Page "Pierre Gaspard Chaumette" Paragraph 4

Chaumette is considered one of the ultra-radical enragés of the French Revolution.

He demanded the formation of a Revolutionary Army which was to " force avarice and greed to yield up the riches of the earth ” in order to redistribute wealth, and feed troops and the urban populations.

He is associated much more with his views on the de-Christianization movement, however.

Chaumette was an ardent critic of Christianity, which he believed to consist of " ridiculous ideas " that " have been very helpful to despotism .” In his ultra-radical views, he was heavily influenced by atheist and materialist writers Paul d ' Holbach, Denis Diderot and Jean Meslier.

Chaumette believed religion to be a relic of superstitious eras that did not reflect the intellectual achievements of his enlightened age.

Indeed, for Chaumette " church and counterrevolution were one and the same.

" Thus, he proceeded to pressure several priests and bishops into abjuring their positions.

Chaumette organized a Festival of Reason on 10 November 1793, which boasted a Goddess of Reason, in the guise of an actress, on an elevated platform in the Notre Dame Cathedral.

Chaumette was so passionately involved in the de-Christianization process that he even publicly changed his name from Pierre-Gaspard Chaumette to Anaxagoras Chaumette.

He stated his reason for changing his name that, “ I was formerly called Pierre-Gaspard Chaumette because my god-father believed in the saints.

Since the revolution I have taken the name of a saint who was hanged for his republican principles .”