Glanvill, Joseph (1636-03-25 - 1680-11-04)

The exact date of birth of Joseph Glanvill is not known. Born in Plymouth, he matriculated at Exeter College, Oxford on 2 April 1652, graduating B.A. on 1 October 1655. He proceeded M.A. from Lincoln College on 29 June 1658. During the 1660s, he held the living of Frome Selwood (Somerset), and also served as rector of the abbey church in Bath. He exchanged Frome Selwood for the rectory of Street with Walton, also in Somerset, on 26 July 1672, becoming chaplain in ordinary to Charles II in the same year. On 22 June 1678, he became a prebendary at Worcester Cathedral. He died on 4 November 1680, and was buried in the abbey church at Bath. He was most prominently a philosopher who defended the pre-existence of the soul, and who was a polemicist for the "new science"; see Rhodri Lewis, 'Of "Origenian Platonisme": Joseph Glanvill on the Pre-existence of Souls', Huntington Library Quarterly, 69.2 (2006), 267-300.