William Melmoth

Who was William Melmoth?

William Melmoth was an English devotional writer and lawyer, whose major work, The Great Importance of a Religious Life Consider'd, proved to be one of the most popular pieces of religious writing of the 18th century. He was the father of William Melmoth a Commissioner of Bankrupts.

Melmoth was admitted to the Inns of Court to begin his training as a barrister at Clifford's Inn on 15 April 1686, and then transferred to Inner Temple on 30 May 1689 and from there he was called to the Bar on 29 May 1693. Records show that he was admitted as a "gentleman." On his admission to the Bar he was called to take the Test Act oath that served as an oath of allegiance to William and Mary and the Protestant succession, he was troubled by Jacobite non-juror concerns of legitimacy. He wrote to John Norris, the religious writer, to ask whether swearing allegiance to an usurper might not make him an accessory to the usurpation. However, Melmoth did take the oath, and in 1699 he moved to Lincoln's Inn, working mostly in chancery cases. He married, and this wife died around 1699 and left him property.