how did the time period influence William Bradford of Plymouth plantation?

The seventeenth century influenced Bradford in two significant ways. It taught him to regard English culture as superior to the native cultures he encountered in North America, and it taught him to regard natives as "savages" and enemies. His initial posture was one of fear, leading him, as a leader, to mount a cannon prominently in the palisade that the newcomers built at Plymouth plantation and to insist that burials take place at night, so the Indians would not know how small their numbers had gotten. Bradford wanted to bring English culture to the New World. He thought it was superior to native cultures, and he did not see natives as equals. He considers a fire that kills many of the Pequot tribe terrible, but also providential:

It was a fearful sight to see them thus frying in the fire, and the streams of blood quenching the same, and horrible was the stink and scent thereof, but the victory seemed a sweet sacrifice, and they gave the prayers thereof to God, who had wrought so wonderfully for them.

Secondly, Bradford, though he could separate the sacred from the secular, brought his Christian worldview with him to the New World, as the quote above indicates. He framed his narrative of establishing a successful colony in a hostile place in terms of an Old Testament understanding of God's Providence. As God helped the chosen people, the Israelites, so too did he help the colonists. Bradford wrote,

Our faithers were Englishmen which came over this great ocean, and were ready to perish in this willdernes; but they cried unto ye Lord, and he heard their voyce, and looked on their adversitie, &c. Let them therfore praise ye Lord, because he is good, & his mercies endure for ever.