Jeremy Taylor

Jeremy Taylor (1613-1667) was a great English divine and preacher, born at Cambridge, son of a barber. He was educated at Caius College, became a Fellow of All Souls', Oxford, and took orders. He attracted the attention of Laud, was made chaplain to the king, and appointed to the living of Uppingham. On the sequestration of his living in 1642 joined the king at Oxford, and adhered to the royal cause through the Civil War. He suffered much privation, and imprisonment at times. Returning to Wales, he procured the friendship and enjoyed the patronage of the Earl of Carberry, in whose mansion at Grove he wrote a number of his works. Before the Restoration he received preferment in Ireland, and after that event was made bishop, first of Down and then of Dromore. His life here was far from a happy one, partly through insubordination in his diocese and partly through domestic sorrow.

His works are numerous, but the principal are his "Liberty of Prophesying," "Holy Living and Holy Dying," "Life of Christ," "Ductor Dubitantium," a work on casuistry. He was a good man and a faithful, more a religious writer than a theological. His books are read more for their devotion than their divinity, and they all give evidence of luxuriance of imagination, to which the epithet "florid" has not inappropriately been applied. In Church matters he was a follower of Laud.

Nearby pages
Jericho, Jerome Cardan, Jerome Klapta Jerome, Jerome of Prague, Jersey, Jersey City