We will mention, briefly, a few of the most striking points of the History before us. At page 48, are some remarks in reply to Burk's insinuation of a persecuting and intolerant spirit in the early colonial religion of the State—an insinuation based on no better authority than a statement in "certain ancient records of the province" concerning the trial, condemnation, and execution by fire, of a woman, for the crime of witchcraft. Dr. Hawks very justly observes, that even if the supposed execution did actually take place, it cannot sanction the inferences which are deduced from it. Evidence is wanting that the judgment was rendered by an ecclesiastical power. Witchcraft was an offence cognizable by the common courts of law, having been made a felony, without benefit of clergy, by the twelfth chapter of the first statute of James I, enacted in 1603. So that, allowing the prisoner to have suffered, her death, says our author, cannot more properly be charged to the ecclesiastical, than to the civil, authority. But in point of fact, the trial alluded to by Burk, (see Appendix xxxi,) can be no other than that of the once notorious Grace Sherwood. And this trial, we are quite certain, took place before a civil tribunal. Besides, (what is most especially to the purpose) the accused though found guilty, and condemned, was never executed.
Some observations of our author upon a circumstance which History has connected with the secular feelings of the colony, will be read with pleasure by all men of liberal opinions. We allude to the fact that when one of the colony's agents in England (George Sandys, we believe) took it upon himself to petition Parliament, in the name of his constituents, for the restoration of the old company, the colony formally disavowed the act and begged permission to remain under the royal government. Now, Burk insists that this disavowal was induced solely by attachment to the Church of England, for whose overthrow the Puritans were imagined to be particularly zealous. With Dr. Hawks we protest against the decision of the historian. It can be viewed in no other light than that of an effort (brought about, perhaps, by love of our political institutions, yet still exceedingly disingenuous) to apologise for the loyalty of Virginia—to apologise for our forefathers having felt what not to have felt would have required an apology indeed! By faith, by situation, by habits and by education they had been taught to be loyal—and with them, consequently, loyalty was a virtue. But if it was indeed a crime—if Virginia has committed an inexpiable offence in resisting the encroachments of the Dictator, (we shall not say of the Commonwealth) let not the Church—in the name of every thing reasonable—let not the Church be saddled with her iniquity—let not political prejudices, always too readily excited, be now enlisted against the religion we cherish, by insinuations artfully introduced, that the loyalty of the State was involved in its creed—that through faith alone it remained a slave—and that its love of monarchy was a mere necessary consequence of its attachment to the Church of England.
While upon this subject we beg leave to refer our readers to some remarks, (from the pen of Judge Beverley Tucker) which appeared under the Critical head of our Messenger before the writer of this article assumed the Editorial duties. The remarks of which we speak, are in reply to the aspersions of Mr. George Bancroft, who, in his late History of the United States, with every intention of paying Virginia a compliment, accuses her of disloyalty, immediately before, and during the Protectorate. Of such an accusation, (for Hening's suggestions, upon pages 513 and 526, of the Statutes at Large cannot be considered as such) we had never seriously dreamed prior to the publication of Mr. Bancroft's work, and that Mr. Bancroft himself should never have dreamed of it, we were sufficiently convinced by the arguments of Judge Tucker. We allude to these arguments now, with the view of apprizing such of our readers as may remember them, that the author of the History in question, in a late interview with Dr. Hawks, has "disclaimed the intention of representing Virginia as wanting in loyalty." All parties would have been better pleased with Mr. B. had he worded his disclaimer so as merely to assure us that in representing Virginia as disloyal he has found himself in error.
We will take the liberty of condensing here such of the leading points on both sides of the debated question as may either occur to us personally or be suggested by those who have written on the subject. In proof of Virginia's disloyalty it is said:
1. There is a deficiency of evidence to establish the fact, (a fact much insisted upon) that on the death of the governor, Matthews, in the beginning of 1659, a tumultuous assemblage resolved to throw off the government of the Protectorate, and repairing to the residence of Sir William Berkeley, then living in retirement, requested him to resume the direction of the colony. If such had been the fact, existing records would have shown it—but they do not. Moreover, these records show that Berkeley was elected precisely as the other governors had been, in Virginia, during the Protectorate.
2. After the battle of Dunbar, and the fall of Montrose Virginia passed an act of surrender—she was therefore in favor of the Parliament.
3. The Colonial Legislature claimed the supreme power as residing within itself. In this it evinced a wish to copy the Parliament—to which it was therefore favorable.
4. Cromwell acted magnanimously towards Virginia. The terms of the article in the Treaty of Surrender by which Virginia stipulated for a trade free as that of England, were faithfully observed till the Restoration. The Protector's Navigation Act was not enforced in Virginia. Cromwell being thus lenient, Virginia must have been satisfied.
5. Virginia elected her own governors. Bennett, Digges, and Matthews, were commonwealth's men. Therefore Virginia was republican.
6. Virginia was infected with republicanism. She wished to set up for herself. Thus intent, she demands of Berkeley a distinct acknowledgement of her assembly's supremacy. His reply was "I am but the servant of the assembly." Berkeley, therefore, was republican, and his tumultuous election proves nothing but the republicanism of Virginia.