Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1900, volume 1).djvu/668

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CLARKE
CLARKE

trine of Prayer " (1854) ; " Karl Hase. Life of Jesus," translated from the German (1860) ; " Service Book " (1844) ; " Disciples' Plymn Book " (1844) ; " Ortho- doxy : its Truths and' Errors " (1866) ; " The Hour which Cometh," sermons (1864) ; " Steps of Be- lief, or Rational Christianity maintained against Atheism, Free Religion, and Romanism" (1870); "Ten Great Religions," an essay in comparative theology (1871-'83) ; " Go up Higher, or Religion in Common Life," sermons (1877) ; " Common Sense in Religion," essays (1879); "'Exotics: At- tempts to Domesticate Them," translations in verse (1876); "Essentials and Non-Essentials in Religion " (1878) ; " How to Find the Stars," an account of the astronomical lantern (invented and patented by him) and its use (1878) ; " Memorial and Biographial Sketches " (1878) ; " Events and Epochs in Religious History " (1881) ; " Legend of Thomas Didymus, the Jewish Sceptic " (New York, 1881); "Self-Culture" (Boston, 1882); " The Ideas of the Apostle Paul " (1884) ; " Anti- Slavery Days" (New York, 1884); "Manual of Unitarian Belief" (1884); "Every-Day Religion" (Boston, 1886); and "Vexed Questions" (1886).


CLARKE, Jeremiah, president-regent of Rhode Island, b. in England ; d. in Newport, R. I., in 1652. He was an eider of Pocasset and one of the origi- nal settlers of Newport in 1689, was elected con- stable of the new plantation on 12 March, 1640, became treasurer of the province in May, 1647, was continued in that office, and chosen as one of the president's assistants the following year. When William Coddington, the president-elect, a royalist who desired to separate the island from the other towns and unite it to Plymouth, neglect- ed to enter upon the office and to meet the charges brought against him in the assembly, Clarke, who was one of the leaders of the dominant republican party, was selected by that body to fill the place provisionally, with the title of president-regent, until the following May, when John Smith, of Warwick, was regularly elected.


CLARKE, John, physician, and one of the founders of Rhode Island, b. in Suffolk, England, 8 Oct., 1609 ; d. in Newport, R. I., 20 April, 1676. He was well educated, but it is not known where and how he obtained his intellectual tr-aining. Deeply sympathizing with the Puritans in their struggles, he emigrated to the New World, arriving at Boston in November, 1637. Finding the gov- ernment at Boston intolerant and oppressive, and the comiiTunity rent with controversies, he resolved to plant a new colony. In company with Codding- ton and others, and with the encouragement of Roger Williams, he selected an island in Narra- gansett bay, known as Aquidneck, afterward called Rhode Island, as his retreat from intolerance. The lands were purchased from the Indians, the deed bearing date 24 March, 1688. From the north end of the island, where the first settlement was made, the government was soon transferred to a place at the south end, which received the name of New- port. When in 1647 Aquidneck was united with the other settlements, which afterward became the state of Rhode Island, a code of laws was framed for the confederacy, closing with these memorable words : " And otherwise than thus what is herein forbidden, all men may walk as their consciences persuade them, every one in the name of his God. And let the saints of the Most High walk in this colony without molestation, in the name of Jeho- vah, their God, for ever and ever." It is supposed that John Clarke was the author of this code. In 1688 a church was gatliered, to which he ministered as teacher, and the second Baptist church established in A merica. While on a visit to one of the members of his church, William Witter, who lived in Lynn, Mr. Clarke, with his two companions, Obadiah Holmes and John Crandall, was arrested and sen- tenced to pay a fine of £20, " or else to be well whipped." Some person unknown to him paid the fine, much to his regret. Troubles having arisen in his infant colony, and its existence being threat- ened, he was induced in 1651 to go to England, with the hope of obtaining relief from the court. In the next year, 1652, his famous work in defence of liberty of conscience was published in London. It was entitled " 111 News from New England ; or, a Narrative of New England's Persecution." Clarke remained abroad for some time, laboring for the welfare of his colony. In 1663 he obtained from King Charles a charter whose piovisions were of unparalleled liberality, guaranteeing that " no per- son within the said colony, at any time hereafter, shall be in anywise molested, punished, disquieted, or called in question for any differences of opinion on matters of religion." In one of his addresses to the king he said of his colony : " It desires to be permitted to hold forth in a lively experiment that a flourishing civil state may stand, yea, and best be maintained, and that among English spirits, with a full liberty of religious concernments." After an absence of more than twelve years, Clarke re- turned home in 1664. He was immediately elected to the general assembly, and continued to be re- elected until 1669, when he was made deputy gov- ernor, an honor repeated in 1671. Besides other important services for his colony, he was appointed to " compose all the laws into a good method and order, leaving out what may be superfluous, and adding what may appear unto him necessary." He left most of his property in the hands of trustees, for I'eligious and educational purposes. He has been called the " Father of Rhode Island " and the " Father of American Baptists." His doctrinal views have been pronounced " so clear and scriptu- ral that they might stand as the confession of faith of Baptists to-day, after more than two centuries of experience and investigation." It is claimed for him that he was the first to show " in an actual government that the best safeguard of personal rights is Christian law." There is no full memoir of Clarke's life and times. Besides general histo- ries, see Isaac Baekus's " History of New England, with Special Refei-ence to the Baptists " (3 vols., 1777-'96; new ed., 2 vols., 1871), and articles on Clarke's place in history, in the " Baptist Quarter- ly " for 1876, by Prof. John C. C. Clarke, under the title of " The Pioneer Statesman."


CLARKE, John Mason, geologist, b. in Canan- daigua, N. Y., 15 April, 1857. He was educated at Amherst, and at the University of Gottingen, Germany. From 1881 till 1884 he was professor of geology and mineralogy at Smith college, North- ampton, Mass., after which he filled a similar chair in the Massachusetts agricultural college at Am- herst, and in 1886 became assistant paleontolo- gist of the state of New York. His published pa- pers include "New Devonian Crustacea" (1882); "Devonian Crustacea" (1883); " Cirriped Crusta- cea from the Devonian " (1883) : " Ueber Deutsche Oberdevonische Crustaceen " (1884); "Die Fauna des Iberger Kalks " (1884) ; " On Devonian Spores " (1885); "The Geological Succession in Ontario County, N. Y." (1886) : and " On tlie Higher Devo- nian Faunas of Ontario County, N. Y." (1886).


CLARKE, John Sleeper, comedian, b. in Baltimore, Md., in 1835. He became a member of an amateur dramatic association in his native city in early life, and essayed tragic parts, but made his dehut