Dissenters were arrested and their houses raided. Joan Helwys was imprisoned in York Castle by the Archbishop of York in the second half of 1607. Between 1607 and 1608, Helwys, Smyth, Robinson and many others from the Gainsborough and Scrooby congregations fled to the safety of Amsterdam in the more tolerant Dutch Republic. Helwys organised the Gainsborough group's emigration - according to Robinson, ‘If any brought oars, he brought sails.’ Assuming their safety, Helwys allowed his family to remain in England. His wife was soon arrested and, after refusing to take the oath in court, she was imprisoned. It is likely that she was banished after three months in prison. It was in the Dutch Republic that a distinctive Baptist faith first emerged amongst the English émigrés, and Helwys was one of the leaders of the foundation of the first Baptist Church in 1609. Taking the Brownist idea that church membership was only for believers to its logical conclusion, Smyth became convinced that baptism into the church should be for Christian believers only and not for infants. In January 1609, Smyth baptised himself first, then the rest of his followers starting with Helwys. The other English Separatists in Amsterdam rejected this new teaching. Later that year, the group led by Smyth and Helwys started renting a meeting house from Dutch Mennonites, and were persuaded by them to abandon the doctrine of predestination. Some of the Baptists also accepted Mennonite christology, that Jesus did not take his flesh from Mary, but Smyth and Helwys did not, so those Baptists left the church. In 1610, Smyth and Helwys fell out after Smyth decided he had been wrong to baptise himself and applied to join the Mennonites and be re-baptised. Helwys and about ten others split from Smyth's church. Helwys formulated the earliest Baptist confession of faith. This "confession" became the twenty-seven articles in (1611). In the next twelve months or so, Helwys wrote three more important works: an argument for Arminianism (A Short and Plain Proof, By the Word and Works of God, That God's Decree Is Not the Cause of Any Man's Sin or Condemnation: And That All Men Are Redeemed by Christ; As Also That No Infants Are Condemned), a polemic explaining his differences with the Mennonites, and, most importantly, A Short Declaration on the Mistery of Iniquity. The Mistery of Iniquity was a critique of the failings of Catholicism,