(June 7, 1629), established the Dutch patroon system of land holdings in New York and New Netherlands. This plan, intended to promote colonization, granted large tracts of land to those who would help fifty families to emigrate and settle along the Hudson River. It stated:
Article XXVII. The Patroons and colonists shall in particular, and in the speediest manner, endeavor to find out ways and means whereby they may support a Minister and Schoolmaster, that thus the service of God and zeal for religion may not grow cool and be neglected among them, and they shall, for the first, procure a Comforter of the sick there … "288