The Dissenters

This third and final volume of Michael Watts's study of dissent examines the turbulent times of Victorian Nonconformity, a period of faith and of doubt. Watts assesses the impacts of the major Dissenting preachers and provides insights into the various movements, such as romanticism and the higher, often German, biblical criticism. He shows that the preaching of hell and eternal damnation was more effective in recruiting to the chapels than the gentler interpretations. A major feature of the volume is a thorough analysis of surviving records of attendance at Nonconformist services. He provides fascinating accounts of Spurgeon and the other key figures of Nonconformity, including of the Salvation Army. Dr Watts also provides a fresh discussion of the contribution which Nonconformity made to the politics of mid- to late-Victorian Britain. He examines such issues of reform as Forster's Education Act of 1871, temperance, and Balfour's Education Act of 1902, and considers Nonconformist interventions in such controversies as the Bulgarian Agitation, Home Rule for Ireland, the Armenian massacres of the mid 1890s, and the Boer War. The volume concludes with the Liberal landslide in the 1906 general election, which saw probably more Nonconformists elected than any time since the era of Oliver Cromwell.

Auteur

Michael Watts was Reader in Modern History at the University of Nottingham (1967-1998). He completed the text of his third volume of the Dissenters before he died in 2011. This volume subsequently has been lightly revised and a preface added by Professor David Bebbington.

Contenu

PART I: 'THE VERY FOUNDATIONS OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH': THE CRISIS OF DISSENT; 1 'The God of the hills': The impact of Romanticism; 2 'Destructive of the authority of divine revelation': Genesis, geology, and evolution; 3 'The ground on which Rational Christianity may firmly take its stand': higher criticism and the Unitarians; 4 'An inspired communication from the Deity ... Or ... Nothing': the dilemma of Evangelical Dissenters; 5 'The seal and servant of Christianity': the Spiritualist alternative; 6 'An easy good - natured God': the collapse of Calvinism; 7 'The hateful mystery': the eclipse of eternal punishment; 8 'The sceptical tendencies of modern times': the isolation of Spurgeon; 9 'The heresies of the Baptist Union': the Down Grade; 10 'A conspiracy to undermine our holy faith': the liberal triumph; PART II: 'THE HUB AND FOUNT OF SOCIAL LIFE': THE LIBERALIZATION OF DISSENT; 11 Church membership and chapel attendance: the consequences of the crisis; 12 'Conversion is not necessary to regeneration': the failure of recruitment; 13 Nonconformity's shrinking constituency: the evidence of the dissenting registers; 14 'Influential families lost to conformity': the flight of the bourgeoisie; 15 The failure of success: the loss of the poor; 16 The 'most spiritually destitute and degraded': missions to the poor; 17 'Diversity of opinion no bar to Christian communion': the relaxation of discipline; 18 'We must not leave Satan to provide the recreations of life': the problem of pleasure; 19 The 'social and intellectual well-being of our members': the institutional church; 20 'A liberal education': culture without anarchy; 21 'Winning souls' or 'unlimited speculation'?: colleges and universities; 22 Frugality and over work: pastors and preachers; 23 'The future rests with the Free Churches': free church union and the Welsh revival; PART III: 'WHAT IS MORALLY WRONG CAN NEVER BE POLITICALLY RIGHT': THE CONSCIENCE OF DISSENT; 24 'The largest and widest church ever established': the influence of George Dawson; 25 'Once bit, twice shy': the Forster Education Act; 26 'A torrent of gin and beer': the Nonconformist revolt and liberal defeat; 27 'The right of the people to judge for themselves': Bulgaria and Ireland; 28 'A Mutual Benefit Association': trade unionists and employers; 29 Making 'men moral by act of parliament': personal redemption versus environmental reformation; 30 'To reconstruct the existing organization of society': from philanthropy to christian socialism and the new liberalism; 31 'A most astonishing opening, furnished by the providence of God': imperialism and the missionary conscience; 32 'The thunder of British guns': Armenia and the Boer War; 33 'The descendants of men like Oliver Cromwell': the Balfour Education Act and the liberal landslide; Index