This treatment so irritated the warm feelings of Williams, and so keenly wounded his sense of justice and love of liberty, that he required the Church of Salem to renounce all connection with the other congregations; and even went so far as to refuse all intercourse with his own church until this separation was agreed to. But strongly as the Salemers were attached to their pastor, they could not consent to so decisive a measure as he demanded; and, being vexed and dispirited by the general disapprobation which their conduct had excited in the rest of the colony, the greatest part of the congregation fell away from him.
This desertion grieved the heart of the zealous minister but it did not discourage him, or subdue his determined spirit. He began to hold spiritual meetings at his own house, which were attended by those members of the church who fully concurred in his views, and who considered that he had been treated with injustice. This proceeding naturally aroused a strong party spirit in the town, and even threatened to produce a permanent division in the church, as the followers of Williams held themselves entirely aloof from the rest of the congregation.
Deeply did Edith lament this unhappy state of affairs. Her devotion to her noble-minded husband, and the natural tendency of her own mind, led her to sympathize entirely in his opinions and feelings; and her strong sense of right and wrong caused her to condemn the injustice of the government, and the weak, truckling spirit of the sister-churches. But her judgement was more calm and dispassionate than that of Roger, and her temper far less excitable. She therefore saw the impropriety, as well as the danger, of, causing a schism in the church; and she used all her powerful influence to induce her husband to give up these irregular assemblies; and, without compromising his own opinions, to endeavor to ward off the enmity of the men of Boston.
She earnestly besought him again to leave the Congregation of Salem-- the greater portion of which had already deserted him and his cause-- and to return to Plymouth, where a safe and a happy home might yet be afforded to them, and where no persecution for conscience' sake, need be feared. But all her arguments and her persuasions were alike ineffectual. On this one point she found her Roger firm and inflexible--for on this point he felt that his honor and his conscience were both concerned; and, even for Edith's sake; he could not act contrary to their dictates. He knew that danger hung over his head; and, though he would not shrink from it himself, he besought her to seek a temporary refuge with her parents, and remain at Plymouth until the threatened storm had blown over. But it was now Ediths turn to show herself firm and decided; and so clearly did Roger perceive that separation would be to her a far greater trial than any other that could befall her in his company, that he forbore to urge a measure that it wrung his own heart to propose.