[Williams, Roger]. First edition of one of William's most significant—and rarest—works on religious tolerance

[WILLIAMS, ROGER]

QUERIES OF HIGHEST CONSIDERATION, PROPOSED TO MR. THO. GOODWIN MR. PHILLIP NYE MR. WIL. BRIDGES MR. JER. BURROUGHS MR. SIDR. SIMPSON. AND TO THE COMMISSIONERS FROM THE GENERALL ASSEMBLY (SO CALLED) OF THE CHURCH OF SCOTLAND; UPON OCCASION OF THEIR LATE PRINTED APOLOGIES FOR THEMSELVES AND THEIR CHURCHES. IN ALL HUMBLE REVERENCE PRESENTED TO THE VIEW OF THE RIGHT HONOURABLE THE HOUSES OF THE HIGH COURT OF PARLIAMENT. LONDON : [S.N.], IMPRINTED IN THE YEARE MDCXLIV [1644]

4to (7 1/8 x 4 1/2 in.; 182 x 142 mm). A-B⁴ C²: 10 leaves. Printer's ornaments on title-page, woodcut initial and headpiece, one line of errata at foot of final text page; margins of title soiled and chipped, scattered light soiling, some shoulder-notes shaved close. Modern modern wrappers with printed paper label. Brown calf folding case gilt.

First edition of one of William's most significant—and rarest—works on religious tolerance. 

Roger Williams was condemned to banishment from Massachusetts in 1636 for spreading "dissent." Among his many controversial opinions was that the Salem church was not sufficiently removed from the Church of England; however, it was his sympathies with the Native Americans that really damaged his standing in the colony. His original missionary zeal to convert the Indians dwindled after he began living among them, learning their language and their customs. Williams began to question the legality of the English settling on a land that was already settled. It was the height of sedition to suggest that a King had no right to grant charters in the New World, but Williams was to go further in his radicalism when he established his own colony in the spring of 1636. A haven for dissenters in what is now present day Rhode Island, the community of "Providence" enjoyed rule by majority vote by head of household and proclaimed no official religion.

Published the same year as his Bloudy Tenent of Persecution, for Cause of Conscience (and like that work, met with a rebuttal by John Cotton), Queries of Highest Consideration extended Williams's call for religious tolerance (and the idea of separation of church and state) to the religious debates then current in England, including the issue of individual sanctification. He calls here for tolerance for Catholics as well as between the Protestant factions of Anglicans and Independents, as he styled himself.

REFERENCE:

ESTC R1998; Wing W2770; Sabin 104343

PROVENANCE:

Robart Reed (ownership inscription on title-page verso, "Robart Reed his book hand and peen 1767")