ARE INSCRIBED
TO THE YOUNG PERSONS
OF THE INDEPENDENT CHURCH AND CONGREGATION
AT BECCLES.
PREFACE.
Many months ago, I was favoured with a perusal of the earliest records of the Independent church at Beccles. An interest in the subject once excited, I went on to collect such other materials for its history as fell in my way: and the re-opening of its place of worship, after considerable alteration, appeared a suitable time for offering these records to notice, in a permanent and connected form.
Publications of dissenting church history have not usually received extensive encouragement. That circumstance is, I believe, chiefly attributable to the anxiety of dissenting ministers and parents, in general, to inculcate and maintain the principles of personal religion, rather than the peculiarities of nonconformity. A just preference, unquestionably,—but which has betrayed many into a neglect of topics immensely, though not supremely, important. The youth of dissenting families too frequently grow up in ignorance of any other reason for their nonconformity than parental example. The natural result is, that “by and by, when persecution ariseth,” or when fashion, or emolument, or the attractive pomp of the national worship, allures, they forsake the ground which their ancestors maintained at the peril of liberty, and of life itself.
Viewed in this light, the prevalent disregard of such subjects becomes a powerful inducement to invite attention to them. Nor am I altogether without hope that local associations and attachments, may, in the present instance, be subservient to such a purpose. At all events, I am desirous that my humble compilation should not be regarded as a mere depository of what is curious; but should tend to encourage a thoughtful and candid investigation of the history and principles of nonconformity, as they are developed in works of wider interest and higher literary pretensions. [vi]
Hence I have been induced to sketch at some length, though, I am aware, very imperfectly, the rise of nonconformity in the East Anglian counties,—a topic which deserves to be separately discussed, with the aids of extensive knowledge and ample leisure.