Leiden and the Pilgrim Way

Abstract The years that the Pilgrim congregation spent in Leiden were a formative time that is often passed over in accounts of the founding of Plymouth. This essay will focus on how the congregation ended up in Leiden, the consequences of that decision, and their experiences as refugees. Attention will be paid to the ways in which Dutch legal and cultural practices influenced the way in which the Pilgrims would govern themselves in New England. But even more significant will be an examination of how the religious positions taken by John Robinson and the members of his congregation changed during these years. Interaction with the faculty of the University of Leiden, contacts with members of the Walloon church and other foreign faiths, and discussions with visiting Englishmen such as Henry Jacob, William Ames, and Robert Parker all helped the English to find further light on how they should govern their relations with other religious communities, in essence modifying their separatism. Those changes led to the Pilgrims being able to engage with the puritans who came to Massachusetts in the late 1620s and 1630s and to play a significant role in defining the New England Way.