Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 11.djvu/253

 other writings are: The above four treatises are praised by McCulloch.
 * 1) 'Justice vindicated from the false fucus put upon it by Thomas White, Gent., Mr. Thomas Hobbs, and Hugo Grotius. As also Elements of Power and Subjection,' &c., '2 parts, London, 1660, fol.
 * 2) 'A Discourse of Trade, in two parts,' London, 1670, 4to.
 * 3) 'A Treatise wherein is demonstrated that the Church and State of England are in equal danger with the Trade of it. Treatise I. (Reasons of the Increase of the Dutch Trade. Treatise II.),' 2 parts, London, 1671, 4to.
 * 4) 'England's Improvements. In two parts: in the former is discoursed how the Kingdom of England may be improved in strength, employment, wealth, trade. In the latter is discoursed how the navigation of England may be increased. Treat. III. (-IV.),' 2 parts London, 1675, 4to.
 * 1) 'Reflections upon the East Indy and Royal African Companies : with animadversions concerning the naturalisation of Foreigners,' London, 1695, 4to.



COKE, THOMAS, D.C.L. (1747–1814), methodist bishop, was born at Brecon on 9 Sept. and baptised on 5 Oct. 1747 (his tombstone says, born 9 Oct.) His father, who first spelled the family name Coke, was Bartholomew, son of Edward Cooke, rector of Llanfyrnach, near Brecon. His mother was Anne (d. 17 May 1783, aged 70), daughter of Thomas Phillips of Trosdre. Bartholomew Coke (d. 7 May 1773, aged 71) was an apothecary and medical practitioner, who made money and filled the chief municipal offices at Brecon (he was J.P. in 1768). Thomas, the third son (two others died in infancy), received his early education under Griffiths at the 'college of the church of Christ,' transferred by Bishop William Barlow from Abergwilli to Brecon, among his classfellows being Walter Churchey [q. v.] On 11 April 1764 he matriculated at Jesus College, Oxford, as a gentleman commoner. In his early undergraduate days his tutor encouraged him in scepticism regarding revelation; but by help of Sherlock's 'Trial of the Witnesses' he had got over his doubts before he took his B.A. degree on 4 Feb. 1768. Returning to Brecon, he became bailiff and alderman of the borough, and J.P. in 1771. He took deacon's orders at Oxford on 10 June 1770, proceeding M.A. on 13 June, and entered priest's orders at Abergwilli on 23 Aug. 1772. His first curacy was at Road, Somersetshire (1770), whence he was transferred to South Petherton in the same county. He ascribes his conversion (after 1772) to a visit paid to South Petherton by Thomas Maxfield [q. v.], one of Wesley's evangelists. This event gave new fervour to his preaching, and to accommodate an increased congregation he erected at his own expense a gallery in South Petherton church. On 17 June 1775 he was created D.C.L., and had considerable prospects of church preferment. At this time he was a rather stiff high churchman; being desirous of meeting Hull, a dissenting minister of South Petherton, he scrupled at going to his house or admitting him to his own, so they were brought together under the roof of a friend. His prejudices were softened by further intercourse with methodists. At his own request he was introduced to Wesley on 13 Aug. 1776 by Brown, a clergyman at Kingston, near Taunton, who had already lent him some of the writings of Wesley and Fletcher of Madeley. Wesley counselled him to stick to the duties of his parish, 'doing all the good he could' there. Osborn, following Hill, reckons him a methodist from 1776. He began open-air preaching and cottage services, a proceeding unpalatable to influential parishioners. His bishop reproved, but declined to remove him; his rector dismissed him. Hereupon he threw himself into the arms of the methodists, and attended the conference at Bristol in 1777. Coke's methodist ministry began in London. His name first appears on the conference minutes in 1778 as a preacher of the London circuit. Wesley employed his hand in conducting some of his enormous correspondence, and sent him to Bath to compose a difference in the methodist society there. It is rather characteristic of Coke that in 1780 he thought it his duty to bring a hasty charge of Arianism against two distinguished methodist preachers, Samuel Bradburn [q. v.] and Joseph Benson [q. v.] Bradburn at once set the imputation at rest, and after the investigation of Benson's case by a committee of conference (he held, after Isaac Watts, the pre-existence of our Lord's human soul), Coke publicly asked his pardon. In 1782 Coke visited Ireland and was the first president of the Irish conference, an office which, with few intermissions, he held for the rest of his life. Coke in 1783 had a good deal to do with the drawing up of Wesley's ' deed of declaration ' (attested 28 Feb. 1784), and was accused of having influenced Wesley in the choice of the number and names of the 'legal hundred.' Wesley cleared him of the charge in the emphatic words ' Non vult, non potuit,' adding,' in naming these preachers had no adviser. Coke was in fact opposed

