Northamptonshire. In 1719 he succeeded George Fownes as minister of the independent congregation at Nailsworth in the parish of Avening, Gloucestershire, and at the same time took charge of his deceased uncle's students, and removed them from Tewkesbury. Between 1719 and 1722 four students were sent to him by the presbyterian board. His popularity as a preacher is shown by the enlargement of his meeting-house, and by the attendance of persons of station. His character as a scholar made him known beyond his own denomination. A hard student, he was of social disposition, and took pleasure in playing bowls. He died prematurely in 1724.
Jones is best remembered for his admirable investigation of the grounds for attributing canonicity to the received books of the New Testament, to the exclusion of others. His treatise on this subject was long unique, and for its time exhaustive. Though now superseded in details, its breadth of treatment and fulness of materials render it still valuable. It was entitled ‘A New and Full Method of Settling the Canonical Authority of the New Testament,’ &c., 1726, 8vo, 2 vols., was left ready for the press at his death. A third volume, 1727, 8vo, contains the special application of his method to the Gospels and Acts, with a reprint of an earlier publication. The three volumes were reprinted at the Clarendon Press, 1798, 8vo, and 1827, 8vo. His earlier publication, ‘A Vindication of the Former Part of St. Matthew's Gospel,’ &c., 1719, 8vo (reprinted Salop, 1721, 8vo; Clarendon Press, 1803, 8vo), dedicated to his uncle, is a criticism of Whiston's endeavour to reconcile the chronology of the evangelists by a theory of ‘dislocations’ in the existing text of St. Matthew. It would appear from the preface that Jones had been in correspondence with Whiston. Jones is said to have projected another volume ‘on the apostolical fathers;’ more probably he meant to apply his method of determining canonicity to the remaining books of the New Testament.
Jones, Joshua (d. 1740), younger brother of the above, and probably editor of his posthumous work, was minister successively at Wem (1717), Oswestry (1718), Nailsworth (1724–5), and Cross Street, Manchester (1725–40); and died while on a visit at Chester on 25 Aug. 1740. He married Mrs. Walker on 6 July 1726.
[Monthly Mag. April 1803, pp. 501 sq. (biographical notice by J. T.—i.e. Joshua Toulmin—reprinted in Gent. Mag. June 1803); Monthly Repository, 1809, p. 656 (article by W. W.—i.e. Walter Wilson); James's Hist. Litig. Presb. Chapels, 1867, pp. 664, 674, 688, 689; Turner's Nonconformist Register (Heywood and Dickenson), 1881, pp. 221, 329; Rees's Hist. Prot. Nonconf. in Wales, 1883, p. 231; Jeremy's Presbyterian Fund, 1885, pp. 13, 44; Walter Wilson's manuscript Account of Dissenting Congregations in Dr. Williams's Library; information from the Rev. E. Myers, Shrewsbury.]
JONES, JEZREEL (d. 1731), traveller, was appointed in 1698 clerk to the Royal Society. Under their patronage he set out in the same year on an expedition of discovery into Barbary, the sum of 100l. being voted by the council towards his journey (Weld, Hist. of Roy. Soc. i. 351–2, ii. 562). In 1699 he communicated to the society an ‘Account of the Moorish Way of Dressing their Meat (with other Remarks) in West Barbary, from Cape Spartel to Cape de Geer’ (Phil. Trans. xxi. 248–58). He returned home at the end of the year, but in February 1701 he sailed on a second voyage to Barbary, and reached Tetuan in September. He sent Sloane and Petiver many valuable specimens (cf. his letters in Addit. (Sloane) MS. 4049, ff. 86–96). Some of his coloured drawings of Barbary products, copied by Albin in 1711, are preserved in the same collection, No. 4003. In July 1704 he was chosen British envoy to Morocco, and arrived at Tangier on 28 Dec. of that year (letter of Sir C. Hedges to Alcaid Ali ben Abdola, Addit. MS. 28948, f. 55; letter of Jones to Sir J. Leake, ib. 5440, f. 119). An excellent Arabic scholar, he often acted, on his return to London, as interpreter to ambassadors from Africa (Gent. Mag. i. 220). To John Chamberlayne's ‘Oratio Dominica in diversas linguas versa,’ 1715, he contributed (pt. ii. pp. 150–6) a learned dissertation ‘De Lingua Shilhensi.’ He died at his house, the Two Golden Arrows, in Plough Yard, Fetter Lane, Holborn, on 21 May 1731 (Hist. Reg. 1731, Chron. Diary, p. 26). By his wife Edith he left three sons and a daughter (will in P. C. C. 185, Isham). His correspondence with Under-secretary John Ellis is in Additional MSS. 28892, ff. 182, 190, and 28916, ff. 121, 137, 143.
[Authorities cited above.]
JONES, JOHN (fl. 1579), physician, a native of Wales, is said to have studied at both Oxford and Cambridge universities, and Wood conjectured that he took one degree in physic at Cambridge, though no record of the fact can now be discovered (Cooper, Athenæ Cantabr. i. 419). It is not known when or at what place he commenced the practice of physic; but he mentions curing a person at Louth in 1562. He was residing at Asple Hall, near Nottingham, in May 1572, and at
