View source for William Ralph Inge

{{Short description|English author, Anglican dean and professor of divinity (1860–1954)}}
{{Lead too short|date=March 2023}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2023}}
{{Use British English|date=March 2012}}
{{Infobox clergy
|honorific_prefix = [[The Very Reverend]]
| name        = William Ralph Inge
|honorific_suffix = {{post-nominals|country=GBR|KCVO|FBA|size=100%}}
| image       = Deaninge.jpg
| caption     =
|birth_name=William Ralph Inge
| birth_date  = 6 June 1860
| birth_place = [[Crayke]], [[Yorkshire]], England
| death_date  = 26 February 1954 (aged 93)
| death_place = [[Wallingford, Oxfordshire|Wallingford]], [[Oxfordshire]], England
| church      = [[Church of England]]
| alma_mater  = [[King's College, Cambridge]]
| writings    = 
| title       = 
| spouse      = {{marriage|Mary Catharine Inge|1905|1949|end=died}}
| children    = 5
|offices_held=[[Vicar (Anglicanism)|Vicar]] of [[All Saints, Knightsbridge]] (1905–1907)<br/>[[Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity]] (1907–1911)<br/>[[Dean of St Paul's]] (1911–1934)}}

''' William Ralph Inge''' {{post-nominals|country=GBR|KCVO|FBA}} ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|ɪ|ŋ}};<ref>[http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/Inge Inge - Definitions from Dictionary.com]</ref> 6 June 1860 – 26 February 1954) was an English author, [[Anglicanism|Anglican]] [[priest]], professor of [[Theology|divinity]] at [[Cambridge]], and [[dean (Christianity)|dean]] of [[St Paul's Cathedral]]. Although as an author he used '''W.&nbsp;R. Inge''', and he was personally known as Ralph,<ref>e.g. in [[Hensley Henson]]'s diaries: {{cite web|title=The Henson Journals|date=31 March 1923|url=https://henson.durham.ac.uk/journals/23-03-31|access-date=23 September 2023}}</ref> he was widely known by his title as '''Dean Inge'''. He was nominated for the [[Nobel Prize in Literature]] three times.<ref name="Nomination Database">{{Cite web|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/nomination/archive/show_people.php?id=4451 |title=Nomination Database|website=nobelprize.org|access-date=19 April 2017}}</ref>

== Early life and education ==
[[File:TIMEMagazine24Nov1924.jpg|thumb|right|''[[Time (magazine)|Time]]'' cover, 24 November 1924|265x265px]]
He was born on 6 June 1860 in [[Crayke]], [[Yorkshire]], England. His father, [[William Inge (priest, born 1829)|Rev. William Inge]] was the local [[curate]], and would later go on to become Provost of [[Worcester College, Oxford]]. His mother was Susanna Inge ({{nee}} Churton), daughter of [[Edward Churton]], rector of Crayke and the [[Archdeacon of Cleveland]]. Inge had a "staunchly [[high-church]] upbringing".{{sfn|Grimley|2004}}

Inge was educated at [[Eton College]], where he was a King's Scholar and won the [[Newcastle Scholarship]] in 1879. In 1879, he went on to [[King's College, Cambridge]], where he won a number of prizes including the [[Chancellor's Gold Medal|Chancellor's Medal]], as well as taking firsts in both parts of the [[Classical Tripos]].<ref name=venn/>

== Career ==

===Positions held===
Inge was an assistant master at Eton from 1884 to 1888, and a Fellow of King's College from 1886 to 1888.<ref name=venn/>

In the [[Church of England]], he was ordained deacon in 1888, and priest in 1892.<ref name=venn/>

He was a Fellow and Tutor at [[Hertford College, Oxford]] from 1889 to 1904.<ref>{{cite magazine|magazine=The Hertford College Magazine|date=May 1954|issue=42|title=Obituary|pages=420–422|url=https://www.hertford.ox.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/1954-No.-42-The-Hertford-College-Magazine.pdf|access-date=23 September 2023}}</ref>

His only parochial position was as [[vicar (Anglicanism)|vicar]] of [[All Saints, Knightsbridge]], London, from 1905 to 1907.<ref name=venn>{{acad|id=IN879WR|name=Inge, William Ralph}}</ref>

In 1907, he moved to [[Jesus College, Cambridge]], on being appointed [[Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity]].

In 1911, he became [[Dean of St Paul's]] Cathedral in [[London]]. He served as president of the [[Aristotelian Society]] at Cambridge from 1920 to 1921.

He retired from full-time church ministry in 1934.

Inge was also a trustee of London's [[National Portrait Gallery, London|National Portrait Gallery]] from 1921 until 1951.

===Writing===
Inge was a prolific author. In addition to scores of articles, lectures and sermons, he also wrote over 35 books.{{sfn|Austen|n.d.}} Inge was a columnist for the ''[[Evening Standard]]'' for many years, finishing in 1946.

He is best known for his works on [[Plotinus]]{{sfn|Austen|n.d.}} and [[neoplatonism|neoplatonic]] philosophy, and on [[Christian mysticism]], but also wrote on general topics of life and current politics.

He was nominated for the [[Nobel Prize in Literature]] three times.<ref name="Nomination Database"/>

=== Views ===

Inge was a strong proponent of the spiritual type of religion—"that autonomous faith which rests upon experience and individual inspiration"—as opposed to one of coercive authority. He was therefore outspoken in his criticisms of the [[Roman Catholic Church]]. His thought, on the whole, represents a blending of traditional Christian theology with elements of Platonic philosophy. He shares this in common with one of his favourite writers, [[Benjamin Whichcote]], the first of the [[Cambridge Platonists]].
[[File:The Idea of Progress.djvu|left|thumb|272x272px|[[wikisource:The_Idea_of_Progress|The Idea of Progress]]. The [[Romanes Lecture]] 1920. ]]
He was nicknamed 'The Gloomy Dean' because of his [[pessimism|pessimistic]] views in his [[Romanes Lecture]] of 1920, "The Idea of Progress"{{sfn|Inge|1920}} and in his ''Evening Standard'' articles. In his Romanes Lecture he said that although mankind's accumulated experience and wonderful discoveries had great value, they did not constitute real progress in human nature itself. 

He critiqued [[democracy]]'s propensity to lead to mob rule and the [[tyranny of the majority]], echoing [[Tocqueville]] and [[Burke]], while remaining supportive of the parliamentary and representative system over against autocracy. His stance was typical of the elitist sensibilities expressed by other interwar liberals, conservatives, and progressives. In 1919, he anticipated [[Churchill]]'s famous 1947 remark about democracy as "the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time," saying that "Democracy is a form of government which may be rationally defended, not as being good, but as being less bad than any other.”{{sfn|Inge|1919|p=5}} He saw the levelling tendency of democratism as in tension with the fact that "Human beings are born unequal" and opined that "the only persons who have a right to govern their neighbours are those who are competent to do so."{{sfn|Inge|1932|p=122}} He questioned the electoral prudence of the [[British Conservative Party]] in [[Women's suffrage in the United Kingdom|lowering the age of women's suffrage from 30 to 21]] on the eve of its being granted, alongside the removal of property requirements for male as well as female voters,{{sfn|Inge|1932|pp=121-127}} though once it had been granted he accepted it pragmatically.{{Citation needed|date=April 2025}}

Inge was a supporter of [[population control]] and a member of the British [[Adelphi Genetics Forum|Eugenics Society]] from 1908{{sfn|Fox|1960|p=98}} “until the Second World War, when he resigned in disgust.”{{sfn|Robinson|2014|p=79}} These were themes he touched on in newspaper or journal articles collected in ''Outspoken Essays'' and subsequent publications.

Inge critiqued certain [[Welfare spending|social welfare]] schemes that he believed "penalized the successful while subsidizing the weak and feckless".{{sfn|Austen|n.d.}}{{dead link|date=April 2025}}

Inge defended the dignity of [[British Jews]] against the [[anti-Dreyfusard]] [[Hilaire Belloc]]’s 1922 book ''The Jews.'' “It is contrary to all our traditions," he wrote, "to do what Mr. Belloc wishes us to do—to refuse to forget a man’s racial origins while he lives among us as a good Englishman […] we have enriched our stock by blending it with desirable foreigners of all sorts.”{{sfn|Inge|1926|p=172}} Against scapegoating of Jews, Inge reminded his readers that “It is not their fault that they have been excluded from agriculture and similar pursuits […] It was not by their own choice that they were impounded in Ghettos, or driven to money-lending.”{{sfn|Inge|1926|p=174}} In Inge’s view, “we ought to be ashamed of anti-Jewish prejudice” because “[a]bove all, race-consciousness is a rather silly thing. The sensible man takes his neighbours as he finds them, and is not too ready to believe in dark conspiracies.”{{sfn|Inge|1926|p=178}} 

He was also known for his support for [[nudism]].{{sfn|Shaw|1937|p=24}} {{Better source|date=April 2025}} He supported the publishing of [[Maurice Parmelee]]'s<ref name="Parmelee1927">{{cite book|last=Parmelee|first=Maurice |title=The new gymnosophy: the philosophy of nudity as applied in modern life|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_9yBAAAAMAAJ|year=1927|publisher=F. H. Hitchcock}}</ref> book, ''The New Gymnosophy: Nudity and the Modern Life'',{{sfn|Hirning|2013|p=276}} and was critical of town councillors who were insisting that bathers wear full bathing costumes.<ref name="brit_Dean">{{Cite news | title = Dean Inge and The Nudists | work = Gloucestershire Echo|page=1 col E| date = 17 November 1932 | access-date = 2 May 2016 | url = http://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0000320/19321117/016/0001 | via= [[British Newspaper Archive]]|url-access=subscription }}</ref>

=== Recognition ===
He was made a [[Royal Victorian Order|Commander of the Victorian Order (CVO)]] in 1918 and promoted to [[Knight Commander]] (KCVO) in 1930.<ref name=venn/> He received Honorary Doctorates of Divinity from both Oxford and Aberdeen Universities, Honorary Doctorates of Literature from both Durham and Sheffield, and Honorary Doctorates of Laws from both Edinburgh and St Andrews. He was also an honorary fellow of both King's and Jesus Colleges at Cambridge, and of Hertford College at Oxford. In 1921, he was elected as a [[Fellow of the British Academy]] (FBA), the United Kingdom's national academy for the humanities and social sciences.<ref>{{cite web |title=Very Revd William Ralph Inge FBA |url=https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/fellows/william-ralph-inge-FBA/ |website=thebritishacademy.ac.uk |publisher=The British Academy |access-date=13 November 2024}}</ref>

== Personal life ==
[[File:Brightwell Manor House - geograph.org.uk - 921263.jpg|thumb|upright=1.4|[[Brightwell Manor]] in 2008]]

On 3 May 1905, Inge married Mary Catharine "Kitty" Spooner, daughter of [[Henry Spooner (priest)|Henry Maxwell Spooner]], the Archdeacon of Maidstone.<ref>{{NPG name | id= 64560 | name= Mary Catharine Inge (née Spooner) }}</ref> They had five children:
* William Craufurd Inge (1906–2001)
* Edward Ralph Churton Inge (1907–1980)
* Catharine Mary Inge (1910–1997), married Derek Wigram
* Margaret Paula Inge (1911–1923), died from [[type 1 diabetes]]<ref>{{cite journal|last=Bliss|first=Michael|year=1984|title=Resurrections in Toronto: Fact and Myth in the Discovery of Insulin|journal=Bulletin of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences|volume=38|number=3|pages=15–36|jstor=20171755|quote=Paula, the 10-year-old daughter of Dean Inge, the noted Anglican theologian, was less fortunate. The onset of her diabetes was late in 1921. Because the British were operating about a year behind the North Americans, Paula Inge died before good insulin was available. her father consoled himself with the thought that God had given the parents a whole year's grace before taking their daughter.}}</ref>
* Richard Wycliffe Spooner Inge (1915–1941), priest, killed on an RAF training flight<ref>{{CWGC|id=2436265|name=Inge, Richard Wycliffe Spooner|access-date=21 September 2023}}</ref>

Inge's wife died in 1949.{{sfn|Austen|n.d.}}

Inge spent his later life at [[Brightwell Manor]] in [[Brightwell-cum-Sotwell]], Oxfordshire, where he died on 26 February 1954, aged 93, five years after his wife.{{sfn|Austen|n.d.}}

== Publications ==
The following bibliography is a selection taken mainly from Adam Fox's biography ''Dean Inge'' and his biographical sketch in ''[[Crockford's Clerical Directory]]''.
{{div col}}
* [https://archive.org/details/societyinromeund00inge ''Society in Rome under the Caesars''] 1888
* ''[[Eton Latin Grammar]]'' 1888
* [https://archive.org/details/christianmystic02ingegoog ''Christian Mysticism''] ([[Bampton Lectures]]) 1899
* [https://archive.org/details/faith014788mbp ''Faith''] 1900
* [https://archive.org/details/contentioveritat00univrich ''Contentio Veritatis''] Essays in Constructive Theology by Six Oxford Tutors (two essays) 1902
* [https://archive.org/details/faithknowledgese00ingerich ''Faith and Knowledge: Sermons''] 1904
* [https://archive.org/details/lightlifeandlov00ingegoog ''Light, Life and Love''] (Selections from the [[German mystic]]s of the Middle Ages) 1904 also online at [http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/gutbook/lookup?num=4664 Project Gutenberg] and [http://www.ccel.org/ccel/inge/light.html CCEL]
* [https://archive.org/details/studiesenglish00ingeuoft ''Studies of English Mystics''] 1905
* [https://archive.org/details/truthandfalseho00ingegoog ''Truth and Falsehood in Religion''] ([https://archive.org/details/truthandfalsehoo00ringuoft ''Cambridge Lectures''] 1906
* [https://archive.org/details/personalidealism00ingeiala ''Personal Idealism and Mysticism''] (Paddock Lectures) 1906
* ''All Saints' Sermons'' 1907
* [https://books.google.com/books?id=1jQqAAAAYAAJ& ''Faith and its Psychology''] ([https://archive.org/details/faithanditspsych002828mbp ''Jowett Lectures'']) 1909 
* ''Speculum Animae'' 1911
* [https://archive.org/details/churchage00ingeuoft ''The Church and the Age''] 1912
* [https://archive.org/details/religiousphiloso00ingeuoft ''The Religious Philosophy of Plotinus and some Modern Philosophies of Religion''] 1914
* [https://archive.org/details/TypesOfChristianSaintliness ''Types of Christian Saintliness''] 1915
* [https://archive.org/details/christianmystici00inge ''Christian Mysticism, considered in eight lectures delivered before the University of Oxford''] (1918)
* ''The Philosophy of Plotinus'' ([[Gifford Lectures]]) 1918. Online: [https://archive.org/details/philosophyofplot01inge ''Volume 1''] [https://archive.org/details/philosophyofplot02ingeuoft ''Volume 2''] Print versions: {{ISBN|1-59244-284-6}} (softcover), {{ISBN|0-8371-0113-1}} (hardcover)
* [https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_dFYPAQAAIAAJ ''Outspoken Essays''] [https://archive.org/details/outspokenessinge00ingeiala ''I''] 1919 & [https://archive.org/details/outspokenessays00ingeiala ''II''] 1922
* {{cite book|last=Inge|first=W. R.|url=https://archive.org/details/ideaofprogress00ingeuoft |title=The Idea of Progress|series=[[Romanes Lecture]]|date= 1920|display-authors=0|ref = none}}
* [https://archive.org/details/victorianage00ingeiala ''The Victorian Age: the Rede Lecture for 1922''] 1922 
* ''Assessments and Anticipations'' 1922 (2nd ed. 1929)
* [https://archive.org/details/personalreligion012406mbp ''Personal Religion and the Life of Devotion''] 1924
* [https://archive.org/details/laythoughtsofade035052mbp ''Lay Thoughts of a Dean''] 1926
* ''The Platonic Tradition in English Religious Thought'' [[Hulsean Lectures]] 1926 {{ISBN|0-8414-5055-2}}
* [https://www.fadedpage.com/showbook.php?pid=20251026 ''England''] 1926
* ''The Church in the World'' 1927
* ''Protestantism'' (London: Ernest Benn Limited, 1927)
* [https://archive.org/details/christianethicsa013199mbp ''Christian Ethics and Modern Problems''] 1930
* {{cite book|last=Inge|first=William Ralph |title=More Lay Thoughts of a Dean|url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.216045/page/n121/mode/2up?q=happy|year=1932|publisher=Putnam|location=London and New York|display-authors=0|ref = none}}
* ''Things New and Old'' 1933
* [https://archive.org/details/godandtheastrono013944mbp ''God and the Astronomers''] 1933
*''The Post Victorians'' 1933 (Introduction only)
* Vale 1934
* ''The Gate of Life'' 1935
* ''A Rustic Moralist'' 1937
* ''Our Present Discontents'' 1938 {{ISBN|0-8369-2846-6}}
* ''A Pacifist in Trouble'' 1939 {{ISBN|0-8369-2192-5}}
* ''The Fall of the Idols'' 1940
* ''Talks in a Free Country'' 1942 {{ISBN|0-8369-2774-5}}
* [https://archive.org/details/mysticisminrelig029411mbp ''Mysticism in Religion''] 1947 {{ISBN|0-8371-8953-5}}
* [https://archive.org/details/endofanageandoth007690mbp ''The End of an Age and Other Essays''] 1948
* ''Diary of a Dean'' 1949
* [https://archive.org/details/thingsthatremain013573mbp ''The Things That Remain''] edited by [[Walter Matthews (priest)|W R Matthews]] 1958
{{div col end}}

==References==
===Footnotes===
{{Reflist}}

===Sources===
{{refbegin}}
* {{citation|first=Timothy |last=Austen|date=n.d.|work=The Gifford Lectures|title=William Ralph Inge|url=https://www.giffordlectures.org/lecturers/william-ralph-inge}}
* {{cite book|last=Fox|first=Adam | author-link = Adam Fox (poet) |title=Dean Inge|url=https://archive.org/details/deaninge0000foxa|url-access=registration|year=1960|publisher=J. Murray|location=London}}
* {{cite ODNB|first=Matthew |last=Grimley|id=34098|title=Inge, William Ralph (1860–1954)|date=23 September 2004}}
* {{cite book|last=Hirning|first=L. Clovis|editor1=Albert Ellis|editor1-link = Albert Ellis | editor2=Albert Abarbanel|title=The Encyclopædia of Sexual Behaviour|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1SOLBQAAQBAJ&pg=PA276|year=2013|publisher=Elsevier|isbn=978-1-4832-2510-4|chapter=Clothing and Nudism}}
* {{cite book | last = Inge | first = W. R. | year = 1919 | title = Outspoken Essays | chapter = Our Present Discontents | publisher = Longmans, Green & Co | location = London | page = 5 }}
* {{cite book|last=Inge|first=W. R.|url=https://archive.org/details/ideaofprogress00ingeuoft |title=The Idea of Progress|series=[[Romanes Lecture]]|date= 1920}}
* {{cite book | last = Inge | first = William Ralph | title = Lay Thoughts of a Dean | year = 1926 | url = https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.209347/page/n3/mode/2up | publisher = G. P. Putnam's Sons }}
* {{cite book|last=Inge|first=William Ralph |title=More Lay Thoughts of a Dean|url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.216045/page/n121/mode/2up?q=happy|year=1932|publisher=Putnam|location=London and New York}}
* {{cite book|last=Robinson|first=W. Sydney |author-link = W. Sydney Robinson |title=The Last Victorians: A Daring Reassessment of Four Twentieth Century Eccentrics|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=G7jsAwAAQBAJ|year=2014|publisher=The Robson Press|location=London|isbn=9781849547710}}
* {{cite book|first=Elton Raymond |last=Shaw | author-link = Elton Raymond Shaw | title=The Body Taboo: Its Origin, Effect, and Modern Denial|url=https://archive.org/stream/bodytabooitsorig00shaw/bodytabooitsorig00shaw_djvu.txt|year=1937|publisher=Shaw Publishing|location = Washington D.C.}}
{{refend}}

=== Further reading ===
* {{cite book|last=Helm|first=Robert Meredith |title=The Gloomy Dean: The Thought of William Ralph Inge|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TJJIAAAAMAAJ|year=1962|publisher=J.F. Blair|isbn=9780910244275 }}
* {{cite book|last=Inge|first=W. R. |title=Diary of a Dean: St. Paul's, 1911-1934|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Im6lngEACAAJ|year=1949|publisher=Hutchinson|location=London|isbn=978-1-258-85399-0}}

==External links==
{{wikiquote|William Ralph Inge|William Inge (priest)}}
* {{wikisource author-inline}}
* [http://anglicanhistory.org/england/wringe/ Bibliographic directory] from [[Project Canterbury]]
* {{Gutenberg author | id=1534}}
* {{FadedPage|id=Inge, William Ralph|name=William Ralph Inge|author=yes}}
* {{Internet Archive author |sname=William Ralph Inge}}
* {{Internet Archive author |name=Dean Inge}}
* {{npg name|id=02358|name=William Ralph Inge}}
* {{npg name|id=64560|name=Mary Catharine Inge}}
* [https://archive.org/details/MickeyDeanWilliamInge1960 Recording of Inge speaking]

{{s-start}}
{{s-rel|en}}
{{s-bef|before=[[Robert Gregory (priest)|Robert Gregory]]}}
{{s-ttl|title=[[Dean of St Paul's]]|years=1911–1934}}
{{s-aft|after=[[Walter Matthews (priest)|Walter Matthews]]}}
{{s-aca}}
{{s-bef|before=[[Alexander Kirkpatrick]]}}
{{s-ttl|title=[[Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity]]|years=1907&nbsp;– {{circa|1911}}}}
{{s-aft|after=[[James Bethune-Baker]]}}
{{s-npo}}
{{s-bef|before=[[James Ward (psychologist)|James Ward]]}}
{{s-ttl|title=President of the [[Aristotelian Society]]|years=1920–1921}}
{{s-aft|after=[[F.&nbsp;C.&nbsp;S. Schiller]]}}
{{s-bef|before=[[Hastings Rashdall]]}}
{{s-ttl|title=President of the [[Modern Church|Modern Churchmen's Union]]|years=1924–1934}}
{{s-aft|after=[[Walter Matthews (priest)|Walter Matthews]]}}
{{s-ach}}
{{s-bef|before=[[Frederick H. Gillett]]}}
{{s-ttl|title=[[List of covers of Time magazine (1920s)|Cover of ''Time'' magazine]]|years=24 November 1924}}
{{s-aft|after=[[Chauncey Depew]]}}
{{s-end}}

{{St Paul's Cathedral}}
{{Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity (University of Cambridge)}}
{{Portal bar|Christianity|Biography}}
{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Inge, William Ralph}}
[[Category:1860 births]]
[[Category:1954 deaths]]
[[Category:19th-century Christian mystics]]
[[Category:20th-century Christian mystics]]
[[Category:Alumni of King's College, Cambridge]]
[[Category:Deans of St Paul's]]
[[Category:English Anglicans]]
[[Category:English eugenicists]]
[[Category:Fellows of Hertford College, Oxford]]
[[Category:Fellows of Jesus College, Cambridge]]
[[Category:Knights Commander of the Royal Victorian Order]]
[[Category:Lady Margaret's Professors of Divinity]]
[[Category:People educated at Eton College]]
[[Category:People from Brightwell-cum-Sotwell]]
[[Category:People from Hambleton District]]
[[Category:Presidents of the Aristotelian Society]]
[[Category:Presidents of the Classical Association]]
[[Category:Protestant mystics]]
[[Category:Social nudity advocates]]