time, formerly belonging to St. George's Chapel, Windsor, contains two motets in the Mixolydian mode with his name affixed to them. They are now in Royal MSS. 11. e. xi. Sampson's chief works were: 1. ‘Oratio quæ docet hortatur admonet omnes potissimum Anglos regiæ dignitati cum primis ut obediant,’ &c., London, 4to, 1533. 2. ‘In priores quinquaginta psalmos Daviticos familiaris explanatio,’ London, 1539, fol. 3. ‘Explanatio in D. Pauli Epistolam ad Romanos atque in priorem ad Corinthos,’ London, 12mo, 1546. 4. ‘Explanationis Psalmorum secunda pars,’ London, 1548, fol.
[Cooper's Athenæ Cantabr. i. 119, 545; Brewer's Reign of Henry VIII, i. 58 &c., ii. 14, 15, &c.; Gough's Index to the Parker Society's Publications; Strype's Works, passim; Sussex Arch. Coll. xxix. 35 (a curious letter as to the diocese of Chichester); Letters and Papers Henry VIII; Cal. State Papers, Spanish Ser., 1509–25, 1525–6, 1529–30, 1534–5, Venetian, 1520–6, 1527–33; Froude's Hist. of Engl. iii. 450, 481, ix. 470; Div. of Catherine of Aragon, p. 274; Friedmann's Anne Boleyn, i. 151, ii. 289, 325; Narr. of the Reformation (Camden Soc.), pp. 53, 55 &c.; Thomas's Hist. Notes, i. 270; information from H. Davey, esq.]
SAMPSON, THOMAS (1517?–1589), puritan divine, born at Playford, Suffolk, about 1517, was educated at Pembroke Hall, Cambridge. There is no evidence to show that he took a degree at Cambridge. It is said that he also studied at Oxford, but it is only certain that he was admitted a student of the Inner Temple, London, in February 1546–7 (Cooke, Students admitted to the Inner Temple, p. 2). While he was studying the common law there he was converted to the protestant religion, and it is said that he shortly afterwards converted John Bradford (1510?–1555) [q. v.] the martyr (Wood, Athenæ Oxon. ed. Bliss, i. 548). In 1549 he and Bradford received holy orders from Bishop Ridley, and when he took exception ‘against the apparel,’ Ridley and Cranmer allowed him to be ordained without assuming the sacerdotal habits (Strype, Annals of the Reformation, i. 473; Life of Cranmer, pp. 191, 192).
He soon acquired celebrity as a preacher. On 10 March 1550–1 he was collated by Archbishop Cranmer to the rectory of Allhallows, Bread Street, London, and in February 1552 he was preferred to the deanery of Chichester. After the death of Edward VI he concealed himself in London for a time, and with Richard Chambers collected money for the support of such scholars of the universities ‘as were haters of the Roman catholic religion.’ On 8 Feb. 1555–6, when William Peryn [q. v.] preached at St. Paul's Cross, Sampson ‘dyd penanse for he had ii wyffes’ (Machyn, Diary, ed. Nichols, p. 100). It is possible that his offence is somewhat exaggerated. Soon afterwards Sampson fled with one wife to Strasburg. There he associated with Tremellius, and greatly enlarged his knowledge of divinity. He addressed to his former parishioners at Allhallows, Bread Street, a letter in which he exhorted them to submit to, and to receive with humbleness, the ceremonies of the church as reformed under King Edward. He removed to Geneva in 1556, and appears also to have resided for some time at Frankfort and Zürich (Burn, Livre des Anglois à Genève, p. 8). During his exile he enthusiastically adopted the Genevan doctrines, and developed a bitter dislike of the ceremonies of the English church. He was constantly engaged in disputes with his fellow-exiles, and Henry Bullinger, writing from Zürich to Theodore Beza, 15 March 1567, says: ‘I have always looked with suspicion upon the statements made by Master Sampson. He is not amiss in other respects, but of an exceedingly restless disposition. While he resided amongst us at Zürich, and after he returned to England, he never ceased to be troublesome to Master Peter Martyr, of blessed memory. He often used to complain to me that Sampson never wrote a letter without filling it with grievances: the man is never satisfied; he has always some doubt or other to busy himself with’ (Zurich Letters, ii. 152).
On the accession of Queen Elizabeth Sampson returned to England, and during the first three years of her reign he delivered the rehearsal sermons at St. Paul's Cross, repeating memoriter the Spital sermons which had been preached at Easter (Strype, Annals, i. 473, fol.) He refused the bishopric of Norwich, which was offered to him in 1560. In the royal visitation to the north he accompanied the queen's visitors as preacher. On 4 Sept. 1560 he was installed canon of Durham, and in March 1560–1 he supplicated the university of Oxford that whereas he had for the space of sixteen years studied divinity, he might be admitted ‘to the reading of the Epistles of St. Paul,’ that is, to the degree of B.D., the formula before the Reformation having been ‘to the reading of the book of Sentences.’ His supplication was granted, though it does not appear that he was admitted to the degree.
In 1561 he was appointed dean of Christ Church, Oxford (ib. i. 474). He was installed in Michaelmas term 1561. A short time pre-
