those sorrowing companies of pilgrims must have been. There were godly and reverend ministers, disguised in shipman's garb, apprehensively watching, lest the pursuivant should come to arrest their flight; dreading to go, but dreading more to be hindered from going. There were men with anxious countenances, hurrying the preparations for their tedious voyage ;-women, with care-worn features, and looks of resignation, waiting the last signal in silent agony :-children, poor things, who must be borne far away, not knowing whither or why. There were friends to be left behind, under the sad presentiment of meeting no more on earth. The tenderest ties were sundering, even such as had never been severed before. Were there ever sorrows or tears like those? What impassioned repetitions of terms of endearment, such as excited affection loves to utter, were mutually breathed, till the voice became choked with emotion, and they wept upon each other's necks till they recovered speech again. Then comes the breaking away from fond embraces, whose tender pressure shall never again be felt;—the brief farewells, the ejaculated blessings, the affectionate charges, and messages of love to absent friends. And now the last fast is cast off. vessel moves upon her billowy course.

The

The

forms so tearfully watched, recede into fainter view. But waving signals tell of the “longing, lingering glances," which cannot bear the deep desponding anguish of the last-last look.

O love of Jesus! how does it triumph in such an hour of bitterest woe! O the power of relig ion, which can constrain to a living martyrdom, keen as the pangs of death, and torturing as thẹ cross! Aye, how does it cheer the soul, not by stupifying its sensibilities, but by lifting them all torn and bleeding, to the view of a pitying Saviour, and elevated in sublime devotion, receiving from his compassion, a rush of sympathy, an overflowing consolation, a joy so full of heaven, that earth and all its sorrows sweetly forgotten. Blessed wounds which bring such healing! Happy griefs which teach such comfort! These scars of the heart are the lovetokens of Christ, and the treasured pledges of a home whose friendships are eternal, and where parting is unknown.

are

Let us rally around the banner of our sires. What recreant and caitive heart,

ate spirit would desert it now?

what degener

The pilgrims

bore it, like valiant standard-bearers, in the front of the Lord's battle. There it has ever been wont to fly, where the conflict raged strongest against the powers of darkness. And still un

torn and untarnished, it has often waved over the field of its glorious triumphs. Though the flag, in these stiller times, may hang drooping from the lofty staff, yet, when iniquity cometh in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord, as a rushing, mighty wind, shall lift up the ancient standard. Then, in sure token of victory, it will spread out its ample folds, with the broad blazon of the bannered cross.

CHAPTER IV.

Mr. Cotton countenanced by the people in his non-conformity. Suspension from ministry. Suspension unexpectedly taken off Successful labors. Theological instructions. Indefatigable preaching. Correspondence. Wonderful and general reformation. Archbishop Williams. Earls of Dorchester and Lyndsay. Disabled by ague. Second marriage. Cited to High Com

mission Court. Fate of the informer. Earl of Dorset intercedes for Mr. Cotton in vain. Concealment. Letter to Mrs. Cotton. Sets out to go to Holland. Diverted to London. Interesting conference with Mr. Davenport and others. Resolves to go to New England. Embarks with difficulty in the Griffin.

WHEN Mr. Cotton ceased from his conformity with the exceptionable features in the national worship, so great was his popularity with his people, that, far from opposing him on that account, the greatest part of them sustained him in his course. Thomas Leverett, however, one of his parishioners, with some others, prosecuted complaints against their minister in the Episcopal courts; till, after some time, he was silenced by order of the bishop.

During his suspension, Mr. Cotton gave constant attendance to the public preaching of his substitute; but never to the reading of the Book

of Common Prayer. He was now subjected to severe temptations to swerve from the path of duty. He was not only promised, that he should be restored to the freedom of his ministry, but promoted to very great preferment in the church, on condition of conformity to the scrupled rites, only in a single instance. But he kept the integrity of his conscience undefiled, "unawed by influence, and unbribed by gain." Meanwhile a portentous cloud of troubles was gathering over his head; but was strangely dispersed again. Mr. Leverett himself, the author of these difficulties, became deeply penitent for his agency in causing them. He went to one of the proctors of the archi-episcopal court, to whom he presented a pair of gloves, and then made his appeal from the court below. Leverett made oath before this officer, who favored him in the terms of the deposition, that "Mr. Cotton was a man conformable to the mind of the Lord." On the strength of this very ambiguous deposition, the silenced minister, he scarce knew how, found himself healed of his ecclesiastical bronchitis, and restored to the use of his voice in the pulpit. The same Mr. Leverett ever after was his steadfast friend; and following his fortunes to this side of the Atlantic, was for many years a useful elder in VOL. I. 7

Mr.