Preston, John (1587 -1628)

John Preston, puritan divine, was the son of Thomas Preston, a farmer in the parish of Bugbrook in Northamptonshire, and Alice Marsh. He was adopted by his uncle Creswell, Mayor of Northampton. He was educated at Northampton Grammar School and matriculated as a sizar of King's College 5 July 1604. He migrated to Queens' College in 1606, took his B.A. in 1607, became Fellow of Queens' 1609, M.A. in 1611, and in the same year started to study scholastic divinity, took orders, and became Dean and Catechist of Queens'. He took the degree of B.D. in 1620. In February 1622 he succeeded John Donne as Lecturer at Lincoln's Inn, and on 2 October was elected Master of Emmanuel College, Cambridge. In 1623 he was made D.D. by royal mandate, and applied for a vacant lectureship at Holy Trinity, Cambridge, in 1624. But his application was opposed by the king, who offered him instead any other preferment he might choose, including the Bishopric of Gloucester, but with the support of the townspeople of Cambridge he obtained the lectureship. Unmarried, he left his books and furniture to Thomas Ball, who edited his posthumous works.