Robert Greville, 2nd Lord Brooke
1607–1643
Puritan peer; Saybrook patron; killed at the siege of Lichfield, 1643.
Biography
Adopted heir of Fulke Greville (the courtier-poet, biographer of Sidney) and his successor in the barony. Brooke was the most intellectually serious of the Puritan peers — his The Nature of Truth (1640) is an early English engagement with anti-Aristotelian metaphysics and shows the influence of Hartlib's circle; A Discourse Opening the Nature of Episcopacie (1641) is one of the sharpest anti-episcopal polemics of the early Long Parliament. With Saye and Sele he was co-patron of the Saybrook Colony in Connecticut. Parliamentary commander in the Midlands, he was killed by a deaf-mute royalist sharpshooter from the spire of Lichfield Cathedral close on 2 March 1643 — four months before the Assembly opened, so his Assembly place was nominal. Independent in church sympathies.
Principal works
- The Nature of Truth (1640)
- A Discourse Opening the Nature of Episcopacie (1641)
Lay Assessor — House of Lords
Parliament seated lay assessors from both Houses to sit with the divines and represent its interest. Ten peers were named from the House of Lords as lay assessors; like the Commons assessors they had voice in the Assembly but were not voting members, and they attended as their other duties allowed.