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 STEPHEN

STEPHEN

In his leisure Stephen was an industrious journalist, writing in the Saturday Bevieiv and other periodicals ; and from 1865 onward he was one of the chief writers on the Pall Mall Gazette. His General View of the Criminal Law was published in 1863. He took silk in 1868, and from 1869 to 1872 was in India as legal member of the Council, In 1875 he became pro fessor of common law at the Inns of Court, and in 1879 was raised to the bench. He resigned his judgeship in 1891 on account of failing health, and was created a baronet. Sir James, who was opposed to aggression arid thought religion a social need, suffi ciently betrayed his Eationalism in two articles on Seeley s Ecce Homo in Fraser s Magazine (June and July, 1866), and in his Liberty, Equality, Fraternity (1873). We have, however, the assurance of his brother, Sir Leslie Stephen, who writes the sketch of Sir James in the Dictionary of National Biography, that he had by 1879 &quot;entirely abandoned his belief in the orthodox dogmas.&quot; See also Sir Leslie s Life of Sir J. F. Stephen (1895). For a judge Sir James cannot be described as reticent ; and his conservative attitude made him sincerely apprehensive about what he thought to be social requirements. D. Mar. 11, 1894.

STEPHEN, Sir Leslie, LL.D., Litt.D., brother of preceding, writer. B. Nov. 28, 1832. Ed. Eton, King s College (London), and Cambridge (Trinity Hall). He devoted himself particularly to mathematics at Cambridge, and was twentieth wrangler in the mathematical tripos. In 1854 he became a fellow of his college, and was obliged by the conditions to take orders within a year. As he was still orthodox and much influenced by F. D. Maurice, though never keen about religion, he did so. He was ordained priest in 1859, and was junior tutor. He rarely preached, and was much better known to Cambridge as an ardent athlete with a robust vocabulary. From 1865 to 1868 he was President of the Alpine Club ; from 1868 to 1871 he 761

edited the Alpine Journal; and in 1871 he published his Playground of Europe. Cam bridge was so liberal at the time that (as Sir Leslie once told the compiler) a dinner got up on the private understanding that it was for heretics only was crowded beyond anticipation. But Stephen was quietly studying religion and philosophy, and in 1862 he refused to take further part in chapel-services. He said later that he had not lost his faith, but discovered that he had never had any. He resigned his tutorship, and in 1875 divested himself of his orders under the new Act. In 1867 he entered as a student of Inner Temple ; but he preferred writing, and his brother introduced him to London journalism. In 1871 he was appointed editor of the Corn- hill, and in that magazine, as well as Fraser s and the Fortnightly, he wrote many Rationalist articles. (Matthew Arnold s Literature and Dogma appeared in the Cornhill.) His articles were republished as Essays on Freethinking and Plain Speak ing (1873). Three years later he issued An Agnostic s Apology. His wife, a daughter of Thackeray, had died in 1875, and he had more deeply realized the hollowness of the Christian message. He married Mrs. Duckworth in 1878. His chief literary works, which gave him one of the highest positions in English letters, appeared after 1875 (History of English Thought in the Eighteenth Century, 2 vols., 1876 ; John son, 1878 ; Pope, 1880 ; Swift, 1882 ; The English Utilitarians, 3 vols., 1900 ; etc.). His Science of Ethics was published in 1882. He edited twenty-six volumes of the Dictionary of National Biography, in which no less than 378 articles came from his own pen. He was knighted, and made a Fellow of the British Academy in 1902. Stephen was one of the most outspoken of the prominent literary men of the last generation. He was a pure Agnostic (from lack of evidence, not on a priori principles), and his high culture and deeply respected personality were a great asset to British Eationalism. See Professor F. W. Mait- land s Life and Letters of Leslie Stephen 762