Page:A biographical dictionary of modern rationalists.djvu/292

 MIEABAUD

MITCHELL

Since the Bolshevist seizure of power he has lived in England. Professor Milyukov is an advanced Eationalist (personal knowledge) and a man of fine culture and character.

MIRABAUD, Jean Baptiste de, French writer. B. 1675. Mirabaud spent some years in the army, then devoted himself to literature. He joined the Oratorian priests, but presently left the society and became tutor to the children of the Duchesse d Orleans. He translated Tasso and Ariosto, and is regarded as the author of a Deistic work, Beflexions sur I evangile (1769). Mirabaud s name, however, was freely used by the Encyclopaedists after his death to cover their Rationalist works and evade the authorities, so that one has to refuse him the credit of most of them. No doubt the use of his name implies that he was known to be heterodox. He was admitted to the Academy, and was in 1742 appointed its Perpetual Secretary. D. June 24, 1760.

MIRABEAU, Honore Gabriel Victor

Riquetti, Comte de, French statesman. B. Mar. 9, 1749. Until 1770 Mirabeau served in the army, but an intrigue com pelled him to fly to Holland, where he wrote an Essai sur le despotisme, which was acclaimed by the Liberals. He was arrested at Amsterdam, and lodged in Vincennes for three years and a-half. He there wrote his Essai sur les lettres de cachet (2 vols., 1782). From the date of his release he passionately attacked the semi-feudal system, and he joined the States General in 1789 as a candidate of the Tiers Etat. His fiery eloquence put him at the head of the Revolution, which he tried to lead towards the acceptance of a reformed monarchy. His stern attitude towards the clergy was free from any religious bias, and he does not seem to have believed in personal immortality or been a very serious Deist. &quot; If that isn t God,&quot; he said of the sun, as he lay dying, &quot;it is at least his cousin&quot; (Carlyle s

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French Revolution, ii, 120). D. Apr. 2, 1791.

MIRANDA, General Francisco, South American soldier. B. June 9, 1756. Miranda was a Venezuelan officer in the Spanish army in his early years. He then joined the American army in the War of Independence, and later became major- general in the French Revolutionary army. The insurrection he tried in South America failed, and he returned to the United States. From 1808 to 1810 he was in England, and J. S. Mill credits him with the chief share in converting his father to Agnosticism. He was enthusiastic for Bentham s views. In 1812 he liberated Venezuela, and became Vice-President of the Republic. But he fell into the hands of the Spaniards in 1813, was shipped to Spain, and died in the dungeons of the Inquisition at Cadiz on July 14, 1816.

MIRBEAU, Octave, French novelist. B. Feb. 16, 1850. Ed. Jesuit College at Vannes. Mirbeau says that at the college he &quot;learned, above all things, to detest his teachers.&quot; He then began the study of law at Paris. Military service in 1870-71 interrupted his studies, and at the close of the war he turned to journalism and letters. He was a great friend of the Goncourt brothers, and, if possible, even less religious than they. He regards religions as &quot; the monstrous flowers and the hideous instru ments of the eternal suffering of man.&quot; His stories are of a high artistic order, but very sensuous and defiant of conventions.

MITCHELL, Peter Chalmers, M.A., D.Sc., LL.D., F.R.S., F.Z.S., O.B.E., zoologist. B. Nov. 23, 1864. Ed. Aber deen, Oxford (Christ s Church College), Berlin, and Leipzig Universities. He took honours in mental philosophy, and was university medallist in literature. From 1888 to 1891 he was university demon strator in anatomy ; from 1891 to 1893 organizing secretary for technical instruc tion to the Oxfordshire County Council 512