Author: Beatson, John
Biography:
BEATSON, John (1743-98: Divine Right)
He was born on 31 Mar. 1743 at Cottingley Hall near Bingley, Yorkshire, the son of John Beatson (1707-67), a farmer, and his wife Elizabeth Calverley (1716-80), who had married the previous year. He was educated at Leeds Grammar School. His parents were Anglicans but on hearing a sermon at White Chapel Independent, Leeds, he became a dissenter. He later joined the Baptists and was rebaptised in 1767. He was ordained a Baptist minister at Sutton-in-Craven in 1769 and in 1771 was invited to be minister to the congregation at Salt House Lane Chapel, Hull, where he served for twenty-three years. He was also one of the founders of the Hull Subscription Library in 1775 and served as its President from 1788 to 1791. A nervous affliction and ill-health led to his retirement in 1794. He married Mary Wood (1743-74) on 11 Apr. 1768 at St. Peter’s, Bradford, apparently without issue. With Mary Collings (1748-1816), whom he married on 28 Dec. 1775 at Holy Trinity, Hull, he had three children. In addition to the work listed here, two early works were much admired, The Divine Character of Christ Considered and Vindicated (1773), and The Divine Satisfaction of Christ Demonstrated (1774). He also wrote a number of sermons in defence of religious and political liberty and against the slave-trade: The Divine Right of a Christian to Freedom of Enquiry, and Freedom of Practice in Religious Matters (1779), A Sermon on the Duty of Men as Members of Civil Society (1788), Compassion, the Duty and Dignity of Man; and Cruelty, the Disgrace of his Nature . . . Occasioned by that Branch of British Commerce which Extends to the Human Species (1789). He died at Hull on 24 Apr. 1798. (The Divine Right of a Christian to Freedom of Enquiry and Practice in Religious Matters. To which are prefixed Brief Memoirs of the Life, Character and Writings of the Author [1799], iii-xvi; ancestry.co.uk 8 Aug. 2022; findmypast.co.uk 8 Aug. 2022; C. F. Forshaw, The Poets of Keighley, Bingley, Haworth and District [1891], 5-6; R. W. Corlass, Hull Authors [1879], 12-13) AA