Editing List of deists (section)

==Born before 1700==

* [[Al-Maʿarri]] (973–1058), was a blind Arab philosopher, poet and writer, and a controversial rationalist.<ref>[http://www.sdsmt.edu/student-orgs/tfs/reading/freethought/islam.html Freethought Traditions in the Islamic World] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120214102422/http://www.sdsmt.edu/student-orgs/tfs/reading/freethought/islam.html |date=14 February 2012 }} by Fred Whitehead; also quoted in Cyril Glasse, (2001), ''The New Encyclopedia of Islam'', p. 278. Rowman Altamira.</ref>
* [[Leonardo da Vinci]] (1452–1519), [[Italian Renaissance]] [[polymath]]: painter, sculptor, architect, musician, scientist, mathematician, engineer, inventor, anatomist, geologist, [[cartographer]], [[botanist]], and writer. Described as a deist by some sources,<ref>{{cite book|title=The Templar Code For Dummies |year=2007|publisher=John Wiley & Sons|isbn=9780470127650|first1=Christopher |last1=Hodapp |author2=Alice Von Kannon |page=256|quote=Da Vinci was definitely an esoteric character and a man of contrasts; a bastard son who rose to prominence; an early Deist who worshipped the perfect machine of nature to such a degree that he wouldn't eat meat, but who made his first big splash designing weapons of war; a renowned painter who didn't much like painting, and often didn't finish them, infuriating his clients; and a born engineer who loved nothing more than hours spent imagining new contraptions of every variety.}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=Leonardo Da Vinci |year=2011 |publisher= Parkstone International|isbn=9781780422954|first=Eugène |last=Müntz |page=80 |quote= To begin with, even if it could be shown – and this is precisely one of the points most in dispute – that Leonardo had broken with the teachings of the Catholic Church, it would still be nonetheless certain that he was a deist and not an atheist or materialist.}}</ref> most historians have deemed him a [[Roman Catholic]].<ref>{{cite book|first1=Zhenwu|last1=Zhu|first2=Aiping|last2=Zhang|year=2016|title=The Dan Brown Craze: An Analysis of His Formula for Thriller Fiction|isbn= 9781443894159|publisher=[[Cambridge Scholars Publishing]]|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8LP6DAAAQBAJ&pg=PA227|page=227|quote=but the overwhelming majority of historians have deemed him a Catholic}}</ref>
* [[Edward Herbert, 1st Baron Herbert of Cherbury]] (1583–1648), British soldier, diplomat, historian, poet and religious philosopher<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.iep.utm.edu/h/herbert.htm |title=Herbert of Cherbury, Edward [The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy&#93; |publisher=Iep.utm.edu |date=16 April 2001 |access-date=4 July 2010}}</ref>
* [[Gottfried Leibniz]] (1646–1716), German mathematician and philosopher. He is best known for developing [[infinitesimal calculus]] independently of [[Isaac Newton]], and his mathematical notation has been widely used ever since it was published. He has also been labeled a Christian as well.<ref>"In a commentary on Shaftesbury published in 1720, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, a Rationalist philosopher and mathematician, accepted the Deist conception of God as an intelligent Creator but refused the contention that a god who metes out punishments is evil." Andreas Sofroniou, ''Moral Philosophy, from Hippocrates to the 21st Aeon'', page 197.</ref><ref>"Consistent with the liberal views of the Enlightenment, Leibniz was an optimist with respect to human reasoning and scientific progress (Popper 1963, p.69). Although he was a great reader and admirer of Spinoza, Leibniz, being a confirmed deist, rejected emphatically Spinoza's pantheism: God and nature, for Leibniz, were not simply two different "labels" for the same "thing". Shelby D. Hunt, ''Controversy in marketing theory: for reason, realism, truth, and objectivity'' (2003), page 33.</ref>
* [[Matthew Tindal]] (1657–1733), controversial English author whose works were influential on Enlightenment thinking<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.onr.com/user/bejo/tindal.htm |title=The Human Jesus and Christian Deism |publisher=Onr.com |date=31 May 2009 |access-date= 4 July 2010|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060316080949/http://www.onr.com/user/bejo/tindal.htm |archive-date=16 March 2006}}</ref>
* [[Voltaire]] (1694–1778), French Enlightenment writer and philosopher<ref>{{cite web |url=http://deism.com/Voltaire.htm |title=World Union of Deists |access-date=2 May 2014 |archive-date=8 June 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090608153319/http://www.deism.com/voltaire.htm |url-status=dead }}</ref>
* [[William Hogarth]] (1697–1764), English painter, visual artist and pioneering cartoonist<ref>{{cite web|url=http://basicfamouspeople.com/index.php?aid=1911 |title=Alfred Adler Biography from Basic Famous People – Biographies of Celebrities and other Famous People |publisher=Basic Famous People |date=28 May 1937 |access-date=4 July 2010}}</ref>
* [[Colin Maclaurin]] (1698–1746), Scottish mathematician who made important contributions to geometry and algebra. The Maclaurin series, a special case of the [[Taylor series]], are named after him.<ref>{{cite book|title=The Man Who Found Time: James Hutton and the Discovery of the Earth's Intiquity|year=2010|publisher=ReadHowYouWant.com|isbn=9781458766625|first=Jack|last=Repcheck|page=58|quote=But Maclaurin had one other major effect on Hutton. Maclaurin was a deist, one who believes in a creator God, a God who designed and built the universe and then set His creation into motion (but does not interfere with the day-to-day workings of the system or the actions of people).}}</ref>