Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 48.djvu/344

 ROACH, RICHARD (1662–1730), divine, son of Thomas Roach, of London, was born there on 18 July 1662, and admitted a scholar of Merchant Taylors' School in 1677. His senior schoolfellow by one year, Dr. Francis Lee [q. v.], remained through life his constant friend. Roach became head scholar, and was elected on 16 July 1681 to St. John's College, Oxford, graduating B.A. 1686, M.A. 1688. He was admitted to deacon's orders by Gilbert Ironside, bishop of Bristol, on 29 Sept. 1689, in Wadham College Chapel, took priest's orders on 16 March following, and graduated B.D. in 1695, having been appointed on 17 March 1690 rector of St. Augustine's, Hackney, where he remained until his death on 26 Aug. 1730. He was buried at St. Bride's, Fleet Street, on 30 Aug.

Roach was always inclined to mysticism, and when Lee devoted himself to the cause of Mrs. Jane Lead [q. v.], Roach followed. He assisted to write the ‘Theosophical Transactions of the Philadelphian Society’ in 1697, and contributed verses to be included in the mystical writings of Mrs. Lead, which were written from dictation and published by Lee. He edited ‘A Perswasive to Moderation and Forbearance in Love among the Divided Forms of Christians,’ of Jeremiah White, London, 8vo, no date; and published ‘The Great Crisis, or the Mystery of the Times and Seasons Unfolded,’ London, 1725 (not issued until 1727), 8vo, being preparatory to ‘The Imperial Standard of Messiah Triumphant. Coming now in the Power and Kingdom of His Father, to reign with His Saints on Earth,’ London, 1728, 8vo. In the latter extracts from Mrs. Lead's works are interspersed with verses by Roach. Rawlinson remarks of Roach ‘Nescio quâ fide obiit,’ but he adhered to the Philadelphian teaching.

[Robinson's Registers of Merchant Taylors, ii. 292; Wilson's Hist. of Merchant Taylors, pp. 382, 957, 992, 1000, 1201; Foster's Alumni Oxon. early series, p. 1261; Newcourt's Rep. Eccles. i. 619; Rawlinson MSS.; Walton's Collections for a Biography of Law, p. 128.]

 ROACH-SMITH, CHARLES (1804–1890), antiquary. [See ]

 ROB DONN (1714–1778), Gaelic poet. [See ]  ROB ROY (1671–1734), highland free-booter. [See ]

 ROBARTES or ROBERTES, FOULK (1580?–1650), divine, was born about 1580 (see funeral inscription in Norfolk, iii. 668). He was educated at Cambridge, proceeding B.A. from Christ's College 1598–9; he soon graduated M.A. 1602, and B.D. 1609 (, Fasti Oxon. i. 400). He was incorporated B.D. at Oxford on 10 July 1621. In 1602 he was rector of St. Clement's at the Bridge, Norfolk (, Alumni Oxon.), and from 1606 to 1607 vicar of Offley, Hertfordshire (, Nonconf. in Hertfordshire, pp. 660–2). On 16 Feb. 1615–16 he was installed prebendary of the fifth stall in Norwich Cathedral (, Fasti, ii. 500). In addition to the prebend, he held the vicarage of Trowse and the rectory of St. Clement's, Norwich, and was also ‘minister’ of St. Saviour's, Norwich (, Norfolk, iii. 365;, The Walloons and their Church at Norwich, p. 67). On 10 March 1633 he signed the circular letter of the dean and chapter of Norwich to their tenants, pressing for the repair of the cathedral (Hist. MSS. Comm. 11th Rep. pt. vii.). In the preceding year he had strongly opposed the puritan demand of a lecturer for Norwich (ib. 12th Rep. pt. i. p. 465, 23 July 1632). Although a constant preacher, he was ejected from all his livings during the civil war, and lived in great poverty till his death on 1 April 1650. He was buried on the 10th on the west side of the south transept of Norwich Cathedral, where an inscription was erected to his memory. His wife, Anne, one of the twenty-one children of Richard Skinner, gent., died on 25 March 1627. Robartes wrote: 1. ‘The Revenue of the Gospel in Tythes due to the Ministry of the Word (by that word in Tim. i. 5, 18),’ Cambridge, 1613, 4to; dedicated to John Jegon, bishop of Norwich, and Sir Edward Coke, chief justice. 2. ‘God's Holy House and Service described according to the Primitive Form thereof,’ London, 1639, 4to.

[Authorities quoted in text; Blomefield's Norfolk, iii. 365, 668; works in Brit. Mus.]  ROBARTES, FRANCIS (1650?–1718), politician and musician, son of John Robartes, first earl of Radnor [q. v.], by his second wife, Letitia Isabella, daughter of Sir John Smith, knight, of Kent, was born about 1650. He was admitted fellow-commoner of Christ's College, Cambridge, 2 May 1663, aged 13. In 1672–3 he was M.P. for Bossiney. Thenceforth until his death he sat for Bodmin and other Cornish boroughs, or for Cornwall. About 1705 he was appointed one of the tellers of the exchequer. Robartes, who became in 1673 F.R.S., died at Chelsea on 3 Feb. 1717–18. He married Anne, the widow of Hugh Boscawen of Tregothnan, and daughter of Wentworth Fitzgerald, seventeenth earl of Kildare. Their son John became the fourth and last earl of Radnor of that line, dying unmarried on 15 July 1757. 