John Eliot, long known as ‘the apostle of the North-American Red Men,’ and other Englishmen early in the seventeenth century, laboured to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ to the heathen natives of New England in their own Indian language, and in doing so, found it necessary to carry on civilisation with religion, and to instruct them in some of the arts of life. Their writings, and more particularly some of the tracts known as the ‘Eliot Tracts,’ aroused so much interest in London that the needs of the Indians of New England were brought before Parliament, and on July 27, 1649, an Act or Ordinance was passed with this title :—‘A Corporation for the Promoting and Propagating the Gospel of Jesus Christ in New England.’
Origin of the New England Company, London, With an Account of its Labours on Behalf of the North-American Indians.