The Collect
ALMIGHTY and everliving God, we give thee thanks for the purity and strength with which thou didst endow thy servant William Law; and we pray that by thy grace we may have a like power to hallow and conform our souls and bodies, to the purpose of thy most holy will; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
William Law (1686 – 9 April 1761) was a Church of England priest who lost his position at Emmanuel College when his conscience would not allow him to take the required oath of allegiance to the first Hanoverian monarch, George I. Previously Law had given his allegiance to the House of Stuart. Thereafter, Law continued as a simple priest and when that too became impossible without the required oath, he taught privately and wrote extensively. His personal integrity, as well as mystic and theological writing greatly influenced the evangelical movement of his day as well as Enlightenment thinkers such as the writer Samuel Johnson and the historian Edward Gibbon.
Law's spiritual writings remain in print today.
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