Burgess, Daniel

BURGESS, DANIEL: English Presbyterian; b. at Staines (15 m. w.s.w. of London), Middlesex, 1645; d. in London Jan. 26, 1713. He studied at Magdalen Hall, Oxford, but would not conform and so did not graduate; went to Ireland in 1667 with Roger Boyle, earl of Orrery, and became master of a school founded by his patron at Charleville, County Cork; was ordained by the Dublin presbytery; in 1685 he settled in London, where he gained influential friends and preached to a large congregation attracted by his lively and witty style. Besides preaching he took pupils and was tutor to Henry St. John (Lord Bolingbroke). His publications were numerous, mostly sermons; they include: Directions for Daily Holy Living (London, 1690); The Golden Snuffers; or Christian Reprovers and Reformer's Characterized, Cautioned, arid Encouraged (1697); Proof of God's Being and of the Scriptures' Divine Original, with Twenty Directions, for Reading them (1697).