Anthony Collins

Anthony Collins (21 June 1676 O.S.13 December 1729 O.S.) was an English philosopher and essayist, notable for being one of the early proponents of Deism in Great Britain. Life and writings Collins was born in Heston, near Hounslow in Middlesex, England, the son of lawyer Henry Collins (1646/7–1705) and Mary (née Dineley). He had two sisters: Anne Collins (born 1678), who married Henry Lovibond (born 1675), and Mary Collins (born 1680), who married Edward Lovibond (1675–1737), a merchant and Director of the East India Company. Mary and Edward's son was the poet Edward Lovibond. Collins was educated at Eton College and King's College, Cambridge, and studied law at the Middle Temple. The most interesting episode of his life was his intimacy with John Locke, who in his letters speaks of him with affection and admiration. In 1715 he settled in Essex, where he held the offices of justice of the peace and deputy-lieutenant, which he had previously held in Middlesex. He died at his house in Harley Street, London. His writings gather together the results of previous English freethinkers. The imperturbable courtesy of his style is in striking contrast to the violence of his opponents; and, in spite of his unorthodoxy, he was neither an atheist nor an agnostic. In his own words, "Ignorance is the foundation of atheism, and freethinking the cure of it" (Discourse of Freethinking, 105).