Many of the early Massachusetts documents relate to Maine. Of later books, especial mention should be made of Folsom's History of Saco and Biddeford, Saco, 1830; Willis's History of Portland, 2 vols., 1831-33 (2d ed. 1865); Memorial Volume of the Popham Celebration, Portland, 1862; Chamberlain's Maine, Her Place in History, Augusta, 1877. On New Hampshire the best general work is Belknap's History of New Hampshire, 3 vols., Phila., 1784-92; the appendix contains many original documents, and others are to be found in the New Hampshire Historical Collections, 8 vols., 1824-66.
The Connecticut Colonial Records are edited by Dr. J.H. Trumbull, 12 vols., 1850-82. The Connecticut Historical Society's Collections, 1860-70, are of much value. The best general work is Trumbull's History of Connecticut, 2 vols., Hartford, 1797. See also Stiles's Ancient Windsor, 2 vols., 1859-63; Cothren's Ancient Woodbury, 3 vols., 1854-79. Of the Pequot War we have accounts by three of the principal actors. Mason's History of the Pequod War is in the Mass. Hist. Coll., 2d series, vol. viii.; Underhill's News from America is in the 3d series, vol. vi.; and Lyon Gardiner's narrative is in the 3d series, vol. iii. In the same volume with Underhill is contained A True Relation of the late Battle fought in New England between the English and the Pequod Savages, by Philip Vincent, London, 1638. The New Haven Colony Records are edited by C.J. Hoadly, 2 vols., Hartford, 1857-58. See also the New Haven Historical Society's Papers, 3 vols., 1865-80; Lambert's History of New Haven, 1838; Atwater's History of New Haven, 1881; Levermore's Republic of New Haven, Baltimore, 1886; Johnston's Connecticut, Boston, 1887. The best account of the Blue Laws is by J.H. Trumbull, The True Blue Laws of Connecticut and New Haven, and the False Blue Laws invented by the Rev. Samuel Peters, etc., Hartford, 1876. See also Hinman's Blue Laws of New Haven Colony, Hartford, 1838; Barber's History and Antiquities of New Haven, 1831; Peters's History of Connecticut, London, 1781. The story of the regicides is set forth in Stiles's History of the Three Judges [the third being Colonel Dixwell], Hartford, 1794; see also the Mather Papers in Mass. Hist. Coll., 4th series, vol. viiI. — The Rhode Island Colonial Records are edited by J.R. Bartlett, 7 vols., 1856-62. One of the best state histories ever written is that of S.G. Arnold, History of the State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, 2 vols., New York, 1859-60. Many valuable documents are reprinted in the Rhode Island Historical Society's Collections. The History of New England, with particular reference to the denomination called Baptists, by Rev. Isaac Backus, 3 vols., 1777-96, has much that is valuable relating to Rhode Island. The series of Rhode Island Historical Tracts, issued since 1878 by Mr. S.S. Rider, is of great merit. Biographies of Roger Williams have been written by J.D. Knowles, 1834; by William Gammell, 1845; and by Romeo Elton, 1852. Williams's works have been republished by the Narragansett Club in 6 vols., 1866. The first volume contains the valuable Key to the Indian Languages of America, edited by Dr. Trumbull. Williams's views of religious liberty are set forth in his Bloudy Tenent of Persecution, London, 1644; to which John Cotton replied in The Bloudy Tenent washed and made White in the Blood of the Lamb, London, 1647; Williams's rejoinder was entitled The Bloudy Tenent made yet more Bloudy through Mr. Cotton's attempt to Wash it White, London, 1652. The controversy was conducted on both sides with a candour and courtesy rare in that age. The titles of Williams's other principal works, George Fox digged out of his Burrowes, Boston, 1676; Hireling Ministry none of Christ's, London, 1652; and Christenings make not Christians, 1643; sufficiently indicate their character. The last-named tract was discovered in the British Museum by Dr. Dexter and edited by him in Rider's Tracts, No. xiv., 1881. The treatment of Roger Williams by the government of Massachusetts is thoroughly discussed in Dexter's As to Roger Williams, Boston, 1876. See also G.E. Ellis on "The Treatment of Intruders and Dissentients by the Founders of Massachusetts," in Lowell Lectures, Boston, 1869.
The case of Mrs. Hutchinson is treated, from a hostile and somewhat truculent point of view, in Thomas Welde's pamphlet entitled A Short Story of the Rise, Reign, and Ruin of Antinomians, Familists, and Libertines that infected the Churches of New England, London, 1644. It was answered in an anonymous pamphlet entitled Mercurius Americanus, republished for the Prince Society, Boston, 1876, with prefatory notice by C.H. Bell. Cotton's view of the theocracy may be seen in his Milk for Babes, drawn out of the Breasts of both Testaments, London, 1646; Keyes of the Kingdom of Heaven; and Way of the Congregational Churches Cleared, London, 1648. See also Thomas Hooker's Survey of the Summe of Church Discipline, London, 1648. The intolerant spirit of the time finds quaint and forcible expression in Nathaniel Ward's satirical book, The Simple Cobbler of Aggawam, 1647.
For the Gorton controversy the best original authorities are his own book entitled Simplicitie's Defence against Sevenheaded Polity, London, 1646; and Winslow's answer entitled Hypocracie Unmasked, London, 1646. See also Mackie's Life of Samuel Gorton, Boston, 1845, and Brayton's Defence of Samuel Gorton, in Rider's Tracts, No. xviI. — For the early history of the Quakers, see Robert Barclay's Inner Life of the Religious Societies of the Commonwealth, London, 1876,—an admirable book. See also New England a Degenerate Plant, 1659; Bishop's New England judged by the Spirit of the Lord, 1661; Sewel's History of the Quakers, 1722; Besse's Sufferings of the Quakers, 1753; The Popish Inquisition newly erected in New England, London, 1659; The Secret Works of a Cruel People made Manifest, 1659; and the pamphlet of the martyrs Stevenson and Robinson, entitled A Call from Death to Life, 1660. John Norton's view of the case was presented in his book, The Heart of New England Rent at the Blasphemies of the Present Generation, London, 1660. See also J.S. Pike's New Puritan, New York, 1879; Hallowell's Pioneer Quakers, Boston, 1887; and his Quaker Invasion of Massachusetts, Boston, 1883; Brooks Adams, The Emancipation of Massachusetts, Boston, 1887; Ellis, The Puritan Age and Rule, Boston, 1888.
Some additional light upon the theocratic idea may be found in a treatise by the apostle Eliot, The Christian Commonwealth; or, the Civil Polity of the Rising Kingdom of Jesus Christ, London, 1659. An account of Eliot's missionary work is given in The Day breaking, if not the Sun rising, of the Gospel with the Indians in New England, London, 1647; and The Glorious Progress of the Gospel amongst the Indians in New England, 1649. See also Shepard's Clear Sunshine of the Gospel breaking forth upon the Indians, 1648; and Whitfield's Light appearing more and more towards the Perfect Day, 1651.
The principal authority for Philip's war is Hubbard's Present State of New England, being a Narrative of the Troubles with the Indians, 1677. Church's Entertaining Passages relating to Philip's War, published in 1716, and republished in 1865, with notes by Mr. Dexter, is a charming book. See also Mrs. Rowlandson's True History, Cambridge, Mass., 1682; Mather's Brief History of the War, 1676; Drake's Old Indian Chronicle, Boston, 1836; Gookin's Historical Collections of the Indians in New England, 1674; and Account of the Doings and Sufferings of the Christian Indians, in Archchaeologia Americana, vol. ii. Batten's Journal is the diary of a citizen of Boston, sent to England, and it now in MS. among the Colonial Papers. Mrs. Mary Pray's letter (Oct. 20, 1675) is in Mass. Hist. Coll., 5th series, vol. i. p. 105.
The great storehouse of information for the Andros period is the Andros Tracts, 3 vols., edited for the Prince Society by W.H. Whitmore. See also Sewall's Diary, Mass. Hist. Coll., 5th series, vols. v.—viii. Sewall has been appropriately called the Puritan Pepys. His book is a mirror of the state of society in Massachusetts at the time when it was beginning to be felt that the old theocratic idea had been tried in the balance and found wanting. There is a wonderful charm in such a book. It makes one feel as if one had really "been there" and taken part in the homely scenes, full of human interest, which it so naively portrays. Anne Bradstreet's works have been edited by J.H. Ellis, Charlestown, 1867.
For further references and elaborate bibliographical discussions, see Winsor's Narrative and Critical History of America, vol. iii.; and his Memorial History of Boston, 4 vols., Boston, 1880. There is a good account of the principal New England writers of the seventeenth century, with illustrative extracts, in Tyler's History of American Literature, 2 vols., New York, 1878. For extracts see also the first two volumes of Stedman and Hutchinson's Library of American Literature, New York, 1888.
In conclusion I would observe that town histories, though seldom written in a philosophical spirit and apt to be quite amorphous in structure, are a mine of wealth for the philosophic student of history.