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Boston Society For The Diffusion Of Useful Knowledge
The Boston Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge (est. 1829) in Boston, Massachusetts, was founded "to promote and direct popular education by lectures and other means." Modelled after the recently formed Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge in London, the Boston group's officers included Daniel Webster, Nathan Hale, Jacob Bigelow, William Ellery Channing, Edward Everett, Nathaniel L. Frothingham, and Abbott Lawrence. The society published the ''American Library of Useful Knowledge,'' a series of scholarly works by British and American authors. Public lectures on a variety of topics were held at Boston's Masonic Temple, and other venues. History In 1829 the founders explained their reasons for creating the society: "From infancy to the age of seventeen, the means provided in this city by public munificence and private enterprise, are ample. From seventeen to the age when young men enter on the more active and responsible duties of their several stations, sufficien ...
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Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- most populous city in the country. The city boundaries encompass an area of about and a population of 675,647 as of 2020. It is the seat of Suffolk County (although the county government was disbanded on July 1, 1999). The city is the economic and cultural anchor of a substantially larger metropolitan area known as Greater Boston, a metropolitan statistical area (MSA) home to a census-estimated 4.8 million people in 2016 and ranking as the tenth-largest MSA in the country. A broader combined statistical area (CSA), generally corresponding to the commuting area and including Providence, Rhode Island, is home to approximately 8.2 million people, making it the sixth most populous in the United States. Boston is one of the oldest ...
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William Robertson (historian)
William Robertson FRSE FSA Scot (19 September 1721 – 11 June 1793) was a Scottish historian, minister in the Church of Scotland, and Principal of the University of Edinburgh. "The thirty years during which epresided over the University perhaps represent the highest point in its history." He made significant contributions to the writing of Scottish history and the history of Spain and Spanish America. He was Chaplain of Stirling Castle and one of the King's Chaplains in Scotland. Early life Robertson was born at the manse of Borthwick, Midlothian, the son of Rev William Robertson (1686–1745), the local minister, and his wife Eleanor Pitcairn, daughter of David Pitcairne of Dreghorn. He was educated at Borthwick Parish School and Dalkeith Grammar School. The family moved to Edinburgh when his father became appointed minister of Lady Yester's Church in 1733. His father moved to Old Greyfriars Kirk in Edinburgh in 1736. He studied divinity at the University of Edinburgh ...
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Thomas Brown (philosopher)
Thomas Brown (9 January 17782 April 1820) was a Scotland, Scottish philosopher and poet. Biography Early life Brown was born at Kirkmabreck, Kirkcudbrightshire, the son of Rev. Samuel Brown (died 1779) (minister of Kirkmabreck and Kirkdale) and Mary Smith. Their son was a wide reader and an eager student. Educated at several schools in London, he went to the University of Edinburgh in 1792, where he attended Dugald Stewart's moral philosophy class, but does not appear to have completed his course. After studying law for a time he took up medicine; his graduation thesis ''De Somno'' was well received. But his strength lay in metaphysics, metaphysical analysis. Career Brown set an answer to the objections raised against the appointment of John Leslie (physicist), Sir John Leslie to the mathematical professorship (1805). Leslie, a follower of David Hume, was attacked by the clerical party as a sceptic and an infidel, and Brown took the opportunity to defend Hume's doctrine ...
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Isaac Ray
Isaac Ray (January 16, 1807 – March 31, 1881) was an American psychiatrist, one of the founders of the discipline of forensic psychiatry. In 1838, he published ''A Treatise on the Medical Jurisprudence of Insanity'' (Boston), which served as an authoritative text for many years. Biography A native of Beverly, Massachusetts, and a graduate of Phillips Academy (class of 1822), Ray received his medical degree in 1827 from the Medical College of Maine (Bowdoin College) and attempted to establish a general practice in Portland, Maine. When this venture failed, he moved to the coastal village of Eastport, where he practiced, taught, and wrote his "Treatise on the Medical Jurisprudence of Insanity," published in 1838. After several years in Eastport, he was appointed Superintendent of the State Hospital for the Insane in Augusta in 1841. In 1845 he moved to Providence, Rhode Island, to supervise the building of the private Butler Hospital and became its first Superintendent. Prior to ...
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Jane Marcet
Jane Marcet (née Haldimand) (1 January 1769 – 28 June 1858) was an English salonnière of Swiss origin, and an innovative writer of popular, explanatory science books. She also broke ground with ''Conversations on Political Economy'' (1816), which explain the ideas of Adam Smith, Malthus and David Ricardo. Life Jane Marcet was born in London on 1 January 1769, one of twelve children of a wealthy Genevan merchant and banker, Anthony Francis Haldimand (1740/41–1817), and his wife Jane (died 1785). She was educated at home with her brothers. Her studies included Latin (essential for the sciences), chemistry, biology and history, and topics more usual for young ladies in England. Jane took over the running of the family at age 15, after her mother's death. She managed the house and helped to bring up her younger siblings. Her younger brother William Haldimand (1784–1862) became a director of the Bank of England and a member of Parliament. She also acted as her father's host ...
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John Mason Good
John Mason Good (25 May 1764 – 2 January 1827), English writer on medical, religious and classical subjects, was born at Epping, Essex. John Good's parents were the Nonconformist minister Revd Peter Good and Sarah Good, the daughter of another Nonconformist minister, Revd Henry Peyto of Great Coggeshall. John Mason Good was named after the Puritan clergyman and hymn writer John Mason (1645-1694), of whom his mother Sarah was a descendant. Good attended a school at Romsey kept by his father. At about the age of 15 John Good was apprenticed to a surgeon-apothecary at Gosport. In 1783 he went to London to practice his medical studies. In the autumn of 1784, he began to practice as a surgeon at Sudbury in Suffolk. There he was an acquaintance of Nathan Drake, a fellow writer and student of Shakespeare. In 1793 Good removed to London, where he entered into partnership with a surgeon and apothecary. But the partnership was soon dissolved, and to increase his income, he began to ...
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William Paley
William Paley (July 174325 May 1805) was an English clergyman, Christian apologist, philosopher, and utilitarian. He is best known for his natural theology exposition of the teleological argument for the existence of God in his work ''Natural Theology or Evidences of the Existence and Attributes of the Deity'', which made use of the watchmaker analogy. Life Paley was born in Peterborough, England, and was educated at Giggleswick School, of which his father - also called William - was headmaster for half a century, and - like his father and great-uncle - at Christ's College, Cambridge. He graduated in 1763 as senior wrangler, became fellow in 1766, and in 1768 tutor of his college. He lectured on Samuel Clarke, Joseph Butler and John Locke in his systematic course on moral philosophy, which subsequently formed the basis of his ''Principles of Moral and Political Philosophy''; and on the New Testament, his own copy of which is in the British Library. The subscription controversy w ...
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Timothy Flint
Timothy is a masculine name. It comes from the Greek name ( Timόtheos) meaning "honouring God", "in God's honour", or "honoured by God". Timothy (and its variations) is a common name in several countries. People Given name * Timothy (given name), including a list of people with the name * Tim (given name) * Timmy * Timo * Timotheus * Timothée Surname * Christopher Timothy (born 1940), Welsh actor. * Miriam Timothy (1879–1950), British harpist. * Nick Timothy (born 1980), British political adviser. Mononym * Saint Timothy, a companion and co-worker of Paul the Apostle * Timothy I (Nestorian patriarch) Education * Timothy Christian School (Illinois), a school system in Elmhurst, Illinois * Timothy Christian School (New Jersey), a school in Piscataway, New Jersey Arts and entertainment * "Timothy" (song), a 1970 song by The Buoys * ''Timothy Goes to School'', a Canadian-Chinese children's animated series * ''Timothy'' (TV film), a 2014 Australian television comedy * ...
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Conrad Malte-Brun
Conrad Malte-Brun (12 August 177514 December 1826), born Malthe Conrad Bruun, and sometimes referred to simply as Malte-Brun, was a Dano- French geographer and journalist. His second son, Victor Adolphe Malte-Brun, was also a geographer. Today he is perhaps best remembered for coining the name for the geographic region Oceania (French ''Océanie'') around 1812, he also coined the name Indo-China. Biography Born in Thisted to an administrator of Danish crown lands, Malte-Brun was originally destined for a career as a pastor, but chose instead to attend classes at the University of Copenhagen, and became a supporter of the French Revolution and an activist in favor of freedom of the press. Following the harsh censorship laws instituted by the Danish ruler crown prince Frederick in September 1799, he was indicted because of his many pamphlets which contained outright criticism of the government, which the new censorship laws forbade. A particular cause for offence was a pamphlet he ...
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A History Of The Life And Voyages Of Christopher Columbus
''A History of the Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus'' is a fictional biographical account of Christopher Columbus written by Washington Irving in 1828. It was published in four volumes in Britain and in three volumes in the United States. The work was the most popular treatment of Columbus in the English-speaking world until the publication of Samuel Eliot Morison's biography ''Admiral of the Ocean Sea'' in 1942. It is one of the first examples of American historical fiction and one of several attempts at nationalistic myth-making undertaken by American writers and poets of the 19th century.Hazlett, John D. "Literary Nationalism and Ambivalence in Washington Irving's ''The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus''". ''American Literature: A Journal of Literary History, Criticism, and Bibliography'' 55.4 (1983): 560-575. It also helped to perpetuate the myth of the flat Earth. Writing Irving was invited to Madrid to translate Spanish-language source material on Columbus ...
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Washington Irving
Washington Irving (April 3, 1783 – November 28, 1859) was an American short-story writer, essayist, biographer, historian, and diplomat of the early 19th century. He is best known for his short stories "Rip Van Winkle" (1819) and " The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" (1820), both of which appear in his collection ''The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent.'' His historical works include biographies of Oliver Goldsmith, Muhammad and George Washington, as well as several histories of 15th-century Spain that deal with subjects such as Alhambra, Christopher Columbus and the Moors. Irving served as American ambassador to Spain in the 1840s. Born and raised in Manhattan to a merchant family, Irving made his literary debut in 1802 with a series of observational letters to the ''Morning Chronicle'', written under the pseudonym Jonathan Oldstyle. He temporarily moved to England for the family business in 1815 where he achieved fame with the publication of ''The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Cr ...
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Henry Lee III
Henry Lee III (January 29, 1756 – March 25, 1818) was an early American Patriot (American Revolution), Patriot and U.S. politician who served as the ninth Governor of Virginia and as the Virginia United States House of Representatives, Representative to the United States Congress. Lee's service during the American Revolution as a cavalry officer in the Continental Army earned him the nickname by which he is best known, "Light-Horse Harry".In the military parlance of the time, the term "Light-horse" had a hyphen between the two words "light" and "horse". See the title page of ''The Discipline of the Light-Horse. By Captain Hinde, of the Royal Regiment of Foresters, (Light-Dragoons.)'' published in London in 1778, a cavalry tactics classic which was used as a manual. He was the father of Robert E. Lee, who led Confederate States of America, Confederate armies against the U.S. in the American Civil War. Life and career Early life and family Lee was born on Leesylvania (plantatio ...
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