Robert Mark Wenley

Background

Robert Mark Wenley was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, the son of James Adams and Jemima Isabella (Veitch) Wenley. His father, of Norman-French descent and East Anglian origin, was sometime treasurer of the Bank of England and president of the Institute of Bankers of Scotland; his mother, of Lowland Scotch ancestry, was related to the Sibbald and Romanes families. Wenley's traditions were thus strictly of the upper bourgeoisie.

Education

He received his early education at a preparatory school in Edinburgh and later at the Park School and a high school in Glasgow, entering the University of Glasgow at the age of fifteen in November 1876.

Career

During his second year at the university, his work in philosophy awakened doubts of the strict religious Calvinism in which he had been brought up, and he plunged into a course of intensive study on an attempted schedule of four days a week without sleep. The inevitable nervous breakdown came at last, but not until he had been thrice gold medallist in philosophy and once university medallist, and, what was more important, had won the close friendship of the Scottish Hegelian, Edward Caird. During this period of heroic study, he was also influenced by, among his other teachers, Lord Kelvin in physics, Jebb and Sonnenschein in the classics, and John Nichol in English literature. He spent fourteen months in Paris, Rome, and Florence, recuperating from his breakdown, after which he returned to Glasgow, where he received the degree of Master of Arts in 1884, followed by those of Doctor of Philosophy in 1895, and Doctor of Science, from the University of Edinburgh, in 1891. From 1886 to 1894 he was assistant professor of logic at the University of Glasgow and also, from 1886 to 1895, was in charge of the philosophy department in Queen Margaret College, as well as being degree examiner in mental philosophy, 1888-1891, and becoming dean of the arts faculty in the latter year. He was at various times president of the University Liberal Club, the Students Representative Council, the Students Union, the Theological Society, the Bothwell Literary Association of Edinburgh, and the Dialectic Society of Glasgow. Invited to the University of Michigan in 1896 to succeed John Dewey, he spent the rest of his life there as head of the department of philosophy, with the exception of the years 1925 to 1927, when he was director of the American University Union in London.

Achievements

• Unusually equipped in both scientific and classical scholarship in addition to his command of his own field, a brilliant and powerful lecturer with a mastery of sarcasm and sardonic wit, he was easily the most influential teacher on the Michigan faculty, attracting the ablest students to his classes. A liberal in religion and a Tory in politics he set forth his particular form of Green-Caird-Bosanquet Hegelianism in a series of volumes: Socrates and Christ (1889); Aspects of Pessimism (1894); Contemporary Theology and Theism (1897); An Outline Introductory to Kant's "Critique of Pure Reason" (1897); The Preparation for Christianity in the Ancient World (1898); Modern Thought and the Crisis in Belief (1909); Kant and His Philosophical Revolution (1910); The Anarchist Ideal (1913); The Life and Work of George Sylvester Morris (1917), probably his most valuable book; Stoicism and its Influence (1924). He also contributed numerous articles to J. M. Baldwin's Dictionary of Philosophy and Psychology and to James Hastings' Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, published a history of The University Extension Movement in Scotland (1895), and edited Poetry by John Davidson (1924).

Works

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  • The Preparation for Christianity in the Ancient World: A Study in the History of Moral Development (Classic Reprint)

    (Excerpt from The Preparation for Christianity in the Anci...)

  • Socrates and Christ, a Study in the Philosophy of Religion

    (Unlike some other reproductions of classic texts (1) We h...)

  • Marian Evans And "george Eliot."

    ( This work has been selected by scholars as being cultur...)

  • An Outline Introductory to Kant's Critique of Pure Reason

    (This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curat...)

  • The Life and Work of George Sylvester Morris, a Chapter in the History of American

    (This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curat...)

  • Movement Towards Physiological Psychology (1908)

    (This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of th...)

  • The Anarchist Ideal: And Other Essays (1913)

    (This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of th...)

  • Pamphlets And Reprints...

    (This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)

Personality

He was very large and strong,

Interests

• He devoted his energies to athletics, gaining prizes in football, rowing, and swimming, but probably laying the foundation for the heart weakness that was ultimately to cause his death. He also seriously injured his right hand in football, making his handwriting almost illegible.

Connections

He was married to Catherine Dickson Gibson, the daughter of Archibald Gibson, secretary of the Caledonian Railway Company, in April 1889.

Father:

James Adams Wenley

Mother:

Jemima Isabella (Veitch) Wenley

Spouse:

Catherine Dickson Gibson