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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 July 2009
This unsigned tract published in 1645 is one of the most interesting and historically significant documents in the polemic literature of the Puritan Revolution; it has also been described as “one of the halfdozen most important contributions ever made to the theory of religious toleration in England.” The authorship has never been established, though some speculation has attributed the work to Francis Rous, Puritan mystic and leading member of Parliament. But certain references in contemporary documents, together with considerations of thought and style provide conclusive evidence that the pamphlet is from the pen of Joshua Sprigge, army chaplain, Fellow of All Souls College, constant advocate of toleration, and author of several sermons and political tracts, among them the important history of the army under Fairfax, Anglia Rediviva.
1. The Ancient Bounds, or Liberty of Conscience Tenderly Stated, Modestly Asserted, and Mildly Vindicated. (London, 1645).Google Scholar
2. Jordan, W. K., The Development of Religious Toleration in England. (Cambridge, 1940) IV, 28.Google Scholar
3. DNB.
4. Jordan, op. cit.
5. Gillett, C. R. (ed.) Catalogue of the McAlpin Collection of British History and Theology. (New York, 1928) II, 375.Google Scholar
6. Jordan, op. cit.
7. Woodhouse, A.S.P. in Puritanism and Liberty, 2nd edition, (London, 1950)Google Scholar, and Barker, A. E. in Milton and the Puritan Dilemma (Toronto, 1942)Google Scholar refer to the work as anonymous.
8. Brauer, Jerald, Francis Rous, Puritan Mystic, 1579–1659, (Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Divinity School, University of Chicago, 1948), pp. 310–11.Google Scholar
9. Mr. Brauer also shows that Rous's pamphlet, The Balme of Love, which appeared in 1648, had first appeared as a part of Catholicke Charity, in 1641; thus that part of the title of The Balme which speaks of an earlier appearance of the tract refers to its place at the beginning of Catholicke Charity, and not to Ancient Bounds, as might otherwise be thought.
10. Bartlet, William, ICHNOGRAPHIA, or A Model of the Primitive Congregational Way. (London, 1647).Google Scholar
11. Ibid., p. 22.
12. Ibid., p. 126.
13. Listed in the University of Chicago Library as Miscellaneous Sermons, Sixteen pamphlets in one volume, 1641–53. The shelf mark is BX 5201. AIM 67.
14. “The Whitehall Debates” Puritanism and Liberty, pp. 144–5.Google Scholar
15. DNB.
16. Ibid., pp. 134, 144.
17. Sprigge, Joshua, Certain Weighty Considerations, Humbly tendered and submitted to the consideration of such of the members of the High Court of Justice, for Tryal of the King, as they shall be presented unto. (London, 1648).Google Scholar
18. Ibid., p. 7.
19. Ancient Bounds, p. 19.
20. “Here's unity over and over, but this doth not necessarily draw uniformity after it in all things.… To violate unity in the Zeal of Uniformity is a bargain as will never make us rich… where unity is, uniformity may be … dispensed withal.” Ibid., pp. 61–2.
21. Sprigg, Joshua, Angali Rediviva, England's Recovery, Being the History of the Motions, Actions, and Successes of the Army Under the Immediate Conduct of His Excellency Sir Thomas FairFax, KT … 1647. A new edition (Oxford, 1854), p. 326.Google Scholar “They were many of them differing in opinion, yet not in action nor business; they all agreed to preserve the kingdom; they prospered more in their unity than uniformity … and they were more visibly pious and peaceable in their opinions than many we call more orthodox.”
