The Puritans
Discovery
Around the year 1000, Vikings under Leif Ericson landed on the eastern coast of North America in a place they called
Vinland. They failed, however, to establish any permanent settlements, and they soon lost contact with the new
continent.
Five hundred years later Christopher Columbus, a mariner from Italy, mistakenly believed he could reach the Far
East by sailing 4000 miles west from Europe. In 1492, he persuaded the King and Queen of Spain to finance such a
voyage (after he had first tried at the court of the English King Henry VI). He sailed west and landed on one of the
Bahama Islands in the Caribbean Sea. Columbus eventually explored most of the Caribbean area and returned home
without having discovered the Indies, but with some gold. Within 40 years, treasure-hungry Spanish adventurers had
conquered a huge empire in South and Central America. The Spanish also established some of the earliest
settlements in North America: St. Augustine in Florida (1565) and Santa Fe in New Mexico (1609).
At first the Europeans were drawn to the New World in search of wealth. When Columbus and later Spanish
explorers returned to Europe with stories of abundant gold in the Americas, each sovereign hastened to claim as
much land there as possible. Enforcing these claims could only be accomplished by establishing settlements of
Europeans on the territory. This requirement and the zeal of Spanish priests to convert the native Americans to
Christianity combined with the need of European religious and political dissenters to find a place where they were
safe from persecution fuelled the drive for the establishment of colonies.
English settlements.
The first successful English colony in the Americas was founded at Jamestown, Virginia in 1607. The settlement was
financed by a London company which expected to make a profit from the settlement, but never did. Of the first 105
colonists, 73 died of hunger and disease within seven months of their arrival. The Virginians discovered a way to earn
money by growing tobacco, which they started shipping to England in 1614.
In New England, the north-eastern region of what is now the United States, several settlements by English Puritans.
These settlers believed that the Church of England had retained too many practices from Roman Catholicism, and
they came to America to escape persecution in England and to found a colony based on their own religious ideals.
One group of Puritans, who called themselves the 'Pilgrims' crossed the Atlantic in a ship called the Mayflower and
settled at Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1620. They sailed from Holland, where they had lived for a number of years,
but they had never really felt at home there. They left behind a continent torn by religious and civil wars. These had
started when early in the 16th century groups of people started breaking away from the Catholic Church, led by
people like Luther and Calvin. They became known as Protestants. But in those days people were expected to
follow the religion of their king and Catholics and Protestants started fighting each other.
In England, King Henry VIII formed a national church with himself as its leader. But many English people considered
the Church of England too much like the Catholic Church. They became known as 'puritans' because they wanted a
'pure' and simple church. When James I became King of England he began to persecute the Puritans. Many went to
prison or left the country. The Pilgrims had obtained permission to settle land from the Virginia company. When they
landed at Cape Cod they were too far north. An argument started among the Pilgrims and other people who had
joined in London. Did the Pilgrims have a right to govern land not controlled by the Virginia Company or not?
The Pilgrim leaders settled the conflict by forming a kind of government of their own, along the lines of their church
group, the covenant, which was formed by all church members and which chose its own minister (preacher). They
made up a contract, called the Mayflower Compact, in which they agreed to make a civil body politic which could
make 'just and equal laws' for the colony. Most adult men in the group signed this 'compact'.
Other Puritans soon followed the Pilgrims to Massachusetts and established towns there. Their life was hard, it was
not at all the earthly paradise they had hoped to find. But they still believed they were in some kind of Paradise,
because they were no longer persecuted and could practise their religion. They claimed the right to interpret the Bible
for themselves. They were particularly interested in the Old Testament, which describes the history of the Jewish
people as a contract between God and Israel. God's contract with the Jewish people was the model for the covenants
by which the Puritans formed their congregations. They thought of themselves as a special people, a chosen people.
"We shall be as a city upon a hill" wrote John Winthrop, a Puritan leader, "the eyes of all people are upon us".
They wished to restore to Christianity the health which, they found, it had lost in the Old World. In America, God
would give the human race a second chance to reach Paradise. Progress towards the goal of influencing human
destiny and being a model society was reached through a form of government that was both civil (worldly) and
ecclesiastical (theological). Most Puritan settlements agreed on the following details which they derived from biblical
principles:
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1.
All men are created equal. It is man's duty to obey his superiors, (God and the Angels) not his fellow-men or
his inferiors (the Devil, people living knowingly in darkness, 'savages').
2.
The Fall (= when Man first sinned and was sent away from Paradise) had upset the Divine order. Living in a
natural state now meant living in a sinful state. By God's allowance the Puritan communities chose their own
leaders who had absolute power to keep the members from falling back into a sinful state. These leaders
supposedly executed God's will and could command absolute obedience. This led to a form of democratic
despotism and to strict group control.
3.
Increasing prosperity was a sign that God was pleased with them. It was man's duty to exploit the animal and
mineral world and to find a useful calling, which was seen as a form of prayer.
4.
Those who disagreed with them were not 'saved' and therefore should not be tolerated.
Puritanism was peculiar mixture of new ideas (equality, democracy, the right to choose one's own leaders) and old
ideas (absolute obedience, the elite of the 'chosen' or saved people, superior to those living in sin. The following
portrait of the Puritan by an American writer shows the unsavoury aspects of this mixture:
There he stood on his pedestal as he first had stood on Plymouth Rock, just disembarked from the Mayflower. A
massive, big-boned man, anchored solidly in his heavy square-toed buckled shoes. Hand on his hip, Bible under
arm, strong and indomitable in his implacable self-righteousness. In every line of his stiff and truculent figure, in all
the features of his severe and square-jawed face he revealed his character.
He feared God and he felt it righteous to strike this fear into the hearts of others by imprisonment in public stocks
and burning at the stake. As a member of an oppressed minority, he knew it his duty to oppress others and
enslave other minorities to prove that all men were equal. Poor, he hated wealth; and to make sure that no others
would be tempted with false desire, he was to gut the continent of its riches. He knew the folly of leisure and play.
He was suspicious of a smile and abhorred laughter. To him, beauty was a mask of evil. Tenderness and mercy a
sign of weakness. The show of emotions superfluous. The natural inclinations of sex an abomination, legally hid
by night.
Deeply inhibited, muscle-bound by tradition, he stood there confidently clad in all the virtues known to man,
embodying the unquestionable dictates of a destiny that was to freeze the hot blood of Spain, topple Napoleon
from his French throne, strike terror into the coloured skins of Africa, Asia, America and Australia, and exact
homage from every people on the face of the Earth.
Here, by the Grace of God, conceived and executed in his own image, stood the Englishman, the Puritan.
Other early settlements.
In 1636, Roger Williams was forced out of Massachusetts for disagreeing with the ministers there. He founded a
colony in what later became the state of Rhode Island. Rhode Island allowed religious freedom to everyone, and it
became a refuge for people persecuted for their religion.
Two other states began as havens of religious freedom. Maryland was founded as a refuge for Catholics.
Pennsylvania was founded as a refuge for Quakers, a religious group which adopted a very plain way of life and
refused to participate in war or swear oaths.
Puritan witchhunts.
The idea that one should watch his or her neighbour very closely because un-puritan behaviour could lead one away
from God, the strong repressions in Puritan society and power struggles between different groups of people led to a
series of bizarre trials in which people were accused of witchcraft. One conviction led to another, as the accused
could save themselves by telling whom they had seen in the presence of the Devil or at the Sabbath. Prisoners were
tortured and a number of people were put to death before the hysteria died down.
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PURITAN
CONCEPTS:
#
Work
is
prayer,
there
is
no
room
for
idleness
#
Some
people
(Saints)
are
elect
#
One
can
only
be
saved
through
leading
an
exemplary
life
#
All
men
are
equal
and
form
a
social
contract
to
govern
themselves
#
Puritans
are
God’s
chosen
people
and
America
is
God’s
chosen
land,
the
last
chance
to
regain
paradise
#
Man
is
inclined
to
sin,
so
we
need
to
keep
a
close
watch
on
him
PRESENT‐DAY
INFLUENCE
OF
THESE
CONCEPTS
IN
US
SOCIETY:
*
The
work
ethic
*
God’s
own
country
*
All
men
are
created
equal
*
Born
again
Christianity
*
The
Moral
Majority
*
Moral
Vigilance
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