To the work of instruction she added a large practical philanthropy, assisting the poor and ministering to the sick. But it was not long before Mrs. Hutchinson, by the independence of her opinions, excited the serious displeasure of the rigid Puritan element. Her precise doctrinal offense against the established standards concerned, says a sympathetic writer, " a point so nice and finely drawn that the modern intellect passes it by in disdain; a difference so faint that one can scarcely represent it in words. Mrs. Hutchinson taught that the Holy Spirit was a person and was united with the believer; the Church, that the Spirit descended upon man not as a person. Mrs. Hutchinson taught that justification came from faith, and not from works; the Church scarcely ventured to define its own doctrine, but contented itself with vague declamation." Although at first the Hutchinsonians were triumphant, especially in Boston, where nearly the entire population were on their side, the power of the church speedily made itself felt. On August 30, 1637, the first synod held in America assembled at Cambridge, its object being "to determine the true doctrines of the church and to discover and denounce the errors of the Hutchinsonians." Eighty-two heresies were defined and condemned, certain individual offenders were punished or admonished, and Mrs. Hutchinson's meetings were declared disorderly and forbidden. Meantime Vane had been deposed as governor, and Winthrop, an unrelenting opponent of innovations, elected in his stead. In the following November Anne was publicly tried at Cambridge. "Although in a condition of health that might well have awakened manly sympathy, and that even barbarians have been known to respect, her enemies showed her no compassion. She was forced to stand up before the judges until she almost fell to the floor from weakness. No food was allowed her during the trial, and even the members of the court grew faint from hunger.