Westward Ho, and Away!
The time arrived when William Penn’s peaceful thoughts went sailing over the Atlantic, westward ho, and away! For he was appointed a trustee of Jersey in America. There came to him while he was still in England, news of immense tracts of land lying beyond Jersey, so fertile that under cultivation they would yield harvests unparalleled in his island home. He heard of rich minerals, of noble forests, of river-banks offering splendid sites for towns and cities, of bays where proud navies might ride at anchor.
Moreover, many Friends, who had fled from persecution in England, were settled in Jersey. Their industry had already turned the wilderness into a garden. They were holding their meetings and worshipping God, without fear of constables and fines, of imprisonments and attacks by mobs. In Jersey, they had full liberty of conscience.
And William Penn, as his thoughts sailed westward ho, and away! saw, rising from the sea, bright and fair, a land of refuge not only for persecuted Friends, but for all oppressed people. He determined to found a new State in America, where nobody should be persecuted for religion’s sake, where everybody should be free, and where the people should govern themselves. “A holy experiment,” he called it.
He presented a petition to Charles the Second, asking for a royal grant of land near Jersey. “After many waitings, watchings, solicitings,” the title to a vast tract was confirmed to him under the Great Seal of England. He was to be its ruler and “Lord Proprietor,” “with large powers and privileges.” He was to make laws, grant pardons, and appoint officials as he saw fit, but subject to the approval of the English Government.
Penn named his land, “Sylvania”; but the King called it Penn-sylvania, in honour of old Admiral Penn, William Penn’s father.
Almost the first thing that Penn did was to write to the people already settled in Pennsylvania, “a loving address.”
“My Friends,” he began, “I wish you all happiness, here and hereafter. These are to let you know that it hath pleased God, in his providence, to cast you within my lot and care....
“You shall be governed by laws of your own making, and live a free, and, if you will, a sober and industrious people.”
Thus William Penn promised the People of Pennsylvania, Liberty and the right to govern themselves. And he kept his promises.
John Stoughton (Retold)