147-550: Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell , OM , FRS (18 May 1872 – 2 February 1970) was a British philosopher, logician, mathematician, and public intellectual . He had influence on mathematics , logic , set theory , and various areas of analytic philosophy . He was one of the early 20th century's prominent logicians and a founder of analytic philosophy , along with his predecessor Gottlob Frege , his friend and colleague G. E. Moore , and his student and protégé Ludwig Wittgenstein . Russell with Moore led
294-511: A "party" in the modern sense. They had no definite programme or policy and were by no means even united. Generally, they stood for reducing crown patronage, sympathy towards nonconformists , support for the interests of merchants and bankers and a leaning towards the idea of a limited reform of the voting system. Most Whig leaders, such as Lord Grey , Lord Grenville , Lord Althorp , William Lamb (later Lord Melbourne ) and Lord John Russell , were still rich landowners. The most prominent exception
441-563: A Tory and Fox as a Whig, Pitt always considered himself to be an independent Whig and generally opposed the development of a strict partisan political system. Fox's supporters saw themselves as legitimate heirs of the Whig tradition and they strongly opposed Pitt in his early years in office, notably during the regency crisis revolving around the King's temporary insanity in 1788–1789, when Fox and his allies supported full powers as regent for their ally,
588-628: A Tory-dominated House of Commons but upon the accession of William III in 1688 a new Act was passed that prohibited the importation of French goods. In 1704, the Whigs passed the Trade with France Act that renewed protectionism against France. In 1710, Queen Anne appointed the predominantly Tory Harley Ministry , which favoured free trade. When the Tory minister Lord Bolingbroke proposed a commercial treaty with France in 1713 that would have led to freer trade,
735-528: A book by Cambridge University Press with a foreword by C. D. Broad —in which he gave an authoritative account of Russell's 1916 dismissal from Trinity College, explaining that a reconciliation between the college and Russell had later taken place and gave details about Russell's personal life. Hardy writes that Russell's dismissal had created a scandal since the vast majority of the Fellows of the College opposed
882-816: A central role in the Glorious Revolution of 1688 and were the standing enemies of the Roman Catholic Stuart kings and pretenders . The period known as the Whig Supremacy (1714–1760) was enabled by the Hanoverian succession of George I in 1714 and the failure of the Jacobite rising of 1715 by Tory rebels. The Whigs took full control of the government in 1715 and thoroughly purged the Tories from all major positions in government,
1029-674: A chance to die down. When it met in October 1680, an Exclusion Bill was introduced and passed in the Commons without major resistance, but was rejected in the Lords. Charles dissolved Parliament in January 1681, but the Whigs did not suffer serious losses in the ensuing election. The next Parliament first met in March at Oxford, but Charles dissolved it after only a few days, when he made an appeal to
1176-689: A collection of articles on the CCNY affair in The Bertrand Russell Case . Russell soon joined the Barnes Foundation , lecturing to a varied audience on the history of philosophy; these lectures formed the basis of A History of Western Philosophy . His relationship with the eccentric Albert C. Barnes soon soured, and he returned to the UK in 1944 to rejoin the faculty of Trinity College. Russell participated in many broadcasts over
1323-496: A foreword to Words and Things by Ernest Gellner , which was highly critical of the later thought of Ludwig Wittgenstein and of ordinary language philosophy . Gilbert Ryle refused to have the book reviewed in the philosophical journal Mind , which caused Russell to respond via The Times . The result was a month-long correspondence in The Times between the supporters and detractors of ordinary language philosophy, which
1470-862: A historian and one of the leading figures in the Liberal Democrat party. Russell returned in 1937 to the London School of Economics to lecture on the science of power. During the 1930s, Russell became a friend and collaborator of V. K. Krishna Menon , then President of the India League , the foremost lobby in the United Kingdom for Indian independence. Russell chaired the India League from 1932 to 1939. Russell's political views changed over time, mostly about war. He opposed rearmament against Nazi Germany . In 1937, he wrote in
1617-555: A house for 20 years with Russell's old friend Lucy Donnelly . Edith remained with him until his death, and, by all accounts, their marriage was a happy, close, and loving one. Russell's eldest son John suffered from mental illness , which was the source of ongoing disputes between Russell and his former wife Dora. In 1962 Russell played a public role in the Cuban Missile Crisis : in an exchange of telegrams with Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev , Khrushchev assured him that
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#17327810073001764-582: A long period of depression . Frank and Bertrand were placed in the care of Victorian paternal grandparents, who lived at Pembroke Lodge in Richmond Park . His grandfather, former Prime Minister Earl Russell , died in 1878, and was remembered by Russell as a kind old man in a wheelchair. His grandmother, the Countess Russell (née Lady Frances Elliot), was the central family figure for the rest of Russell's childhood and youth. The Countess
1911-517: A manner that would not do if generally adopted". Russell merely smiled, but afterwards claimed that the reply "That's right, just like your brother " immediately came to mind. In 1950, Russell attended the inaugural conference for the Congress for Cultural Freedom , a CIA -funded anti-communist organisation committed to the deployment of culture as a weapon during the Cold War . Russell was one of
2058-498: A multitude to do evil", became his motto. The atmosphere at Pembroke Lodge was one of frequent prayer, emotional repression and formality; Frank reacted to this with open rebellion, but the young Bertrand learned to hide his feelings. Russell's adolescence was lonely and he contemplated suicide. He remarked in his autobiography that his interests in "nature and books and (later) mathematics saved me from complete despondency;" only his wish to know more mathematics kept him from suicide. He
2205-418: A national network of newspapers and magazines as well as local clubs to deliver their message. The press organised petitions and debates and reported to the public on government policy, while leaders such as Henry Brougham (1778–1868) built alliances with men who lacked direct representation. This new approach to the grass roots helped to define Whiggism and opened the way for later success. Whigs thereby forced
2352-740: A neck ribbon (as a necklet ), while women wear theirs on a ribbon bow pinned to the left shoulder, and aides-de-camp may wear the insignia on their aiguillettes . Since 1991, the insignia must be returned upon the recipient's death. number appointment There have been no honorary members of the Order of Merit since the death of the last such member, Nelson Mandela , in December 2013. Secretary and Registrar : Robin Janvrin, Baron Janvrin GCB , GCVO , QSO , PC As
2499-529: A new system emerged with two separate opposition groups. The Rockingham Whigs claimed the mantle of Old Whigs as the purported successors of the party of the Pelhams and the great Whig families. With such noted intellectuals as Edmund Burke behind them, the Rockingham Whigs laid out a philosophy which for the first time extolled the virtues of faction, or at least their faction. The other group were
2646-540: A number of Labour Members of Parliament (MPs), including Ramsay MacDonald and Philip Snowden , as well as former Liberal MP and anti-conscription campaigner, Professor Arnold Lupton . After the event, Russell told Lady Ottoline Morrell that, "to my surprise, when I got up to speak, I was given the greatest ovation that was possible to give anybody". His conviction in 1916 resulted in Russell being fined £100 (equivalent to £7,100 in 2023), which he refused to pay in
2793-544: A permanent threat to democracy. In 1943, he adopted a stance toward large-scale warfare called "relative political pacifism": "War was always a great evil, but in some particularly extreme circumstances, it may be the lesser of two evils." Before World War II, Russell taught at the University of Chicago , later moving on to Los Angeles to lecture at the UCLA Department of Philosophy . He was appointed professor at
2940-457: A personal letter: "If the Germans succeed in sending an invading army to England we should do best to treat them as visitors, give them quarters and invite the commander and chief to dine with the prime minister." In 1940, he changed his appeasement view that avoiding a full-scale world war was more important than defeating Hitler. He concluded that Adolf Hitler taking over all of Europe would be
3087-838: A strong presidency , initially the presidency of Andrew Jackson , analogous to the British Whig opposition to a strong monarchy. The True Whig Party , which for a century dominated Liberia , was named for the American party rather than directly for the British one. Dickinson reports the following: All historians are agreed that the Tory party declined sharply in the late 1740s and 1750s and that it ceased to be an organized party by 1760. The research of Sir Lewis Namier and his disciples [...] has convinced all historians that there were no organized political parties in Parliament between
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#17327810073003234-469: A work on the foundations of mathematics. It advanced a thesis of logicism , that mathematics and logic are one and the same. At the age of 29, in February 1901, Russell underwent what he called a "sort of mystic illumination", after witnessing Whitehead 's wife's suffering in an angina attack. "I found myself filled with semi-mystical feelings about beauty and with a desire almost as profound as that of
3381-533: Is a deficit of trade with France was bad because it would enrich France at England's expense. In 1678, the Whigs passed the Prohibition of 1678 that banned certain French goods from being imported into England. The economic historian William Ashley claimed that this Act witnessed the "real starting-point in the history of Whig policy in the matter of trade". It was repealed upon the accession of James II by
3528-653: Is distinctive in their culture". In a speech in 1948, Russell said that if the USSR 's aggression continued, it would be morally worse to go to war after the USSR possessed an atomic bomb than before it possessed one, because if the USSR had no bomb the West's victory would come more swiftly and with fewer casualties than if there were atomic bombs on both sides. At that time, only the United States possessed an atomic bomb, and
3675-755: The BBC , particularly The Brains Trust and for the Third Programme , on various topical and philosophical subjects. By this time Russell was known outside academic circles, frequently the subject or author of magazine and newspaper articles, and was called upon to offer opinions on a variety of subjects, even mundane ones. En route to one of his lectures in Trondheim , Russell was one of 24 survivors (out of 43 passengers) of an aeroplane crash in Hommelvik in October 1948. He said he owed his life to smoking since
3822-541: The Buddha to find some philosophy which should make human life endurable", Russell would later recall. "At the end of those five minutes, I had become a completely different person." In 1905, he wrote the essay " On Denoting ", which was published in the philosophical journal Mind . Russell was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 1908 . The three-volume Principia Mathematica , written with Whitehead,
3969-503: The Cambridge Apostles . He distinguished himself in mathematics and philosophy, graduating as seventh Wrangler in the former in 1893 and becoming a Fellow in the latter in 1895. Russell began his published work in 1896 with German Social Democracy , a study in politics that was an early indication of his interest in political and social theory. In 1896 he taught German social democracy at the London School of Economics . He
4116-605: The City College of New York (CCNY) in 1940, but after a public outcry the appointment was annulled by a court judgment that pronounced him "morally unfit" to teach at the college because of his opinions, especially those relating to sexual morality , detailed in Marriage and Morals (1929). The matter was taken to the New York Supreme Court by Jean Kay who was afraid that her daughter would be harmed by
4263-583: The Dominions of the British Empire became independent countries within the empire, equal in status to the UK, the Order of Merit continued as an honour open to all these realms and, in many, became a part of their newly developing national honours systems. The order's statutes were amended in 1935 to include members of the Royal Air Force and, in 1969, the definition of honorary recipients
4410-640: The Duke of Bedford and elements of that which had been led by George Grenville , it also contained elements of the Kings' Men, the group formerly associated with Lord Bute and which was generally seen as Tory-leaning. The association of Toryism with Lord North's government was also influential in the American colonies and writings of British political commentators known as the Radical Whigs did much to stimulate colonial republican sentiment. Early activists in
4557-585: The Duke of Monmouth , being implicated, fled to and regrouped in the United Provinces . Algernon Sidney , Sir Thomas Armstrong and William Russell, Lord Russell , were executed for treason. The Earl of Essex committed suicide in the Tower of London over his arrest for treason, whilst Lord Grey of Werke escaped from the Tower. After the Glorious Revolution of 1688, Queen Mary II and King William III governed with both Whigs and Tories, despite
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4704-638: The Earl of Shelburne , took its place. After Rockingham's unexpected death in July 1782, this uneasy coalition fell apart, with Charles James Fox , Rockingham's successor as faction leader, quarrelling with Shelburne and withdrawing his supporters from the government. The following Shelburne administration was short-lived and Fox returned to power in April 1783, this time in an unexpected coalition with his old enemy Lord North. Although this pairing seemed unnatural to many at
4851-421: The India League . He went to prison for his pacifism during World War I , and initially supported appeasement against Adolf Hitler 's Nazi Germany , before changing his view in 1943, describing war as a necessary "lesser of two evils". In the wake of World War II , he welcomed American global hegemony in preference to either Soviet hegemony or no (or ineffective) world leadership, even if it were to come at
4998-601: The Lieutenant Governor of Nova Scotia , stated that the Order of Merit was the highest civilian award for merit a Canadian could receive. Some orders of precedence are as follows: Order of wear British Whig Party Factions: The Whigs were a political party in the Parliaments of England , Scotland , Ireland , Great Britain and the United Kingdom . Between the 1680s and
5145-601: The Paris Exhibition of 1889 and climbed the Eiffel Tower soon after it was completed. Russell won a scholarship to read for the Mathematical Tripos at Trinity College, Cambridge , and began his studies there in 1890, taking as coach Robert Rumsey Webb . He became acquainted with the younger George Edward Moore and came under the influence of Alfred North Whitehead , who recommended him to
5292-531: The Prince of Wales . The opposition Whigs were split by the onset of the French Revolution . While Fox and some younger members of the party such as Charles Grey and Richard Brinsley Sheridan were sympathetic to the French revolutionaries, others led by Edmund Burke were strongly opposed. Although Burke himself was largely alone in defecting to Pitt in 1791, much of the rest of the party, including
5439-551: The Prince of Wales . Following his success in defeating the government over the Peerage Bill in 1719, Walpole was invited back into government the following year. He was able to defend the government in the Commons when the South Sea Bubble collapsed. When Stanhope died unexpectedly in 1721, Walpole replaced him as leader of the government and became known as the first Prime Minister . In the 1722 general election
5586-539: The Royal Academy of Arts , advised against the new order, primarily because of its selection process. It was Victoria's son Edward VII who eventually founded the Order of Merit on 26 June 1902 (the date for which his coronation had been originally scheduled ) as a means to acknowledge "exceptionally meritorious service in Our Navy and Our Army, or who may have rendered exceptionally meritorious service towards
5733-583: The Tory party as treasonous Jacobites , and the Septennial Act ensured that the Whigs became the dominant party, establishing the Whig oligarchy. Between 1717 and 1720 the Whig Split led to a division in the party. Government Whigs led by the former soldier James Stanhope were opposed by Robert Walpole and his allies. While Stanhope was backed by George I, Walpole and his supporters were closer to
5880-527: The Volga on a steamship. His experiences destroyed his previous tentative support for the revolution. He subsequently wrote a book, The Practice and Theory of Bolshevism , about his experiences on this trip, taken with a group of 24 others from the UK, all of whom came home thinking well of the Soviet regime, despite Russell's attempts to change their minds. For example, he told them that he had heard shots fired in
6027-544: The aristocratic families, the continued disenfranchisement of Catholics and toleration of nonconformist Protestants ( dissenters such as the Presbyterians), while the Tories generally favoured the minor gentry and people who were ( relatively speaking ) smallholders; they also supported the legitimacy of a strongly established Church of England . (The so-called High Tories preferred high church Anglicanism, or Anglo-Catholicism . Some, particularly adherents of
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6174-599: The colonies called themselves Whigs, seeing themselves as in alliance with the political opposition in Britain, until they turned to independence and started emphasising the label Patriots . In contrast, the American Loyalists , who supported the monarchy, were consistently also referred to as Tories. Later, the United States Whig Party was founded in 1833 on the basis of opposition to
6321-404: The non-juring schism , openly or covertly supported the exiled House of Stuart 's claim to the throne—a position known as Jacobitism .) Later, the Whigs came to draw support from the emerging industrial reformists and the mercantile class while the Tories came to draw support from farmers, landowners, royalists and (relatedly) those who favoured imperial military spending. By the first half of
6468-676: The "Whigs". In The History of England , c. 1760 , David Hume wrote: The court party reproached their antagonists with their affinity to the fanatical conventiclers in Scotland, who were known by the name of Whigs: The country party found a resemblance between the courtiers and the popish banditti in Ireland, to whom the appellation of Tory was affixed. And after this manner, these foolish terms of reproach came into public and general use; and even at present seem not nearer their end than when they were first invented. The precursor to
6615-606: The 1713 Treaty of Utrecht , which they attempted to block through their majority in the House of Lords . The Tory administration led by Harley and the Viscount Bolingbroke persuaded the Queen to create twelve new Tory peers to force the treaty through. The Whigs primarily advocated the supremacy of Parliament, while calling for toleration for Protestant dissenters. They adamantly opposed a Catholic as king. They opposed
6762-413: The 1840s and 1860s. A member of Parliament since the early 1810s, he met with Napoleon Bonaparte in Elba . The Russells had been prominent in England for several centuries before this, coming to power and the peerage with the rise of the Tudor dynasty (see: Duke of Bedford ). They established themselves as one of the leading Whig families and participated in political events from the dissolution of
6909-564: The 1850s, the Whigs contested power with their rivals, the Tories . The Whigs became the Liberal Party when the faction merged with the Peelites and Radicals in the 1850s. Many Whigs left the Liberal Party in 1886 over the issue of Irish Home Rule to form the Liberal Unionist Party , which merged into the Conservative Party in 1912. The Whigs began as a political faction that opposed absolute monarchy and Catholic emancipation , supporting constitutional monarchism and parliamentary government , but also Protestant supremacy. They played
7056-429: The 19th century, the Whig manifesto had come to encompass the supremacy of parliament , the abolition of slavery , the expansion of the franchise (suffrage) and an acceleration of the move toward complete equal rights for Catholics (a reversal of the party's late-17th-century position, which had been militantly anti-Catholic ). The term Whig began as a short form of whiggamore , a term originally used by people in
7203-474: The 3rd Earl Russell . Russell's marriage to Dora grew tenuous, and it reached a breaking point over her having two children with an American journalist, Griffin Barry. They separated in 1932 and finally divorced. On 18 January 1936, Russell married his third wife, an Oxford undergraduate named Patricia ("Peter") Spence , who had been his children's governess since 1930. Russell and Peter had one son, Conrad Sebastian Robert Russell , 5th Earl Russell, who became
7350-424: The British "revolt against idealism ". Together with his former teacher A. N. Whitehead , Russell wrote Principia Mathematica , a milestone in the development of classical logic and a major attempt to reduce the whole of mathematics to logic (see logicism ). Russell's article " On Denoting " has been considered a "paradigm of philosophy". Russell was a pacifist who championed anti-imperialism and chaired
7497-430: The British Empire with the Slavery Abolition Act 1833 . It purchased and freed the slaves, especially those in the Caribbean sugar islands. After parliamentary investigations demonstrated the horrors of child labour, limited reforms were passed in 1833. The Whigs also passed the Poor Law Amendment Act 1834 that reformed the administration of relief to the poor and the Marriage Act 1836 that allowed civil marriages. It
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#17327810073007644-495: The Catholic Church because they saw it as a threat to liberty, or as Pitt the Elder stated: "The errors of Rome are rank idolatry, a subversion of all civil as well as religious liberty, and the utter disgrace of reason and of human nature". Ashcraft and Goldsmith (1983) have traced in detail, in the period 1689 to 1710, the major influence of the liberal political ideas of John Locke on Whig political values, as expressed in widely cited manifestos such as "Political Aphorisms: or,
7791-401: The Church of England, opposed to a Whig". He linked 18th-century Whiggism with 17th-century revolutionary Puritanism, arguing that the Whigs of his day were similarly inimical to the established order of church and state. Johnson recommended that strict uniformity in religious externals was the best antidote to the objectionable religious traits that he linked to Whiggism. At their inception,
7938-483: The Junto led to a split among the Whigs, with the so-called Country Whigs seeing the Junto as betraying their principles for office. The Country Whigs, led by Robert Harley , gradually merged with the Tory opposition in the later 1690s. Although William's successor Anne had considerable Tory sympathies and excluded the Junto Whigs from power, after a brief and unsuccessful experiment with an exclusively Tory government she generally continued William's policy of balancing
8085-426: The Order of Merit is open to the citizens of 15 countries, each with their own system of orders, decorations, and medals, the order's place of precedence varies from country to country. While, in the United Kingdom, the order's postnominal letters follow those of Knights and Dames Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath , membership in the Order of Merit itself gives members no place in any of the orders of precedence in
8232-425: The Order of Merit, members are entitled to use the post-nominal letters OM and are entrusted with the badge of the order. The insignia consists of a badge, which consists of a golden crown from which is suspended a red enamelled cross pattée , itself centred by a disk of blue enamel, surrounded by a laurel wreath . The obverse of the badge's central disk bears the words FOR MERIT in gold lettering, while
8379-462: The Order, having been admitted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1968, when he was 47 years old. Robin Eames , Baron Eames represented the order at the coronation of Charles III and Camilla on 6 May 2023. All citizens of the Commonwealth realms are eligible for appointment to the Order of Merit. There may be, however, only 24 living individuals in the order at any given time, not including honorary appointees, and new members are personally selected by
8526-457: The Soviet government would not be reckless. Russell sent this telegram to President Kennedy : YOUR ACTION DESPERATE. THREAT TO HUMAN SURVIVAL. NO CONCEIVABLE JUSTIFICATION. CIVILIZED MAN CONDEMNS IT. WE WILL NOT HAVE MASS MURDER. ULTIMATUM MEANS WAR... END THIS MADNESS. Member of the Order of Merit The Order of Merit (French: Ordre du Mérite ) is an order of merit for the Commonwealth realms , recognising distinguished service in
8673-436: The True Maxims of Government Displayed", an anonymous pamphlet that appeared in 1690 and was widely cited by Whigs. The 18th-century Whigs borrowed the concepts and language of universal rights employed by political theorists Locke and Algernon Sidney (1622–1682). By the 1770s the ideas of Adam Smith , a founder of classical liberalism became important. As Wilson and Reill (2004) note: "Adam Smith's theory melded nicely with
8820-400: The USSR was pursuing an aggressive policy towards the countries in Eastern Europe which were being absorbed into the Soviet Union's sphere of influence . Many understood Russell's comments to mean that Russell approved of a first strike in a war with the USSR, including Nigel Lawson , who was present when Russell spoke of such matters. Others, including Griffin , who obtained a transcript of
8967-406: The United Kingdom . However, Stanley Martin says in his book The Order of Merit 1902–2002: One Hundred Years of Matchless Honour , that the Order of Merit is the pinnacle of the British honours system. Similarly, though it was not listed in the Canadian order of precedence for honours, decorations, and medals until December 2010, Christopher McCreery, an expert on Canadian honours and secretary to
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#17327810073009114-460: The United States possessed them and before the USSR did. In September 1949, one week after the USSR tested its first A-bomb, but before this became known, Russell wrote that the USSR would be unable to develop nuclear weapons because following Stalin's purges only science based on Marxist principles would be practised in the Soviet Union. After it became known that the USSR had carried out its nuclear bomb tests , Russell declared his position advocating
9261-465: The Whig Party ( blue and buff , a yellow-brown colour named after buff leather ) were particularly associated with Charles James Fox . Poet Robert Burns in "Here's a health to them that's awa" wrote: It's guid to support Caledonia's cause And bide by the Buff and the Blue. "The British Whig March" for piano was written by Oscar Telgmann in Kingston, Ontario , c. 1900 . Punk band The Men That Will Not Be Blamed for Nothing have
9408-440: The Whig Party's hold on power remained strong for many years thereafter. Thus historians have called the period from roughly 1714 to 1783 the "long period of Whig oligarchy". During the American Revolution , the Whigs were the party more sympathetic to American independence and the creation of a democracy in the United States. By 1784, both the Whigs and Tories had become formal political parties, with Charles James Fox becoming
9555-494: The Whigs swept to a decisive victory. Between 1714 and 1760, the Tories struggled as an active political force, but always retained a considerable presence in the House of Commons . The governments of Walpole, Henry Pelham and his older brother the Duke of Newcastle dominated between 1721 and 1757 (with a brief break during the also-Whig Carteret ministry ). The leading entities in these governments consistently referred to themselves as "Whigs". This arrangement changed during
9702-406: The Whigs was Denzil Holles ' parliamentarian faction, which was characterised by its opposition to absolute monarchism . Under Lord Shaftesbury's leadership, the Whigs (also known as the Country Party) sought to exclude the Duke of York (who later became King James II) from the throne due to his Roman Catholicism, his favouring of monarchical absolutism, and his connections to France. They believed
9849-440: The Whigs were protectionist in economic policy, with free trade policies being advocated by Tories. The Whigs were opposed to the pro-French policies of the Stuart kings Charles II and James II as they believed that such an alliance with the Catholic absolute monarchy of France endangered liberty and Protestantism. The Whigs claimed that trade with France was bad for England and developed an economic theory of overbalance, that
9996-519: The Whigs were vehemently against it and it had to be abandoned. In 1786, Pitt's government negotiated the Eden Agreement , a commercial treaty with France which led to freer trade between the two countries. All of the Whig leaders attacked this on traditional Whig anti-French and protectionist grounds. Fox claimed that France was England's natural enemy and that it was only at Britain's expense that she could grow. Edmund Burke , Richard Sheridan , William Windham and Charles Grey all spoke out against
10143-462: The Whigs, especially as her personal relationship with the Duchess of Marlborough deteriorated. This situation also became increasingly uncomfortable to many of the non-Junto Whigs, led by the Duke of Somerset and the Duke of Shrewsbury , who began to intrigue with Robert Harley's Tories. In the spring of 1710, Anne dismissed Godolphin and the Junto ministers, replacing them with Tories. The Whigs now moved into opposition and particularly decried
10290-446: The advancement of Art, Literature and Science". All modern aspects of the order were established under his direction, including the division for military figures. From the outset, prime ministers attempted to propose candidates or lobbied to influence the monarch's decision on appointments. But, the Royal Household adamantly guarded information about potential names. After 1931, when the Statute of Westminster came into effect and
10437-435: The appointment, though her daughter was not a student at CCNY. Many intellectuals, led by John Dewey , protested at his treatment. Albert Einstein 's oft-quoted aphorism that "great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds" originated in his open letter, dated 19 March 1940, to Morris Raphael Cohen , a professor emeritus at CCNY, supporting Russell's appointment. Dewey and Horace M. Kallen edited
10584-494: The armed forces, science, art, literature, or the promotion of culture. Established in 1902 by Edward VII , admission into the order remains the personal gift of its Sovereign—currently Edward VII's great-great-grandson Charles III —and is restricted to a maximum of 24 living recipients from the Commonwealth realms, plus honorary members. While all members are awarded the right to use the post-nominal letters OM and wear
10731-474: The army, the Church of England , the legal profession, and local political offices. The first great leader of the Whigs was Robert Walpole , who maintained control of the government from 1721 to 1742, and whose protégé, Henry Pelham , led the government from 1743 to 1754. Great Britain approximated a one-party state under the Whigs until King George III came to the throne in 1760 and allowed Tories back in. But
10878-406: The badge of the order, the Order of Merit's precedence among other honours differs between countries. In around 1773, George III considered establishing an order of knighthood to be called the "Order of Minerva " with membership restricted to 24 distinguished artists and authors. Knights would be entitled to the post-nominal letters KM , and would wear a silver nine-pointed breast star with
11025-603: The basis for one of Russell's best-received books according to Hardy: The Analysis of Matter , published in 1927. In the preface to the Trinity pamphlet, Hardy wrote: I wish to make it plain that Russell himself is not responsible, directly or indirectly, for the writing of the pamphlet.... I wrote it without his knowledge and, when I sent him the typescript and asked for his permission to print it, I suggested that, unless it contained misstatement of fact, he should make no comment on it. He agreed to this... no word has been changed as
11172-455: The biologist Douglas Spalding . Both were early advocates of birth control at a time when this was considered scandalous. Lord Amberley was a deist , and even asked the philosopher John Stuart Mill to act as Russell's secular godfather. Mill died the year after Russell's birth, but his writings later influenced Russell's life. His paternal grandfather, Lord John Russell, later 1st Earl Russell (1792–1878), had twice been prime minister in
11319-503: The by then long-widowed Queen a draft constitution for an Order of Merit in Science and Art, consisting of one grade split into two branches of knighthood: the Order of Scientific Merit, for Knights of Merit in Science, with the post-nominal letters KMS , and the Order of Artistic Merit, for Knights of Merit in Art, with the post-nominal letters KMA . However, Frederic Leighton , President of
11466-691: The case of Eric Chappelow , a poet jailed and abused as a conscientious objector. Russell played a part in the Leeds Convention in June 1917, a historic event which saw well over a thousand "anti-war socialists" gather; many being delegates from the Independent Labour Party and the Socialist Party, united in their pacifist beliefs and advocating a peace settlement. The international press reported that Russell appeared with
11613-689: The coalition, the Whiggish elements of the new party progressively lost influence during the long leadership of former Peelite William Ewart Gladstone. Subsequently, the majority of the old Whig aristocracy broke from the party over the issue of Irish home rule in 1886 to help form the Liberal Unionist Party , which in turn would merge with the Conservative Party by 1912. However, the Unionist support for trade protection in
11760-584: The complex and changing factional politics of the Restoration into the neat categories of 19th-century political divisions. In 1836, a private gentleman's Club was constructed in Pall Mall , Piccadilly as a consequence of the successful Reform Act 1832 . The Reform Club was founded by Edward Ellice Sr. , MP for Coventry and Whig Whip , whose riches came from the Hudson's Bay Company but whose zeal
11907-586: The cost of using their nuclear weapons . He would later criticise Stalinist totalitarianism , condemn the United States' involvement in the Vietnam War , and become an outspoken proponent of nuclear disarmament . In 1950, Russell was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature "in recognition of his varied and significant writings in which he champions humanitarian ideals and freedom of thought ". He
12054-580: The country against the Whigs and determined to rule without Parliament. In February, Charles had made a deal with the French King Louis XIV , who promised to support him against the Whigs. Without Parliament, the Whigs gradually crumbled, mainly due to government repression following the discovery of the Rye House Plot . The Whig peers, the Earl of Melville , the Earl of Leven , and Lord Shaftesbury , and Charles II's illegitimate son
12201-496: The couple visited Japan on their return journey, Dora took on the role of spurning the local press by handing out notices reading "Mr. Bertrand Russell, having died according to the Japanese press, is unable to give interviews to Japanese journalists". Apparently they found this harsh and reacted resentfully. Russell supported his family during this time by writing popular books explaining matters of physics , ethics, and education to
12348-615: The decision. The ensuing pressure from the Fellows induced the Council to reinstate Russell. In January 1920, it was announced that Russell had accepted the reinstatement offer from Trinity and would begin lecturing in October. In July 1920, Russell applied for a one-year leave of absence; this was approved. He spent the year giving lectures in China and Japan. In January 1921, it was announced by Trinity that Russell had resigned and his resignation had been accepted. This resignation, Hardy explains,
12495-631: The decline of the Liberal Party in the early 20th century, it was de rigueur for Liberal MPs and peers to be members of the Reform Club, being regarded as an unofficial party headquarters. However, in 1882 the National Liberal Club was established under William Ewart Gladstone 's chairmanship, designed to be more "inclusive" towards Liberal grandees and activists throughout the United Kingdom. The Liberal Party (the term
12642-472: The early twentieth century under Joseph Chamberlain (probably the least Whiggish character in the Liberal Unionist party) further alienated the more orthodox Whigs. By the early twentieth century "Whiggery" was largely irrelevant and without a natural political home. One of the last active politicians to celebrate his Whiggish roots was the Liberal Unionist statesman Henry James . The colours of
12789-610: The end of the conflict. During World War I , Russell was one of the few people to engage in active pacifist activities . In 1916, because of his lack of a fellowship, he was dismissed from Trinity College following his conviction under the Defence of the Realm Act 1914 . He later described this, in Free Thought and Official Propaganda , as an illegitimate means the state used to violate freedom of expression. Russell championed
12936-454: The fact that many of the Tories still supported the deposed Roman Catholic James II . William saw that the Tories were generally friendlier to royal authority than the Whigs and he employed both groups in his government. His early ministry was largely Tory, but gradually the government came to be dominated by the so-called Junto Whigs , a group of younger Whig politicians who led a tightly organised political grouping. The increasing dominance of
13083-601: The fall of the Talents ministry in 1807, the Foxite Whigs remained out of power for the better part of 25 years. The accession of Fox's old ally, the Prince of Wales, to the regency in 1811 did not change the situation, as the Prince had broken entirely with his old Foxite Whig companions. The members of the government of Lord Liverpool from 1812 to 1827 called themselves Whigs. By 1815, the Whigs were still far from being
13230-656: The first International Congress of Philosophy in Paris in 1900 where he met Giuseppe Peano and Alessandro Padoa . The Italians had responded to Georg Cantor , making a science of set theory ; they gave Russell their literature including the Formulario mathematico . Russell was impressed by the precision of Peano's arguments at the Congress, read the literature upon returning to England, and came upon Russell's paradox . In 1903 he published The Principles of Mathematics ,
13377-540: The followers of Lord Chatham , who as the great political hero of the Seven Years' War generally took a stance of opposition to party and faction. The Whigs were opposed by the government of Lord North which they accused of being a Tory administration. While it largely consisted of individuals previously associated with the Whigs, many old Pelhamites as well as the Bedfordite Whig faction formerly led by
13524-481: The franchise and ended the system of " rotten and pocket boroughs " (where elections were controlled by powerful families) and instead redistributed power on the basis of population. It added 217,000 voters to an electorate of 435,000 in England and Wales. Only the upper and middle classes voted, so this shifted power away from the landed aristocracy to the urban middle classes. In 1832, the party abolished enslavement in
13671-507: The government to recognise the role of public opinion in parliamentary debate and influenced views of representation and reform throughout the 19th century. Whigs restored their unity by supporting moral reforms, especially the abolition of slavery. They triumphed in 1830 as champions of Parliamentary reform. They made Lord Grey prime minister 1830–1834 and the Reform Act 1832 championed by Grey became their signature measure. It broadened
13818-637: The heir presumptive, if allowed to inherit the throne, would endanger the Protestant religion, liberty and property. The first Exclusion Bill was supported by a substantial majority on its second reading in May 1679. In response, King Charles prorogued Parliament and then dissolved it, but the subsequent elections in August and September saw the Whigs' strength increase. This new parliament did not meet for thirteen months, because Charles wanted to give passions
13965-604: The hope that he would be sent to prison, but his books were sold at auction to raise the money. The books were bought by friends; he later treasured his copy of the King James Bible that was stamped "Confiscated by Cambridge Police". A later conviction for publicly lecturing against inviting the United States to enter the war on the United Kingdom's side resulted in six months' imprisonment in Brixton Prison (see Bertrand Russell's political views ) in 1918 (he
14112-633: The idea, though he briefly reconsidered it in 1789; on 6 February of that year, he revised the design of the order, with the breast star to have sixteen points, the motto to be the Latin for "Learning improves character" and with membership to include distinguished scientists. Following the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805, First Lord of the Admiralty Charles Middleton, 1st Baron Barham and William Pitt exchanged correspondence concerning
14259-469: The image of Minerva at its centre, along with a "straw-coloured" sash worn across the chest from the right shoulder. The motto of the Order would be "Omnia posthabita scientiae" (in Latin , 'Everything comes after science'). Once the King's proposal was made public, however, arguments within intellectual circles over who would be most deserving of the new order grew so heated that George ultimately dropped
14406-473: The influential House of Lords leader the Duke of Portland , Rockingham's nephew Lord Fitzwilliam and William Windham , were increasingly uncomfortable with the flirtations of Fox and his allies with radicalism and the French Revolution. They split in early 1793 with Fox over the question of support for the war with France and by the end of the year they had openly broken with Fox. By the summer of
14553-535: The known patrons of the Congress until he resigned in 1956. In 1952, Russell was divorced by Spence, with whom he had been very unhappy. Conrad, Russell's son by Spence, did not see his father between the time of the divorce and 1968 (at which time his decision to meet his father caused a permanent breach with his mother). Russell married his fourth wife, Edith Finch , soon after the divorce, on 15 December 1952. They had known each other since 1925, and Edith had taught English at Bryn Mawr College near Philadelphia, sharing
14700-474: The last person so honoured. Honorary members form another group, to which there is no numerical limit, though such appointments are rare; individuals from countries in the Commonwealth of Nations that are not headed by King Charles are therefore considered foreigners, and thus are granted only honorary admissions, such as Nelson Mandela (South Africa) and Mother Teresa (India). Upon admission into
14847-502: The late 1750s and the early 1780s. Even the Whigs ceased to be an identifiable party, and Parliament was dominated by competing political connections, which all proclaimed Whiggish political views, or by independent backbenchers unattached to any particular group. The North administration left power in March 1782 following the American Revolution and a coalition of the Rockingham Whigs and the former Chathamites, now led by
14994-673: The layman. From 1922 to 1927 the Russells divided their time between London and Cornwall , spending summers in Porthcurno . In the 1922 and 1923 general elections Russell stood as a Labour Party candidate in the Chelsea constituency , but only on the basis that he knew he was unlikely to be elected in such a safe Conservative seat, and he was unsuccessful on both occasions. After the birth of his two children, he became interested in education, especially early childhood education . He
15141-536: The leader of a reorganized Whig Party arrayed against William Pitt the Younger 's new Tories. The foundation of both parties depended more on the support of wealthy politicians than on popular votes. Although there were elections to the House of Commons , only a few men controlled most of the voters . Both parties slowly evolved during the 18th century. In the beginning, the Whig Party generally tended to support
15288-408: The liberal political stance of the Whig Party and its middle-class constituents". Samuel Johnson (1709–1784), a leading London intellectual, repeatedly denigrated the "vile" Whigs and praised the Tories, even during times of Whig political supremacy. In his great Dictionary (1755), Johnson defined a Tory as "one who adheres to the ancient Constitution of the state and the apostolical hierarchy of
15435-423: The matter; it was recorded in his diary that he met Sir Robert Peel on 16 January 1844 to discuss the "idea of institution of a civil Order of Merit" and, three days later, he conferred with the Queen on the subject. Though nothing came of the idea at the time, the concept did not wither and, more than 40 years later, on 5 January 1888, Prime Minister Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury submitted to
15582-457: The metaphysics of both Hegel and Marx plain nonsense—Marx's claim to be 'science' is no more justified than Mary Baker Eddy 's. This does not mean that I am opposed to socialism." In 1943, Russell expressed support for Zionism : "I have come gradually to see that, in a dangerous and largely hostile world, it is essential to Jews to have some country which is theirs, some region where they are not suspected aliens, some state which embodies what
15729-499: The middle of the night and was sure that these were clandestine executions, but the others maintained that it was only cars backfiring. Russell's lover Dora Black , a British author, feminist and socialist campaigner, visited Soviet Russia independently at the same time; in contrast to his reaction, she was enthusiastic about the Bolshevik revolution . The following year, Russell, accompanied by Dora, visited Peking (as Beijing
15876-607: The monasteries in 1536–1540 to the Glorious Revolution in 1688–1689 and the Great Reform Act in 1832. Lady Amberley was the daughter of Lord and Lady Stanley of Alderley . Russell often feared the ridicule of his maternal grandmother, one of the campaigners for education of women . Russell had two siblings: brother Frank (seven years older), and sister Rachel (four years older). In June 1874, Russell's mother died of diphtheria , followed shortly by Rachel's death. In January 1876, his father died of bronchitis after
16023-546: The next year, large portions of the opposition had defected and joined Pitt's government. Many of the Whigs who had joined with Pitt would eventually return to the fold, joining again with Fox in the Ministry of All the Talents following Pitt's death in 1806. The followers of Pitt—led until 1809 by Fox's old colleague the Duke of Portland—rejected the label of Tories and preferred to call themselves The Friends of Mr. Pitt . After
16170-541: The north of England to refer to (cattle) drovers from western Scotland who came to Leith to buy corn. The Gaelic -speaking Scottish cattle drivers would call out "Chuig" or "Chuig an bothar"—meaning "away" or "to the road"; this sounded to the English like "Whig", and they came to use the word "Whig" or "Whiggamore" derisively to refer to these people. During the English Civil Wars , when Charles I reigned,
16317-523: The other. On 17 December 1783, Fox stated in the House of Commons that "[i]f [...] a change must take place, and a new ministry is to be formed and supported, not by the confidence of this House or the public, but the sole authority of the Crown, I, for one, shall not envy that hon. gentleman his situation. From that moment I put in my claim for a monopoly of Whig principles". Although Pitt is often referred to as
16464-751: The parties, supported by her moderate Tory ministers, the Duke of Marlborough and Lord Godolphin . However, as the War of the Spanish Succession went on and became less and less popular with the Tories, Marlborough and Godolphin were forced to rely more and more on the Junto Whigs, so that by 1708 they headed an administration of the Parliament of Great Britain dominated by the Junto. Anne herself grew increasingly uncomfortable with this dependence on
16611-471: The past. Later on, several members from the Whig party came to oppose the protectionism of the Corn Laws , but trade restrictions were not repealed even after the Whigs returned to power in the 1830s. With the succession of Elector George Louis of Hanover as king in 1714, the Whigs returned to government with the support of some Hanoverian Tories . The Jacobite rising of 1715 discredited much of
16758-529: The people who drowned were in the non-smoking part of the plane. A History of Western Philosophy (1945) became a best-seller and provided Russell with a steady income for the remainder of his life. In 1942, Russell argued in favour of a moderate socialism , capable of overcoming its metaphysical principles. In an inquiry on dialectical materialism , launched by the Austrian artist and philosopher Wolfgang Paalen in his journal DYN , Russell said: "I think
16905-537: The possible creation of an order of merit, though nothing came of the idea. Later, Queen Victoria , her courtiers , and politicians alike, thought that a new order, based on the Prussian order Pour le Mérite , would make up for the insufficient recognition offered by the established honours system to achievement outside public service, in fields such as art, music, literature, industry and science. Victoria's husband, Albert, Prince Consort , took an interest in
17052-663: The potential to snowball into another controversy. Although Russell did the right thing, in Hardy's opinion, the reputation of the College suffered with Russell's resignation since the 'world of learning' knew about Russell's altercation with Trinity but not that the rift had healed. In 1925, Russell was asked by the Council of Trinity College to give the Tarner Lectures on the Philosophy of the Sciences; these would later be
17199-426: The reign of George III , who hoped to restore his own power by freeing himself from the great Whig magnates. Thus George promoted his old tutor Lord Bute to power and broke with the old Whig leadership surrounding the Duke of Newcastle. After a decade of factional chaos, with distinct Bedfordite , Chathamite , Grenvillite and Rockinghamite factions successively in power and all referring to themselves as "Whigs",
17346-447: The reigning monarch of the realms, currently Charles III , with the assistance of his private secretaries; the order has thus been described as "quite possibly, the most prestigious honour one can receive on planet Earth." Within the limited membership is a designated military division, with its own unique insignia; though it has not been abolished, it is currently unpopulated, Louis Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma having been
17493-415: The rest of the population, though they were on the whole slightly below the usual level of intelligence as was shown by their having been caught. While he was reading Strachey 's Eminent Victorians chapter about Gordon he laughed out loud in his cell prompting the warder to intervene and reminding him that "prison was a place of punishment". Russell was reinstated to Trinity in 1919, resigned in 1920,
17640-621: The result of any suggestion from him. In August 1920, Russell travelled to Soviet Russia as part of an official delegation sent by the British government to investigate the effects of the Russian Revolution . He wrote a four-part series of articles, titled "Soviet Russia—1920", for the magazine The Nation . He met Vladimir Lenin and had an hour-long conversation with him. In his autobiography, he mentions that he found Lenin disappointing, sensing an "impish cruelty" in him and comparing him to "an opinionated professor". He cruised down
17787-414: The reverse bears the royal cypher of the reigning monarch in gold. The insignia for the military grouping is distinguished by a pair of crossed swords behind the central disk. The ribbon of the Order of Merit is divided into two stripes of red and blue. The neck ribbon is 50mm in width, while the ribbon bar width is the standard British 32mm size for military or civilian wear. Men wear their badges on
17934-500: The school in 1932, Dora continued it until 1943. In 1927 Russell met Barry Fox (later Barry Stevens) , who became a known Gestalt therapist and writer in later years. They developed an intense relationship, and in Fox's words: "... for three years we were very close." Fox sent her daughter Judith to Beacon Hill School. From 1927 to 1932 Russell wrote 34 letters to Fox. Upon the death of his elder brother Frank, in 1931, Russell became
18081-422: The speech, have argued that he was explaining the usefulness of America's atomic arsenal in deterring the USSR from continuing its domination of Eastern Europe. Just after the atomic bombs exploded over Hiroshima and Nagasaki , Russell wrote letters, and published articles in newspapers from 1945 to 1948, stating clearly that it was morally justified and better to go to war against the USSR using atomic bombs while
18228-675: The term "Whig" was picked up and used by the English to refer derisively to a radical faction of the Scottish Covenanters who called themselves the Kirk Party (see the Whiggamore Raid ). It was later applied to Scottish Presbyterian rebels who were against the king's Episcopalian order in Scotland. The word Whig entered English political discourse during the Exclusion Bill crisis of 1679–1681: there
18375-477: The time, it was to last beyond the demise of the coalition in December 1783. The coalition's untimely fall was brought about by George III in league with the House of Lords and the King now brought in Chatham's son William Pitt the Younger as his prime minister. It was only now that a genuine two-party system can be seen to emerge, with Pitt and the government on the one side, and the ousted Fox-North coalition on
18522-578: The total abolition of atomic weapons. In 1948, Russell was invited by the BBC to deliver the inaugural Reith Lectures —what was to become an annual series of lectures, still broadcast by the BBC. His series of six broadcasts, titled Authority and the Individual , explored themes such as the role of individual initiative in the development of a community and the role of state control in a progressive society. Russell continued to write about philosophy. He wrote
18669-487: The trade agreement on the same grounds. Ashley claimed that "[t]he traditional policy of the Whig party from before the Revolution [of 1688] down to the time of Fox was an extreme form of Protectionism". The Whigs' protectionism of this period is today increasingly cited with approval by heterodox economists such as Ha-Joon Chang , who wish to challenge contemporary prevailing free trade orthodoxies via precedents from
18816-456: The validity of Christian religious dogma , which he found unconvincing. At this age, he came to the conclusion that there is no free will and, two years later, that there is no life after death. Finally, at the age of 18, after reading Mill's Autobiography , he abandoned the " First Cause " argument and became an atheist . He travelled to the continent in 1890 with an American friend, Edward FitzGerald , and with FitzGerald's family he visited
18963-454: Was Henry Brougham , the talented lawyer, who had a relatively modest background. Hay argues that Whig leaders welcomed the increasing political participation of the English middle classes in the two decades after the defeat of Napoleon in 1815. The fresh support strengthened their position in Parliament. Whigs rejected the Tory appeals to governmental authority and social discipline and extended political discussion beyond Parliament. Whigs used
19110-449: Was Tarner Lecturer in 1926 and became a Fellow again in 1944 until 1949. In 1924, Russell again gained press attention when attending a "banquet" in the House of Commons with well-known campaigners, including Arnold Lupton , who had been an MP and had also endured imprisonment for "passive resistance to military or naval service". In 1941, G. H. Hardy wrote a 61-page pamphlet titled Bertrand Russell and Trinity – published later as
19257-529: Was a drain on Russell's energy, but Russell continued to be fascinated by him and encouraged his academic development, including the publication of Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus in 1922. Russell delivered his lectures on logical atomism , his version of these ideas, in 1918, before the end of World War I . Wittgenstein was, at that time, serving in the Austrian Army and subsequently spent nine months in an Italian prisoner of war camp at
19404-725: Was a member of the Coefficients dining club of social reformers set up in 1902 by the Fabian campaigners Sidney and Beatrice Webb . He now started a study of the foundations of mathematics at Trinity. In 1897, he wrote An Essay on the Foundations of Geometry (submitted at the Fellowship Examination of Trinity College) which discussed the Cayley–Klein metrics used for non-Euclidean geometry . He attended
19551-632: Was also the recipient of the De Morgan Medal (1932), Sylvester Medal (1934), Kalinga Prize (1957), and Jerusalem Prize (1963). Bertrand Arthur William Russell was born at Ravenscroft , a country house in Trellech , Monmouthshire , on 18 May 1872, into an influential and liberal family of the British aristocracy . His parents were Viscount and Viscountess Amberley . Lord Amberley consented to his wife's affair with their children's tutor,
19698-473: Was around this time that the great Whig historian Thomas Babington Macaulay began to promulgate what would later be coined the Whig view of history , in which all of English history was seen as leading up to the culminating moment of the passage of Lord Grey's reform bill. This view led to serious distortions in later portrayals of 17th-century and 18th-century history, as Macaulay and his followers attempted to fit
19845-585: Was chiefly devoted to securing the passage of the Reform Act 1832 . This new club, for members of both Houses of Parliament , was intended to be a forum for the radical ideas which the First Reform Bill represented: a bastion of liberal and progressive thought that became closely associated with the Liberal Party , who largely succeeded the Whigs in the second half of the 19th century. Until
19992-492: Was considered for a fellowship, which would give him a vote in the college government and protect him from being fired for his opinions, but was passed over because he was "anti-clerical", because he was agnostic. He was approached by the Austrian engineering student Ludwig Wittgenstein , who became his PhD student. Russell viewed Wittgenstein as a successor who would continue his work on logic. He spent hours dealing with Wittgenstein's various phobias and his bouts of despair. This
20139-495: Was controversy about whether King Charles II's brother, James, Duke of York , should be allowed to succeed to the throne on Charles's death, and Whig became a term of abuse for members of the Country Party , which sought to remove James from the line of succession on the grounds that he was a Roman Catholic ( Samuel Johnson , a fervent Tory, often joked that "the first Whig was the Devil".). Eventually, Country Party politicians themselves would start describing their own faction as
20286-730: Was educated at home by a series of tutors. When Russell was eleven years old, his brother Frank introduced him to the work of Euclid , which he described in his autobiography as "one of the great events of my life, as dazzling as first love". During these formative years, he also discovered the works of Percy Bysshe Shelley . Russell wrote: "I spent all my spare time reading him, and learning him by heart, knowing no one to whom I could speak of what I thought or felt, I used to reflect how wonderful it would have been to know Shelley, and to wonder whether I should meet any live human being with whom I should feel so much sympathy." Russell claimed that beginning at age 15, he spent considerable time thinking about
20433-449: Was ended when the paper published an editorial critical of both sides but agreeing with the opponents of ordinary language philosophy. In the King's Birthday Honours of 9 June 1949, Russell was awarded the Order of Merit , and the following year he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature . When he was given the Order of Merit, George VI was affable but embarrassed at decorating a former jailbird, saying, "You have sometimes behaved in
20580-429: Was expanded to include members of the Commonwealth of Nations that are not realms. The order has always been open to women, Florence Nightingale being the first woman to receive the honour, in 1907. Several individuals have refused admission into the Order of Merit, including Rudyard Kipling , A. E. Housman , and George Bernard Shaw . Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh , remains the youngest person ever inducted into
20727-424: Was first used officially in 1868, but had been used colloquially for decades beforehand) arose from a coalition of Whigs, free trade Tory followers of Robert Peel and free trade Radicals , first created, tenuously under the Peelite Earl of Aberdeen in 1852 and put together more permanently under the former Canningite Tory Lord Palmerston in 1859. Although the Whigs at first formed the most important part of
20874-497: Was from a Scottish Presbyterian family and petitioned the Court of Chancery to set aside a provision in Amberley's will requiring the children to be raised as agnostics. Despite her religious conservatism, she held progressive views in other areas (accepting Darwinism and supporting Irish Home Rule ), and her influence on Bertrand Russell's outlook on social justice and standing up for principle remained with him throughout his life. Her favourite Bible verse, "Thou shalt not follow
21021-534: Was not satisfied with the old traditional education and thought that progressive education also had some flaws; as a result, together with Dora, Russell founded the experimental Beacon Hill School in 1927. The school was run from a succession of different locations, including its original premises at the Russells' residence, Telegraph House, near Harting , West Sussex. During this time, he published On Education, Especially in Early Childhood . On 8 July 1930, Dora gave birth to her third child Harriet Ruth. After he left
21168-459: Was prosecuted under the Defence of the Realm Act ) He later said of his imprisonment: I found prison in many ways quite agreeable. I had no engagements, no difficult decisions to make, no fear of callers, no interruptions to my work. I read enormously; I wrote a book, "Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy"... and began the work for "The Analysis of Mind". I was rather interested in my fellow-prisoners, who seemed to me in no way morally inferior to
21315-415: Was published between 1910 and 1913. This, along with the earlier The Principles of Mathematics , soon made Russell world-famous in his field. Russell's first political activity was as the Independent Liberal candidate in the 1907 by-election for the Wimbledon constituency , where he was not elected. In 1910, he became a lecturer at the University of Cambridge , Trinity College, where he had studied. He
21462-417: Was then known outside of China) to lecture on philosophy for a year. He went with optimism and hope, seeing China as then being on a new path. Other scholars present in China at the time included John Dewey and Rabindranath Tagore , the Indian Nobel-laureate poet. Before leaving China, Russell became gravely ill with pneumonia , and incorrect reports of his death were published in the Japanese press. When
21609-401: Was voluntary and was not the result of another altercation. The reason for the resignation, according to Hardy, was that Russell was going through a tumultuous time in his personal life with a divorce and subsequent remarriage. Russell contemplated asking Trinity for another one-year leave of absence but decided against it since this would have been an "unusual application" and the situation had
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