Page:A biographical dictionary of modern rationalists.djvu/389

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SAND


SANDEESON


Salverte had to leave the country for some years. He was elected to the Chambre in 1828, and at the Eevolution of 1830 demanded the disestablishment of the Church. He opposed the reactionaries until death, and insisted on having a secular funeral. Salverte, an excellent scholar, was a member of the Academy of Inscriptions and of the Celtic Academy. D. Oct. 27, 1839.

SAND, George, French novelist, poet, and dramatist. B. July 2, 1804. Aurore Dupin, as she was originally named, spent her early years in the country, and was educated by private tutors. She then spent three years (1817-20) with the Augustinian nuns at Paris ; but her real education began after her return to the country. She studied Aristotle, Bacon, Locke, Condillac, etc., and lost the pious faith of her earlier years. In 1822 she married Baron Dudevant, but he was totally unworthy, and she soon left him and applied herself to letters. Her first novel (Eose et Blanche, 1831) was unsuc cessful. The second (Indiana, 1832) opened her brilliant career. She had adopted the pen-name of George Sand. In 1833 she went with A. de Musset to Venice, and three years later she secured a judicial separation divorce being impossible in France from her husband. Consuelo (a novel in eight volumes) was published in 1842. She hailed the Eevolution of 1848 with enthusiasm, for she was an advanced democrat, and founded the weekly La Cause du Peuple. Her autobiography (His- toire de ma vie) runs to twenty volumes (1854-55). George Sand s Eationalist views changed a good deal at different periods, but she never returned anywhere near the Church. She was at one time under the influence of Lamennais, at another time a follower of the mystic Leroux. As Professor Caro says in his George Sand (1887), which gives the best account of her opinions, she uses the word God " prodigally " in all her writings, but it is an avatar of which the meaning is 705


often an enigma." She wavered between Theism and Pantheism, and was even at the last uncertain about a future life. During most of her life she was aggres sively anti-clerical, though in her later years she abandoned this attitude. " She remained outside [the Church] , but thun dered not," says Caro (p. 190). From an artist of George Sand s temperament one would not expect a severe and consistent philosophy of religion, but her views were seriously based on philosophical reading, and she was at least consistently non- Christian to the end. D. June 7, 1876.

SANDERSON, Sir John Scott Burdon,

M.A., M.D, LL.D., D.Sc., F.E.S., physio logist. B. Dec. 21, 1828. Ed. privately and Edinburgh and Paris Universities. His original name was Burdon, but he took the name of Sanderson when he married the daughter of Sir J. Sanderson. In 1853 he settled in medical practice at London, and was appointed medical regis trar of St. Mary s Hospital. In the follow ing year he began to lecture in the medical school at the Hospital, and in 1856 he- became medical officer of health for Pad- dington. He earned considerable repute; by his mastery of epidemic disease. la 1859 he applied for the post of Assistant Physician to the Brompton Hospital. The authorities, who seem to have been informed that he was a Eationalist, demanded testi monials of his orthodoxy. He got the appointment, though the testimonials merely refer to his character. He was admitted to the Eoyal Society in 1867, and in 1871 he was appointed Superin tendent of the Brown Institution and professor of practical physiology and histo logy at London University College. In 1874 he became Jodrell professor of physio logy there. He was Harveian Orator in 1878 ; won the Baly medal in 1880 ; and was Waynflete professor of physiology at Oxford from 1882 to 1895, and Eegius professor of medicine from 1895 to 1903. He was President of the British Associa tion in 1893, and was created baronet in


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