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Modern (Post-Reformation)

c. 1700-c.1970



The following are links to 18th, 19th, and 20th century Church History documents available online, in English, for free.  In some cases, there are better translations or editions available in print, so for serious scholarly publications, you will want to consult those.  But for introductory purposes, the following links may be helpful.


Eighteenth Century


• Authors writing in English 1700-1750 (PRDL ) - pdf's of facsimiles
• Authors writing in English 1750-1800 (PRDL) - pdf's of facsimiles
• Eighteenth Century Collections Online (Text Creation Partnership - English texts available to the public; use 'Browse' function to see the authors and works)
• Evans Early American Imprint Collection (Text Creation Partnership - texts available to the public; use 'Browse' function to see the authors and works)

•  Astell, Mary - (1666-1731) (PRDL) - 4 works

• Austen, Jane (1775-1814) - English, Anglican novelist
          • List of works online - (upenn.edu)
          • Emma
          • Letters of Jane Austen - (pemberley.com)
          • Love and Friendship and Other Early Works - (gutenberg via upenn.edu)
          • Many other works

• Carey, William (1761-1834) - "Father of modern missions" - British Baptist missionary to India
          • Works - long list of online works - (wmcarey.edu)

•  Chauncey, Charles (PRDL) - 44 works available as facsimile pdf's

•  Dutton, Anne (1692-1765) - Baptist Calvinist poet and theologian
          • Works (PRDL)
          • Letters - correspondance with Whitefield and Wesley
          • Letters - Volume 1, Volume 2, Volume 3, Volume 4, Volume 5, Volume 6, Volume 7, Volume 8 - (archive.org)
          • "Who Was Anne Dutton?" in Christian Monthly Record, p. 131ff - (google book pdf)
          • Narration of the Wonders of Grace in Verse (1833 edition) - (google book pdf)

• Edwards, Jonathan
          • Jonathan Edwards Center at Yale University
          • Works of Jonathan Edwards - links to pdf's of about 40 different works (PRDL)

• Equiano, Olaudah
          • The Life of Olaudah Equiano...The African (1794) - (google book pdf facsimile)

• Huntingdon, Selina, Countess of - sponsor of Whitefield, Wesley, Phyllis Wheatley, etc.
          • Letters from Pastors to Selina (google pdf)
• Lamb, Charles (1775-1834) - poet and author
     • Works of Charles Lamb - Volume 1, Volume 2, Volume 3, Volume 4, Volume 5 (google books) - note that different editions number their volumes differently
     • The Last Essays of Elia
     • Thomas Noon - Executor of Charles Lamb's estate - Letters and Sketch of Lamb's life

• Moravians
          •  History of Bohemian-Moravian Church (c. 1757) (ATLA)

• Quakers
     • Digital Quaker Collection - browse primary sources alphabetically

• Wesley, John
          • Wesley Center Online
          • Wesley Works
          • Register of John Wesley's Sermons
          • Center for Studies in the Wesleyan Tradition - at Duke Divinity School
                    • Includes list of Wesleyan / Methodist-related journals available online
          • John Wesley Letters - (smu.edu) and Wesleyan memorabilia images (ATLA) and wesley-works.org
          • Wesley Family Letters (ATLA)
          •  Steward, Bristol - traveled with John Wesley
                 •  Bristol Steward's Diary (1752-54)

• Whitefield, George (1740-1770)
          • Letters - Volume I, Volume 2 (17), Volume 3 (1772) - (google pdf facsimiles) - 1734-1742 Letters (Banner of Truth facsimile on google books)
          • Works of George Whitefield - Volume 1 (1771), Volume 2 (1771), Volume 3 (1771), Volume 4 (1771) - Volumes 5&6 (1772) (google pdf facsimiles)
          • Journals of George Whitefield - Continuation (1741)
          • Collection of Hymns for Social Worship (1758) - (google book pdf facsimile)
          • Memoirs of George Whitefield (1772)
          • 18 Sermons (1771) - Part 4 - (google book pdf facsimile)
          • John Wesley, Sermon on the death of George Whitefield - (google book pdf facsimile)
          • Additional works - PRDL



• Wheatley, Phillis
          • Poems on Various Subjects (1793) - (google pdf facsimile)

• Wilberforce, William (1759-1833) - English abolitionist
          • A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians - (gutenberg.org)
          • Private Papers of William Wilberforce - (gutenberg.org)
          • The Correspondence of William Wilberforce - volume 1, volume 2 (archive.org)
          • Recollections of William Wilberforce - (archive.org)
          • Speech on slavery, 1789 - (archive.org)
          • The Duty and Safety of Immediate Emancipation - (archive.org)




Nineteenth Century

• Douglass, Frederick (1818-1895; American abolitionist)
          • "The Heroic Slave" (1853) (docsouth.unc.edu)
          • My Bondage and My Freedom (1857) (googlebook pdf 1857)
          • A Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave (1845) (googlebook pdf)
          • Life and Times of Frederick Douglass (1882) (googlebook pdf)
• Elaw, Zilpha (b. 1790) - African-American preacher
          • Memoirs of the Life, Religious Expericne, Ministerial Travels, and Labours of Mrs. Elaw (archive.org)
• Finney, Charles (1792-1875)
          • Lectures on Systematic Theology (theologywebsite.com)
          • Website for Finney's works (gospeltruth.net)
• Foote, Julia (1832-1900) - First ordained woman deacon in African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church
          • A Brand Plucked From the Fire: An Autobiographical Sketch (googlebooks pdf)
• Judson, Anne Hasseltine - Missionary to Burma
          • Memoirs - includes her journals and letters (google books pdf facsimile)
• Lee, Jarena - African Methodist Episcopalian Church itinerant preacher
          • Religious Experience and Journal of Mrs. Jarena Lee, giving an Account of Her Call to Preach the Gospel (google books pdf)
• MacDonald, George (1824-1905) - Scottish author
          • Works - almost 75 works (gutenberg.org)
          • Selected works - (george-macdonald.org)

• Scopes Monkey Trial
          • William Jennings Bryan
                    • The Menace of Darwinism (1922) - (google book pdf facsimile)
                    • Speeches - Volume 1, Volume 2 - (google book pdf facsimile)
                    • Memoirs - (google book pdf facsimile)
                    • Last speech - (pbs.org)

•  Spurgeon, Charles (1834-1892)
          • All of Grace
          • Website for Spurgeon's works (spurgeon.org)

• Stowe, Harriet Beecher (1811-1896)
          • Uncle Tom's Cabin - Parts 1-13 (1852), Volume II (1852)
                    • Text form of 1852 first-edition (Gutenberg text at msa.maryland.gov)
          • The Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin (1854) - Stowe rebuts accusations of inaccuracy in UTC
          • Reviews of UTC: New York Times; The Nation, Christian Examiner; Putnam's Monthly; The North American Review and many more texts related to UTC, at (utc.iath.virginia.edu)
          • Many more of her writings available as google book pdf's

• The Gifford Lectures - Lectures on Natural Theology through 1923 in Scotland

• Thanksgiving Day Sermons (1801-1900) (ATLA)

• Sermons Preached at Princeton in 19C (ATLA)

• African-American collections
        • The Church in the Southern Black Community - (unc.edu) - many primary source texts
• Baptist primary sources - (baptiststudiesonline.com)
          • Books by Baptist authors (Galusha Anderson, Thomas Armitage, Joshua Bradley, Isaac Burgess, Ernest DeWitt Burton, Shirley Jackson Case, William Newton Clarke, John Marvin Dean, John Dowling, Charles W. Eliot, Daniel Faunce, Harry Emerson Fosdick, George Burman Foster, James R. Graves, R. H. Graves, William R. Harper, Hezekiah Harvey, Alvah H. Hovey, Eri B. Hulbert, Henry Mabie, Robert S. MacArthur, G.W. McPherson, Shailer Mathews, Ernest Pickering, Walter Rauschenbush, T. D. Teasdale, Chester Tulga, Henry Clay Vedder, William R. Williams) - (baptiststudiesonline.com)
          • American Baptist journals - baptiststudiesonline.com
          • Religious liberty - baptiststudiesonline.com
          • Baptists and race - baptiststudiesonline.com
• Chinese
        • The Chinese Christian Texts Database - 1000 texts from 1582-1840

• Korean
         •  The Moffett Korea Collection of Photographs - (ATLA)

Twentieth Century

• Bonhoeffer, Dietrich (1906-1945)
        • Dietrich Bonhoeffer Reading Room - links to many of Bonhoeffer's writings
• Graham, Billy (1918-2018) - American Evangelist
          • Sermon videos - (billygraham.org)
• King, Jr., Martin Luther (1929-1968)
          • Speeches - (mlkonline.net)

• Lewis, C. S. (1898-1963)
        • Introduction to St. Athanasius On the Incarnation
        • C. S. Lewis Reading Room - links to many of C.S.Lewis' writings
• Lewis, John (1940-2020) - African-American civil rights leader
          • Oral interview - (docsouth.unc.edu)
          • Towards the Beloved Community: The Story of the Nashville Christian Leadership Council - (crmvet.org = Civil Rights Movement Archive)
          • "We March Today" - (crmvet.org)
          • "Why We Protest" - (crmvet.org)
          • Additional documents (search "John Lewis") at crmvet.org
• Nouwen, Henri (1932-1996)
         • Letters and photographs (ATLA)
• Ockenga, Harold - founder of National Association of Evangelicals, cofounder of Fuller Theological Seminary and Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, pastor of Park St. Church, Boston
          • Audio of sermons at Park St. Church (parkstreet.org)
• Vatican II
          • Documents - note the link under each for an English translation (vatican.va/archive)

• Yoder, John Howard (1927-1997) - Mennonite Theologian - Digital Collection -

Johann Haidt, First Fruits (1747)
Moravian Archives, Bethlehem, PA

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