Taylor, Jeremy

The Anglican bishop and writer Jeremy Taylor (1613–1667), one of the key exemplars of pastoral care and a gifted writer, was born and educated in Cambridge, England. He was ranked by the English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge as the equal of Shakespeare and Milton. Taylor was probably ordained in 1633, the year in which he took his master's degree; he became a fellow of Gonville and Caius College and, two years later, a fellow at All Souls in Oxford. Shortly after being appointed the rector of Uppingham in 1638, he became the chaplain to the king of England on Laud's nomination; Laud also seems to have retained him as his own chaplain.

Taylor joined the Royalist army as chaplain when civil war broke out in 1642, and he was briefly imprisoned twice. In 1645 he became private chaplain to Lord Carbery at his Golden Grove estate. There, Taylor produced his greatest works, including A Discourse of the Liberty of Prophesying (1647), a call for Christian toleration that probably alienated Charles I; The Golden Grove (1655), a collection of daily prayers; and the Unum Necessarium (1655), a work on sin and repentance. His two famous books of devotion, The Rule and Exercises of Holy Living (1650) and The Rule and Exercises of Holy Dying (1651), were intended to act as guides for those not served by local Anglican clergy because of the ejection of priests during the interregnum. At the Restoration in 1660, Taylor published his comprehensive manual of moral theology, the Ductor Dubitantium. That same year he was appointed bishop of Down and Connor; in 1661 he was appointed bishop of Dromore, in Ireland; and later vice-chancellor of Trinity College, in Dublin.

Although he seemed conventional in his relations with the royal and Episcopal authorities, Taylor aroused controversy because of his defense of Christian toleration and his allegedly Pelagian views on original sin and justification, both of which were attacked by the Scottish Presbyterian Samuel Rutherford. Holy Dying was written in the circumstances of the death of his wife, Phoebe, but was directed at a general audience as a self-help manual: "The first entire Body of Directions for sick and dying People, that I remember to have been publish'd in the Church of England." The importance of the text was not only in the quality of its prose but in the serenity of its ecumenical verdict: "Let it be enough that we secure our Interest of Heaven," Taylor wrote, "for every good Man hopes to be saved as he is a Christian, and not as he is a Lutheran, or of another Division." Taylor advocated daily self-examination by the Christian to avoid divine judgment, and especially the "extremely sad" condition of many "Strangers and Enemies to Christ." Thus, he concluded, "He that would die holily and happily, must in this World love Tears, Humility, Solitude, and Repentance" (Taylor, 2:1:3).

See also: Christian Death Rites, History of; Good Death, The; Moment of Death

Bibliography

Askew, Reginald. Muskets and Altars: Jeremy Taylor and the Last of the Anglicans. London: Mowbray, 1997.

Hughes, H. Trevor. The Piety of Jeremy Taylor. London: Macmillan, 1960.

Taylor, Jeremy. The Rule and Exercises of Holy Dying. N.p., 1811.

RICHARD BONNEY

Taylor, Jeremy (1613–67), Church of Ireland bishop and noted devotional writer, theologian, and preacher. Born and educated at Cambridge (BA 1631, MA 1634), Taylor was closely associated with the high church regime of Archbishop William Laud of Canterbury and with the royalist cause in the English civil wars. In 1658 he accepted a lectureship near Lisburn, Co. Antrim, and after the Restoration was made bishop of Down and Connor (consecrated 27 Jan. 1661), to which was added the responsibility for administering the diocese of Dromore. Down and Connor were a stronghold of Irish Presbyterianism, and Taylor repeatedly clashed with Presbyterian ministers in his efforts to impose uniformity. Unhappy in Ireland, he sought translation to England, but was unsuccessful and died at Lisburn on 13 August 1667. His main achievements were his stylish prose works, which include A Dissuasive from Popery (1664), The Rule and Exercises of Holy Living (1651), The Rule and Exercises of Holy Dying (1668), and Doctor Dubitantium, or the Rule of Conscience (1660).

Alan Ford

Taylor, Jeremy (1613–67), was chaplain to Laud and Charles I, and was appointed rector in 1638. He was taken prisoner in the Royalist defeat before Cardigan Castle in 1645, and retired to Golden Grove, Carmarthenshire, where he wrote most of his greater works. After the Restoration he was made bishop of Down and Connor, and subsequently of Dromore. He died at Lisburn and was buried in his cathedral of Dromore. His fame rests on the combined simplicity and splendour of his style, of which The Rule and Exercise of Holy Living (1650) and The Rule and Exercises of Holy Dying (1651) are perhaps the best examples. Among his other works, The Liberty of Prophesying, an argument for toleration, appeared in 1647; his Eniautos, or series of sermons for the Christian Year, in 1653; and The Golden Grove, a manual of daily prayers, in 1655.

Taylor, Jeremy (1613–67), Anglican bishop and writer. He was chaplain to Charles I, rector of Uppingham, and then chaplain in the Royalist army. After a short imprisonment he retired in 1645 to Wales, where he lived as chaplain to Lord Carbery at Golden Grove. In 1660 he was appointed Bp. of Down and Connor and vice-chancellor of Dublin University, and in 1661 he received the further see of Dromore. His fame rests mainly on his devotional writings, especially The Rule and Exercise of Holy Living (1650) and The Rule and Exercise of Holy Dying (1651). They are characteristic expressions of Anglican spirituality in their insistence on a well-ordered piety which stresses temperance and moderation. His theological works are less felicitous. Feast day in some Anglican Churches, 13 Aug.

Taylor, Jeremy (1613–67). Anglican bishop and writer, ‘the Shakespeare of the divines’ (Emerson). He was chaplain to Charles I, and rector of Uppingham (1638–42). When the king's cause failed, he used his exile in Carmarthenshire to write his plea for toleration, The Liberty of Prophesying (1647), his influential devotional works, The Life of Christ (1649), Holy Living (1650), Holy Dying (1651), Unum Necessarium (1655), and various sermons. He was appointed bishop of Down and Connor in 1660. He regarded his Ductor Dubitantium, a comprehensive study of moral theology, as his most important work.