Life
He was born in Guildford, the elder brother of George Abbot the future archbishop, and shared the same course of education. He early distinguished himself as a preacher, and a sermon which he preached at Paul's Cross gained for him the living of Bingham, Nottinghamshire, to which he was presented by John Stanhope.
King James appointed Abbot one of the chaplains in ordinary. In 1609, he was elected master of Balliol College. In 1613 he became Regius Professor of Divinity at Oxford, and attacked the writings of Petrus Bertius, a Dutch Remonstrant, on the topic of falling from grace. Subsequently he made a broader attack based on orthodox Calvinism and Augustine of Hippo on the spreading ideas of Jacobus Arminius. In 1615 he attacked John Howson and William Laud, implying Catholic sympathies, and wrapping in those terms the further implication that Laud was Arminian. Howson retorted that the Abbot brothers were Puritans. In speaking of secret methods by which certain persons were attempting to undermine the Protestant Reformation, Abbot was clearly referencing Laud, who was present for the lecture. Laud, stung, wrote to his friend, Richard Neile, Bishop of Lincoln, complaining that, "he was fain to sit patiently at the rehearsal of this sermon, though abused almost an hour together, being pointed at as he sat," and asking whether he ought to take public notice of the insult.
Abbot obtained the see of Salisbury, and his brother George consecrated him. On his departure from the university, he delivered a farewell oration in Latin, which was much admired. Comparing the merits of the two brothers, Robert and George, Thomas Fuller remarks that
- "George was the more plausible preacher, Robert the greater scholar; George was the abler statesman, Robert the deeper divine."
Abbot died in Salisbury, being one of five bishops who succeeded to the see of Salisbury within the space of six years.
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