In 1641, he was made a Fellow of All Souls' College, Oxford, where Gilbert Sheldon was Warden, and he later obtained his Master of Arts (1647) and Doctor of Divinity (1661) degrees.
[2] He fought on the Royalist side during the English Civil War as a cornet of horse in his brother's regiment.
He returned to Oxford when the fighting was over, and survived the threat of ejection by the Parliamentary Visitors in control of the university with the help of Edmund Ludlow, a prominent Parliamentarian and his nephew by marriage.
He held positions, at one time or another, at parishes in Fulham and St Bride's Church, Fleet Street (London), Hanwell (Middlesex), Cliffe-at-Hoo and Sutton-at-Hone (Kent).
He was also canon of St Paul's Cathedral and of Westminster Abbey: appointed to both in 1660, he was still holding these posts when he died.