One of the first and most formidable of all those who dared array themselves against this bulwark of Puritanism was Roger Williams.  He was the son of a merchant tailor of London, had developed into a precocious boy, had shown a leaning toward Puritan doctrines, and had ended by out-Puritaning the Puritans.  This was principally apparent in an intolerance of compromise which led him to remarkable extremes.  He refused to conform to the use of the common prayer, and so cut himself off from all chance of preferment; he renounced a property of some thousands of pounds rather than take the oath required by law; and at last was forced to flee the country, reaching Massachusetts in 1631.

He was, of course, soon at war with the constituted authorities over questions of doctrine, and at last it was decided to get rid of him by sending him back to England.  He was at Salem at the time, and hearing that a warrant had been despatched from Boston for him, he promptly took to the woods, and, making his way with a few followers to Narragansett Bay, broke ground for a settlement which he named Providence.  It was the beginning of the first state in the world which took no cognizance whatever of religious belief, so long as it did not interfere with civil peace.  He was soon joined by more adherents, and a few years later, he obtained from the king a charter for the colony of Rhode Island.

Almost from the moment of his landing in America, Williams had interested himself greatly in the welfare of the Indians.  The principal cause of his expulsion from Massachusetts was his contention that the land belonged to the Indians and not to the King of England, who therefore had no right to give it away, so that the colony’s charter was invalid.  His town of Providence was built on land which the Indians had given him, and he soon acquired considerable influence among them.  He learned to speak their language with great facility, translated the Bible into their tongue, and on more than one occasion saved New England from the horrors of an Indian war.  But, despite his lofty character, it is impossible at this day, to regard Williams with any degree of sympathy or liking, or to think of him except as a trouble-maker over trifles.  Intolerance, happily, is fading from the world, and with it that useless scrupulosity of behavior, which accomplishes no good, but whose principal result is to make uncomfortable all who come in contact with it.

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Meanwhile, just to the south of Rhode Island, a prosperous little settlement had been established, which was soon to grow into the most commercially important on the continent.  We have seen how Henry Hudson, in 1609, in a vessel chartered by the Dutch West India Company, entered the Hudson river and explored it for some hundred and fifty miles.  The Dutch claimed the region as the result of that voyage, and during the next few years, Dutch traders visited it regularly and did a lively business in furs; but no attempt was made at colonization until 1624, although small trading-posts had existed at various points along the river for ten years previously.