tterness
and rancour which characterized these times, and with which Romanist and
Protestant alike assailed the persecuted Anabaptists, a letter of
Philpot's, to a friend of his, "prisoner the same time in Newgate," who
held the condemned opinions. His friend had written to ask his judgment
concerning the baptism of infants. Philpot in a long reply, whilst
maintaining the obligation of infant baptism, yet addresses his
correspondent as, "dear brother, saint, and fellow-prisoner for the truth
of Christ's gospel"; and at the close of his argument he says, "I beseech
thee, dear brother in the gospel, follow the steps of the faith of the
glorious martyrs in the primitive church, and of such as at this day follow
the same."

Many Anabaptist communities existed in England toward the end of the 16th
century, particularly in East Anglia, Kent and London. Their most notable
representative was Robert Cooke, but they were more notorious for heretical
views as to the Virgin Mary (see ANABAPTISTS) than for their
anti-paedobaptist position. It was for these views that Joan Boucher of
Kent was burnt in 1550. There is no doubt that these prepared the way for
the coming of the modern Baptists, but "the truth is that, while the
Anabaptists in England raised the question of baptism, they were almost
entirely a foreign importation, an alien element; and the rise of the
Baptist churches was wholly independent of them."

II. THE MODERN BAPTISTS

1. _Great Britain and Ireland._--If the Anabaptists of England were not the
progenitors of the modern Baptist church, we must look abroad for the
beginnings of that movement. Although there were doubtless many who held
Baptist views scattered among the Independent communities, it was not until
the time of John Smith or Smyth (d. 1612) that the modern Baptist movement
in England broke away from Brownism. Smyth was appointed preacher of the
city of Lincoln in 1600 as an ordained clergyman, but became a separatist
in 1605 or 1606, and, soon after, emigrated under stress of persecution
with the Gainsborough Independents to Amsterdam. With Thomas Helwys (_ca._
1560-_ca._ 1616) and Morton he joined the "Ancient" church there, but,
coming under Mennonite teaching in 1609, he separated from the
Independents, baptized himself (hence he is called the "Se-baptist"),
Helwys and others probably according to the Anabaptist or Mennonite fashion
of pouring. These then formed the first English Baptist Church which