Excerpt from Half-Hours With the Best Authors, Including Biographical and Critical Notices, Vol. 1 of 4 Joseph Hall, Bishop of Norwich, was born at Ashby-de-la-Zouch, in Leicestershire, on the 1st July 1574. He received his academical education at Emmanuel College, Cambridge. In 1597, he published a volume of Satires, which gave great offence, but which remain to the student of English poetry as amongst the most masterly productions of their class. Pope held them to be the best poetry and the truest satire in the English language. In 1617, he was preferred to the Deanery of Worcester; in 1627, was made Bishop of Exeter; and in 1641, was translated to Norwich. His earnest piety and professional zeal rendered him obnoxious to the charge of puritanism, but he was a vigorous defender of the Church in its times of tribulation and danger, and was a sufferer for his conscientious opinions. The revenues of his bishopric were sequestrated in 1642, and he spent the remainder of his life in great poverty, residing at Higham, near Norwich, where he died in 1656. His theological works are very numerous; and though many of them are controversial, others will remain as durable monuments of masterly reasoning, eloquent persuasion, and touching devotion. The piece which we first select, as an opening to the Sunday "Half-Hours," is from an Epistle to Lord Denny.] About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.