ertains a sense of
justice will now be disposed to object to this opinion; but it gave
great offence to the government of Boston, and he was summoned before
the general court, to answer to Governor Winthrop for having
promulgated such notions. He did not, however, attempt to defend them,
but good-humoredly declared that they were privately addressed to
Bradford, who, with tin chief men of Plymouth, agreed with him in all
the material points of his essay, and he offend to burn it if it had
given offence at Boston. The subject was then dropped, and Williams
returned to Plymouth, where he continued to reside for a considerable
time.

During that period, he not only gained many friends among the
inhabitants, but he also, by a constant intercourse with the Wampanoges
and other neighboring tribes, obtained a considerable knowledge of
their language and manners, and secured their veneration and love.
This, as we shall have occasion to observe, proved afterwards of the
greatest advantage to him.

But his own restless spirit was not satisfied with quietly discharging
the duties of his office, and enjoying the society of his own
countrymen and their Indian allies. Again he drew upon himself the
wrath of the Boston Church, by openly stating his conviction that no
civil government had a right to punish any individual for a breach of
the Sabbath, or for any offence against either of the four
commandments, or the first table. He maintained that these points
should be left to the conscience alone; or, in the case of those who
had agreed to a church covenant, to the authorities of the church. The
civil magistrates he considered as only empowered to punish such
violations of the law as interfered with the public peace. This
unheard-of heresy against the principles by which the Bostoners were
governed, was received with amazement and indignation: and, although
they could not take any immediate measures to testify their
displeasure, and to punish the offender, yet he thenceforth became the
object of hatred and suspicion to the rulers, and they only waited for
a fitting opportunity of openly manifesting it.

Williams was aware of the feeling entertained towards him by the
government of Massachusetts, but he was not thereby deterred from
expressing his opinions in New Plymouth; and so great was his
attachment to the people of Salem, who had first afforded him a home,
that he would again have ventured thither, had he not been detained