affairs, assembled their servants and laborers, and transferred their capital and their energy to another sphere—the new settlements springing up at Boston, Charlestown, Salem, and in the neighboring regions.
These Bay colonists carried with them livestock, tools, great stores of supplies, and goods for trading with the Indians, the capital for large economic enterprise. Beyond question, their leaders desired to reproduce in America the stratified society that they had known in England, excepting the titled aristocracy which stood above them in rank and in the affections of the king. If they had not encountered obstacles, they would have made Massachusetts a land of estates tilled by renters and laborers, with yeomen freeholders interspersed and the home of an Established Church directed by a learned clergy according to English forms, though "purified" to suit the taste and temper of the emigrants. "We will not say," exclaimed a Puritan leader in the first great expedition, "as the Separatists were wont to say at their leaving of England, Farewell Babylon, farewell Rome! but we will say, farewell, dear England! farewell the Church of God in England and all the Christian friends there!" Rich in this world's goods, rich in the religious learning of the schools, imbued with a firm belief in the proper subordination of the lower ranks, and endowed with a charter of self-government, the directors of the Massachusetts Company embarked on their great experiment.
As the Massachusetts Bay Colony grew in numbers and prospered, the drift of affairs in the open air of the New World indicated a decided bent in its religious and economic life. Now far removed from the discipline of Anglican bishops and the ambitions of the Anglican clergy, the Puritans floated off into independency, each of the little churches becoming a sovereign congregation before many years had elapsed. Varying likewise from original designs, the course of rural economy ran somewhat contrary to the expectations of those wealthy managers who hoped to see
