Roberts, Francis

, a puritan divine, the son of Henry Roberts of Aslake, in Yorkshire, was born there or in that county in 1609, and entered a student of Trinity college, Oxford, in 1625. In 1632 he completed his degrees in arts, and was ordained. Where he first officiated does not appear but on the breaking out of the rebellion he went to London, took the covenant, and wns appointed minister of St. Augustine’s, Watlirtg-street, in room of Ephraim Udal, ejected for his loyalty. In 1649 he was presented to the rectory of WriiHTton in Somersetshire by his patron Arthur lord Capel, son of the beheaded lord Capel. While on this living he was appointed one of the commissioners for the “ejectment of those” who were called “ignorant and insufficient ministers and schoolmasters.” At the restoration, however^ he conformed, tired out, as many other’s were, by the distractions of the | contending parties, and disappointed in every hope which the encouragers of rebellion had held forth. It does not appear whether he had any additional preferment, except that of chaplain to his patron lord Capel whenhe became earl of Essex; and when thrit nobleman was lord-lieutenant, of Ireland in 1672, it is suppose. i he procured him the degree of D. D. from the university of Dublin. He died at Wriugton about the end of 1675, and most probably wasi interred in that church. He published some single sermons: “The Believer’s evidence for Eternal Life,” &c, 1649, 1655, 8vo, and the “Communicant instructed,” 1651, 8vo, often reprinted; but his principal work is entitled “Chivis Bibliorum, the Key of the Bible,” in eluding the order, names, times, penmen, occasion, scope, and principal matter of the Old and New Testament. This was first printed at London and Edinburgh, 1649, in 2 vols, 8vo, and afterwards in 4to; and the fourth edition, 1675, in folio. Wood mentions another work, “Mysterium & Medulla Bibliorum, or the Mystery and Marrow of the Bible,” 1657, 2 vols. fol. as he says, but this is doubtful, and “The True way to the Tree of Life,” 1673, 8vo. ¹