Augustus Montague Toplady (November 4, 1740 – August 11, 1778) was an English preacher, hymn writer, and theologian whose fervent Calvinist ministry left a lasting mark on 18th-century Anglicanism. Born in Farnham, Surrey, to Richard Toplady, a Royal Marines major who died of yellow fever at Cartagena in 1741, and Catherine Bate, a pious widow, he was raised alone by his mother after his father’s early death. Educated at Westminster School and Trinity College, Dublin, where he earned a B.A., he converted at 15 in 1755 under a lay preacher’s sermon in an Irish barn, an event he later credited to God’s sovereign grace, not John Wesley, despite initial Methodist ties. Toplady’s preaching career began with his ordination as an Anglican deacon in 1762, serving as curate in Blagdon and Farleigh Hungerford, then as vicar of Harpford and Venn Ottery (1766–1768), before settling at Broadhembury, Devon, in 1768 until 1775. His sermons championed Calvinist doctrines—election, predestination, and grace—delivered with fiery conviction despite fragile health, later preaching at Orange Street Chapel in London from 1775 until his death. A fierce opponent of Wesley’s Arminianism, he authored The Doctrine of Absolute Predestination (1769) and the iconic hymn “Rock of Ages” (1763), alongside other works like Historic Proof of the Doctrinal Calvinism of the Church of England (1774). Never married, he died at age 37 in London of tuberculosis, leaving a legacy as a bold defender of Reformed faith and a hymnist whose words endure.