"Understanding by an Act of the honoured Council, that there is offence taken at a book published in England by others, the copy whereof was sent over by myself about nine or ten years since, and that the further consideration thereof is commended to this honoured Court now sitting in Boston: Upon perusal thereof, I do judge myself to have offended, and in way of satisfaction not only to the authority of this jurisdiction, but also to any others that shall take notice thereof, I do hereby acknowledge to this General Court, that such expressions as do too manifestly scandalize the Government of England, by King, Lords and Commons, as anti-christian, and justify the late innovators, I do sincerely bear testimony against, and acknowledge it to be not only a lawful but eminent form of government.
"2nd. All forms of civil government, deduced from Scripture, I acknowledge to be of God, and to be subscribed to for conscience sake; and whatsoever is in the whole epistle or book inconsistent herewith, I do at once and most cordially disown.
It must have been painful and humiliating to John Eliot to be brought to account for and compelled to recant the sentiments of a book which had been in circulation eight or nine years, and much applauded by those who now arraigned and made a scapegoat of him, to avert from themselves the consequence and suspicion of sentiments which they had held and avowed as strongly as Eliot himself.
It has been said that the Government of Massachusetts Bay had desisted from acknowledging and addressing Charles the Second as King, until they found that their silence endangered their interests. Mr. Holmes, in his Annals, speaking under the date of May, 1661 (a year after Charles had entered London as King), says: "Charles II., had not yet been proclaimed by the colony. The Governor (Endicot), on receiving intelligence of the transactions that were taking place in England to the prejudice of the colony, judged it inexpedient longer to delay that solemnity. Calling the Court together, a form of proclamation was agreed to, and Charles was acknowledged to be their sovereign Lord, and proclaimed to be the lawful King of Great Britain, France and Ireland, and all other territories thereto belonging." An address to the King was agreed to, and ordered to be sent to England.[116]