They led lives believing that you must act like saint, for the hopes that you may be one. It was thought that your fate was already determined and known by God, and that those who were chosen to be the special ones, knew and so one would act the way of the chosen, leading a saintly life. The ministers of the towns were so involved and knowing about the peoples' lives that one minister, when perhaps confronted with the idea that a resident may be immoral, the minister replied, "the church was satisfied with Mrs. Carlton as to the weight of her butter." Everything was known and open for everyone to know in these towns. When Quakers began to move into some of the Puritans territory, they were treated with severe punishments and disrespect. Many Quakers were branded on their faces with iron in the shape of an "H" for heresie, as well many women "would be stripped to the waist, tied to the back of a cart, and whipped as they were paraded through the towns." New England was less than welcoming to foreigners. .
Eventually in the late 1700s' New Englanders became excellent tradesmen. They were limited with land, the soil was not as rich as those colonies in the south, and they also seemed to have more barriers than those in the south. The Northern Indians were said to guard and hold on to their land very aggressively, as well the French settlements to the north of Quebec, along with the natural borders of the sea and the mountains. So the New Englanders produced farms that did not have much surplus for selling, they started to become fishermen. They had no trouble exporting the fish, accounting for over one third of all exports in New England in the eighteenth century. The rest was comprised of timber and livestock. Most of their exports went to the West Indies, while the rest was taken by Europe. Eventually the people of New England began to immerse themselves in some of the riches they were sitting on, particularly the wealthy merchants in Boston.
