@Banana Breath,
Samuel Butler
Author of a number of novels including, Erewhon and The Way of All Flesh.
He considered himself, foremost, a philosopher.
...his personal struggle with the stifling of his own nature by his parents, ....
He seems to have spent the majority of his life unraveling the harm caused him by the brutal facade of religion foisted upon him by his parents and the credo of the time. "Parents are the last people on earth who ought to have children."
Ultimately, he emerged as a sort of pantheist, stating at one time that all living things were god, and then later revising that to include all non-living things as well. He was, in my opinion, well on his way to becoming a mystic. All he needed was a bit of hallucinogenic drug, but, he died a few years too early--1902-- for that to happen.
