Samuel Clarke

Samuel Clarke or Clark (1626–1701) was an English Nonconformist clergyman known as an assiduous annotator of the Bible.

Life He was the eldest son of Samuel Clarke (1599–1683), and was born at Shotwick, near Chester, on 12 November 1626. He was educated at Peterhouse, Cambridge; and was appointed fellow of Pembroke Hall by Edward Montagu, 2nd Earl of Manchester on 13 March 1644. Refusing to take the engagement of fidelity to the Commonwealth, exacted in April 1649, he was deprived of his fellowship in 1651 (after 3 April).

At the Restoration he held the rectory of Grendon Underwood, Buckinghamshire. He was ejected after the Act of Uniformity 1662.

The son was more advanced than his father in his nonconformity. After a sojourn at Upper Winchendon, Buckinghamshire, the seat of Philip Wharton, 4th Baron Wharton, he settled at High Wycombe, in the same county. There he gathered a congregation, originally Presbyterian, by then independent. He assisted in the ordinations which kept up the succession of nonconformist ministers. Clarke died at High Wycombe on 24 February 1701. Samuel Clarke (1684–1750) of the Scripture Promises was his grandson.

Works His theology was of the Baxterian type. The work of his life was his annotated edition of the Bible, published in 1696.