Page:A biographical dictionary of modern rationalists.djvu/332

 PEACOCK

PELLETT

most brilliant of English translators, and a man of extraordinary literary erudition. D. Feb. 11, 1916.

PEACOCK, John Macleay, poet. B. Mar. 31, 1817. Of poor family, Peacock was sent as a boy to work in a tobacco factory. He afterwards became a boiler- maker, and in tbe course of his work he travelled in various parts of the world and educated himself. For many years he was at Laird s works at Birkenhead, and his poetical production was so esteemed that in 1864, at the Shakespeare tercentenary, he was invited to plant the memorial oak. He was &quot; until his death an energetic Secularist,&quot; and he took an active part in the Chartist movement in the forties. His poems were published in three volumes in 1864 (Poems and Songs), and a posthumous volume appeared in 1880. In his later years Peacock was a newsvendor and in poor circumstances. D. May 4, 1877.

PEARSON, Professor Karl, M.A., LL.B., F.E.S., Eugenist. B. 1857. Ed. University College School and Cambridge (King s College). He studied law, and was called to the Bar (Inner Temple) in 1882. He was, however, more interested in science, especially mathematics, and he has done much for the mathematical precision of the doctrine of evolution (chiefly in his Grammar of Science, 1899). The friend and biographer of Sir F. Galton (Life and Letters of Galton, 1915), he took up with great zeal the Eugenic movement which Galton founded, and became Galton Pro fessor of Eugenics and Director of the Laboratory for National Eugenics at the University of London. He also edits Biometrika, the organ of the movement. His Eationalist views are given in his Ethic of Freethought (1887). He is for &quot; a concrete religion which places entirely on one side the existence of God and the hope of immortality &quot; (p. 8).

PELLETAN, Charles Camille, French writer and politician. B. Dec. 15, 1848. 591

Ed. Lycee Louis le Grand and Ecole des Chartes. He secured the diploma of palaeographic archivist, but he engaged in political journalism and struggled against reaction. For one of his articles he had a month in prison. In 1888 he began to edit Clemenceau s paper La Justice. From 1902 to 1905 he was Minister of Marine in the Combes Cabinet. Pelletan has edited Victor Hugo s works, written a biographical sketch of Clemenceau (Georges Clemenceau, 1883), and published various historical works (De 1815 a nos jours, Les guerres de la revolution, etc.).

PELLETAN, Pierre Clement Eugene,

French writer and politician. B. Oct. 29, 1813. Ed. Poictiers and Paris. He studied law, but abandoned it for journalism and letters. His philosophical novel La lampe eteinte drew attention to his work as early as 1840, and during the reaction of the Second Empire he was one of the most brilliant writers in the Opposition papers. He was elected to the Legislative Body in 1864, and edited the Tribune Franqaise. In 1870 he was a member of the Provi sional Government; in 1871 he was elected to the National Assembly ; and in 1876 he was raised to the Senate, where he sat on the extreme left. Pelletan was Vice- President of the Senate in 1884, and was nominated Perpetual Senator. His drastic Eationalism w r as expressed in many of his works, such as Les Dogmes, le clerge, et I etat (1848), La profession de foi du XIX siecle (1852), and Le Grand Frederic (1878). The State recognized his life-long services to progressive France by granting his widow a pension of 6,000 francs a year. D. Dec. 13, 1884.

PELLETT, Thomas, M.D., F.R.C.P.,

physician. B. 1671. Ed. Cambridge (Queen s College) and Padua University. Pellett began to practise medicine in London in 1707. He was elected a Fellow of the Eoyal College of Physicians in 1716; and he was Censor in 1717, 1720, and 1727, and President of the College from 1735 to 592