the condition of the dog and toad . . . yea, gladly would I have been in the condition of the dog or horse, for I knew they had no soul to perish under the everlasting weights of hell for sin, as mine was like to do. : At the forefront of this radical movement within puritanism were the mil- lenarian and open-Baptist Independent congregations with which John Rogers and John Bunyan were involved. Born only a year apart, Rogers and Bunyan occupied very different places among the radical Independents in 1653. Rogers was an experienced pastor with a university education; Bunyan

doi:10.4324/9780203166505-26

Chapter

the condition of the dog and toad . . . yea, gladly would I have been in the condition of the dog or horse, for I knew they had no soul to perish under the everlasting weights of hell for sin, as mine was like to do.

Chapter

ABSTRACT

But while there are allusions to the established paradigm of conversion, there are also distinct novelties about Rogers’ approach. The descriptions of the despair of the convicted sinner, for example, evidence a radicalization of the typical puritan discourse. The principal theologians of the Independent movement had argued that a state of ‘void’ should characterize the convicted sinner. This ‘void’ was ‘an emptiness’, a recognition that the individual ‘has nothing he can point to, or even reflect upon, including his preparedness’.31

Thus, for example, Jeremiah Burroughs encouraged those who sought salvation to pray,