John Newton (1725-1807) was an English hymn writer and Church of England minister. Early life of wanton sin. For ten years involved in Afr...
John Newton (1725-1807) was an English hymn writer and
Church of England minister. Early life of wanton sin. For ten years involved in
African slave trade. Wrote the words and music for the familiar hymns
"Amazing Grace," "How Sweet the Name of Jesus Sounds," and
"Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken." Collaborated with William
Cowper in producing the "Olney Hymns."
John Newton (1725-1807), divine and friend of the poet
Cowper, born in London, [England] 24 July 1725 (Old Style), was son of a
commander in the merchant service engaged in the Mediterranean trade. His
mother, who gave him some religious training, died of consumption 11 July 1732.
Thereupon his father married again, and the child was sent to school at
Stratford, Essex, where he learned some Latin. When he was eleven (1736) he
went to sea with his father, and made six voyages with him before 1742. In that
year the elder
Newton retired from the service, and subsequently becoming
governor of York Fort, under the Hudson's Bay Company, was drowned there in
1751. Meanwhile the son, after returning from a voyage to Venice about 1743,
was impressed on board H.M.S. Harwich, and, although made a midshipman through
his father's influence, he soon deserted. When recaptured he was degraded to
the rank of a common seaman (1745), and at his own request exchanged off
Madeira into a slaver, which took him to the coast of Sierra Leone. He became
subsequently servant to a slave-trader on one of the Plantane Islands, and
suffered brutal persecution. By another master he was treated more humanely,
and was given some share in the business. Early in 1748 he was rescued at a
place called Kittam by the captain of a vessel whom his father had asked to
look out for him.
During his wandering life he had lost all sense of religion,
and afterwards accused himself of degrading debauchery. But the dangers of the
homeward voyage, when Newton was set to steer the ship through a storm,
suddenly awakened in him strong religious feeling. To the end of his days he
kept the anniversary of his 'conversion,' 10 (21st, New Style) March 1748, as a
day of humiliation and thanksgiving for his 'great deliverance.' On settling
again in England, he was offered by a Liverpool friend of his father, Mr.
Manesty, the command of one of his slave vessels. He preferred, however, to go
as mate first (1748-9). On 12 February 1750 he was married at Chatham to Mary
Catlett, the daughter of a distant relative, with whom he bad been in love
since 1742, when he was only seventeen, and the girl no more than fourteen.
Three voyages followed his marriage, but in 1754, owing to ill-health, he
relinquished his connection with the sea. During his adventurous career as a
sailor he succeeded in educating himself. Even while in Africa he had mastered
the first six books of Euclid, drawing the figures on the sand. Subsequently he
taught himself Latin, reading Virgil, Terence, Livy, and Erasmus, and learning
Horace by heart. At the same time be studied the Bible with increasing
devotion; and adopted, under the instruction of a friend at St. Kitts (Captain
Clunie), Calvinistic views of theology. Although a captain of slave-ships, he
repressed swearing and profligacy, and read the Liturgy twice on Sunday with
the crew.
From 1755 to 1760 Newton held, on the recommendation of
Manesty, the post of surveyor of the tides at Liverpool. Shortly after his
settlement there, Whitefield, whom he had already met in London, arrived in
Liverpool. Newton became his enthusiastic disciple, and gained the nickname of
'young Whitefield.' At a later period Wesley visited the town, and Newton laid
the foundation of a lasting friendship with him; while he obtained
introductions to Grimshaw at Haworth, Venn at Huddersfield, Berridge at Everton,
and Romaine in London. Still eagerly pursuing his studies, he taught himself
Greek, and gained some knowledge of Hebrew and Syriac. He soon resolved to
undertake some ministerial work; but he was undecided whether to become an
independent minister or a clergyman of the church of England. In December 1758
he applied for holy orders to the Archbishop of York, on a title in Yorkshire,
but received through the archbishop's secretary 'the softest refusal
imaginable.' In 1760 he was for three months in charge of an independent
congregation at Warwick. In 1763 he was brought by Dr. Haweis, rector of
Aldwinkle, to the notice of Lord Dartmouth, the young evangelical nobleman; and
on 29 April 1764 was ordained deacon, and on 17 June priest. His earliest
charge was the curacy of Olney, Buckinghamshire, in Lord Dartmouth's patronage.
In the same year he published an account of his life at sea and of his
religious experiences, called 'The Authentic Narrative.' It reached a second
edition within the year, and still holds a high place in the history of the
evangelical movement.
Olney was a small market town occupied in the manufacture of
straw plait and pillow lace, with a large poor population. Moses Browne was the
vicar, but had recently ceased to reside, on his appointment to the chaplaincy
of Morden College, Blackheath. Newton's stipend, which was only 60£ a year, was
soon supplemented by the munificence of John Thornton the evangelical merchant,
to whom he had sent a copy of 'The Authentic Narrative.' Thornton allowed him
200£ a year, enjoining him to keep 'open house' for those worthy of
entertainment;' to 'help the poor,' and to draw on him for what he required
further. Newton faithfully discharged the trust. The church became so crowded
that a gallery was added. Prayer-meetings, at which his parishioners and his
friends among the neighbouring dissenting ministers took part with him in
leading the prayers, were held in the large room at Lord Dartmouth's old
mansion, the Great House. Newton preached incessantly, not only in Olney, but
in cottages and houses of friends far and near.
In October 1767 the poet Cowper and Mrs. Unwin settled at
Olney. Their house at Orchard Side was only separated from the vicarage by a
paddock. Cowper at once identified himself with the religious life of the
village. He joined Newton in all religious services, in his preaching tours and
in his visits to the sick and dying. But in 1772-3 Cowper's religious madness
returned, and he made a renewed attempt at suicide. Cowper's mania ultimately took
a Calvinistic tone; but it is more reasonable to attribute this fact to the
fierce Calvinistic controversy which raged at the time in the religious world
than to the influence of Newton, whose Calvinism was always moderate, and a
latent rather than a conspicuous force. The extreme tension and emotional
excitement of the life at Olney under Newton's guidance must, however, have
been very dangerous to Cowper. Still more dangerous was the spirit of
desolation and seIf-accusation which pervades all Newton's writings, and which
is directly reflected in the hymns and letters written by Cowper while at
Olney. Newton regarded spiritual conflict as the normal type of God's dealing
with the awakened soul (see OMICRON, Letters, letter xi), and hence was blind
to the disastrous physical effects of Cowper's delusion. He throughout treated
him with exquisite tenderness. For thirteen months Cowper and Mrs. Unwin lived
with him at the vicarage. To the end of his life he had the deepest affection
for Cowper, and they never ceased to correspond together. Two temporary
breaches in their friendship — on publication of the 'Task' and on Cowper's
removal to Weston — were due to Newton's puritanical objections to every form
of secular amusement and to any sort of toleration for Roman catholicism —
sentiments which Cowper only imperfectly shared. His letters had always the
affectionate aim of removing Cowper's delusion as to the divine reprobation,
but they generally deepened his gloom. They were, however, not always sombre.
Newton, like Cowper, was capable at times of an easy, natural, and even playful
epistolary style (see especially SOUTHEY, Life of Cowper, iv. 111), and sought
to amuse Cowper by a display of a shrewd and quaint humour (see BULL, Life of
John Newton, p. 250; cf. OVERTON, Evangelical Revival, p. 74; CECIL, Anecdotes;
NEWTON, Letters to Bull. of Newport Paynell; CAMPBELL, Conversational Remarks
of John Newton). Jay of Bath credited Newton with 'the drollest fetches of
humour.'
During his residence at Olney Newton published a volume of
'Olney Sermons' (1767); a 'Review of Ecclesiastical History,' which suggested
to Joseph and Isaac Milner the idea of their large 'History' (1770) ; and
'Omicron's Letters' (1774), which had appeared in the 'Gospel Magazine' under
that signature. Other letters under the signature of 'Virgil' were added to the
edition of 1785. Finally, in 1779 was issued the 'Olney Hymns,' which had great
and lasting popularity. The book contained sixty-eight pieces by Cowper, and
280 by Newton, including 'How sweet the name of Jesus sounds!' The contrast
between the two writers' contributions is not great, but such hymns as exhibit
any real flash of poetic genius may generally be safely assigned to Cowper.
Only about twenty of the hymns remain in general use. One of the finest by
Newton is 'Glorious things of Thee are spoken,' and it is the only really
jubilant hymn in the book (see JULIAN, Dictionary of Hymnology). The last years
at Olney had their discouragements ... Consequently, in January 1780, he accepted
the offer made by John Thornton of the benefice of St. Mary Woolnoth with St.
Mary Woolchurch, Lombard Street.
When Newton came to London, Romaine was the only other
evangelical incumbent there. His church accordingly was soon crowded by
strangers, and to the end of his life his congregation was very large. The bulk
of his preaching was extempore, and both Venn and Cecil testify to his scant
preparation. His utterance was not clear, and his gestures were uncouth. But
his marked personality and history, his quaint illustrations, his intense
conviction of sin, and his direct address to men's perplexities, temptations,
and troubles, sent his words home. His printed sermons have no literary value.
In 1781 he published his most considerable work, 'Cardiphonia,' a selection
from his religious correspondence. The easy and natural style of the book, the
sincerity, fervour, and almost womanly tenderness of the writer, and the vivid
presentation of evangelical truths, gave it an immediate popularity; and it opened
to Newton his most distinctive office in the evangelical revival — that of a
writer of spiritual letters. Numbers of these have been published since his
death. He said that his letters would fill many folios, and that 'it was the
Lord's will that he should do most by them.' Among the persons whom at various
times he aided by his personal counsel are Thomas Scott, the biblical
commentator, whom he converted, after much debate, from socinianism; William
Wilberforce at the crisis of his conversion (1785); Richard Cecil, his
biographer; Claudius Buchanan, the eminent Indian chaplain, who was converted
by a sermon at St. Mary Woolnoth; young Jay, the eloquent minister at Bath, who
has left a graphic account of Newton's breakfast parties; young Charles Simeon,
whom he visited at Cambridge; and Hannah More, with whom he stayed at Cowslip
Green. In 1786, the Handel celebration, which to his stern mind seemed a
profanation of sacred things, drew from him a series of sermons on the texts in
the oratorio of the 'Messiah.' In 1788 he aided Wilberforce by publishing his
own experiences of the slave trade — a temperate, restrained, but, ghastly
recital of facts. In 1789 he published 'Apologia,' a strenuous defence of his
adhesion to the church of England, and all effective defence of establishment.
It was called forth apparently by charges of inconsistency, grounded on his
attendance at dissenting chapels, and on his contempt for all distinctive
tenets outside the evangelical creed. On 15 December 1790 he suffered the loss
of his wife, whom to the end he loved with what he feared was an idolatrous
love. She died of cancer. He had been preparing for the blow for months in
prayer, and he had strength to preach three times while she lay dead in the
house, and then her funeral sermon. The anniversaries of her death were always
seasons for him of solemn meditation, often marked also by very lame but
touching memorial verses. Just as in the 'Narrative' he had expressed the
depths of his unregenerate crimes, and in the 'Cardiphonia' his regenerate
depravity, so now in his 'Letters to a Wife' (2 vols. 1793) he unfolded the
innermost recesses of his life-long love. He had no dread of the world's
judgment which leads most men to shrink from uttering their darkest and holiest
secrets.
Newton's house was kept henceforward by his niece Eliza,
daughter of George Catlett, whom he had adopted as an orphan in 1774. As his
sight gradually failed he depended entirely on her devoted care of him. In
1802-3, however, she fell into a deep melancholy, which necessitated her
removal to Bedlam. It is said that Newton, old and blind, daily stood under her
window in the hospital, and asked his guide if she had waved her handkerchief.
After her recovery she married an optician named Smith in 1805, but she
remained with her husband under Newton's roof. In 1792 he was presented with
the degree of D.D. by the University of New Jersey. He continued to preach till
the last year of his life, although he was too blind to see his text, and the
failure of his faculties grew painful. In 1806, when Cecil entreated him to
give up preaching, He replied, 'I cannot stop. What! shall the old African
blasphemer stop while he call speak? ' His last sermon, during which he had to
be reminded of his subject, was for the sufferers from Trafalgar (1806). He
died on 21 December 1807, and was buried by the side of his wife in St. Mary
Woolnoth. The bodies of both were removed to Olney in 1893, when St. Mary's
Church was cleared of all human remains ...
Newton's chief works are:
1. 'An Authentic Narrative of some...Particulars in the Life
of...John Newton,' 1st ed, 1764; 2nd ed. 1764; 3rd ed. 1765; other editions
1775, 1780, 1792.
2. 'Omicron: Twenty-six Letters on Religions Subjects,' Ist
ed. 1774; 2nd ed. 1775.
3. 'Omicron...to which are added fourteen Letters...formerly
published under the signature of Vigil: and three fugitive Pieces in verse,'
1785; other editions 1793, 1798.
4. 'Olney Hymns,' 1st ed. 1779; 2nd ed. 1781; 3rd ed. 1783;
4th ed. 1787; other editions 1792, 1795, 1797, &c
5. 'Cardiphonia, or the Utterance of the Heart,' 1st ed.
1781; frequently reprinted.
Other works:
6. 'Discourses...intended for the Pulpit,' 1760.
7. 'Sermons, preached in the Parish Church of Olney,' 1767.
8. 'A Review of Ecclesiastical History,' 1770.
9. 'Messiah: Fifty...Discourses on the...Scriptural
Passages...of the...Oratorio of Handel,' 1786.
10. 'Apologia: Four Letters to a Minister of an Independent
Church,' 1789.
11. 'The Christian Correspondent: Letters to Captain Clunie
from the Year 1761 to 1770,' 1790.
12. 'Letters to a Wife,' 1793.
Posthumous works:
13. 'The Works of Rev. John Newton,' 6 vols. 1808; new ed.
12 vols. 1821.
14. 'The Works of Rev. John Newton, 1 vol., with 'Memoir,'
by R. Cecil,' 1827.
15. 'One Hundred and Twenty Letters to Rev. W. Bull from
1703 to 1805,' 1847.
[Memoir by R. Cecil, attached to Newton's Works; Bull's Life
of John Newton; Letters and Conversational Remarks of John Newton, edited by
John Campbell, 1808; Life of Jay of Bath (reminiscences); Bull's Memorials of
Rev. William Bull.]
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