David Martin

Who was David Martin?

David Martin, a learned French Protestant theologian, was born at Revel, in the diocese of Lavaur.

He was educated at Montauban, and at the academy of the reformed at Nîmes. He afterwards studied divinity at Puy-Laurent, whither the academy of Montauban had been removed. Having been admitted to the ministry in 1663, he settled as pastor with the church of Esperance, in the diocese of Castres. In 1670 he accepted an invitation to the church of La Caune, in the same diocese, where he officiated till the revocation of the edict of Nantes, in 1685. In 1686, the magistrates of Deventer invited him to become professor of divinity, Pand pastor of the Walloon church in that city; but the regency of Utrecht, where he had taken up his residence, fully apprised of his merit, prevailed upon him to accept the office of pastor in their city.

He had studied his native language grammatically; and when the French Academy was about to publish the second edition of their Dictionary, he sent them remarks and observations, of which they availed themselves, with polite acknowledgments to the author. He died of a violent fever in 1721, after he had completed his eighty-second year.