The Puritans believed that they were the Chosen People of God destined to found a New Jerusalem-a New City of God in the wilderness. They interpreted the Bible more literally than their British counterparts, and sought to establish a purified church, which sometimes meant imposing their religious beliefs on unwilling citizens.

Massachusetts Bay Colony

In 1629, the Massachusetts Bay Company obtained a charter allowing it to trade and colonize in New England. Its Puritan stockholders envisioned the colony as a refuge from religious persecution. The charter, which ceded lands from three miles south of the Charles River to three miles north of the Merrimack, allowed the company to establish its own government, subject only to the king. Its government was to be placed in the hands of a governor, deputy governor, and eighteen assistants, to be elected annually by the company.

Unlike the poor and humble Pilgrims, the founders of Massachusetts Bay Colony were men of wealth and social position. They left comfortable homes in England to found a Puritan state in America. They got a large tract of land extending from the Merrimac River to the Charles, and westward across the continent.

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