Matthew Poole (1624–1679) was born at York, England, and educated at Emmanuel College, Cambridge (B. A., 1649; M.A., 1652). From 1549 he ministered at St Michael le Querne in London. In July 1657 he was one of eleven Cambridge graduates incorporated M.A. at Oxford on occasion of the visit of Richard Cromwell as chancellor.
On the passing of the Act of Uniformity in 1662 he was ejected from his living. Thereafter, though he occasionally preached and printed some tracts, Poole appears to have made no attempt to gather a congregation. He had a patrimony of £100 a year, on which he lived.
After threats to his life connected with the ‘Popish Plot’ in 1679, Poole moved to the Netherlands, where he died shortly afterwards in Amsterdam, possibly from poisoning.
Poole’s famous commentary, Annotations Upon the Holy Bible, was first published in 1683-85, and is published by the Trust in three volumes.