M TAGGART
MAETEKLINCK
1836, iv, 485-90). Lord Coleridge, in a
letter to Baron Bramwell of October 18,
1877, speaks of " men so very unclerical as
Sir J. Mackintosh, the Mills, Tyndall, and
Huxley " (quoted in A Memoir of Baron
Bramwell). D. May 30, 1832.
M TAGGART, John MTaggart Ellis,
LL.D., Litt.D., philosopher. B. 1866. Ed. Clifton College and Cambridge (Trinity College). Mr. M Taggart has been a Fellow since 1891, and a lecturer since 1897, at Trinity College. He is one of the most eminent English Hegelians (see his Studies in the Hegelian Dialectic, 1896, and Studies in Hegelian Cosmology, 1901). In the latter work he observes (p. 94) that " the Absolute is not God, and, in consequence, there is no God." In Some Dogmas of Religion (1906) he sees no reason to think that " positive belief in immortality is true," and " no reason to suppose that God exists " (p. 291). He is a Fellow of the British Academy.
MADACH, Imre, Hungarian poet. B. Jan. 21, 1823. Ed. Buda Pesth University. He was trained in law, and became Vice- Notary, then Over-Commissary, of his district. In 1852 he was imprisoned for a year for his share in the revolutionary movement, though illness had prevented him from fighting. In 1861 he wrote a long, somewhat Schopenhauerian, poetical chronicle of human history (The Human Tragedy), of a pronounced Eationalist character. His poetic and dramatic works (3 vols., 1880) were extremely popular in Hungary. Madach was a brilliant writer and scholar, a member of the Hungarian Academy. D. Oct. 5, 1864.
MADISON, James, fourth President of the United States. B. Mar. 16, 1751. Ed. private schools and Princeton University. After graduating at Princeton, he remained for a year to study Hebrew ; and he con tinued for some time to make a serious study of theology, as well as of law and history. He had no rival at the time in
471
America in knowledge of history and
constitutional law, and his learning and
integrity soon won him public recognition.
In 1776 he was sent as delegate to the
State Convention. Being appointed to a
committee for drafting a constitution for
the State of Virginia, he protested vehe
mently against the religious clause, and got
it altered, thus securing complete freedom
of conscience. He was elected to the first
Virginia legislature, and when, in 1784,
a proposal to make contributions to the
Churches compulsory was laid before it,
Madison again strongly opposed though
he was at first almost alone and won the
complete separation of Church and State.
His political services in other matters were
equally important. He became Secretary
of State (to Jefferson) in 1801, and he was
President of the Eepublic from 1809 to
1817 (two terms). One might infer from
his public action that he was, like Adams,
Franklin, Washington, and so many of the
great early Americans, not more than a
Deist, and his letters (published in The
Writings of James Madison, 9 vols., 1910)
make this quite clear. On Mar. 19, 1823,
he protests disdainfully that he will not
have the American university turned into
" an Arena of Theological Gladiators " (ix,
126). To the end of his days he resisted
any concession to the Churches. In 1832
(near the end of his life) he gave, in the
course of a letter to a clergyman, w 7 hat
seems to have been the extent of his own
creed : " There appears to be in the nature
of man what ensures his belief in an
invisible cause of his present existence,
and an anticipation of his future existence "
(ix, 485). Theistic expressions never occur
in his letters. He seems to have been on
the Agnostic side of Deism. D. June 28,
1836.
MAETERLINCK, Maurice, Belgian writer. B. Aug. 29, 1862. Ed. Jesuit College and Ghent University. He studied philosophy and law, and practised as an advocate at Ghent from 1887 to 1896. Since the latter date he has lived at Paris, 472
