NICHOLAS

See also:

• NICHOLAS FERRAR (1592-1637)
• FERRAR, ROBERT (d. 1555)

FERRAR (1592-1637)  , English theologian, was born in London in 1592 and educated at Clare Hall, Cambridge, graduating in Oro . He was obliged for some years to travel for his health, but on returning to England in 1618 became actively connected with the Virginia Company . When this company was deprived of its patent in 1623 Ferrar turned his attention to politics, and was elected to parliament . But he sncsn deridedto devote himself to a religious life; he purchased the manor of Little Gidding in Huntingdonshire, where he organized a small religious community . Here, iii 1626, he was ordained a deacon by Laud, and declining preferment, he lived an austere, almost monastic life of study and good works . He died on the 4th of December 1637, and the house was despoiled and the community broken up ten years later . There are extant a number of " harmonies " of the Gospel, printed and bound by the community, two of them by Ferrar himself . One of the latter was made for Charles I. on his request, after a visit in 1633 to see the " Arminian Nunnery at Little Gidding, " which had been the subject of some scandalous—and undeserved—criticism .