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1em 1em  GERSONIDES, or,, a distinguished Jewish philosopher and commentator, was born at Bagnolu in Languedoc, towards the, probably in. As in the case of the other Jewish writers on philosophy during the Middle Ages, extremely little is known of his life. His family had been distinguished for piety and exegetical skill, but though he was known in the Jewish community by commentaries on certain books of the Bible, he never seems to have accepted any Rabbinical post. Possibly the freedom of his opinions, which drew on him the suspicion of inﬁdelity, may have put obstacles in the way of his preferment. He is known to have been at Avignon and Orange during his life, and is believed to have died at Perpiguan in. Part of his writings consist of connnentaries on the portions of Aristotle then known, or rather of commentaries on the commentaries of Averroes. Some of these are printed in the early Latin editions of Aristotle’s works. His most important treatise, that by which he has a place in the history of philosophy, is entitled Jlil/iamoth Adonai (The \Vars of God), and is said to have occupied twelve in composition. A portion of it, con- taining an elaborate survey of astronomy as known to the Arabs, was translated into Latin in at the request of Clement VI. The .111 il/iamoth is throughout modelled after the plan of the great work of Jewish philosophy, the Jlo-ré Nebuc/iim of Moses Maimonides, and may be regarded as an elaborate criticism from the more philosophical point of view (mainly Averroistic) of orthodoxy as presented in that work. The six books pass in review the doctrine of the soul, in which Gersonides defends the theory of impersonal reason as mediating between God and man, and explains the formation of the higher reason ( or acquired intellect, as it was called) in humanity,—his view being thoroughly realist and resembling that of Ibn Gebirol (see ); (2) prophecy; (3) and (4) God’s knowledge of facts and providence, in which is advanced the curious theory that God does not know individual facts, and that, while there is general providence for all, special providence only extends to those whose reason has been enlightened ; (5) celestial substances, treating of the strange spiritual hierarchy which the Jewish philosophers of the Middle Ages accepted from the N eo-Platonists and the Pseudo-Dionysius, and also giving, along with astronomical details, much of astrological theory; (6) creation and miracles, in respect to which Gerson deviates widely from the orthodox position of Maimonides.

1em  GERSTÄCKER, (1816—1872), who enjoyed a most extensive popularity as a novelist and a writer of travels both at home and abroad, was born at Hamburg on 10th May 1816. Having lost his father at the age of nine, he was placed under the guardianship of an uncle at