FRANCIS

See also:

• FRANCIS ROUS (1579-1659)
• ROUS, HENRY JOHN (1795-1877)

ROUS (1579-1659)  , English Puritan, was born at Dittisham in Devon in 1579, and educated at Oxford (Broad-gates Hall, afterwards Pembroke College) and at Leiden, graduating at the former in January 1596-97, and at the latter thirteen months afterwards . For some years he lived in seclusion in Cornwall and occupied himself with theological studies, producing among other books The Arte of Hap pines (1619) and Testis Veritatis, a reply to Richard Montagu's Appello Caesarem . He entered parliament in 1625 as member for Truro, and continued to represent that or some neighbouring west country constituency in such parliaments as were summoned till his death . He obtained many offices under the Commonwealth, among them that of provost of Eton College . At first a Presbyterian, he afterwards joined the Independents . In 1657 he was made a lord of parliament . He died at Acton in January 1658-J9 . The subjective cast of his piety is reflected in his Mystical Marriage . . . betweene a Soule and her Saviour (1635), but he is best known by his metrical version of the Psalms (1643), which was approved by the Westminster Assembly and (in a revised form) is still used in the Scottish Presbyterian churches .