Maurice, Frederick Denison

Maurice, Frederick Denison, 1805–72, English clergyman and social reformer. He was brought up a Unitarian but became an Anglican. He studied law at Cambridge and was a founder of the Apostles' Club. Entering Oxford in 1830, he took holy orders in 1831, but in 1853 he lost the post of professor of divinity at King's College, London, because of the views contained in his Theological Essays (1853). He held the chair of moral philosophy at Cambridge from 1866 until his death. Besides one novel, Eustace Conway (1834), he wrote many religious works, including Lectures on Ecclesiastical History (1854) and The Doctrine of Sacrifice (1854). Maurice was a leader of the Christian socialism movement and also a leader in education, being a founder of Queen's College for women (1848) and the Working Men's College (1854), both in London.

See biographies by his son, Sir J. F. Maurice (1884), and C. F. G. Masterman (1907); studies by F. M. McClain (1972) and O. J. Brose (1972).

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