“RELIGION’S FIRM-ROOTED TRUTHS:” RICHARD POLWHELE, PULPIT ORATORY AND LOYALIST ROMANTICISM IN THE ENGLISH PROVINCE

This article explores the rearguard action fought by the clergyman and writer Richard Polwhele against what he saw as the threat of Anglican Evangelicalism and Methodism in Cornwall during the French Revolutionary period, highlighting the connections between religious experience, rhetorical performance and politics. Whether it be through his theorizing of pulpit oratory, his rows with those he considered Enthusiasts or his understanding of ordination oaths, Polwhele maintained that religious belief should be regulated by rhetorical distance. Explaining this stance, the article shows how Polwhele’s theological and ecclesiological opposition to the Enthusiasm he regarded as dangerously inherent in Evangelical Protestantism also led him to address shortcomings within the governance of the Church of England itself. This danger was embodied in Polwhele’s eyes by the failure of too much pulpit oratory, particularly in the provinces, to engage through its language, content and tone with its popular audience. By focusing on the neglected figure of Polwhele, the article brings together and adds to current work on regional identity, Loyalism, Romantic religion and the sermon as a performative literary form in the eighteenth century.