Robert Hill (died 1623) was an English clergyman, a
conforming Puritan
Historians have produced and worked with a number of definitions of Puritanism, in an unresolved debate on the nature of the Puritan movement of the 16th and 17th century. There are some historians who are prepared to reject the term for historica ...
according to Anthony Milton.
Life
He was a native of
Ashbourne, Derbyshire
Ashbourne is a market town in the Derbyshire Dales district in Derbyshire, England. Its population was measured at 8,377 in the 2011 census and was estimated to have grown to 9,163 by 2019. It has many historical buildings and independent sho ...
. He was educated at
Christ's College, Cambridge
Christ's College is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge, England. The college includes the Master, the Fellows of the College, and about 450 undergraduate and 250 graduate students. The c ...
, and graduated B.A. in 1584, M.A. in 1586. In 1588-9 he was admitted fellow of
St. John's College, Cambridge, and from about 1591 to 1602 was perpetual curate of
St Andrew's Church, Norwich. He found Norwich full of preaching, and attributed this in part to the mayor,
Francis Rugge.
[Carole Rawcliffe, Richard Wilson, ''Medieval Norwich'' (2006), p. 272.]
Hill took an active part in the disputed election to the mastership of St. John's in 1595. By October 1601 he was chaplain to Lord Chief Justice
John Popham. Having commenced B.D. in 1595, he was incorporated at Oxford on 10 July 1605. In 1602 he became lecturer of
St. Martin-in-the-Fields in London, and on 15 September 1607 rector of
St. Margaret Moyses, Friday Street. In 1609 he proceeded D. D. On 24 February 1613 he was preferred by
Lord Chancellor Ellesmere
Thomas Egerton, 1st Viscount Brackley, (c. 1540 – 15 March 1617), known as Lord Ellesmere or Lord Egert from 1603 to 1616, was an English nobleman, judge and statesman from the Egerton family who served as Lord Keeper and Lord Chancellor f ...
to the well-endowed rectory of
St. Bartholomew Exchange, and resigned his other cure.
Hill died in August 1623, and was buried by his desire near his first wife in the chancel of St. Bartholemew. He married, first, between 1613 and 1615, Margaret, daughter of John(?) Witts of Ghent, and widow of
Adrian de Saravia, who died in childbed on 29 June 1615, aged 39. Her death was mourned by
Joshua Sylvester. Hill's second wife, Susan, apparently the sister of
Thomas Westfield, survived him.
Works
Hill was author of:
*''Life everlasting; or the trve knowledge of the One Jehovah, Three Elohim, and Iesvs Immanvel: collected ovt of the best modern Divines, and compiled into one volume'', Cambridge 1601.
*''Christs Prayer expounded, a Christian directed, and a Communicant prepared … To which is added a Preface of Prayer, a pithie Prayer for Christian Families, &.,'' 8vo, London 1606. Hill afterwards issued a greatly enlarged edition, under the title of ''The Pathway to Prayer and Pietie. Containing (1) An Exposition of the Lords Prayer …; (2) A Preparation to the Lords Supper, with Ma.
Zanchius Confession concerning that Sacrament; (3) A Direction to a Christian Life; (4) An Instruction to die well'', 2 pts, London 1613. To the sixth edition (5 pts, London 1615-16) is appended
Joshua Sylvester's ''Elegie'' on the death of Margaret Hill. The eighth edition (1629) contains ''The Protestation of J. White written to the end the Papists might understand he departed out of this world of the same opinion.'' From the plan of this manual
Jeremy Taylor
Jeremy Taylor (1613–1667) was a cleric in the Church of England who achieved fame as an author during the Protectorate of Oliver Cromwell. He is sometimes known as the "Shakespeare of Divines" for his poetic style of expression, and he is fr ...
may have derived that of his ''Holy Living and Dying.''
Hill translated from the Latin of
William Bucanus ''Institvtions of Christian Religion'', London, 1606, and edited
William Perkins's ''Godly Exposition upon the three first chapters of the Revelation'', London, 1607. In the fourth part of the ''Workes'' of
Richard Greenham London, 1612, is ''An Exposition of the 119 Psalme found unperfect and perfected by R. Hill''. He also collected the posthumous sermons and lectures of
Samuel Hieron, and published them in 1620 as the second volume of Hieron's works. Hill has Latin verses before
Foulk Robartes's ''The Revenue of the Gospel in Tythes'', 1613.
Notes
References
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hill, Robert
English conforming Puritans
Alumni of Christ's College, Cambridge
Fellows of St John's College, Cambridge
1623 deaths
16th-century English Anglican priests
17th-century English Anglican priests
People from Ashbourne, Derbyshire
Early modern Christian devotional writers
16th-century Anglican theologians
17th-century Anglican theologians