author
W. R. Washington (William Robert Washington) Sullivan
1860–1917
A physician, lecturer, and leading voice in London’s Ethical Religion movement, W. R. Washington Sullivan argued that morality could provide the foundation traditionally sought in religion. His best-known book, Morality as a Religion, blends philosophy, social thought, and spiritual idealism.
1 Audiobook
Morality as a religion : an exposition of some first principles
by W. R. Washington (William Robert Washington) Sullivan
About the author
W. R. Washington Sullivan (1860–1917) was a physician and ethical-religion lecturer associated with London’s Ethical Religion Society, which held Sunday services at Steinway Hall. He helped promote a form of religious life centered on conscience, moral duty, and human progress rather than fixed creeds or supernatural doctrine.
His principal work, Morality as a Religion: An Exposition of Some First Principles, was published in 1898. Drawing especially on Immanuel Kant, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and the wider Ethical Culture movement, Sullivan explored the relationship between ethics, science, religion, conscience, marriage, war, prayer, and death.
Sullivan’s writing presents morality not simply as a set of rules, but as a source of meaning and spiritual purpose. Though little biographical information about his private life is readily available, his work remains a vivid example of late-Victorian efforts to rebuild religious thought around ethical living.