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English Evangelical Dissent and the European Conflict 1789–1815
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 March 2016
Extract
In november 1789 a notable address was delivered at the meeting-house in Old Jewry in the city of London to the society formed to commemorate the glorious revolution. The overtly political tone of Richard Price’s words to that audience of dissenters and fellow-sympathisers appeared to Edmund Burke to epitomise the democratic and levelling spirit already operating with such devastating results across the Channel. Eight years later the fear of dissenting ambition was if anything enhanced. In a rising tide of clerical polemic dissenters were accused of a variety of evils including anti-establishment activity, schism, covert Jacobinism, regicide and the encouragement of fanaticism and ignorance among the lower classes. At a time when England was embroiled in a long and costly struggle with revolutionary France the real charge was that of siding with the enemy; of implicit disloyalty. The principal difference from 1789, a distinction not always apparent to the accusers, was that those now engaging their attention were evangelicals, men of an entirely different stamp from the provocative rationalists surrounding Priestley and Price.
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- Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 1983
References
1 Price, Richard, A Discourse on the Love of Our Country (London 1790)Google Scholar.
2 Burke, Edmund, Reflections on the Revolution in France and on the Proceedings in Certain Societies in London relative to that Event (London 1790) p 12 Google Scholar.
3 In The Duty of Christians to Magistrates: a Sermon, occasioned by the late Riots at Birmingham (London nd [1791]). Clayton argued that dissenters were not as a body disaffected towards the government.
4 Their broad approval for the principles and the spirit behind the French revolution had been expressed in a number of publications, including: Reasons for Seeking a Repeal of the Corporation and Test Acts, Submitted to the Consideration of the Candid and Impartial. By a Dissenter [David Bogue] (1790); Wilks, Mark, The Origin and Stability of the French Revolution; A Sermon, preached at St Paul’s Chapel, Norwich . . . July 14, 1791 (Norwich 1791)Google Scholar; Hall, Robert, Christianity Consistent with a Love of Freedom (London 1791)Google Scholar. The change in attitude was not universal, however, for James Bicheno, Baptist minister at Newbury, continued to show a distinct sympathy for the young French republic and a corresponding opposition to British militarism. Mark Wilks also retained outspokenly radical views.
5 William Winterbotham, a Baptist minister from Plymouth, was found guilty of sedition by a jury at the Devon assizes in 1793 and was sentenced to four years imprisonment and a fine of ¿200. The basis of the charge consisted of statements made in two sermons preached in November 1792.
6 See for example the article entitled ‘The civil state of dissenters in England’ in [The Baptist Annual] Register [ed Rippon, J.] 4 vols (London 1793-1802) 1 p 524 Google Scholar.
7 The minute book of the Essex congregational union formed in 1798 records as an initial resolution the decision ‘That at the meetings of this union no political conversation be introduced’. Essex County Record Office, D/NC 9/1.
8 See for example the 1800 report issued by the ministers of the Staffordshire congregational association quoted by Matthews, A.G., The Congregational Churches of Staffordshire (London 1924) pp 197-8Google Scholar; also the 1812 circular letter of the Northamptonshire baptist association pp 3-4.
9 Stcadman, W., The Christian Minister’s Duty and Reward. A sermon addressed as a charge to Mr Richard Pengilly, when ordained pastor of the baptist church at Newcastle upon Tyne, August 12, 1807 (Gateshead 1807) pp 21–22 Google Scholar. Steadman advised Pengilly, ‘I do not wish you to be wholly ignorant of the political state of your country . . . but do not, I beseech you, let politics engross so much of your thoughts, or your conversation, as to cause the duties of the citizen to interfere with those of the preacher’.
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12 The successor of the Countess of Huntingdon’s institution at Trevecca for the training of itinerant preachers.
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15 Greatheed, S., General Union Recommended to Real Christians in a Sermon preached at Bedford, October 31, 1797 (London 1798) pp viii–ix and xvi-xviiGoogle Scholar.
16 Anonymous unpublished typescript entitled ‘Sutcliff: the meeting and the man’, Bristol Baptist College, MSS G98 p 139.
17 For example 1807 circular letter of the Oxfordshire and East Gloucestershire baptist association p 14; 1812 circular letter of the baptist midland association p 12; Blunham Bedfordshire Old Meeting House (baptist) minutes 24 January 1794.
18 Hampshire association circular letter 1797 p 3.
19 Late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth-century millennial views are discussed by Orchard, S.C., ’English Evangelical eschatology 1790-1850‘ (unpublished PhD thesis, Cambridge 1969)Google Scholar; see also Hempton, D.N., ’Evangelicalism and eschatology‘ JEH 31 (1980) pp 179–194 Google Scholar.
20 Roby, W., The Glory of the Latter Days (2 ed London 1814) prefaceGoogle Scholar.
21 The Protestant Dissenter’s Magazine 6 vols (London 1794-99) 2 pp 252-256.
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23 Bennett, J., Memoirs of the Life of the Rev. David Bogue, D.D. (London 1827) p 214 Google Scholar; Brown, J., The History of the Bedfordshire Union of Christians. The Story of a Hundred Years ed Prothero, D. (London 1946) p 54 Google Scholar.
24 A Sketch of [the History and Proceedings of] the Deputies [appointed to Protect the Civil Rights of the Protestant Dissenters] (London 1814) pp 105, 112, 117.
25 As happened at the dissenting school in Leaf Square, Manchester, minutes 11 February 1812, Manchester Congregational College MSS.
26 Apparent provision for Sunday training in militia bills of 1796 and 1806 stimulated dissenting fears and opposition. See minutes of the General Body of Protestant Dissenting Ministers for 3 November 1796-11 April 1797 and 15 April 1806, Dr. Williams’s Library, MS 38.106-107.
27 Bristol education society annual report 1808.
28 Dissenting Deputies minutes for 29 November and 27 December 1799, Guildhall Library, MS 3083.
29 A Sketch of the Deputies pp 115-7 and 120-1.
30 In order of delivery the four sermons were: Robert Hall, Reflections [on War A Sermon, preached at the Baptist Meeting, Cambridge, on Tuesday, June 1, 1802 being the day of thanksgiving for a general peace]; Joseph Hughes, Britain’s Defence. [A Sermon, preached, August 21, 1803, in the Protestant Dissenting Meeting-House, Battersea]; Robert Hall, [The] Sentiments [Proper to the Present Crisis: A Sermon, preached at Bridge Street, Bristol, October 19, 1803; being the day appointed for a general fast]; John Rippon, [A] Discourse [delivered at the Drum Head, on the Fort, Margate, Oct. 19, 1803, the day of the general fast, before the Volunteers, commanded by the Right Hon. William Pitt; . . . and then addressed to the Volunteers of London and Southwark, Assembled with the Author’s own Congregation in Carter Lane, near London Bridge, Nov. 13, 1803].
31 Rippon, , Discourse (4 ed London nd) p 3Google Scholar.
32 Hall, , Sentiments, Works 1 ed Gregory, O. (11ed London 1853) p 137 Google Scholar.
33 Ibid p 138.
34 Hughes, , Britain’s Defence (3ed London 1803) pp 20–21 Google Scholar; Rippon, Discourse pp 27–29 Google Scholar; Hall, , Sentiments, Works 1 pp 172–178 Google Scholar.
35 Hughes, Britain’s Defence p 33.
36 Rippon, Discourse pp 20-26; Hall, Sentiments, Works 1 pp 139-141.
37 Hughes, Britain’s Defence p 10. Hughes’ irenic remarks appear restrained, however, when compared with the vigorous opposition to the war expressed by Thomas Wilson, the leading London Independent who was treasurer of Hoxton Academy. A letter soliciting support for the patriotic fund established in the wake of Nelson’s victory of 1805 elicited a characteristically firm response: ‘. . . it is my sentiment that war is contrary to Christianity that it can only be justified upon the principle of defence—and it is my firm conviction that the American war and all the wars since with France—have neither been just or necessary—consequently my family shall never reflect on me for giving any thing voluntarily to support a system of murder abroad and corruption at home.’ Thomas Wilson, Autobiographical notes and correspondence p 13, Congregational Library, MS.H.d.5.
38 Hall, Reflections, Works 1 p 98.
39 Deuteronomy 23:9.
40 Rippon, Discourse pp 30-32.
41 Hughes, Britain’s Defence pp 41-42.
42 Ibid p 27.
43 Hall, Reflections, Works 1 pp 101, 104.
44 Hall, Sentiments, Works 1 pp 161-9, 183-5.
45 Rippon, Register 4 p 943.
46 Circular letter for 1814 p [1].
47 Circular letter for 1816 p 2.