Page:A biographical dictionary of modern rationalists.djvu/57

 and economic questions. From 1860 to 1877 he edited The Economist. His works on political philosophy (The English Constitution, 1867, and Physics and Politics, 1872) are not less authoritative. In regard to religion his expressions were cautious and conservative, but he undoubtedly describes his own position in the following passage: " Few cultivated persons willingly think on the special dogmas of distinct theology.... They do not question the existence of Kamschatka, but they have no call to busy themselves with Kamschatka " (Literary Studies, 1879, i, 38). In a letter to Percy Greg we find Bagehot plainly repudiating the authority of the Gospels (Works, x, 227). D. Mar. 24, 1877.

BAGGESEN, Professor Jens Immanuel, Danish poet. B. Feb. 15, 1764. He was put to work at an early age, but he studied so zealously that he was sent to Copenhagen University. In 1785 his Comic Stories won recognition of his great power as a humorist. He travelled over Europe (1789-90), and enthusiastically accepted Voltaireanism and the French Revolution. In 1796 he took charge of the Students Hostel at Copenhagen, and in 1798 became Director of the theatre. After then spending ten years at Paris, he ended as professor of the Danish language and literature at Kiel University. Baggesen is one of the greatest poets of Denmark. His collected works fill ten volumes (182732), and contain a great deal of satire on religion (especially a mock-epic on Adam and Eve which he published in 1826). D. Oct. 3, 1826.

BAHNSEN, Julius Friedrich August, German philosopher. B. Mar. 30, 1830. Ed. Kiel University. After taking part in the Danish War in 1849, he devoted him self to philosophy, and was recognized as the chief authority on, and follower of, Schopenhauer's "aesthetic pessimism." He taught philosophy at Anklam gymnasium from 1858 to 1862, then at Lauenberg. His chief work is Der Widerspruch im Wissen und Wesen der Welt (2 vols., 1880-82). D. Dec. 6, 1881.

BAHRDT, Professor Karl Friedrich, German Deist. B. Aug. 25, 1741. Ed. Leipzig University. Educated for the Church, Bahrdt was professor of Biblical philology at Leipzig (1766-68), then of Biblical archaeology at Erfurt. In 1771 he was driven from Erfurt for heresy, and became professor at Giessen. Here again he lost his chair by heresy, and, though a man of great learning and high character, was reduced to an adventurous life. In 1788 he suffered a year in prison for the violent Deism of his writings. D. Apr. 23, 1792.

BAILEY, Samuel, philosophical writer and philanthropist. 5.1791. Mr. Bailey " Bailey of Sheffield " as he was familiarly known to readers of philosophy was a prosperous cutler who gave his leisure to study. He was Chairman of the Sheffield Banking Company and, from 1828 onward, one of the Trustees of Sheffield. He was very widely esteemed for his philanthropy and his zeal for education. At his death he left 80,000 to the Town-Trust, which more than doubled its income. His philosophic works (especially Letters on the Philosophy of the Human Mind, 3 vols., 1855-63) were well known. He was a Determinist and Utilitarian, but his towns men were surprised to hear, after his death, that he was the author of an anonymous little work, Letters from an Egyptian Kafir on a Visit to England in Search of a Religion (1839), which mordantly criticized Christianity. D. Jan. 18, 1870.

BAILLIE, George, philanthropist. B. Dec. 23, 1784. Ed. Glasgow. He was received into the Glasgow faculty of pro curators and practised until 1825, when he was appointed Sheriff -Substitute for the western district of Perthshire. Baillie, who seems to have been a Deist, offered several substantial pi izes for the writing of Rationalist works.