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 QUENTAL

QUETELET

various parts of Europe, and was soon esteemed one of the leading zoologists of his country. In 1850 he was appointed professor of natural history at the Lycee Napoleon, and in 1855 he succeeded Flourens in the chair of anthropology. He was admitted to the Academy of Sciences in 1852 ; and he was a Member of the Institut and honorary member of the English Royal Society. As Quatre- fages never accepted Darwinism though it was chiefly he who got Darwin elected a corresponding member of the French Academy and came of an old French Protestant family, he is often described as a Christian. He was always a liberal Theist, but his last work (Emules do Darwin, 2 vols., 1894) plainly shows that he certainly did not accept revelation, and was not far removed from Agnosticism. He regards the origin of life and of species as a &quot; mystery,&quot; accepting neither the Christian nor the Darwinian version. Against Dubois-Reymond s &quot; Ignorabimus&quot; he gives his own verdict as &quot; Ignoramus &quot; (&quot; We do not know,&quot; vol. i, p. 4). D. Jan. 12, 1892.

QUENTAL, Anthero de, Portuguese poet. B. Apr. 18, 1842. Ed. Coimbra University. He studied law, but never practised, having been attracted from his early years to poetry, letters, and philo sophy. He lived quietly in the small town of Villa do Conde until within a few months of his death. His early poems (Odes modcrnas, 1865 ; Primoveras roman- ticas, 1871 ; etc.) are of the romantic school, fiery and advanced. In the seventies he wrote a number of prose works, historical and philosophical (chiefly Tendencias geraes da philosophia na sccunda metade do seculo XIX) ; but his development from an early mysticism to a pessimistic Atheism, and then to a tranquil Agnosticism, is best traced in Os sonctos completes (1886). Quental was the second greatest lyrical poet of Portugal, and his fine Rationalistic verse had much influence in preparing the country for its present secular development.

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There is an excellent study of him by Bjorkmann (Anthero de Quental, 1894), and the leading Portuguese writers compiled a volume in his honour (In Memoriam, 1896). D. Sep. 11, 1891.

QUESNAY, Francois, M.D., French political economist. B. June 4, 1694. Quesnay had little schooling in his early years. He worked in the fields, and could not read until he was twelve years old. Then he conceived a passion for study, learned Latin and Greek, and went to Paris for medicine, surgery, mathematics, and philosophy. He attained great distinc- j tion as a surgeon, and did much for his science and for medicine, especially by opposing bleeding. A defect in his sight compelled him to abandon surgery for medicine. He was body-physician to Louis XV, and used his leisure to study economics. Contemporaries spoke of him as &quot; the European Confucius.&quot; Quesnay is chiefly remembered as an economist, the founder of the Physiocratic School (La physiocratie, 2 vols., 1707-1708) ; but he was a man of very wide erudition and emancipated ideas. He never wrote on religion, but he contributed several articles to Diderot s Dictionnaire Encyclopedique. Oncken has published a complete edition of his economic and philosophic works (Oeuvres cconomiques et pliilosophiques, 1888), with an excellent biography. D. Dec. 16, 1774.

QUETELET, Lambert Adolphe Jacques, Belgian astronomer and statis tician. B. Feb. 22, 1796. Ed. Ghent. In 1814 he was appointed teacher of mathematics at the College Royal at Ghent, and seven years later at the Brussels Athenaeum. He superintended the building of the Brussels Observatory, and in 1828 became Director of it. In 1836 he was appointed teacher of astro nomy, geodesy, and mathematics at the Military School, and in 1841 Director of the Statistical Central Commission for Belgium. He was also Perpetual Secretary G30