Deism
(Lat. Deus, God)
The term used to denote certain doctrines apparent in a tendency
of thought and criticism that manifested itself principally in
England towards the latter end of the seventeenth century. The
doctrines and tendency of deism were, however, by no means
entirely confined to England, nor to the seventy years or so
during which most of the deistical productions were given to the
world; for a similar spirit of criticism aimed at the nature and
content of traditional religious beliefs, and the substitution for
them of a rationalistic naturalism has frequently appeared in the
course of religious thought. Thus there have been French and
German deists as well as English; while Pagan, Jewish, or
Mohammedan deists might be found as well as Christian. Because of
the individualistic standpoint of independent criticism which they
adopt, it is difficult, if not impossible, to class together the
representative writers who contributed to the literature of
English deism as forming any one definite school, or to group
together the positive teachings contained in their writings as any
one Systematic expression of a concordant philosophy. The deists
were what nowadays would be called freethinkers, a name, indeed,
by which they were not infrequently known; and they can only be
classed together wholly in the main attitude that they adopted,
viz. in agreeing to cast off the trammels of authoritative
religious teaching in favour of a free and purely rationalistic
speculation. Many of them were frankly materialistic in their
doctrines; while the French thinkers who subsequently built upon
the foundations laid by the English deists were almost exclusively
so. Others rested content with a criticism of ecclesiastical
authority in teaching the inspiration of the Sacred Scriptures, or
the fact of an external revelation of supernatural truth given by
God to man. In this last point, while there is a considerable
divergence of method and procedure observable in the writings of
the various deists, all, at least to a very large extent, seem to
concur. Deism, in its every manifestation was opposed to the
current and traditional teaching of revealed religion.
In England the deistical movement seems to be an almost necessary
outcome of the political and religious conditions of the time and
country. The Renaissance had fairly swept away the later
scholasticism and with it, very largely, the constructive
philosophy of the Middle Ages. The Protestant Reformation, in its
open revolt against the authority of the Catholic Church, had
inaugurated a slow revolution, in which all religious pretensions
were to be involved. The Bible as a substitute for the living
voice of the Church and the State religion as a substitute for
Catholicism might stand for a time; but the very mentality that
brought them into being as substitutes could not logically rest
content with them. The principle of private judgment in matters of
religion had not run its full course in accepting the Bible as the
Word of God. A favourable opportunity would spur it forward once
more; and from such grudging acceptance as it gave to the
Scriptures it would proceed to a new examination and a final
rejection of their claims. The new life of the empirical sciences,
the enormous enlargement of the physical horizon in such
discoveries as those of astronomy and geography, the philosophical
doubt and rationalistic method of Descartes, the advocated
empiricism of Bacon, the political changes of the times--all these
things were factors in the preparation and arrangement of a stage
upon which a criticism levelled at revelational religion might
come forward and play its part with some chance of success. And
though the first essays of deism were somewhat veiled and
intentionally indirect in their attack upon revelation, with the
revolution and the civil and religious liberty consequent upon it,
with the spread of the critical and empirical spirit as
exemplified in the philosophy of Locke, the time was ripe for the
full rehearsal of the case against Christianity as expounded by
the Establishment and the sects. The wedge of private judgment had
been driven into authority. It had already split Protestantism
into a great number of conflicting sects. It was now to attempt
the wreck of revealed religion in any shape or form.
The deistical tendency passed through several more or less clearly
defined phases. All the forces possible were mustered against its
advance. Parliaments took cognizance of it. Some of the
productions of the deists were publicly burnt. The bishops and
clergy of the Establishment were strenuous in resisting it. For
every pamphlet or book that a deist wrote, several "answers" were
at once put before the public as antidotes. Bishops addressed
pastoral letters to their dioceses warning the faithful of the
danger. Woolston's "Moderator" provoked no less than five such
pastorals from the Bishop of London. All that was ecclesiastically
official and respectable was ranged in opposition to the movement,
and the deists were held up to general detestation in the
strongest terms. When the critical principles and freethought
spirit filtered down to the middle classes and the masses, when
such men as Woolston and Chubb put pen to paper, a perfect storm
of counter-criticism arose. As a matter of fact, not a few
educated and cultured men were really upon the side of a broad
toleration in matters of religion. The "wit and ridicule" by which
the Earl of Shaftesbury would have all tested meant, as Brown
rightly notes, no more than urbanity and good nature. But
Shaftesbury himself would by no means allow that he was a deist,
except in the sense in which the term is interchangeable with
theist; and Herbert of Cherbury, by far the most cultured
representative of the movement, is noted as having been the most
moderate and the least opposed of them all to the teachings of
Christianity. One phase through which deism may be said to have
passed was that of a critical examination of the first principles
of religion. It asserted its right to perfect tolerance on the
part of all men. Freethought was the right of the individual; it
was, indeed, but one step in advance of the received principle of
private judgment. Such representatives of deism as Toland and
Collins may be taken as typical of this stage. So far, while
critical and insisting on its rights to complete toleration, it
need not be, though as a matter of fact it undoubtedly was,
hostile to religion. A second phase was that in which it
criticized the moral or ethical part of religious teaching. The
Earl of Shaftesbury, for example, has much to urge against the
doctrine of future rewards and punishments as the sanction of the
moral law. Such an attitude is obviously incompatible with the
accepted teaching of the Churches. Upon this follows a critical
examination of the writings of the Old and New Testaments, with a
particular regard to the verification of prophecy and to the
miraculous incidents therein recorded. Antony Collins performed
the first part of this task, while Woolston gave his attention
principally to the latter, applying to Scriptural records the
principles put forward by Blount in his notes to the "Apollonius
Tyan�us". Lastly, there was the stage in which natural religion as
such was directly opposed to revealed religion. Tindal, in his
"Christianity as old as the Creation", reduces, or attempts to
reduce, revelation to reason, making the Christian statement of
revelational truths either superfluous, in that it is contained in
reason itself, or positively harmful, in that it goes beyond or
contradicts reason.
It is thus clear that, in the main, deism is no more than an
application of critical principles to religion. But in its
positive aspect it is something more, for it offers as a
substitute for revealed truth that body of truths which can be
built up by the unaided efforts of natural reason. The term deism,
however, has come in the course of time to have a more specific
meaning. It is taken to signify a peculiar metaphysical doctrine
supposed to have been maintained by all the deists. They are thus
grouped together roughly as members of a quasi-philosophical
school, the chief and distinguishing tenet of which is the
relationship asserted to obtain between the universe and God. God,
in this somewhat inferential and constructive thesis, is held to
be the first cause of the world, and to be a personal God. So far
the teaching is that of the theists, as contrasted with that of
atheists and pantheists. But, further, deism not only
distinguishes the world and God as effect and cause; it emphasizes
the transcendence of the Deity at the sacrifice of His indwelling
and His providence. He is apart from the creation which He brought
into being, and unconcerned as to the details of its working.
Having made Nature, He allows it to run its own course without
interference on His part. In this point the doctrine of deism
differs clearly from that of theism. The verbal distinction
between the two, which are originally convertible terms--deism, of
Latin origin, being a translation of the Greek theism--seems to
have been introduced into English literature by the deists
themselves, in order to avoid the denomination of naturalists by
which they were commonly known. As naturalism was the epithet
generally given to the teaching of the followers of the
Spinozistic philosophy, as well as to the so-called atheists,
deism seemed to its professors at once to furnish a disavowal of
principles and doctrines which they repudiated, and to mark off
their own position clearly from that of the theists. The word
seems however, to have been first employed in France and Italy
about the middle of the sixteenth century, for it occurs in the
epistle dedicatory prefixed to the second volume of Viret's
"Instruction Chretienne" (1563), where the reforming divine speaks
of some persons who had called themselves by a new name--deists.
It was principally upon account of their methods of investigation
and their criticism of the traditional Protestant religious
teaching that they had also come to to be called rationalists,
opposing, as has been pointed out, the findings of unaided reason
to the truths held on faith as having come from God through
external revelation. Whether it was by ignoring this altogether,
or by attempting actively to refute it and prove its
worthlessness, rationalism was the obvious term of their
procedure. And it was also, in very much the same manner, by their
claiming the freedom to discuss on these lines the doctrines set
forth in the Bible and taught by the Churches, that they earned
for themselves the no less commonly given title of freethinkers.
There are notable distinctions and divergences among the English
deists as to the whole content of truth given by reason. The most
important of these distinctions is undoubtedly that by which they
are classed as "mortal" and "immortal" deists; for, while many
conceded the philosophical doctrine of a future life, the
rejection of future rewards and punishments carried with it for
some the denial of the immortality of the human soul. The five
articles laid down by Lord Herbert of Cherbury, however, with
their expansion into six (and the addition of a seventh) by
Charles Blount, may be taken--and especially the former--as the
format professions of deism. They contain the following doctrines:
� that there exists one supreme God,
� who is chiefly to be worshipped;
� that the principal part of such worship consists in piety and
virtue;
� that we must repent of our sins and that, if we do so, God will
pardon us;
� that there are rewards for good men and punishments for evil
men both here and hereafter.
Blount, while he enlarged slightly upon each of these doctrines,
broke one up into two and added a seventh in which he teaches that
God governs the world by His providence. This can hardly be
accepted as a doctrine common to the deists; while, as has been
said, future rewards and punishments were not allowed by them all.
In general they rejected the miraculous element in Scripture and
ecclesiastical tradition. They would not admit that there was any
one "peculiar people", such as the Jews or the Christians, singled
out for the reception of a truth-message, or chosen to be the
recipients of any special grace or supernatural gift of God. They
denied the doctrine of the Trinity and altogether refused to admit
any mediatorial character in the person of Jesus Christ. The
atonement, the doctrine of the "imputed righteousness" of Christ--
especially popular with orthodoxy at the time--shared the fate of
all Christological doctrines at their hands. And above all things
and upon every occasion--but with at least one notable exception--
they raised their voices against ecclesiastical authority. They
never tired of inveighing against priestcraft in every shape or
form, find they went so far as to assert that revealed religion
was an imposture, an invention of the priestly caste to subdue,
and so the more easily govern and exploit, the ignorant.
As deism took its rise, in the logical sequence of events, from
the principles asserted at the Protestant Reformation, so it ran
its short and violent course in a development of those principles
and ended in a philosophical scepticism. For a time it caused an
extraordinary commotion in all circles of thought in England,
provoked a very large and, in a sense, interesting polemical
literature, and penetrated from the highest to the lowest strata
of society. Then it fell flat, whether because the controversy had
lost the keen interest of its acuter stage or because people in
general were drifting with the current of criticism towards the
new views, it would be difficult to say. With most of the
arguments of the deists we are nowadays quite familiar, thanks to
the efforts of modern freethought and rationalism to keep them
before the public. Though caustic, often clever, and sometimes
extraordinarily blasphemous, we open the shabby little books to
find them for the most part out-of-date, commonplace, and dull.
And while several of the "replies" they evoked may still be
reckoned as standard works of apologetics, the majority of them
belong, in more senses than one, to the writings of a bygone age.
When Viscount Bolingbroke's works were published posthumously in
1754, and even when, six years previously, David Hume's "Essay on
the Human Understanding" was given to the public, little stir was
caused. Bolingbroke's attacks upon revealed religion, aimed from
the standpoint of a sensationalistic theory of knowledge, were, as
a recent writer puts it, "insufferably wearisome"; nor could all
his cynicism and satire, any more than the scepticism of the
Scottish philosopher, renew general interest in a controversy that
was practically dead. The deistical controversy traceable to the
philosophy of Hobbes and Locke is pre-eminently an English one,
and it is to the English deists that reference is usually made
when there is question of deism. But the same or a similar
movement took place in France also. "In the eighteenth century",
says Ueberweg, "the prevailing character of French philosophy . .
was that of opposition to the received dogmas and the actual
conditions in Church and State, and the efforts of its
representatives were chiefly directed to the establishment of a
new theoretical and practical philosophy resting on naturalistic
principles" (Gesch. d. Philosophie, Berlin, 1901, III, 237). Men
like Voltaire, and even the materialistic Encyclop�dists,
exemplify a tendency of philosophic thought which has very much in
common with what in England ended in deism. It had the same basis,
the theory of knowledge propounded by Locke and subsequently
pushed to an extreme point by Condillac, and the general advance
of scientific thought. From Voltaire's criticisms of
ecclesiastical organization and theology, his unwearying attacks
upon Christianity, the Bible, the Church, and revelation, the
tendency turned towards pantheism and materialism. Rousseau would
have a religion of nature substituted for the traditional forms of
revelation, and bring it, as he would bring philosophy and
politics, to the point of view of individualism. Helvetius would
have the moral system based upon the principle of present self-
interest. And thus, as in England the logical development of deism
ended in the scepticism of Hume, so in France it came to rest in
the materialism of La Mettrie and Holbach.
PROMINENT DEIST WRITERS
Reference has been made above to several of the more important
representatives of English deism. Ten or twelve writers are
usually enumerated as noteworthy contributors to the literature
and thought of the movement, of whom the following brief sketches
may be given.
Lord Herbert of Cherbury (1581-1648), a contemporary of the
Philosopher Hobbes, was the most learned of the deists and at the
same time the least disposed to submit Christian revelation to a
destructive criticism. He was the founder of a rationalistic form
of religion--the religion of nature--which consisted of no more
than the residuum of truth common to all forms of positive
religion when their distinctive characteristics were left aside.
The profession of faith of Herbert's rationalism is summed up in
the five articles given above. His principal contributions to
deistical literature are the "Tractatus de Veritate prout
distinguitur a Revelatione, a Verisimili, a Possibili et a Falso"
(1624); "De Religione Gentilium Errorumque apud eos Causis" (1645,
1663); "De Religione Laici."
Charles Blount (1654-93) was noted as a critic of both the Old and
New Testaments. His methods of attack upon the Christian position
were characterized by an indirectness and a certain duplicity that
has ever since come to be in some degree associated with the whole
deistical movement. The notes that he appended to his translation
of Apollonius are calculated to weaken or destroy credence in the
miracles of Christ, for some of which he actually suggests
explanations upon natural grounds, thus arguing against the
trustworthiness of the New Testament. In a similar manner, by
employing the argument of Hobbes against the Mosaic authorship of
the Pentateuch, and by attacking the miraculous events therein
recorded, he had impeached the accuracy and veracity of the Old
Testament. He rejects utterly the doctrine of a mediatorial Christ
and contends that such a doctrine is subversive of true religion;
while the many falsehoods he perceives in the traditional and
positive forms of Christianity he puts down to the political
invention (for purposes of power and of easy government) of
priests and religious teachers. The seven articles into which
Blount expanded the five articles of Lord Herbert have been
noticed above. His notes to the translation of Philostratus' "Life
of Apollonius Tyan�us" were published in 1680. He wrote also the
"Anima Mundi" (1678-9); "Religio Laici", practically a translation
of Lord Herbert's book of the same title (1683); and "The Oracles
of Reason" (1893).
John Toland (1670-1722), while originally a believer in Divine
revelation and not opposed to the doctrines of Christianity,
advanced to the rationalistic position with strong pantheistic
tendencies by taking away the supernatural element from religion.
His principal thesis consisted in the argument that "there is
nothing in the Gospels contrary to reason, nor above it; and that
no Christian doctrine can properly be called a mystery. "This
statement he made on the assumption that whatever is contrary to
reason is untrue, and whatever is above reason is inconceivable.
He contended, therefore, that reason is the safe and only guide to
truth, and that the Christian religion lays no claim to being
mysterious. Toland also raised questions as to the Canon of
Scripture and the origins of the Church. He adopted the view that
in the Early Church there were two opposing factions, the liberal
and the Judaizing; and he compared some eighty spurious writings
with the New Testament Scriptures, in order to cast doubt upon the
authenticity and reliability of the canon. His "Amyntor" evoked a
reply from the celebrated Dr. Clarke, and a considerable number of
books and tracts were published in refutation of his doctrine. The
chief works for which he was responsible are--"Christianity not
Mysterious" (l696); "Letters to Serena" (1704); "Pantheisticon"
(1720); "Amyntor" (1699); "Nazarenus" (1718).
Antony Ashley Cooper, third Earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713), one
of the most popular, elegant, and ornate of these writers, is
generally classed among the deists on account of his
"Characteristics". He himself would not admit that he was such,
except in the sense in which deist is contrasted with atheist; of
him bishop Butler said that, had he lived in a later age, when
Christianity was better understood, he would have been a good
Christian. Thus, in a preface that Shaftesbury contributed to a
volume of the sermons of Dr. Whichcot (1698), he "finds fault with
those in this profane age, that represent not only the institution
of preaching, but even the Gospel itself, and our holy religion,
to be a fraud". There are also passages in "Several Letters
Written by a Noble Lord to a Young Man in the University" (1716)
in which he shows a very real regard for the doctrines and
practice of the Christian religion. But the "Characteristics of
Men, Matters, Opinions, and Times" (1711-1723) gives clear
evidence of Shaftesbury's deistical tendencies. It contains
frequent criticisms of Christian doctrines, the Scriptures, and
revelation. He contends that this last is not only useless but
positively mischievous, on account of its doctrine of rewards and
punishments. The virtue of morality he makes to consist in a
conformity of our affections to our natural sense of the sublime
and beautiful, to our natural estimate of the worth of men and
things. The Gospel, he asserts with Blount, was only the fruit of
a scheme on the part of the clergy to secure their own
aggrandizement and enhance their power. With such professions it
is difficult to reconcile his statement that he adheres to the
doctrines and mysteries of religion; but this becomes clear in the
light of the fact that he shared the peculiar politico-religious
view of Hobbes. Whatever the absolute power of the State sanctions
is good; the opposite is bad. To oppose one's private religious
convictions to the religion sanctioned by the State is of the
nature of a revolutionary act. To accept the established state
religion is the duty of the citizen. Shaftesbury's more important
contributions to this literature are the "Characteristics" and the
"Several Letters", mentioned above.
Antony Collins (1676-1729) caused a considerable stir by the
publication (1713) of his "Discourse of Freethinking, occasioned
by the Rise and Growth of a Sect call'd Freethinkers". He had
previously conducted an argument against the immateriality and
immortality of the soul and against human liberty. In this he had
been answered by Dr. Samuel Clarke. The "Discourse" advocated
unprejudiced and unfettered enquiry, asserted the right of human
reason to examine and interpret revelation, and attempted to show
the uncertainty of prophecy and of the New Testament record. In
another work Collins puts forth an argument to prove the Christian
religion false, though he does not expressly draw the conclusion
indicated. He asserts that Christianity is dependent upon Judaism,
and that its proof is the fulfilment of the prophetic utterances
contained in the Old Testament. He then proceeds to point out that
all such Prophetic utterance is allegorical in nature and cannot
be considered to furnish a real proof of the truth of its event.
He further points out that the idea of the Messiah among the Jews
was of recent growth before the time of Christ, and that the
Hebrews may have derived many of their theological ideas from
their contact with other peoples, such as the Egyptians and
Chaldeans. In particular, when his writings on prophecy were
attacked he did his utmost to discredit the book of Daniel. The
"Discourse on the Grounds and Reasons of the Christian Religion"
(1724) called forth a great number of answers, principal among
which were those of the Bishop of Richfield, Dr. Chandler
("Defence of Christianity from the Prophecies of the Old
Testament"), and Dr. Sherlock ("The Use and Intent of Prophecy").
It was in Collins' "Scheme of Literal Prophecy" that the antiquity
and authority of the Book of Daniel were discussed. The
"prophecies were made to be a record of past and contemporary
events rather than a prevision of the future. But the "Scheme" was
weak, and though it was answered by more than one critic it cannot
be said to have added much weight to the discourse". Altogether
Collins' attacks upon prophecy were considered to be of so serious
a nature that they called forth no less than thirty-five replies.
Of his works, the following may be noticed, as bearing especially
upon the subject of deism: "Essay Concerning the Use of Reason in
Theology" (1707); "Discourse of Freethinking" (1713); "Discourse
on the grounds and Reasons of the Christian Religion" (1724); "The
Scheme of Literal Prophecy Considered" (1727).
Thomas Woolston (1669-1733) appeared as a moderator in the
acrimonious controversy that was being waged between Collins and
his critics with his "Moderator between an Infidel and an
Apostate". As Collins had succeeded in allegorizing the prophecies
of the Old Testament until nothing remained of them, so Woolston
tried to allegorize away the miracles of Christ. During the years
1728-9, six discourses on the miracles of Our Lord came out in
three parts, in which Woolston asserted, with an extraordinary
violence of language and blasphemy that could only be attributed
to a madman, that the miracles of Christ, when taken in a literal
and historical sense, are false, absurd, and fictitious. They must
therefore, he urges, be received in a mystical and allegorical
sense. In particular, he argued at great length against the
miracles of resurrection from the dead wrought by Christ, and
against the resurrection of Christ Himself. The Bishop of London
issued five pastoral letters against him, and many ecclesiastics
wrote in refutation of his work. The most noteworthy reply to his
doctrines was "The Tryal of the Witnesses" (1729) by Dr. Sherlock.
In 1729-30, Woolston published "A Defense of his Discourse against
the Bishops of London and St. David's", an extremely weak
production.
Matthew Tindal (1657-1733) gave to the controversy the work that
soon became known as the "Deists' Bible". His "Christianity as Old
as the Creation" was published in his extreme old age in 1730. As
its sub-title indicates, its aim was to show that the Gospel is no
more than a republication of the Law of Nature. This it undertakes
to make plain by eviscerating the Christian religion of all that
is not a mere statement of natural religion. External revelation
is declared to be needless and useless, indeed impossible, and
both the Old and New Testaments to be full of oppositions and
contradictions. The work was taken as a serious attack upon the
traditional position of Christianity in England, as is evinced by
the hostile criticism it at once provoked. The Bishop of London
issued a pastoral; Waterland, Law, Conybeare, and others replied
to it, Conybeare's "Defence" creating a considerable stir at the
time. More than any other work, "Christianity as Old as the
Creation" was the occasion of the writing of Butler's well known
"Analogy".
Thomas Morgan (d. 1743) makes professions of Christianity, the
usefulness of revelation, etc., but criticizes and at the same
time rejects as revelational the Old Testament history, both as to
its personages and its narratives of fact. He advances the theory
that the Jews "accomodated" the truth, and even goes so far as to
extend this "accomodation" to the Apostles and to Christ as well.
His account of the origin of the Church is similar to that of
Toland, in that he holds the two elements, Judaizing and liberal,
to have resulted in a fusion. His principal work is "The Moral
Philosopher, a Dialogue between Philalethes, a Christian Deist,
and Theophanes, a Christian Jew" (1737, 1739, 1740). This was
answered by Dr. Chapman, whose reply called forth a defense on the
part of Morgan in "The Moral Philosopher, or a farther Vindication
of Moral Truth and Reason".
Thomas Chubb (1679-1746), a man of humble origin and of poor and
elementary education, by trade a glove-maker and tallow-chandler,
is the most plebeian representative of deism. In 1731 he published
"A Discourse Concerning Reason" in which he disavows his intention
of opposing revelation or serving the cause of infidelity. But
"The True Gospel of Jesus Christ", in which Lechler sees "an
essential moment in the historical development of Deism",
announces Christianity as a life rather than as a collection of
doctrinal truths. The true gospel is that of natural religion, and
as such Chubb treats it in his work. In his posthumous works a
sceptical advance is made. These were published in 1748, and after
the "Remarks on the Scriptures" contain the author's "Farewel to
His Readers". This "Farewel" embraces a number of tracts on
various religious subjects. A marked tendency to scepticism
regarding a particular providence pervades them. The efficacy of
prayer, as well as the future state, is called in question.
Arguments are urged against prophecy and miracle. There are fifty
pages devoted to those against the Resurrection alone. Finally,
Christ is presented as a mere man, who founded a religious sect
among the Jews. Chubb published also "The Supremacy of the Father"
(1715) and "Tracts" (1730). He is also responsible for the
sentiments of "The Case of Deism Fairly Stated", an anonymous
tract which he revised.
Henry St. John, Viscount Bolingbroke (l678-1751), belongs to the
deists chiefly by reason of his posthumous works. They are
ponderously cynical in style and generally dull and uninteresting,
Containing arguments against the truth and value of Scriptural
history, and asserting that Christianity is a system footed upon
the unlettered by the cunning of the clergy to further their own
ends.
Peter Annet (1693-1769) was the author, among other works, of
"Judging for Ourselves, or Freethinking the great Duty of
Religion" (1739), "The Resurrection of Jesus Considered" (1744),
"Supernatural Examined" (1747), and nine numbers of the "Free
Inquirer" (1761). In the second of these works he denies the
resurrection of Christ and accuses Holy Writ of fraud and
imposture.
Henry Dodged (d. 1748), who wrote "Christianity not Founded on
Argument", is also generally reckoned, with Annet, as among the
representative deists. (See GOD; PROVIDENCE; RATIONALISM;
SCEPTICISM; THEISM.)
FRANCIS AVELING
Transcribed by Rick McCarty
From the Catholic Encyclopedia, copyright � 1913 by the
Encyclopedia Press, Inc. Electronic version copyright � 1996 by
New Advent, Inc.
Taken from the New Advent Web Page (www.knight.org/advent).
This article is part of the Catholic Encyclopedia Project, an
effort aimed at placing the entire Catholic Encyclopedia 1913
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editor of the New Advent Catholic Website. If you would like to
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