Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 02.djvu/561

BAPTISTS. erty should be given to all, even to Roman Catholics and Jews. It required two centuries for England to approximate the adoption of this Baptist programme. After the Restoration the Baptists were severely persecuted, the Conventicle and Five-Mile acts being strictly enforced against them. The well-known prolonged imprisonment of John Bunyan is the most conspicuous instance. Some proved more pliable than he, and by promise of silence obtained their release; some, like Hanserd Knollys, were in prison many times; others, like William Kiffen, enjoyed the royal favor and escaped with comparative immunity. Under these persecutions the Baptists declined in numbers, and the Revolution (1688) found them greatly depleted and discouraged. The Act of Toleration secured them from further persecution, but for a whole century thereafter their progress was very slow. A convention of the Particular Baptists, held in 1689, and representing over 100 churches, published what remained for generations their recognized standard of doctrine and practice. It was in the main a readoption of the Westminster Confession, and differed from the Confession of 1644 chiefly in being silent on the question of baptism (immersion) before communion. Until the great Wesleyan revival, in the middle part of the Eighteenth Century, there was no further progress among the English Baptists, Among the Particular churches a form of hyper-Calvinism was common, which prohibited more than the preaching of the law to the unconverted, and discouraged all direct appeals to men to accept Christ as their Saviour. The result was paralysis to most churches, and death to not a few. Among the General Baptists, Socinian views made rapid progress, and in the end a large part of their churches became Unitarian. The Wesleyan revival greatly affected the Baptist churches. A more evangelical type of preaching was revived in both wings of the denomination. Under the leadership of Dan Taylor, a converted miner, the New Connection of General Baptists was organized, and became a flourishing and influential body. But the most important result of this new quickening of spiritual life was the undertaking of work in foreign missions, under the leadership of William Carey. The English Baptist Missionary Society was organized October 2, 1792, and the following year Carey was able to begin his labors in India. At his death, in 1834, not only had many converts been made, but versions of the Scriptures had been issued under his supervision in 40 different dialects, spoken by one-third of the people in the world; and 212,000 copies of these versions had been printed. The great increase of the modern missionary cause is directly traceable to the work of Carey and the English Baptists. The reflex influence of this missionary enterprise upon the English Baptists themselves is equally remarkable. More than 100 new churches were organized in the last two decades of the Eighteenth Century — nearly equaling the increase of the entire century preceding this time — while in the first half of the Nineteenth Century 700 new churches were constituted. The most important step in the unification of the English Baptists was the formation of the Baptist Union, in 1832. Into this all the various societies for missionary and educational purposes have been merged; and, finally, in 1891, the long-separated General and Particular Baptists became one body. Of the men whom these churches have produced during the last hundred years three stand forth preeminent: Andrew Fuller (1754-1815), Robert Hall (1764-1831), and Charles Haddon Spurgeon (1834-92).

The first Baptist church in Wales of which record remains was formed at or near Swansea, in 1649. The growth of Baptists in that principality was greatly promoted by the labors of Vavasor Powell, who was baptized about 1655, and thereafter preached throughout the land, establishing 22 churches, some of which had several hundred members. The progress of Baptist churches in Wales was steady but slow until 1800. Of the 821 Welsh churches now in existence, 640 were founded in the Nineteenth Century. Until lately these churches have belonged to the strict communion wing; in recent years, some of the city and town churches have adopted 'open' principles.

The first Baptist church in Scotland was founded in Caithnesshire in 1750, but progress was very slow until Archibald McLean and the Haldane brothers began their work as evangelists — the first quarter of the last century. Scotland is naturally Presbyterian, and the growth of Baptist churches has been very slow, an average of 10 to the decade for the last hundred years. Ireland has also been an unpromising field. The oldest church dates from 1653. Two-thirds of the existing churches have been established since 1850.

There were among the early colonists those who held Baptist views, but the first church established was at Providence, R. I. Roger Williams, a minister of the Church of England, but an advanced Puritan, on coming to the Colony of Massachusetts, became almost at once a disturbing element there, by his advocacy of notions that the authorities of that colony were not disposed to tolerate. He was condemned to banishment, October 8, 1635, and, to escape being deported to England, made his way through the wilderness in midwinter, bought land of the Narragansett Indians, and founded the Colony of Providence, on the principle of complete civil and religious liberty. His study of the Scriptures convinced him that only believers are fit subjects of baptism, and others of the little colony had come by March, 1639, to hold similar opinions. No minister being within call, this little band of twelve believers decided to originate baptism; one of their number, Ezekiel Holliman, baptized Williams, and he baptized the rest. In the following year, probably, another Baptist church was formed in the neighboring Colony of Newport. A company of Welsh Baptists emigrated in 1665 and established themselves in the Colony of Massachusetts, settling after some vicissitudes at Rehoboth, in 1667. A Baptist church was formed in Boston in 1655, and in spite of severe persecutions succeeded in maintaining itself there. Until 1691 the Baptists of Massachusetts experienced repeated and severe persecutions — fines and imprisonments and whippings — and it was not until 1833 that they ceased to be taxed for the support of a State Church. Up to the Great Awakening (1750), there were but eight Baptist churches in this region.

A group of churches, established a little later than these in the New England region, became the most influential centre for the propagation of Baptist ideas. In 1688 a Baptist church was