JORTIN (John), a very learned and ingenious English clergyman, was born in Huntingdonshire, about the year 1701. Having some private fortune of his own, and being of a peculiar disposition that could not solicit promotion, he remained long without preferment. In 1738, lord Winchester gave him the living of Eastwell in Kent; but the place not agreeing with his health, he soon resigned it. Archbishop Herring, who had a great value for him, about the year 1751 presented him to the living of St Dunstan's in the East; and bishop Osbaldiston in 1762 gave him that of Kenington, with a prebend in St Paul's cathedral, and made him archdeacon of London. His temper, as well as his aspect, was rather morose and saturnine; but in company that he liked, he was at all times facetious, yet still with a mixture of sal censura superiorum. His sermons were sensible and argumentative; and would have made more impression on his hearers, had he been more attentive to the advantages flowing from a good delivery: but he appeared to greater advantage as a writer. His remarks on ecclesiastical history, his six dissertations, his life of Erasmus, and his sermons, were extremely well received by the public, and have undergone several editions. He died in the year 1770.