Edward Caird

Edward Caird FRSE FBA (/kɛərd/; 23 March 1835 – 1 November 1908) was a Scottish philosopher. He was a holder of LLD, DCL, and DLitt.

Edward Caird FRSE FBA
Caird while a professor at the University of Glasgow
Born	23 March 1835 Greenock, Scotland
Died	1 November 1908 Oxford, England
Alma mater	University of Glasgow
Era	19th-century philosophy
Region	Western philosophy
School	British idealism[1]
Institutions	Merton College, Oxford
Academic advisors	Benjamin Jowett
Main interests	Philosophy of religion
Notable ideas	The relation of evolutionary theory to the development of thought and culture[1]

Life

Caird as caricatured by Spy (Leslie Ward) in Vanity Fair, April 1895.

The younger brother of the theologian John Caird, he was the son of engineer John Caird, the proprietor of Caird & Company,^[2] born at Greenock in Renfrewshire, and educated at Greenock Academy and the Universities of Glasgow and Oxford (B.A. 1863). He was a Fellow and Tutor of Merton College from 1864 to 1866.^{[3][4]: xxxvi}

In 1866, he was appointed to the Chair of Moral Philosophy at Glasgow, which he held until 1893. In that year he became Master of Balliol College, from which he retired in 1907. In 1894 he was made an Honorary Fellow of Merton College.^[3]

He was elected an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1900.

In May 1902 he was at Carnavon to receive the honorary degree D.Litt. (Doctor of Letters) from the University of Wales during the ceremony to install the Prince of Wales (later King George V) as Chancellor of that university.^[5]

He was a founder member of the Glasgow and West of Scotland Association for Women's Suffrage,^[6] alongside his wife, Caroline.

The philosopher John Watson was among his pupils at the University of Glasgow.^[7]

He died in Oxford on 1 November 1908 and was buried there in St Sepulchres Cemetery.^[8]

Caird was a Hegelian idealist and was an important contributor to the British idealist movement.^{[9][10]: 121}

Family

He married Caroline Frances Wylie in 1867. They had no children.^[11]

Works

Books

• The Collected Works of Edward Caird, 12 volumes, ed. Colin Tyler, Bristol: Thoemmes Press, 1999
• A Critical Account of the Philosophy of Kant, with an Historical Introduction, Glasgow: J. Maclehose, 1877
• Hegel, Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott and Co.; Edinburgh: W. Blackwood and Sons, 1883
• The Social Philosophy and Religion of Comte, Glasgow: J. Maclehose and Sons, 1885; New York: Macmillan, 1885
• The Critical Philosophy of Immanuel Kant, Glasgow: J. Maclehose and Sons, 1889; New York: Macmillan, 1889 (2 volumes) Volume 1 Volume 2 second edition 1909
• Essays on Literature and Philosophy, Glasgow: J. Maclehose and Sons, 1892 (2 volumes) Volume 1 Volume 2
• The Evolution of Religion, Glasgow: James Maclehose and Sons, 1893; New York: Macmillan, 1893 (Gifford Lectures 1890–92; I, II)
• The Evolution of Theology in the Greek Philosophers, Glasgow: J. Maclehose and Sons, 1904 (Gifford Lectures, 1900–02; I, II)
• Lay sermons and addresses, delivered in the Hall of Balliol College, Oxford (1907)

Pamphlets

• The Problem of Philosophy at the Present Time: an Introductory Address Delivered to the Philosophical Society of the University of Edinburgh, Glasgow, James Maclehose & Sons, 1881
• The Moral Aspect of the Economical Problem: Presidential Address to the Ethical Society, London, Swan Sonnenschein, Lowrey & Co., 1888
• Address on Plato's Republic as the Earliest Educational Treatise, Bangor: Jarvis & Foster, 1894
• Individualism and Socialism, Being the Inaugural Address to the Civic Society of Glasgow (1897)
• Idealism and the Theory of Knowledge, London: Henry Frowde, 1903

References

Citations

1. "Edward Caird". Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
2. "Former RSE Fellows 1783–2002" (PDF). Royal Society of Edinburgh. Archived from the original (PDF) on 4 October 2006. Retrieved 19 September 2010.
3. Levens, R.G.C., ed. (1964). Merton College Register 1900–1964. Oxford: Basil Blackwell. p. 6.
4. Boucher, D., Geuss, R., & Skinner, Q., eds., The British Idealists (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), p. xxxvi.
5. "The Royal visit to Wales". The Times. No. 36759. London. 5 May 1902. p. 10.
6. King, Elspeth (1978). The Scottish Women's Suffrage Movement / ... compiled by Elspeth King to accompany the Government sponsored 'Right to Vote' exhibition organised to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Representation of the People Act, from 9th September- 7th October 1978, Peoples Palace Museum, Glasgow Green. Glasgow: People's Palace Museum.
7. "Gifford Lecture Series – Biography – John Watson". Archived from the original on 14 September 2011. Retrieved 5 September 2011.
8. C D Waterston; A Macmillan Shearer (July 2006). Former Fellows of The Royal Society of Edinburgh, 1783–2002: Part 1 (A–J) (PDF). Royal Society of Edinburgh. ISBN 090219884X. Archived from the original (PDF) on 24 January 2013. Retrieved 18 September 2015.
9. Mander, W. J. (2014). The Oxford Handbook of British Philosophy in the Nineteenth Century. Oxford University Press. p. 560. ISBN 978-0-19-959447-4
10. Brown, Stuart; Collinson, Diane; Wilkinson, Robert. (1996). Biographical Dictionary of Twentieth-Century Philosophers. Routledge. p. 121. ISBN 0-415-06043-5
11. Anon., Who was Who: A Companion to "Who's Who" (London: A & C Black, 1967), p. 111.

Sources

• Jones, H., & Muirhead, J. H., The Life and Philosophy of Edward Caird, Glasgow: MacLehose, Jackson & Co., 1921.
• Tyler, C., Edward Caird, in Dictionary of Liberal Thought; Brack & Randall (eds.), Politico's 2007, pp. 54–56.

External links

• Works by or about Edward Caird at the Internet Archive
• The life and philosophy of Edward Caird, by Sir Henry Jones and John Henry Muirhead (1921), on the Internet Archive
• Edward Caird biographical notes and Lectures online at the Gifford Lectures website
• Edward Caird's grave in St Sepulchre's Cemetery, Oxford, with biography
• Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Caird, Edward" . Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.
•  Cousin, John William (1910), "Caird, Edward", A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature, London: J. M. Dent & Sons – via Wikisource

Academic offices
Preceded by Benjamin Jowett	Master of Balliol College, Oxford 1893–1907	Succeeded by James Leigh Strachan-Davidson