_Gov._ You say you do not remember, but can you say she did not speak so?

_Mr. C._ I do remember that she looked at them as the apostles before the
ascension....

_Dep. Gov._ They affirm that Mrs. Hutchinson did say they were not able
ministers of the New Testament.

_Mr. C._ I do not remember it.

* * * * *

Mrs. Hutchinson had shattered the case of the government in a style worthy
of a leader of the bar, but she now ventured on a step for which she has
been generally condemned. She herself approached the subject of her
revelations. To criticise the introduction of evidence is always simpler
than to conduct a cause, but an analysis of her position tends to show not
only that her course was the result of mature reflection, but that her
judgment was in this instance correct. She probably assumed that when the
more easily proved charges had broken down she would be attacked here; and
in this assumption she was undoubtedly right. The alternative presented to
her, therefore, was to go on herself, or wait for Winthrop to move. If she
waited she knew she should give the government the advantage of choosing
the ground, and she would thus be subjected to the danger of having fatal
charges proved against her by hearsay or distorted evidence. If she took
the bolder course, she could explain her revelations as monitions coming
to her through texts in Scripture, and here she was certain of Cotton's
support. Before that tribunal she could hardly have hoped for an
acquittal; but if anything could have saved her it would have been the