James Stillingfleet (priest, born 1741)
James Stillingfleet (1741–1826) was an English evangelical cleric, vicar of Hotham in Yorkshire from 1771 until his death.
Early life
Born into a clerical family, he was the son of the Rev. Edward Stillingfleet (died 1777), vicar of
The elder James Stillingfleet, a Fellow of Merton College until 1767, was prominent in Oxford as a leading evangelical: he led Methodist prayer meetings, associated with
In Yorkshire
Stillingfleet took up in 1766 the position of chaplain to Richard Richardson of Bierley Hall.
In 1771 Stillingfleet became a parish priest, at Hotham, south of the market town Market Weighton in the East Riding. At a later point, he set up the Hotham Society, to emulate the Elland Society in the West Riding founded by Henry Venn at Huddersfield, which from 1777 was in a position to fund an Oxbridge education for potential ordinands.[8][11]
Stillingfleet became a close friend of
The evangelical clerical societies of the later 18th centuries worked to provide graduate priests.
Stillingfleet in 1775 built a house, Hotham Villa, near the existing rectory which was a cottage; from 1870 to the 1950s it was used as the rectory.
Works
Thomas Adam, parish priest at Wintringham for half a century, ran a "Parson's Club" and associated with Stillingfleet and his friends.[19][16] His Posthumous Works (1786) were edited by the Hotham Society group of Stillingfleet, Joseph Milner and William Richardson of York, with Stillingfleet providing the biographical introduction signed "J.S".[13][20]
A slim volume of diary entries from these Works, entitled Private Thoughts on Religion, became a religious classic.[13] It was in demand from Anglican evangelicals, and was reprinted through the 19th century in the UK and USA.[21] Through the work, Thomas Adam was known in the family of Jacques Reclus.[22] In 1848 Edward Bickersteth combined "Thoughts on Religion" from the Pensées with Private Thoughts, which was organised in a similar way.[13][23] John Henry Overton, writing in 1881, called Private Thoughts a "once popular devotional book", but also "of no small merit", characterising Stillingfleet as Adam's "pious and accomplished biographer" who revived interest in William Law.[24]
Stillingfleet himself published:
- A Sermon Preached at the Opening of the General Infirmary at Hull, on Wednesday the First of September, 1784.[25]
- A Short and Familiar Explanation of the Church-Catechism (1787)[26]
He edited:
- Sermons on important subjects : selected from the papers of the Rev. John King, B. A. Late Vicar of Middleton, near Pickering, and Minister of St. Mary's, Hull (1782), with a funeral sermon.[27]
Family
In 1774, Stillingfleet married Elizabeth Taylor, daughter of William Taylor (died 1752) of
Edward William Stillingfleet, who was curate of Hotham from 1814 to 1844, was James's son.[30]
Notes
- ^ a b Burke, John; Burke, Bernard (1850). A Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary of the Landed Gentry of Great Britain & Ireland. H. Colburn. p. 1307 – via Google Books.
- ISBN 978-1-911576-04-4– via Google Books.
- ^ Alumni Oxonienses: the Members of the University of Oxford, 1715–1886. Oxford: Parker and Co – via Wikisource.
- Alumni Oxonienses: the Members of the University of Oxford, 1715–1886. Oxford: Parker and Co – via Wikisource.
- ^ Newton, John (1790). The Christian Correspondent; Or a Series of Religious Letters, Written by ... John Newton ... to Captain A. Clunie, from the Year 1761 to ... 1770. p. 104 – via Google Books.
- ^ ISBN 978-0-8308-9964-7– via Google Books.
- ISBN 978-0-8028-4741-6.
- ^ a b c d e f "CalmView: Record zDDX1041 - Reverend Stillingfleet of Hotham Records". www.eastriding.gov.uk.
- ^ "The Richardsons and their Garden at Bierley Hall". Bradford Historical & Antiquarian Society.
- Cudworth, William (1876). Round about Bradford: A Series of Sketches (descriptive and Semi-historical) of Forty-two Places Within Six Miles of Bradford. T. Brear. p. 73 – via Google Books. - ISBN 978-0-19-251823-1– via Google Books.
- ISBN 978-1-4438-0697-8– via Google Books.
- ISBN 978-1-78327-439-0– via Google Books.
- ^ doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/18792. (Subscription or UK public library membershiprequired.)
- ^ "Memoir of the Rev. William Richardson". The Christian Guardian and Church of England Magazine: 281–282. August 1831 – via Google Books.
- ^ Lee, Sidney, ed. (1894). . Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 38. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
- ^ JSTOR 3020566
- ^ Cave, Edward; Nichols, John (1836). "OBITUARy - Clergy dusused". The Gentleman's Magazine: 563 – via Google Books.
- "Wasney, Robert (WSNY791R)". A Cambridge Alumni Database. University of Cambridge.
- "Wasney, Robert (1795–1796) (CCEd Person ID 111001)". The Clergy of the Church of England Database 1540–1835. Retrieved 16 May 2020.
- Fenwick, John (1836). John Fenwick (ed.). Obituaries of James Losh, esquire, mr. John Bruce, Robert Hopper Williamson, esquire, and the rev. Robert Wasney. p. 22 – via Google Books. - ^ Transactions of the Society, Instituted at London, for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures ... The Society. 1797. pp. 157–162.
- doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/106. (Subscription or UK public library membershiprequired.)
- . Bell. 1876. p. 474 – via Google Books.
- JSTOR 24900188
- JSTOR 43500590
- ^ Pascal, Blaise; Adam, Thomas (1833). Thoughts on Religion. R.B. Seeley & W. Burnside – via Google Books.
- ^ Overton, John Henry (1881). William Law, Nonjuror and Mystic. London: Longmans, Green. p. 111.
- ^ The English Review, Or, An Abstract of English and Foreign Literature. J. Murray. 1785. p. 310 – via Google Books.
- ^ Stillingfleet, James (1787). A Short and Familiar Explanation of the Church-Catechism, Third Edition. [With the Text.]. A. Ward – via Google Books.
- ^ Rev James Stillingfleet (1782). "Sermons on important subjects : selected from the papers of the Rev. John King, B. A. Late Vicar of Middleton, near Pickering, and Minister of St. Mary's, Hull. To which is added a sermon preached at his funeral". Hull History Centre Catalogue.
- Frost, Charles (1831). An address delivered to the literary and Philosophical Society at Kingston upon Hull: at the opening of the seventh session, on Friday, November 5th, 1830 ... I. Wilson. p. 37 – via Google Books. - ISBN 978-0-300-08499-3.
- ^ "Stondon Massey: Manor". British History Online.
- Alumni Oxonienses: the Members of the University of Oxford, 1715–1886. Oxford: Parker and Co – via Wikisource.