Robert Dingley

Robert Dingley, A. M.—This pious minister was the son of Sir John Dingley, by a sister of Dr. Henry Hammond; was born in Surrey, in the year 1619, and educated in Magdalen college, Oxford. Having finished his studies at the university, he took orders, and, according to Wood, became "a strict observer of church ceremonies, and a remarkable bower to the altar when he entered the church." Upon the commencement of the wars, he espoused the cause of the parliament, became an avowed enemy to superstitious ceremonies in divine worship, and a zealous puritan. He was made rector of Brightstone in the Isle of Wight, where he was much followed by those of his own persuasion, for his excellent practical preaching. He was presented to this benefice when Colonel Hammond, his kinsman, was governor of the island. But while Mr. Dingley was thus caressed and followed by his own party, he was hated by the royalists, on account of his activity as assistant to the commissioners of Hampshire, for ejecting ignorant and scandalous ministers and schoolmasters.* This is the only crime alleged against him, for which he was even hated by the contrary party. He died at Brightstone, in the year l£j59, and his remains were interred in the chancel of his own church. Over his grave was the following monumental inscription erected to bis memory:

Here

lieth the body

of Mr. Robert Dingley,

Minister of this place;

second son of Sir John Dingley, Knight,

who died on tin- twelfth day of January,

1G09,

in the fortieth year

of his age.

Tlis Works.—1. The Spiritual Taste described: or, a Glimpse of Christ discovered, 1649.—2. The Disputation of Angels: or, the Angel Guardian, 1654.—3. Messiah's Splendour: or, the glimpsed Glory of a Beauteous Christian, 1654.—4. Divine Optics: or, a 1 reatise of the Eye, discovering the Vices and Virtues thereof. 1655.— 6. Philosophical, Historical, and Theological Observations of Thunder, with a more general >icw of God's wonderful Works, 1658.—0. A Sermon on Job xxvi. 14., 1658.

• Wood's Athenae Oxon. vol. ii. p. 155.