Becoming America - An Exploration of American Literature from Precolonial to Post-Revolution, 2018a

BECOMING AMERICA
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY ENGLISH COLONIAL LITERATURE
3. According to Winthrop, what causes social distinctions, or inequalities?
What does he think counters or answers them? Why?
4. Why is self-love not a form of love, according to Winthrop? Why does he
think self-love should be avoided, and what are the benets he sees for
doing so?
5. Why does Winthrop believe that the Massachusetts Bay Colony should
be seen as a city on a hill? What is he cautioning against through this
allusion? What is he promising?
2.5 ROGER WILLIAMS
(c. 1603–1683)
Born in London, Roger Williams hailed from a merchant family. His work
as a stenographer for Sir Edward Coke (1552–1634) led to Williams’ attending a
grammar school in London and then enrolling as a scholarship student at Cambridge
University in 1623. He earned his BA with honors and, in order to graduate, signed
an oath to the Anglican Church, which was headed by the English monarch. He
began a course of study for an MA in theology; however, growing estranged from
what he saw as the corrupt practices of the Anglican Church, he withdrew without
obtaining the degree and converted to Puritanism.
The religious controversies in England were tied to the crown, and the civil war
between the Royalists and the Parliamentarians was already fomenting. To escape
threatened persecutions against the Puritans, Roger Williams and his wife Mary
Barnard (m. 1629–d. 1676) left for religious freedom in America.
He soon deemed the refuge he sought as unobtainable at the Massachusetts
Bay Colony and other such established religious colonies. He objected to their
intolerance of religious dissent, appropriation of Native American land, and
uniting government with the church. His objections and criticisms led the General
Court of Massachusetts Bay to eject Rogers from the colony in 1636. He again
sought refuge, this time at Narragansett Bay, where he purchased land from the
Native Americans and founded Providence in what is now Rhode Island, a city he
envisaged as a religious sanctuary for true Dissenters and Separatists.
Williams viewed existing churches and institutions—as well as Christians
themselves—as imperfect and unable to achieve true purity until the return of
Christ, or the millennium. From this perspective, he believed that the church had
no dominion over individual conscience and should therefore not enforce religious
conformity in its civil rule or organization.
He returned to England in 1644 to obtain a patent for Rhode Island, returning
again in 1651 to have it renewed upon its expiration or annulment. Williams thereby
ensured a place open to liberty of conscience and relative tolerance of religious and
racial dierences. In 1654, he was elected as the colony’s president, a position he
held for three succeeding terms.
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