The Tower of Babel

Ned Ward,

The Tower of Babel

Published by J. Morphew, 1718

Availability: Sold

$100.00

A satire on Benjamin Hoadly, Bishop of Bangor and the Bangorian Controversy.

“So I, a puny pamphleteer,
And only fit to close the Rear,
Since a new sort of Pulpit-Fustian
Has Kindled such a dire Combustion
In Church as well as Commonweal
Under the smooth Disguise of Zeal;”

The volume(s) measure about 18 cm. by 11.5 cm. by .5 cm.

Each leaf measures about 180 mm. by 105 mm.

The full title reads:

The tower of Babel: an anti-heroic poem. Humbly dedicated to the B—-p of B—-r. Magnis tamen excidit Ausis.  London: Printed for J. Morphew near Stationers-Hall. MDCCXVIII (1718). (Price, Six-pence)

B—p of B—r. = Bishop of Bangor.

The volume is paginated as follows: [2]-32.

The volume collates as follows: A-D4.

The Volume is in Very Good Condition in modern paper wraps: externally the wraps are new and show no major stains or tears. Internally the leaves are generally clean and amply margined with a piece of sellotape, and a library id number stamp, both on the first page of text, with a mild damp-stain and blind library stamps on the title, with some repairs to certain leaf edges and manuscript volume and page numbers in the upper corner of the margins. The Volume is Complete in All Respects.

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Ned Ward (1667 – 20 June 1731), also known as Edward Ward, was a satirical writer and publican in the late 17th and early 18th century in London

The Bangorian Controversy

The Bangorian Controversy was a theological argument within the Church of England in the early 18th century, with strong political overtones. The origins of the controversy lay in the 1716 posthumous publication of George Hickes’s Constitution of the Catholic Church, and the Nature and Consequences of Schism. In it, Hickes, on behalf of the minority non-juror faction that had broken away from the Church of England after the Glorious Revolution, as Bishop of Thetford, excommunicated all but the non-juror churchmen. Benjamin Hoadly, the Bishop of Bangor, wrote a reply, Preservative against the Principles and Practices of Non-Jurors; his own Erastian position was sincerely proposed as the only test of truth.

The controversy itself began very visibly and vocally when Hoadly delivered a sermon on 31 March 1717 to George I of Great Britain on The Nature of the Kingdom of Christ. His text was John 18:36, “My kingdom is not of this world” and from that, Hoadly deduced, supposedly at the request of the king himself, that there is no Biblical justification for any church government of any sort. He identified the church with the Kingdom of Heaven. It was therefore not of this world, and Christ had not delegated His authority to any representatives.

The sermon was immediately published and instantly drew counterattacks. William Law (Three Letters to the Bishop of Bangor) and Thomas Sherlock (dean of Chichester), in particular, gave vigorous defences of church polity. Hoadly himself wrote A Reply to the Representations of Convocation to answer Sherlock, Andrew Snape, provost of Eton, and Francis Hare, then dean of Worcester. The three men, and another opponent, Robert Moss, dean of Ely, were deprived of their royal chaplaincies by the king. Hoadly did not, however, attempt to answer William Law. It has been claimed that in all, over 200 pamphlets linked to the controversy were published by 53 writers. Of those, 74 were published in July 1717.

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