Henry Longueville Mansel

Henry Longueville Mansel (1820-1871) was an English philosopher and Anglican theologian who served as Dean of St Paul's Cathedral. Educated at Oxford, where he later became Waynflete Professor of Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy, Mansel developed a distinctive approach to religious epistemology influenced by William Hamilton's philosophy and Kantian thought. His most significant work, The Limits of Religious Thought (1858), argued that human reason cannot comprehend the infinite nature of God, defending faith against rationalist criticism by emphasizing the limitations of human knowledge. While critics accused him of promoting agnosticism, Mansel maintained that recognizing reason's boundaries actually strengthened the case for revelation and faith. His philosophy influenced subsequent debates about the relationship between reason and revelation, contributing to Victorian discussions about the knowability of God and the proper limits of theological speculation.