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Clapham
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Clapperton

during the epidemic induced him to publish ‘An Epistle discoursing upon the present Pestilence, teaching what it is, and how the people of God should carrie themselves towards God and their Neighbour therein.’ In the dedication of this Clapham states that he has ‘been sent to Coventry by the Brownists,’ probably because of the ‘Antidoton,' but the present tract brought him worse trouble. He argues that a christian who dies of the plague shows in so dying ‘a want of faith,’ but not to such an extent as to imperil his soul. Clapham was misunderstood and thrown into prison in November 1603 on the charge of increasing the panic caused by the epidemic. Here he remained for nearly a year, and wrote a tract in 1604 entitled ‘His Demaundes and Answeres touching the Pestilence, methodically handled, as his time and meanes could permit.’ The book is edited by some friend of Clapham’s, who gives only his initials, and contains an account by Clapham of the injustices he had suffered, with an elaborate and generally very sensible discussion of the plague itself, and asks why he should be left in prison for doing his duty ‘when almost none els would.’ In a tract dated 1605 he speaks of himself as ‘at the beginning of his third year’s bonds,’ but shortly after this he must have been set at liberty, for in 1608 the preface to his ‘Errour on the Left Hand’ is dated ‘from my house at Norburne, East Kent, 8 of June.’ In Hasted's ‘Kent’ we find that Henry Clapham was appointed vicar of Northbourne by the archbishop of Canterbury in 1607. Henry is evidently a mistake for Henoch. His successor was appointed in 1614, which is probably the date of Clapham’s death. he book published in 1608 contains two parts: the first, ‘Errour on the Right Hand through a Preposterous Zeale,’ the second, ‘Errour on the Left Hand through a Frozen Securitie.’ This is the most valuable of all Clapham's works; it contains a series of dialogues between representatives of existing religious and irreligious opinions in England—Anabaptist, Legatine-Arrian, Familist, Romanist, Libertinus, Atheos. Mediocritie speaks for the author, while Malcontent and Flyer stand for ‘the Nickafidge,’ the undecided man. This book and the tracts on the plague are full of interest for the student of the times. Besides the works mentioned already Clapham published in 1605 ‘Doctor Andros, his Prosopopeia Answered, and necessarily directed to his Majestic for removing of Catholike Scandale,’ and ‘Sacred Policie, directed of dutie to our sweet young Prince Henry;’ in 1609, 'A Chronologicall Discourse, touching the Church, Christ, Anti-Christ, Gog and Magog, &c.,’ which was apparently preceded by an epistle ‘to such as are troubled in minde about the stirres in our church.’ All Clapham's works contain numerous dedications, prologues, and epilogues, frequently in verse, and occasionally some not very witty epigrams; his erudition is considerable, and he displays some knowledge of Hebrew.

[Catalogues Brit. Mus. and Bodleian Libraries; Ames's Typogr. (Herbert), passim; Hasted's Kent, iv. 156; Hunter’s Chorus Vatum in Brit. Mus. MS. Addit. 24489.]

R. B.


CLAPHAM, SAMUEL (1755–1830), divine, born at Leeds in 1755, was educated by his father in his native town, and at Clare Hall, Cambridge, where he graduated B.A. in 1778 and M.A. in 1784 (Graduati Cantab. edit. 1856, 76). He became curate of Yarm, Yorkshire, in 1790, and vicar of Great Ouseburn, in the same county, in 1797. As a remuneration for his abridgment of Bishop Pretyman’s ‘Elements of Christian Theology,’ that prelate obtained for him the vicarage of Christchurch, Hampshire, in 1802 (Biog. Dict. of Living Authors, pp. 63, 421). In 1806 he was instituted to the rectory of Gussage St. Michael, Dorsetshire. He died at Sidmouth on 1 June 1830 (Gent. Mag. c. (i.) 646).

Besides numerous occasional discourses he published: 1. Abridgment of Bishop Pretyman’s ‘Elements of Theology,’ 1802. 2. ‘Sermons selected and abridged, chiefly from minor authors,’ 3 vols. 1803–11, 5th edit. 2 vols. Lond. 1830. 3. ‘Practical Sermons on several important subjects,’ 2nd edit. Lond. 1804, 8vo, 3rd edit. 2 vols. Lond. 1808, 8vo. 4. A translation of Massillon’s ‘Charges’ under the assumed name of Theophilus St. John, LLB., 1805 and 1806. 5. ‘Sermons selected from the works of the Rev. Dr. Samuel Clarke,’ in opposition to the tenets of Methodism and Calvinism, with some account of his life, 1806. 6. ‘English Grammar taught by examples rather than by rules of Syntax,’ 1810. 7. ‘Prayers selected from the several writings of Jeremy Taylor,’ 1816. 8. ‘A collection of the several Points of Sessions’ Law, alphabetically arranged,’ 2 vols. Lond. 1818. 9. ‘The Pentateuch, or Five Books of Moses, illustrated; containing an explication of the phraseology incorporated with the text,’ 1818.

[Authorities cited above; also Watt's Bibl. Brit.; Cat. of Printed Books in Brit. Mus.; Butterworth's Law Cat. p. 45; Nichols's Lit. Anecd. ix. 728.]

T. C.

CLAPOLE. [See Clapwell.]

CLAPPERTON, HUGH (1788–1827), African explorer, born at Annan, Dumfries-