looked, with anxious hope, ever since the day of their sorrowful parting in Holland.  ’Surely’—­as a friend of Bradford’s wrote to him from Leyden—­our pastor would never have gone from hence, if prayers, tears or means of aid could have saved him.’  The consternation of the settlers was great indeed.  Year after year they had gone on, expecting and waiting for his coming to resume his official duties among them; and, therefore, they had never taken any measures to provide themselves with regular pastors, who might preach the gospel to them three times every Lord’s day, according to their custom in Europe and also administer to them the sacrament, which, previous to their exile, all the grown-up members of the community had habitually received every Sunday.

The death of their spiritual leader and counselor had destroyed all their hopes of being again united to him on earth; and the blow fell heavily on all, and cast a gloom over the settlement that was not soon dispersed; but still the Pilgrims did not immediately proceed to choose another minister.  The belief that the divine service could receive no part of its sanctity from either time, place, or person, but only from the Holy Spirit of God, which hallows it—­was then, as it is now, a leading feature of the Independent and Presbyterian churches of America, and, therefore, the Puritans of New Plymouth did not feel it a necessity—­although they deemed it a privilege—­to enjoy the spiritual ministrations of ordained clergymen.

Hitherto the venerable Brewster, with the occasional aid of Bradford, Winslow, and a few others distinguished for piety and eloquence, had delivered the customary addresses and prayers, and had performed the rite of baptism.  At length, in the year 1628, Allerton, the assistant of Bradford, after he had been on a mission to England, brought back with him a young preacher of the name of Rogers, who very shortly gave such evident signs of insanity, that the settlers were obliged to send him back to his native land, at a considerable expense and trouble.

In the meantime, the number of settlers on other parts of the coast of New England had augmented to a great extent; and in Salem alone there were four ministers who had come out with the English emigrants, of whom only two could find adequate employment.  One of the others, therefore, named Ralph Smith, who was a man of much piety, and judged orthodox by the Puritans, went to Plymouth, and offered himself as pastor to the inhabitants.  He was chosen by the people to be their spiritual leader, and became the first regularly-appointed preacher who officiated among these, the earliest settlers in New England.