METCALFF, PRINTERS,
5 GROCERS’ HALL COURT, POULTRY.
TO THE PUBLIC.
The object of this little work, is, to show to the English reader, that Wales has produced a number of highly talented and distinguished individuals; and the publication might be greatly extended, were it deemed prudent to add the names of those learned men who are still among us.
The publisher will feel obliged for any additional names, which will be inserted in a future edition.
Mr. Williams’s portion may be had printed in Welsh.
Price one shilling.
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES,
ETC.
William Baxter was born in Wales in the year 1650. In his eighteenth year he was sent to Harrow School, when he could speak no other language but Welsh; he, however, soon acquired English, and triumphantly overcame all these disadvantages, and at the age of twenty-nine he commenced author, with the publication of his “Analogia Linguæ Latinæ.” He afterwards was appointed master of the Mercer’s School, in London. He soon made himself known as an excellent philologist and antiquary, by several learned works, and more particularly his Horace and his Dictionary of British Antiquities, entitled “Glossarium Antiquitatum Britannicarum,” in which he attempted, from his knowledge of the British language, to determine geography by etymology. He died in 1723.
Lewis Bayly, an eminent prelate, was a native of Caermarthen, and studied at Oxford. He was appointed chaplain to Henry Prince of Wales, son of James the First, to whom he dedicated a religious work, entitled the “Practice of Piety,” which has passed through a vast number of editions. He was rector of St. Matthew’s church, in London, and afterwards bishop of Bangor; and died in 1631. His son,
Thomas Bayly was educated for the church at Cambridge; and during the civil war he resided at Ragland Castle, as chaplain to the Marquis of Worcester; after the surrender of which he travelled on the Continent; and on his return to England he published his “Certamen Religiosum, or a Conference between King Charles the First and Marquis of Worcester, concerning religion, in Ragland Castle, Anno 1646,” which he is supposed to have written to justify his embracing the Roman Catholic religion. He also published the “Royal Charter granted to Kings,” for which he was committed to Newgate. He also published another work, entitled “Herba parietis.” Having made his escape from prison, he died in France in 1659.
Morris Clynog was a native of Caernarvonshire, and was educated at Cambridge, where he graduated L.L.B. He was appointed rector of Corwen sinecure in 1556, and became a prebendary of York, and an officer in the Prerogative Court, under Cardinal Pole, archbishop of Canterbury, and he was nominated to succeed Dr. William Glynn in the bishopric of Bangor; but the queen dying before he was consecrated, he fled beyond sea, and going to Rome he became, some years after, the first rector of the English hospital there, after it was converted into a college for English students, where he became much noted for his partiality to his countrymen of Wales, which always caused a great faction between the Welsh and English students resident there.