Page:A biographical dictionary of modern rationalists.djvu/111

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CASPAEI


CATTANEO


In 1894 he was elected President of the Republic, but he resigned, owing to the attacks of more advanced politicians, in 1895. He gave important evidence in favour of Dreyfus. President Casimir- Perier incurred the hostility of many on account of his moderation, but the above dates show that he co-operated with all the successive anti-clerical Governments during the laicization of France. D. Mar. 11, 1907.

CASPARI, Professor Otto, Ph.D., Ger man philosopher. B. May 24, 1841. Ed. Berlin, Greifswald, Munich, and Gottingen Universities. In 1869 he became private teacher, and in 1877 professor, of philo sophy at Heidelberg. He retired in 1895, and has since devoted himself entirely to writing. His numerous works show an attempt to reconcile philosophy with modern evolutionary science, and, a Monist himself, he has given much valuable sup port to Professor Haeckel.

CASSELS, Walter Richard, merchant and writer. E. Sep. 4, 1826. Ed. private tutor and abroad. After some years in Italy, he engaged in business in Bombay, and became a Member of the Syndicate of the Bombay University and the Legislative Council of Bombay (1863). He retired from business in 1865, and published, anonymously, his famous Supernatural Eeligion in 1874 (2 vols., 3rd vol. in 1876). He had previously published two volumes of poems, and two theological works fol lowed Supernatural Eeligion. Mr. Cassels during most of his life accepted the existence of an impersonal divine power (Sup. Eel., i, 73), but he ended in Agnos ticism. D. June 10, 1907.

CASTELLI, Professor David, Italian orientalist. B. Dec. 30, 1836. #d. privately and at Pisa University. In 1875 he became professor of Hebrew at the Florence Institute of Higher Studies. He translated and edited the Song of Songs (1892) and Job (1897), and his numerous works on Hebrew literature are Eationalistic. 149


CASTILHON (or CASTILLON), Jean Louis, French writer. B. 1720. He was the editor of the Journal de Jurisprudence, and contributed to many periodicals. Beginning with his Essais sur les erreurs et les superstitions anciennes et modernes (2 vols., 1765), he wrote a number of Deistic works, besides novels and academic discourses. D. 1793.

CATHERINE II, Empress of Russia. B. May 2, 1729. Sophia Augusta Friederika, as she was originally named, was a daughter of the Prince of Anhalt-Serbst. She was selected in her fourteenth year to be the wife of Peter, heir to the Russian throne, and was sent to Moscow to be educated. Her name was changed to Catherine at her reception into the Russian Church, and she was married in 1745. The irregu larities of her later years were in part a natural reaction upon this early union with a drunken and entirely contemptible prince, and in part a defiant disregard of the mingled piety and licence of the Russia of the time. Catherine and her friends deposed her husband in 1762, and he was strangled in prison. There is no evidence connecting Catherine with the crime (see J. McCabe s Eomance of the Eomanoffs). As Empress, Catherine endeavoured to enforce the enlightened humanitarian views of the great French Rationalists, with whom she was in complete sympathy. Her reforms, in regard to education, justice, sanitation, industry, etc., were of great value. In her later years the French Revolution soured her love of France and drove her into a profession of conservatism. D. Nov. 10, 1796.

CATTANEO, Professor Carlo, Italian philosophical writer. B. June 15, 1801. Ed. Milan. From 1825 to 1835 he taught rhetoric at Milan, and founded II Politec- nico, but he flung himself into the revolu tionary movement and was compelled to fly to Switzerland. The Swiss appointed him professor at Lugano. A pupil of Romagnosi, he was an enthusiast for 150