into Presbyterianism by exalting the power of the ruling elders. It was a Cambridge man, John Robinson, once Fellow of Corpus Christi College, who gave new life to Independency by leading out to Leyden a little flock which had gathered round him in the chapel of Scrooby Manor in Norfolk. Robinson, a man of broad mind and strong intelligence, as well as fervent zeal, reduced the position of the elders to that of moral leadership of the people, with an authority resting on persuasion—a compromise between popular and aristocratic government which was intelligible to Englishmen of that time.
But Robinson and his congregation were not happy in Holland, and few promptings of heroism rank higher in human annals than the courageous resolve which led that little band to seek in the unknown western world a new home where they might worship God according to the dictates of their conscience, and found a pure and regenerate society unfettered by the surroundings of a degenerate past. Few relics are more profoundly pathetic than that grey boulder, religiously preserved in Plymouth Bay, Massachusetts, on which tradition says that the Pilgrim Fathers first set foot, when on 20th December, 1620, they disembarked from the Mayflower, and amid the blinding snow looked out upon the desolate spot which they were henceforth to call their home.
I need not follow the history of New England Congregationalism, which stamped upon the early colonies of America the severe morality and patient industry which have trained a nation. Nor will I make it a reproach that the commonwealth, founded on an
