Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 43.djvu/416

Parsons president of St. John's College. The scene is laid in Arcadia. The manuscript is in the British Museum (Harl. MS. 6924).

[Foster's Alumni, 1500–1714; Robinson's Reg. of Merchant Taylors' School, i. 53; Reg. Univ. Oxford (Oxford Hist. Soc.), vol. ii. pt. ii. p. 319, pt. iii. p. 328; Wood's Fasti, ed. Bliss, vol. i. col. 414; Commons' Journals, i. 87; Le Neve's Fasti, ed. Hardy, iii. 583; Proceedings of the Committee for the Advance of Money, p. 74; Le Neve's Monumenta Anglicana, 1650–79, p. 19; St. John's College Books, per the president.]  PARSONS, PHILIP (1729–1812), divine and miscellaneous writer, descended from a family seated at Hadleigh, Suffolk, was born at Dedham, Essex, in 1729, and was educated at Lavenham grammar school, Suffolk, under the care of his maternal uncle, the Rev. Thomas Smythies, then the master there. Thence he proceeded to Sidney-Sussex College, Cambridge, went out B.A. in 1752 as third junior optime, and proceeded M.A. in 1776. After taking orders he was appointed to the mastership of Oakham School, Rutland, which he resigned in 1761 on being presented to the school and perpetual curacy of Wye, Kent, by Lord Winchilsea. At Wye he instituted a Sunday-school, and contributed much to the establishment of such schools in Kent by a sermon and some letters which he published (see below). In 1776 Lord Winchilsea gave him the rectory of Eastwell, Kent, and in 1776 Dr. Cornwallis, archbishop of Canterbury, instituted him to the rectory of Snave in the same county. He was also domestic chaplain to Lord Sondes. Parsons died at the college, Wye, on 12 June 1812.

His most important work is entitled ‘Monuments and Painted Glass in upwards of one hundred Churches, chiefly in the eastern part of Kent … with an Appendix, containing three Churches in other Counties; to which are added, a small Collection of detached Epitaphs,’ 4to, Canterbury, 1794. The three churches are those of Hadleigh, Lavenham, and Dedham. Many copies of this useful volume having been destroyed in the fire at Messrs. Nichols's printing office, it has become very scarce.

Parsons wrote also: 1. ‘The Inefficacy of Satire: a Poem,’ 4to, 1766. 2. ‘Newmarket; or an Essay on the Turf’ (anon.), 2 vols. 12mo, London, 1771. 3. ‘Astronomic Doubts; or an Enquiry into the Nature of that Supply of Light and Heat which the superior Planets may be supposed to Enjoy,’ 8vo, Canterbury, 1774. 4. ‘Essays and Letters, with other miscellaneous Pieces’ (anon.), 12mo, Canterbury, 1775. 5. ‘Dialogues of the Dead with the Living’ (anon.), 8vo, London, 1779. 6. ‘Simplicity: a Poem,’ 4to, 1784. 7. ‘Six Letters to a Friend on the Establishment of Sunday Schools,’ 12mo, London, 1786. To vol. ii. of the ‘Student,’ 1751, he contributed the first nine papers, and wrote in the ‘World’ for 1756 an amusing jeu d'esprit ‘On advertising for Curates.’ These essays attracted the notice of Lord Winchilsea, who proved afterwards Parsons's steady patron.

[Gent. Mag. 1812, pt. i. p. 671, pt. ii. pp. 291–2; Smith's Bibl. Cantiana; Halkett and Laing's Dict. of Anon. and Pseud. Lit.]  PARSONS, RICHARD (1643–1711), divine and antiquary, was son of William Parsons (1599–1671), royalist divine, who was, as of founder's kin, scholar of Winchester and fellow of New College, Oxford, from 1604 (B.C.L. 1629, and D.C.L. 1660); rector of Birchanger in Essex from 1641; prebendary of Chichester, rector of Lambourne, Essex,and vicar of Dunmow, Essex, from 1660.

The son, born at Birchanger in 1643, was admitted to a scholarship at Winchester College, as of kin to the founder, in 1654, succeeded to a fellowship at New College, Oxford, in 1659, and matriculated on 25 Oct. in the same year. He vacated his fellowship in 1665. He graduated B.C.L. on 8 April 1665, and D.C.L. on 25 June 1687. He became vicar of Driffield in Gloucestershire in 1674, and chancellor of the diocese of Gloucester in 1677. In 1695 a bill was filed against him in the court of exchequer, charging him with having unduly levied, and afterwards retained, sums of money from the dissenters during 1678, 1681, 1683, and 1685. He died on 12 June 1711, and was buried in Gloucester Cathedral. His wife Mary, two sons, Robert and Thomas, and three daughters — Anne, Mary, and Honour—were also buried in the cathedral.

At the instigation of Henry Wharton, Parsons made considerable collections towards a history of the cathedral and diocese of Gloucester. His manuscripts, after his death, passed into the possession of Jonathan Colley, chaplain and chanter of Christ Church, Oxford, thence into the library of Peter Le Neve [q.v.], and in 1729, on the death of Le Neve, into that of Thomas Martin [q.v.], of Palgrave in Suffolk. They were sold in 1730 to Rawlinson, and, with the rest of his manuscripts, came into the possession of the Bodleian Library in 1755 (Rawl. B. 323). They were made some use of by Sir Robert Atkyns (1647-1711) in his 'Ancient and Present State of Gloucestershire,' London, 1712. A manuscript by Parsons concerning impropriations in Gloucestershire, dated