Spencer was a polymath who made contributions to philosophy, sociology, and ethics. He was an important figure in the establishment of evolutionary theory and in the development of individualist ethics. Spencer was widely influential in both Europe and North America and was highly regarded by such figures as John Stuart Mill (1806-1873), Charles Darwin (1809-1882) and T. H. Huxley (1825-1895).
Herbert Spencer was born on 27 April 1820 in Derby, an East-Midlands manufacturing town which at the time had a very active intellectual nonconformist community characterized by rational philosophical debate, an interest in experimental science, and the politics of reform and free trade. Spencer received an informal education until the age of thirteen from his father, an intellectually exacting auto-didactic Methodist schoolmaster who sought reason as the cause in all things and disapproved of the...
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Citation: McLean, Steven. "Herbert Spencer". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 12 February 2010 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=4169, accessed 09 June 2026.]
