Life

Ashworth was born at Clough-Fold, Rossendale

Rossendale

Rossendale is a local government district with borough status. It is made up of a number of small former mill towns in Lancashire, England centered around the valley of the River Irwell in the industrial North West...

, Lancashire, in 1722. His father, Richard Ashworth, who died in 1751, aged eighty-four, was a lay preacher among the Particular Baptists; he had three sons—Thomas, Particular Baptist minister at Heckmondwike

Heckmondwike

Heckmondwike is a small town in the metropolitan borough of Kirklees, which is located geographically at the centre of West Yorkshire, England, south west of Leeds. Close to Cleckheaton and Liversedge, it is part of Cleckheckmondsedge, a name invented by J.B. Priestley to represent a West Riding...

; Caleb; and John, General Baptist minister, colleague of Dr. James Foster

James Foster (baptist minister)

James Foster was an English Baptist minister.-Early life:Foster was born and baptized at Exeter, 6 September 1697. Most of our biographical knowledge of him comes from memoirs attached to a sermon preached at his funeral by his friend and colleague, Caleb Fleming...

, who preached his funeral sermon in 1742.

Caleb was originally a carpenter; he probably was not in sympathy with his father's views, and thus did not at first turn to the ministry. He was afterwards educated for the independent ministry, under Philip Doddridge

Philip Doddridge

Philip Doddridge DD was an English Nonconformist leader, educator, and hymnwriter.-Early life:...

, at Northampton

Northampton

Northampton is a large market town and local government district in the East Midlands region of England. Situated about north-west of London and around south-east of Birmingham, Northampton lies on the River Nene and is the county town of Northamptonshire. The demonym of Northampton is...

, where he first took up his quarters in 1739; and settled at Daventry in 1746, originally as assistant to James Floyd.

Under Doddridge's will the management of the academy was left to Ashworth, and, as the Northampton congregation did not elect him their minister, he moved it to Daventry

Daventry

Daventry is a market town in Northamptonshire, England, with a population of 22,367 .-Geography:The town is also the administrative centre of the larger Daventry district, which has a population of 71,838. The town is 77 miles north-northwest of London, 13.9 miles west of Northampton and 10.2...

 in 1752 (see Daventry Academy

Daventry Academy

Daventry Academy was a dissenting academy, that is, a school or college set up by English Dissenters. It moved to many locations, but was most associated with Daventry, where its most famous pupil was Joseph Priestley...

). He obtained the degree of D.D. from Scotland in 1759. Ashworth died on 18 July 1775.

Influence

Under him Daventry academy became a chief seat of culture among liberal independents and presbyterians, who at that time were close, and shared views on theology and church polity. A list of his students is in Monthly Repository

Monthly Repository

The Monthly Repository was a British monthly Unitarian periodical which ran between 1806 and 1838.The Monthly Repository was established when Robert Aspland bought William Vidler's Universal Theological Magazine and changed the name to the Monthly Repository of Theology and General Literature...

, 1822. The academy covered languages, biblical criticism, and ecclesiastical history quite weakly; its staple was dogmatics and philosophy, including psychology (then called pneumatology

Pneumatology

Pneumatology is the study of spiritual beings and phenomena, especially the interactions between humans and God.Pneuma is Greek for "breath", which metaphorically describes a non-material being or influence....

), ethics, and physics. Ashworth published for his academy a Hebrew Grammar.

His most distinguished scholar was Joseph Priestley

Joseph Priestley

Joseph Priestley, FRS was an 18th-century English theologian, Dissenting clergyman, natural philosopher, chemist, educator, and political theorist who published over 150 works...

, who says that Ashworth took ‘the orthodox side of every question’ in theology and philosophy, the sub-tutor, Samuel Clark, ‘that of heresy.’ Doddridge's plan of referring to authors on all sides of every question, and requiring his students to give an account of them, was pursued by his successors. A pupil says: ‘Under Dr. Doddridge there was a more popular exterior; under Dr. Ashworth a more disciplined interior.’

Family

He married a Miss Hemings, by whom he had three sons and three daughters. His son John entered Daventry academy in 1760, but became a grazier.