Works of Samuel Clarke (the Anglican clergyman, 1675 – 1729) in CP

Rosie Perera

There are many people, even Christian writers, named Samuel Clarke, so to be clear, I'm talking about this one.

My newly discovered friend John Jortin (whose works I've just requested in CP) quotes Samuel Clarke's Evidences of Natural and Revealed Religion at length in his book Remarks on Ecclesiastical History, so I went looking up Clarke.

He looks like someone important that we should have in Logos. Some excerpts from his Wikipedia entry:

Clarke "was an English philosopher and Anglican clergyman. He is considered the major British figure in philosophy between John Locke and George Berkeley."

"Clarke...came to adopt the new physical system of Newton."

"Queen Anne appointed him one of her chaplains in ordinary, and in 1709 presented him to the rectory of St James's, Westminster. His church brought Clarke into personal contact with Newton."

"Clarke was Boyle lecturer for two years, and produced two books. The Newtonian theologians used the Boyle Lectures to attack opponents (Thomas Hobbes and Baruch Spinoza, deists and freethinkers in particular). Clarke's lectures set the agenda for further debates. He dealt in 1704 with the Being and Attributes of God, an example of a physico-theological system; and in 1705 with the Evidences of Natural and Revealed Religion. These books were later published together."

"Clarke's reputation rested largely on his effort to demonstrate the existence of God, and his theory of the foundation of rectitude."

"Clarke studied scripture in the original languages, and the primitive Christian writers. He took the degree of doctor in divinity in 1710."

There's lots more in the Wikipedia article. Worth reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Clarke

He seems to have been quite a controversial figure: stirring up debates over the nature of the Trinity, etc. He published a lot of works, the most interesting titles of which seem to be:

• Three Practical Essays on Baptism, Confirmation and Repentance (1699)
• Some Reflections on that part of a book called Amyntor, or a Defence of Milton's Life, which relates to the Writings of the Primitive Fathers, and the Canon of the New Testament (1699)
• A Paraphrase upon the Gospel of St Matthew (1701)
• Being and Attributes of God (1704)
• Evidences of Natural and Revealed Religion (1705)
• A revision of William Whiston's English translation of the Apostolical Constitutions (1709)
• The Scripture Doctrine of the Trinity (1712)
• seventeen sermons (1724)
• An Exposition of the Church Catechism (posthumously)
• Ten volumes of sermons (posthumously)
• various letters

There's a longer biographical sketch of him in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/clarke/

Dean J

I don't see his works in CP--I had my hopes up for a second. His work on the Trinity is by far the best I have ever read. 

Ben Amundgaard (Faithlife)

Rosie Perera said:

He looks like someone important that we should have in Logos.

I agree.  I'll add him to my list.  Thanks for another great suggestion. [:)]