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Track 4. The Defence of Master William Dowsing

Here is another side of faith; I met William Dowsing in Blythburgh Church in Suffolk where one of the gilded medieval angels that gaze down from the wonderful medieval roof had been brought down to ground level, to show that it had musket balls embedded in it; apparently William Dowsing, the Puritan iconoclast, had been trying to shoot them down. What a wonderful idea! Dowsing kept a diary of all the things in churches which he felt contributed to ‘popish superstition’, but was not a total vandal – he could admire beauty as well. He destroyed what he thought stood in the way of the better; art and beauty can become idols, at least that is what WD thought. Was he wrong?

With skill and cunning artifice the church ceiling was painted
Angels in wood and plaster wrought with feathered wings like birds
A semblance of the firmament, the starry host resplendent
But all this was the work of man defying God’s own word
The graven image made in contravention of the Scripture
The painted glass, the kings and queens and all their pomp and show
I will treat them as they merit, they will all fall before my hand
I have my warrant from the Earl, this is the work I know

I am Master William Dowsing
I have come here with my gun
I am bringing down man’s heaven
So we all can see the sun

The rich brought gold and silver thinking they could purchase grace
The crooked priests in their avarice were not denied their share
These were the faithless shepherds, Hired hands I do disdain
Unworthy of the human souls entrusted to their care
But today they no longer can hold the poor man in their thrall
The falsehood of their doctrine must give way to the Word
I am Master William Dowsing with my ladder and my axe
I have come here to prepare the way of the Lord

I am Master William Dowsing
I will break before I build
To see these ancient houses
with God’s true glory filled

You may call me vandal you may call me destroyer
I only sought to bring down the things that stand between
The soul of a man and the knowledge of his Maker
Where no earthly power or priest should ever intervene
The only beauty that I see, the fair beauty of holiness
Not the dust of old tradition, the gilt upon the clay
You may trust in paint and plaster that is all of human craftsmanship
But I will stand before my God in the clear light of day

I am Master William Dowsing
I am carrying a broom
To sweep all superstition
Out from this living room

William Dowsing was a Puritan iconoclast who worked his way through East Anglia in 1644. He didn't do it off his own bat but had a warrant from the Earl of Manchester, who then commanded the Parliamentary army of the Eastern Association (East Anglia). The Earl, in turn, was responding to an Ordinance (1643) from Parliament.

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