impulse seemed to revive. Three poems written near the close of his life (‘Winter Hymn to the Snow,’ ‘When the World is Burning,’ and ‘To Death’) show the space his mind had traversed in the interval of silence. Daringly original in conception, these remarkable pieces are also almost perfect in expression; more striking than the most striking things in ‘Studies of Sensation and Event,’ and entirely exempt from the crude vehemence of that ill-starred book. Jones died on 14 Sept. 1860, and for a while was forgotten. In 1870, however, Dante Rossetti spoke in ‘Notes and Queries’ of his ‘vivid disorderly power,’ and prophesied that he would some day be disinterred. William Bell Scott followed to the same effect, and in 1878 Mr. R. H. Shepherd ‘issued a little brochure giving a brief account of Ebenezer Jones and his volume, and quoting some half-dozen of his most striking and remarkable lyrics.’ This occasioned a most interesting series of biographical papers in the ‘Athenæum’ of September and October 1878, by Mr. Theodore Watts; and in 1879 Mr. Shepherd published a nearly complete edition of ‘Studies of Sensation and Event,’ with corrections by the author himself, a few additional pieces, a memoir by Ebenezer's brother Sumner, and reminiscences by Mr. W. J. Linton. A second volume, containing Jones's prose writings and additional poems, preserved by his friend Horace Harral, was to have followed, but never appeared.
There can be no question of Jones's genius; his infirmities were those of most young poets, especially the self-taught; his latest productions show that his faults had gradually cured themselves, and that he needed nothing but fortitude to have taken a distinguished place among English poets. Personally he was as amiable as enthusiastic, deficient only in steadiness of purpose and virtues of the self-regarding order.
[Mr. Sumner Jones and Mr. W. J. Linton in Shepherd's edition of Studies of Sensation and Event, 1879; Theodore Watts in Athenæum, September and October 1878; William Bell Scott in Academy, November 1879; information from Mr. Sumner Jones.]
JONES, EDWARD (1641–1703), bishop of St. Asaph, born in July 1641 at Llwyn Ririd, near Montgomery, was the son of Richard Jones, by Sarah, daughter of John Pyttes of Marrington. He was educated at Westminster School, whence he was elected in 1661 to Trinity College, Cambridge. He graduated B.A. in 1664, and M.A. in 1668, and was made fellow of his college in 1667. Going to Ireland as domestic chaplain to the Duke of Ormonde, the lord-lieutenant, he was appointed master of Kilkenny free school, where Swift was his pupil. In May 1677 he was collated to a prebend in the church of Ossory, and was promoted to the deanery of Lismore in November 1678. Early in 1683 he was raised to the bishopric of Cloyne, but during Tyrconnel's administration, in James II's reign, hastily returned to England (1688). In November 1692 he was translated to St. Asaph as successor to Bishop William Lloyd (Le Neve, Fasti, ed. Hardy, i. 77). Jones's episcopate was distinguished by corruption, negligence, and oppression, and contrasts ill with the good administration of his predecessor. An address, signed by thirty-eight of the principal beneficed clergymen, was sent to Archbishop Tenison in March 1697, and in the following July the primate appointed the Bishops of Lichfield and Bangor and Dr. Oxenden, dean of arches, commissioners to receive the presentments of the clergy against Jones on 20 July 1698. The archbishop summoned Jones to answer the charges, but Jones's firm adherence to the court party led to delays in bringing him to trial (Burnet, History of his own Time, iv. 407, 450), and the formal hearing before the archbishop did not commence until 5 June 1700. Jones signed a written confession of his guilt in promoting to a canonry a notorious person ‘accused of crimes and excesses,’ in permitting laymen to act as curates, and in entering into simoniacal contracts for the disposal of preferments. The archbishop, in June 1701, pronounced sentence that the bishop be suspended for six months and thenceforth until he gave satisfaction. The deprivation was continued till 5 May 1702. He died on 10 May 1703 at his house in College Court, Westminster, and was buried at the parish church of St. Margaret's, without inscription or monument.
He married Elizabeth, eldest daughter of Sir Richard Kennedy, bart., of Wicklow, by whom he had six children.
Jones published a few forms of prayer from the church catechism in Welsh (London, 1695), which was mentioned in his defence at the trial; and issued, probably after his restoration, visitation articles for the diocese, printed in London in 1702.
Matthew Jones (1654–1717), prebendary of Donoughmore, was a younger brother of the bishop. He accompanied his brother to Ireland, and became vicar-choral of Lismore Cathedral in 1681, precentor of Cloyne Cathedral November 1683, and prebendary of Donoughmore in 1687. He died on 7 Dec. 1717.
