NEWMAN
NEWNES
Legion of Honour, and Knight of the
Prussian Order Pour le Merite ; and he
was at various times President of the
American Association for the Advancement
of Science (1877), the American Mathe
matical Society (1897-98), and the Astro
nomical and Astrophysical Society of
America (1899 and 1905). More than
three hundred papers and a number of
books were written by him. Newcomb
was a well-known Eationalist. " It seems
difficult," he said, " to assign any limit in
the series at which we can suppose so
great a break to have occurred as is
implied in the passage from mortality to
immortality " (quoted by E. Proctor in
Knowledge, Oct. 1, 1888, p. 281). D.
July 11, 1909.
NEWMAN, Ernest, musical critic. B. Nov. 30, 1868. Ed. Liverpool College and University. He was intended for the Indian Civil Service, but his health broke down, and he abandoned study and entered business in Liverpool. He devoted himself to musical and literary work in his leisure, and in 1903 joined the staff of the Birmingham Midland Institute. In 1905 he became musical critic of the Manchester Guardian, and since 1906 he has been musical critic of the Birmingham Post. He is also musical critic of the Observer. His works on music are numerous (Gluck and the Opera, 1895 ; E. Strauss, 1908, etc.), and he is a special authority on Wagner. In his Study of Wagner (1899) he dissents from even the sentimental Christianity of the great composer and declares himself a Eationalist (pp. 357-60).
NEWMAN, Professor Francis William,
B.A., writer. B. June 27, 1805. Ed. pri vate school Ealing, and Oxford (Worcester College). At Oxford he began to diverge from his famous elder brother, John Henry, and became rather sceptical about immortality. Their father, a London banker, a great admirer of Franklin and Jefferson, had been a very liberal man, if not a Eationalist. Francis won his degree
551
with double first in classics and mathe
matics, but he refused to subscribe to the
Articles, and so never became M.A. In
1827-28 he was a private tutor in Dublin.
After some years travel in the East he
became classical tutor at Bristol College,
and in 1840 professor of classical literature
at Manchester New College, Oxford. At
this time he was a liberal Christian, and in
his Catholic Union (1844) he appeals for a
union of all the sects on an ethical basis.
From 1845 to 1869 he was professor of Latin
at London University College, and in 1848
he became Principal of University Hall.
Newman translated Horace and Homer,
and was a fine classical scholar ; but he is
best remembered for the literary works in
which he discusses religious questions.
Mr. Benn regards his Phases of Faith
(1850) as " the most formidable direct
attack ever made against Christianity in
England." He was a devout Theist. In
1876 he joined the Unitarian Association,
and in 1879 he was its Vice-President ; but
he came in time entirely to reject the
doctrine of immortality, and .was thus a
decided non-Christian and dissenter from
Unitarianism. Mr. Benn, in his History,
shows that in The Soul (1849) Newman
was uncertain about it ; in Theism (1858)
he accepted it ; and in his Palinodia he
firmly rejected it. See also his Mature
Thoughts on Christianity (1897) and an
article on Newman s religion in the Fort
nightly Review, July, 1905. Newman sup
ported women suffrage and other reforms
of his time, and wrote various literary and
social works. His intellect was never
clouded by the obscurantism, and his stern
character never tainted by the casuistry,
which befel his more brilliant brother, the
Cardinal. Their younger brother, Charles
Eobert, who died in 1884, was an even
more advanced Eationalist, but an un
fortunate temperament and poor health
condemned him to obscurity. Francis
Newman died Oct. 4, 1897.
NEWNES, Sir George, Baronet, pub lisher. B. Mar. 13, 1851. Ed. private 552
