TAILLIANDIER
SYMES, Joseph, lecturer and writer.
B. Jan. 29, 1841. Symes came of a
Methodist family, and was trained for the
ministry at the Richmond Wesleyan Col
lege. From 1867 to 1872 he served as a
preacher, but he then became a Rationalist
and resigned. Four years later he began
to lecture for the Secularists, and for more
than forty years he took a prominent and
active part in Secularist propaganda. He
lectured constantly, frequently debated,
contributed to the Freethinker, and wrote
a number of Rationalist pamphlets. In
1883 he went to Australia, and he con
tinued his propagandist work there until
the year before his death. D. Dec. 29, 1906.
SYMONDS, John Addington, writer. B. Oct. 5, 1840. Ed. Harrow and Oxford (Balliol). He won a double first-class in classics, the Newdigate Prize, an open fellowship at Magdalen, and a chancellor s prize for an English essay. In 1864 he settled to the study of law in London, but he became consumptive and had to live abroad for two years. In 1868 he took a house at Clifton, and devoted himself to letters. His first notable books were an Introduction to the Study of Dante (1872) and Studies of Greek Poets (2 vols., 1873-76) ; but it was the first volume of his monumental study of medieval history (The Renaissance in Italy, 1875) which drew general attention to his fine literary quality and remarkable erudition. Six further volumes were published between 1877 and 1886. Symonds s health again broke down in 1877, and he lived chiefly in Switzerland for the remainder of his life. He was a singular mixture of delicacy and energy, and his literary output was as extensive as it was high in quality. In 1887 he published a beautiful translation of the Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini (2 vols.), in 1890 his Essays, Speculative and Subjective, and in 1892 his Life of Michelangelo (2 vols.). Symonds was an artist rather than a thinker, but he plainly discarded Christianity and even the belief in personal immortality. See Life, by 777
H. D. Brown (pp. 319, 421, etc.). D.
Apr. 19, 1893.
SYMONS, Arthur, poet and dramatist. B. Feb. 28, 1865. Ed. private schools. He entered the literary field with an Intro duction to the Study of Browning in 1886, and his long series of volumes of verse and prose (Collected Poems, 1901 ; Plays, 1903 ; Tragedies, 1916 ; etc.) since that date have won for him a high literary position. He rarely touches religion ; but in an auto biographical chapter of his Spiritual Adven tures (1905) he tells us that he ceased as a boy to go to church. The prayers, he says, " made me ashamed, as if I were unconsciously helping to repeat absurdities to God " (p. 45). He did not so much rebel against Christianity as find that " it had never taken hold of me."
TADEMA, Sir Lawrence Alma, Litt.D., D.C.L., R.A., F.S.A., O.M., painter. B. (Holland) Jan. 8, 1836. Ed. Leeuwarden Gymnasium and Antwerp Royal Academy. He became an Associate of the Royal Academy in 1876, and a full Academician in 1879. His first notable picture, "Clothilde at the Tomb of her Grandchildren," had been exhibited in 1858, and for many years he was devoted to historical subjects. In time he passed to the painting of superb scenes of Greek and Roman life, which have made his art familiar throughout the world. As the spirit of his pictures conveys, Sir L. Alma Tadema was an Agnostic. He received honorary degrees from Dublin and Durham Universities, was knighted in 1899, and received the Order of Merit in 1905. D. June 25, 1912.
TAILLIANDIER, Professor Rene Gaspard Ernest (commonly known as " Saint Ren6 "), French writer. B. Dec. 16, 1817. Ed. Paris and Heidelberg. He was appointed professor of literature at Strass- burg University in 1841, and at Montpelier in 1843. In 1868 he passed to the chair of French poetry and eloquence at the Sorbonne. Tailliandier, who belonged to 778
