BALGUY, JOHN. - English Protestant theologian, b. at Sheffield in 1686 and d. in 1748. He studied at the University of Cambridge. The bishop of Bangor, Beniamino Hoadly, having noticed his keen intellect, wished to have him with him and procured for him a prebend. During this period the famous Bangor controversy arose (v.), caused by a sermon preached by the said bishop on 31 March 1717, in which he maintained that individual sincerity was the sole requirement for a Christian, and argued that Jesus Christ had delegated his power to no ecclesiastical authority. The controversy did not end with the suppression of the «Convocations» (v.), but continued unofficially for some years among Whigs and Tories, among non-jurors and jurors, between High and Low Church, and extended to the legality or illegality of State intervention in ecclesiastical affairs, and to the visibility or invisibility of the Church. Throughout the controversy B. proved himself a capable polemicist and faithful to his bishop.
Among B.'s various works, noteworthy are: A Letter to a Deist concerning the Beauty and Excellence of Moral Virtues, and the Second Part of the Foundation of Natural Goodness, in which he replies to the critics of the letter. Two volumes of sermons are also preserved (3rd ed., London 1890), many on moral subjects. He has been reproached with attaching too much importance to reason and with almost excluding every supernatural element from perfection.