congregation having become very large, and some of them differing from the others on the subject of infant baptism, they agreed to divide. Those who disbelieved in infant baptism were regularly dismissed in 1633, and formed into a new church, under Rev. John Spilsbury. In 1638, several more members were dismissed to Mr. Spilsbury's church. And in 1639, a new Baptist church was formed. Churches of Particular Baptists now multiplied rapidly. In 1646, there were forty-six in and about London. They published a confession of their faith in 1643, which was reprinted in 1644, and 1646; and which was revised in 1689 by a convention of elders and delegates from more than one hundred churches in England and Wales. Besides these, there were, at that time, several churches of Calvinistic Baptists, who held to open communion, especially in Bedfordshire, where John Bunyan preached. There were also some Seventh Day Baptists. Baptist churches were also planted in Ireland, in the times of the civil wars; and Roger Williams established a Baptist church in Providence in 1639, which was the commencement of this denomination in America.-When Cromwell had usurped the government, he dismissed the principal officers of the army, alleging, among other reasons, that they were all Anabaptists. Yet, during his administration they had full toleration; indeed his Tryers admitted a number of their preachers to become parish ministers of England. On the restoration of Charles II. in 1660, the Baptists, with all other Nonconformists, were exposed to great troubles and persecutions; and at the revolution in 1688, they, with the other Dissenters, obtained free toleration. Among the English Baptists of this century, there were some men of education: but the greater part of their preachers were not men of learning. The Particular Baptists, at their general convention in 1689, made arrangements for the better education of young men for their pulpits; and from their provisions originated afterwards the famous Baptist Academy at Bristol. Before the erection of regular Baptist congregations, and indeed for some time after, it was very common for Baptists and others to belong to the same church, and to worship and commune together. From their first rise, the Baptists were assailed for holding only to adult baptism, and that by immersion; and they were not backward to defend themselves. The severest conflict of the Particular Baptists was with the Quakers in the time of William Penn. One of their writers made statements, for which the Quakers accused him of falsehood; which caused violent animosities, and much mutual crimination. The particular Baptists had also controversies among themselves. One was, respecting their practice of confirmation, or imposing hands on those newly baptized. Another related to the propriety of admitting singing, as a part of their public worship.-The Particular Baptists scarcely differed at all from the Independents, except on the mode and subjects of baptism. The General Baptists having no bond of union among themselves, held a considerable diversity of opinions; and as they did not set forth full and explicit accounts of their faith, it is impossible to characterize them, otherwise than by saying, they in general laid little stress on doctrines, and allowed very great liberty of opinion.-See Crosby's History of the Baptists. Benedict's General History of the Baptists, vol. i. ch. v. Toulmin's Supplement to Neal's History of the Puritans, vol. ii. p. 169, &c. vol. iii. p. 543, &c. vol. iv. p. 308, &c. 493, &c. vol. v. p. 115, &c. 239, &c. Bogue and Bennet's Hist. of Dissenters, vol. i. p. 147, &c. Tr.] VOL. IV. Bb CHAPTER VII. HISTORY OF THE SOCINIANS AND ARIANS. § 1. Flourishing state of the Socinians.-§ 2. Socinians at Altorf.—§ 3. Adversities of the Polish Socinians.-§ 4, 5. Fate of the Exiles.-§ 6. The Arians. § 1. THE condition of the Socinians, at the commencement of this century, seemed in many respects to rest on a firm basis. For they not only enjoyed the fullest religious liberty in Transylvania and Luzko [in Volhinia], but they had, in Poland, a distinguished school at Rakow, furnished with teachers eminent for learning and talents, a printing establishment, numerous congregations, and many patrons, who were men of the highest rank. Elated with this prosperity, they thought proper to make great efforts to extend their church, or to obtain friends and patrons in other countries. And it may be shown by numerous proofs that emissaries of the Polish Socinians, in the beginning of this century, were active in Holland, England, Germany, and Prussia, and that they endeavoured to make proselytes among the great and the learned. For while most other sects endeavour first to make friends among the common people, this sect, which exalts reason alone, has the peculiarity, that it does not much seek the favour and friendship of women, the illiterate, and persons of inferior rank, but labours to recommend itself especially to persons of high rank and eminent talents. § 2. Though these missions were, for the most part, committed to men of birth and genius, yet their results, in most places, did not answer the expectations of their projectors. No where did there seem to be a greater prospect of success, than in the university of Altorf, in the territory of Nuremberg. For here Earnest Sohner, a physician and Peripatetic philosopher, a man of great acuteness and subtilty, and a professor of philosophy, who had joined the Socinians while he resided in Holland, found it the more easy to instil into the minds of his hearers the doctrines of his new brethren, because he was in high reputation for learning and genuine piety, But after his death in 1612, this new Socinian party, being deprived of their guide and head, could not manage their affairs so craftily, as to elude the vigilance of the other professors of the university. Hence, the whole matter being fully exposed in 1616, this already mature and daily increasing pest was suddenly arrested and destroyed, by the zealous and dextrous severity of the Nuremberg magistrates. The foreigners, who were infected with the heresy, saved themselves by flight: the infected citizens of Nuremberg allowed themselves to be reclaimed, and returned to correct principles'. § 3. Neither could the Socinian sect long hold that high ground which they appeared to occupy in Poland'. The chief pillar that supported it, was removed in the year 1638, by a decree of the Polish diet. For in this year, some students of the school at Rakow wantonly threw stones at a wooden statue of our Saviour extended on the cross, and demolished it. For this offence the Papists took such severe revenge, that they procured the fatal law to be enacted at Warsaw, which commanded the school at Rakow to be broken up, the instructors to be banished in disgrace, the printing establishment to be destroyed, and the Socinian church to be shut up. All this was executed forthwith, and without abatement, in spite of all the efforts which the powerful patrons of the sect could put forth. This first calamity was the harbinger of that dire 1 A very full and learned history of this whole business, derived chiefly from unpublished documents and papers, was drawn up by a late divine of the university of Altorf, Gustavus George Zeitner, entitled Historia Crypto-Socinismi Altorfinæ, quondam Academia infesti arcana; which was published by Gebauer, Leipsic, 1729, 2 vols. 4to. [Sohner kept up a brisk correspondence with the Polish Socinians; who sent a number of Polish youth to Altorf with their private tutors, to aid in spreading Socinian principles. It was intended, not only to diffuse these principles in and around Altorf, but to communicate them also to other Ger man universities. See Schroeckh's Kirchengesch. seit der Reformation, vol. v. p. 625, &c. Tr.] 2 On the flourishing state of the Socinian cause, especially of the Racovian school, under the rectorship of Martin Ruarus, see Jo. Möller's Cimbria Litterata, tom. i. p. 572; in his life of Ruarus, a very learned man of Holstein, who, it appears, had embraced Socinianism. 3 Epistola de Wissowatii vita, in Sand's Bibliotheca Antitrinitaria, p. 233. Gust. Geo. Zeltner's Historia Crypto-Socinismi Altorfini, vol. i. p. 299. : tempest, which twenty years after entirely prostrated the glory and prosperity of the sect. For in a diet at Warsaw, in 1658, all the Socinians, dispersed throughout Poland, were commanded to quit the country; and it was made a capital offence, either to profess their doctrines, or to harbour others who professed them. Three years were allowed the proscribed, in which to dispose of their property, and settle their affairs. But soon after, the cruelty of their enemies reduced it to two years. Finally, in the year 1661, the tremendous edict was renewed; and all the Socinians that remained were most inhumanly driven from Poland, with immense loss, not merely of property, but also of the health, and the lives of many persons*. § 4. A part of the exiles took their course towards Transylvania and nearly all these perished by divers calamities. Others were dispersed in the provinces adjacent to Poland, Silesia, Brandenburg, and Prussia; where their posterity still remain, scattered here and there. A considerable number of the more respectable families settled for a time at Creutzberg in Silesia, under the protection of the Duke of Brieg. Others went to more distant countries, Holland, England, Holstein, and Denmark, to see if they could obtain a comfortable settlement for themselves and their brethren. The most active and zealous in such embassies was Stanislaus Lubieniezky, a very learned Polish knight, who rendered himself acceptable to great men by his eloquence, politeness, and sagacity. In the years 1661, and 1662, he came very near to obtaining a secure residence for the Socinians at Altona, from Frederic III. king of Denmark; at Frederickstadt, from Christ. Albert, duke of Holstein, 1662; and at Manheim, from Charles Lewis, the elector Palatine. But all his efforts and expectations were frustrated by the remonstrances and entreaties of theologians; Stanisl. Lubieniezky, Historia Reform. Polonica, lib. iii. cap. 17, 18. p. 279, &c. Equitis Polonia Vindicia pro Unitarior. in Polonia Religionis Libertate; in Sand's Biblioth. Antrinit. p. 267, and many others. 5 [Some say there were 380 of these refugees; others say 500. On the borders of Hungary, they were assaulted and plundered, so that when they arrived at Clausenburg in Transylvania, they were almost naked. Disease now attacked them, and carried them nearly all off. See J. G. Walch's Linleit. in die rel. Streit, aus d. Ec. Luth. Kirche, vol. iv, p. 275. con Einem.] 6 Lubieniezky, Historia Reform. Polon. cap. xviii. p. 285, where there is quite a long epistle of the Creutzburgers. in Denmark, by John Suaning, bishop of Seeland; in Holstein, by John Reinboth, the general superintendent; in the Palatinate, by John Lewis Fabricius [doctor and professor of theology, at Heidelberg]'. The others, who undertook such negociations, had much less success than he nor could any nation of Europe be persuaded, to allow the opposers of Christ's divinity freely to practise their worship among them. § 5. Such, therefore, as remain of this unhappy people, live concealed in various countries of Europe, especially in Brandenburg, Prussia, England, and Holland; and hold here and there clandestine meetings for worship; in England, however, it is said, they have public religious meetings, with the connivance of the magistrates. Some have united themselves with 7 See Sand's Bibliotheca Antitrinit. p. 165. The Life of Lubieniezky, prefixed to his Historia Reformat. Polonicæ, p. 7, 8. Jo. Möller's Introductio in Historiam Cherson. Cimbrica, pt. ii. p. 105, and Cimbria Litterata, tom. ii. p. 487, &c. Jo. Henr. Heidegger's Life of Jo. Lewis Fabricius, subjoined to the works of the latter, p. 38. 8 The Socinians residing in Brandenburg were accustomed, a few years ago, to meet at stated times at Königswald, a village near Frankfort on the Oder. See Jourdain, (for he is the author of the paper,) Recueil de Littérature, de Philosophie, et d'Histoire, p. 44. Amsterd. 1731. 8vo. They also published at Berlin, in 1716, a German confession of their faith; which, with a confutation of it, is printed in Die Theologischen Heb-Opfern, part x. p. 852. [In Prussian Brandenburg they found some protection, under the kindness of the electoral stadtholder, Bogislaus, prince von Radzivil, who retained some Socinians at his court: and perhaps they would also have obtained religious freedom under the electoral prince, Frederic William, had not the states of the duchy insisted on their expulsion. See Fred. Sam. Bock's Historia Socinianismi Prussici, p. 55. &c. and Hartknoch's Preussische Kirchenhistorie, p. 646, &c. By the indulgence of the above-named electoral prince, they obtained religious freedom in Brandenburg, particularly in New Mark, under the hope that this little company would gradually unite itself with the Protestant churches. They likewise had churches and schools at Landsberg, down to the end of the seventeenth century. After that they were expelled; the protection of the Schwerin family, which they had hitherto enjoyed, now ceasing.-In Holland, the book of John Völkel, a Socinian, de Vera Religione, 1642, was burnt; and the states of Holland in 1653, forbad the publication of Unitarian books, and all religious meetings of Socinians. Yet Andre Wissowatius procured the famous Bibliotheca Fratrum Polonorum to be printed at Amsterdam; though the place is not mentioned on the title page: and the Socinians have been allowed to reside there; but without the public exercise of their religion. Many of them likewise are concealed among the Mennonites, and the other sects. Schl."The Socinians in England have never made any figure as a community, but have rather been dispersed among that great variety of sects that have arisen in a country, where liberty displays its most glorious fruits, and at the same time exhibits its most striking inconveniences. Besides, few ecclesiastics or writers of any note have adopted the theological system, now under consideration, in all its branches. The Socinian doctrine relating to the design and efficacy of the death of Christ had indeed many abettors in England, during the seventeenth century; and |