Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 11.djvu/11

 to Sir Elijah Impey (Impey to Bathurst, 's Memoirs, p. 166).

Burke affirmed (Impeachment, ii. 68) that Clavering was the equal of Hastings 'in every respect,' but in truth he was no match for him. He was an honest, straightforward man, of passionate disposition and mediocre abilities.

Clavering married, first, Lady Diana West, daughter of the first Earl Delaware, and had issue two sons and three daughters; secondly, Katherine, daughter of John Yorke of Bewerley Hall, Yorkshire.

 CLAVERING, ROBERT (1671–1747), bishop of Peterborough, son of William Clavering of Tillmouth, Durham, was born in 1671. He was admitted of Lincoln College, Oxford, on 26 June 1693, at the age of twenty-one, having graduated previously at Edinburgh, and after a residence of three years was permitted to proceed M.A. as a member of that house on 20 May 1696 (Notes and Queries, 1st ser. vi. 589). In 1701 he was fellow and tutor of University College. In July 1714 he was preferred to the deanery and rectory of Booking, Essex, which he resigned on 27 July 1719 for the well-endowed rectory of Marsh Gibbon, Buckinghamshire. Meanwhile he had accumulated his degrees in divinity, proceeding D.D. on 2 March 1715 as a member of Christ Church, and having been elected regius professor of Hebrew on 20 May of that year in place of Roger Altham, resigned, was made prebendary of the sixth stall in the cathedral on the following 2 June. On 2 Jan. 1725 he was promoted to the bishopric of Llandaff and deanery of Hereford, two posts which at that time always went together, where he continued until his translation to Peterborough in February 1729. He obtained permission to hold his professorship, prebendal stall, and rectory with his bisnopric. Clavering died on 21 July 1747. By his wife Mary, second daughter of John Cook, a Spanish merchant, of Fawley Court, Buckinghamshire, he had a son and four daughters. Besides two episcopal charges and three sermons, he published: 'R. Mosis Maimonidis Tractatus duo: 1. De doctrina Legis, sive educatione puerorum. 2. De natura & ratione Pœnitentia apud Hebræos [being the third and fifth chapters of the first book of the Yad hachazakah]. Latine reddidit notisque illustravit R. Clavering. . . . Præmittitur dissertatio de Maimonide en usque operibus,' Oxford, 1705, 4to. The 'Dissertatio' was reprinted by Blasius Ugolinus in vol. viii. of his 'Thesaurus Antiquitatum.' Clavering's portrait, by Thomas Gibson, was engraved by Jean Simon.

 CLAXTON or CLARKSON, LAURENCE (1615–1667), sectary, was born at Preston, Lancashire, in 1615. He was brought up in the faith of the church of England. In an age of puritanism his conscience was afflicted, among other things, with the 'toleration of maypoles, dancing, and rioting,' with which the Lord's day was profaned in Lancashire. He started on a strange pilgrimage through various sects, beginning, as a layman, with the presbyterians, with whose system he quarrelled after a time. He then made a brief trial of the independents, joined the antinomians, became a preacher among them, and in his own opinion was 'not inferior to any priest in those days.' After this time he held for six months a 'benefice' of the value of about 50l. per annum. The name of the place at which he was 'parish priest' is called by him Pulom. There is little doubt that Pulham Market in Norfolk is meant, although his name does not occur in the registers. In the course of a rambling life which he afterwards led he became a dipper or anabaptist (immersed 6 Nov. 1644, exercised his ministry till 24 Jan. 1645), and his practices brought upon him a prosecution, when he was cast into prison at Bury St. Edmunds. He was released from confinement 15 July 1645, having procured his liberty by formally renouncing the practice of dipping. He is found shortly after among the seekers, and we have the first of his tracts, entitled 'The Pilgrimage of Saints by Church cast out, in Christ found, seeking Truth' (Lond. 1646, 4to). Edwards (