POE
POINCAEE
bury, and Oxford (Pembroke College).
Podmore obtained a second class in
classical moderations and a first class in
natural science. He entered the service
of the Post Office in 1879, and retired on a
pension in 1907. He had become a
Spiritualist while he was at Oxford, and
contributed to the Spiritualist organ
Human Nature ; but in 1880 he disturbed
the National Association of Spiritualists by
informing them that he had become a
sceptic. He was a member of the Council
of the Society for Psychical Eesearch from
1882 to 1909, when he wearily abandoned
the futile search, and was one of its ablest
and most critical investigators. He
collaborated with Gurney and Myers in
compiling Phantasms of the Living (1886),
and believed strongly in telepathy ; but his
Modern Spiritualism (1902) and The Newer
Spiritualism (1910) are the two finest
exposures of Spiritualism. He worked
also in the Fabian Society, and published
a most painstaking, but hypercritical, Life
of Robert Owen (2 vols., 1906). Podmore
was an Agnostic (personal knowledge). D.
Aug. 14, 1910.
POE, Edgar Allan, American poet. B. Jan. 19, 1809. Ed. Eichmond (U.S.), Manor House School, London (England), and Virginia University. Son of an actor and actress, who died early, he was adopted by a Mr. Allan, whose name he added to his own. Allan put him in an j office at the end of his academic course, but he quitted it for letters, opening his career with Tamurlane, and Other Poems (1827). He then served in the U. S. army i for two years (1827-29). His Poems (1831) drew general attention to his remarkable powers, and in 1833 he won a prize for a story and developed his unique gifts in that field. Many of his stories appeared in the Southern Literary Mes senger, which he edited for some years. The Raven, and Other Poems, which com pleted his reputation as the best poet America had yet produced, appeared in 1845. He had, however, an unfortunate Gil
temperament, and this the early loss of his
parents had left uncorrected, so that his
career ended prematurely and tragically.
The year before he died he published
Eureka, which he called a " prose-poem."
It is not an important work, but it em
bodies a Pantheism which is not far re
moved from Agnosticism. He says that
the idea of God, Infinity, or Spirit " stands
for the possible attempt at an impossible
conception" (p. 23), and that we know
nothing about the nature of God (p. 28).
Nature and God are one, and there is no
personal immortality (pp. 141-43). G. E.
Woodberry shows in his Life of E. A. Poe
(2 vols., 1909) that this was Poe s settled
creed. A doctor s wife read a page of the
Bible to him when he was dying, and this
" is the only mention of religion in his
entire life" (ii, 345). Writers who speak
of Poe s " drunkenness" may be reminded
that a small quantity of alcohol was poison
to him. D. Oct. 7, 1849.
POINCARE, Professor Jules Henri,
D.Math., Ph.D., Sc.D., L.L.D., M.D., French mathematician. B. Apr. 29, 1854. Ed. Ecole Polytechnique and Ecole Supe- rieure des Mines. He became a mining engineer, and in 1879 was appointed pro fessor of the Faculty of Sciences at Caen. From 1881 to 1885 he taught under the Faculty of Sciences at Paris ; in 1885-86 he was professor of physical mechanics at Paris University; from 1886 to 1896 he was professor of physical mathematics ; and from 1896 until he died he was pro fessor of mathematical astronomy at the University, of general astronomy at the Polytechnic, and of theoretical electricity at the Higher School of Posts and Tele graphs. Poincare was one of the most brilliant mathematicians of recent times. He had eight gold medals and nine honorary degrees, and was a member or associate of forty foreign academies, and president or member of the council of twenty French societies. He was also a Commander of the Legion of Honour, and President of the Paris Academy of Sciences G12
