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tensions to religion ; and the cause they fought for , they always spoke of as the cause of God . Is it then , at all likely , that their acknowledged chaplain should have been a very vicious man ? The supposition appears to me to be ridiculous . We shall , however ,
be better able to judge , when we have considered the principal incidents of his life , which I shall now endeavour to relate with as much brevity as is consistent with the subject . Hugh Peters was born in the year 1599 , at Foy , in Cornwall , of very respectable parents . His parentage on
the mother ' s side was very reputable , so much so , that Dr . Harris , when speaking of the antiquity of her family , asserts , that a it does not yield in" gentility to any in Cornwall . " * His father was a very respectable merchant at "Foy , whose ancestors were driven thither from Antwerp for their adherence to the Reformed Religion .
At the age of 14 , young Peters was sent to the University of Cambridge , ( his elder brother being at the same time a student at Oxford , ) and was entered at Trinity College . When of the age of 17 , he took the degree of Bachelor of Arts , which was as early as it could have been conferred upon
him , according to the rules of the University ; and six years afterwards , when he was in his twenty-third year , he obtained that of Masterof Arts . f Upon his leaving the University he came to London , and was licensed as a preacher , or admitted into holy orders , by Dr . Mountaine , then bishop of that See . I have met with no account of
the place where he first preached , but it appears that soon after his ordination he was appointed Lecturer at St . Sepulchre ' s , on Snowhill , where he preached to an audience consisting of six or seven thousand persons , t
In an interesting little volume which Peters prepared but a short time before his death , entitled * A Dying Father ' s Last Legacy , " he relates
* See "An Historical and Critical Account of Hugh Peters , " prefixed to Dr . Harris ' s Lives , in five volumes . Vol . I . p . 9 . f * Harris ' s Life , p . 10 . J The Last Legacy , p . 99 . ^ This curious and scarc e book was printed in ( 24 mo . in 1661 , and the whole title runs thus : A Dying Father ' s Last
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that a young man * who had accidentally heard him preach , made interest to have him appointed Lecturer at St . Sepulchre ' s , and subscribed £ 30 . per annum to the Lecture , which was certainly a large sum in those days . The resort to these Lectures became
so great that it occasioned much envy , and procured the preacher many enemies ; * a circumstance which occasioned his biographer , Dr . Harris , to remark , that " church governors are apt to dislike popular preachers , especially if they teach in a manner different from themselves . " f
How long Peters continued to preach in London does not appear . I find nothing upon this point except what is said in Ludlow ' s Memoirs , where we are told that he " had been a minister in England for many years , till he was forced to leave his native
country by the persecution set on foot , in the time of Archbishop Laud , against all those who refused to comply with the innovations and superstitions which were "then introduced into the public worship . * %
From this account we may conclude that he left the University very young , for Laud ' s persecution of the Puritans began about the year 162 £ > , when Peters was only thirty years of age ; and as few men would be more obnoxious to that proud prelate , it is
not likely that Peters could have remained in this country long after that period . This supposition is indeed confirmed by what he himself related upon his trial , for he told the judge that he had lived fourteen years out of England , iind that the war between
the king -and the parliament had already begun when he returned to his native country . $ When ho left England lie went directly to Holland , and was chosen co-pastor with the celebrated Dr . William Ames , of an Independent
Legacy to an only Child : or Mr . Hugh Peters' Advice to his Daughter : written by his own hand , during * his late imprisonment in the Tower of London , and given her a little before his death . "
* See Last Legacy , p , 100 . J * Historical and Critical Account , p . x . j Memoirs of Edmund Ludlow , Esq . III . 61 . § See " An Account of the Tryals of the Regicides , " 4 to . l ( i 60 p . 172 .
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528 The Nonconformist . No . XIV .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1819, page 528, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1776/page/4/
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