GIBSON, EDMUND (1669-1748), Bishop of London, and an authority upon canon law. He was born in 1669; entered Queen's College, Ox ford, in 1686; and in 1692 published an edition of the Saxon Chronicle, with a Latin translation, indices, and notes. This was followed in 1693 by an annotated edition of the De Institutione Oratoria of Quintilian, and in 1695 by a transla tion of Camden's Britannia, 'with additions and improvements,' in the preparation of which he had the assistance of several other scholars. The year preceding he had taken holy orders, and be came chaplain and librarian to Thomas Tenison, Archbishop of Canterbury. In 1703 he became rector of Lambeth, and in 1710 Archdeacon of Surrey. In the discussions which arose in the reigns of William and Anne relative to the rights and privileges of the Convocation, Gibson took a very active part, and in a series of pamphlets warmly advocated the right of the Archbishop to continue or prorogue that assembly. The con
troversy suggested to him the idea of those researches which resulted in the Codex Juris Ec clesiw Anglicance. In 1716 Gibson was conse crated Bishop of Lincoln, whence he was, in 1723, translated to London, where for twenty five years he exercised an immense influence, being the authority chiefly consulted by the Court on all ecclesiastical affairs. Among the literary efforts of his later years, the principal were a series of Pastoral Letters, and the Preservative Against Popery (1738), a compilation of nu merous controversial writings of eminent Church of England divines, dating chiefly from the period of James II. He died at Bath, September 6, 1748.