Charles Bridges (theologian)

Educated at Queens' College, Cambridge,^[4] he was ordained in 1817 and served from 1823 to 1849 as vicar of Old Newton, Suffolk.^[1][3] Thomas Chalmers wrote,

My excellent friend, the Rev. Charles Bridges, of Old Newton, Suffolk, finds, I am sure, most ample occupation among those six hundred people whom he may be said to have domesticated into one parochial family; and, were it not for his still more important services to the Christian church at large, would show, by his incessant labours, how possible it were to make out a most beneficial expenditure of all his strength and all his time amongst them.^[5]

In 1849, he became vicar of Weymouth, Dorset, later serving as vicar of Hinton Martell, Dorset (c. 1857).^[2][6] Bridges participated (with J. C. Ryle) in the Clerical Conference at Weston-super-Mare of 1858, and also participated in the consecration of the Bishop of Carlisle in York Minster in 1860.^[3]

Bridges was married to Harriet Torlesse, with whom he had at least two sons, the second of whom was physician John Henry Bridges, BA BM Oxon FRCP (1832–1906).^[7]

At least twenty-four editions of Bridges' Exposition of Psalm 119 (1827) were published in his lifetime.^[2] C. H. Spurgeon considered the commentary to be "worth its weight in gold".^[2] Spurgeon also pronounced Bridges' Exposition of Proverbs (1840) "The best work on the Proverbs".^[8]