PART III.
EVASIONS AND DENIALS OF THE ABOLITION OF EPISCOPAL, AND ESTABLISHMENT OF CONGREGATIONAL WORSHIP AT MASSACHUSETTS BAY; PROOFS OF THE FACTS, THAT THE COMPANY AND FIRST SETTLERS OF MASSACHUSETTS BAY WERE PROFESSED EPISCOPALIANS WHEN THE LATTER LEFT ENGLAND; LETTERS OF THE LONDON COMPANY AGAINST THE INNOVATIONS WHICH ABOLISHED THE EPISCOPAL, AND ESTABLISHED CONGREGATIONAL WORSHIP BY THE "ADVENTURERS" AFTER CROSSING THE ATLANTIC; THIS THE FIRST SEED OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION, AND OF CRUEL PERSECUTIONS.
When the Browns arrived in England as banished "criminals" from the Plantation to which they had gone four months before as members of the Council of Government, and with the highest commendation of the London General Court itself, they naturally made their complaints against the conduct of Endicot in superseding the Church of England by the establishment of a new confession of faith and a new form of worship.

It is worthy of remark, that in the Records of the Company the specific subjects of complaint by the Browns are carefully kept out of sight--only that a "dispute" or "difference" had arisen between them and "Governor Endicot;" but what that difference was is nowhere mentioned in the Records of the Company.

The letters of Endicot and the Browns were put into the hands of Goffe, the Deputy Governor of the Company; were never published; and they are said to have been "missing" unto this day.
Had the real cause and subject of difference been known in England, and been duly represented to the Privy Council, the Royal Charter would undoubtedly have been forthwith forfeited and cancelled; but the Puritan-party feeling of the Browns seems to have been appealed to not to destroy the Company and their enterprise; that in case of not prosecuting their complaints before a legal tribunal, the matter would be referred to a jointly selected Committee of the Council to arbitrate on the affair; and that in the meantime the conduct of Endicot in making Church innovations (if he had made them) would be disclaimed by the Company.

To render the Browns powerless to sustain their complaints, their letters were seized[44] and their statements were denied.
Nevertheless, the rumours and reports from the new Plantation of Massachusetts produced a strong impression in England, and excited great alarm among the members and friends of the Company, who adopted three methods of securing themselves and their Charter, and of saving the Plantation from the consequences of Endicot's alleged innovations and violent conduct.

Firstly--The Governor of the Company, Mr.Cradock, wrote to Endicot, Higginson, and Skelton, professing doubts of the truth of the charges made against them--disclaiming and warning them against the reported innovations--thus protecting themselves in case of charge from all participation in or responsibility for such proceedings.
Secondly--They positively denied the statements of the Browns as to Endicot's alleged "innovations," and used every means to depreciate the trustworthiness and character of the Browns, notwithstanding their former commendation of them and their acknowledged respectability.
Thirdly--They prepared and published documents declaring their adherence to the Church of England, and the calumny of the charges and rumours put forth against them as being disaffected to it.
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