814
FULLER
important services of his life, however, were those rendered in connexion with the Baptist Missionary Society, which was formed at Kettering in 1792, and of which he was secretary until his death on the 7th of May 1815. The correspondence he maintained, the journeys he undertook, the pamphlets he wrote in defence of the society, and the discourses he preached on its behalf, imply an amount of work which few men could possibly have overtaken, and which ultimately proved too heavy even for his naturally powerful constitution. Several editions of his collected works have appeared, and a Memoir, principally compiled from his own papers, was published about a year after his decease by Dr Ryland, his most intimate friend and coadjutor in the affairs of the Baptist mission. There are also biographies by his son, the Rev. A. G. Fuller, and by the Rev. J. W. Morris.
FULLER, Sarah Margaret. See Ossoli.
FULLER, Thomas (1608–1661), the witty divine and historian, eldest son of a father of the same name who was rector of Aldwincle St Peter’s, Northamptonshire, was born at the rectory house of that country parish in the year 1608, and was baptized on 19th June in that year. Dr Robert Townson and Dr John Davenant, bishops of Salisbury, were his uncles and godfathers. The boy’s training was influenced by the position of these prelates and of other friends of his father, who was B.D., and had held the position of lector primarius in Trinity College, Cambridge. The youth studied under the care of the Rev. Arthur Smith, and of his cousin Dr Edward Davenant, the mathematician. According to Aubrey, Fuller was “a boy of pregnant wit.” At an early age he was admitted of Queen’s College, Cambridge, then presided over by Dr John Davenant. He was apt and quick in study; and in Lent 1624–5 he became B.A., and in July 1628 M.A. Being overlooked in an election of fellows of his college, he was removed by Bishop Davenant to Sidney Sussex College, November 1628. In 1630 he received from Corpus Christi College, in the same university, the curacy of St Benet’s, which he held for a short time, and where he had for a parishioner the celebrated carrier Hobson. Fuller’s quaint and humorous oratory, as displayed in his sermons on Ruth, soon attracted attention. He also attained a certain fame in the university as a writer of verses, and as the author of a poem, 1631, on the subject of David and Bathsheba. In June of the same year his uncle gave him a prebend in Salisbury, where his father, who died in the following year, held a canonry. The rectory of Broadwindsor, Dorsetshire, then in the diocese of Bristol, was his next preferment (1634); and 11th June 1635 he proceeded B.D. For about six years he devoted himself to his rustic flock, and meanwhile compiled The Holy War, being a history of the crusades (published in 1640), and The Holy and Prophane States, being a book of character biography (1642), both which deservedly popular works went through several editions. At this time Fuller was well known as a man of engaging manners, of good connexions, and of literary tastes. Being, moreover, a cordial lover of the Church of England, and of its discipline as fixed by the canons of 1603, he was in 1640 elected proctor for Bristol in the memorable convocation of Canterbury, which assembled with the Short Parliament. On the sudden dissolution of the latter, he united himself to those who urged that convocation should likewise dissolve as usual. That opinion was overruled; and the assembly continued to sit by virtue of a royal writ, and to frame, amongst its canons, the much-ridiculed Etcetera Oath. Fuller has left a valuable account of the proceedings of this synod, for sitting in which he was fined £200, but was never pressed to pay it. Meanwhile he preached in some of the “voiced pulpits” of London, and was followed for his excellent gifts. His first published volume of sermons appeared in 1640 under the title of Joseph’s parti-coloured Coat, 4to, which contains many of his quaint utterances and odd conceits. His grosser mannerisms of style, derived from the divines of the former generation, disappeared for the most part in his subsequent discourses. About 1640 he married Eleanor, daughter of Hugh Grove of Chisenbury co., Wilts. Their eldest child, John, baptized at Broadwindsor by his father, 6th June 1641, was afterwards of Sidney Sussex College, edited the Worthies of England, 1662, and became rector of Great Wakering, Essex, where he died in 1687. At Broadwindsor, early in the year 1641, Thomas Fuller, his curate Henry Sanders, the church wardens, and others, nine persons altogether, certified that their parish, represented by 242 grown-up male persons, had taken the Protestation ordered by the Speaker of the Long Parliament. Again Fuller is met with in London, interested in the coming strife. He is said to have foreseen whither the commotions were tending; and he directed his efforts, as events developed, in advocacy of peace and in preservation of the interests of his order. For a short time he preached with success at the Inns of Court, and thence removed, at the invitation of the master of the Savoy (Dr Balcanqual) and the brotherhood of that foundation, to be lecturer at their chapel of St Mary Savoy. Certain of the parishioners would have elected one Thomas Gibbs, whose claims were put forward in the House of Commons by Sir Robert Harley; but the greater number earnestly desired Fuller, whose better title was upheld in the House by Sir John Northcote, M.P. for Ashburton. Some of the best discourses of the witty preacher were delivered at the Savoy to audiences which extended into the chapel-yard. In one, he set forth with searching and truthful minuteness the hindrances to peace, and urged the signing of petitions to the king at Oxford, and to the parliament, to continue their care in advancing an accommodation. In his intercourse with persons of influence who attended upon his ministry, or who resided in the neighbourhood of his cure, Fuller, with all the earnestness of Lord Falkland in that direction, laboured to promote the same peaceful views. With these honourable efforts an historic circumstance of some significance connects itself. With Sir Edward Wardour, clerk of the pells, Dr Dukeson, and four or five others, Fuller was deputed to take an influential peace-petition to the king, emanating from the city of Westminster and the parishes contiguous to the Savoy. To carry it with fitting circumstance, a pass was granted by the House of Lords, 2d January 1643, for an equipage of two coaches, four or six horses, and eight or ten attendants. On the arrival of the deputation at Uxbridge, 4th January, officers of the Parliamentary army stopped the coaches and searched the gentlemen; and they found upon the latter “two scandalous books arraigning the proceedings of the House,” and letters with ciphers to Lord Viscount Falkland and the Lord Spencer. A message was then sent to acquaint the House of Commons with the matter, and it was complained that the Lords had given the pass. Ultimately a joint order of both Houses remanded the party; and Fuller and his friends suffered a brief imprisonment. The Westminster Petition, notwithstanding, reached the king’s hands; and it was published with the royal reply. When it was expected, three months later, that a favourable result would attend the negotiations at Oxford, Fuller preached a remarkable sermon in the old abbey of Westminster, 27th March 1643, on the text 2 Sam. xix. 30, the occasion being the anniversary of Charles I.’s accession, and the subject, his return to “our English Zion.” This loyal discourse, in accord with the loyal text, brought the preacher into disfavour in the city. Domestic trouble likewise overtook him in the death of his wife. On 19th April the Lords gave him a pass to and from Salisbury to carry her remains thither, to be
