Jeremy Taylor

JEREMY TAYLOR August 13
Bishop of Down, Connor, and Dromore, 1667

Jeremy Taylor, one of the most influential of the "Caroline Divines," was educated at Cambridge and, through the influence of William Laud, became a Fellow of All Souls at Oxford. He was still quite young when he became chaplain to Charles the First and, later, during the Civil War, a chaplain in the Royalist army.

The successes of Cromwell's forces brought about Taylor's imprisonment and, after Cromwell's victory, Taylor spent several years in forced retirement as chaplain to the family of Lord Carberry in Wales. It was during this time that his most influential works were written, especially Holy Living and Holy Dying (1651).

Among his other works, Liberty of Prophesying proved to be a seminal work in encouraging the development of religious toleration in the seventeenth century. The principles set forth in that book rank with those of Milton's Areopagitica in its plea for freedom of thought.

Despite Taylor's unquestioned literary genius, he was, unfortunately, not asked to have a part in the Prayer Book revision of 1662. The first American Prayer Book, however, incorporated one of his prayers, part of which has been adapted to serve as the Collect of his commemoration; and another has been added in the present Prayer Book.

Taylor's theology has sometimes been criticized, most bitingly by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, who claims that Taylor seems to "present our own holy life as the grounds of our religious hope, rather than as the fruit of that hope, whose ground is the mercies of Christ." No such complaint, however, was ever made about his prayers, which exemplify the best of Caroline divinity, blended with great literary genius.

In later life, Taylor and his family moved to the northeastern part of Ireland where, after the restoration of the monarchy, he became Bishop of Down and Connor. To this was later added the small adjacent diocese of Dromore. As Bishop, he labored tirelessly to rebuild churches, restore the use of the Prayer Book, and overcome continuing Puritan opposition. As Vice-chancellor of Trinity College, Dublin, he took a leading part in reviving the intellectual life of the Church of Ireland. He remained to the end a man of prayer and a pastor.

1994 Lesser Feasts And Fasts