Scholar and bookseller, born in Aberdeen, NE Scotland, UK. He worked as a tutor, then started as a bookseller in London. In 1737 appeared his Concordance of the Holy Scriptures. He suffered from bouts of insanity and, assuming the title of Alexander the Corrector, from 1755 went through the country reproving Sabbath-breaking and profanity.
Alexander Cruden (June 8, 1699 – 1 November 1770), also called (by himself) Alexander the Corrector, was the author of a concordance to the Bible.
Concordances
First edition, 1737 Second edition, 1761 Third edition, 1769Cruden's Bible Concordance became well-known, and further editions were published after his death.
Life
Alexander Cruden was born in Aberdeen in Scotland (baptised on June 8, 1699, St. Nicholas Kirk, Aberdeen, according to recent research) and was educated at Aberdeen Grammar School and Marischal College, and became an excellent Latin, Greek and Biblical scholar.
After a term of confinement he recovered and moved to London. Years afterwards, in an application for the title of bookseller to the Queen, he stated that he had been for some years corrector for the press in Wild Court. In April 1735 he obtained the title of bookseller to the Queen by recommendation of the Lord Mayor and most of the Whig aldermen.
Cruden presented the first edition of his Concordance on November 3, 1737 to Queen Caroline (wife of George II).
Although Cruden's biblical labours have made his name a household word among English-speaking people, he was disappointed in his hopes of immediate profit, and his mind again became unhinged. In spite of his earnest and self-denying piety, and his exceptional intellectual powers, he developed idiosyncrasies, and his life was marred by a harmless but ridiculous egotism, which so nearly bordered on insanity that his friends sometimes thought it necessary to have him confined. He paid unwelcome addresses to a widow which resulted in an enforced stay, this time in Matthew Wright's Private Madhouse in Bethnal Green, London.
On his release he published a pamphlet dedicated to Lord H. He also published an account of his trial, dedicated to the King. In December 1740 he writes to Sir Hans Sloane saying he has been employed since July as Latin usher in a boarding-school at Enfield. He superintended the printing of one of Matthew Henry's Commentaries, and in 1750 printed a small Compendium of the Holy Bible (an abstract of the contents of each chapter), and also reprinted a larger edition of the Concordance.
He attempted to prosecute those responsible for his confinement, and made a similar attempt when his sister had him institutionalised again in 1753, this time only for a few days. In April 1755 he printed a letter to The Speaker and other Members of the House of Commons, and about the same time an Address to the King and Parliament. The dismissal of his legal claims resulted in another account of his sufferings, titled The Adventures of Alexander the Corrector.
The second edition of the Concordance was dedicated to King George III and presented to him in person. After the slow success of the first Concordance, the second and third editions made Cruden considerable profit.
Cruden attempted to have his self-imposed 'Corrector' title made official and put himself forward for a knighthood, believing he had been divinely chosen to safeguard the nation's moral health.
The self-styled title "Corrector" derived from Cruden's main employment of proofreading, and his desire to "correct" the morals of England.
He made attempts to present to the king in person an account of his trial, and to obtain the honour of knighthood, one of his predicted honours. In 1755 he paid unwelcome addresses to the daughter of Sir Thomas Abney, of Newington (1640-1722), and then published his letters and the history of his repulse in the third part of his Adventures. Neville of Emmanuel to Dr. Cos Macro, in the British Museum.) The Correctors Earnest Address to the Inhabitants of Great Britain, published in 1756, was occasioned by the earthquake at Lisbon. Against John Wilkes, whom he hated, he wrote a small pamphlet, and used to delete with his sponge the number 45 wherever he found it, this being the offensive number of the North Briton. In 1769 he lectured in Aberdeen as Corrector, and distributed copies of the fourth commandment and various religious tracts. The Scripture Dictionary, compiled about this time, was printed in Aberdeen in two volumes shortly after his death. Alexander Chalmers, who in his boyhood heard Cruden lecture in Aberdeen and wrote his biography, says that a verbal index to John Milton, which accompanied the edition of Thomas Newton, Bishop of Bristol, in 1769, was Cruden's.
The second edition of the Bible Concordance was published in 1761, and presented to the King in person on 21 December. The third edition appeared in 1769. He returned to London from Aberdeen, and died suddenly while praying in his lodgings in Camden Passage, Islington, on 1 November 1770.
Cruden was never married.
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