Sewall tells how Dudley went out in state to inaugurate his friend. “The governour prepared a Latin speech for instalment of the president. Then took the president by the hand and led him down into the hall;... The governour sat with his back against a noble fire.... Then the governour read his speech ... and mov’d the books in token of their delivery. Then president made a short Latin speech, importing the difficulties discouraging, and yet that he did accept: ... Clos’d with the hymn to the Trinity. Had a very good dinner upon 3 or 4 tables.... Got home very well. Laus Deo.” [Footnote: Mass. Hist. Coll. fifth series, vi. 209.]
Nor did Dudley fail to provide the new executive with fit support. By the old law he had revived the corporation was reduced to seven; of this board Leverett himself was one, and on the day he took his office both the Brattles and Pemberton were also appointed. And more than this, when, a few years later, Pemberton died, the arch-rebel, Benjamin Colman, was chosen in his place. The liberal triumph was complete, and in looking back through the vista of the past, there are few pages of our history more strongly stamped with the native energy of the New England mind than this brilliant capture of Harvard, by which the ancient cradle of bigotry and superstition was made the home of American liberal thought. As for the Mathers, when they found themselves beaten in fair fight, they conceived a revenge so dastardly that Pemberton declared with much emotion he would humble them, were he governor, though it cost him his head. Being unable longer to withstand Dudley by honorable means, they tried to blast him by charging him with felony. Their letters are too long to be reproduced in full; but their purport may be guessed by the extracts given, and to this day they remain choice gems of theocratic morality.
SIR, That I have had a singular respect for you, the Lord knows; but that since your arrival to the government, my charitable expectations have been greatly disappointed, I may not deny....
1st. I am afraid you cannot clear yourself from the guilt of bribery and unrighteousness....
2d. I am afraid that you have not been true to the interest of your country, as God (considering his marvellous dispensations towards you) and his people have expected from you....
3d. I am afraid that you cannot clear yourself from the guilt of much hypocrisy and falseness in the affair of the college....
4th. I am afraid that the guilt of innocent blood is still crying in the ears of the Lord against you. I mean the blood of Leister and Milburn. My Lord Bellamont said to me, that he was one of the committee of Parliament who examined the matter; and that those men were not only murdered, but barbarously murdered....
5th. I am afraid that the Lord is offended with you, in that you ordinarily forsake the worship of God in the holy church to which you are related, in the afternoon on the Lord’s day, and after the publick exercise, spend the whole time with some persons reputed very ungodly men. I am sure your father did not so.... Would you choose to be with them or such as they are in another world, unto which you are hastening?... I am under pressures of conscience to bear a publick testimony without respect of persons.... I trust in Christ that when I am gone, I shall obtain a good report of my having been faithful before him. To his mercy I commend you, and remain in him,
Yours to serve, I. MATHER. [Footnote: Mass. Hist. Coll. first series, iii. 126.] BOSTON, January 20, 1707-8. To the Governour.