>Muzilon: /* Early life */ Italy

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Early life: Italy

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{{Use dmy dates|date=July 2017}}
{{Use British English|date=July 2017}}
{{Infobox writer
| name = Walter Richard Cassels
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| birth_date = {{birth date|1826|09|04|df=yes}}
| birth_place = [[London]], [[England]]
| death_date = {{death date and age|1907|6|10|1826|09|04|df=yes}}
| death_place = London, England
| occupation = Writer, merchant
| nationality = English
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| notableworks = ''Supernatural Religion''
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'''Walter Richard Cassels''' (4 September 1826 – 10 June 1907) was an English poet and theological critic best known as the author of ''Supernatural Religion'' (1874).

==Early life==
Cassels was born in London, the son of a British consular official. In the 1850s, he published two volumes of poetry, and spent three years in Italy, where he befriended the poets [[Robert Browning|Robert]] and [[Elizabeth Browning]].<ref name="Huxley">{{cite journal |last1=Huxley |first1=Leonard |authorlink=Leonard Huxley (writer)|title=A Visitor to the Brownings |journal=The Yale Review |date=October 1923 |volume=13 |pages=228-246 |url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.502026/page/n230/mode/1up}}</ref> He later became a partner with two of his brothers in the firm of Peel, Cassels & Co. in [[Bombay]], India. In 1862, he published a monograph on the Bombay cotton industry. After serving on the [[Legislative Council of Bombay]] from 1863 to 1865, Cassels returned to England.

==''Supernatural Religion''==
In 1874, Cassels published an anonymous two-volume work entitled ''Supernatural Religion: An Inquiry into the Reality of Divine Revelation'', in which he challenged the credibility of [[miracle]]s and the validity of the [[New Testament]]. The work at once attracted attention, and resulted in much speculation about the identity of the anonymous author. Many books and articles were written in response to the criticism of Christianity made in ''Supernatural Religion''. The most famous of these rebuttals is a series of essays by Bishop {{nowrap|[[J. B. Lightfoot]]}}, which were subsequently collected and published as a book. In 1877, a third volume was added to ''Supernatural Religion'', and a fully revised edition was published in 1879. A series of anonymous replies to Bishop Lightfoot and other critics appeared in magazine articles and as footnotes or prefaces to reprints of ''Supernatural Religion''. These replies were also compiled as a book in 1889. Abridged popular editions of ''Supernatural Religion'' in a single volume were published in 1902 and 1905.<ref name="ODNB">{{cite web |title=Cassels, Walter Richard (1826-1907)|publisher=Oxford Dictionary of National Biography |url=https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/32325 |doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/32325 |date=23 September 2004}} {{paywalled}}</ref>

==Later life==
News of Cassels' authorship of ''Supernatural Religion'' began to leak out in 1895, after he published a series of signed articles on theology. However, Cassels never publicly acknowledged his authorship of ''Supernatural Religion''. Little is known about his private life, or of how he acquired his extensive knowledge of [[early Christianity]]. It is known that he collected art and was a Fellow of the [[Royal Photographic Society]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Exhibitions of the Royal Photographic Society 1870-1915 |url=http://erps.dmu.ac.uk/exhibitor_details.php?year=1896&efn=Walter+R.+Cassels |publisher=De Montfort University |access-date=7 December 2021}}</ref> He never married and died in London on 10 June 1907.

==Works==
* ''[https://archive.org/details/eidolonorcourseo00cassrich Eidolon, or the Course of a Soul]; and other poems''. William Pickering: London, 1850.
* ''[https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10328 Poems]''. Smith, Elder & Co.: London, 1856.
* ''[https://archive.org/details/cottonanaccount00unkngoog Cotton: An Account of its Culture in the Bombay Presidency]''. 1862.

=== Published anonymously ===

* ''Supernatural Religion: An Inquiry into the Reality of Divine Revelation.''
**[https://archive.org/details/supernaturalreli02cassiala Longmans & Co.: London, 1874 (Volumes I and II). Six editions, 1874-1876. Volume III, 1877.]
**Complete Edition (3 vols), 1879.
**[http://www.ftarchives.net/cassels/sr/contents.htm Popular edition (in 1 volume), 1902, Watts & Co. (Reprinted 1905.)]
*''A Reply to Dr. Lightfoot's Essays''. Longmans & Co.: London, 1889.
*''[https://archive.org/details/gospelaccordingt00cassrich The Gospel according to Peter: A Study]''. Longmans & Co.: London, 1894.

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Bibliography==
*{{cite DNB12|wstitle=Cassels, Walter Richard|volume=1}}
*''[https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/497 Tracks of a Rolling Stone]'' (1905), Henry J. Coke.
*[https://doi.org/10.2307/450282 "Matthew Arnold and 'The Author of Supernatural Religion': The Background to God and the Bible"], by Jerold J. Savory. ''SEL: Studies in English Literature 1500–1900'', Autumn 1976 (Vol 16 no 4), pp. 677–91.
*[https://doi.org/10.1177/1740355307077933 "Male Diagnosis of the Female Pen in Late Victorian Britain: Private Assessments of Supernatural Religion"], by Alan H. Cadwallader. ''Journal of Anglican Studies'', Vol. 5, No. 1, pp. 69–88 (2007).

== External links ==
* [http://www.ftarchives.net/cassels/sr/contents.htm Supernatural Religion: An Inquiry into the Reality of Divine Revelation] (online text of 1902 reprint)
* {{Gutenberg author | id=Cassels,+Walter+Richard }}
* {{Internet Archive author |sname=Walter Richard Cassels}}
* {{Librivox author |id=12673}}
* {{Find a Grave|142180880}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cassels, Walter Richard}}
[[Category:1826 births]]
[[Category:1907 deaths]]
[[Category:19th-century English theologians]]
[[Category:British biblical scholars]]
[[Category:Criticism of the Bible]]
[[Category:Fellows of the Royal Photographic Society]]
[[Category:Members of the Bombay Legislative Council]]
[[Category:Writers from London]]

Walter Richard Cassels - Revision history

>Muzilon: /* Early life */ Italy