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REIMARUS—REIMS
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have been built before the Conquest to command the pass through the valley, there only remains the entrance to a cave beneath, 150 ft. long and from IO to 12 ft. high, excavated in the sandstone, which was used as a guardroom. The grounds are laid out as a public garden. Near the market house is the site of an ancient chapel dedicated to Thomas a Becket. In the chance] of the parish church of St Mary, a building ranging from Transitional Norman to Perpendicular, is buried Lord Howard, the commander of the English navy against the Spanish Armada. Above the vestry there is a library containing choice manuscripts and rare books. The grammar school was founded in 1675. Among the other public buildings are the town hall, the public hall, the market hall, and the working men's institute. The borough includes the township of Redhill, adjacent on the east. The town has some agricultural trade, and in the neighbourhood are quarries for freestone, hearthstone and white sand. The borough is under a mayor, 6 aldermen and 18 councillors. Area, 5994 acres. Reigate (Cherchefelle, Regal, Reygate) owed its first settlement to its situation at a cross-road on the l'ilgrim's Way, at the foot of the North Downs; and its carly importance to the castle which was the stronghold of the De Warennes in the 12th, 13th and I4th centuries. On the death of Edith, the widow of Edward the Confessor, to whom it belonged, William I. secured the manor of Cherchefelle, as it was then called. It was granted by William Rufus to Earl Warenne, through whose family it passed in 1347 to the earls of Arundel. The name Reigate occurs in 1199. Burgesses of Reigate are mentioned in a close roll of 1348, but no early charter is known. The town was incorporated in 1863. It returned two members to parliament from 1295 till 1831, and afterwards one member only until 1867, when it was disfranchised for corruption. In the reign of Edward I. Earl Warenne held a weekly market on Saturdays, and fairs on Tuesday in Whitsun-week, the eve and day of St Lawrence, and the eve and day of the Exaltation of the Cross, by prescriptive right. Edward II. granted a market on Tuesdays, which is still held. The fair days are now Whit-Tuesday and the 9th of December.


REIMARUS, HERMANN SAMUEL (1694-1768), German philosopher and man of letters, was born at Hamburg, on the 22nd of December 1694. He was educated by his father and by the famous scholar J. A. Fabricius, whose son-in-law he subsequently became. He studied theology, ancient languages, and philosophy at Jena, became Prioatdozent in the university of Wittenberg in 1716, and in 172O"2I visited Holland and England. In 1723 he became rector of the high school at Wismar in Mecklenburg, and in 1727 professor of Hebrew and Oriental languages in the high school of his native city. This post he held till his death, though oiiers of more lucrative positions were made to him. His duties were light, and he employed his leisure in the study of philology, mathematics, philosophy, history, political economy, natural science and natural history, for which he made large collections. His house was the centre of the highest culture of Hamburg, and a monument of his influence in that city still remains in the Haus der patriotischen Gesellschaft, where the learned and artistic societies partly founded by him still meet. He had seven children, only three of whom survived him-the distinguished physician Johann Albrecht Heinrich, and two daughters, one of them being Elise, Lessing's friend and correspondent. He died on the 1st of March 1768.

Reimarus's reputation as a scholar rests on the valuable edition of Dio Cassius (17 5o-52) which he prepared from the materials collected by I. A. Fabricius. He published a work on logic (Vernunftlehre als Anweisung zum richtigen Gebranche der Vernunft, 1756, 5th ed., 1790), and two popular books on the religious questions of the day. The first of these was a collection of essays on the principal truths of natural religion (Abhandlungen von den vornehmsten Wahrheiten der natiirlichen Religion, 1755, 7th ed., 1798); the second (Betrachtungen uber die Triebe der T hiere, 1760, 4th ed., 1798) dealt with one particular branch of the same subject. His philosophical position is essentially that of Christian Wolff. But he is best known by his Apologie oder Schutaschrift fitr die vernainftigen Verehrer Gottes (carefully kept back during his lifetime), from which, after his death, Lessing published certain chapters under thetitle of the WoUenb12ttel Fragments (see LESSING). The original MS. is in the Hamburg town library; a copy was made for the university library of Gottingen, 1814, and other copies are known to exist. In addition to the seven fragments published by Lessing, a second portion of the work was issued in 1787 by C. A. E. Schmidt (a pseudonym), under the title U ebrige noch ungedruckte Werke des Wohenbiittelschen Fragmentisten, and a further portion by D. W. Klose in Niedner's Zeitschrift fitr historische T heologie, 1850-52. Two of the five books of the first part and the whole of the second part, as well as appendices on the canon, remain unprinted. But D. F . Strauss has given an exhaustive analysis of the whole work in his book on Reimarus.

The standpoint of the A pologie is that of pure naturalistic deism. Miracles and mysteries are denied, and natural religion is put forward as the absolute contradiction of revealed. The essential truths of the former are the existence of a wise and good Creator and the immortality of the soul. These truths are discoverable by reason, and are such as can constitute the basis of a' universal religion. A revealed religion could never obtain universality, as it could never be intelligible and credible to all men. Even supposing its possibility, the Bible does not present such a revelation. It abounds in error as to matters of fact, contradicts human experience, reason and morals, and is one tissue of folly, deceit, enthusiasm, selfishness and crime. Moreover, it is not doctrinal compendium, or catechism, which a revelation would have to be. What the Old Testament says of the worship of God is little, and that little worthless, while its writers are unacquainted with the second fundamental truth of religion, the immortality of the soul. The design of the writers of the New Testament, as well as that of Jesus, was not to teach true rational religion, but to serve their own selfish ambitions, in promoting which they exhibit an amazing combination of conscious fraud and enthusiasm. It is important, however, to remember that Reimarus attacked atheism with equal effect and sincerity, and that he was a man of high moral character, respected and esteemed by his contemporaries.

Modern estimates of Reimarus may be found in the works of B. Piinjer, O. Pi-leiderer and H. Hiiliding. Piinjer states the position of Reimarus as follows: “ God -is the Creator of the world, and His wisdom and goodness are conspicuous in it. Immortality is founded upon the essential nature of man and upon. the purpose of God in creation. Religion is conducive to our happiness and alone brings satisfaction. Miracles are at variance with the divine purpose; without miracles there could be no revelation " (Punier, History of Christian Philosophy of Religion since Kant, Engl. trans., pp. 550-57, which contains an exposition of the Abhandlungen and Schutzschrift). Pfleiderer says the errors of Reimarus were that he ignored historical and literary criticism, sources, date, origin, &c., of documents, and the narratives were said to be either purely divine or purely human. He had no conception of an immanent reason (Philosophy of Reli ion, Eng. trans., vol. i. p. 102). H. Hoffding also has a briefg section on the Schutzsohrift, stating its main position as follows: “ Natural religion suffices; a revelation is therefore superliuous. Moreover, such a thing is both physically and morally impossible. God cannot interrupt His own work by miracles; nor can He favour some men above others by revelations which are not granted to all, and with which it is not even possible for all to become acquainted. But of all doctrines that of eternal punishment is most contrary, Reimarus thinks, to true ideas of God, and it was this point which first caused him to stumble ” (History of Modern Phil., Eng. trans. (1900), vol. ii. pp. 12, 13). See the “ Fragments " as published by Lessing, reprinted in vol. xv. of Lessing's Werke, Hempel's edition; D. F. Strauss, H. S. Reimarus und seine Schutzschrift für die 'oerniinftigen Verehrer Gottes (1862, 2nd ed. 1877); Charles Voysey, Fragments from Reimarus (London, 1879) (a translation of the life of Reimarus by Strauss, with the second part of the seventh fragment, on the “ Ob'ect oféesus and his Disciples ”); the Lives of Lessing by Danzei and E. Guhrauer, Sime, and Zimmern; Kuno Fischer, Geschichte der neuern Philosophie (vol. ii. pp. 759-72, 2nd ed. 1867); Zeller, Geschichte der deutschen Philosophie (2nd ed., 1875, pp. 243-46).


REIMS (RHEIMS), a city of north-eastern France, chief town of an arrondissement of the department of Marne, 98 m. E.N.E. of Paris, on the Eastern railway. Pop. (1906) 102,800. Reims is situated in a plain on the right bank of the Vesle, a tributary of the Aisne, and on the canal which connects the Aisne with the Marne. South and west rise the “ montagne de Reims ” and vine-clad hills. Reims is limited S.W. by the Vesle and the canal, N.W. by promenades which separate it from the railway and in other directions by boulevards lined with iine residences. Beyond extend large suburbs, the chief of which are Cérés to the N.E., Coutures to the E., Laon to the N. and Vesle to the W. Of its squares the principal are the Place