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Annie Besant
Annie Besant , 1847-1933, English social reformer and theosophist, b. Annie Wood. She steadily grew away from Christianity and in 1873 separated from her husband, a Protestant clergyman. In 1879 the courts deprived her of her children because of her atheism and alleged unconventionality. As a member...
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Sir Walter Besant
Sir Walter Besant , 1836-1901, English novelist and humanitarian, grad. Christ's College, Cambridge, 1859. He taught at the Royal College of Mauritius from 1861 to 1867. After his return to England he devoted himself to writing and to various causes, among them the improvement of the copyright laws....
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Jiddu Krishnamurti
Jiddu Krishnamurti , 1895-1986, Indian religious figure whose message centered on the need for maximum self-awareness. In 1909, Annie Besant met him and proclaimed him an incarnation of Maitreya, the messianic Buddha. Krishnamurti repudiated these claims in 1929, following a two-year tour of Engla...
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Charles Bradlaugh
Charles Bradlaugh , 1833-91, British social reformer, a secularist. Editor of the free-thinking weekly National Reformer from 1860 and later associated with Annie Besant , he was an early advocate of woman's suffrage, birth control, free speech, national education, trade unionism, and other contr...
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Fabian Society
Fabian Society British socialist society. An outgrowth of the Fellowship of the New Life (founded 1883 under the influence of Thomas Davidson), the society was developed the following year by Frank Podmore and Edward Pease. George Bernard Shaw and Sidney Webb joined soon after this and became its o...
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Portsmouth
Portsmouth city (1991 pop. 174,218) and district, Hampshire, S England, on Spithead Channel. The district includes Portsea (naval station), Southsea (residential district and resort), and the old town of Portsmouth proper. Since Henry VII had stone fortifications and docks built there, Portsmouth c...
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Bhagavad-Gita
Bhagavad-Gita [Skt.,=song of the Lord], Sanskrit poem incorporated into the Mahabharata , one of the greatest religious classics of Hinduism. The Gita (as it is often called) consists of a dialogue between Lord Krishna and Prince Arjuna on the eve of the great battle of Kurukshetra. Arjuna is ov...
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theosophy
theosophy [Gr.,=divine wisdom], philosophical system having affinities with mysticism and claiming insight into the nature of God and the world through direct knowledge, philosophical speculation, or some physical process. This system of thought differs from many other philosophical positions in ...
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Richard Whittington
Richard Whittington 1358-1423, English merchant and lord mayor of London. He made his fortune as a mercer and then entered London politics to become successively councilman, alderman, sheriff, and finally (1397) lord mayor, an office to which he was elected three times. Like most of the London merc...
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Gaspard de Châtillon Coligny, comte de
Gaspard de Châtillon Coligny, comte de , 1519-72, French Protestant leader. A nephew of Anne, duc de Montmorency , he came to the French court at an early age. He distinguished himself at Ceresole (1544) in the Italian Wars, was promoted colonel general of infantry, and in 1552 became admiral...
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