English nonjuring priest and devotional writer whose Serious Call helped define eighteenth-century Anglican spirituality. In later life he turned increasingly toward mystically inflected theology, engaging the legacy of Jakob Böhme and inward prayer. Law's prose is notable for moral rigor, practical instruction, and a sustained critique of complacent religion.
Full title: An earnest and serious answer to Dr. Trapp's Discourse of the folly, sin, and danger, of being righteous over-much
The Dial's edition: Precise edition unknown.
A polemical moral-theological reply to Joseph Trapp, insisting that rigorous devotion is not 'excess' but the proper logic of Christian life, and pressing Trapp on how 'reasonable' religion can become a cover for comfortable mediocrity.
An appeal to all that doubt, or disbelieve the truths of the Gospel, whether they be Deists, Arians, Socinians, or nominal Christians. In which, the true grounds and reasons of the whole Christian faith and life are plainly and fully demonstrated
The Dial's edition: Precise edition unknown.
Law's major anti-deist and anti-rationalist apologetic, arguing that Christianity must be grasped as a transformative divine life rather than reduced to propositions acceptable to 'mere reason,' and addressing Deists, Arians, Socinians and nominal Christians in one sweeping case.
The case of reason, or natural religion, fairly and fully stated. In answer to a book, intitled, Christianity as old as the creation
The Dial's edition: Precise edition unknown.
Law's extended answer to Matthew Tindal's Christianity as Old as the Creation, contesting the Enlightenment claim that 'natural religion' is sufficient and that revelation adds nothing essential; a key text in early-18th-century debates over reason, revelation, and authority.
Full title: A practical treatise upon Christian perfection
The Dial's edition: Precise edition unknown.
A program for 'perfection' as faithful performance of duty in every sphere of life, pursued through self-denial, prayer, and imitation of Christ—less a mystical apex than a comprehensive moral-spiritual regimen. Listed in The Dial as William Law, Christian Perfection.
The Latin works of Giordano Bruno, the Italian philosopher burned for heresy in 1600. This Paris edition collects his speculative, cosmological, and mnemonic writings. Listed in The Dial's 1843 catalog under William Law's holdings.
Digital copy not available
Letters
Full title: A collection of letters on the most interesting and important subjects, and on several occasions
The Dial's edition: Precise edition unknown.
A posthumous collection of Law's correspondence on spiritual and theological subjects, reflecting his mature devotional thought and pastoral counsel. Digital copy not yet located.
Full title: The Christian's manual : or, The desire of the soul turned to God
The Dial's edition: Precise edition unknown.
A thematic anthology of Law's devotional and mystical passages (this edition associated with Andrew Murray), arranged to guide readers into a single-minded interior Christianity of surrender, prayer, and holy desire. Listed in The Dial as William Law, Christian's Manual (Extracts).
Full title: Remarks upon a late book, entituled, The fable of the bees, or private vices, publick benefits
The Dial's edition: Precise edition unknown.
Law's extended rebuttal to Bernard Mandeville's Fable of the Bees, rejecting the claim that 'private vices' can be socially beneficial and challenging Mandeville's reduction of virtue to disguised self-interest. Law defends a robust moral realism (virtue as genuinely ordered love and self-government), and argues that a society built on cultivated appetites and cynicism about motives corrodes both personal character and the common good.
Full title: A reply to the Bishop of Bangor's Answer to the representation of the Committee of Convocation
The Dial's edition: 1719
Law's intervention in the Bangorian Controversy, answering Bishop Benjamin Hoadly's claims about the nature of Christ's kingdom and church authority; the letters defend 'high church' sacramental and ecclesial principles against what Law reads as a reduction of Christianity to inward morality alone.
Full title: A serious call to a devout and holy life : adapted to the state and condition of all orders of Christians
The Dial's edition: Precise edition unknown.
A classic of Anglican devotional literature arguing that authentic Christianity is a whole-life discipline, not periodic religious observance, and offering concrete practices aimed at reshaping habit, intention, and daily conduct into sustained devotion.
A companion work that presents divine love (charity) as the essence and criterion of real Christianity: not sentiment, but a purified will that seeks the good of God and neighbor without self-interest. Law frames love as the goal of spiritual growth and the true test of illumination, pressing readers toward a disciplined, habitual life of meekness, forgiveness, and active benevolence.
Full title: The spirit of prayer, or, The soul rising out of the vanity of time into the riches of eternity
The Dial's edition: Precise edition unknown.
Law's classic guide to prayer as an inward disposition rather than a technique: he argues that true prayer arises from the Spirit's life in the soul, expressed in humility, repentance, and continual turning toward God. Written in a dialogic form, it treats prayer as the engine of regeneration—reforming desire and will so that devotion becomes steady, practical, and transformative.
Full title: Spiritual fragments, selected from the works of the Rev. William Law
The Dial's edition: Precise edition unknown.
A short selection designed for devotional reading, excerpting Law's most pointed spiritual counsel and typically framing him biographically and pedagogically for 19th-century readers. Selected by Mary Ann Kelty.
The way to divine knowledge being several dialogues between Humanus, Academicus, Rusticus, and Theophilus : as preparatory to a new edition of the works of Jacob Behmen; and the right use of them
The Dial's edition: Precise edition unknown.
A late, mature statement of Law's mystical theology: it argues that genuine 'knowledge of God' is not primarily intellectual assent but an inward transformation, a new birth of the divine life in the soul. Written in a dialogic, catechetical mode, the book insists that reason and learning can diagnose spiritual need but cannot produce holiness; only repentance, self-denial, and the Spirit's working can open the 'divine knowledge' that is experiential, Christ-centered, and practical. In effect it functions as a guide to Law's later synthesis of Anglican devotion with Behmenist themes: the fall into selfhood, the necessity of regeneration, and the recovery of charity as the true mark of illumination.
