View source for Samuel Wesley (poet, died 1739)

{{Short description|English poet and cleric}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}
{{More footnotes needed|date=January 2023}}
{{Infobox person
| honorific_prefix= [[The Reverend]]
| name          = Samuel Wesley
| image         = File:Samuel Wesley Jr.jpg
| alt           = Portrait engraving
| caption       = Portrait of by Nathaniel Parr (''Poems on Several Occasions'', 1743)
| birth_name    = <!-- only use if different from name -->
| birth_date    = {{Birth date|1691|02|10|df=y}}
| birth_place   = [[Spitalfields]], London
| death_date    = {{Death date and age|1739|11|06|1691|02|10|df=y}}
| death_place   = [[Tiverton, Devon]]
| nationality   = <!-- use only when necessary per [[WP:INFONAT]] -->
| other_names   = Samuel Wesley the Younger; Samuel Wesley Junior
| occupation    = [[Church of England|Anglican]] priest
| years_active  =
| known_for     = Christian poetry
| notable_works =
}}
'''Samuel Wesley the Younger''' (10 February 1690 or 1691 – 6 November 1739) was a poet, teacher and an [[Church of England|Anglican]] cleric. He was the eldest of the Wesley brothers—with younger brothers [[John Wesley|John]] and [[Charles Wesley|Charles]]—but did not play a notable role in the nascent [[Methodism|Methodist movement]].
==Birth==
Wesley was the eldest son of the cleric and poet [[Samuel Wesley (poet, died 1735)|Samuel Wesley]] and of [[Susanna Wesley|Susanna Annesley Wesley]].  He was the brother of [[John Wesley]] and [[Charles Wesley]]. He was born in Spitalfields, [[London]] in either 1690 or 1691.  He said he was 18 years old in 1711 and he wrote a letter in which he said he was born in 1690.  His tombstone said he died in his 49th year, which would put his birth in 1691.
==Education and career==
Wesley was educated at [[Westminster School]] before entering [[Christ Church, Oxford]] in 1711 where he received a [[Bachelor of Arts|B.A.]] degree in 1715 and a [[Master of Arts (Oxbridge and Dublin)|M.A.]] in  1718.  He was ordained and became head [[schoolmaster|usher]] at Westminster School for 20 years (from 1713 to 1733).  After that he was [[schoolmaster|master]] of [[Blundell's School]], [[Tiverton, Devon]], where he died after a short illness on 6 November 1739. He is buried in the Tiverton churchyard.
==Marriage==
Wesley married Ursula Berry (died c1742), daughter of the Reverend John Berry, [[vicar]] of Walton, [[Norfolk]].  They had six children, four of whom died in infancy.  They were survived by two children: a daughter and a son.
==Religion==
A [[high church]] Tory, Wesley was a friend of [[Francis Atterbury|Bishop Francis Atterbury]]. He was never a Methodist and yet five hymns of several composed by him are in the Wesleyan Hymn Book of the present day.<ref>{{cite web |title=Samuel Wesley {{!}} Hymnary.org |url=http://www.hymnary.org/person/Wesley_SamuelJunior?sort=desc&order=Texts+by+Samuel+Wesley+%2819%29 |website=hymnary.org |access-date=7 November 2022 |language=en}}</ref>
==Text records==
*1723 The Battle of the Sexes. A Poem.
*1726 Pastoral.
*1726 The Iliad in a Nutshell: or, Homer's Battle of the Frogs and Mice.
*1736 The Descriptive: a Miltonick. After the Manner of the Moderns.
*1736 ca. Wroote: a Heroic Poem. Humbly inscribed to Miss [[Mehetabel Wesley]].
==Publications==
*Neck or nothing, a consolatory letter from Mr Dunton to Mr Curll. 1716.
*The battle of the sexes: a poem. 1723.
*A new ballad. 1723.
*The story of the three children. 1724.
*The pig and the mastiff: two tales. 1725.
*The Iliad in a nutshell: or Homer's Battle of the frogs and mice. 1726.
*To the memory of the right reverend father in God, Francis Gastrell. 1726.
*The prisons open'd: a poem. 1729. [http://access.bl.uk/item/viewer/ark:/81055/vdc_000000028A70#loaded Online at the British Library]
*Verses on the death of Mrs Morice. 1730.
*The cobbler, a tale. 173?
*The parish priest: a poem upon a clergyman lately deceas'd. 1732.
*The Christian poet ... or poems by Mr. Wesley. 1735.
*Four tales after the manner of the ingenious Matt Prior. 1735?
*Poems on several occasions. 1736, 1743.
*Tales, instructive and entertaining. 1808.
*Poems on several occasions ... including many pieces never before published, ed. John Nichols
==References==
{{Reflist}}
==Sources==
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20100624005523/http://wiz2.cath.vt.edu/Spenser/authorrecord.php?action=GET&recordid=32978 Virginia Tech, Center for Applied Technologies in the Humanities, Biography of Rev. Samuel Wesley the Younger, Extracted 9 July 2009]
*[http://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Search/Home?lookfor=author-browse:%22Wesley%2C+Samuel%2C+1691-1739%22&iknowwhatimean=1 National Library of Australia, Catalogue of works by Samuel Wesley, Extracted 9 July 2009]
*Henry D. Rack, 'Wesley, Samuel the younger(1690/91–1739)', ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press, 2004 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/29070, accessed 15 Dec 2006]
* {{Cite NIE|wstitle=Wesley, Samuel (junior)|year=1905}}
==External links==
*{{wikisource author-inline|Samuel Wesley (1691-1739)}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wesley, Samuel 02}}
[[Category:Heads of Blundell's School]]
[[Category:Wesley family|Samuel 2]]
[[Category:1691 births]]
[[Category:1739 deaths]]
[[Category:Alumni of Christ Church, Oxford]]
[[Category:18th-century English Anglican priests]]
[[Category:People educated at Westminster School, London]]
[[Category:English male poets]]
[[Category:18th-century English poets]]
[[Category:18th-century Anglican theologians]]