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In the two chapters in American Colonies, Taylor phrases his sentences to make readers think the Puritans were unjust to the Indians, while the colonists who lived in the Middle Colonies, because of the way they treated others, lived the best colonial life. I agree with Matt’s last post when he describes how Taylor tends to share his own opinion on certain groups of people in colonial America. It was definitely apparent in this section that Taylor thought the Puritans should have been more accepting of the Indians around them. He also seems so impressed with colonial life in the Middle Colonies, misleading his readers, because life was not always perfect there either.
When Taylor writes about the Puritan and Indian societies, I noticed that he tries to compare the different ways of life, more than he does contrast. For example, when he explains how the New Englanders, “cut off [Metacom’s] head for display on a post atop a brick watchtower,” an act most would think Indians would do, readers see how hypocritical the Puritans were in their quest to extinguish the “savages” (Taylor 201). Taylor also describes the gender roles in the two different societies similarly: the men do the tougher labor of harvesting or hunting, while the women usually take care of the children and tend to household duties. He shows these comparisons so readers can see that the Puritans may not have been so different from the Indians, yet they thought they were so above them. I had never thought about the English colonists being similar to the native tribes, but both the Puritans and the Indians in the area lived in communities and worked together. Because of this comparison, when Taylor writes about the Puritan destruction of Indian villages, readers view New Englanders as unjust invaders.
On the other hand, Taylor emphasizes the civility of life in the Middle Colonies because of the acceptance of all ethnicities and religions. Taylor describes William Penn in a new way, as the connection between the elite and the outcasts. Although I knew that he was raised wealthy, but was different because of his Quaker conversion, Taylor shows how necessary it was for Penn to have ties to both types of people. Without him, the colony, and possibly even the future country, would never have been able to survive. Taylor also emphasizes the peace between the middle colonists and the Indians, differing them from the Chesapeake and New England colonists. Without the fear of Indian attacks, the middle colonists were able to thrive and Taylor describes a seemingly ideal colony, filled with accepting people.
Just as he did while comparing the Spanish and French colonizers, Taylor writes with some bias, making readers see certain English colonists as better people than others.