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Congreve was a pupil of Dr. Arnold, and a disciple of Auguste Comte in philosophy. After taking first-class honours at Wadham College, Oxford (later becoming a Fellow of the college), he spent some time as a master at Rugby, but returned to Oxford as a tutor. Soon after the French Revolution of 1848 he visited Paris, where he made the acquaintance of Barthelemy St Hilaire and Auguste Comte. He was so attracted by the Positive philosophy that he resigned his fellowship in 1855, and devoted the remainder of his life to the propagation of the Positive philosophy. He took a leading part in the work carried on in Chapel Street, Lamb's Conduit Street. In 1878 he declined to admit the authority of Pierre Laffitte, Comte's official successor, and the result was a split in the ranks of English Positivism, Frederic Harrison, Dr J. H. Bridges and Professor Edward Spencer Beesly forming a separate society at Newton Hall, Fetter Lane. Congreve translated several of Comte's works, and in 1874 published a large volume of essays, in which he advocated Comte's view that it was the duty of Great Britain to renounce her foreign possessions. He was said to have a high character and great intellectual capacity. He died at Hampstead on the 5th of July 1899.