Goodwin, John

, one of the most violent of the republican sectaries in the time of Charles I. but whom no sect seems to own, was born in 1593, and educated at Queen’s college, Cambridge. In 1633 he was presented to the living of St. Stephen’s, Coleman-street, from which he was turned out by what was called the “committee for plundered ministers,” because he refused to baptise the children of his parish promiscuously, and refused to administer the sacrament to his whole parish. He was an independent, and carried on many warm disputes with the presbyterian party. What was more singular in these days, was his embracing the Arminian doctrines, which he defended with great vigour both by the pulpit and press; and such was the general turbulence of his temper, and conceit in his own opinions, that he is said to have been against every man, and every man against him. Being a decided republican, he peculiarly gratified the savage spirit of the times by promoting the condemnation of the king, which he afterwards endeavoured to justify in a pamphlet called “The Obstructors of Justice,” the wickedness, absurdity, and impiety of which Mr. Neal has very candidly exposed. At the restoration it was thought he would have been excepted from the act of indemnity, but, although he afterwards was permitted to live, a proclamation was issued in 1660 against the above pamphlet, and in that he is stated to have been “late of Coleman-street, clerk,” and-to have fled. His pamphlet was burnt by the hands of the hangman. Returning afterwards, he kept a private conventicle in Coleman-street, where he died in 1665. His works, now in very little repute, are chiefly theological, among which the following may be mentioned: 11 Redemption Redeemed,“in folio.” The divine Authority of the Scriptures,“4to;” An Exposition of the Ninth Chapter of the Epistle of St. Paul to the Romans," 4to. ²