A sermon against schisme: or, The seperations of these times. Preacht in the church of Wattlington in Oxford-shire 1652

Mayne, Jasper, 1604-1672    A sermon against schisme: or, The seperations of these times. Preacht in the church of Wattlington in Oxford-shire, with some interruption, September 11. 1652. At a publick dispute held there, between Jasper Mayne, D.D. and one –  printed for R. Royston, at the Angel in Ivie-lane,, London, 1652

Disbound [2], 22 p. ; 4to

Mayne was a noted Oxford divine, dramatist, and later Dean of Gloucester (from the Restoration). Richard Royston (?at the Angel?), the publisher, was the leading Royalist bookseller of the 1640s?50s, so the imprint already signals its political and ecclesiastical stance.

Occasion & setting
The sermon was preached at Watlington, Oxfordshire, 11 September 1652, during the Commonwealth, when parish pulpits were frequent arenas for sharp debate between conformist clergy and ?sectaries? (Independents, Baptists, Seekers, etc.). The title?s phrase ?with some Interruption? isn?t just dramatics?Mayne was publicly heckled and drawn into a disputation (the pamphlet frames the event as a formal ?publick dispute?). It?s one of the more vivid printed accounts of a parish-level flashpoint in the mid-century ?war of the churches.?

This pamphlet provides a snapshot of post-war religious contention (1652): from the parish aisle you hear a Church of England conformist arguing with emerging dissenting groups. The Watlington dispute documented: the Watlington “publick dispute” becomes a printed event; it is often linked in contemporary sources with Baptist figures in the Abingdon Henley circuit.

Printed for Richard Royston, the leading royalist bookseller?so this is part of the concerted Restoration-minded print offensive of the early 1650s.
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