4 - A Rationalist Manifesto: Pseudo-Philosophy at the end of the Nineteenth Century, 1897

Summary

IN 1964, the music critic Philip Hope-Wallace committed to print some unsavoury rumours about Newman's past: ‘I once met an owl who solemnly assured me that Newman was an ex-criminal with a “closed chapter” in his life’. This closed chapter was the publication of Pseudo-Philosophy at the end of the Nineteenth Century (1897), which brought Newman into contact with a shady publisher and appears to have dashed his chances of receiving a British knighthood. Not even lobbying by William Emrys Williams (chief editor at Penguin Books, 1936–1965) to have Newman admitted to the Order of the Companions of Honour on his eightieth birthday came to anything. The stench of association from this controversial episode in Newman's life hung over the rest of his career.

Newman wrote Pseudo-Philosophy during his time on the Free Review (discussed in the previous chapter), under the pseudonym of Hugh Mortimer Cecil. In the course of the book's production, Newman unwittingly became associated with a criminal who owned the imprint under which the book was published, the University Press, Watford. There is no evidence that Newman broke the law or was a criminal. Nevertheless, the publication of Pseudo- Philosophy implicated Newman in a case of imprint theft and, indirectly, the suicide of a publisher.

Pseudo-Philosophy is an extreme example of Newman's rationalist ideology and capacity for hard-hitting criticism. Despite its overwhelmingly positive critical reception, which brought Newman considerable respect in freethought circles, it was Newman's last major freethought work. The book was a fierce critique of three recently published, and hugely popular but conservative, books (discussed below) that, amongst other agendas, questioned evolutionary theory and the idea of progress.

G.A. Singer, the Free Review's second editor, commissioned Newman to write Pseudo-Philosophy (John M. Robertson had bequeathed the journal to Singer in 1895 while he pursued a career in politics). Singer's real name, however, was George Ferdinand Springmühl von Weissenfeld. He was a criminal who, under yet another name, Dr Roland de Villiers, was the proprietor of Watford University Press, which later changed its name to University Press Limited, London. By April 1897, Watford University Press had taken control of the Free Review, renaming it University Magazine and Free Review, and had announced the publication of Newman's Pseudo-Philosophy.