Nicholas Ferrar

Nicholas Ferrar
Nicholas Ferrar, from a portrait by Cornelius Janssens, the original of which hangs in Magdalene College, Cambridge, alongside those of his parents.
Deacon, Founder of the Little Gidding Community
Born	(1592-02-22)22 February 1592 City of London, England
Died	4 December 1637(1637-12-04) (aged 45) Little Gidding, Huntingdonshire
Venerated in	Anglican Communion
Feast	4 December (Church of England), 1 December (Episcopal Church (US) and Southern Africa)

Nicholas Ferrar (22 February 1592 – 4 December 1637) was an English scholar, courtier and businessman, who was ordained a deacon in the Church of England. He lost much of his fortune in the Virginia Company and retreated with his extended family in 1626 to the manor of Little Gidding, Huntingdonshire, for his remaining years, in an informal spiritual community following High Anglican practice.^[1] His friend the poet and Anglican priest George Herbert (1593–1633), on his deathbed, sent Ferrar the manuscript of The Temple, telling him to publish the poetry if it might "turn to the advantage of any dejected poor soul." "If not, let him burn it; for I and it are less than the least of God's mercies."^[2] Ferrar published the verses in 1633; they remain in print.