Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 06.djvu/172

 . In 1730, while still a boy, be was admitted a 'disciple' of the bardic chair of Glamorgan, in which chair he himself presided in 1750. Some of his poems, 'moral pieces of great merit,' according to Dr. Owen Pughe, were printed in a contemporary Welsh periodical entitled the 'Eurgrawn.'

 BRADFORD, JOHN (1750–1805), dissenting minister, was born at Hereford in 1750, the son of a clothier, educated at Hereford grammar school, and at Wadham College, Oxford, where he took the degree of B.A. On leaving college he accepted a curacy at Frelsham in Berkshire, where he married when twenty-eight years of age, and had a family of twelve children. About this time his religious opinions became decidedly Calvinistic, and he preached in several of Lady Huntingdon's chapels. On account of this irregularity the rector discharged him from his curacy. He then joined the Countess of Huntingdon's connection, and, after spending some time in South Wales, removed to Birmingham, and preached with great popularity in the old playhouse, which the countess had purchased and made into a chapel for him. Subsequently he left the connection of the countess for a new chapel in Bartholomew Street, supplementing his small income by making watch-chains. Not being successful, he removed to London in 1797, and preached till his death in the City Chapel, Grub Street. He died 16 July 1805, and was buried in Bunhill Fields. Some account of his life is given in an octavo volume, chiefly controversial, by his successor, William Wales Horne. Bradford published:
 * 1) 'The Law of Faith opposed to the Law of Works,' Birmingham, 1787 (being an answer to the baptist circular letter signed Joshua Thomas).
 * 2) 'An Address to the Inhabitants of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, on the Mission of two Ministers sent by the Countess of Huntingdon,' 1788.
 * 3) 'A Collection of Hymns' (some of them composed by himself), 1792.
 * 4) 'The Difference between True and False Holiness.'
 * 5) 'A Christian's Meetness for Glory.'
 * 6) ' Comfort for the Feeble-minded.'
 * 7) 'The Gospel spiritually discerned.'
 * 8) 'One Baptism.' A fine octavo edition of Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, with Notes by John Bradford,' was published in 1792. Mr. Offor says, 'These notes are very valuable.'



BRADFORD, SAMUEL, D.D. (1652–1731), bishop successively of Carlisle and Rochester, was the son of William Bradford, a citizen of London, who distinguished himself as a parish officer at the time of the plague, and was born in St. Anne's, Blackfriars, on 20 Dec. 1652. He was educated at St. Paul's School; and when the school was closed, owing to the plague and the fire of London, he attended the Charterhouse. He was admitted to Corpus Christi, Cambridge, in 1669, but left without a degree in consequence of religious scruples. He devoted himself for a time to the study of medicine; but, his former scruples being removed, he was admitted in 1680, through the favour of Archbishop Sancroft, to the degree of M.A. by royal mandate, and was incorporated at Oxford on 13 July 1697. He shrank from taking orders until after the Revolution, and acted as private tutor in the families of several country gentlemen. Bradford was ordained deacon and priest in 1690, and in the spring of the following year was elected by the governors of St. Thomas's Hospital the minister of their church in Southwark. He soon received the lectureship of St. Mary-le-Bow, and was tutor to the two grandsons of Archbishop Tillotson, with whom he resided at Carlisle House, Lambeth. In November 1693 Dr. Tillotson collated Bradford to the rectory of St. Mary-le-Bow; he then resigned his minor ecclesiastical preferments, but soon after accepted the lectureship of All Hallows, in Bread Street.

Bradford was a frequent preacher before the corporation of London, and was a staunch whig and protestant. On 30 Jan. 1698 he preached before William III, who was so much pleased that in March following he appointed Bradford one of the royal chaplains in ordinary. The appointment was continued by Queen Anne, by whose command he was created D.D. on the occasion of her visit to the university of Cambridge, 16 April 1705; and on 23 Feb. 1708 was made a prebendary of Westminster.

In 1699 Bradford delivered the Boyle lecture in St. Paul's Cathedral, and preached eight sermons on 'The Credibility of the Christian Revelation, from its Intrinsick Evidence.' These, with a ninth sermon preached in his own church in January 1700, were issued with other Boyle lectures delivered between 1691 and 1732, in 'A Defence of Natural and Revealed Religion,' &c. 3 vols. fol., London, 1739.

Bradford was elected master of Corpus Christi College on 17 May 1716; and on 21 April 1718 was nominated to the bishopric of Carlisle, to which he was consecrated on 1 June following. In 1723 he was 