The Pilgrim Progress
More far reaching than the voice of the guns, was the message to the future from the small lower room of the fort, where the Pilgrims held their services of worship. Here their Elder, William Brewster, extolled freedom of thought and conscience; here were read letters received from their beloved pastor in Leyden, John Robinson; here they sang hymns of praise and thanksgiving; but still surrounded by danger, “they must constantly be on their guard, night and day.”
“With arms they gathered in the congregation to worship Almighty God. But they were armed, that in peace they might seek divine guidance in righteousness: not that they might prevail by force, but that they might do right though they perished.”
—Calvin Coolidge
Plymouth, Dec. 21, 1920
The congregation assembled “at beat of drum,” and marched together from their homes on Leyden Street, protected by the muskets of the men. “They march three abreast, and are led by a sergeant.—Behind comes the Governor in a long robe, beside him on the right hand comes the preacher with his cloak on, and on the left hand the captain with his side arms.”
The women with babes in their arms and their children clinging to them, the boys and young men and the maidens follow,—“and so they march in good order, and each sets his arms down near him.”
It is minutely described in a letter written in 1627, by Isaac de Rasieres, a visitor of state from the Dutch colony at Manhattan.
This “Pilgrim Progress” is yearly reproduced by a memorial service to the Pilgrims on the site of the first fort-meeting house.
On successive Fridays in August, at five o’clock, a group of men, women and children, many of them still bearing the names of their Pilgrim forefathers, wearing the white caps and kerchiefs, the steeple-crowned hats and cloaks of the congregation of 1621, assemble again on the first street, and mount the hill, where a short service of commemoration is held. Old hymns are sung, among them those which the Pilgrims brought with them from Leyden.
“Bow down thine ear, Jehovah, answer me:
For I am poor, afflicted, and needy.
Keep Thou my soul, for merciful am I;
My God, Thy servant save, that trusts in Thee.”
Psalm 68 from the Psalm book, published in Amsterdam by Henry Ainsworth, and used by the Pilgrim congregation in Leyden and at Plymouth.