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William Spurstowe (1605-1666)

He was a Calvinist English minister, theologian, and member of the Westminster Assembly.
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“No man ever miscarried for being a great sinner; but only for being an impenitent sinner.”

His Works:

The Sermons of William Spurstowe by William Spurstowe – eBook
The Wells of Salvation Opened by William Spurstowe – eBook
The Spiritual Chemyst by William Spurstowe – eBook
Buy the Printed Books HERE

 

Biography of William Spurstowe (1605–1666):

William Spurstowe, D.D. (1605?–1666), was a Calvinist puritan divine, son and heir of William Spurstowe, citizen and mercer of London, who was remotely connected with the Spurstowes of Bunbury, Cheshire. He was born in London about 1605. He was admitted a pensioner at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, in 1623, graduated B.A. 1626, M.A. 1630, and obtained a fellowship at Catharine Hall, which he resigned in 1637. He had been awarded a B.A. at Oxford on July 15, 1628. His first preferment was the rectory of Great Hampden, Buckinghamshire, to which he was instituted June 30, 1638, though he signs the register as rector in August, 1637; he succeeded Egeon Askew who was buried on May 10, 1637. To his connection with the parliamentary leader John Hampden (1594–1643) he probably owed his introduction to public life. He was one of the five divines [see Thomas Smith’s work Select Memoirs of the English and Scottish Divines on Edmund Calamy, the elder] who wrote in 1641 as “Smectymnvvs,” the last three letters of this word being his initials (VVS, or WS). In 1642 he was chaplain to Hampden’s regiment of “green coats.” With the other Smectymnuans he was included in the original summons (June 12, 1643) to the Westminster assembly of divines, and took the “league and covenant” in the following September. He preached four times over the course of the Assembly to them on various subjects. Among these sermons were, “England’s Patterne and Duty” (1643), and “England’s Eminent Judgments” (1644).

On May 3, 1643 he succeeded Calybute Downing as vicar of Hackney, Middlesex. On the deprivation (1645) of Ralph Brownrig he was put into the mastership of Catharine Hall, having been approved for it by the Westminster Assembly (May 12, 1645). He had previously been approved (Feb. 17) for the mastership of Clare College, but this was given to Ralph Cudworth He was a member of the provincial assembly of London, and at its first meeting (May 3, 1647) was placed on its committee.

Spurstowe was one of the clerical commissioners appointed to confer with the king in the Isle of Wight (September–November, 1648). Clarendon affirms that he and William Jenkyn told Charles “if he did not consent to the total abolishing of episcopacy, he would be damned.” As it stands, the statement is not credible. Spurstowe was strongly opposed to the judicial proceedings against Charles, and signed in January 1649 the “Vindication” promoted by Cornelius Burges, D.D., protesting against the trial. In a work current being updated by Puritan Publications called The Spiritual Chemyst, his twenty-sixth meditation is titled “Upon the Royal Oak,” which gives expression to his loyalty. In 1649 he was made D.D. He refused the engagement (Oct. 12, 1649) of allegiance to the existing government “without a king or a house of lords;” and, failing to take it by March 23, 1650, was deprived of his mastership of Catharine Hall, which, in November, was given to John Lightfoot (1602–1675).

At the Restoration of Charles II, Lightfoot offered to resign the mastership in his favor, but Spurstowe declined. He was made chaplain in ordinary to Charles II, and once preached at court. Ezekiel Hopkins, D.D., was his curate in 1660. In the negotiations for an accommodation of religious parties he was consulted as a leading man, and was a commissioner to the Savoy conference (April–July 1661), but took no prominent part. At his vicarage-house at Hackney, Baxter spent a week in retirement while preparing the answer to the episcopal defense of the prayer-book. He resigned his living on the coming into force of the Uniformity Act (Aug. 24, 1662), and was succeeded (Sept. 22) by Thomas Jeamson, B.D.

From this time he lived retired at Hackney, being a man of independent fortune. In 1664 he visited Cambridge, and was entertained at dinner in Catharine Hall. Baxter describes him as “an ancient, calm, reverend minister;” Calamy speaks of his charity and the agreeableness of his conversation. He died early in 1666, and was buried at Hackney on 8 Feb. His only child, William, died at Hackney in March 1654, aged 9. His widow, Sarah became in 1669 the second wife of Anthony Tuckney. He founded six almshouses for six poor widows at Hackney, which were finished in 1666, and endowed by his brother and heir, Henry Spurstowe, a London merchant.

For further study of Spurstowe, see:

[Wood’s Athenæ Oxon. (Bliss), iv. 287; Wood’s Fasti (Bliss), i. 443; Calamy’s Account, 1713, p. 471; Calamy’s Continuation, 1727, ii. 613, 743; Fuller’s Hist. of the University of Cambridge, 1655, p. 170; Reliquiæ Baxterianæ, 1696, i. 42, ii. 229, 303, 334, iii. 97; Clarendon’s Hist. of the Rebellion, 1706, iii. 216; Walker’s Sufferings of the Clergy, 1714, ii. 151; Palmer’s Nonconformist’s Memorial, 1802, ii. 448 sq.; Neal’s Hist. of the Puritans (Toulmin), 1822, iii. 325; Robinson’s Hist. of Hackney, 1843, ii. 159 sq., 368 sq.; Lipscomb’s Buckinghamshire, 1847, ii. 247, 284; Urwick’s Nonconformity in Cheshire, 1864, p. 146 (errs in making him a native of Bunbury); Mitchell and Struthers’s Minutes of Westminster Assembly, 1874, pp. 59, 90; Whitehead’s Historical Sketch of New Gravel Pit Church, Hackney, 1889, pp. 6 seq.; Foster’s Alumni Oxon. 1500–1714, iv. 1402; Ashe’s Funeral Sermon for William Spurstowe (the son), 1654; Cole’s Athenæ Cantabr. (manuscript); Lansdowne MS. 916, fol. 56; information from the master of Catharine College and from the Rev. A. Marshall, Great Hampden.]

 

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