Life

Pike was born about 1717 at "Ramsey, Wiltshire" (Wilson), which may mean Ramsbury

Ramsbury

Ramsbury is a village in Ramsbury and Axford civil parish in the English county of Wiltshire. The village is in the Kennet Valley near the Berkshire boundary. The nearest towns are Hungerford about east and Marlborough about west. The much larger town of Swindon is about to the north.The civil...

, Wiltshire but more probably Romsey

Romsey

Romsey is a small market town in the county of Hampshire, England.It is 8 miles northwest of Southampton and 11 miles southwest of Winchester, neighbouring the village of North Baddesley...

, Hampshire . He was educated for the independent ministry, receiving his general training from John Eames

John Eames

-Life:He was a native of London. He was admitted to Merchant Taylors' School on 10 March 1696–7, and was subsequently trained for the dissenting ministry. He preached only once and seems never to have been ordained....

 of the Fund academy, and his theology from John Hubbard at Stepney academy. His first settlement was at Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire, about 1740. Thence he removed in 1747 to succeed John Hill (1711–1746) as pastor at the Three Cranes meeting-house in 'Fruiterers' Alley, Thames Street, London. Early in his London ministry he established, at his house 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...

, an academy for training students for the ministry. He adopted the principles of John Hutchinson

John Hutchinson (writer)

John Hutchinson was an English theological writer.He was born at Spennithorne, Yorkshire, and served as steward in several families of position, latterly in that of the Duke of Somerset, who ultimately obtained for him the post of riding purveyor to the master of the horse, a sinecure worth about...

 (1674–1737), and defended them (1753) in a laborious work. In 1754 he succeeded Zephaniah Marryat, D.D. (1684?–1754), as one of the Tuesday lecturers at Pinners' Hall. About the same time he joined Samuel Hayward (1718–1757), independent minister at Silver Street, Wood Street, Cheapside, in a Sunday-evening lecture, dealing with ‘cases of conscience,’ at Little St. Helen's, Bishopsgate Street. His ‘Body of Divinity’ (1755) was criticised by Caleb Fleming

Caleb Fleming

Caleb Fleming, D.D. was an English dissenting minister and polemicist.-Life:Fleming was born at Nottingham 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...

.

In 1757 Pike became acquainted with the views of Robert Sandeman

Robert Sandeman

Robert Sandeman may refer to:*Robert Sandeman , whose teachings became known as Sandemanianism*Robert Groves Sandeman , Indian officer and administrator...

, the son-in-law and disciple of John Glas

John Glas

John Glas was a Scottish clergyman who started the Glasite church movement.He was born at Auchtermuchty, Fife, where his father was parish minister. He was educated at Kinclaven and Perth Grammar School, graduated from the University of St Andrews in 1713, and completed his education for the...

. Sandeman had published (1757) a series of Letters dealing with the Dialogues between Theron and Aspasio (1755), by James Hervey

James Hervey

James Hervey was an English clergyman and writer.-Life:He was born at Hardingstone, near Northampton, and was educated at the grammar school of Northampton, and at Lincoln College, Oxford. Here he came under the influence of John Wesley and the Oxford Methodists, especially since he was a member...

 (1714–1758). The Letters were admired by members of Pike's church; and Pike, on reading them, began (17 Jan. 1758) a correspondence with Sandeman, then in Edinburgh. The correspondence, as it proceeded, was communicated to Pike's church, with the result that he, and a section of his people, came gradually into Sandeman's views; while others showed such dissatisfaction that Pike ceased the correspondence, suppressing his fourth letter. He began, however, to adopt Glassite or Sandemanian usages, including a weekly communion. This led (August 1758) to rumours of his unsoundness; his discourses at Pinners' Hall gave offence, and he was excluded from the lectureship in 1759 by forty-four votes to one, Dr. John Conder

John Conder

John Conder D.D. was an Independent minister at Cambridge who later became President of the Independent College, Homerton in the parish of Hackney near London.-Life:...

being chosen to succeed him on 3 Oct. In his own church he was hotly opposed by William Fuller and Thomas Uffington. A church meeting (9 Oct. 1759) came to no conclusion; church meetings on 13 Jan. and 21 April 1760 were equally divided (seventeen votes on either side), but Pike's casting vote carried the exclusion of the malcontents, who formed a new church under Joseph Barber. Disputes then arose about possession of church property, and a lawsuit was begun (1761) by Pike for recovery of an endowment of 12l. a year. At length he resigned his charge (14 Dec. 1765), left the independents, and became a member of the Sandemanian church in Bull-and-Mouth Street, St. Martin's-le-Grand. He was chosen ‘elder’ in 1766, and ministered with great acceptance.

From London he removed in 1771 to minister to a Sandemanian congregation at Trowbridge, Wiltshire. Unfounded reports were spread of his insobriety. Pike was a follower of the doctrines of Hutchinson, who found in scripture a system of physical science, and then became a follower of Glas, who held that biblical authority did not extend to such topics. He died at Trowbridge in January 1773, and was buried on 10 Jan. in the parish churchyard. His portrait, engraved by Hopwood, is given in Wilson. He was married, and left issue.

Works

He published, besides single sermons (1748–53):

• Philosophia Sacra … Natural Philosophy. Extracted from Divine Revelation, &c., 1753, 8vo; Edinburgh, 1815, 8vo.
• Thoughts on such Phrases of Scripture as ascribe … Passions to the Deity, &c., 1753, 12mo.
• Some important Cases of Conscience, &c., 1755–6, 8vo, 2 vols. (the substance of lectures by Pike and Hayward); Glasgow, 1762, 8vo; with title ‘Religious Cases of Conscience, 1775, 8vo; 1807, 8vo; Romsey, 1819, 8vo; Philadelphia [1859], 12mo; with title ‘The Doubtful Christian encouraged, &c., Woodbridge [1800], 8vo; in Welsh, 1769, 12mo.
• A form of Sound Words; or … Body of Divinity, &c., 1755, 12mo; 1756, 12mo (based on the shorter catechism of the Westminster assembly).
• Public Fasting, &c., 1757, 12mo; 1758, 8vo.
• An Epistolary Correspondence between … Pike and … Sandeman, &c., 1758, 8vo; in Welsh, 1765, 12mo.
• Saving Grace, Sovereign Grace, &c., 1758, 8vo (lectures at Pinners' Hall); 1825, 8vo.
• Free Grace indeed! &c., 1759, 8vo; 1760, 12mo.
• A … Narrative of the … Schism in the Church under … Pike, &c., 1760, 8vo.
• Simple Truth Vindicated, &c., 1760, 12mo (anon).
• The Nature and Evidence of Saving Faith, &c., 1764, 8vo.
• A Plain … Account of … Practices observed by the Church in St. Martin's-le-Grand, &c., 1766, 8vo; 1767, 12mo.
• A Compendious Hebrew Lexicon, &c., 1766, 8vo (annexed is a short grammar); Glasgow, 1802, 8vo.