Firmin Abauzit

Firmin Abauzit (11 November 1679 – 20 March 1767) was a French scholar who worked on

For two years his brother and he lived as fugitives in the mountains of the Cévennes, but they at last reached Geneva, where their mother afterwards joined them on escaping from the imprisonment in which she was held from the time of their flight. Abauzit at an early age acquired great proficiency in languages, physics, and theology.^[4]

In 1698, he traveled to

The reputation of Abauzit induced William III to request him to settle in England, but he did not accept the king's offer, preferring to return to Geneva.^[4][5] There from 1715 he rendered valuable assistance to a society that had been formed for translating the New Testament into French. He declined the offer of the chair of philosophy at the University of Geneva in 1723.^[1] He assisted in the French language New Testament in 1726.^[1] In 1727, he was granted citizenship in Geneva, and he accepted the office of honorary librarian to Geneva, the city of his adoption.^[1] It was while he was in Geneva in his later years that he authored many of his works. He died in Geneva at the age of 87, on 20 March 1767.^[4]

Legacy

Abauzit was a man of great learning and of wonderful versatility. Whatever chanced to be discussed, it used to be said of Abauzit that he seemed to have made it a subject of particular study.

Little remains of the labours of this intellectual giant, his heirs having, it is said, destroyed the papers that came into their possession, because their own religious opinions were different. A few theological, archaeological, and astronomical articles from his pen appeared in the Journal helvétique and elsewhere, and he contributed several papers to Rousseau's Dictionnaire de musique (1767). He wrote a work throwing doubt on the canonical authority of the Apocalypse, which called forth a reply from Dr Leonard Twells, and was published in Denis Diderot's Encyclopédie. He also edited and made valuable additions to Jacob Spon's Histoire de la république de Genève. A collection of his writings was published at Geneva in 1770 (Œuvres de feu M. Abauzit), and another at London in 1773 (Œuvres diverses de M. Abauzit).^[4]

Works

Footnotes

References

• Debus, Allen G.; Calinger, Ronald S.; Collins, Edward J.; Kennedy, Stephen J., eds. (1968). "Abauzit, Firmin". World Who's Who in Science: A Biographical Dictionary of Notable Scientists From Antiquity to the Present. Chicago, Illinois: The A. N. Marquis Company.
  LCCN 68056149
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• Hoiberg, Dale H., ed. (2010). "Abauzit, Firmin". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. I: A-Ak - Bayes (15th ed.). Chicago, Illinois: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
  LCCN 2002113989
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• Magnusson, Magnus; Goring, Rosemary, eds. (1990). Cambridge Biographical Dictionary. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
  ISBN 0-521-39518-6
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•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Abauzit, Firmin". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 1 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 8.
• LCCN 04021025
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• Abauzit, Firmin (1774). Miscellanies of the Late Ingenious and Celebrated M. Abauzit on Historical, Theological, and Critical Subjects. Translated by
  LCCN 82067547
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• LCCN 07020498
  .

• Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, Abauzit, Firmin.