John Troughton

son of Nathan. Trought. a Clothier, was born in the City of Coventry, educated in the Free-School there under Sam. Frankland, became Scholar of S. Johns Coll. an. 1655, afterwards Fellow and Bach. of Arts; but upon the restauration of K. Ch. 2, being ejected, to make room for one who had been expel’d by the Visitors in 1648, he retired to a mercate town in Oxfordshire commonly called Bister; where living a moderate Nonconformist, read Academical learning to young men, and somtimes preached in private, whereby he got a comfortable subsistence. Upon the issuing out of his Majesties Declaration for the toleration of religion, dat. 15. Mar. 1671 this Mr. Troughton was one of those four (Dr. Hen. Langley, and Tho. Gilbert and Hen. Cornish Bachelaurs of Div. being the other three) who were appointed by the principal heads of the Brethren to carry on the work of preaching within the City of Oxon. The place where they held their meetings was in Thamestreet, without the north gate, in an house which had been built, a little before the Civil War began, by Tom. Pun, alias Tho. Aires; where each person endeavouring to shew his parts, this our author Troughton was by the auditory of Scholars (who came among them meerly out of novelty) held [•] he best, and was by them most applauded. The truth is tho the man had been blind, occasion’d by the small pox, ever since he was four years old, yet he was a good School Divine and Metaphysitian and was much commended while he was in the University for his disputations. He was not of so busie, turbulent and furious a spirit as those of his persuasion commonly are, but very moderate: And altho he often preached as occasions offer’d themselves in prohibited Assemblies, yet he did not make it his business by employing all the little tricks and artifices, too frequently practiced by other hot-headed zealots of his fraternity, viz. by vilifying and railing at the established ordinances of the Church, libelling the conformable ministry, by keeping their meetings at the very time when the services and administrations of the Church are regularly performing, &c. He did not, I say, by these and such like most unwarrantable contrivances endeavour to withdraw weaker persons from the sacred bosome of the Church, in order to fix and herd them in associated defying Conventicles. He was respected by, and maintain’d an amicable correspondence with, some of the conformable Clergy, because of his great knowledg and moderation. He hath written and published,

Lutherus redivivus: or, the Protestant doctrine of justification by faith only, vindicated. And the plausible opinion of justification by faith and obedience proved to be Arminian, Popish and to lead unavoidably to Socinianisme. part 1. Lond. 1677. oct. This is reflected on by Tho. Hotchkis in his preface to the second part of A discourse concerning imputed righteousness, &c. Lond. 1678. oct.

Luther. Rediv. or, the Protest. doctr. of justif. by Christs righteousness imputed to believers, explained and vindicated. part. 2. Lond. 1678. oct.

Letter to a Friend touching Gods providence about sinful actions; in answer to a Letter intit. The reconcilableness of Gods prescience, &c. and to a postcript of that Letter. Lod. 1678. oct.

Popery the grand Apostasie. Being the substance of certain Sermons preached on 2. Thess. 2. from ver. 1. to 12, on occasion of the desperate plot of the Papists against the K, Kingdome and Protestant religion. To which is added a Sermon on Rev. 18.4. preached 5. Nov. 1678. Lond. 1680. oct.

An Apologie for the Nonconformists, shewing their reasons, both for their not conforming and for their preaching publickly, tho forbidden by Law. Lond. 1681. quart.

An Answer to Dr. Stillingfleets sermon and his defence of it; so much as concerneth the Nonconformists preaching.—Printed with the Apologie. This learned and religious person Mr. Jo. Troughton died in an house of one of the Brethren, situat and being in Allsaints Parish within the City of Oxon. on the 20 of Aug. in sixteen hundred eighty and one, aged 44 years;1681. whereupon his body was carried to Bister before mentioned, alias Burchester, and buried in the Church there. At which time Abrah. James a blind man, Master of the Free-school at Woodstock (sometimes of Magd. Hall) preaching his funeral sermon, did take occasion not only to be lavish in the commendations of the Defunct, but to make several glances on the government established by law. So that an Auditor there named Sam. Blackwell M. A. and Vicar of Bister (a zealous man for the Church of England) complaining to the Diocesan of him, James was glad to retract what he had said before him, to prevent an ejection from his School, which otherwise would inevitably have come to pass. Now I am got fnto the name of Troughton, I cannot, without the guilt of concealment, but let the Reader know this story of one of that name, which is this. While his Majesty K. Ch. 1. of ever blessed memory was a Prisoner at Carisbrook in the Isle of Wight an. 1648 he was his own Chaplain, as not thinking it fit to accept of any of the Presbyterian Ministers upon that account, albeit, as occasion offered, he thanked, and was civil to, them when they applied themselves to him for that purpose. Among others one Troughton who was Chaplain to Col. Rob. Hammond Governour of the Isle of Wight, and Preacher to the Soldiers of the Garrison of Carisbrook, would many times be in the Presence Chamber when his Majesty was at dinner: And tho he was a young man, yet he was a scholar, had good education, and would argue notably in defence of some Tenents he held in opposition to certain ceremonies and discipline in the Episcopacy. The King usually after meals would walk for near an hour, and take many turns in the Presence-Chamber; and when he found the Chaplain there, he would pleasurably enter into disputation with him, and the Chaplain would be very earnest in defence of his opinion. The K. never check’d him for his confidence, but allowed him his liberty, and would be very pleasant and merry with him. The K. being a good Logician and well read in History and matters of Controversie, gained ground of his Opponent, and would please himself with one passage which hapned, and that was this. During their discourse, the Chaplain then standing at the end of the Presence-Chamber, between a Lieutenant of the Garrison (who had a Sword in his hand and was earnestly listning to what the K. said in the Debate) and a Gentleman who was not known there, the King, in the heat of his discourse, suddenly disarmed the Lieutenant by taking the Sword out of his hand, which made him look strangely, and the more when his Majesty drew it, for that put the Chaplain into a fright also, he not imagining the reason, until the stranger (better understanding the Kings meaning) fell upon his knees, and the K. laying the naked Sword upon his shoulder, confer’d upon him the honour of Knighthood, telling him withal, it was to perform a promise to his Relations. This strangers name was John Duncomb of Battlesdon in Bedfordshire Esq. who was afterwards a servant to K. Ch. 2, sworn a member of his Privy Council 22. May 1667, being then, or about that time, one of the Commissioners of his Majesties Treasury, and at length upon the resignation of Sir Anth. Ashley Cooper, Chancellour and Under-Treasurer of the Exchecquer, about the 20. of Novemb. 1672. As for the Chaplain, Troughton, tho Tho. Herbert then one of the Grooms of his Maj. Bedchamber (from whom I had this story) could not tell me his Christian name, yet I take it to be William, and him to be the same Will. Troughton, who afterwards was beneficed in Salisbury in the time of Oliver, silenc’d for Nonconformity after his Majesties restauration, lived there several years after keeping his Conventicles, as he did afterwards at Bristow, and now, if living, in or near, London, where we shall leave him for the present, till an opportunity may be had to make farther mention of him.