Venality had become possible; and clever and venal men had a motive for enlisting the selfish and the stupid, and decrying the generous and wise."[203] These eloquent words of Dr.Palfrey are very suggestive, and deserve to be carefully pondered by the reader.
I.In the concluding sentences he tacitly admits that the Government of Massachusetts Bay had become, at the end of fifty-four years, partially at least, a failure in "public morality" and patriotism; yet during that period the Government had been exclusively, in both its legislation and administration, in the hands of one religious denomination, under the influence of its ministers, who were supported by taxation on the whole population, controlled the elections, and whose counsels ruled in all conflicts with the King and Parliament of England.

None but a Congregationalist could be a governor, or assistant, or deputy, or judge, or magistrate, or juror, or officer of the army, or constable, or elector, or have liberty of worship.

The union of Church and State in Massachusetts was more intimate and intolerant than it had or ever has been in England; and their contests with England in claiming absolute and irresponsible powers under the Charter were at bottom, and in substance, contests for Congregational supremacy and exclusive and proscriptive rule in Church and State--facts so overlooked and misrepresented by New England historians.

Yet under this denominational and virtually hierarchical government, while wealth was largely accumulated, the "pristine tone of public morality" declined, and patriotism degenerated into "ambition and venality." II.

It is also worthy of remark, that, according to Dr.Palfrey, had not the spirit of the first generation of the rulers of Massachusetts Bay departed, the war of the American Revolution would have been anticipated by a century, and the sword would have been unsheathed, not to maintain the right of representation co-extensive with subjection to taxation, but to maintain a Government which for half a century had taxed four-fifths of its citizens without allowing them any representation, supported the ministers of one Church by taxes on the whole population, and denied liberty of worship to any but the members of that one denomination.
III.