Puritans: Then Versus Now
History is not static. It flows smoothly, as a river from one point to the next.
Where we are today is a process from where we were yesterday. We are always in a state of becoming.
The United States of America is not a millennium-long nation as many in Europe. So we can trace many of our streams and creeks back only a few centuries to learn a wealth of information.
(Obviously, the nations and blood lines before many of the original colonists came over are important, but what is also imperative is the mindset that they had upon arrival that still lingers to this day.)
They were quite a few original colonial groups. The main ones I’m focused on today are the Puritans and the Quakers.
The pilgrims are mixed in there, too, but they have a very important distinction from the Puritans that we must address.
The pilgrims were also called separatists. They wanted to separate from the Anglican church. The Puritans had a much different mindset. They wanted to purify that same church.
Separate versus purify.
While the two groups are similar in their Calvinist beliefs, and in their hesitation to support the church of England, this subtle mindset difference is no small thing to scoff at.
Reform versus separation is a huge difference in belief. This really is the difference between an American conservative versus an American dissident. One believes in reforming the system; the other realizes that reform is impossible.
That covers a political system. Now imagine how much more impactful it is for a religious system, especially back in their day. This is no minor difference. The reformers were a danger back then, just as they are now.
The Puritan mindset that came to dominate many regions in New England radically impacts us to this day. The pilgrims left their mark, but mostly only for the revolutionary and civil war eras. After which, their mindsets seemed to die out more so than the other early settlers.
Many Puritans came over in ships such as the Arbella that ended up carrying over a 1000 Puritans to Massachusetts. They created Harvard college, which continues to indoctrinate people now is it even did back then.
In the late 1630s, there was a great migration of Puritans out of England. Nearly 14,000 settlers came to Massachusetts.
John Winthrop once said, “we shall be as a city upon a hill, the eyes of all people are upon us.” They felt they were called for greatness and were always a beacon for others to look up to. More on this note later.
Not everything that the Puritans did was bad. They increased the literacy rate, had their children reading the Bible, and created a really solid foundation for where we are now.
But the Puritans had a peculiarity that is still with us today. That peculiarity is their underlying root beliefs, such as the enforcement of their beliefs on to others (for the “betterment of others”, of course), and their habit of showing off how good they are publicly.
Does that sound familiar? It should. That is exactly what the modern leftists to still do to this day. They act holier than thou, attempt to force their beliefs on everyone else, and constantly spread the gospel of leftist lies.
The Puritans, throughout the course of their history, abandoned their Bible. They switched to a social focus. This heritage is still with us today with modern leftist groups.
They kept the values and underlying philosophies, but tossed out the originator of those values/philosophies: God and the Bible. Which then creates a wicked perversion of what once was.
But the Puritans are not alone in the river of history. They are one Creek that merged with another Creek to create the River of Leftism.
That other Creek is the Quakers.
William Penn used his land award in the New World to create a “quaker paradise”. It was also to avoid similar persecution that they were facing in England, just like the Puritans/Pilgrims.
Penn used the land award and shipped in the Quakers. Thus, the Society of Friends was truly born in the New World.
The Quakers had their quirks. They were devout pacifists. The Quakers were also incredibly liberal, even by some country’s standards today. They demanded religious freedom, got along with the Native Americans, women were given greater freedom than anywhere else in the new world, all men were considered equals, and similar beliefs promulgated their land.
Does all of that also sound familiar? Again, it should. It’s the roots of modern leftism.
In the earlier colonial days, there were three major cities in these areas. Boston, New York, and Philadelphia. Philadelphia was controlled by the Quakers and Boston by the Puritans. Their influence eventually grew to encompass much of New York state and surrounding territories.
From there, pre-Civil War, they spread west at a rapid pace to combat the ever-growing South. They’ve since spread far from their original home and have taken much of the West Coast and many major cities in between.
The combination of the Puritans and Quakers left its mark on modern America.
What I believe happened was that the mindset—the underlying philosophy—of the Quakers converged with the Puritans. This led to the modern leftist.
- What happens when you combine the Quaker belief in tolerance with the Puritan feeling of needing to force your beliefs on to everyone else?
- What happens when you combine the Quaker concept of brotherly love with the Puritan concept of superiority?
- What happens when you combine the Puritan desire to reform what they dislike with the Quakers’ enlightenment values?
The answer to all the above is, of course, leftism.
It is not hard to see modern leftism reflected in these instances. The Puritan’s spiritual descendants simply switched out the religious zeal for a social-political one. The Quakers kept their tolerance, equality, and egalitarianism but merged it into the Puritan’s secular evangelism.
What does this mean? Well, it means that:
- Leftism is the bastard child of the spiritual degeneration of the Puritans and Quakers.
Mix those two groups together, subtract God, toss in subjective secular morality, switch a spiritual focus to a material focus, and what do you get? You get the pink-haired nutcases and sanpaku-eyed freaks we are all so familiar with today.
Just like how the old Puritans sought to “purify” the Church of England, our new leftist Puritans seek to “purify” the American Continent. From many things, such as the new sin of Whiteness and the secular sin of racism. The Quakers are no different. They once called for tolerance and equality in their communities, they now demand it in every community.
It is no surprise then that their universities (Harvard) and their regions (Northeast) remain leftist strongholds. It’s where this all began and where it morphed into modernity’s variant.
The Middle and New England Colonies combined into one monstrosity.
History really is a river. If you ever question one aspect of what stands in front of you, it can be immensely helpful to just look back upriver. The creeks flowing into the river can give you immense information to help you understand why the rivers is how it is now.
And if you ever wonder why leftism is as it is, look back to its origins in New England. You will find a wealth of information to help you piece together the spiritual ancestors of our modern leftists.
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