William Bradford Quotes
It is against my conscience that you should play whilst others were at work: and that if you had any devotion to the day, you should show it at home in the exercises of religion, and not in the streets with pasttime and frolicks.
In the 17th century American Plymouth Colony there were a series of tasks that had to be performed every day for the survival and benefit of the community. The workload was shared by all citizens. One Christmas some of the younger men decided not to work on religious grounds believing that their religious interpretation forbad work on Christmas. They were excused, but soon the Governor discovered that all the young men in question were playing and sporting in the street. They were embarrassed and all went home.
William Bradford, 1590-1657, Pilgrim Father & Governor of Plymouth Colony, Challenge to young men
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
William Bradford was an English Puritan separatist originally from the West Riding of Yorkshire in Northern England. He moved to Leiden in Holland in order to escape persecution from King James I of England, and then emigrated to the Plymouth Colony on the Mayflower in 1620. He was a signatory to the Mayflower Compact and went on to serve as Governor of the Plymouth Colony intermittently for about 30 years between 1621 and 1657. His journal Of Plymouth Plantation covered the years from 1620 to 1646 in Plymouth.
