“Beloved, there is now set before us life and death, good and evil,” in that we are commanded this day to love the Lord our God, and to love one another, to walk in his ways and to keep his Commandments and his ordinance and his laws, and the articles of our Covenant with Him, that we may live and be multiplied, and that the Lord our God may bless us in the land whither we go to possess it. We shall shame the faces of many of God’s worthy servants, and cause their prayers to be turned into curses upon us till we be consumed out of the good land whither we are going.Īnd to shut this discourse with that exhortation of Moses, that faithful servant of the Lord, in his last farewell to Israel, Deut. We shall open the mouths of enemies to speak evil of the ways of God, and all professors for God’s sake. So that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken, and so cause Him to withdraw His present help from us, we shall be made a story and a by-word through the world. We shall find that the God of Israel is among us, when ten of us shall be able to resist a thousand of our enemies when He shall make us a praise and glory that men shall say of succeeding plantations, “may the Lord make it like that of New England.” For we must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill. The Lord will be our God, and delight to dwell among us, as His own people, and will command a blessing upon us in all our ways, so that we shall see much more of His wisdom, power, goodness and truth, than formerly we have been acquainted with. So shall we keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. We must delight in each other make others’ conditions our own rejoice together, mourn together, labor and suffer together, always having before our eyes our commission and community in the work, as members of the same body. We must uphold a familiar commerce together in all meekness, gentleness, patience and liberality. We must be willing to abridge ourselves of our superfluities, for the supply of others’ necessities. For this end, we must be knit together, in this work, as one man. We must entertain each other in brotherly affection. Now the only way to avoid this shipwreck, and to provide for our posterity, is to follow the counsel of Micah, to do justly, to love mercy, to walk humbly with our God. In time their colonies flourished and led the way to establishing religious freedom and creating the foundations of the democracy Americans enjoy today. They arrived in New England, as winter was settling in and endured significant hardships as they struggled to establish a successful colony at Plymouth.Īs the years passed, more Pilgrims made the journey to the New World in search of a new home and new freedoms. In their second attempt to cross the Atlantic, they boarded the Mayflower in September 1620 bound for the New World. However, after many problems the Speedwell was forced to return to England where the group was reorganized. They planned to make the crossing to America in two ships, the Speedwell and Mayflower. In August 1620, the group sailed for Southampton, England, where other English colonists who hoped to make a new life in America met them. From there the group moved to the town of Leiden, Holland, where they remained for about ten years, able to worship as they wished under lenient Dutch law.įearing their children were losing their English heritage and religious beliefs, a small group from the Leiden churches made plans, initially, to settle in Northern Virginia. After two unsuccessful attempts to leave England and move to Holland, a Separatist group was finally relocated to Amsterdam where they stayed for about one year. The first New England Pilgrims are recognized to be a group of English people who came to America seeking religious freedom during the reign of King James I. Though many Pilgrims were Puritanical, it is not universally true. It is important to note the distinction between Pilgrims and Puritans in American history.
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