Thomas Fuller - Early Life

Early Life

The eldest son of Thomas Fuller, rector of Aldwinkle St Peter's, Northamptonshire, he was born at his father's rectory and was baptised on 19 June 1608. Dr John Davenant, bishop of Salisbury, was his uncle and godfather. According to John Aubrey, Fuller was "a boy of pregnant wit." At thirteen he was admitted to Queens' College, Cambridge, then presided over by John Davenant. His cousin, Edward Davenant, was a tutor there. He did well academically; and in Lent 1624-1625 he became B.A. and in July 1628, M.A. After being overlooked in an election of fellows of his college, he moved to Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge in November 1628. In 1630 he received from Corpus Christi College the curacy of St Bene't's, Cambridge.

Fuller's oratory soon attracted attention. In June 1631 his uncle gave him a prebend in Salisbury, where his father, who died in the following year, already held a canonry. The rectory of Broadwindsor, Dorset, then in the diocese of Bristol, was his next preferment (1634); and on 11 June 1635 he proceeded B.D. In 1640, he was elected proctor for Bristol in the memorable convocation of Canterbury, which assembled with the Short Parliament. On the sudden dissolution of the latter he joined those who urged that convocation should likewise dissolve. That opinion was overruled; and the assembly continued to sit by royal writ. Fuller left, in his Church History, a valuable account of the proceedings of this synod, for sitting in which he was fined £200.