Ralph Cudworth

Ralph Cudworth (1617-1688), English philosopher and teacher, born at Aller, Somersetshire, and educated at Emmanuel College, University of Cambridge. He remained at Cambridge, where he became master of Clare Hall in 1645 and master of Christ's College in 1654. He was the principal member of a group of philosophers, known as the Cambridge Platonists, opposed to the materialistic philosophy of the English philosopher Thomas Hobbes. Cudworth's chief work was The True Intellectual System of the Universe, the first part of which appeared under that title in 1678. This portion, a treatise against atheism, was followed by other parts of the work that were posthumously published as A Treatise Concerning Eternal and Immutable Morality (1731) and A Treatise of Freewill (1838).