FROM

ABOUT A. D. 250 TO THE PRESENT TIME

IN CONTINUATION OF THE ACCOUNT OF THE ORIGIN AND EARLIEST HISTORY OF THIS SYSTEM OF CHURCH POLITY CON

TAINED IN "A VIEW OF CONGREGATIONALISM"

BY

GEORGE PUNCHARD

SECOND EDITION

REWRITTEN AND GREATLY ENLARGED

VOL. III.

NEW YORK

PUBLISHED BY HURD AND HOUGHTON

459 BROOME STREET

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1867, by

GEORGE PUNCHARD,

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the District of Massachusetts.

CONTENTS OF VOLUME III.

CHAPTER I.

THE ERA OF OPEN SEPARATION OF PURITANS FROM THE CHURCH

OF ENGLAND, A. D. 1575-81.

-

-

ROBERT BROWNE. -BROWNISM.

Separate churches early organized, 1. The movement in and

around Bury, 1576- Robert Browne, 2. Of an ancient and

wealthy family, 3. Early indications of his career, 5. At

twenty-one a puritan leader-Summoned before the ecclesias-

tical commissioners in London, 1571-2, p. 6. At Bury in 1581,

troubling bishop Freke, 7. Arrested and imprisoned - Lord

Burleigh, his kinsman, interposes, 8. Browne's respectable

"backers at Bury, 10. Aims at "setting up a new dis-

cipline' Gathering churches, with Robert Harrison as an

assistant, 12. Compelled to leave the country, and goes to Mid-

dleburgh, Zealand — Organizes a Congregational church, and

publishes "A Book, which showeth the Life and Manners of

all True Christians," 13. Extracts showing Browne's Con-

gregational views, 14. His "Treatise on Reformation".

Leaves Middleburgh for Scotland, 17. Makes a great stir in

Edinburgh. Called before the church authorities, 18. Denies

their right to adjudicate, and appeals to the civil authorities,

by whom he is allowed to go unpunished, 19. Returns to

England - Arraigned before Archbishop Whitgift - Lord Bur-

leigh's interference - Letters to Browne's father, 20. Cited

before Lindsell, bishop of Peterboro', and excommunicated -

Gives up his Separatism and becomes rector of an episcopal

church, 23. Browne's character, 26. His miserable end, 27.

Fuller's estimate of Browne - Probably never changed his

views - Masters', Bridwell's, and Baylie's account of him, 28.

The mystery of Browne's career, and of Burleigh's protection

and favor, 31. Burleigh's opposition to the persecuting, high-

church bishops, 34.

CHAPTER II.

THE MARTYRS COPPING AND THACKER.- PERSECUTION OF

NONCONFORMISTS, 1576-1583.

-

Rev. John Copping, Rev. Elias Thacker, and Thomas Gibson,

after long imprisonment, the protomartyrs of the Brownists,

37. Other sufferers - Lord Rich, his uncle Richard, Rev.

Robert Wright, and one Dix," 39. A Congregational church

in Lord Rich's house - The parties imprisoned, 40. Cruel

persecution of the Separatists by Whitgift and Aylmer-Rev.

Giles Wigginton's opinion of Whitgift, 42. Bishop Aylmer's

character first a puritan, afterwards a cruel persecutor, and a

crawling sycophant, 43. Accused of habitual profaneness, Sab-

bath breaking, an ungoverned temper, covetousness, meanness

and unrelenting cruelty, 44, note. Multitudes of serious clergy-

men of the church of England silenced for slight neglects of

ritualism, while the vilest men are kept in office, 45.

JOHN

CHAPTER III.

GREENWOOD AND HENRY BARROWE, CONGREGATIONAL

MARTYRS. THEIR PROTRACTED IMPRISONMENT, REPEATED

EXAMINATIONS AND SEVERE SUFFERINGS. THEIR EXECU-

- 1580-1593.

TION.

-

Of most of the sufferers for nonconformity, between 1583 and

1593, little is known.

lain to Lord Rich, 47.

Examination before the

swear

66

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Rev. John Greenwood, domestic chap-
Arrested and thrown into prison
high commissioners, 48. Refuses to
upon a book" Confession of his faith Congrega-
tional views, 49. Remanded to prison - Henry Barrowe, a
gentleman of good family and wealthy, a courtier - Charac-
ter, 50. His remarkable conversion, 53. Through John Green-
wood, his friend, brought into connection with the Congrega-

-