| Thomas Gisborne | |
|---|---|
detail from Joseph Wright painting |
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| Born | 31 October 1758 Bridge Gate, Derbyshire |
| Died | 24 March 1846 (aged 87) |
| Education | Harrow and entered St John's College |
| Occupation | divine |
| Spouse | Elizabeth |
| Children | eight |
| Parents | John and Ann Gisborne |
Thomas Gisborne (31 October 1758 – 24 March 1846) was an Anglican divine, priest and poet. He was a member of the Clapham Sect, who fought for the abolition of the slave trade in England.
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Gisborne was born at Bridge Gate, Derbyshire, the son of John Gisborne of Yoxhall Lodge in Needwood Forest, Staffordshire and his wife Anne Bateman. He was educated at Harrow and entered St John's College, Cambridge in 1776, where he established life-long friendships with William Wilberforce and Thomas Babington. At Cambridge, he became the first Chancellor's medallist in 1780.[1]
In 1783 he became curate of Barton-under-Needwood, and later that year inherited Yoxall Lodge, Staffordshire, which was 3 miles from the church. The next year he married Mary Babington (b. 1760). They had six sons and two daughters. The eldest son, Thomas Gisborne (1794–1852), became a member of parliament, and the fourth son, James, a clergyman, succeeded his father as perpetual curate of Barton in 1820.[2]
Gisbourne was a central figure in the Clapham Sect, an abolitionist group which included William Wilberforce and Gisbourne's brother-in-law Thomas Babington. Yoxall Lodge acted as a major focus of the group, and Wilberforce was a frequent visitor there.[2]
Gisborne was appointed prebendary of Durham Cathedral in 1823. He died at Yoxall Lodge on 24 March 1846 at the age of eighty-seven.[2] Gisborne left money for an annual scholarship at the University of Durham, which is referred to as the Gisborne Scholarship.[3]
Gisbourne's Principles of Moral Philosophy (1789) was a forceful evangelical attack on William Paley's Principles of Moral and Political Philosophy (1785), an influential work studied at both Cambridge and Oxford Universities, arguing morality as a categorical imperative against Paley's utilitarian standpoint. Gisborne also wrote Enquiry into the Duties of Men (1795) and Enquiry into the Duties of the Female Sex (1797) stressing subordination to the divinely imposed social hierarchy. His Walks in a Forest (1794) was a book of poems describing the scenery of Needwood Forest, which bordered his estate at Yoxall.[2]
A scriptural geologist, Gisborne wrote two books which criticized the trend of geology away from a basis in the Bible: Testimony of Natural Theology to Christianity (1818) and Considerations on Modern Theories of Geology (1837). Though a clergyman and not a geologist, Gisborne was not totally ignorant in natural history and geology due to his extensive reading and his own observations in his rural parish.[4]