BUCHER, boolfer, Anton von, German polemical writer: b. Munich, 8 Jan. 1746; d. 1817. He was educated in the Latin schools of the Jesuits, studied at Ingoldstadt and was conse crated priest in 1768. In 1771 he was appointed rector of the German schools of Munich. In his different offices as a public teacher he did a great deal in his day to instruct and enlighten his country. He incurred the enmity of the Jesuits by his satirical attacks upon them and was finally removed from his position by Max imilian Joseph II, who, however, compensated him by bestowing upon him the benefice of Engelbrechtsmiinster. His contributions to the history of the Jesuits in Bavaria ((Beitrage zur Geschichte der Jesuiten in Elder& ) are of great historical value. His collected works appeared in 1819-20.
BUCHEZ, Philippe Joseph Benja min, French philosopher: b. Matange-la-Petite (now in Belgium), 31 March 1796; d. Rodez, France, 12 Aug. 1865. He gave himself up to the study of the natural sciences, and in par ticular to medicine, receiving his doctor's de gree in 1825. He was bitterly hostile to the government of the Restoration and was one of those who, in 1821, founded the French Society of Carbonari. He became chief editor of the Journal des Progres des Sciences et Institutions Medicales, and in 1826 assisted in editing the Producteur, a weekly paper which advocated the doctrines of Saint-Simonism. In 1831 he
founded a journal of moral and political sci ence, called L'Europ#en, in which he expounded those doctrines which owe their origin chiefly to himself and have been collectively denom inated cBuchezism.a The fundamental idea of his system is that of the progress and develop ment of the human race. But progress pre supposes an aim, and this aim must be pointed out beforehand, or revealed. Thus the idea of progress leads him to the orthodox belief in revelation. This theory is worked out in his a Ia science de l'histoire' (1833) and his (Essai d'un traite complet de philoso phic au point de vue du catholicisme et du (1839). Along with his predilections for the Catholic Church he still retained his strong democratic and republican opinions, and with M. Roux-Lavergne published (Histoire parliamentaire de la Revolution francaise, ou journal des assemblies rationales, depuis 1789 jusqu'en 1815) (40 vols., 1833-38). After the revolution of 1848 he was elected to the con stituent National Assembly, of which he was soon appointed president. Thenceforth he held aloof from public life, prosecuting his studies and writing several works, among which is the (Histoire de la formation de Ia nationalite francaise' (1859).