More kindly memories of the unpopular governor are associated with the building of the first King’s Chapel on the spot where its venerable successor now stands.  The church was not finished until after Sir Edmund had taken his departure, but Lady Andros, who died in February, 1688, lies in the burying-ground hard by.  Her gentle manners had won all hearts.  For the moment, we are told, one touch of nature made enemies kin, and as Sir Edmund walked to the townhouse “many a head was bared to the bereaved husband that before had remained stubbornly covered to the exalted governor.” [38] [Sidenote:  Episcopal services in Boston] [Sidenote:  Founding of the King’s Chapel, 1689]

The despotic rule of Andros was felt in more serious ways than in the seizing upon a meetinghouse.  Arbitrary taxes were imposed, encroachments were made upon common lands as in older manorial times, and the writ of habeas corpus was suspended.  Dudley was appointed censor of the press, and nothing was allowed to be printed without his permission.  All the public records of the late New England governments were ordered to be brought to Boston, whither it thus became necessary to make a tedious journey in order to consult them.  All deeds and wills were required to be registered in Boston, and excessive fees were charged for the registry.  It was proclaimed that all private titles to land were to be ransacked, and that whoever wished to have his title confirmed must pay a heavy quit-rent, which under the circumstances amounted to blackmail.  The General Court was abolished.  The power of taxation was taken from the town-meetings and lodged with the governor.  Against this crowning iniquity the town of Ipswich, led by its sturdy pastor, John Wise, made protest.  In response Mr. Wise was thrown into prison, fined L50, and suspended from the ministry.  A notable and powerful character was this John Wise.  One of the broadest thinkers and most lucid writers of his time, he seems like a forerunner of the liberal Unitarian divines of the nineteenth century.  His “Vindication of the Government of the New England Churches,” published in 1717, was a masterly exposition of the principles of civil government, and became “a text book of liberty for our Revolutionary fathers, containing some of the notable expressions that are used in the Declaration of Independence.” [Sidenote:  Tyranny] [Sidenote:  John Wise of Ipswich]

It was on the trial of Mr. Wise in October, 1687, that Dudley openly declared that the people of New England had now no further privileges left them than not to be sold for slaves.  Such a state of things in the valley of the Euphrates would not have attracted comment; the peasantry of central Europe would have endured it until better instructed; but in an English community it could not last long.  If James II. had remained upon the throne, New England would surely have soon risen in rebellion against Andros.  But the mother country had by this time come to repent