Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Burscough, Robert
BURSCOUGH, ROBERT (1661–1709), divine, the son of Thomas Burscough, was born at Cartmel, Lancashire, in 1651. He entered Queen's College, Oxford, as servitor in 1668, and took his B.A. in 1672 and M.A. in 1682. In 1681 he was presented by Charles II to the vicarage of Totnes, Devonshire, in succession to the Rev. John Prince, author of the 'Worthies of Devon.' He was prebendary of Exeter Cathedral in 1701, and archdeacon of Barnstaple in 1703. He was buried at Bath 29 July 1709. He is characterised by Anthony à Wood as 'a learned man, zealous for the church of England, and very exemplary in his life and conversation.'
He wrote the following: 1. 'A Treatise of Church Government, occasioned by some letters lately printed concerning the same subject,' 1692 (pp. xlii, 270), being an answer to Richard Burthogge's 'Nature of Church Government freely discussed.' 2. 'A Discourse of Schism; addressed to those Dissenters who conformed before the Toleration and have since withdrawn themselves from the communion of the Church of England,' 1699 (pp. 231). This occasioned two pamphlets in reply, and Burscough rejoined by 3. 'A Vindication of the "Discourse of Schism,"' Exeter, 1701. 4. 'A Discourse of the Unity of the Church, of the Separation of the Dissenters from the Church of England, of their Setting up Churches,' &c., Exeter, 1704. 5. 'A Vindication of the Twenty third Article of Religion,’ 1702 (mentioned in Biog. Brit. 1748, ii. 1042). The preface to Zachary Mayne's ‘Sanctification by Faith vindicated,’ 1693, is from his pen.
[Wood's Athenæ Oxon., ed. Bliss, iv. 413, 533, 582; Fasti, ii. 331, 383; Le Neve's Fasti (Hardy), i. 408, 426; Oliver's Monasticon, Add. Supp. p. 21; J. I. Dredge in Western Antiquary, August 1884; Watt's Bibl. Brit.; Prince's Worthies of Devon, 1701, p. 600, where he commends Burscough's liberality in allowing him the free use of his ‘very good library;’ Worthy's Ashburton, p. 115.]