HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH CALVINISTIC BAPTISTS 1771 - 1892
By Robert W. Oliver
Banner of Truth. 410 pages. £16.50
ISBN 0 85151 920 2
The book is a pleasure to handle, being produced with typical Banner of Truth care.
The book benefits from fine illustrations of prominent men in English Calvinistic Baptist history of the period under review. The end papers reproduce a watercolour painting by Thomas Spurgeon of the site on the river Lark where his father, C.H. Spurgeon, was baptised. The 15 chapters and three appendices give an overview of the several controversies which repeatedly caused good men to differ through the period under observation, and echoes of which remain controversial even today among different groups of Calvinistic Baptists. Therein lies a practical value of this book, for it could help to prevent a repetition of positions adopted, and answered, by characters of the past and therefore lead to better-informed discussions in the present.
