The French philosopher, writer, and statesman Jules François Simon (1814-1896) was a leader of the moderate republican faction in the early years of the Third Republic.

Jules Simon was born François Jules Simon Suisse at Lorient on Dec. 27, 1814, but he later dropped the family name. Graduating from the École Normale, he taught philosophy at Caen in 1836 and at Versailles in 1837. Victor Cousin employed him to make translations of Plato and Aristotle, for which Cousin took credit, and Simon soon became Cousin's deputy in the chair of philosophy at the Sorbonne. He also lectured at the École Normale and began his literary career--editing the works of Nicolas Malbranche, René Descartes, Jacques Bossuet, and Antoine Arnauld; writing the Histoire de l'école d'Alexandrie (2 vols., 1844-1845); contributing to the Revue des deux mondes; and helping to found the journal Liberté de penser...