Background
Richard Baxter was born in 1615, near Shrewsbury, in Rowton, Shropshire, United Kingdom.
Richard Baxter was born in 1615, near Shrewsbury, in Rowton, Shropshire, United Kingdom.
Richard Baxter was helped by John Owen, master of the free school at Wroxeter, where he studied from about 1629 to 1632, and made fair progress in Latin.
In 1638, Baxter became master of the free grammar school at Dudley. Baxter remained at Bridgnorth for nearly two years, during which time he took a special interest in the controversy relating to Nonconformity and the Church of England.
On the outbreak of the First English Civil War, Baxter blamed both parties and recommended the Protestation.
In the winter of 1654–1655, Baxter met Archbishop James Ussher and they agreed (allegedly within thirty minutes) on a modified form of episcopacy that ought to be acceptable to both Presbyterians and Episcopalians.
Baxter's prominence in moderate Puritan circles guaranteed that his views would be sought at the Restoration.
He became a royal chaplain and prepared position papers for the Presbyterians, helping to argue their case at the Savoy Conference (1661) where the Episcopalians and Presbyterians failed to agree on revisions to the Prayer Book.
Under the royal indulgence of 1672, he began to preach publicly in London but suffered mounting persecution until in 1685 he was imprisoned for nearly two years.
Baxter's significance stems from three sources: his acknowledged leadership of the moderate wing of dissent; his voluminous and diverse writings, which numbered perhaps 111 publications; and his influence with respect to the way subsequent generations viewed the history and religion of seventeenth-century England.
Baxter's extensive correspondence, which has been cataloged, is housed at Dr. Williams's Library, London.
"Baxter's pastoral focus had theological implications.
Although he could accept a "reduced" episcopacy that would not circumscribe the pastoral efforts of the local minister, he soon turned against the lordly prelates who returned with the Church of England in 1662.
Richard Baxter became a moderate Nonconformist and continued as such throughout his life. Though regarded as a Presbyterian, he was not exclusively tied to Presbyterianism, and often seemed prepared to accept a modified Episcopalianism. All forms of church government were regarded by him as subservient to the true purposes of religion.
Richard Baxter feared the antinomianism of the sects and the strict Calvinists on one hand and the superstition of "popery" on the other: his own theology could be described as a Puritan Arminianism.
Baxter was married to Margaret Charlton, a woman like-minded with himself. She died in 1681 and Baxter wrote the words for the hymn Ye Holy Angels Bright in that year.