WOOLSTON (Thomas), an English divine, was born at Northampton in 1669, and educated at Cambridge. His first appearance in the learned world was in 1705, in a work intitled, The old Apology for the Truth of the Christian Religion against the Jews and Gentiles.
which, Gentiles revived. He afterward wrote many pieces; but what made the most noise, are his Six Discourses on the Miracles of Christ; which occasioned a great number of books and pamphlets upon the subject, and raised a prosecution against him. At his trial in Guildhall, before the lord chief-justice Raymond, he spoke several times himself; and urged, that "he thought it very hard that he should be tried by a set of men, who, though otherwise very learned and worthy persons, were no more judges of the subjects on which he wrote, than himself was a judge of the most crabbed points of the law." He was sentenced to a year's imprisonment, and to pay a fine of 100l. He purchased the liberty of the rules of the King's-bench, where he continued after the expiration of the year, being unable to pay the fine. The greatest obstruction to his deliverance from confinement was, the obligation of giving security not to offend by any future writings, he being resolved to write again as freely as before. He died in 1733.