Anthony Collins

Anthony Collins (1676-1729) was an English philosopher and essayist, and one of the early advocates of Deism in Great Britain. He belonged to a generation of English freethinkers who, at the beginning of the eighteenth century, debated reason, revelation and established religion amid fierce controversy. His work matters because it gathered the objections of earlier English freethinkers and pushed them further.

He was born at Heston, near Hounslow in Middlesex, the son of a lawyer. He was educated at Eton and King's College, Cambridge, and studied law at the Middle Temple. His friendship with John Locke, whom his letters describe with warmth, was the most notable episode of his life. In 1715 he settled in Essex, where he served as a justice of the peace. He died at his house in Harley Street, London.

His first notable work was the Essay concerning the Use of Reason (1707), in which he rejected the distinction between what is above reason and what is contrary to it, and demanded that revelation conform to natural ideas of God. His chief work, A Discourse of Freethinking (1713), presented free inquiry as an inalienable right, necessary for reaching the truth and for the good of society, and argued that the Bible itself endorses it. The book stirred a great debate and drew several replies, including one from Richard Bentley. In 1724 he published a treatise on the grounds of the Christian religion that questioned whether Old Testament prophecies were literally fulfilled in Christ and denied the canonicity of the New Testament, provoking many answers. In philosophy he stood out as a defender of necessitarianism with his Inquiry Concerning Human Liberty (1717), which Samuel Clarke rebutted; Collins replied in 1729 with Liberty and Necessity.

Collins was also a great book collector, with one of the largest private libraries of his time. His influence can be seen in later debates over deism and biblical criticism, and his courteous style, in contrast with the harshness of his opponents, gave him a distinctive place in the history of freethought.