per for men, whose minds are stronger, etc., she had kept her wits, and might have improved them usefully and honorably in the place God had set her." (D.F. Hawke, Everyday Life in Early America, pps. 62-63.)In light of this mindset, it is hardly surprising that Anne's ideas and intelligence were met with hostility and rejection.Anne actually lived a relatively submissive life in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. She never publicly gave her own opinions on religious issues, but only in the privacy of a home among other women. She started another women's club in her home to discuss the sermon and the Bible each week. The attendance at these meetings increased with the controversy over the banishment of Roger Williams. The women were attracted to Anne and wanted to hear her opinions. This was often the lone intellectual stimulation they received in their restricted lives. John Winthrop, one of Anne's chief opposers, reported a resolution passed by the assembly in 1637 as saying, That though women might meet (some few together) to pray and edify one another; yet such an assembly, (as was then the practice in Boston), where sixty or more did meet every week, and one woman (in a prophetical way, by resolving questions of doctrine, and expounding the scripture) took upon her the whole exercise, was agreed to be disorderly, and without rule." (As quoted in C. Holliday, Woman's Life in Colonial Days, p. 40.)This was the legal action that the Massachusetts Bay colony first took against her. She was arrested and brought to trial because her meetings were said to be disorderly.The Puritans denounced Anne's beliefs as heresy and sedition, justifying her subsequent excommunication and banishment. John Winthrop summed it up in this way: "The two capital errors with which she was charged were these: That the Holy Ghost dwells personally in a justified person; and that nothing of sanctification can help to evidence to believers their justification." (As qu...
