KKEKEL
LABICHE
philosophy and psychology at the Tsech
University at Prague. He is a member of
the Franz Joseph Academy, and a frequent
contributor to academic periodicals. Krejei
is, in spite of the bigotry of the Austrian
authorities, an open and disdainful Eation-
alist. He was President of the fourteenth
annual Congress of Freethinkers, which
was held at Prague in 1907. " Eeaction,"
he says, "is the real subversive element,
because it shuts down the energy of motive
forces until they accumulate and explode."
KREKEL, Arnold, American judge. B. (Prussia) Mar. 14, 1815. He was taken to America in 1832 and studied law. In 1842 he became a Justice of the Peace, was appointed County Attorney a few years later, and in 1852 was elected to the State Legislature (Missouri). He served as a colonel in the Civil War, and was president of the Constitutional Convention of 1865. Lincoln made him a Federal Judge in 1865, and he had a high reputa tion for integrity. Krekel was an out spoken Agnostic, and is included in Putnam s Four Hundred Years of Free- thought (p. 756). D. July 14, 1888.
KROPOTKIN, Prince Peter Alexeie- Yitch, geographer. B. Dec. 9, 1842. Ed. Petersburg College of Pages and Univer sity. He won the gold medal of the Eussian Geographical Society for explora tion in Manchuria in 1864, and became, in succession, aide-de-camp to the Governor of Transbaikalia, attach^ to the Governor General of Eastern Siberia, and secretary to the Physical Geography section of the Geographical Society. In 1872 he joined the International. He was arrested, and confined in a fortress ; but he escaped, and fled to England. Passing to Switzerland, he founded the Revolte, and was expelled. He was next imprisoned at Lyons (1883-86), and has since lived in England until 1919, when he went to Eussia. His Fields, Factories, and Workshops (1899), Memoirs of a Revolutionist (1900), and Mutual Aid (1902) have circulated 409
very widely. He has written many other
works, and is as radical in religion as in
politics.
LAAS, Professor Ernst, German philo sopher. B. June 16, 1837. Ed. Berlin University. Laas was at first devoted to theology, but he deserted it for philosophy, and in 1872 he was appointed professor at Strassburg University. Originally a Kantian, he turned rather to Mill and Comte, and he became the leading German Positivist (in philosophy). He thought God or the Absolute " an ideal freely imagined according to need " (Idealismus und Positivismus, 1879, p. 143), and rejected all theology. D. July 25, 1885.
LABANGA, Professor Baldassare,
Italian philosopher. B. Aug. 17, 1829. Ed. Naples University. He took an active part in the 1848 Eovolution, and was imprisoned and then expelled. Eeturning with the triumph of Italy, he became professor of philosophy at Padua Univer sity, then professor of the history of Christianity at the University of Eome. Professor Labanca treats Christianity, and religion generally, in an objective Eation- alist spirit (see his Study of Religion in the Italian Universities, Eng. trans., 1909). He wrote many works on philosophy and religion (of the latter see especially his Gesil Cristo nella letteratura contemporanea, 1903, and II Papato, 1905), and was a Commander of the Order of the Crown of Italy.
LABIGHE, Eugene Marin, French dramatist. B. May 5, 1815. Ed. College Bourbon and Ecole de Droit. From the study of law he turned to journalism, and a successful play (La cuvette d eau) which he produced in 1837 opened for him a prosperous and distinguished career as playwright. He wrote more than a hun dred comedies, and the collected edition of his plays (10 vols., 1879) had an unpre cedented sale. Labiche, whom Jules Claretie rightly describes as " Voltairean, "
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