Newton and Newtonianism: New Studies (International Archives of the History of Ideas Archives internationales d'histoire des idées)

254 Pages·2005·1.35 MB·English

by  J.E. Force

NEWTONANDNEWTONIANISM
ARCHIVESINTERNATIONALESD’HISTOIREDESIDE´ES
INTERNATIONALARCHIVESOFTHEHISTORYOFIDEAS
188
NEWTON AND NEWTONIANISM
New Studies
Editedby
JAMESE.FORCE
and
SARAHHUTTON
FoundingDirectors:
P.Dibon†(Paris)andR.H.Popkin(WashingtonUniversity,St.Louis&UCLA)
Director:
SarahHutton(MiddlesexUniversity,UnitedKingdom)
Associate-Directors:J.E.Force(Lexington);J.C.Laursen(Riverside)
EditorialBoard:M.J.B.Allen(LosAngeles);J.R.Armogathe(Paris);A.Gabbey(NewYork);
T.Gregory(Rome);J.Henry(Edinburgh);J.D.North(Oxford);J.Popkin(Lexington);
G.A.J.Rogers(Keele);Th.Verbeek(Utrecht)
NEWTON AND
NEWTONIANISM
New Studies
editedby
JAMES E. FORCE
UniversityofKentucky,
Lexington,U.S.A.
and
SARAH HUTTON
MiddlesexUniversity,
UnitedKingdom
KLUWER ACADEMIC PUBLISHERS
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CONTENTS
PREFACE—JamesE.ForceandSarahHutton ....................... vii
INTRODUCTION—MargaretC.Jacob .............................. ix
ESSAY1 / “TheNewNewtonianScholarshipandtheFateoftheSci-
entificRevolution”—MargaretJ.Osler ........................... 01
ESSAY2 / “PlansforPublishingNewton’sReligiousandAlchemical
Manuscripts,1982–1998”—RichardH.Popkin ................... 15
ESSAY3 / “Digitizing Isaac: The Newton Project and an Electronic
EditionofNewton’sPapers”—RobIliffe .......................... 23
ESSAY4 / “WasNewtonaVoluntarist?”—PeterHarrison ........... 39
ESSAY5 / “ProvidenceandNewton’sPantokrator:NaturalLaw,
Miracles,andNewtonianScience”—JamesE.Force ............. 65
ESSAY6 / “Eighteenth-CenturyReactionstoNewton’s
Anti-Trinitarianism”—ScottMandelbrote ......................... 93
ESSAY7 / “Prosecuting Athanasius: Protestant Forensics and the
MirrorsofPersecution”—RobIliffe ............................... 113
ESSAY8 / “Lust,Pride,andAmbition:IsaacNewtonandtheDevil”
—StephenD.Snobelen ............................................. 155
ESSAY9 / “Women,Science,andNewtonianism:EmilieduChaˆtelet
versusFrancescoAlgarotti”—SarahHutton ...................... 183
ESSAY10 / “ReflectionsonNewton’sAlchemyinLightoftheNew
HistoriographyofAlchemy”—LawrenceM.Principe ............ 205
ESSAY11 / “The Trouble with Newton in the Eighteenth Century”
—LarryStewart .................................................... 221
INDEX ................................................................. 239
v
PREFACE
Sir Isaac Newton’s pre-eminence in the history of science remains fixed, yet
the picture which we have of the whole man, and of the influence of his
wide-ranging intellect, has been changing rapidly as scholars have increas-
inglytakencognizanceofthoseaspectsofNewton’sthoughthithertohidden
inhisunpublishedmanuscripts.Atthestartofthethirdmillennium,wefind
ourselvespoisedtolaunchthegreatestrevolutionyetinNewtonstudiesasan
internationalteamofscholarshasbeenassembledtopublishallofNewton’s
widelyscatteredunpublishedpapers.TheWilliamAndrewsClarkMemorial
LibraryhasbeenassociatedwiththeworldofNewtonianscholarshipforsome
yearsthroughitspurchase,in1961,ofanimportantmanuscript(“Paradoxical
Questions concerning ye morals & Actions of Athanasius & his followers”)
andthroughitslongassociationwithProfessorRichardH.Popkin(U.C.L.A.)
and Professor James E. Force (University of Kentucky). Through the gen-
erous sponsorship of both the U.C.L.A. Center for 17th- and 18th-Century
StudiesandtheU.C.L.A.WilliamAndrewsClarkMemorialLibrary—which
areunderthedirectionofProfessorPeterH.Reill—ProfessorsForceandPop-
kinwereabletostageaseriesofClarkLibraryconferencesdevotedtoNewton
throughoutthe1990s.Thepapersdeliveredattheseconferencesevolvedinto
aseriesofimportanteditedvolumeswhosegeneralthemewasthecentrality
of theological and religious ideas to Newton’s intellectual formation. In the
presentvolume,thislongstandingprojectcontinues.Onceagainthankstothe
generosityofProfessorReillandtheresourcesoftheU.C.L.A.Centerfor17th-
and18th-CenturyStudiesandtheClarkLibrary,inNovember,2000,Professor
Force and Dr Sarah Hutton (Middlesex University) organized a conference
at the Clark Library which aimed to review the current state of Newtonian
scholarship and to describe the revolution that the publication of Newton’s
manuscripts was bringing about in Newton studies. Several of the speakers,
whose papers are included in this volume, are eminent scholars connected
with the Newton Project, based in London and Cambridge, which aims to
publishallNewton’sunpublishedwritings.Alloftheessaysincludedinthis
collectionelucidateeitherthecurrentstateofNewtonianstudiesorthesemi-
nalfigureofSirIsaacNewtonhimselfwhoembodiessomanyofthecomplex
andseeminglyparadoxicalpatternsoftheEnlightenment.
JamesE.Force
SarahHutton
vii
INTRODUCTION
MARGARETC.JACOB
UniversityofCalifornia,LosAngeles
They have now all passed away. The greats of the previous era of Newton
scholarship—I. B. Cohen, B. J. T. Dobbs, Henry Guerlac, Frank Manuel,
Richard Westfall, Derek (Tom) Whiteside—will never again contribute to
Newtonianscholarship.Theirachievementsweremassivelyimpressive,even
ifconsideredsolelyontheleveloftranscriptionandediting.Beforethe1960s
wehadnodefinitivepublishedcorrespondence,nobackgroundmathematical
papers, none of the critically important manuscript material in print, and we
possessed a rationalist definition of science that was alien to what Newton
wastryingtodo.ThatgroupofscholarsrescuedNewtonfromthepositivist
obliviontowhichhehadbeenconsigned.Theopeningessayinthiscollection
by Margaret Osler does a fine job at describing their major achievements in
fargreaterdetailthanIcanofferhere.
Yet even after their labors, one area remained relatively untouched, New-
ton’s voluminous theological writings. By the 1980s, everyone who studied
Newton and Newtonianism had come somewhat belatedly to recognize the
importance of his theology. As the essays by Richard Popkin and Rob Iliffe
presented here explain, the theological manuscripts, along with many of the
alchemicalones,stillremainthelastfrontier,asitwere,uponwhicharising
generationwillnowincreasinglyconcentrate.
As this volume attests, Newton’s theological and religious material has
begun to yield its secrets to scholarly effort. We have here a sampling of
the next generation of that scholarship. Predictably its trajectory is radically
different from the characteristic work of ‘the greats.’ Theological issues are
frontandcenter,followedbythealchemical-chemical,andtheeverpersistent
questions about Newton’s legacy and complex influence into the eighteenth
century, and beyond. The masters of the previous generation labored just
tosetNewton’shistoricalchronology,toestablishthewaysandmeansofhis
mathematicalandphysicalexperimentsandhisnaturalphilosophicalinsights.
Nowthefocushasshifted,althoughtheissueofgettinghismanuscriptsinto
useableformremainsasvitalasitwasbackinthe1960s.
This volume also offers an account of past and present efforts to make
all of Newton’s legacy available to the world of historical research. Richard
Popkin,fortunatelyforusoneofthefewofthegreatsstillwithus,andactive,
recountstheherculeaneffortstofindafundingsourcebackatatimewhenthe
ix
x Introduction
verythoughtofNewtonastheologianandalchemistwasfoundtoberepellant
insomequarters.Iwasintheaudienceinthe1970swhenRichardWestfall,
speakingatoneofthebiginternationalcongressesinthehistoryofscience,
presented his early work on Newton’s alchemy. There were audible gasps,
andunderabarrageofhostilequestioning,Westfallretortedinexasperation,
“I did not write these manuscripts,” or words to that effect. Very few in the
audience wanted Newton to be a practicing alchemist, as well as a serious
religiousthinker.
The reluctance to accept Newton’s alchemy and theology also was fed
by the culture wars when the right could assume that anti-rationalist lefties
were trying to debunk the founder of modern science. The Popkin-headed
projecttoproducetenormorevolumesofNewton’salchemicalandtheolog-
ical manuscripts never got its funding, and I suspect that Dick is right when
he sees the politics of the 1980s at work in the decision at the NEH (with
assistance from the NSF) not to fund. The only good news to come out of
thatsadstoryarisesfromthechangeinformatthattimemadepossibleasthe
digital revolution unfolded. As Rob Iliffe explains, putting Newton on-line
electronically will permit an almost photographic reproduction of his reser-
vations, crossing outs, jottings, ramblings and musings to be registered in a
manner that print does not allow. A more authentic Newton can be seen on
thewebthanontheprintedpage.TheAHRBdidtheglobalworldofscholar-
shipimmensegoodservicewhenitprovidedtheinitialfundingfortheproject
nowhousedatImperialCollege.WouldthattheAmericanfundingagencies
hadbeenasclear-sighted.Wecanonlyhopethatprivatedonorswillnowbe
moregenerous,andthattheobviousqualityofvolumessuchasthisonewill
aidImperialCollegeinitsfund-raisingefforts.
ReevaluatingNewtonopensthewholeofearlymodernintellectualhistory
forreevaluation.MargaretOslerissurelyrighttostressthatpoint,asdidthe
volumesherecentlyedited.Itexploredthequestionofwhathashappenedto
our understanding of the Scientific Revolution because we have changed so
muchofourunderstandingofitsmajorfigures,mostnotably,Newtonhimself.1
In the late 1980s a split had occurred among the “greats” as to how to view
the Scientific Revolution. Dobbs argued that it was a concept that had worn
outitsusefulness,whileWestfallsawitasunproblematicallyself-explanatory,
thecentraleventofmodernity.InOsler’searlieranthology,andinheressayin
thisvolume,sherecountshowwegottothosecontradictorypositions,without
perhaps, regrettably, telling us where she stands on the issue of whether, or
if,aScientificRevolutionoccurred.Aswithmostconceptsofthisnature,the
issueisoneofdefinition.IbelievethatJoDobbswaswrongwhensheargued
thatbecauseNewtonpracticedalchemythewholehistoricalconstructofthere
1 MargaretJ.Osler,ed.,RethinkingtheScientificRevolution(Cambridge:CambridgeUniversityPress,
2000).
Introduction xi
havingbeenascientificrevolutionhadbeenpoorlyconceivedandincorrectly
defined. The old positivist Newton is a dead duck, but the larger shift, one
that made his alchemy an embarrassment and that mechanized the Western
understanding of nature, still needs explaining, regardless of what Newton
wasreadingandwritingaboutinhisroomsatTrinity.Forbetterorworse,the
modernemergedwithonefootplantedfirmlyonthebackofwhatitlabeled
magicandsuperstition.From1600to1750aculturalshiftasprofoundasany
wehaveknownoccurred,andtheappellation“scientificrevolution,”provided
itiscarefullynuanced,willdotobeginaconversationaboutwhathappened
withinliterateculture.
As a later essay in this volume by Lawrence Principe reminds us, what
Newtonwasdoinginhis“laboratory”atTrinityisbynomeanstransparent.
Principe argues that Boyle’s alchemy/chemistry is a whole lot clearer than
Newton’s, and he implies that Dobbs took too holistic an approach to the
manuscripts,andhencetotheargumentthatalchemyprovidedNewtonwith
thecrucialevidenceforhisconceptofforce.Byholistic,IbelievethatPrincipe
means that Dobbs wished to lump the manuscripts, to see coherence among
them where he would split, and break them down as to their origin or pedi-
gree.ShealsotookasyntheticapproachtoNewton’salchemy,religiosity,and
celestial dynamics, indeed she saw the categories themselves as inhibiting.
Dobbs in The Janus Face of Genius had a deft appreciation for his religious
sensibility,onethatseemedtodemandthekindofholismsheembraced.
While I disagreed with Jo Dobbs about the issue of there having been a
ScientificRevolution,asherfriendandcollaboratorIalsocametoadmireand
endorsehervisionofaunifiedNewton,heldtogetherbythefabricofhisdeep
religiosity. It never occurred to me that Jo had much sympathy for Jungian
ideas as Principe seems to find in her approach. Yet if she possessed some
sortofreligiouscore,howevereccentric,didthatperhapsnotplacehercloser
to her subject than more secularist scholars might hope to be? We need to
knowmoreaboutNewton’sreligion,andtakingalookatthevastmanuscript
notesonthesubjectthatDobbsleftbehindandnowstoredattheUniversity
ofCalifornia,Davis,mightbeoneplacetobegin.Principefindstheeffortby
somefeministscholarstogenderthemechanicalphilosophymale,andhence
the alchemical, female, to be vastly overdone. He is undoubtedly right, but
surely the baby is sliding along in the bath water when he tries to dismiss
the association of some alchemical texts with Renaissance naturalism, and
hence with vitalist, spirit-in-matter and heretical natural philosophies. Just
like naturalism, alchemy had the potential to be intellectually subversive,
as civil war radicals demonstrated when they took it up as but one of their
manyheresies.IfweneedtorethinkNewton’salchemy,thelargerseventeenth-
century ideological context, particularly as presented by the English civil
wars,mustbepreserved.Sotoo,asthemanyeighteenth-centuryadmirersof
xii Introduction
Newtonianmethodwouldhavetoldus,thepointofanewanalysisistoarrive
atanewsynthesis.
Newton’s alchemy may belong in that dark nether world outlined by Rob
Iliffe in his essay on prosecuting Athanasius, in a place in Newton’s mind
wherebishopsandkingscouldbetraytheirbelievers,wherelittlewassacred
exceptapersonalsearchforpurityofheartandsoul.Perhapsonlylonghours
overthecruciblemadepuritypossibleinaworldwhereevenpriestscouldnot
be trusted and where, after 1660, alchemy along with all doctrinal deviation
had been banned from public discourse. Indeed the survival of alchemy in
theFrenchacademyofscienceafteritsestablishmentin1666offersdramatic
testimony, by way of contrast, to the crushing effect of the fear induced in
English intellectual life by the disorder of the 1650s. The retreat from all
radicalassociations,andhencethesuppressionofalchemicaltalk—although
not alchemical practice and the desire to reform medicine and science—
gripped Boyle (b. 1632) and then Newton, and their many associates who
backinthe1650shadthoughtaneworderfigurativelybutmomentsaway.We
looklongandhardattheproceedingsoftheRoyalSociety,foundedin1662,
for evidence of any alchemical activities. Indeed only the scholarship of the
lasttwentyyearshasrevealedthem,socarefullyweretheykeptprivate.
Bycontrast,journeytoParisinthe1660sandalchemyisfrontandcenter
in the early proceedings of the royally sponsored, Acade´mie des Sciences.
Meetinginprivatetwiceaweek,onedaytoconsidermathematics,theother
physics,thecompanymightseemveryfamiliartomoderneyes.Butitsunder-
standing of the natural world that set the agenda of what ‘physics’ meant in
the 1660s in Paris was far closer to what we would call alchemy (as well
as medicine.) The guiding spirits in matters experimental were two older
naturalists, Gilles Personne de Roberval and Samuel Cottereau Duclos.2 By
1668, a mere twenty-two investigators—of whom two, the famous Huygens
and Cassini, were foreign but essentially expatriated in France—assembled
in the King’s Library to search the mysteries of nature. In texts to this day
unpublished, Duclos laid out the terms and the language; it was essentially
alchemical.Truetotheexperimentaltraditionwithinalchemy,hewantedthe
companytofindbymeansof“l’analysechymique”theunderlyingsubstances
that compose all natural mixes or combinations found in the world. “Three
ofthesesubstancesareaswewouldsayessential,spirit(l’esprit),oilandsalt
becausetheyparticipateintheessentialvirtuesofduMixte...thatismercury,
sulphur, and salt (which has no other name.)” The three essential principles
2 Forbiographicalinformationonthem,seetheinvaluableDavidJ.Sturdy,ScienceandSocialStatus.The
MembersoftheAcademiedesSciences,1666–1750(Rochester,NY:TheBoydellPress,1995),chap.6.
SeealsoAllenG.Debus,TheFrenchParacelsians.TheChemicalChallengetoMedicalandScientific
TraditioninEarlyModernFrance(Cambridge:CambridgeUniversityPress,1991),p.151,butupdated
bySturdy.