increased both in numbers and in wealth. In the Hewley suit, 1830–42 [see Bowles, Edward], great pains were taken by the unitarian defendants to collect indications of concession to heterodox opinion on the part of Bury, as a representative presbyterian of his time. James has shown that the ‘Exhortation’ at Savage's ordination, quoted to prove (which it does not) opposition to the Calvinistic doctrine of election, was not by Bury, but by John Rastrick, M.A., of Lynn (d. 18 Aug. 1727, aged seventy-eight). The strength of the unitarian case is in a farewell letter from Bury to his Lewin's Mead congregation. He here says, ‘I never was prostituted to any party, but have endeavoured to serve God as a catholic christian,’ and speaks of requirements which have no good Scripture warrant, as making ‘apocryphal sins and duties.’ The address is essentially practical, avoiding controversy, and the strain is fervently evangelical. Bury died 10 March 1730, and was buried in St. James's churchyard, where formerly was an altar tomb with Latin epitaphs to Bury and his wife (given in Corry and Evans's Bristol, 1816, ii. 181). The parish register has the entry, ‘Burialls 1729, March 15. Mr. Samll. Bury. Tom [i.e. tomb] a techer lewends mead meating.’ His portrait hangs in the vestry at Bury St. Edmunds. He married, on 29 May 1697, Elizabeth [q. v.], second daughter of Captain Adams Lawrence, of Linton, Cambridgeshire.
Bury published: 1. ‘A Scriptural Catechism, being an Abridgment of Mr. O. Stockton's, design'd especially for the use of charity schools in Edmund's-Bury,’ 1699 (not seen). 2. ‘A Collection of Psalms, Hymns, &c.,’ for private use, 3rd ed. 1713 (not seen). 3. ‘Θρηνωδία. The People's Lamentation for the Loss of their Dead Ministers, or Three Sermons occasioned by the death of the late Reverend and Learned Divines, Mr. John Fairfax and Mr. Timothy Wright,’ 1702, 8vo. 4. ‘A Funeral Sermon for the Rev. Mr. Samuel Cradock,’ &c. 1707, 8vo. 5. ‘Two sermons preach'd at the opening of a new erected Chappel in St. Edmunds-Bury,’ &c., 1712, 8vo. 6. ‘A Funeral Sermon for Robert Baker, Esq.,’ &c., 1714, 8vo. 7. ‘The Questions’ at the ordination of S. Savage, printed with John Rastrick's ‘Sermon’ on the occasion, 1714, 8vo. 8. ‘An Account of the Life and Death of Mrs. Elizabeth Bury, &c., chiefly collected out of her own Diary,’ Bristol, 1720, 8vo, 4th edit. 1725, 8vo.
[Tong's Life of Matthew Henry, 1716, p. 27; Palmer's Nonconf. Memorial, 1803, iii. 250; Toulmin's Histor. View of Prot. Diss., 1814, p. 584; Calamy's Histor. Account of My Own Time, 1830, i. 106; Prot. Diss. Mag. 1794, p. 235; Murch's Hist. of Presb. and Gen. Bapt. Churches in W. of Eng., 1835, p. 107 sq.; Historical Illustrations and Proofs, in Shore v. Attorney-Gen. [by Joseph Hunter], 1839, p. 17; Hunter's Life of O. Heywood, 1842, p. 389; James's Hist. Presb. Chapels and Charities, 1867, pp. 165 sq., 634 sq., 675, 679; Browne's Hist. of Congregationalism in Norf. and Suff., 1877, pp. 420, 498, 518; Bristol Times and Mirror, 13 April 1885; extract from Register of Bolas Magna, per Rev. R. S. Turner; Evans's MS. List of Congregations, in Dr. Williams's Library; manuscript minute-book of Churchgate Street Chapel, Bury St. Edmunds; and Bury's publications, noted above.]
BURY, THOMAS (1655–1722), judge, youngest son of Sir William Bury, knight, of Linwood in Lincolnshire, waa born in 1655, took a bachelor's degree at Lincoln College, Oxford, in February 1667, and in 1668 was entered a student at Gray's Inn. He was called to the bar in 1676, and after some years' practice became a serjeant-at-law in 1700, and on 26 Jan. 1701, when Sir Littelton Powys was removed to the king's bench, he was created a baron of the exchequer. Of this his epitaph says that he 'by his Great Application to the Study of the Law, raised himself to one of the highest Degrees in that Profession,' but Mr, Speaker Onslow, in his notes to Bishop Burnet's 'History,' affirms 'that it appeared from Bury's book of accounts (a most unlikely place for such a revelation) that he gave Lord-keeper Wright a bribe of 1,000l. for elevating him to the bench. For fifteen years he continued to discharge the duties of a puisne judge. In 1704, when corrupt practices had extensively prevailed at the Aylesbury election, the whigs, who were then defeated, knowing that proceeding by a petition to the House of Commons would be useless, caused actions to be brought in the queen's bench by some of the electors against the returning officers. One of these actions, the leading case of Ashby v. White, after judgment for the defendants in the queen's bench, from which Lord Chief Justice Holt dissented, was taken to the House of Lords upon a writ of error, and the judges were summoned to advise the house. Of these judges Bury was one, and his opinion was given in support of that of the lord chief justice in the court below; and Lord Somers being of the same opinion, the decision of the queen's bench was reversed by fifty to sixteen. On 20 and 22 April 1710 he, with Chief-justice Parker and Mr. Justice Tracy, at the Old Bailey, tried one Damary for riot and being ringleader of a mob. There is a letter of his (25 June 1713) preserved among
