Chapman Cohen was a leading English atheist and secularist writer and lecturer.

Life

Chapman Cohen was the elder son of Enoch Cohen, a Jewish confectioner, and his wife, Deborah (née Barnett). He attended a local elementary school but was otherwise self-educated. He had read Spinoza, Locke, Hume, Berkeley, and Plato by the time he was eighteen.

Cohen recalled that he had "little religion at home and none at school", as he was withdrawn from Religious Instruction classes.

Cohen and his wife had two children; a son (who entered the medical profession) and a daughter, who died at the age of 29.

On his death, The Times printed a short obituary of Cohen, which said:

He was the author of many books setting forth the freethought

Freethought

Freethought is a philosophical viewpoint that holds that opinions should be formed on the basis of science, logic, and reason, and should not be influenced by authority, tradition, or other dogmas...

 philosophy of life, which had a large sale, and he was outstanding as a forthright, witty and courteous debater and lecturer.

Secularist activism

Cohen moved to London in 1889, and soon became involved in the secularist movement. Cohen commented that,

My introduction to the platform of the National Secular Society was quite accidental. I had heard none of its speakers, read none of its publications, except an occasional glance at Bradlaugh's National Reformer. I knew there was a Freethought movement afoot, but that was about all.

Cohen (1940, p. 61) relates that in the Summer of 1889 he was walking in Victoria Park when he came across a crowd listening to a Christian speaker:

the speaker was opposed by an old gentleman – at least he seemed old to me – who suffered from an impediment in his speech. The lecturer in replying spent part of his time in mimicking the old gentleman's speech. After he had "replied," the lecturer asked for more opposition. Mainly because of his treatment of the old man I accepted the invitation.

He spoke against the same lecturer – at their invitation – a few weeks later. Shortly afterwards he was invited to speak the local branch of the National Secular Society

National Secular Society

The National Secular Society is a British campaigning organisation that promotes secularism and the separation of church and state. It holds that no-one should gain advantage or disadvantage because of their religion or lack of religion. It was founded by Charles Bradlaugh in 1866...

. After a year of lecturing for the freethought cause, he joined the NSS.

He was a popular lecturer for the Society, at his peak delivering over 200 lectures a year. He was elected a vice-president of the NSS in 1895.

In 1897 Cohen began contributing weekly articles to G. W. Foote

George William Foote

George William Foote was a British secularist and journal editor.He was born in Plymouth, England and brought up in the Anglican tradition...

's Freethinker

The Freethinker (journal)

The Freethinker is a British secular humanist magazine, founded by G.W. Foote in 1881. It is the world's oldest surviving freethought publication.It has always taken an unapologetically atheist, anti-religious stance...

, having previously written accounts of his lecture tours. In 1898 he became assistant editor of The Freethinker, and after Foote's death in 1915 he was appointed editor. Cohen had written for other freethought journals before joining The Freethinker, and had edited The Truthseeker, owned by J.W. Gott. Cohen also succeeded Foote as President of the National Secular Society.

According to Edward Royle

Edward Royle

Edward Royle is Emeritus Professor of History at the University of York and author of books on the history of religious ideas, particularly in Yorkshire.-Career:...

 (2004), "as an organizer Cohen did much to build up the resources of secularism in the inter-war years, but by 1949, when he was persuaded to resign as president, many members felt he had stayed on too long."

In 1940, summarising his own contribution to the Secularist

Secularism

Secularism is the principle of separation between government institutions and the persons mandated to represent the State from religious institutions and religious dignitaries...

 movement, Cohen wrote:

For about forty-four years I have been busy in the interests of Freethought with my pen as well as with my tongue, and for about forty-two years I have been a regular writer for one of the oldest Freethought journals in Europe, and with a single exception, the oldest in the world. For twenty-four years I have been the official editor of that journal, and for the same period, President of the National Secular Society, the only organization for the propagation of militant Freethought in the British Isles.

My career as a lecturer – continuously lecturing – is a record in the history of the Freethought movement.

Cohen remained editor of The Freethinker until 1951, when he retired and was replaced by F.A. Ridley.

Cohen criticised what he saw as mystical tendencies in the writings of some physicists, such as Arthur Eddington

Arthur Stanley Eddington

Sir Arthur Stanley Eddington, OM, FRS was a British astrophysicist of the early 20th century. He was also a philosopher of science and a popularizer of science...

. Matthew Stanley interprets Cohen's materialism in Marxist

Marxism

Marxism is an economic and sociopolitical worldview and method of socioeconomic inquiry that centers upon a materialist interpretation of history, a dialectical view of social change, and an analysis and critique of the development of capitalism. Marxism was pioneered in the early to mid 19th...

terms, describing him as a "highly visible contemporary spokesman for socialist materialism", but noting that "It is unclear whether Cohen was a Marxist in a formal sense: he was a materialist, determinist socialist but he apparently never explicitly used dialectical reasoning or similar ideological resources... It seems likely that his anti-authoritarian attitudes prevented him from declaring formal allegiance to any system of thought, including Marxism."

Works by Cohen

• Almost an autobiography: confessions of a freethinker. London: Pioneer Press, 1940.
• Essays in freethinking: first series. London: Pioneer Press, 1923.
• Essays in freethinking: second series. London: Pioneer Press, 1927.
• Essays in freethinking: third series. London: Pioneer Press, 1928.
• Essays in freethinking: fourth series. London: Pioneer Press, 1938.
• Essays in freethinking: fifth series. London: Pioneer Press, 1939.
• Essays in freethinking: volume one. Reprint of Essays in freethinking, first and second series. Revised edition. Austin, Texas: American Atheist Press, 1987.
• Essays in freethinking: volume two. Reprint of Essays in freethinking, third and fourth series. Revised edition. Austin, Texas: American Atheist Press, 1987.
• God and the universe: Eddington, Jeans, Huxley and Einstein. London: Pioneer Press, 1931.
• A grammar of freethought. London: Pioneer Press, 1921.
• Materialism restated. London: Pioneer Press, 1927 (3rd edition 1943).
• Opinions, random reflections and wayside sayings. London: Pioneer Press, 1931.
• Religion and sex: studies in the pathology of religious development. London/Edinburgh: TN Foulis, 1919. Reprint, New York: AMS Press, 1975.
• Theism or atheism: the great alternative. London: Pioneer Press, 1921.
• War, civilization and the churches. London: Pioneer Press, 1930.

External links

• http://www.positiveatheism.org/tochcohn.htm
• http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/chapman_cohen/index.shtml