the United States. He was first President of the American National Liberal League. D. 1903.
Abbott, George Frederick, B.A., Hellenist, Knight Commander of the Hellenic Order of the Redeemer. Ed. Cambridge (Emmanuel College), where he was prizeman in Greek. In 1900-1901 he investigated the folklore of Macedonia on behalf of his University, and he published the results in his Macedonian Folklore (1903). He has since written numerous volumes on Greece and Turkey, and his work has been honoured with a title by the Greek Government. His Philosophy of a Don (1911) contains much caustic and entertaining Rationalism. He deprecates aggressiveness on the genial ground that "the actual Ruler of the Universe compares very favourably with some of his predecessors " (p. 31).
Abbott, Leonard Dalton, American journalist. B. (Liverpool) May 20, 1878. He went to America in 1897 and joined the staff of the Commonwealth. Two years later he passed to the Literary Digest, and since 1905 he has been associate-editor of Current Literature (now Current Opinion}. Mr. Abbott was President of the Thomas Paine National Historical Association in 1910, and he is one of the founders of the Rand School of Social Science and the Intercollegiate Socialist Society. He is President of the Free Speech League and the Francisco Ferrer Association. For many years he has worked devotedly for the poor of New York in the Ferrer School, and he edited the American memorial volume, Francisco Ferrer (1910).
About, Edmond François Valentin, French novelist and dramatist. B. Feb. 14, 1828. Ed. Ècole Normals, Paris, and Ècole Française d Athènes. About carried off the literary prize in his college against Victor Hugo, H. Taine, and F. Sarcey; and his first published work, La grèce contemporaine (1855), led reviewers to compare him with Voltaire. He had had a thorough training in philosophy, but in 1854 he deserted abstract thought for fiction, and his Germaine (1857) and other brilliant novels soon put him in the front rank of his art. Many of his novels have appeared in English. He wrote also in the Figaro, under the name of Valentin de Quevilly, and produced several plays. He was an intimate friend of Prince Jerome Bonaparte, who was as anti-clerical as himself; but he cordially accepted the Republic in 1871. "Il n'y a que les morts et les sots qui ne changent jamais," he said. About was admitted to the Legion of Honour in 1867, and to the Academy in 1884. His drastic rejection of all religious beliefs is best seen in his Question romaine (1859; English translation same year), which he wrote after spending some months in Rome. It is the most powerful exposure in any literature of the foul condition of the Papal States before 1870, and its style moved Scherer to describe the author as "the grandson of Voltaire." About says that an act of faith is "to close one's eyes in order to see better." D. Jan. 16, 1885.
Achelis, Thomas, German ethnologist. B. June 17, 1850. Ed. Gottingen University. Achelis taught ethnology in a college at Bremen from 1874 until he died, devoting his attention particularly to the evolution of religion. He was associate-editor of the Lehrbuch der Religionsgeschichte and editor of the Archiv für Religionswissenschaft. His numerous and weighty works include biographies of several distinguished German Rationalists. As he held a very high position in his science in Germany, he is often described as a Protestant; but in his Adolf Bastian (1892) he entirely agrees with that eminent and thorough Rationalist. He quotes several pages of the most advanced heresy from Bastian's Mensch in der Geschichte [see Bastian], and adds that, while this may seem to some poetical and extravagant, it is "from the scientific point of view an entirely sound conception" (p. 26) D. 1909.
