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Richard Dean (c. 1727 – 8 February 1778) was an English Anglican minister and early animal rights writer.

Biography

Dean was born in Kirkby Malham, Yorkshire, around 1727. In addition to being an Anglican minister, Dean was schoolmaster of Middleton grammar school. He was first curate of Royton Chapel and curate of Middleton.

Dean is best known for his two volume book, An Essay on the Future Life of Brutes, which argued for animal rights and a future existence (afterlife) for animals from the Bible. He argued that animal immortality followed logically and morally from animal sentience. Dean believed that animals had a sentient principle or soul and that and a loving God would not have created animals subject to pain if he had not intended to compensate their suffering with a future existence.

Dean argued against the Cartesian view that animals were mere machines. He argued for animal intelligence and asserted that animals live and suffer as humans do. He believed that this implied that man has a moral responsibility to animals. During his time not many writers held this view; however, Dean did acknowledge the work of John Hildrop.

Dean died in Middleton on 8 February 1778.

Selected publications

• An Essay on the Future Life of Brutes (two volumes, 1768)

See also

• Christian writers about animal rights and welfare

References

1. ^ Grayling, A. C.; Goulder, Naomi; Pyle, Andrew, eds. (1 January 2006). The Continuum Encyclopedia of British Philosophy (1 ed.). Continuum. p. 802. doi:10.1093/acref/9780199754694.001.0001. ISBN 978-0-19-975469-4.
2. ^ Sutton, Charles William (1888). "Dean, Richard" . Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 14. p. 250.
3. Garrett, Aaron. (2000). Animal Rights and Souls in the Eighteenth Century. Thoemmes Press. p. 18. ISBN 1-85506-826-5
4. Perkins, David. (2003). Romanticism and Animal Rights. Cambridge University Press. p. 28. ISBN 0-521-82941-0
5. Richardson, Angelique. (2013). After Darwin: Animals, Emotions, and the Mind. Rodopi. pp. 38-40. ISBN 978-90-420-3747-2

• 1727 births
• 1778 deaths
• 18th-century English Anglican priests
• 18th-century English educators
• 18th-century English male writers
• 18th-century English non-fiction writers
• Clergy from Yorkshire
• English animal rights scholars
• English Christian writers
• People from Craven District
• Anglican writers
• Christian writers about animal rights and welfare