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Richard Baxter and the Savoy Conference (1661)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 January 2017

TIM COOPER
TIM COOPER*
Affiliation:
Department of Theology and Religion, University of Otago, PO Box 56, Dunedin 9054, New Zealand; e-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

The 1661 Savoy Conference has generally been seen as a failure for which Richard Baxter is principally to blame. While it is true that he must share in the responsibility, it should be shared more widely. This article argues that the failure at the Savoy was the end result of tactical errors made a year earlier by the wider Presbyterian leadership who then left Baxter to shoulder the blame alone; and that the restored bishops never had any intention of offering any meaningful concessions at the Savoy.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Ecclesiastical History , Volume 68 , Issue 2 , April 2017 , pp. 326 - 339
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Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

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References

1 I use the label of ‘Presbyterian’ in the way that Baxter recognised it, as comprising those moderate Puritans who supported neither diocesan episcopacy nor Congregational or Separatist ecclesiology; like Baxter, they need not have been Presbyterian in any formal sense.

2 The Book of Common Prayer: the texts of 1549, 1559, and 1662, ed. Cummings, Brian, Oxford 2011, p. xliv Google Scholar.

3 For general accounts of the Savoy in its context, along with Baxter's part in it, see Bosher, Robert, The making of the Restoration settlement: the influence of the Laudians, 1649–1662, London 1951 Google Scholar; Walter Douglas, ‘Richard Baxter and the Savoy Conference of 1661’, unpublished PhD diss. McMaster 1972; Buchanan, Colin, The Savoy Conference revisited, Cambridge 2002 Google Scholar; and Seggar, Glen J., Richard Baxter's Reformed liturgy: a Puritan alternative to the Book of Common Prayer, Farnham 2014 Google Scholar. See also Green, I. M., The re-establishment of the Church of England, 1660–1663, Oxford 1978 Google Scholar.

4 Seaward, Paul, The Cavalier Parliament and the reconstruction of the old regime, 1661–1667, Cambridge 1989, 163 Google Scholar.

5 Morley, George, The bishop of Worcester's letter to a friend for vindication of himself from Mr. Baxter's calumny, London 1662, 13 Google Scholar.

6 Burnet, Gilbert (ed.), Bishop Burnet's history of his own time, London 1724, i. 207–8Google Scholar. For a very hostile description of Baxter's ‘clownish’ actions see [Young, Samuel], Vindiciae anti-Baxterianae; Or, Some animadversions on a book, intituled, Reliquiae Baxterianae; Or, The life of Mr. Richard Baxter, London 1696, 126–7Google Scholar.

7 Ratcliff, E. C., ‘The Savoy Conference and the revision of the Book of Common Prayer’, in Nuttall, Geoffrey F. and Chadwick, Owen (eds), From uniformity to unity, 1662–1962, London 1962, 125, 108–9Google Scholar.

8 Anne Whiteman, ‘Restoration of the Church of England’, in Nuttall and Chadwick, From uniformity to unity, 77–8.

9 Baxter, Richard, Reliquiae Baxterianae; Or, Mr. Richard Baxter's narrative of the most memorable passages of his life and times, ed. Sylvester, Matthew, London 1696, i. 137 §213Google Scholar.

10 See Cooper, Tim, Fear and polemic in seventeenth-century England: Richard Baxter and Antinomianism, Aldershot 2001, ch. iiGoogle Scholar.

11 [Morley, George], The bishop of Winchester's vindication of himself from divers false, scandalous and injurious reflexions made upon him by Mr. Richard Baxter in several of his writings, London 1683, 48 Google Scholar.

12 DWL, ms BC i. 193v (CCRB, letter 179); i.197r (CCRB, letter 397).

13 Reliquiae Baxterianae, ii. 339 §200.

14 Ibid. ii. 337–8 §195.

15 Walter Douglas's PhD thesis, ‘Richard Baxter and the Savoy Conference’, seeks to mitigate the blame cast on Baxter.

16 Ratcliff, ‘Savoy Conference’, 127.

17 Clark, G. N., The later Stuarts, 1660–1714, Oxford 1934, 19 Google Scholar.

18 Bosher, Restoration settlement, 119, ch. iv.

19 English historical documents, 1660–1714, ed. Browning, Andrew, London 1953, 58 Google Scholar.

20 Reliquiae Baxterianae, ii. 231 §91.

21 Ibid. ii. 259–64 §105.

22 Ibid. ii. 265–74 §106; ii. 278 §114. For the conciliatory nature of the Declaration see Till, Barry, ‘The Worcester House Declaration and the restoration of the Church of England’, Historical Research lxx (June 1997), 203–30CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

23 Keeble, N. H., ‘Introduction: attempting uniformity’, in Keeble, N. H. (ed.), ‘Settling the peace of the Church’: 1662 revisited, Oxford 2014, 11–13 Google Scholar.

24 Ibid. 14.

25 Reliquiae Baxterianae, ii. 217 §74.

26 Ibid. ii. 218 §81.

27 Ibid. ii. 229 §88.

28 DWL, ms BT iii. 62(2), fo. 132v (Reliquiae Baxterianae, ii. 281 §§119, 121). Note that I am quoting from the manuscript version of the Reliquiae Baxterianae where it is extant. This will be the text used in the forthcoming critical edition to be published by Oxford University Press and edited by N. H. Keeble, John Coffey, Tim Cooper and Thomas Charlton.

29 Reliquiae Baxterianae, ii. 287 §143.

30 DWL, ms BT iii. 62(2), fo. 121v (Reliquiae Baxterianae, ii. 216 §73).

31 British Library, ms Egerton 2570, fo. 27r (Reliquiae Baxterianae, i. 103, §147).

32 Baxter, Richard, Gildas Salvianus: the first part: i.e. the reformed pastor, London 1656 Google Scholar, preface, sig. [B4]r–v, and pp. 194, 201.

33 Baxter, Richard, Five disputations of church-government and worship, London 1659 Google Scholar, preface, 36.

34 DWL, ms BT iii. 62(2), fo. 121v (Reliquiae Baxterianae, ii. 216 §73).

35 Keeble, ‘Attempting uniformity’, 8.

36 [Ussher, James], The reduction of episcopacie unto the form of synodical government received in the ancient Church, London 1656 Google Scholar.

37 Keeble, ‘Attempting uniformity’, 6.

38 R. Buick Knox posits a greater distance between the views of Baxter and Ussher than Baxter allows, and he suggests that ‘Ussher had the weakness of giving the impression that he agreed with many points of view, but when it came to practice he seemed to halt far short of what he had seemed to concede’: ‘Archbishop Ussher and Richard Baxter’, Ecumenical Review xii (1959), 60.

39 Idem, James Ussher archbishop of Armagh, Cardiff 1967, 126, 127Google Scholar.

40 Reliquiae Baxterianae, ii. 232 §96, 278 §113.

41 Elliot Vernon, London Presbyterianism and the politics of religion in the British Revolution, c. 1637–1664, forthcoming.

42 Book of Common Prayer (Cummings edn), 98.

43 His Majestie's declaration to all his loving subjects…concerning ecclesiastical affairs, London 1660, 14 Google Scholar.

44 Reliquiae Baxterianae, ii. 303–5 §170. For an alternative source of Charles's Commission, with slightly different wording, see An accompt of all the proceedings of the commissioners of both perswasions, appointed by his sacred majesty, according to letters patent, for the review of the Book of Common Prayer, &c., London 1661 Google Scholar, sigs. A2r–[A4]v.

45 Reliquiae Baxterianae, ii. 335–6 §192.

46 Ibid. ii. 305 §171.

47 Ibid. ii. 306–7 §173. Baxter's ‘Reformed Liturgy’ was published initially in A petition for peace: with the reformation of the liturgy, London 1661. It is discussed and reprinted in Seggar, Richard Baxter's Reformed liturgy.

48 Reliquiae Baxterianae, ii. 307 §174.

49 Ibid. ii. 334 §178; Bosher, Restoration settlement, 227.

50 Reliquiae Baxterianae, ii. 335 §190.

51 Barry Till, ‘Participants in the Savoy Conference (act. 1661)’, ODNB.

52 See Vernon, London Presbyterianism. I appreciate the opportunity to read the final chapter of Vernon's book before its publication.

53 DWL, ms BC i. 210v (CCRB, letter 639).

54 University of Glasgow Library ms GEN 210, p. 81; Robert Wodrow, The history of the sufferings of the Church of Scotland, from the Restauration to the Revolution, i, Edinburgh 1721, introduction at p. xviii.

55 Elliot Vernon explains that the London Presbyterians found themselves practically abandoned by their political allies who made a series of tactical blunders during 1660, thus losing the political advantage that they once had: London Presbyterianism. For the broader political context see Seaward, Cavalier Parliament.

56 ms GEN 210, p. 20; Wodrow, History of the sufferings, i, introduction at p. xi. I have included the reference to Wodrow, which is the more accessible source, but it is essential to note that Wodrow selected from and freely paraphrased Sharp's letters and the text that I have used is that of Sharp himself. I am very grateful to the librarians in Special Collections at the University of Glasgow Library for access to the manuscript and permission to photograph it.

57 ms GEN 210, p. 22. Wodrow did not include this comment.

58 ms GEN 210, p. 76; Wodrow, History of the sufferings, i, introduction at p. xvii.

59 ms GEN 210, p. 123; Wodrow, History of the sufferings, i, introduction at p. xxvii.

60 ms GEN 210, p. 130; Wodrow, History of the sufferings, i, introduction at p. xxxi.

61 Wodrow, History of the sufferings, i, introduction at pp. xxxi, xxxiv.

62 ms GEN 210, pp. 141, 143; Wodrow, History of the sufferings, i, introduction at pp. xxxviii, xxxix.

63 ms GEN 210, pp. 144, 146; Wodrow, History of the sufferings, i, introduction at pp. xxxix, xl.

64 Wodrow, History of the sufferings, introduction at p. xl.

65 ms GEN 210, p. 147; Wodrow, History of the sufferings, i, introduction at p. xli.

66 ms GEN 210, p. 149; Wodrow, History of the sufferings, i, introduction at pp. xli–xlii.

67 ms GEN 210, p. 163; Wodrow, History of the sufferings, i, introduction at p. xlv; Reliquiae Baxterianae, i. 103 §147.

68 ms GEN 210, p. 171; Wodrow, History of the sufferings, introduction, p. xlvii.

69 Reliquiae Baxterianae, ii. 335–6 §192.

70 Ibid. ii. 368 §239.

71 DWL, ms BT iii. 62(2), fo. 105v; Reliquiae Baxterianae, ii. 145 §§21, 22.

72 See Cooper, Tim, John Owen, Richard Baxter and the formation of Nonconformity, Farnham 2011, ch. viiiGoogle Scholar.

73 Reliquiae Baxterianae, ii. 384–5 §§276–80.

74 Ibid. ii. 385 §280.

75 Ibid. ii. 286 §132.

76 Ibid. ii. 286–8 §§132–43.

77 Bosher, Making of the Restoration settlement, 102–3, 139.

78 I am indebted to Elliot Vernon for suggesting this possibility.

79 Reliquiae Baxterianae, ii. 364 §236.

80 Goldie, Mark, Roger Morrice and the Puritan Whigs: The Entring Book, 1677–1691, Woodbridge 2016, 160 Google Scholar; or, alternatively, Mark Goldie (ed.), The Entring Book of Roger Morrice, 1677–1691, I: Roger Morrice and the Puritan Whigs, Woodbridge 2007, 160.

81 Winship, Michael P., ‘Defining Puritanism in Restoration England: Richard Baxter and others respond to A friendly debate ’, HJ liv (2011), 709 Google Scholar.

82 Wodrow, History of the sufferings, i, introduction at p. xl.

83 Stark, Rodney, For the glory of God: how monotheism led to reformations, science, witch-hunts and the end of slavery, Princeton 2004, 40 Google Scholar.