Hence it was, that some were admitted by expressing their consent to that written confession of faith and covenant; others did answer to questions about the principles of religion that were publicly propounded to them; some did present their confession in writing, which was read for them; and some, that were able and willing, did make their confession in their own words and way; a due respect was also had unto the conversations of men, namely, that they were without scandal. But some of the passengers that came over at the same time, observing that the ministers did not at all use the book of common prayer, and that they did administer baptism and the Lord’s supper without the ceremonies, and that they professed also to use discipline in the congregation against scandalous persons, by a personal application of the word of God, as the case might require, and that some that were scandalous were denied admission into the church, they began to raise some trouble; of these Mr. Samuel Brown and his brother were the chief, the one being a lawyer, the other a merchant, both of them amongst the number of the first patentees, men of estates, and men of parts and port in the place. These two brothers gathered a company together, in a place distinct from the public assembly, and there, sundry times, the book of common prayer was read unto such as resorted thither. The governor, Mr. Endicot, taking notice of the disturbance that began to grow amongst the people by this means, he convented the two brothers before him. They accused the ministers as departing from the orders of the church of England, that they were separatists, and would be anabaptists, etc., but for themselves, they would hold to the orders of the church of England. The ministers answered for themselves, they were neither separatists nor anabaptists, they did not separate from the church of England, nor from the ordinances of God there, but only from the corruptions and disorders there; and that they came away from the common prayer and ceremonies, and had suffered much from their non-conformity in their native land, and therefore being in a place where they might have their liberty, they neither could nor would use them, because they judged the imposition of these things to be sinful corruptions in the worship of God. The governor and council, and the generality of the people, did well approve of the ministers’ answer; and therefore finding those two brothers to be of high spirits, and their speeches and practices tending to mutiny and faction, the governor told them, that New England was no place for such as they; and therefore he sent them both back for England, at the return of the ships the same year; and though they breathed out threatenings both against the governor and ministers there, yet the Lord so disposed of all, that there was no further inconvenience followed upon it.

The two ministers there being seriously studious of reformation, they considered of the state of their children, together with their parents; concerning which, letters did pass between Mr. Higginson and Mr. Brewster, the reverend elder of the church at Plimouth, and they did agree in their judgments, namely, concerning the church membership of the children with their parents; and that baptism was a seal of their membership, only when they were adult, they being not scandalous, they were to be examined by the church officers, and upon their approbation of their fitness, and upon the children’s public and personally owning of the covenant, they were to be received unto the Lord’s supper. Accordingly, Mr. Higginson’s eldest son, being about fifteen years of age, was owned to have been received a member together with his parents, and being privately examined by the pastor, Mr. Skelton, about his knowledge in the principles of religion, he did present him before the church when the Lord’s supper was to be administered, and the child, then publicly and personally owning the covenant of the God of his father, he was admitted unto the Lord’s supper; it being then professedly owned, according to I Cor. vii. 14; that the children of the church are holy unto the Lord as well as their parents, accordingly the parents owning and retaining the baptism, which they themselves received in their infancy, in their native land, as they had any children born, baptism was administered unto them, namely, to the children of such as were members of that particular church.

Mr. Higginson lived but one year after the settling of the church there, departed this life about the same time the next year, in the month of August, 1630.⁸