(1745-1813)
The table of contents to the six
volume set.
William Huntington was born on February 2,1745, near Cranbrook, Kent, England. He died on July 1, 1813, in his sixty-ninth year.
Of Huntington's description of his sweet blessed deliverance into gospel liberty, J. C. Philpot says: "We have read some of the finest productions of human eloquence, in both ancient and modern languages, and therefore we know what we assert when we declare that, in our judgment, the decryption . . .; apart from the experience there described, as a mere piece of eloquence, is one of the grandest and most beautiful pieces of writing that has ever come under our eye." Well might our author say: "Oh happy year! happy day! blessed minute! sacred spot! Yea, rather blessed be my Redeemer, who 'delivered my soul from death, and mine eyes from bears, and my feet from falling.' "
"God raises up such men as John Bunyan and William Huntington but once in a century." -William Romaine.
Dr. Henry Cole, translator of the Works of Luther and Calvin, after referring to Huntington as "that great and blessed servant of the Most High," says, "I believe he bore and left in Britain the greatest and most glorious testimony to the power of God's salvation that ever was borne or left therein."
A. J. Baxter, editor of the Gospel Advocate, wrote: "There are hundreds who will both speak and write with respect of such men of God as Owen, Bunyan, Romaine, Barridge and Newton, who would recoil at the mention of the name of Huntington. And why? Because his conduct was less consistent than they? No, but because, in depth, closeness, and discrimination of vital realities he excelled them all; and was therefore the least comprehended, 1 Cor. 2:15. (Thomas Wright in Life of Huntington.)
(-T. Rutt in Foreword to Kingdom of Heaven Taken by Prayer, by William Huntington)
Quotes of William Huntington
"Now therefore why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear?" The liberty which Peter here alludes to is the liberty of the Holy Spirit, which God had given them, which Paul calls the law of the Spirit of life, which made him free from the law of sin and death; and "where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty," (2 Cor.3:17) for, as David says, the Spirit of God is a free Spirit. (Psa. 2:12) The rule that Peter gives them is faith, which purifies the heart. The unbearable yoke that they were going to tempt God with, by galling the neck of the disciples, was first, the needfulness of circumcision; Secondly, a command to keep the law of Moses; and it is called tempting God, because it was a reflection cast upon His work who had purified their hearts by faith, and sent His Spirit to govern and lead them into all truth; as if the Holy Spirit was not sufficient to make them obedient, nor God's purifying their hearts a sufficient purification, nor faith a sufficient rule, without yoking them with the killing letter as the only rule of life.
The law obeyed, and disarmed of its curse, is in the heart of the Mediator, who is Judge of quick and dead, and therefore keeps the keys of hell and of death. The believer is under the law of faith to Christ; and they that are His have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts; such are delivered from the law; and against such there is no law; and sin is not imputed where there is no law. I do insist upon it that, if a believer be brought to the law of Moses, to be under it in any other sense, sin stares him in the face, wrath works in his heart, his enmity is stirred up, bondage seizes him, and despondency or despair will sink him, unless the law of the Spirit of life makes him free from the law of sin and death.
William Huntington
A Confession Written And Published By Huntington