HUGEL, FRIEDRICH VON, BARON (1852-1925), Cath olic theologian, son of Karl Von Hugel (1775-187o), baron of the Holy Roman Empire, was born on May 5, 1852 at Florence. In 1867 the family moved to England, and settled at Torquay. Von Hugel later became one of the most sympathetic, resourceful and persuasive religious teachers of his age. But while he possessed a generous sympathy for all seekers after truth, he held the Catholic Church to possess the fullest, richest and deepest realiza tion of religion. He accepted the papacy, but thought that Church government was overcentralized, believing that this tendency could be counteracted by the healthy interaction of energy be tween the head and the members of the whole body of believers. His relations with the Higher Criticism resulting from his Biblical scholarship led him to be classed with the Modernists, but when the crisis of Modernism was over he made it clear that he could not follow the Modernists who revolted from Rome, and that he rejected their theory of belief.
In 1873 Von Hugel married Lady Mary Herbert, a daughter of Sydney Herbert (Lord Herbert of Lea). He died in London on Jan. 27, 1925, leaving his library to St. Andrews university.