a German Protestant jurist and theologian, was born at Frankfort-on-the- Main in 1695. He studied jurisprudence at Marburg, became soon known as an essayist on questions of morals, philosophy, and theology, which he treated with great ease and brilliancy, although occasionally inaccurate in his statements, and was finally appointed president of the Council of Lingen and Tecklenburg. He died in 1776. He is especially known for his efforts to bring about a union of the different Christian churches, or, at least, of the evangelical denominations. He sought to unite them all into one, to carry out indifferentism towards dogmatics to its full extent. With this object in view, he wrote, under the name of Gottlob von Friedenheim, Evangelischer Friedenstempel nach d. Art d. ersten Kirche (1724): — Von Vereinigung d. Protestanten (1748): — Die einzig wahre Religion (1750). These works brought him into a long controversy with Hoffmann, Weickhmann, Brenner, etc., and his attempts at establishing a union proved fruitless. — Herzog, Real-Encyklopä die, 8:452; Pierer, Universal-Lexikon 10:463. (J.N.P.)