Grace Irwin

The Seventh Earl

A Dramatized Biography

Eerdmans 1976

Stron 259, format: 16x24 cm

"This book is a poignant achievement, per¬haps the best of what Grace Irwin has written ... a labor of both love and of considerable erudition and accuracy."
—Catholic Register
". . . required reading for affluent twentieth-century evangelicals who
are in danger of losing contact with the vast majority in this world who
are the 'have-nots.' "    —Faith Today


ANTHONY ASHLEY COOPER, Seventh Earl of Shaftesbury, is most widely remembered as a 19th-century British philanthropist and factory reformer who was famous for his Ten Hour Law, took an interest in missionary work, and came to the aid of Florence Nightingale in her schemes for army welfare. Far ahead of his own time, he labored un¬ceasingly for social reform, not out of a sense of commitment to cause, but out of a profound Christian concern for the poor and friendless. His story is especially poignant because his solicitude for others often made him an object of ridicule, and his determination to act in accor¬dance with his convictions accounted at least in part for his lifelong financial difficulties.
Convinced that a biographical novel can be both lively and histori¬cally accurate, Grace Irwin has woven together this account of the Earl's life from a wide variety of materials: diaries, letters, clippings, and legal documents. She assures her readers, "I doubt if I have put a dozen sentences into my hero's mouth which he did not say or write." With unusual care and skill she provides us with a picture of a fascinat¬ing era and of a man whose Christian faith informed his life.
GRACE IRWIN, formerly Head of the Classics Department at the Humberside Collegiate Institute, Toronto, retired in 1969 to devote her¬self to writing full time. She has published five other novels: Least of All Saints, Andrew Connington, In Little Place, Servant of Slaves, and Contend with Horses.