Roger Williams, founder of Rhode Island

Author of The Hireling Ministry - None of Christ's (London, 1652). Don't look for this title at your local Christian book / paraphernalia store.

Besides founding Rhode Island, in 1638 he founded the First Baptist Church in America in Providence. Williams studied the language of the New England Native Americans and published the first book-length study of it in English.

His combined writings fill 7 volumes. He was active in church, state, political, and missionary activities yet he provided for his own family. I wonder how many Baptists in today's world are aware of his example. The books I found this information in have not been recently checked out, you see.

A page below from the book Roger Williams, A Study of the Life, Times and Character of a Political Pioneer by Edmund Janes Carpenter (1909) is for further clarification of his unusual but Scriptural views: