1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/White, Thomas (canon)

WHITE, THOMAS (c. 1550–1624), English divine, was born at Bristol about 1550, the son of a clothier. He graduated from Magdalen Hall (now Hertford College), Oxford, in 1570; took holy orders, and, coming to London, became rector of St Gregory by St Paul's and shortly after vicar of St Dunstan's in the West. Several of his sermons, attacking play-going and the vices of the metropolis, were printed. He was made a prebendary of St Paul's, treasurer of Salisbury, canon of Christ Church, Oxford, and canon of Windsor. In 1613 he built and endowed an almshouse, called the Temple Hospital, in Bristol. In 1621 he founded what is now known as White's chair of moral philosophy at Oxford, with a salary of £100 per annum for the reader, and several small exhibitions for scholars of Magdalen Hall. He died on the 1st of March 1624, bequeathing £3000 for the establishment of a college of “all the ministers, parsons, vicars, lecturers and curates in London and its suburbs” (afterwards Sion College (q.v.)), and an almshouse, now abolished; and leaving bequests for lectureships at St Paul's, St Dunstan's and at Newgate.