Great Tew Circle

The Great Tew Circle was a group of clerics and literary figures who gathered in the 1630s at the manor house of Great Tew, Oxfordshire in southern England, and in London.^[1]

Lord Clarendon referred to the Circle as "A college situate in a purer air", referring to its pursuit of truth away from the partisan passions of the town. The house was the property of the noble Cary family, and the circle was brought together by Lucius Cary, who became 2nd Viscount Falkland on the death of his father in 1633. The most prominent of those taking part was Edward Hyde, the future 1st Earl of Clarendon, who after 1660 would become known as a leading statesman, and then a historian.^[2]

Views

 

Late engraving (1811) of Lord Falkland, after a portrait by Cornelis Janssens van Ceulen

In the vexed religious climate of the time, the Circle was heterodox, inclining to sympathy with Socinianism.^[3] The favoured approach of some of those involved has been defined as "Arminian humanism", and in any case opposed to rigid Calvinism;^[4] this approach fitted with political views that were essentially royalist.^[5] The central religious figure of the Circle was William Chillingworth.^[6] Falkland himself had a Catholic convert, Elizabeth Cary, Lady Falkland, for his mother, and found the tolerant approach of Erasmus attractive.^[7] He organised the circle with his wife Lettice.^[8]

Influences

Major influences on the thinking of the circle were Hugo Grotius^[1] and Richard Hooker because of the place the latter made for the use of reason in Biblical interpretation and church polity.^[9] These writers formed part of the broader Christian humanist tradition of Jacobus Acontius, George Cassander, Sebastian Castellio, Bernardino Ochino and Faustus Socinus.^[1] The anti-patristic views of Jean Daillé were also significant.^[10] According to the writings of Hyde (as Lord Clarendon), the gatherings and discussions themselves were modelled on those of Cicero and Erasmus, with guests being welcome to differ on points of view. Discourse also took place around the dinner table, with Clarendon likening the "Convivium Philosophicum or Convivium Theologicum ("philosophical-" or "theological feast") to Erasmus's Convivium Religiosum ("godly feast")."^[1]

Tolerance, eirenicism, latitude

Chillingworth was influenced by Acontius, and the Circle read Acontius alongside Johannes Crellius, a Socinian.^[11] They found greater relevance in the eirenicism of Acontius than in the theology (Unitarianism) of Socinus himself.^[12] The context, as explained by the historian Hugh Trevor-Roper, was that of the Thirty Years' War with its Protestant defeats of the 1620s and Catholic expansion; but also of the doctrines of the contra-Remonstrants in an environment of increasing skepticism on religious matters.^[13] Falkland and Chillingworth had been seared by the "Pyrrhonian crisis" of skepticism rampant.^[14] Opposed to fideism, the Circle found in the use by Grotius of probabilism a more attractive option to deal with the challenge of skepticism.^[15]

Trevor-Roper supported the claims of the Great Tew group to the eirenic moral high ground on religious toleration and a commitment to rational dialogue on religion. This analysis has been challenged from the direction of the Circle's political thought, with its commitment to sovereignty. It has also been argued that these are two sides to the understanding of the period of the term "Socinian".^[3] The eirenic style was understood by Puritan opponents as Arminian rhetoric, and they moved away from compromise with it, to polemic and contemplation of war.^[16]

The major theologians of the circle (Chillingworth, Hales, Taylor) have regularly been claimed as precursors of the Latitudinarians, a term anachronistic before 1660.^[17] They are now considered to have paved the way for the Cambridge Platonists, in the attitude that there is no single basis for essential and true beliefs.^[18] The distinction now usual between the Cambridge Platonists and other Latitudinarians is a conventional one, introduced by John Tulloch in the 19th century.^[19]

Participants

Participation in any actual dialogues as described by Hyde is problematic to establish; and the time scale has different points on it, though a beginning date of 1634 (Martinich) seems to be agreed widely. After about 1640 the troubled political situation overshadowed theoretical discussion and writing. The influence of the circle can be traced in theological production (especially Chillingworth's Religion of Protestants, 1638),^[20] literary works and translation in a humanist vein, and the political line pursued by Falkland and Hyde in 1640–1, attempting to find a middle position between Puritan and Laudian extremes.

 

Memorial to Falkland, who died at the first battle of Newbury of 1643, fighting recklessly on the royalist side, some 30 miles south of Great Tew

Among those mentioned as being in Falkland's circle are:

Churchmen

• George Aglionby^[21]
• Thomas Barlow^[22]
• William Chillingworth^[22]
• Hugh Paulinus Cressy^[22]
• John Earle^[22]
• Charles Gataker^[23]
• John Hales^[22][24]
• Henry Hammond^[22]
• George Morley^[22][24]
• Walter Raleigh the cleric.^[25]
• Gilbert Sheldon^[22][24]
• Jeremy Taylor.^[26]

Men of letters

• Thomas Carew^[27]
• Charles Cotton (died 1658), father of Charles Cotton the poet.^[28]
• Abraham Cowley^[23]
• Sidney Godolphin^[29]
• George Sandys^[30]
• Sir John Suckling^[27]
• Thomas Triplet^[23]
• Edmund Waller^[24]

Politicians and lawyers

• Dudley Digges^[31]
• Edward Hyde^[22]
• John Selden^[32]

Associations

Since Great Tew was best known as an open house for Oxford scholars, and Falkland's contacts included a group centred on London and the court, it is artificial at best to assign membership in the circle to some who are known to have associated with the group.

• Thomas Hobbes.^[27] Whether Hobbes actually visited Great Tew is unclear; he possibly did so in 1634. His associations with the circle through friendships are more certain in a London context.^[33]
• Poets: Ben Jonson was on good terms with members of the circle, and visited Great Tew;^[34][35] Thomas May associated with the circle.^[36]
• Wits: George Digby and Sir John Vaughan.^[37][38]
• Katherine Jones, Viscountess Ranelagh, who moved to England from Ireland after the 1641 rebellion.^[39]
• Sons of Thomas Coventry, 1st Baron Coventry.^[40]
• Francis Wenman and Henry Rainsford, friends and neighbours of Falkland, linked to the Virginia Company of London.^[41][42]
• Robert Payne and Thomas Lockey, on the Great Tew–Oxford axis of the 1630s.^[43]
• The Catholics Kenelm Digby and Wat Montagu, possibly.^[23]
• Izaak Walton, biographer of Hooker, not likely to have participated at Great Tew, but close to a number of the Circle.^[44]

Relationship to other groups

 

Lettice Cary, Viscountess Falkland, as a widow

Falkland himself is identified as one of the Tribe of Ben, the followers of Jonson;^[45] and others of the Circle were also in the Tribe. Falkland also gave the first of the poetical tributes in the 1638 Oxford memorial volume Jonson Virbius, and others of the Circle who contributed were Henry Coventry, May and Digges.^[46]

Hales and Chillingworth have been identified with an "Oxford School of rational theology", containing also Christopher Potter and William Page.^[47] It has been said that, despite the political difference over the defence of episcopacy, there is no clear distinction between the Great Tew line and Laudianism in theology.^[48] Falkland, Hyde and Sir John Colepepper were leaders of the "Country Alliance" of 1640.^[49]

Katherine Jones was someone common to the Great Tew Circle and the Hartlib Circle.^[50] Robert Payne was a central figure in the so-called Welbeck Academy, around the Cavendishes, with which Hobbes was more closely associated than with Great Tew.^[51]

The widowed Lady Falkland (Lettice) took in John Duncon, brother of Eleazar Duncon and Edmund Duncon, who had lost his Essex rectory during the Civil war. He later wrote her biography (1648, in the form of an exchange of letters).^[52][53] It has been suggested that the household was run on lines similar to the Little Gidding community.^[54]

References

• A. P. Martinich, Hobbes: A Biography (1999)
• Noel Malcolm, Aspects of Hobbes (2002)

Notes

1. Gary Remer (31 January 2008). Humanism and the Rhetoric of Toleration. Penn State Press. p. 144. ISBN 978-0-271-02811-8. Retrieved 24 March 2012.
2. Ted-Larry Pebworth, ed. (2000). Literary circles and cultural communities in Renaissance England. University of Missouri Press. p. 174. ISBN 978-0-8262-1317-4. Retrieved 24 March 2012.
3. Sarah Mortimer (4 March 2010). Reason and Religion in the English Revolution: The Challenge of Socinianism. Cambridge University Press. pp. 63–5. ISBN 978-0-521-51704-1. Retrieved 24 March 2012.
4. See Arminianism in the Church of England.
5. Patrick Müller (19 January 2009). Latitudinarianism and didacticism in eighteenth century literature: moral theology in Fielding, Sterne, and Goldsmith. Peter Lang. p. 17. ISBN 978-3-631-59116-1. Retrieved 24 March 2012.
6. Tom Sorell (26 January 1996). The Cambridge Companion to Hobbes. Cambridge University Press. p. 22. ISBN 978-0-521-42244-4. Retrieved 24 March 2012.
7. Jean-Louis Quantin (25 April 2009). The Church of England and Christian antiquity: the construction of a confessional identity in the 17th century. Oxford University Press. p. 215. ISBN 978-0-19-955786-8. Retrieved 24 March 2012.
8. Allen, Elizabeth. "Cary [née Morison], Lettice, Viscountess Falkland". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/66709. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
9. Michael Brydon, The Evolving Reputation of Richard Hooker: An examination of responses 1600–1714 (2006), p. 52.
10. John William Packer (1969). The transformation of Anglicanism, 1643-1660: with special reference to Henry Hammond. Manchester University Press ND. pp. 69. GGKEY:2UELGKR2ZUF. Retrieved 24 March 2012.
11. John Marshall (30 March 2006). John Locke, Toleration and Early Enlightenment Culture: Religious Intolerance and Arguments for Religious Toleration in Early Modern and 'Early Enlightenment' Europe. Cambridge University Press. p. 324. ISBN 978-0-521-65114-1. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
12. Sarah Mortimer (4 March 2010). Reason and Religion in the English Revolution: The Challenge of Socinianism. Cambridge University Press. p. 6. ISBN 978-0-521-51704-1. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
13. Reid Barbour (2002). Literature and Religious Culture in Seventeenth-Century England. Cambridge University Press. pp. lxxx. ISBN 978-0-521-00664-4. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
14. Hugh Trevor-Roper, From Counter-Reformation to Glorious Revolution (1992), p. 176.
15. Daniel Garber; Michael Ayers (2003). The Cambridge History of Seventeenth-Century Philosophy. Cambridge University Press. pp. 1034 and 399. ISBN 978-0-521-53720-9. Retrieved 26 March 2012.
16. Gregory D. Dodds (9 April 2009). Exploiting Erasmus: the Erasmian legacy and religious change in early modern England. University of Toronto Press. p. 212. ISBN 978-0-8020-9900-6. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
17. E.g. Edward Augustus George, Seventeenth Century Men of Latitude; forerunners of the new theology (1908); [1].
18. Knud Haakonssen, ed. (2 November 2006). Enlightenment and Religion: Rational Dissent in Eighteenth-Century Britain. Cambridge University Press. p. 20. ISBN 978-0-521-02987-2. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
19. Martin Ignatius Joseph Griffin; Richard Henry Popkin; Lila Freedman (1992). Latitudinarianism in the seventeenth-century Church of England. BRILL. p. 12. ISBN 978-90-04-09653-0. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
20. In full The Religion of Protestants, a safe way to salvation, or, An answer to a booke entitle Mercy and truth, or, Charity maintain'd by Catholiques, which pretends to prove the contrary (Oxford, 1638).
21. Malcolm, p.92 note 53.
22. Brückmann, Patricia C. "Cressy, Hugh Paulinus". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/6676. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
23. Martinich, p. 103.
24. Chernaik, Warren. "Chillingworth, William". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/5308. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
25. Underdown, David. "Raleigh, Walter". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/23040. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
26. Kim Ian Parker; Canadian Corporation for Studies in Religion (1 March 2004). The biblical politics of John Locke. Wilfrid Laurier Univ. Press. p. 17. ISBN 978-0-88920-450-8. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
27. Jagger, Nicholas. "Carew, Thomas". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/4842. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
28. Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon (12 February 2009). The History of the Rebellion: A New Selection. Oxford University Press. p. 489. ISBN 978-0-19-160777-6. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
29. Duffin, Anne. "Godolphin, Sidney". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/10881. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
30. Ellison, James. "Sandys, George". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/24651. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
31. Martinich, pp. 63–4.
32. Martinich, pp. 63–4, and p. 217.
33. Tom Sorell (26 January 1996). The Cambridge Companion to Hobbes. Cambridge University Press. p. 23. ISBN 978-0-521-42244-4. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
34. Donaldson, Ian. "Jonson, Benjamin". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/15116. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
35. Martinich, p. 217.
36. Norbrook, David. "May, Thomas". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/18423. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
37. Robert Wilcher (2007). The discontented cavalier: the work of Sir John Suckling in its social, religious, political, and literary contexts. Associated University Presse. p. 175. ISBN 978-0-87413-996-9. Retrieved 24 March 2012.
38. Gordon McMullan; Jonathan Hope (1992). The Politics of tragicomedy: Shakespeare and after. Routledge. pp. 40. ISBN 978-0-415-06403-3. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
39. Sylvia Monica Brown (2007). Women, gender, and radical religion in early modern Europe. BRILL. p. 289. ISBN 978-90-04-16306-5. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
40. Hegarty, A. J. "Potter, Christopher". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/22607. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
41. Malcolm, pp. 74–5.
42. Preston T. King (1993). Thomas Hobbes: critical assessments. Taylor & Francis. p. 348. ISBN 978-0-415-08081-1. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
43. Malcolm, p. 325.
44. Ted-Larry Pebworth (2000). Literary circles and cultural communities in Renaissance England. University of Missouri Press. p. 178. ISBN 978-0-8262-1317-4. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
45. Virginia Brackett (2008). The Facts On File Companion to British Poetry. Infobase Publishing. p. 452. ISBN 978-1-4381-0835-3. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
46. Barrett Wendell, The Temper of the Seventeenth Century in English Literature (1904), p. 136;archive.org.
47. Nicholas Tyacke (2001). Aspects of English Protestantism, c. 1530-1700. Manchester University Press. p. 279. ISBN 978-0-7190-5392-4. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
48. Paul D. L. Avis (2002). Anglicanism and the Christian Church: theological resources in historical perspective. Continuum International Publishing Group. p. 73. ISBN 978-0-567-08745-4. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
49. J. S. Morrill, The Revolt of the Provinces: Conservatives and Radicals in the English Civil War 1630–1650 (1980), p. 19.
50. Steven Shapin (1994). A social history of truth: civility and science in seventeenth-century England. University of Chicago Press. pp. 144 note 49. ISBN 978-0-226-75018-7. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
51. Juhana Lemetti (16 December 2011). Historical Dictionary of Hobbes's Philosophy. Scarecrow Press. p. 352. ISBN 978-0-8108-5065-1. Retrieved 3 April 2012.
52. "Duncon, Eleazar" . Dictionary of National Biography. London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1900.
53. John Duncon; Lettice Cary (viscountess Falkland.) (1760). The holy life and death of the lady Letice, vi-countess Falkland, with the returnes of spiritual comfort and grief in a devout soul. Repr. (of part of the 1648 ed.). Retrieved 29 March 2012.
54. A. L. Maycock, Nicholas Ferrar of Little Gidding (1938), note p. 231.