Frits Moquette

Career As a boy, Moquette read the Dutch translation De negerhut van Oom Tom of Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel Uncle Tom's Cabin and letters sent by his father Pierre Moquette from the plantation L'Hermitage on the cruel treatment of black slaves in Surinam. These readings inspired him at the age of 17 to become the founding president of the Dutch Jongelings Genootschap ter Afschaffing van Slavernij (Youth Society for the Abolition of Slavery) on 13 November 1853. Members should be at least 15 years of age and no older than 23. The Latin motto of the Society was "Servitus Generis Humani Flagitum" (Slavery is the scourge of mankind). Moquette then was a pupil of the Amsterdam Stedelijk Gymnasium, the Amsterdam municipal gymnasium.

Later, Moquette studied theology in Utrecht (1856, 1859) and Amsterdam (1856), became a kandidaat for the ministry in the Walloon church (1861) and subsequently served as a Dutch Reformed Church minister at Jutphaas, Sluis, Hijkersmilde, Sneek and Rotterdam until his retirement there.

As a minister in Sneek, he strove to reduce the influence of landowners, the so-called floreenplichtigen, on church management. An expert on church law, he later opposed the juridical claims on church property of the 1886 separatist Doleantie led by Abraham Kuyper.

Publications F.J.P. Moquette: Goed bedoeld - ook goed bedacht?, 1897. Title page. Moquette's publications include:

Full text online Translations by Moquette concerning the historical bible criticism of Jesus' resurrection by David Strauss. Translation from the French of Edmond de Pressensé: Jésus-Christ. Son temps, sa vie, son oeuvre. Paris, 1865.