Caleb Fleming
Encyclopedia
Caleb Fleming, D.D. was an English dissenting minister and polemicist.
on 4 November 1698. His father was a hosier; his mother, whose maiden name was Buxton, was a daughter of the lord of the manor of Chelmerton, Derbyshire
. Brought up in Calvinism
, Fleming's early inclination was for the independent ministry. As a boy he learned shorthand, in order to take down sermons. In 1714 John Hardy became one of the ministers of the presbyterian congregation at the High Pavement Chapel
, Nottingham, and opened a nonconformist academy. Fleming was one of his first pupils. He was admitted as a communicant in 1715. Hardy (who conformed in 1727) taught him to discard his inheritance in theology. He gave up the idea of the ministry and took to business, retaining, however, his theological tastes.
In 1727 he left Nottingham for London. By this time he had married and had a family. How he maintained himself is not clear. He began at to publish pamphlets which attracted some attention, but remained poor. In 1727 a Catholic tried to make a convert of him, but desisted on discovering that he had to deal with an anti-trinitarian. Some help in further classical and biblical study was given to him by John Holt, then a presbyterian minister in London, later mathematical tutor at Warrington Academy
, and he learned Hebrew from a rabbi. Through William Harris
, D.D., presbyterian minister at Crutched Friars, an offer was made for his services as a government pamphleteer. He replied that he 'would sooner cut off his right hand.' In 1736 he published a pamphlet, 'The Fourth Commandment abrogated by the Gospel,' dedicating it to his namesake, Sir George Fleming, bishop of Carlisle. It would appear that he had been advised to do this by John Thomas
, afterwards bishop of Winchester. Bishop Fleming offered him the living of Lazonby
, Cumberland
, worth some 600l. a year. Dr. Thomas was ready to advance what was needed for his removal, but Fleming could not conform. In his refusal he was supported by his wife.
His friends now began to urge him to enter the dissenting ministry. In his fortieth year he preached his first sermon to the presbyterian congregation at Wokingham
, Berkshire
, Catcot, the minister, publicly thanking him for his services. After this he officiated at a few places in the neighbourhood of London. At length, on the death of John Munckley (August 1738), he was strongly recommended by Benjamin Avery
as a suitable candidate for the charge of the presbyterian congregation at Bartholomew Close. Here Fleming and William May were ordained as joint pastors in 1740. Fleming had scruples about presbyterian forms, and classed himself as an independent. At his ordination, conducted by Samuel Chandler
, D.D., Jeremiah Hunt, D.D., a learned independent, and others, he refused to submit to the imposition of hands, His confession of faith was unique. He would only say that he believed the New Testament contained 'a revelation worthy of God to give and of man to receive;' and this he promised to teach in the sense in which he should 'from time to time' understand it. It was soon rumoured that Fleming was a Socinian. His congregation was never large, and the scantiness of his stipend reduced him to straits. His friends fell off, with the exception of Jeremiah Hunt. After Hunt's death (1744) Fleming contracted an intimacy with Nathaniel Lardner, D.D., his neighbour in Hoxton Square
, and co-operated with him in literary work.
In January 1752 James Foster
, became disabled from preaching. John Weatherley (d. May 1752), a General Baptist
minister, who supplied Foster's place, met Fleming at Hamlin's Coffee-house, and engaged him for a Sunday at Pinners' Hall, an Independent congregation. He attracted the notice of Timothy Hollis, was soon afterwards elected as Foster's assistant, and on Foster's death (5 November 1753) as pastor. The Bartholomew Close congregation then came to an end, its few remaining members joining Pinners' Hall. For nearly a quarter of a century Fleming remained at his post; his ministry, though painstaking, was not popular, and when he ceased to preach, in December 1777, his congregation became extinct, the lease of their meeting-house expiring in 1778. He had admirers, who left him considerable legacies, among them being a bequest by a Suffolk gentleman (Reynolds), who had once heard him preach but did not know his name. A wealthy widow placed her whole fortune at his disposal. Fleming, however, declined to be enriched at the expense of her needy relatives.
In his old age his friend William Dalrymple of Ayr procured for him the degree of D.D. from St. Andrews. Fleming was inclined to reject this ‘compliment;’ but his friend Thomas Hollis
‘put it into the public papers,’ so Fleming accepted it in a characteristic letter (6 April 1769).
After completing his seventy-ninth year, Fleming retired. He died on 21 July 1779, and was buried in Bunhill Fields
. He left an epitaph for his gravestone, in which he describes himself as ‘dissenting teacher,’ and expresses a conditional hope of immortality. For this, however, was substituted a eulogistic inscription by Joseph Towers
, LL.D. His funeral sermon was preached by John Palmer
at New Broad Street. A portrait of Fleming, by William Chamberlain
, was bequeathed by him to Dr. Williams's Library. An engraving by Hopwood is given in Wilson.
. To prove, against Coward, the existence of a separate soul, Fleming employs the arguments of Samuel Clarke
, and especially of Andrew Baxter
. He does not contend that the soul is inherently immortal, but simply that it possesses a ‘capacity of immortality.’ His view of the resurrection was adopted by John Cameron (1724–1799).
Fleming was an unwearied writer of argumentative and combative pamphlets, the greater part of them being anonymous. His political brochures, in defence of civil liberty and against the Jacobites
, church establishments, and the toleration of popery, are tart enough. Against the theological writers of his time, high and low, he entered the field with confident vigour. He attacked Thomas Sherlock
, Soame Jenyns
, John Wesley
, the Sabbatarians as represented by Robert Cornthwaite, and the Muggletonians. His most severe, and perhaps his best remembered, publication is his ‘character’ of Thomas Bradbury
, ‘taken from his own pen.’
The topics to which he most frequently recurred were the defence of infant baptism
and of the authority of the New Testament against the deists, especially Thomas Chubb
, whom he is said to have impressed. His own theology, as may be seen in his ‘True Deism, the Basis of Christianity,’ 1749, was little more than a specially authenticated deism
. He retains the ‘supernatural conception,’ minimised after a fashion of his own, and the miracles of Christ, which ‘did not introduce a single unnatural phenomenon,’ but ‘removed defects in nature’ (True Deism, p. 14). In a manuscript sermon (10 October 1773) he ranks Confucius, Socrates, Plato, Cicero, and Seneca among organs of divine revelation. Many of his pamphlets and sermons attempt to deal with the problem of a general depravity of morals. Under the title of ‘A Modern Plan,’ 1748, he drew up ‘a compendium of moral institutes,’ in the shape of a catechism
in which the learner asks the questions.
Walter Wilson
enumerates sixty of Fleming's publications. The following are not included in Wilson's list. Most of them will be found in Dr. Williams's Library, Grafton Street, W.C.; others are from a collection formed by Fleming's nephew:
Some of Cardale's anonymous pieces have sometimes been ascribed to Fleming. He edited many works by divines and others, including the first volume (1756) of Thomas Amory
's ‘Life of John Buncle.’
Life
Fleming was born at NottinghamNottingham
Nottingham is a city and unitary authority in the East Midlands of England. It is located in the ceremonial county of Nottinghamshire and represents one of eight members of the English Core Cities Group...
on 4 November 1698. His father was a hosier; his mother, whose maiden name was Buxton, was a daughter of the lord of the manor of Chelmerton, Derbyshire
Derbyshire
Derbyshire is a county in the East Midlands of England. A substantial portion of the Peak District National Park lies within Derbyshire. The northern part of Derbyshire overlaps with the Pennines, a famous chain of hills and mountains. The county contains within its boundary of approx...
. Brought up in Calvinism
Calvinism
Calvinism is a Protestant theological system and an approach to the Christian life...
, Fleming's early inclination was for the independent ministry. As a boy he learned shorthand, in order to take down sermons. In 1714 John Hardy became one of the ministers of the presbyterian congregation at the High Pavement Chapel
High Pavement Chapel
High Pavement Chapel is a building on High Pavement in Nottingham. It is now the Pitcher and Piano public house and is Grade II listed.-History:...
, Nottingham, and opened a nonconformist academy. Fleming was one of his first pupils. He was admitted as a communicant in 1715. Hardy (who conformed in 1727) taught him to discard his inheritance in theology. He gave up the idea of the ministry and took to business, retaining, however, his theological tastes.
In 1727 he left Nottingham for London. By this time he had married and had a family. How he maintained himself is not clear. He began at to publish pamphlets which attracted some attention, but remained poor. In 1727 a Catholic tried to make a convert of him, but desisted on discovering that he had to deal with an anti-trinitarian. Some help in further classical and biblical study was given to him by John Holt, then a presbyterian minister in London, later mathematical tutor at Warrington Academy
Warrington Academy
Warrington Academy, active as a teaching establishment from 1756 to 1782, was a prominent dissenting academy, that is, a school or college set up by those who dissented from the state church in England...
, and he learned Hebrew from a rabbi. Through William Harris
William Harris (presbyterian minister)
-Life:He was born about 1675, probably in Southwark, where his mother was living as a widow in 1692. Walter Wilson, following Josiah Thompson, thinks he was educated at Timothy Jollie's Attercliffe Academy, near Sheffield ; records of the presbyterian board show that in 1692–6 he studied...
, D.D., presbyterian minister at Crutched Friars, an offer was made for his services as a government pamphleteer. He replied that he 'would sooner cut off his right hand.' In 1736 he published a pamphlet, 'The Fourth Commandment abrogated by the Gospel,' dedicating it to his namesake, Sir George Fleming, bishop of Carlisle. It would appear that he had been advised to do this by John Thomas
John Thomas
-Education:* John Martin Thomas , Twelfth president of Rutgers University* John R. Thomas , American intellectual property professor- Military history :* John Thomas , American general in the American Revolutionary War...
, afterwards bishop of Winchester. Bishop Fleming offered him the living of Lazonby
Lazonby
Lazonby is a village and civil parish in the Lower Eden Valley of Cumbria about north north east of Penrith.The total population of the ward of Lazonby, which also includes the nearby villages of North Dykes, Great Salkeld and Salkeld Dykes, was 1,425 at the time of the 2001 UK Census...
, Cumberland
Cumberland
Cumberland is a historic county of North West England, on the border with Scotland, from the 12th century until 1974. It formed an administrative county from 1889 to 1974 and now forms part of Cumbria....
, worth some 600l. a year. Dr. Thomas was ready to advance what was needed for his removal, but Fleming could not conform. In his refusal he was supported by his wife.
His friends now began to urge him to enter the dissenting ministry. In his fortieth year he preached his first sermon to the presbyterian congregation at Wokingham
Wokingham
Wokingham is a market town and civil parish in Berkshire in South East England about west of central London. It is about east-southeast of Reading and west of Bracknell. It spans an area of and, according to the 2001 census, has a population of 30,403...
, Berkshire
Berkshire
Berkshire is a historic county in the South of England. It is also often referred to as the Royal County of Berkshire because of the presence of the royal residence of Windsor Castle in the county; this usage, which dates to the 19th century at least, was recognised by the Queen in 1957, and...
, Catcot, the minister, publicly thanking him for his services. After this he officiated at a few places in the neighbourhood of London. At length, on the death of John Munckley (August 1738), he was strongly recommended by Benjamin Avery
Benjamin Avery
Benjamin Avery, LL.D. was an English physician.-Life:Avery was originally a presbyterian minister at Bartholomew Close, London, but quitted the ministry in 1720, in consequence of the Salters' Hall controversy on subscription, 1719, He practised as a physician, and was treasurer of Guy's Hospital...
as a suitable candidate for the charge of the presbyterian congregation at Bartholomew Close. Here Fleming and William May were ordained as joint pastors in 1740. Fleming had scruples about presbyterian forms, and classed himself as an independent. At his ordination, conducted by Samuel Chandler
Samuel Chandler
Samuel Chandler was an English Nonconformist minister.-Life:He was born at Hungerford in Berkshire, where his father was a minister. He was sent to school at Gloucester, where he began a lifelong friendship with Bishop Butler and Archbishop Secker; and he afterwards studied at Leiden...
, D.D., Jeremiah Hunt, D.D., a learned independent, and others, he refused to submit to the imposition of hands, His confession of faith was unique. He would only say that he believed the New Testament contained 'a revelation worthy of God to give and of man to receive;' and this he promised to teach in the sense in which he should 'from time to time' understand it. It was soon rumoured that Fleming was a Socinian. His congregation was never large, and the scantiness of his stipend reduced him to straits. His friends fell off, with the exception of Jeremiah Hunt. After Hunt's death (1744) Fleming contracted an intimacy with Nathaniel Lardner, D.D., his neighbour in Hoxton Square
Hoxton Square
Hoxton Square is a garden square situated in Hoxton in the London Borough of Hackney, in London's East End. Formerly home to industrial premises, since the 1990s it has become the heart of the Hoxton arts and media scene, as well as being a hub of the thriving local entertainment district...
, and co-operated with him in literary work.
In January 1752 James Foster
James Foster (baptist minister)
James Foster was an English Baptist minister.-Early life:Foster was born and baptized at Exeter, 6 September 1697. Most of our biographical knowledge of him comes from memoirs attached to a sermon preached at his funeral by his friend and colleague, Caleb Fleming...
, became disabled from preaching. John Weatherley (d. May 1752), a General Baptist
General Baptist
General Baptists is a generic term for Baptists who hold the view of a general atonement, as well as a specific name of groups of Baptists within the broader category.General Baptists are distinguished from Particular or Reformed Baptists.-History:...
minister, who supplied Foster's place, met Fleming at Hamlin's Coffee-house, and engaged him for a Sunday at Pinners' Hall, an Independent congregation. He attracted the notice of Timothy Hollis, was soon afterwards elected as Foster's assistant, and on Foster's death (5 November 1753) as pastor. The Bartholomew Close congregation then came to an end, its few remaining members joining Pinners' Hall. For nearly a quarter of a century Fleming remained at his post; his ministry, though painstaking, was not popular, and when he ceased to preach, in December 1777, his congregation became extinct, the lease of their meeting-house expiring in 1778. He had admirers, who left him considerable legacies, among them being a bequest by a Suffolk gentleman (Reynolds), who had once heard him preach but did not know his name. A wealthy widow placed her whole fortune at his disposal. Fleming, however, declined to be enriched at the expense of her needy relatives.
In his old age his friend William Dalrymple of Ayr procured for him the degree of D.D. from St. Andrews. Fleming was inclined to reject this ‘compliment;’ but his friend Thomas Hollis
Thomas Hollis
Thomas Hollis was an English political philosopher and author.-Early life:Hollis was educated at Adams Grammar School until the age 10, and then in St. Albans until 15, before learning French, Dutch and accountancy in Amsterdam. After the death of his father in 1735, his guardian was a John...
‘put it into the public papers,’ so Fleming accepted it in a characteristic letter (6 April 1769).
After completing his seventy-ninth year, Fleming retired. He died on 21 July 1779, and was buried in Bunhill Fields
Bunhill Fields
Bunhill Fields is a cemetery in the London Borough of Islington, north of the City of London, and managed by the City of London Corporation. It is about 4 hectares in extent, although historically was much larger....
. He left an epitaph for his gravestone, in which he describes himself as ‘dissenting teacher,’ and expresses a conditional hope of immortality. For this, however, was substituted a eulogistic inscription by Joseph Towers
Joseph Towers
-Life:He was born in Southwark on 31 March 1737. His father was a secondhand bookseller, and at twelve years old he was employed as a stationer's errand boy. In 1754 he was apprenticed to Robert Goadby of Sherborne, Dorset, a Whig supporter, and influential through his newspaper, the Sherborne...
, LL.D. His funeral sermon was preached by John Palmer
John Palmer (Unitarian, 1729?–1790)
John Palmer was an English Unitarian minister.-Life:He was born about 1729 in Southwark, where his father was an undertaker. His parents were independents, and he was educated for the congregational ministry, under David Jennings, D.D....
at New Broad Street. A portrait of Fleming, by William Chamberlain
William Chamberlain
William Chamberlain may refer to:* William Chamberlain , U.S. Representative from Vermont* William Charles Chamberlain , Royal Navy rear admiral...
, was bequeathed by him to Dr. Williams's Library. An engraving by Hopwood is given in Wilson.
Works
Fleming's major work is ‘A Survey of the Search after Souls,’ 1758, dedicated to Nicolas Munckley, M.D. The title and topic were suggested by the writings of William CowardWilliam Coward
William Coward was an English physician, controversial writer, and poet. He is now remembered for his sceptical writings on the soul, which Parliament condemned as blasphemous and ordered to be burned in his presence.-Life:...
. To prove, against Coward, the existence of a separate soul, Fleming employs the arguments of Samuel Clarke
Samuel Clarke
thumb|right|200px|Samuel ClarkeSamuel Clarke was an English philosopher and Anglican clergyman.-Early life and studies:...
, and especially of Andrew Baxter
Andrew Baxter
Andrew Baxter was a Scottish metaphysician.Baxter was educated at King's College, University of Aberdeen. He maintained himself by acting as tutor to noblemen's sons. From 1741 to 1747 he lived with Lord Blantyre and Mr Hay of Drummelzier at Utrecht, and made excursions in Flanders, France and...
. He does not contend that the soul is inherently immortal, but simply that it possesses a ‘capacity of immortality.’ His view of the resurrection was adopted by John Cameron (1724–1799).
Fleming was an unwearied writer of argumentative and combative pamphlets, the greater part of them being anonymous. His political brochures, in defence of civil liberty and against the Jacobites
Jacobitism
Jacobitism was the political movement in Britain dedicated to the restoration of the Stuart kings to the thrones of England, Scotland, later the Kingdom of Great Britain, and the Kingdom of Ireland...
, church establishments, and the toleration of popery, are tart enough. Against the theological writers of his time, high and low, he entered the field with confident vigour. He attacked Thomas Sherlock
Thomas Sherlock
Thomas Sherlock was a British divine who served as a Church of England bishop for 33 years. He is also noted in church history as an important contributor to Christian apologetics.-Life:...
, Soame Jenyns
Soame Jenyns
Soame Jenyns was an English writer.- Biography :He was the son of Sir Roger Jenyns and his second wife Elizabeth Soame, the daughter of Sir Peter Soame. He was born in London, and was educated at St Johns College, Cambridge. In 1742 he was chosen M.P...
, John Wesley
John Wesley
John Wesley was a Church of England cleric and Christian theologian. Wesley is largely credited, along with his brother Charles Wesley, as founding the Methodist movement which began when he took to open-air preaching in a similar manner to George Whitefield...
, the Sabbatarians as represented by Robert Cornthwaite, and the Muggletonians. His most severe, and perhaps his best remembered, publication is his ‘character’ of Thomas Bradbury
Thomas Bradbury
-Life:Bradbury was born in Yorkshire, and was educated for the congregational ministry Attercliffe Academy; Oliver Heywood gave him books. He preached his first sermon on 14 June 1696, and went to reside as assistant and domestic tutor with Thomas Whitaker, minister of the independent congregation,...
, ‘taken from his own pen.’
The topics to which he most frequently recurred were the defence of infant baptism
Infant baptism
Infant baptism is the practice of baptising infants or young children. In theological discussions, the practice is sometimes referred to as paedobaptism or pedobaptism from the Greek pais meaning "child." The practice is sometimes contrasted with what is called "believer's baptism", or...
and of the authority of the New Testament against the deists, especially Thomas Chubb
Thomas Chubb
Thomas Chubb was an English lay Deist writer, born near Salisbury.Chubb regarded Christ as a divine teacher, but held reason to be sovereign in matters of religion, questioned religions' morality, yet was on rational grounds a defender of Christianity...
, whom he is said to have impressed. His own theology, as may be seen in his ‘True Deism, the Basis of Christianity,’ 1749, was little more than a specially authenticated deism
Deism
Deism in religious philosophy is the belief that reason and observation of the natural world, without the need for organized religion, can determine that the universe is the product of an all-powerful creator. According to deists, the creator does not intervene in human affairs or suspend the...
. He retains the ‘supernatural conception,’ minimised after a fashion of his own, and the miracles of Christ, which ‘did not introduce a single unnatural phenomenon,’ but ‘removed defects in nature’ (True Deism, p. 14). In a manuscript sermon (10 October 1773) he ranks Confucius, Socrates, Plato, Cicero, and Seneca among organs of divine revelation. Many of his pamphlets and sermons attempt to deal with the problem of a general depravity of morals. Under the title of ‘A Modern Plan,’ 1748, he drew up ‘a compendium of moral institutes,’ in the shape of a catechism
Catechism
A catechism , i.e. to indoctrinate) is a summary or exposition of doctrine, traditionally used in Christian religious teaching from New Testament times to the present...
in which the learner asks the questions.
Walter Wilson
Walter Wilson (biographer)
Walter Wilson was an English biographer of nonconformist clergy and their churches.-Life:He was born about 1781, the illegitimate son of John Walter, the newspaper publisher. He was brought up a Presbyterian, and went to work at East India House as a clerk. In 1802 he went into journalism, and in...
enumerates sixty of Fleming's publications. The following are not included in Wilson's list. Most of them will be found in Dr. Williams's Library, Grafton Street, W.C.; others are from a collection formed by Fleming's nephew:
- ‘The Parent Disinherited by his Offspring,’ &c., 1728.
- ‘Observations on Some Articles of the Muggletonians' Creed,’ &c., 1735,(answered in ‘The Principles of the Muggletonians,’ &c., 1735, by A. B., i.e. Arden Bonell).
- ‘An Appeal to the People of England,’ &c. [1739].
- ‘The Challenge … on … Baptism,’ &c., 1743.
- ‘A Fine Picture of Enthusiasm,’ &c. 1744.
- ‘A Letter to the Rev. Charles Willats upon his Assize Sermon,’ &c., 1744.
- ‘Remarks upon the Life of John Duke of Argyle,’ &c., 1745.
- ‘Tracts on Baptism,’ &c., 1745 (a collection of six previous pieces, with an introduction).
- ‘A Fund raising for the Italian Gentleman,’ &c., 1750 (the reference is to the Young Pretender).
- ‘The Devout Laugh,’ &c., 1750.
- ‘Natural and Revealed Religion at Variance,’ &c., 1758 (against Thomas SherlockThomas SherlockThomas Sherlock was a British divine who served as a Church of England bishop for 33 years. He is also noted in church history as an important contributor to Christian apologetics.-Life:...
). - ‘A Letter to the Rev. John Stevens,’ &c., 1760.
- ‘The Pædo-Baptist's sense of Positive Institutions,’ &c., n.d.
- ‘Grammatical Observations on the English Language,’ &c., 1765.
- ‘A few Strictures relative to the Author,’ prefixed to ‘An Enquiry,’ &c., 1776, by Paul CardalePaul Cardale-Life:He was educated at the dissenting academy of Ebenezer Latham, M.D., at Findern, Derbyshire, from 1720. Early in life he became an assistant minister for the Presbyterians at Kidderminster, and preached there in 1726...
. - ‘Two Discourses,’ &c., 1778.
Some of Cardale's anonymous pieces have sometimes been ascribed to Fleming. He edited many works by divines and others, including the first volume (1756) of Thomas Amory
Thomas Amory
Thomas Amory was a writer of Irish descent.In 1755 he published Memoirs containing the lives of several ladies of Great Britain, a History of Antiquities and Observations on the Christian Religion, which was followed by the Life of John Buncle, Esq. , practically a continuation...
's ‘Life of John Buncle.’