The Conditionalist Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 2

XI. Lawyer Layton Produces Succession of Conditionalist Treatises

As previously noted, the latter part of the seventeenth century witnessed a sharp rise in the tempo of the controversy that raged in England over the issue of Innate or Conditional Immortality and the condition of man in the intermediate state. Numerous works appeared in opposition to the “sleep of the soul” teaching, many merely repeating what had been denounced “a hundred times before.” But as many defenders appear. CFF2 199.2

Doubtless the most voluminous champion of the Conditionalist position, at the time, was HENRY LAYTON (c. 1622-1705), learned barrister, theological writer, controversialist, and author of twelve books sustaining Conditionalism. He too came of a distinguished and well-to-do family, his father being “one of the masters of the jewel-house” under Charles I and II. ⁵³ Henry was educated at Oxford, then at Grays-Inn, where he studied law, and was “called to the Bar.” CFF2 199.3

Pursuant to the terms of his father’s will, he built a chapel at Rawdon. There he also printed tractates on various subjects. He then became intrigued in investigating the popular contention of the “separate existence” of the soul. According to the scholarly Blackburne, he delved into the question with “utmost avidity,” with the one purpose of “coming at the truth, examining every thing he could meet with, ancient and modern, on the subject.” He engaged in prolonged research. As a result, he came to reject the “separate existence” position, and “made no scruple of opposing the sentiments” of some of the chief proponents of Innate Immortality of his time. ⁵⁴ Against these he wrote twelve “long and laborious disquisitions”—all in the ponderous style of the day. CFF2 199.4

He had corresponded with several leading clergymen and educators, putting his arguments into manuscript form. Encountering difficulty over getting a publisher to assume the responsibility for printing and promoting his first manuscript taking the unpopular side, Layton put it away in a box, labeling it, “Treatise ... Concerning the Humane Soul.” Finally he printed it at his own expense. It was promptly challenged. He then began a series of searching analyses of books championing Innate Immortality, his replies continuing to issue periodically from his pen until the very year of his death. Since his books were not published under the patronage of a regular bookseller, his works are not so well known nor so extensively circulated as some. Nevertheless, they exerted a strong influence. ⁵⁵ CFF2 200.1

Dr. William Coward’s Second Thoughts—charging the popular view of the soul as “plain heathenish invention,” “not consonant to the principles of philosophy, reason, or religion,” and “derogatory in general to truest Christianity”—had created a furor. Various Immortal-Soulists, such as Manlove, Wadsworth, Nicholl, Broughton, Sherlock, and Turner, sprang to the defense of “orthodoxy.” Coward did not bother to answer them, but Layton took on one challenger after another, answering in the characteristically heavy but devastating style of the times. Over a spread of thirty-six years (from 1670 to 1706), he produced these twelve volumes. In his very first treatise Layton set forth this short but comprehensive thesis—a position from which he never deviated: “During life, we live and move in Him; and when we die, we rest and sleep in Him, in expectation to be raised at His Second Coming.” ⁵⁶ CFF2 200.2