Works
In 1608 Ainsworth answered Richard Bernard's The Separatist Schisme, but his greatest minor work in this field was his reply to John Smyth (commonly called "the Se-Baptist"), entitled Defence of Holy Scripture, Worship and Ministry used in the Christian Churches separated from Antichrist, against the Challenges, Cavils and Contradictions of Mr Smyth (1609).
His scholarly works include his Annotations—on Genesis (1616); Exodus (1617); Leviticus (1618); Numbers (1619); Deuteronomy (1619); Psalms (including a metrical version, 1612); and the Song of Solomon (1623). These were collected in folio in 1627. From the outset the Annotations took a commanding place, especially among continental scholars, establishing a scholarly tradition for English nonconformity.
His publication of Psalms, The Book of Psalmes: Englished both in Prose and Metre with Annotations (Amsterdam, 1612), which includes thirty-nine separate monophonic psalm tunes, constituted the Ainsworth Psalter, the only book of music brought to New England in 1620 by the Pilgrim settlers. Although its content was later reworked into the Bay Psalm Book, it had an important influence on the early development of American psalmody.
Ainsworth died in 1622, or early in 1623, for in that year was published his Seasonable Discourse, or a Censure upon a Dialogue of the Anabaptists, in which the editor speaks of him as a departed worthy.
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