AMES (William): - Guiljelmi Amesii de Conscientia et Eius Jure. vel Casibus. Libri Quinque.

Amstelodami Apud Ioan. Ianssonium 1654. Small 12mo, 133 x 68 mms., pp. [x], 450, [20], including engraved title-page, later calf (early 18th century); bookplate removed from front interior board, but a very good copy. The English-born theologian, university lecturer, and Puritan divine William Ames (1576 - 1633) studied at Christ's College, Cambridge, but his non-conformity led him to an academic and clerical career in the Dutch Netherlands. He became Professor of theology at the University of Franeker in 1622 and remained there until his death in 1633. During this period, he produced his so-called magnum opus, Medulla Theologiae as well as the present book, both of which made him famous. His biographer, Keith L. Sprunger records in his ODNB entry,that De Conscientia "pleaded for less doctrinal wrangling and more zeal for 'life and practice … conscience and its concerns'. Franeker needed more daily puritanical 'observance'. During his years as professor Ames often called for a 'reformation' to deliver professors and students from love of stage plays, oaths, dicing, masking, swearing, heavy drinking, and Sabbath breaking; instead, they would all work for personal godliness. He warned: unless the godly party acted decisively, the university motto might just as well be changed from Christo et ecclesiae ('for Christ and church') to Bacchus et Bacchantibus ('for Bacchus and the Bacchants')...." Sprunger, in his various works on Ames and Puritanism, especially in New England in the 17th century, underscores the importance of Ames's writings in the emigration of English Puritans to and in America.

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