from the rectorship of St. Botolph's in the Lincolnshire Boston,
John Cotton dominated that new Boston which was named in his
honor. He became the Pope of the theocracy; a clever Pope and not
an unkindly one. He seems to have shared some of the opinions of
Anne Hutchinson, though he "pronounced the sentence of
admonition" against her, says Winthrop, with much zeal and
detestation of her errors. Hawthorne, in one of his ironic moods,
might have done justice to this scene. Cotton was at heart too
liberal for his role of Primate, and fate led him to persecute a
man whose very name has become a symbol of victorious tolerance,
Roger Williams.

Williams, known today as a friend of Cromwell, Milton, and Sir
Harry Vane, had been exiled from Massachusetts for maintaining
that the civil power had no jurisdiction over conscience. This
doctrine was fatal to the existence of a theocratic state
dominated by the church. John Cotton was perfectly logical in
"enlarging" Roger Williams into the wilderness, but he showed
less than his usual discretion in attacking the quick-tempered
Welshman in pamphlets. It was like asking Hotspur if he would
kindly consent to fight. Back and forth the books fly, for
Williams loves this game. His "Bloody Tenet of Persecution for
Cause of Conscience" calls forth Mr. Cotton's "Bloody Tenet
washed and made white in the Blood of the Lamb;" and this in turn
provokes the torrential flood of Williams's masterpiece, "The
Bloody Tenet yet more Bloody, by Mr. Cotton's endeavor to wash it
white in the Blood of the Lamb." There is glorious writing here,
and its effect cannot be suggested by quoting sentences. But
there is one sentence in a letter written by Williams in his old
age to his fellow-townsmen of Providence which points the whole