by Effie Moore Salem

Created on: November 02, 2009   Last Updated: December 22, 2010

The Pilgrims came to America for two very important reasons, religious freedom and giving vent to a latent entrepreneurial spirit. We've all heard over and over their story of how the Church of England persecuted them, forcing their flight to Holland. This is known knowledge. Yet it is in knowing that not all the original Puritans -Separatists - that fled to Amsterdam, Holland sought passage to America. Some were satisfied to stay there and to worship their God freely. It was allowed.

Entrepreneurs as we know them today often get bored and seek new opportunities. The status quo is not for them. I believe this is the principal difference between those that stayed and those that crossed the Atlantic. God and His cause can be served anywhere, but leave it to those who want to hasten His return to earth to get out there and push the boat when it gets sunk in quicksand. 

This idea for the above idea surfaced when  learning that the pastor of the original group of Puritans stayed in Holland and did not immigrate with the Pilgrims because more of his flock were staying in Holland than were booking passage to America. This pastor, Richard Clyfton, according to the writings of William Bradford in his book Of Plymouth Plantation, was the one who started the group in England, fled with them to Holland and who stayed there rather than go to America.

In Europe Martin Luther was the first to differ with the Church and this division later gave King Henry VIII the courage to break away and start the Church of England with himself as leader. There were problems in the Church and in politics and it was this Church that was having its own internal struggles. The Puritans were not satisfied with the way the Church was keeping many of the old customs of the Catholic Church.

They had at first hoped when the dissolution came that the church would cleanse itself of from all resemblance and this did not happen. The Puritans was the larger group of dissenters and the Pilgrims or Separatists were a smaller group with a few different ideas. Basically, this is what caused the group to settle into Amsterdam and then sail for America. .

The Church leaders were trying to force them to get in line or leave. The left for Holland and stayed there for ten or twelve years. When they heard about the colonization in America and the building of new colonies in America, they signed on; or some of them did. They were free in Holland but their children were becoming too assimilated into Dutch

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