Editing Roger Williams (section)

==Writings==
[[File:A_Key_into_the_Language_of_America.jpg|thumb|In 1643, Williams published ''[[A Key into the Language of America]],'' the first published study of a Native American language.]]
Williams's career as an author began with ''[[A Key into the Language of America]]'' (London, 1643), written during his first voyage to England. His next publication was ''Mr. Cotton's Letter lately Printed, Examined and Answered'' (London, 1644; reprinted in ''Publications of the Narragansett Club'', vol. ii, along with [[John Cotton (minister)|John Cotton]]'s letter which it answered). His most famous work is ''[[The Bloudy Tenent of Persecution for Cause of Conscience]]'' (published in 1644), considered by some to be one of the best defenses of liberty of conscience.<ref>James Emanuel Ernst, Roger Williams, New England Firebrand (Macmillan Co., Rhode Island, 1932), pg. 246 [https://books.google.com/books?id=IsgMAAAAYAAJ&q=bloudy+tenent+of+persecution+vigor+style+roger+williams] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140104135551/http://books.google.com/books?id=IsgMAAAAYAAJ&q=bloudy+tenent+of+persecution+vigor+style+roger+williams&dq=bloudy+tenent+of+persecution+vigor+style+roger+williams&pgis=1|date=4 January 2014}}</ref>

An anonymous pamphlet was published in London in 1644 entitled ''Queries of Highest Consideration Proposed to Mr. Tho. Goodwin, Mr. Phillip Nye, Mr. Wil. Bridges, Mr. Jer. Burroughs, Mr. Sidr. Simpson, all Independents, etc.'' which is now ascribed to Williams. These "Independents" were members of the [[Westminster Assembly]]; their ''Apologetical Narration'' sought a way between extreme Separatism and Presbyterianism, and their prescription was to accept the state church model of Massachusetts Bay.

Williams published ''The Bloody Tenent yet more Bloudy: by Mr. Cotton's Endeavor to wash it white in the Blood of the Lamb; of whose precious Blood, spilt in the Bloud of his Servants; and of the Blood of Millions spilt in former and later Wars for Conscience sake, that most Bloody Tenent of Persecution for cause of Conscience, upon, a second Tryal is found more apparently and more notoriously guilty, etc.'' (London, 1652) during his second visit to England. This work reiterated and amplified the arguments in ''Bloudy Tenent'', but it has the advantage of being written in answer to Cotton's ''A Reply to Mr. Williams his Examination''.<ref>''Publications of the Narragansett Club'', vol. ii</ref>

Other works by Williams include:
* ''The Hireling Ministry None of Christ's'' (London, 1652)
* ''Experiments of Spiritual Life and Health, and their Preservatives'' (London, 1652; reprinted Providence, 1863)
* ''[[George Fox Digged out of his Burrowes]]'' (Boston, 1676) (discusses Quakerism with its different belief in the "inner light," which Williams considered heretical)

A volume of his letters is included in the Narragansett Club edition of Williams's ''Works'' (7 vols., Providence, 1866–74), and a volume was edited by [[John Russell Bartlett]] (1882).
* ''The Correspondence of Roger Williams,'' 2 vols., Rhode Island Historical Society, 1988, edited by Glenn W. LaFantasie

[[Brown University]]'s [[John Carter Brown Library]] has long housed a 234-page volume referred to as the "Roger Williams Mystery Book".<ref>{{cite web|last=Mason-Brown|first=Lucas|title=Cracking the Code: Infant Baptism and Roger Williams|url=http://blogs.brown.edu/jcbbooks/2012/07/11/cracking-the-code/|work=JCB Books Speak|date=July 11, 2012 |access-date=16 September 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130618180720/http://blogs.brown.edu/jcbbooks/2012/07/11/cracking-the-code/|archive-date=18 June 2013|url-status=live}}</ref> The margins of this book are filled with notations in handwritten code, believed to be the work of Roger Williams. In 2012, Brown University undergraduate Lucas Mason-Brown cracked the code and uncovered conclusive historical evidence attributing its authorship to Williams.<ref>{{cite web|last=Fischer|first=Suzanne|title=Personal Tech for the 17th Century|url=https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/04/personal-tech-for-the-17th-century/255609/|work=The Atlantic|date=9 April 2012|access-date=16 September 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120910025030/http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/04/personal-tech-for-the-17th-century/255609/|archive-date=10 September 2012|url-status=live}}</ref> Translations are revealing transcriptions of a geographical text, a medical text, and 20 pages of original notes addressing the issue of [[infant baptism]].<ref>{{cite news|last=McKinney|first=Michael|title=Reading Outside the Lines|url=https://www.brown.edu/Facilities/John_Carter_Brown_Library/images/Reading%20outside%20the%20lines.pdf|access-date=16 September 2012|newspaper=The Providence Journal|date=March 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120710004658/http://www.brown.edu/Facilities/John_Carter_Brown_Library/images/Reading%20outside%20the%20lines.pdf|archive-date=10 July 2012|url-status=live}}</ref> Mason-Brown has since discovered more writings by Williams employing a separate code in the margins of a rare edition of the ''[[Eliot Indian Bible]]''.<ref>{{cite web|last=Mason-Brown|first=Lucas|title=Cracking the Code: Infant Baptism and Roger Williams|url=http://blogs.brown.edu/jcbbooks/2012/07/11/cracking-the-code/|work=JCB Books Speak|date=July 11, 2012 |publisher=Brown University|access-date=16 September 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130618180720/http://blogs.brown.edu/jcbbooks/2012/07/11/cracking-the-code/|archive-date=18 June 2013|url-status=live}}</ref>