Modern British Heresy

  ( Bibliography ) John Burk was placed in Dublin University at a young age by an uncle , though this bare statement tells us little. He was tried for heresy at Dublin University in 1794 aged 22 or 23 (his birth date is not certain). The only account of Burk’s trial I have found is his self-published defence: The Trial of John Burk, Late of Trinity College, for heresy and Blasphemy, Before the Board of Senior Fellows. 1794 Page numbers relate to this text. (R eproduction, Making of Modern Law print edn, BiblioLife) Perhaps a fuller account (and from another perspective) survives somewhere in the archives of the University. I believe the first public accusation was made in the Belfast Journal or the Dublin Evening Post of 1794. _________________________________________ Trial On April 15 1794, a Saturday, one Dr Hall formally interrogated three undergraduates of the University. He wanted to know what  Burk had told them of his views and the arguments he had made.  Burk was consequently

I've been chasing a thread down a rabbit hole, to mix metaphors: burning Bibles in Ireland.  I have been trying to follow up my previous post,  Books condemned to be burned , by instancing episodes of Bible burning in Ireland. I am confident they're there (I recall seeing occasional newspaper accounts that I didn't log at the time) and, although I've found just one instance between 1789 and 1830 (see below),  I keep looking. There was a fair amount of burning in general in Ireland. In the rumbling sustained violence of English control, fire was a general and occasional weapon of the marginalised poor in the south of the country in particular. It could be a particular weapon against protestantising missionaries, not least the Hibernian Bible Society ( wiki ) and the linked Hibernian Sunday School Society. Protestant intent The Hibernian Bible Society ( established 1808)  promised much more than merely distributing scripture. Its prospectus - for a Protestant audience -