Ezekiel Hopkins Biography
Ezekiel Hopkins was born at Sanford, county of Devon,England, about the year 1633, where his father was many yearsa laborious minister. He was educated at Oxford, where hewas some time chaplain of Magdalen College. From Oxford hewent to London, where he was assistant to Dr. William Spur-stow till the act of uniformity. After this he was preacher at St. Edmunds, Lombard-street, and subsequently was chosenminister of St. Mary Arches, in Exeter, where he was much ad- mired. From Exeter he was transferred to the deanery of Ra-phoe, Ireland, and from the deanery was promoted to the bishop-ric, which he occupied about ten years, when he was transfer-red to the bishopric of Derry. Here he continued about sevenyears, till the papists got the sword into their hands, when hefled for his life to England, and became minister of St. Mary,Aldermanbury, in London, 1689, where he died, about sevenmonths only after his establishment there.
As a preacher, Bishop Hopkins was esteemed one of the firstof the age in which he lived, being much admired and followedafter in all the places where he preached.
As a writer, he was eminent above most authors for the com-bination of clear statements of doctrinal and practical truth,with an eloquent application of it to the heart and conscience.Scarcely any other writer has, within an equal compass, so ablydiscussed, and applied with such energy the whole range ofchristian truth. His works are published in four volumes, editedby the late Rev. Josiah Pratt, of London, who in his dedicationof the volumes to William Wilberforce, Esq. says, “Thatauthor is of special value whose works supply, within a mod-rate compass, the most complete refutation of whatever can beurged against true religion, by exhibiting her in her most beauti-ful proportions. Such an author is Bishop Hopkins.” His works,embrace the following subjects: Vanity of the World, Exposi-tions of the Lord’s Prayer and the Ten Commandments, Dis-courses on the Law, Discourses concerning Sin, The Doctrineof the Two Covenants, Doctrine of the Two Sacraments, TheAll-Sufficiency of Christ to save Sinners, Excellency of Heaven-ly Treasures, Practical Christianity, Assurance of Heaven andSalvation a principal motive to serve God with fear, On Glori-fying God in his Attributes, Almost Christian, Conscience, GreatDuty of Mortification, Death Disarmed, Miscellaneous Sermons.
As a divine, Bishop Hopkins was one of the sound theologiansto which the Reformation gave birth, and he unequivocally andopenly held and inculcated the pure doctrines of the Reformers,opposed as they are to the pride and passions of unsanctifiedmen. On the difficult questions concerning the grace of God andthe obligation of man, he adopted those views which most natu-rally reconcile with one another the declarations and exhortationsof Scripture. Few writers have entered so unequivocally intothe extent of man’s responsibility, and at the same time so strong-ly insisted on the sovereignty, and so graphically described the 1operations of the grace of God.
Exposition of the Ten Commandments
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