reason that the Ship before she went was not certaine where to make her Fish by this accident it fell out that a good quantitie of the Fish she tooke was cast away and some other part was brought home in another Ship At the returne of the Ships that yeare Fish by reason of our warres with Spaine falling to a very low rate the Company endevoured to send the greater Ship for France but she being taken short with a contrary Winde in the West-Country and intelligence given in the meane time that those Markets were over-laid they were en-Forced to bring her backe againe and to sell her Fish at home as they might Which they did and with it the Fish of the smaller Ship the New-England Fish about ten shillings the hundred by tale or there about the New-found-Land Fish at six shillings foure pence the hundred of which was well nigh eight pence the hundred charge raised vpon it after the Ships returne by this reason the Fish which at a Market in all likely-hood might have yeelded well nigh two thousand pounds amounted not with all the Provenue of the Voyage to aboue eleaven hundred pounds Vnto these losses by Fishing were added two other no small disaduantages the one in the Country by our Land-Men who being ill chosen and ill commanded fell into many disorders and did the Company little seruice The other by the fall of the price of Shipping which was now abated to more then the one halfe by which meanes it came to passe that our Ships which stood vs in little lesse then twelue hundred pounds were sold for foure hundred and eighty pounds The occasions and meanes then of wasting this stocke are apparently these First the ill choice of the place for fishing the next the ill carriage of our men at Land who having stood vs in two yeares and a halfe in well nigh one thousand pound charge never yeelded one hundred pound profit The last the ill sales of Fish and Shipping By all which the Aduenturers were so far discouraged that they abandoned the further prosecution of this Designe and tooke order for the dissoluing of the Company on Land and sold away their Shipping and other Provisions Two things withall may be intimated by the way the first that the very proiect it selfe of planting by the helpe of a fishing Voyage can never answer the successe that it seemes to promise which experienced Fisher-men easily have foreseene before hand and by that meanes haue preuented divers ensuing errors whereof amongst divers other reasons these may serue for two First that no sure fishing place in the Land is fit for planting nor any good place for planting found fit for fishing at least neere the Shoare And secondly rarely any Fisher-men will worke at Land neither are Husband-men fit for Fisher-men but with long vse experience The second thing to be obserued is that nothing new fell out in the managing of this stocke seeing experience hath taught vs that as in building houses the first stones of the foundation are buried vnder ground and are not seene so in planting Colonies the first stockes employed that way are consumed although they serue for a foundation to the worke CHAP. IX The vndertaking and prosecution of the Colony by the Londoners BVT to returne to our former subiect from which we digressed Vpon the manifestation of the Westerne Aduenturers resolution to give off their worke most part of the Land-men being sent for returned but a few of the most honest and industrious resolved to stay behinde and to take charge of the Cattell sent over the yeare before which they performed accordingly and not likeing their seate at Cape Anne chosen especially for the supposed commoditie of fishing they transported themselues to Nahum keike about foure or fiue leagues distant to the South-West from Cape Anne Some then of the Aduenturers that still continued their desire to set forwards the Plantation of a Colony there conceiving that if some more Cattell were sent over to those few Men left behinde they might not onely be a meanes of the comfortable subsisting of such as were already in the Country but of inviting some other of their Friends and Acquaintance to come over to them aduentured to send over twelue Kine and Buls more And conferring casually with some Gentlemen of London moved them to adde vnto them as many more By which occasion the businesse came to agitation a-fresh in London and being at ration are nothing else but the fruits of jealousie of some distempered minde or which is worse perhaps savour of a desperate malicious plot of men ill affected to Religion endevouring by casting the vndertakers into the jealousie of State to shut them out of those advantages which otherwise they doe and might expect from the Countenance of Authoritie Such men would be entreated to forbeare that base and unchristian course of traducing innocent persons under these odious names of Separatists and enemies to the Church and State for feare least their owne tongues fall upon themselves by the justice of his hand who will not fayle to cleare the innocency of the just and to cast backe into the bosome of every slaunderer the filth that he rakes up to throw in other mens faces As for men of more indifferent and better tempered mindes they would be seriously advised to beware of entertaining and admitting much more countenancing and crediting such uncharitable persons as discover themselves by their carriage and that in this particular to be men ill affected towards the worke it selfe if not to Religion at which it aymes and consequently unlikely to report any truth of such as undertake it CHAP. X. The Conclusion of the whole Treatise NOw for the better preventing of such suspitions and jealousies and the ill affections to this Worke that may arise thereupon two things are earnestly requested of such as passe their Censures upon it or the persons that undertake it The first is that although in this barien and corrupt age wherein we live all our actions are generally swayed and carryed on by private interests in so much as sincere intentions of furthering the common good grounded upon that love through which wee are commanded to serve one another be the wonders of men notwithstanding men would not thinke it impossible that the love which waxeth cold and dyeth in the most part yet may revive and kindle in some mens hearts and that there may be found some that may neglect their case and profit to doe the Church good and God service out of a sincere love and affection to Gods honour and the Churches good Why may not wee conceive that God may prevaile upon the hearts of his servants to set them on as effectually to seeke