301 LIVES OF THE PURITANS. WILLIAM PEMBLE, A. M.-This learned divine was the son of a minister,born at Egerton in Kent, in the year 1591, and educated in Magdalen college, Oxford, where Mr. Richard Capel was his tutor. From a child hewas trained up in good literaturj, and profited in all kinds of know- ledge, more than most others. From the tender years of Anfancy he was constantly taught in the school of Christ; so that, under the influence of divine grace, together with the sanctified use ofhis manifold afflictions and temptations, he attained a high degree of heavenly wisdom. Though he was young in years, he offered to God a more excellent sacrifice than many of his elder brethren.* At the university he acquired a most distinguished reputation, and became a celebrated reader of divinity in Magdalen college. Ac- cording to our author, " he was a zealous Calvinist, a famous preacher, an excellent artist, a skilful linguist, a good orator, an expert mathematician, and an ornament to the society to which he belonged." Adrian Heereboord, the famous professor of philosophy at Leyden, was very profuse in the commendation of his learning and learned works.+ Another writer observes, " that he thoroughly traced the circle of the arts ; and attained a degree of eminence, not only in the sciences, but even in those more sublime speculations of which many are not capable."# Magdalen college was the very nursery of puritans. Mr. Pemble was justlydenominated oneof them, though he did not carry his nonconformity, in certain points, quite so far as some of his brethren. He laboured openly to promote the reformation of the church, and encouraged the relaxation of subscription and other points of conformity. He was tutor to many, puritans, who afterwards became distinguished ornaments for learning, piety, andusefulness. This divine, with many others, affords sufficient proof that the puritans were not all unlearned, or at all inferior in learning to those who conformed.§ Mr. Pemble going on a visit to Mr, Capel, formerly his tutor, but now minister at Eastington in Gloucestershire, was taken ill, and died at his tutor's house, in the thirty- second,year of his age. His remains were interred in the Pemble's Works ' Pref. Edit. 1627. + Wood's Athena Oxon. vol. i. p. 405. Pemble onJustification, Pref. Edit. 1625. MS. Chronology, vol. ii. p. 705. (4.)
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTcyMjk=