Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Jones, William (1561-1636)

by William Arthur Jobson Archbold

JONES, WILLIAM (1561–1636), biblical commentator, born in 1561, was educated at Clare Hall, Cambridge, but was one of the first foundation fellows at its foundation in 1584. He taught there for some years, and proceeded B.D. in 1590, and D.D. in 1597. In 1592 he obtained the living of East Bergholt, Suffolk, where he ministered for forty-four years, and died, as he says, ‘spent with sicknesse, age, and labour,’ on 12 Dec. 1636. He was buried in the church at East Bergholt, and there is a monument to his memory in the north wall of the chancel. Jones published ‘A Commentary upon the Epistles of St. Paul to Philemon and the Hebrewes,’ London, 1636, 8vo. It was one of the charges against Laud that he had expunged certain passages from this work (cf. Prynne, Canterbury's Doom, pp. 255, 259, 260, &c.) The commentator must be distinguished from a William Jones (fl. 1612–1631), who was chaplain to the Countess of Southampton, who is styled ‘preacher to the Isle of Wight,’ and who lived at Arreton in the Isle of Wight. He published:

1. ‘A pithie and short Treatise … whereby a Godly Christian is directed how to make his last Will and Testament,’ &c., London, 1612, 8vo.
2. ‘The Mysterie of Christ's Nativitie,’ London, 1614.
3. ‘A Treatise of Patience in Tribulation,’ London, 1625, 4to; an enlarged sermon with verses, suggested by the deaths of the Earl of Southampton and his son.
4. ‘A brief Exhortation to all Men to set their Houses in Order,’ London, 1631, 4to; and n. d., 8vo.

[Cole's Athenæ Cantabr., Brit. Mus. Add. MS. 5873, f. 26; Davy's Suffolk Collections, Add. MS. 19104, ff. 142, 155; Laud's Works, iv. 283, 323, 406.]

W. A. J. A.