Theophilus Lindsey

[7] After exchanging it for that of Piddletown in Dorset, in the gift of Francis Hastings, 10th Earl of Huntingdon, he rejected a chance to go to Dublin with the Duke of Northumberland, who became Lord Lieutenant of Ireland in 1762.

[11] The parish had at around this time about 400 households, and a local Catholic gentry family, represented by Sir Henry Lawson, 4th Baronet at Brough Hall.

On Lindsey's own account, he was influenced by William Robertson and his Attempt to explain the words reason, substance, person, creeds, orthodoxy, Catholic-church, subscription, and Index expurgatorius of 1766, with letter to his diocesan bishop from 1760 in the later editions.

[17] In 1771 Lindsey joined with Blackburne, John Jebb (1736–1786), Christopher Wyvill (1740–1822) and Edmund Law (1703–1787), bishop of Carlisle, in preparing a petition to Parliament.

[16][18] Two hundred and fifty signatures were obtained, but in February 1772 the House of Commons declined even to receive the petition by a majority of 217 to 71; the adverse vote was repeated in the following year.

[19] Alexander Gordon writing in the Dictionary of National Biography commented that Turner disapproved of Lindsey's idea of leading a secession from the Church of England.

[20] Lindsey eventually acquired a copy of Samuel Clarke's altered prayer book from his brother-in-law John Disney.

Lindsey was so impressed with Clarke's work that he intended to introduce the changes to his congregation at Catterick but ultimately decided against such action as he believed they would in violation of his vows to the Church of England.

[25] In 1785 in the United States, James Freeman created his own revised prayer based on Lindsey's 1774 book which is still used in its ninth edition by the King's Chapel congregation of Boston.

In 1800 he received a considerable bequest from Elizabeth Rayner, a wealthy member of his congregation, and as a result his final years were spent in comfort.

[16] Thomas Belsham's Memoirs of the Late Reverend Theophilus Lindsey, M.A., including a brief analysis of his works; together with anecdotes and letters of eminent persons, his friends and correspondents; also a general view of the progress of the Unitarian doctrine in England and America appeared in 1812.