A digital library of the English Puritans and their spiritual heirs. All texts but one are in the public domain, drawn from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library, Project Gutenberg, the Text Creation Partnership and page scans read afresh, and formatted for Obsidian.
Most works are given in modern spelling. The seventeenth-century works of John Owen, Bunyan, Watson, Baxter, Scougal, Flavel, and Gurnall come from the CCEL editions; Charnock is from Project Gutenberg; and the confessional standards are taken from Philip Schaff’s Creeds of Christendom (with the Scripture proof-texts omitted).
Sixteen further works have since been added, from two other kinds of source.
Sibbes, Brooks, Alleine, Flavel’s Mystery of Providence and Turretin’s Atonement of Christ were read again from the page images of nineteenth-century printings, and so are in modern spelling like the rest.
Perkins, Burroughs, Burgess, Ames and Watson’s three remaining treatises come from the Text Creation Partnership, which had the first editions keyed by hand from the page images and proofread rather than scanned. Those five keep the spelling and punctuation of their own century, and mark with […] the few words the transcribers could not read.
Wilhelmus à Brakel is the one exception to the public domain: his Christian’s Reasonable Service exists in English only in Bartel Elshout’s translation of 1992–95, which Reformation Heritage Books holds the copyright of and whose four volumes the publisher’s own seminary distributes free as PDFs. It is taken from those.
65 works · 1,709 notes across 19 authors.
John Owen
John Owen (1616–1683), the greatest of the English Puritan theologians, was Vice-Chancellor of Oxford and the leading Independent divine of his age. His complete works are gathered here.
Author index: John Owen
- Brief Declaration and Vindication of the Doctrine of the Trinity — A concise defense of the Trinity and the deity of Christ against Socinian cavils. (8 notes)
- Brief Instruction in the Worship of God — A catechism on gospel worship and the ordinances of the church. (54 notes)
- Death of Death in the Death of Christ — His classic defense of particular redemption — Christ’s death actually saves those for whom he died. (40 notes)
- Discourse concerning Evangelical Love, Church Peace, and Unity — On the peace and unity of the churches grounded in evangelical love. (7 notes)
- Discourse Concerning Liturgies, and their Imposition — Against the imposition of prescribed liturgies upon the conscience. (12 notes)
- Display of Arminianism — His first published work, exposing the errors of Arminian theology. (18 notes)
- Dissertation on Divine Justice — On the necessity of divine vindicatory justice. (22 notes)
- Doctrine of Justification by Faith — A full treatment of justification by the imputed righteousness of Christ. (42 notes)
- Doctrine of the Saints’ Perseverance Explained and Confirmed — His major defense of the final perseverance of the saints. (25 notes)
- Duty of Pastors and People Distinguished — On the distinct duties of ministers and their congregations. (13 notes)
- Eshcol; a Cluster of the Fruit of Canaan — Rules of church fellowship — a foretaste of the fruit of Canaan. (28 notes)
- Gospel Grounds and Evidences of the Faith of God’s Elect — On the marks and assurance of saving faith. (8 notes)
- Grace and Duty of being Spiritually Minded — On heavenly-mindedness as the life and peace of the soul. (25 notes)
- Inquiry into the Original, Nature, Institution, Power, Order, and Communion of Evangelical Churches — On the nature and order of gospel churches. (34 notes)
- Meditations and Discourses on the Glory of Christ — His dying meditations on beholding the glory of Christ. (19 notes)
- Nature and Causes of Apostasy from the Gospel — On the causes and cure of declension from the gospel. (17 notes)
- Nature, Power, Deceit, and Prevelancy of the Remainders of Indwelling Sin in Believers — On the power and deceit of remaining sin in the believer. (20 notes)
- Of Communion with God the Father, Son and Holy Ghost — On the believer’s distinct communion with each Person of the Godhead. (31 notes)
- Of Schism — A treatise on the true nature of schism. (28 notes)
- Of Temptation — On the nature and danger of entering into temptation. (11 notes)
- Of the Mortification of Sin in Believers — His celebrated treatise on putting sin to death by the Spirit. (16 notes)
- Pneumatologia — His monumental discourse on the Person and work of the Holy Spirit. (91 notes)
- Poema — Latin verse. (2 notes)
- Practical Exposition upon Psalm Cxxx — An exposition of Psalm 130 on forgiveness and evangelical repentance. (57 notes)
- Review of the Annotations of Hugo Grotius — A critical review of Grotius’s biblical annotations. (3 notes)
- Sacramental Discourses — Short addresses delivered at the Lord’s Table. (32 notes)
- Sermons of John Owen — His collected sermons. (116 notes)
- Several Practical Cases of Conscience Resolved — Practical resolutions of cases of conscience. (15 notes)
- Treatise of the Dominion of Sin and Grace — On the reign of sin and the greater reign of grace. (10 notes)
- Truth and Innocence Vindicated — A defense of nonconformity against Samuel Parker. (9 notes)
- Two Short Catechisms — A lesser and a greater catechism. (31 notes)
- Vindiciæ Evangelicæ or, the Mystery of the Gospel Vindicated and Socinianism Examined — His large refutation of Socinianism. (47 notes)
John Bunyan
John Bunyan (1628–1688), the Bedford tinker and preacher, wrote from prison the most beloved allegories in the English language.
Author index: John Bunyan
- Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners — His spiritual autobiography of conviction and conversion. (6 notes)
- The Holy War — The allegory of the town of Mansoul, besieged and reclaimed by Emmanuel. (21 notes)
- The Pilgrim’s Progress — The immortal allegory of the Christian’s journey to the Celestial City. (21 notes)
Thomas Watson
Thomas Watson (c. 1620–1686), preacher at St Stephen’s Walbrook, is prized for his warm, quotable, and practical divinity.
Author index: Thomas Watson
- A Body of Divinity — Sermons on the Westminster Shorter Catechism. (44 notes)
- A Divine Cordial — An exposition of Romans 8:28 — all things work together for good. (11 notes)
- The Art of Divine Contentment — An exposition of Philippians 4:11 on Christian contentment. (15 notes)
- The Doctrine of Repentance — Repentance taken apart into its six ingredients, and then pressed home. (17 notes)
- The Godly Man’s Picture — Twenty-four characteristical signs of a man that shall go to heaven. (36 notes)
- The Mischief of Sin — On Psalm 106:43: how sin brings a person, and a nation, low. (1 note)
Richard Baxter
Richard Baxter (1615–1691), pastor of Kidderminster, was one of the most influential and prolific of the Puritan pastors.
Author index: Richard Baxter
- A Call to the Unconverted — An earnest evangelistic appeal to turn and live. (6 notes)
- The Reformed Pastor — His searching call to faithful, personal pastoral ministry. (19 notes)
- The Saints’ Everlasting Rest — A classic meditation on the believer’s heavenly rest. (19 notes)
Henry Scougal
Henry Scougal (1650–1678), professor at Aberdeen, left one small classic that helped kindle the Evangelical revival.
Author index: Henry Scougal
- The Life of God in the Soul of Man — On true religion as the life of God in the soul. (3 notes)
John Flavel
John Flavel (1627–1691), minister of Dartmouth, was a tender and experimental Puritan preacher and writer.
Author index: John Flavel
- Keeping the Heart — On the great work of keeping the heart in every condition of life. (25 notes)
- The Mystery of Providence — What providence has performed for the saints, and what it asks of them in return. (25 notes)
William Gurnall
William Gurnall (1616–1679), rector of Lavenham in Suffolk, is remembered for one immense and richly practical work on spiritual warfare.
Author index: William Gurnall
- The Christian in Complete Armour — A vast exposition of Ephesians 6:10-20 on the Christian’s spiritual warfare. (18 notes)
Stephen Charnock
Stephen Charnock (1628–1680), Presbyterian divine of London, is chiefly remembered for his profound discourses on the being and attributes of God.
Author index: Stephen Charnock
- The Existence and Attributes of God — Fourteen discourses on the being and attributes of God. (16 notes)
William Perkins
William Perkins (1558–1602), fellow of Christ’s College and lecturer at Great St Andrew’s in Cambridge, is the father of the English Puritan tradition — the elder to whom nearly everyone else in this section owes a method.
Author index: William Perkins
- The Art of Prophesying — The first Protestant manual of preaching in English: read the text, give the sense, gather the doctrine, apply it to the seven kinds of hearer. (14 notes)
Richard Sibbes
Richard Sibbes (1577–1635), preacher at Gray’s Inn and master of St Catharine’s Hall, Cambridge, was called “the sweet dropper” for the tenderness of his preaching. The Bruised Reed was the book that turned Richard Baxter.
Author index: Richard Sibbes
- The Bruised Reed and Smoking Flax — On Matthew 12:20: that Christ deals gently with weak and failing faith. (28 notes)
Jeremiah Burroughs
Jeremiah Burroughs (1599–1646), preacher at Stepney and Cripplegate and one of the five Dissenting Brethren of the Westminster Assembly, pressed the sweetest subjects in the plainest words.
Author index: Jeremiah Burroughs
- The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment — Eleven sermons on Philippians 4:11, and the classic Puritan treatment of contentment. (13 notes)
- A Treatise of Earthly-Mindedness — On Philippians 3:19: what it is to mind earthly things, and how the heart is got free. (8 notes)
- An Heavenly Conversation — Its companion, on Philippians 3:20: the saints as citizens of heaven. (22 notes)
- Of Walking with God — On Genesis 5:24, printed with the two treatises above. (9 notes)
Thomas Brooks
Thomas Brooks (1608–1680), of St Margaret’s, Fish Street Hill, stayed in London through the plague and the Fire after his ejection. He writes in short, hammered sentences and piles image on image.
Author index: Thomas Brooks
- Precious Remedies Against Satan’s Devices — Satan’s devices named one at a time, with the remedy against each. (37 notes)
Joseph Alleine
Joseph Alleine (1634–1668), ejected from Taunton and imprisoned for going on preaching, died at thirty-four and left one book, which sold in numbers no other Puritan work matched.
Author index: Joseph Alleine
- An Alarm to the Unconverted — What conversion is not, what it is, and why it cannot be put off. (9 notes)
Anthony Burgess
Anthony Burgess (d. 1664), vicar of Sutton Coldfield, sat in the Westminster Assembly and preached to it. He wrote at length and against everybody, but always to a pastoral end.
Author index: Anthony Burgess
- Spiritual Refining — A treatise of grace and assurance in a hundred and twenty sermons: the true signs of grace, the false ones, and grace under every name Scripture gives it. (121 notes)
- Vindiciae Legis — Twenty-nine lectures vindicating the moral law and the covenants against the Antinomians. (32 notes)
William Ames
William Ames (1576–1633) was Perkins’ pupil, driven out of England for nonconformity, and professor of theology at Franeker. His Medulla was the textbook of New England divinity for a century.
Author index: William Ames
- The Marrow of Sacred Divinity — His systematic theology in two books, faith and observance; the 1642 English translation of the Medulla Theologiae. (63 notes)
Westminster Assembly
The Westminster Assembly of Divines (1643–1649) produced the confession and catechisms that became the doctrinal standards of Presbyterian and Reformed churches throughout the English-speaking world.
Author index: Westminster Assembly
- The Westminster Confession of Faith — The confession of the Westminster Assembly (1646), the classic Reformed standard. (33 notes)
- The Westminster Shorter Catechism — The Assembly’s catechism of the faith in question and answer. (1 notes)
Savoy Assembly
The Savoy Assembly of Congregational divines — led by John Owen and Thomas Goodwin — met in 1658 to adapt the Westminster Confession for the Congregational churches.
Author index: Savoy Assembly
- The Savoy Declaration — The Congregational adaptation of the Westminster Confession (1658). (2 notes)
Francis Turretin
Francis Turretin (1623–1687), professor at Geneva for thirty-four years, was the last great systematiser of Reformed orthodoxy, and the theologian the English Puritans’ heirs read. He is not an English Puritan; he is kept here with them.
Author index: Francis Turretin
- The Atonement of Christ — Locus XIV of the Institutio, on the satisfaction of Christ, in James R. Willson’s translation. (8 notes)
Wilhelmus à Brakel
Wilhelmus à Brakel (1635–1711), minister of Rotterdam and “Father Brakel” to the Dutch Reformed, was the great popular divine of the Dutch Second Reformation — the Netherlands’ own Puritanism, whose English authors he read and translated. His Christian’s Reasonable Service (1700) goes through the whole of Reformed doctrine and ends every chapter in its practice. He is not an English Puritan; he is kept here with them.
Author index: Wilhelmus à Brakel
- The Christian’s Reasonable Service — The complete four volumes of Bartel Elshout’s translation: doctrine of God, man, Christ, the church, salvation and the last things, the Ten Commandments, the Christian graces, the Lord’s Prayer, and the appendix on the covenant of grace in both Testaments. (115 notes)
Missing Works
What remains genuinely unavailable in English is the rest of Turretin: the complete Institutio Theologiae Elencticae exists in the public domain only in its original Latin, George Musgrave Giger’s complete translation having been published in 1992.