Henry King (1592 – 30 September 1669) was an English poet who served as Bishop of Chichester.

Life

The elder son of John King, Bishop of London, and his wife Joan Freeman, he was baptised at Worminghall, Buckinghamshire, 16 January 1592. He was educated at Lord Williams's School, Westminster School and in 1608 became a student of Christ Church, Oxford. With his brother John King he matriculated 20 January 1609, and was admitted (19 June 1611 and 7 July 1614) to the degrees of bachelor and master of arts. On 24 January 1616 he was collated to the prebend of St. Pancras in St. Paul's Cathedral, receiving at the same time the office of penitentiary or confessor in the cathedral, together with the rectory and patronage of Chigwell, Essex. He was made archdeacon of Colchester on 10 April 1617, and soon afterwards received the sinecure rectory of Fulham, in addition to being appointed one of the royal chaplains. All these preferments he held until he was advanced to the episcopal bench.

Late in 1617 he preached a sermon at Paul's Cross. About this time King married Anne, eldest daughter of Robert Berkeley, esq., and granddaughter of Sir Maurice Berkeley. There were four or five children of the marriage, but only two survived. His wife died about 1624 at age 24, and was buried in St. Paul's Cathedral. Her death is the subject of his poem The Exequy. Other friends were Ben Jonson, George Sandys, Sir Henry Blount, and James Howell. His friendship with Izaak Walton began about 1634, and was lifelong. King preached a sermon refuting this claim on 25 November 1621. He was made canon of Christ Church 3 March 1624, and his brother John was made canon in the following August. On 19 May 1625 they were admitted to the degrees of B.D. and D.D.

Shortly afterwards King retired to Ritchings, near Langley, the residence of Lady Anne Salter (supposed to be the sister of Brian Duppa), where other members of the King family and John Hales of Eton found refuge. In 1659 King was engaged in negotiations for supplying the vacant bishoprics, and was reinstated at the Restoration (by 20 June 1660), returning to Chichester. On 20 May 1661 he preached at Whitehall, and on 24 April 1662 he delivered an impressive funeral sermon on Bishop Duppa at Westminster Abbey. King died at Chichester 30 September 1669, and was buried in Chichester Cathedral, where the widow of his son John erected a monument to his memory and that of her husband. His second son, Henry, died 21 February 1669; his eldest son, John, died 10 March 1671. asks for the love of a white boy. King had the conventional views of the time and in his response, which exists in alternative versions, the boy explains that racial differences keep them apart. In King's opinion the interbreeding of races can only produce unwelcome results:

:Prodigious might that union prove,

:Where Night and Day together move,

:And the conjunction of our lips

:Not kisses make but an eclipse;

:In which the mixed black and white

:Portends more terrour than delight.

Notes

References

Attribution

  • Index entry for Henry King at Poets' Corner

Poems

  • A Renunciation
  • The Exequy
  • A Collection of Poems by Henry King