Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography/Wright, Chauncey

WRIGHT, Chauncey, mathematician, b. in Northampton, Mass., 20 Sept., 1830; d. in Cambridge, Mass., 12 Sept., 1875. He was graduated at Harvard in 1852, and at once became a computer for the recently established “American Ephemeris and Nautical Almanac” in Cambridge. His occasional contributions to the “Mathematical Monthly” and similar journals soon gained for him reputation as a mathematician and physicist. Gradually his attention became fixed upon the questions in metaphysics and philosophy that are presented in their latest form in the works of John Stuart Mill, Charles Darwin, Alexander Bain, Herbert Spencer, and others, and he prepared a series of philosophical essays for the “North American Review,” which continued until within a few months before his death. These are regarded by Charles Eliot Norton as “the most important contribution made in America to the discussion and investigation of the questions which now chiefly engage the attention of the students of philosophy.” In 1870 he delivered a course of university lectures at Harvard on the principles of psychology, and in 1874-'5 he was instructor there in mathematical physics. He was appointed recording secretary of the American academy of arts and sciences in 1863, and held that office for seven years. His writings were collected by Charles Eliot Norton and published, with a biographical sketch, as “Philosophical Discussions” (New York, 1877).