Together with János Arany and Sándor Petőfi they formed the triumvirate of young great poets of the Hungarian folk-national literature of the 19th century.

He studied law and theology in Sárospatak, and subsequently at Budapest; and, after many vicissitudes, at the age of thirty he accepted the post of Protestant minister in Beje, a small village in his native county, whence, in two years, he removed to Kelemér, and four years later to Hanva, in the county of Borsod, where he remained till his death.

[1] He took part in the Hungarian Revolution of 1848, acting as field chaplain to the volunteers of his county and seeing several battles; but the unfortunate close of that heroic struggle silenced his poetic vein for a considerable time, and when in 1852 and 1853 he gave vent to his patriotic grief in some masterly allegories on the state of oppressed Hungary, he was twice arrested by the Austrian authorities.

[1] After being released he published his Virágregék ("Legends of Flowers"), a collection of poems showing great imagination and love of nature.

He published three volumes of sermons, which, says his biographer, Károly Szász, Protestant bishop of Budapest, are among the best in Hungarian literature, and will favourably compare with those of Robertson, Monod or Parker.