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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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tv Previous to this he had become acquainted with Samuel Eaton , a celebrated preacher in the city of Chester to whom he offered sufficient inducement to settle him in Dukinfield . In 1650 , Mr . Eaton published a work in 2 vois ., entitled , " The Mystery of God Incarnate , or the Word made
Flesh , cleared up . By Samuel Eaton , Teacher of the Church of Christ at Dukinfield . " This book he addressed " To the faithful and dearly beloved saints of Jesus Christ in and about Chester , especially to all such who have known the doctrine , read the
papers of Mr * John Knowles , and who have been his familiar hearers and followers . " Mr . Eaton ' s congregation , it appears , chose Mr . Knowles as his successor at Chester , for which situation the latter gentleman quitted Gloucester , where he had been previously stationed . His great sin was that of Arianism , and against the
influence of his opinions on that subject Mr . Eaton ' s work is principally directed . The celebrity of character , and Mr . Eaton ' s ability as a divine , were , most likely , the temptation which induced the founder of Quakerism , the celebrated George Fox , to visit Dukinfield ,
as early in his life as the year 1647 . He , in his Diary , Vol . I . p . 97 , makes the following statement : " Passing on , I went ainong the professors at Dukinfield and Manchester , where I staid
awhile , and declared truth among them . " From the ambiguity of Fox ' s language , it is a point yet unascertained at what place he first became a preacher . Tradition has recorded this
as the first village in which he essayed his dormant powers , and points but the place where , mounted on the stocks , he delivered his first public exhortation . Several communications appeared about two years ago in the Monthl y Magazineon the subject of
, 1 'ox ' s early preaching ; but as it is n a point of much importance , no one then claimed that distinction for dukinfield . There is , however , great Probability in this being the case , as rt is evident from Fox ' s own account
<>* Ins curly life , that his intention in tr avelling from place to place , was to inverse with those men most eminent 1 Jr ihcjr piety and superior sanctity of ^ aracter . His mind likewise appears " ° have been early imbued with the
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ideal susceptibility of supernatural impressions ^ Hence any extrao rd inary occurrence connected with the manifestation of such pretensions was sure to fix his attention . In this view , somewhere in this neighbourhood , he was induced to visit a woman who
pretended to a longer fast than hers of Tatbury , but the imposture of whose character , as he himself relates , he soon detected . His early opponents describe him as first emerging" from obscurity at Manchester . The author
of the " Snake in the Grass /* in the preface to his " Essay concerning the Divine Rig-lit of Tythe / ' describes him as a journeyman to a shoemaker in
Manchester , " who , from going on foot , and often barefoot , mounted by his preaching trade on horseback , with his man carrying his cloak before him , to act the gentleman , and leaving ^ 1000 behind him for printing his books . ' So it appears he first drew attention as a sectary , in that age of sectarian fecundit / at Manchester .
Dukinfield being only seven miles from that town , and being mentioned by himself , in connexion with it , he is most likelv to have first tried those talents here , the force of which every
part of the kingdom afterwards became acquainted with . The house is yet standing in which the Friends * meetings were first held , but we have now no members of that persuasion resident in the place .
From this time , and during the Protectorate , and to the termination of the Stuart dynasty , opposition to episcopal authority , appears to have had much influence in the religious principles and conduct of the inhabitants of this neighbourhood .
The accession of William and Mary to the throne brought with it toleration to Dissenters , and the history of Dukinfield Chapel , and the succession of its ministers , which appeared in the Monthly Repository , XVIII . p . 681 , brings the Presbyterian establishment in this village down to the present period .
The United Brethren , or Moravians , in the year \ 743 , formed a small society here , which was supplied with labourers ( preachers ) from Smith-House and Fulnec , in Yorkshire ; but the present meeting-house was not completed until 17 &l > and the choir houses iu 17 & 7- The chapel having
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fragments of the History of Religious Denominations in J ) ukinfiekL 519
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1825, page 519, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2540/page/7/
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