THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
of the Metropolitan Methodist Episcopal Church, Washington, 1869; he was chaplain of the United States Senate, 1869-74; inspector of United States consulates in Asia 1874-76; again pastor of the Metropolitan Church, Washington, 1876-79; of the Central Church, New York, 1879-82; of the Madison Avenue Church, New York, 1882-84; and a third time pastor of the Metropolitan Church, Washington, 1885-88; and in 1888 was elected bishop. He won high repute as a pulpit orator and lecturer. He was three times elected to the general conference of his denomination; and in 1881 went to England as delegate to the Methodist ecumenical council. He wrote: From Dan to Beersheba, or the Land of Promise as it now Appears (New York, 1864); The Thrones and Palaces of Babylon and Nineveh, from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean . (1876); Christianity Triumphant; its Defensive and Aggressive Victories (1883); Supremacy of Law (1890); and Conversations with Christ (1900). He was also editor of the New Orleans Christian Advocate, 1866-69.
NEWSOM, GEORGE ERNEST: Church of England; b. at Blundellsands (5 m. n. of Liverpool), Lancashire, May 24, 1871. He was educated at Merton College, Oxford (B.A., 1894), and was ordered deacon in 1895 and ordained priest in 1896. After being curate of Cannock from 1895 to 1897, he was vice-principal of King's College, London, from 1897 to 1903. Since 1903 he has been professor of pastoral theology in the same institution. He has also been warden of King's College Hostel and reader in the Temple Church since 1902, and examining chaplain to the bishop of Lichfield since 1905.
NEWTIAN CHURCH. See New, John Fair.
NEWTON, BENJAMIN WILLS: Plymouth Brother; b. at Plymouth 1805; d. at Tunbridge Wells 1898. He was educated at the Plymouth Grammar School, and at Exeter College, Oxford (B.A., 1828), where he read privately with Francis William Newman (q.v.), through whom he became acquainted with John Nelson Darby (q.v.), whom he induced to visit Plymouth. In the " Assembly " of the Plymouth Brethren (q.v.), he labored for seventeen years as a teacher, and contributed to The Christian Witness many papers of value. Until 1845 Newton held sway in the Plymouth " gathering," as it was called, but early displayed divergence from Darby's teaching on ministry, justification, the " secret rapture of the saints," etc. Their different attitude on ministry and church government led to a rupture between them in 1845, when Darby started another " meeting " in Plymouth. Newton continued in the original company until 1847. But in the mean time notes of a lecture by Newton on Christ's status as an Israelite, which he seemed to treat in such a way as to impair the Lord's personal sinless relations to God, coming into Darby's hands, were used by his old associate effectively against him, so that his remaining supporters were gradually detached from him as heterodox, with the exception of S. P. Tregelles, who was related to him by marriage. Newton left Plymouth
finally at the end of 1847 for residence in London and elsewhere. Thenceforth he ministered and worked in isolation, remaining a layman to the end of his life.
Of his works, which are numerous and well written, the chief are:
Thoughts on the Apocalypse (London, 1844, last ed. 1904); Remarks on the Sufferings of the Lord Jesus (1847, in explanation of his views criticized by Darby); Ancient Truths Respecting the Deity and True Humanity of the Lord Jesus (1857, new ed., 1893); Aids to Prophetic Enquiry (1848; 1881); Prospects of the Ten Kingdoms of the Roman Empire (1849; new ed., 1873); Prophetic System of Elliott and Cumming Considered (1850); Doctrines of Popery Considered (1851; new ed., 1883); Occasional Papers on Scriptural Subjects (1851, 1856); Thoughts on Leviticus (1852); Europe and the East (1855; new ed., 1878); First and Second Chapters of the Epistle to the Romans Considered (1856; new ed., 1897); The Antichrist Future (1859; new ed., 1900); Gospel Truths (1861); Remarks on Mosaic Cosmogony (1864); Judgment of the Court of Arches in Case of Rowland Williams (1866); Prophecy of the Lord Jesus as Contained in Matt, xxiv., xxv. (1879); Old Testament Saints not Excluded from the Church in Glory (1887); Babylon, its future History and Doom (1890).
E. E. Whitfield.
Bibliography: W. B. Neatby, History of the Plymouth Brethren, London, 1902.
NEWTON, JOHN: Church of England; joint author with Cowper of the Olney Hymns; b. in London July 24, 1725; d. there Dec. 21, 1807. He was the son of a shipmaster in the Mediterranean service, with whom he sailed until 1742. In 1743 he was impressed into the English naval service, was made midshipman, deserted, was recaptured and reduced to the ranks, exchanged to a ship in the African station, became servant to a slave-trader, and was rescued in 1748, being converted on the way home in a storm at sea. He continued to follow the sea till 1754, meanwhile studying Latin and the Bible. He was surveyor of tides at Liverpool, 1755-60, where he heard Whitefield and Wesley, and studied Greek, Hebrew, and Syriac. In 1763 he was brought to the notice of Lord Dartmouth by Thomas Haweis, through whose influence he was made deacon and priest, 1764, and given the curacy of Olney. In 1767 Cowper settled there, and the result of their very close intimacy was the Olney Hymns (London, 1779 and often), which greatly influenced English hymnology. In 1780 he accepted the offer of the benefice of St. Mary Woolnoth with St. Mary Woolchurch, London, where he officiated till his death. Hardly less famous than the Hymns was his Authentic Narrative of Some Particu-
lars in the Life of John Newton (London, 1764, 9th. ed., 1799; an account of his early life). He wrote also, Sermons Preached in Olney (1767);
Omicron: Twenty-six Letters on Religious Subjects (1774; subsequent editions, in which the number of the letters became forty-one); Cardiphonia; or, the Utterance of the Heart in the Course of a real Correspondence (2 vols., 1781); Letters to a Wife (2 vols., 1793), and other works. A collected edition of his works was issued by his executors (6 vols., London, 1808; new ed., 12 vols., 1821). He was a strong support of the Evangelicals in the Church of England, and was a friend of the dissenting clergy as well as of the ministry of his own church. One of the questions much debated is whether the influence of the sternly Calvinistic Newton on Cowper