Abstract
Henry More was born into a well-established family of Lincolnshire gentry. He was baptised on October 12, 1614, at Grantham, the seventh son and twelfth child of Alexander More, Esquire, former Mayor and sometime Alderman of that town, a strict and pious Calvinist of a kind that was then fairly typical within the Anglican Church.1 The young Henry appears to have suffered from few wants as a child, and speaks on more than one occasion of his parents with sincere affection and gratitude.2 Judging from his surviving correspondence, he maintained his connections with several relations and with Grantham throughout his long life, and on a number of occasions attempted to assist the more needy amongst them.3
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Notes
The parish record of More’s baptism, now held in the Lincoln Public Records Office, is ink stained and hard to verify, and could in fact be 10th or 11‘“ rather than 12t’ October, although this is the date given by his biographers. I assume that he was born on, or within a few days of this date. On More’s family, see the introduction to More, The Complete Poems of Dr Henry More. ed A.B. Grosart (Chertsey Worthies Library, Blackburn, 1876) (hereafter Grosart), J. Peile, Biographical Register of Christ’s College, Cambridge (2 vols, Cambridge, 1910), vol. 1: 239 (hereafter Peile), and Richard Ward, The Life of the Learned and Pious Dr Henry More (1710): 15–17 and 24 (The edition used here, which includes its manuscript continuation and notes, is S. Hutton, C. Courtney, M. Courtney, R. Crocker, R. Hall (eds), Richard Ward: Life of Henry More, Parts 1 and 2 (Dordrecht, Kluwer, 2000) (hereafter Ward)
Our main sources for More’s early life are his own Praefatio Generalissima printed with his Opera Omnia (tom.2, 1679) (referred to as General Preface in the text here, but as PG in the notes), and the prefaces to his poems, particularly the prefatory letter “To his dear Father, Alexander More Esquire”, printed before his Psychodia Platonica (1642, hereafter PsyP) and Philosophicall Poems (1647; hereafter PP). All references here are to the latter, because it contains important additional verses, including the Democritus Platonissans of 1646 (hereafter DP), extensive and learned annotations on his poems and an annotated glossary, the “Interpretation General”.
See Appendix, below, especially letter number
‘To his dear Father’, PP A2v.
On Gabriel More, DD, Fellow of Christ’s (1608–23)., see Peile, vol. 1: 238–9. On More’s time at Eton, see Ward p.16. The three brothers who also attended Christ’s were Richard and Alexander (both matriculated 1615), and Gabriel (matriculated 1627).
Translated and quoted in Ward: 15–17. Alexander More’s will is also of interest in that it confirms the simple and literal Calvinism of More’s upbringing that the young Platonist was to rebel against (also held in the Lincolnshire Record Office).
Ward: 15. This is intended to deliberately contrast with ignorance of God in the unregenerate assumed by most Calvinists - for instance see Bunyan’s ‘Ignorance’ in The Pilgrim’s Progress, and the discussion below.
On Hales, see, DNB, and Elson, John Hales (1948); on Harrison and Wotton at Eton, see R. Birley, “Robert Boyle’s Head Master at Eton”, NRRS (1958): 104–14, which also discusses the remains of his library there.
Robert Boyle and John Beale, both students of Harrison, also rejected this doctrine early in their careers, and with them also it led eventually to a reassessment of scholasticism but a quite different theological and philosophical position. John Beale (1603–1683), DD, was early a correspondent of Robert Boyle and Samuel Hartlib, Fellow of the Royal Society and Chaplain to King Charles II. See DNB and Beale to Samuel Hartlib, November 28, 1659, Ms in Hartlib Papers, lx, fol.l; and also M. Stubbs, “John Beale, Philosophical Gardener of Herefordshire: Part 1. Prelude to the Royal Society (1608–1663)”“ AS, 39 (1982): 463–89, especially 467–71 on his early life. On Boyle, see Boyle, ”An Account of Philaretus during his Minority“, in R.E.W. Maddison, Robert Boyle (1969): 35. There are many biographies of Boyle. See below. On Glanvill, see J. I. Cope, Joseph Glanvill (St Louis, 1956): 1–8; and below
See John Spun, “’Latitudinarianism’ and the Restoration Church”, Historical Journal, 31 (1988): 6182, and see also More, Apology (1664) and below, Chapters 6 and 7.
On the whole question of Patristic Platonism and its background to Cambridge Platonism, and particularly the interest in Platonism amongst other Puritan intellectuals in this early period, see D.W. Dockrill, “The Heritage of Patristic Platonism in Seventeenth Century Philosophical Theology”, in Rogers et al (eds), Cambridge Platonism in Philosophical Context (Dordrecht, Kluwer: 1997: hereafter Rogers et al): 55–77, especially 57. See also the next chapter, below.
On Ward (1658–1723) and his connection to More, first as his sizar at Christ’s, and then as a disciple and for a brief period his rector at Ingoldsby, see Ward: ix-x.
Ward: 40–1, 80, 86–7, 91–92, and see also my “Illuminism in the Thought of Henry More”, in Rogers et al: chapter 9.
Ward: 34.
More, “Mastix his Private Letter to a Friend”, in Enthusiasmus Triumphatus (1656: hereafter El): 312 ff. See below, Chapter 4.
Ibid: 315.
On Gell and his influence, see below. On More’s early years at Christ’s, see also Peile, vol. 1: 239, and also C.C. Brown, “Henry More’s ‘Deep Retirement’: New Material on the Early Years of the Cambridge Platonist”, RES (1969): 445–454.
PG: section 8, omitted by Ward. More is referring here to the scholastic followers of Averroes. C.A. Staudenbaur, in “Gallileo, Ficino and Henry More’s Psychathanasia”, JHI, 29 (1968): 575, contends that More included an attack on monopsychism in his poems because Ficino had done so in his Platonic Theology. Although the structural parallels between More’s Psychodia and Ficino’s work are evident as Staudenbaur claims, monopsychism was still a lively issue in the seventeenth century. See below.
Nicolson: 299, and Ward, 17–18.
Op Om (tom.2, 1679): 758, translated in Ward: 18, and also, perhaps more elegantly, by More’s young admirer, the eccentric and quarrelsome Anglican poet, Edmund Elys, Letters on Several Subjects (1694): 6–7, and reproduced in Nicolson: 299–300.
PG: sect. 9, translated in Ward: 18–19.
More, in Ward: 19, summarises the message of this book thus: “That we should thoroughly put off, and extinguish our own Proper Will; that being thus dead to our selves, we may live alone unto God, and do all things by his Instinct, or plenary Permission.” See Jones, Spiritual Reformers (1928): xxvi and 4; and also E. Windstosser, Etudes sur la Theologie Germanique (1911). The edition More was using was probably the Latin translation by Sebastian Castellio (‘Johannes Theophilus’, Basle 1580).
More, PG sect. 10, translated in Ward: 20. See also Brown, “Deep Retirement”: 451–2.
Translated in Ward: 20
More, Aphorisms (1704), I vii.
See C.A. Patrides (ed), The Cambridge Platonists (London: Arnold, 1969; reprinted Cambridge University Press, 1980; hereafter Patrides): 5, 19 ff, and below.
“I was most firmly perswaded, not only concerning the Existence of God, but also of his Absolute both Goodness and Power, and of His most real Will that we should be perfect, even as our Father which is in Heaven is perfect”, and thus the pressing necessity ‘annihilate’ our own will, “so that the Divine Will alone, with the New Birth, may revive and grow up in us.” Translated in Ward: 19.
See below, final section.
In Ward: 20. The poem was also translated by Edmund Elys, and quoted by More in a letter to Anne Conway, Conway Letters (1930): 300. See More to Elys, in Elys, Letters (1694): 6–7, in which the Greek model of these verses is revealed: a tetrastice of Gregory Nazianzen. The original is in Elys to More, December 17, 1669, Library of Christ’s College, Cambridge, Ms 21, f.15.
In Ward: 21. See my “Illuminism” in Rogers et al (1997), chapter 9.
The main exception is the excellent article on More in the new Dictionary of National Biography (2000) by Sarah Hutton, who also emphasises this perfectionism.
In Ward above, and in Glanvil’s early essay, contained in the ms. eulogy to More, A Kind though Vain Attempt.
The most elegant and accurate redaction of this approach is the essay by C.A. Patrides in his Cambridge Platonists, although he leaves room for the viewpoint I am advancing here. On Ficino’s influence, and the limitations of this approach in general, see C. A. Staudenbaur, “Galileo, Ficino and Henry More’s Psychathanasia”, J.H.I., 29 (1968),p.565–78. See also A. Jacob, “Henry More’s Psychodia Platonica and its relationship to Marsilio Ficino’s Theologia Platonica.” J.H.I. 46 (1985): 503–522.
See Sears Jayne, Plato in Renaissance England (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1995), which emphasises the shallow, literary nature of much Platonism in the late Elizabethan and Jacobean periods. Few possessed or read the Dialogues.
As is apparent from the PG, sect. 8 (cited above), philosophical monism was of great concern to More. And as is apparent from his own remarks, Plotinus is his inspiration here. See “Antipsychopannychia”, Preface, in PP: 216, and the discussion below.
See Brown, “Deep Retirement”: 451–2. On Gell and his significance, see below, next section.
Brown, “Deep Retirement”: 449–50.
Ward: 120.
Peile, History of Christ’s College (1900): 99 ff.; and see also Fletcher, Intellectual Development of John Milton (2 vols, Cambridge, 1961) vol 2: 23–9.
Peile, History (1900): 100–123. On Perkins and Ames, see D.N.B., and Kendall, Calvin and English Calvinism (1979): 51 ff. and 151–64.
Peile thinks there were real tensions in the College in this period between the stricter Calvinists and Carey and his Arminian allies. History of Christ’s College (1900): 123
On Mede, see D. N. B.; and Peile, Biographical Register (1910), I: 245–7.
See Mede’s Life by John Worthington, prefacing Mede, Works (1672): xvii-xix; and his remarks on ‘saving fundamentals’ in several of the letters to Hartlib in Works (1672): 863 ff., especially 868–9, on his distinction between ‘Fundamentals of Salvation’, and ‘Fundamentals of Ecclesiastical Communion’.
See Worthington, in his Life, in Mede, Works (1672): iii; and S. Hutton, “Thomas Jackson, Oxford Platonist William Twisse, Aristotelian.” JHI 39 (1978): 635–52, especially 641–6. It is important to note here that Mede was also a friend of Jackson’s opponent, William Twisse, who wrote prefaces to Mede’s Apostacy of these Latter Times (1642), and Key of Revelation (1643). See Hutton, /bid: 636.
See below, Chapter 7.
On Gell, see Peile, vol. I: 301.
R. Gell, Remaines (1676), vol I: 148; 155–80.
‘Familism’ suggests that he shared the doctrines of the infamous heterodox sect, ‘the Family of Love’ founded by the radical Anabaptist, Hendrik Niclaes (c.1502–1580). On More and Familism and Niclaes, see below. Etherington’s tract was A Brief Discovery of the Blasphemous Doctrine of Familisme (1645): 10; Etherington’s other targets were John Everard and Giles Randall. See (Randall) Theologia Germanica, or, Mysticall Divinitie (1648). As Jones, Spiritual Reformers (1928): 103n., and A. Hamilton, Family of Love (1981): 6–8, point out, this work was also greatly admired by the Quakers and Familists. On Boehme, see below. The Quakers were often nicknamed ‘familists’ in this period.
In Ward: 17.
Sebastian Castellio (1515–1563), humanist Reformer and former follower of Calvin, whose condemnation of Calvin’s execution of Servetus brought down the wrath of the Reformer on his head. On Castellio, see F. Buisson, Sebastien Castellion, sa vie et son oeuvre (1515–1563) (2 vols, Paris, 1892); R. Bainton (ed), Castellio, De Haereticiis (1935): 10 ff., and Popkin, History of Scepticism (1979): 10–14. On Boehme (1575–1624) see A. Koyr¨¦, La Philosophie de Jacob Boehme (Paris: Vrin, 1929), and N. Thune, The Behmenists and the Philadelphians: a contribution to the study of English mysticism (Uppsala: Almquist & Wilksells, 1948), and also L. M. Principe and A. Weeks, “Jacob Boehme’s Divine Substance Salitter: its nature, origin and relation to seventeenth-century science theories.” BJHS 22 (1989): 53–61. On More’s fascination for, and somewhat ambivalent relationship to Boehme’s writings, see S. Hutton, “Henry More and Jacob Boehme”, in Hutton (1990): 157–171.
Quoted by Nicolson: 155, note 3, from Taylor, (ed. R. Heber), The Whole Works (1828), vol. I,: lxxxxv and lxxxviii. The doctrine continued to gain support in England. Castellio’ s work was translated into English as Of Obedience, and His Modest Apology, or Defense of Himself [against Calvin] (1679). See below, and More, in Ward: 19–20; and his comments on this to an unknown author, possibly Stillingfleet, in a long letter printed by Ward: 160–168.
Charles Hotham (1615–1672?) was at this time a Fellow of Peterhouse. He was the son of Sir John Hotham who was executed for treason by the Parliamentarians in 1645. See DNB and Peile, vol. 1: 418 and 424. Hotham was expelled from his place after a quarrel with the master of the college, Lazarus Seaman.
On the Hothams and their relationship with More, see Charles Hotham, Ad Teutonicam Manductio (1648), dedicatory verses (by More and a reply by Charles Hotham); and Sarah Hutton, “Henry More and Jacob Boehme”, in Hutton (1990): 157–171; and Peile, vol. I: 418 and 424, and below
Richard Baxter 1615–1691), Presbyterian minister and leading dissenter, looking back on the troubles of the period, in M. Sylvester (ed) Reliquae Baxterianae (2 vols, London, 1696), I: 78. On Baxter, see DNB.
See Calvin (trans. Beveridge), Institutes (1895), II xv 6; and IV xiv 11–14
See the more detailed discussion below, next chapter.
See below, and Castellio, Conference (1679): 46–49. Compare More’s definition of faith in the glossary or “Interpretation General” to the PP.
Gell, Remaines (1676), I: 148. See More’s similar use of this text, DD: 306–7. On this perfectionism in the poems, see below, next chapter.
Gell, Remaines: I, 149.
More, in Ward: 19–20 and 160 ff., and see below.
See below; and More, in Ward,: 19–20.
Ibid.
See below for a more detailed discussion of this in the context of More’s poems.
Versus the traditional view that made the older Benjamin Whichcote the ‘father’ of Cambridge Platonism. See below, next chapter.
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Crocker, R. (2003). Early Life and Education. In: Henry More, 1614–1687. International Archives of the History of Ideas / Archives Internationales d’Histoire des Idées, vol 185. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-0217-1_1
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