Puritanism and Emotion in the Early Modern World

251 Pages·2016·1.43 MB·English

by  Alec Ryrie

Puritanism and Emotion in the Early Modern World
ChristianitiesintheTrans-AtlanticWorld,1500–1800
GeneralEditors:
ProfessorCrawfordGribben,Queen’sUniversityBelfast,UK
DrScottSpurlock,UniversityofGlasgow,UK
EditorialBoard:
ProfessorJohnCoffey(LeicesterUniversity)
ProfessorJeffJue(WestminsterTheologicalSeminary)
ProfessorSusanHardmanMoore(UniversityofEdinburgh)
ProfessorJohnMorrill(UniversityofCambridge)
ProfessorDavidMullan(CapeBretonUniversity)
ProfessorRichardMuller(CalvinTheologicalSeminary)
ProfessorJaneOhlmeyer(TrinityCollegeDublin)
ProfessorMargoTodd(UniversityofPennsylvania)
ProfessorArthurWilliamson(CaliforniaStateUniversity,Sacramento)
Buildingupontherecentrecoveryofinterestinreligionintheearlymoderntrans-
Atlanticworld,thisseriesoffersfresh,livelyandinter-disciplinaryperspectivesonthe
broadviewofitssubject.Booksintheserieswillworkstrategicallyandsystematically
toaddressmajorbutunder-studiedoroverlysimplifiedthemesinthereligiousand
culturalhistoryoftheearlymoderntrans-Atlantic.
Theseriesincludes:
BenjaminBankhurst
ULSTERPRESBYTERIANSANDTHESCOTSIRISHDIASPORA,1750–1764
JordanLandes
LONDONQUAKERSINTHETRANSATLANTICWORLD
TheCreationofaTransatlanticEarlyModernCommunity
CrawfordGribbenandScottSpurlock(editors)
PURITANISMINTHETRANS-ATLANTICWORLD1600–1800
AlecRyrieandTomSchwanda
PURITANISMANDEMOTIONINTHEEARLYMODERNWORLD
ChristianitiesintheTrans-AtlanticWorld,1500–1800
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Puritanism and Emotion in
the Early Modern World
Editedby
Alec Ryrie
ProfessoroftheHistoryofChristianity,DurhamUniversity,UK
and
Tom Schwanda
AssociateProfessorofChristianFormationandMinistry,
WheatonCollege,USA
PURITANISMANDEMOTIONINTHEEARLYMODERNWORLD
Introduction,selectionandeditorialmatter©AlecRyrie&
TomSchwanda2016
Individualchapters©Respectiveauthors2016
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Contents
ListofFigures vi
ListofContributors vii
Introduction 1
AlecRyrieandTomSchwanda
1 ‘LightAccompaniedwithVitalHeat’:Affectionand
IntellectintheThoughtofRichardBaxter 13
KeithCondie
2 ThomasGoodwinandthe‘SupremeHappinessofMan’ 47
KarlJones
3 TheSaints’DesireandDelighttoBewithChrist 70
TomSchwanda
4 ‘MilkeandHoney’:PuritanHappinessintheWritingsof
RobertBolton,JohnNordenandFrancisRous 94
S.BrynRoberts
5 AfflictionandtheStonyHeartinEarlyNewEngland 121
AdrianChastainWeimer
6 PietyandthePoliticsofAnxietyinNonconformistWriting
oftheLaterStuartPeriod 144
DavidWalker
7 RestingAssuredinPuritanPiety:TheLayExperience 166
KateNarveson
8 EmotionsandtheDevelopmentofVirtueinPuritan
Thought:AnInvestigationofPuritanFriendship 193
NathanielWarne
9 PuritanEmotionsinSeventeenth-CenturyDutchPiety 213
WillemJ.op’tHof
Index 241
v
Figures
9.1 WilliamTeellinck:author’scollection 219
9.2 WilliamPerkins:fromJanJacobusvanBaarsel,William
Perkins(’s-Gravenhage:H.P.deSwart&Zoon,1912) 222
9.3 1620DutcheditionofLewisBayly,ThePractiseofPietie,
frontispiece:UniversityLibraryofAmsterdam 224
9.4 1620DutcheditionofLewisBayly,ThePractiseofPietie,
titlepage:UniversityLibraryofAmsterdam 225
9.5 JacobusKoelman:author’scollection 231
vi
Contributors
KeithCondieisDeanofStudentsandLecturerinMinistryandChurch
HistoryatMooreTheologicalCollege,Sydney.
Willem J. op ’t Hof is Professor of the History of Reformed Pietism at
theVrijeUniversiteit,Amsterdam.
Karl Jones is a non-stipendiary minister of the Church of England
workingintheDurhamarea.
Kate Narveson is Associate Professor of English at Luther College in
Decorah,Iowa.
S. Bryn Roberts is a tutor for the International Christian College,
GlasgowandteachesatBedeAcademy,Northumberland.
Alec Ryrie is Professor of the History of Christianity at Durham
University.
TomSchwandaisAssociateProfessorofChristianFormation&Ministry
atWheatonCollege.
DavidWalkerisProfessorofSeventeenth-CenturyEnglishLiteratureat
NorthumbriaUniversity.
NathanielWarneisaResearchFellowattheUniversityofNotreDame.
AdrianChastainWeimerisAssistantProfessorofHistoryatProvidence
College.
vii
Introduction
Alec Ryrie and Tom Schwanda
There was a time when the title ‘Puritanism and Emotion’ would have
seemed like the set-up for a weak joke. Fortunately, the study both of
Puritanismandofthehistoryoftheemotionshaslongagopassedthat
point. It no longer needs to be said that Puritans had emotions, nor
indeedthattheiremotionalrangeextendedbeyondlugubriousmalice.
The purpose of the chapters in this volume is only incidentally to dis-
play the variety, complexity and vigour of Puritans’ emotional lives –
although any readers who still doubt that will find ample evidence of
it here. The reason for assembling a volume such as this is, rather, to
raise a series of deeper and, we believe, more fruitful questions about
Puritans and their emotions. What kinds of emotional patterns were
characteristic of Puritanism? What did Puritans understand their emo-
tions to be? What, indeed, did they desire them to be and what work
did those emotions do for them? How did they deal with, and disci-
pline,emotionswhichdidnotsitneatlywiththeirideals?Howdidthey
cultivateemotionsinrelationshipswiththeirfamilyandfriendsaswell
aswithGod?
Theonlysensiblewaytotacklesuchsweeping,generalquestionsis,of
course, with detailed and specific answers which do not claim to have
any sort of universal applicability. For all their common themes, the
chapterscollectedinthisvolumedonotdealwith‘Puritanism’orindeed
with‘emotion’intheabstract,butconcentrateonthespecificemotional
experiencesortheoriesofparticularPuritanorPuritan-leaningindividu-
als.Severalofthem,indeed,focusunashamedlyononeortwoofthebig
namesofseventeenth-centuryPuritanism:RichardBaxter,JohnBunyan,
ThomasGoodwin,RalphVenningandThomasWatson.Othersventure
beyond these commanding peaks of Puritanism into the more thickly
populated foothills of everyday godly life in old and new England
1
2 Introduction
in order to examine how a wider range of believers found assurance,
dealt with affliction, understood the purpose of human friendship or
celebratedthejoysofexperiencingGod.
Naturally, therefore, the contributors do not share a single interpre-
tative framework for understanding these issues. If there is an over-
all picture to be had, it can properly only emerge from collections
such as this rather than determining their shape in advance. How-
ever, and perhaps inevitably, the volume is grounded on two shared
premises. First, Puritans did not merely have emotions, but their emo-
tional life was rich and complex, and is essential to grasp if we are to
understand their religion and its impact on the seventeenth-century
world. Willem op ’t Hof’s chapter on the fruitful encounter between
Anglophone Puritanism and the more emotionally cautious world of
Dutch Reformed piety is an important reminder that Puritanism’s
emotional culture was in fact unusually rich by some contemporary
standards. Second, all of these authors approach their Puritan sub-
jects with a degree of sympathetic understanding. Some of us would
see ourselves as, to one degree or another, following in the Puritans’
own spiritual tradition; others of us would not. All of us are willing
to be clear-eyed in our criticism when necessary. But, as will become
apparent, we also share a certain humane appreciation of the authen-
ticity and, at times, the costliness of the lived experiences this volume
describes. This is no great achievement of empathy. The texts them-
selves often speak so vividly that such an appreciation is virtually
unavoidable.
*
Evenifwearenotadvancingaunifiedthesis,wehavehadthenerveto
puttwofiercelycontestedabstractnounsinourtitle.Someoverviewof
whatwemeanby‘Puritanism’andby‘emotion’isunavoidable.
‘Puritan’ is a word both too useful to be abandoned and almost
too weighed down with dubious intellectual baggage to be useful.1
It began as a term of abuse in Elizabethan England, a near-synonym
to less enduring terms such as ‘precisionist’ or ‘Novationist’, all of
whichwereappliedtoProtestantswhoweredissatisfiedwiththerigour,
depthandauthenticityoftheReformationoftheEnglishChurch.The
most visible of these Puritans pressed for further structural change, a
1J.CoffeyandP.C.H.Lim,‘Introduction’inJ.CoffeyandP.C.H.Lim(eds),The
CambridgeCompaniontoPuritanism(CambridgeUniversityPress,2008).