Obadiah Couchman

The Adamites Sermon: Containing their manner of Preaching, Expounding and Prophesying: As it was delivered in Marie-bone Park, by Obadiah Couchman, a grave Weaver, dwelling in Southwark, who with his companie were taken and discovered by the Constable and other Officers of that place

Francis Coules, 1641.

The Adamites were a sect who practised 'holy nudism' and rejected the marriage laws, claiming that its members were re-established in Adam and Eve's state of original innocence. In the introduction to the sermon one of them is explaining to a non-member how the Friday meetings are conducted.

He on whom the Spirit falls is led in state between two sisters and mounted on a chair, circled on every side with the holy brethren and more holy sisters, where he prophecies till the spirit giveth way to the flesh, and suffers it to rebel; then he whom the Spirit so moveth by the insurrection of the flesh makes his election among the holy sisters; the rest follow his example, and so they endeavour to propagate and augment their number

The listener needs no further persuasion for what seems to be an invitation to an orgy:

so they both departed from that place where they held this conference and went straight to Mary-bone Park, where were gathered at least one hundred men and women...[who] instantly stripped themselves to the bare skin, both men and women, and then in the manner aforesaid, one of this Holy tribe ascends the chair, wherein he preached this sermon verbatim, as follows

This our assembly is more holy than their consecrated church; the green liberty of these trees more pleasant than their painted windows; the summer apparel of the earth more delightful and softer by far than their stone; the chirping of these pretty birds more melodious than their howling organs.

Adamite purity is compared to the corruption of the Church of England. The speaker concludes by urging his listeners, with 'not so much as fig leaves upon us,' to 'rejoice exceedingly and express our joy in the lively act of generation and propagation of the godly, that may be born naked as we are at this present'.

there are no surviving records of the Marylebone constables, no incident of this sort appears in the London or Middlesex sessions records, and no other trace can be found of the weaver Obadiah Couchman. We are left with an artful construction, a dialogue followed by a monologue, satirically representing what the author imagined the Adamites to have said

Disappointingly, it seems that despite the specificity of the information this is a work of fiction. David Cressy, in Agnes Bowker's Cat (OUP, 2000), says this.