Jeremy Taylor's Holy LivingHoly Living and Holy DyingHoly Dying are two of the most famous prose works of 17th-century English literature and among the greatest examples of Anglican spirituality. These new editions are the first critically edited and fully annotated editions to appear since 1842. The text is based on the first editions of 1650 and 1651 and includes textual variants, a full commentary, a textual introduction, and a general introduction recounting Taylor's life and the intellectual background of his devotional classics.
Jeremy Taylor was a clergyman in the Church of England who achieved fame as an author during The Protectorate of Oliver Cromwell. He is sometimes known as the "Shakespeare of Divines" for his poetic style of expression and was often presented as a model of prose writing. He is remembered in the Church of England's calendar of saints with a Lesser Festival on 13 August.
He went on to become chaplain in ordinary to King Charles I as a result of Laud's sponsorship. This made him politically suspect when Laud was tried for treason and executed in 1645 by the Puritan Parliament during the English Civil War. After the Parliamentary victory over the King, he was briefly imprisoned several times.
Eventually, he was allowed to live quietly in Wales, where he became the private chaplain of the Earl of Carbery. At the Restoration, his political star was on the rise, and he was made Bishop of Down and Connor in Ireland. He also became vice-chancellor of the University of Dublin.
Taylor's fame has been maintained by the popularity of his sermons and devotional writings rather than by his influence as a theologian or his importance as an ecclesiastic.
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