John Howe (1630-1705): a short life

By Dr Martin Sutherland, University of Auckland, New Zealand

John Howe had clerical Nonconformity in his blood. His father, John Howe sen., was ejected from his curacy in Loughborough, Leicestershire in 1634 for his prayer during a service ‘that the young prince might not be brought up in popery’. The family spent some time in Ireland following this reversal returning to England in 1641-2 and settling in Winwick, Lancashire. Here John Howe jun. received his early education. In May 1647 he entered Christ’s College, Cambridge where he was influenced by the Cambridge Platonists, in particular Henry More (1614-1687). In 1648, having gained a B.A., he moved to Oxford. He was admitted to Brasenose College, became Chaplain at Magdalen from 1650 and a Fellow there from 1652 until 1655. In these six years Howe’s platonic influences and his religious views were cultivated and enriched.

Though ordained in 1652 as a Presbyterian Howe was never a narrow sectarian. The apparent ease and range of his associations are an important feature of his university years. In 1654 he took up a perpetual curacy at Great Torrington, succeeding ‘the famous Independent’, Lewis Stucley (1632?-1687). This ministry was for the most part a happy one. Howe’s first biographer Edmund Calamy asserted that ‘the more he spent himself in his Master’s service, the more was he belov’d by the Inhabitants of his Parish.’ Evidence of mutual affection is not lacking. Howe maintained links with Torrington after he had left. As late as 1674 he dedicated his treatise Delighting in God to ‘much valued friends’ in his first charge. Nevertheless Calamy's view that Howe ‘had thought of no other, than of living and dying [at Torrington]’ must be questioned. In a letter to Richard Baxter in 1658, Howe noted that ‘when I settled there, I expressly reserved to myself a liberty of removing’ if so led. In the event, a move came in 1656, only two and a half years into the Torrington ministry.

No Christian ministry was easy in those troubled times. In the preface to Delighting in God, Howe referred to ‘some who have...expressed more contempt of God...than delight in him.’ A rift had developed under his predecessor. Although he seems to have been able temporarily to calm this situation, soon after his departure Howe admitted to Baxter that ‘the people I left are breaking into parties’. Howe would later cite his peacemaking role as a key to his ministry.

In 1656 Howe moved to London, to be private Chaplain to Oliver Cromwell. He was unhappy from the outset and within a short time was looking for a way out of a role he increasingly disliked. Shocked by what he saw as loose morals in the Protector’s court he wrote to Richard Baxter that ‘I see the designed work here hopelessly laid aside’, describing himself as ‘bashful, pusillanimous, easily brow-beaten’. The answer was found a continuation of his link to Torrington via a series of interim ministers, with Howe himself spending three months there each year.

After the fall of the Protectorate Howe returned to Torrington. In October 1660, he was charged with sedition, the accusation being that he encouraged rebellion against those who would reintroduce such measures as the wearing of surplices and kneeling at Communion. In Howe’s defence, some twenty Torrington parishioners insisted that Howe’s intent was merely to warn them against ‘having our hearts more set upon [ceremonies] than upon the substantial duties of God’s worship’.

On Bartholomew’s Day in 1662 Howe was ejected under the provisions of the Act of Uniformity. For nine years he remained in Devon. Although he preached occasionally in the houses of sympathetic gentry, he did not set up conventicles or provoke the authorities. In 1665 he was listed in the Episcopal return as living in Great Torrington ‘peaceably’. He published two well-received works based on Torrington sermons. In 1671 he accepted a position with Lord Massarene in Antrim, Ireland. Howe was given remarkable latitude by the Irish Church authorities. A divinity school was established in Antrim, run by Howe and the local Presbyterian incumbent. By 1675 he was being noticed. He was invited to take up the resultant vacancy in the Presbyterian chapel at Haberdashers’ Hall, London.

In London Howe published important works on theology and toleration. In the 1680s Dissent came under increasing pressure. In August 1685 Howe abruptly left London to travel to Europe. He would not return until 1687. The context of Howe's sudden departure, in August 1685, is important. Monmouth's rebellion had been crushed only one month previously. One who would be executed for his part in the uprising was John Hickes, John Howe’s brother-in-law. Another friend, Matthew Mead, had been implicated in the 1683 Rye House plot and was a principal figure in the Monmouth conspiracy. In the early 1680s Howe had had contact with the conspirator Robert Ferguson. Along with several who would be subsequently implicated, Howe had met with Monmouth in the Autumn of 1682. There can be little doubt where Howe's sympathies lay in the mid-1680s. His surprise departure for Holland may not have been as a fugitive, but it was almost certainly prompted by his connections with those who were.

Howe settled in Utrecht. He preached regularly in the English Church there and again assisted in the training of young men for ministry. The interval on the continent marks a definite turning point in his career. The five years following his return in 1687 were the most politically active of his life. His congregation, perhaps aware of how precarious his situation had been in August 1685, appears to have welcomed him back. With older figures such as John Owen dead and Richard Baxter failing Howe now assumed a major role in Nonconformist leadership.

Howe was an active supporter of William of Orange and presented the Dissenters’ welcome after the Glorious Revolution. After a limited toleration was granted he was an architect of the short-lived ‘Happy Union’ of Presbyterians, Independents and Baptists in 1692. Until his death in 1705 he would work for toleration and unity within an increasingly divided Dissent.

John Howe’s influence on later Dissent was profound. His statues as a major icon of Nonconformist piety is primarily due to his irenic approach to Church disputes. What is less recognised is that he based this stance on a sophisticated theology for which he deserves to be ranked among the premier thinkers of his day.