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Religion in colonial America
The key impacts of the protestant reformation on european and world history
Religion in colonial America
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Today, many people see America to be the land of opportunity and wealth. During the beginnings of the New World, this fact was relevant to the Europeans as well. The growing powers competed for land in America in order to become the omnipotent country of Europe. However, because America was overseas from Europe and direct supervision by the monarch was not possible, the land of opportunity was restricted to the European countries. Eventually, as history shows, all of the European powers who colonized in the Americas lose their control, thus leading to independent countries. From the 1400s to the 1600s, European countries set up American colonies in the North and South colonial regions, with principles of economic opportunity and religious toleration for the benefit of the motherland, to the extent of the desires and decisions of the immigrants of America.
During the 1400s, England did not tolerate any church beside the Anglican church. Catholics were persecuted and did not have religious freedom. "King Henry VIII split with the Roman Catholic Church over a question of his divorce from Catherine of Aragon. Though his religious position was not at all Protestant, the resultant schism ultimately led to England distancing itself almost entirely from Rome." Many people moved out of their comfortable homes in England to start a new life in the New World with religious freedom. "Anne Hutchnison left her comfortable home in England, with her husband and children, to settle in Boston, Massachusetts Bay Colony in search for religious freedom for all peoples." However, Religious toleration was still limited and controlled by the people living in the New World. Although they arrived with hopes of religious freedom, full religiou...
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... 1608." The General Historie of Virginia, New England & The Summer Isles. Online Edition. Volume 01. James MacLehose and Sons. 1907. 158-59. Many Pasts. History Matters. 31 August 2006
This excerpt shows the experience of John Smith in the New World and his perception of the colonies and their opportunities and gains. This primary source is significant in the embodiment of the ideals of economic opportunity and religious toleration.
Wright, Louis B. and Elaine W. Fowler. West and By North: North America Seen Through the Eyes of Its Seafaring Discoveries. New York: Delacorte Press, 1971.
This primary source has many different excerpts from voyagers and colonizers of North America. "West and By North" brings together the firsthand accounts of early explorers, depicting in their own words their dangers, their adventures and their expectations of the New World.
In this book, Kupperman is telling a well-known event in remarkable detail. She intentionally uses last three chapters of the nine to tell the Jamestown’s history. The first six are in relation to how Jamestown came to be. The first chapter deals with political, national and religious conflicts during this period and how it motivated the English to venture West. The second is titled,” Adventurers, Opportunities, and Improvisation.” The highlight of this chapter is the story of John Smith, and how his precious experience enabled him to save ”the Jamestown colony from certain ruin.” (51) He is just an example of the “many whose first experiences along these lines were Africa or the eastern Mediterranean later turned their acquired skills to American ventures.” (43) Chapter three discusses the European and Native American interaction before and during this period. “North America’s people had had extensive and intimate experience of Europeans long before colonies was thought of, and through this experience they had come to understand much about the different kind of people across the sea.” (73) This exchange of information happened because a lot of Europeans lived among the Natives (not as colonist or settlers), and Natives were brought back to Europe. The people in Europe were very fascinated with these new people and their culture. Chapter four analyzes this fascination. It starts off talking about Thomas Trevilian, an author of “an elaborate commonplace book,” that showed “the English public was keenly interested in the world and in understanding how to categorize the knowledge about all the new things, people, and cultures of which specimens and descriptions were now available to them.
Virtual Jamestown. "Indenture Contract of Richard Lowther." Personal Narratives from the Virtual Jamestown Project, 1575-1705. http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/etcbin/jamestown-browse?id=J1046
Captain Meriwether Lewis and William Clark took the risk of life, limb, and liberty to bring back the precious and valuable information of the Pacific Northwest of the United States territory. Their accomplishments of surviving the trek and delivering the data to the U.S. government, have altered the course of history, but have some Historian’s and author’s stating, “It produced nothing useful.”, and having “added little to the stock of science and wealth. Lewis and Clark’s expedition is one of the most famous and most unknown adventures of America’s frontier.
By 1763, although some colonies still maintained established churches, other colonies had accomplished a virtual revolution for religious toleration and separation of church and state. Between the two established churches, in the colonies, Anglican and Congregational, a considerable number of people didn't worship in any church. But in the colonies with a maintained religion, only a few belonged to it. As in England, Catholics were still discriminated against, but since their numbers were fewer the laws were less severe. Similarly, The Church of England was established in America, as it was in England already. However, in America the Congregationalists and Anglicans were the more dominate religions compared to the Catholics in Europe and England.
American colonies were clearly established with the intent to all live together with Christian beliefs, but with so many interpretations and versions of the same religious scripture, freedom to practice whichever adaptation feels right became most important in colonial life. And as a safe haven for those who were persecuted in their home countries, America truly flourished as a place for the religiously tolerant.
William Bradford and John Smith’s two pieces both convey America as a place to escape the European world but completely fail to contain congruency on what early America was like in this time period.
After the discovery of the New World by Christopher Columbus, European Nations competed in a race against one another to claim pieces of the new land. Before Columbus found this land, the sea separating the New World from Europe seemed endless, and mundane. The Europeans were only interested in the land to the East. But with the New World as a new hat thrown into the ring, the Europeans tossed aside their old toy to go play with a new one. This time period of conquest over the New World was known as the Age of Exploration, and by the 1700s, they kept their pickings. A New World meant more land to build homes and plant crops, and more money to be earned by buying out new houses and selling new crops grown in foreign soil. Spain claimed Mexico, and the Southwest portions of what would be known as America. France got their hands on most of present-day Canada, as well as Louisiana. The Dutch set foot on land they called New Amsterdam, however, The English, who had settled their first colony in Jamestown, Virginia, drove the Dutch out and claimed New Amsterdam for themselves, later renaming it New York. The English claimed more land as time passed, and eventually they had formed 13 different colonies in the Eastern part of America. The English Colonies were separated into 3 different regions. The New England Colonies (Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Hampshire), the Middle Colonies (New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware), and the Southern Colonies (Maryland, Virginia, North and South Carolina, Georgia). The New England Colonies were the earliest of the 3 regions, founded by English Settlers seeking religious freedom. The Middle Colonies were also founded by settlers seeking religious freedom. The Southern Colonies,...
Many of England’s problems could be solved in America, and so colonization began. When the earliest settlers came, England had the responsibility to continue the Protestant Church, and prevent the Catholic Church from converting the entire Native American population of North America (Morison, p.105) A potential Protestant refuge could be based there in the threat of civil wars or a change of religion.
Without this knowledge so early on, many more explorers may have died. Without Lewis and Clark’s exploring and mapping, the United States may not have become our land, but may have continued to be the Indian’s land, or possibly the Spanish. With the Indian’s cooperation, some of the history that had been previously unrecorded was written down, as well as scientifically inspecting the wildlife in their Western habitats. In the end, this shows that Lewis and Clark mapping the new Western territory was their greatest
Often when looking at American history, people tend to lump all the characters and actors involved as similar. This is especially the case in regards to Early American Colonial history. Because the Puritan communities that grew rapidly after John Winthrop’s arrival in 1630 often overshadow the earlier colony at Plymouth, many are lead to assume that all settlers acted in similar ways with regard to land use, religion, and law. By analyzing the writings of William Bradford and John Winthrop, one begins to see differing pictures of colonization in New England.
Vilbert, Elizabeth. Traders' Tales: Narratives of Cultural Encounters in the Columbia Plateau, 1807-1846. University of Oklahoma Press, 1997.
Looking back into history, at around the 1500s to the 1600s, people were very much the same in the sense that many countries were looking to aggrandize their economy and appear the greatest. It was this pride and thinking that motivated many of the superpowers of the world’s past. Two such monarchies in the European continent included England and Spain, which had at the time, the best fleets the world has ever seen. Because both were often striving to be the best, they conflicted with one another. Although England and Spain had their differences, they both had a thirst to see new things and it was this hunger that led them both to discovering different parts of the “New World” and thus, colonizing the Americas.
In the early 17th century, British colonizers began arriving in the New World in hopes of expanding their territorial domain. By the 18th century, Spanish colonizers had established trading posts and missions in the New World, covering a vast expanse of land that extended beyond even England’s colonial holdings. When the British arrived, they spurred on Indian depopulation and African and European immigration. The arrival of the Spanish resulted in near Indian extinction and a burgeoning international trade. Though Spain had an advantage of a century over Britain, both nations used the New World’s resources to further their mercantile goals, in the process, ravaging the native populations; however, Spain’s missionary efforts were more successful and the location of their respective colonies resulted in a monopoly of different economic commodities.
Taylor, Alan American Colonies: The Settling of North America, New York, NY: Penguin Group, 2001. pg. 1685-1730
In “ A Description of New England ”, Smith starts by describing the pleasure and content that risking your life for getting your own piece of land brings to men. On the other hand, Bradford reminds us how harsh and difficult the trip to the New World was for the p...