An exposition of the festivall Epistles and Gospels, vsed in our English Liturgie. Together with a reason why the Church did chuse the same. …. The second part from the Purification of blessed Mary the Virgin, to the feast of S. Iohn the Baptist.
London, Imprinted for William Aspley, 1614.
£900
4to, pp. (iv) 159 (i); A2 B-L8 . Roman and Italic letter, sporadic Greek. Title-page within a plain double-fillet border, pages ruled in black with references section to the outer margin, head- and tailpieces. A crisp, untrimmed and surprisingly widemargined copy bound in modern speckled paper over boards with older label to front cover. A lovely copy. This is the second part of three texts forming ‘An Exposition of the Festival Epistles and Gospels, used in our English Liturgie’. The first part was published in 1613 and the third one in 1615. John Boys (1571-1625) was Dean of Canterbury. Before covering such high position, he proved himself as a very skilled preacher. While in service at St Mary’s, Cambridge, Archbishop Richard Bancroft took him into his favour, and he preached at Ashford, on the occasion of the primate holding his primary visitation there on 11 September 1607. Two years after, Boys published his first work, ‘The Minister’s Invitatorie, being An Exposition of all the Principall Scriptures used in our English Liturgie: together with a reason why the Church did chuse the same’. The work was dedicated to Bancroft, who had lately been made chancellor of the University of Oxford, and in the ‘dedicatorie epistle’ Boys speaks of his ‘larger exposition of the Gospels and Epistles’ as shortly about to appear. In 1611, ‘An Exposition of the Dominical Epistles and Gospels used in our English Liturgie throughout the whole yeere’ supplied a great need and had a very large and rapid sale, encouraging Boys to further his work. Archbishop Bancroft died in November 1610, and George Abbot was promoted to the primacy in the spring of 1611. Boys dedicated to him the present work, ‘An Exposition of the Festival Epistles and Gospels, used in our English Liturgie’. This second part includes a dedication “To my loving neighbours of Hollingburne, more principally to the Right Worthy Sr. Francis Barnham Knight, and Thomas Culpeper Esquire”.
ESTC S106192.