Priestley's Questions: An Historiography Survey

Rose R. B. , “The Priestley riots, 1791”, Past and present, xviii (1960), 68–88; Robinson E. , “New light on the Priestley riots”, Historical journal, iii (1960), 73–75.

Rutt J. T. (ed.), Theological and miscellaneous works of Joseph Priestley (25 vols, London, 1817–32); Priestley Joseph , Memoirs written by himself (London, 1806). For the correspondence, see Bolton H. (ed.), Scientific correspondence of Joseph Priestley (New York, 1892) and Schofield R. E. , Scientific autobiography of Joseph Priestley (Cambridge, Mass., 1966). Compare the collection in Passmore J. A. , Priestley's writings on philosophy, science and politics (New York, 1965) and Crook R. E. , A bibliography of Joseph Priestley (London, 1966).

Schofield R. E. , “Joseph Priestley: Theology, physics and metaphysics”, Enlightenment and dissent, ii (1983), 69–81, p. 70; Crosland M. , “A practical perspective on Joseph Priestley as a natural philosopher”, British journal for the history of science, xvi (1983), 223–8, p. 237.

McEvoy J. G. , “Joseph Priestley, aerial philosopher: Metaphysics and methodology in Priestley's chemical thought, 1772–1781”, Ambix, xxv (1978), 1–55, 93–116, 153–75, and xxvi (1979), 16–38, pp. 1–5 of vol. xxv. See idem, Joseph Priestley, philosopher, scientist and divine (Ph.D. thesis, Pittsburgh, 1975), 1. Compare Christie J. R. R. and Golinski J. V. , “The spreading of the word: New directions in the historiography of chemistry, 1600–1800”, History of science, xx (1982), 235–66, pp. 256–7.

Lavoisier Antoine , Essays physical and chemical, trans. by Henry Thomas (London, 1776), 120–1.

[ Jeffrey Francis ], “Memoirs of Joseph Priestley”, Edinburgh review, ix (1807), 137–52, p. 151.

Thomson Thomas , History of chemistry , 2nd edn (2 vols, London, 1830), 17–18. For Thomson's historiography and the discovery model, see Fisher N. , “Avogadro, the chemists and the historians of chemistry”, History of science, xx (1982), 77–102 and 212–31; Schaffer S. , “Scientific discoveries in the late eighteenth century: Heroism, authorship and the end of natural philosophy”, Materiali filosofici, in press.

Davy Humphry , Works, ed. by Davy John (9 vols, London, 1839–40), i, 147 and vii, 116. See Levfere T. H. , “Humphry Davy, the sons of genius, and the idea of glory”, in Forgan S. (ed.), Science and the sons of genius: Studies on Humphry Davy (London, 1980), 33–58.

Meldrum A. , The eighteenth century revolution in science (Bombay, 1930), 60; Hartley H. and Meldrum A. , “The bicentenary of Joseph Priestley”, Journal of the Chemical Society (1933), 896–920, p. 902.

Hartog P. , “Joseph Priestley”, Dictionary of national biography , xlvi, 355–76; idem, “Joseph Priestley and his place in the history of science”, Proceedings of the Royal Institution, xxvi (1931), 395.

Cooper Thomas , “Of the discoveries in factitious airs before the time of Dr Priestley”, in Priestley , Memoirs (ref. 2), 223–93, p. 252.

[ Jeffrey ], op. cit. (ref. 6), 137–9.

Caven R. M. , Joseph Priestley 1733–1804 (London, 1933), 4.

Darwin Erasmus , in Rutt , op. cit. (ref. 2), ii, 152; Gibbon Edward , Autobiography, ed. by Trevor-Roper H. (London, 1966), 47: “instead of listening to this friendly advice, the dauntless philosopher of Birmingham continued to fire away his double battery against those who believed too little, and those who believed too much”.

Davy , op. cit. (ref. 8), vii, 116; Willey B. , The eighteenth century background (Harmondsworth, 1972), 163.

Schofield R. E. , “Joseph Priestley, natural philosopher”, Ambix, xiv (1967), 1–15; McEvoy J. G. , “Joseph Priestley, natural philosopher: Some comments on Prof. Schofield's views”, Ambix, xv (1968), 115–23.

Gibbs F. W. , Joseph Priestley: Adventurer in science and champion of truth (London, 1965), 145; Hartog P. , “Newer views of Priestley and Lavoisier”, Annals of science, v (1941), 1–56, pp. 20–21.

Hartog , op. cit. (ref. 17), 16; Lindsay J. (ed.), Autobiography of Joseph Priestley (Bath, 1970), 51–54 and 27; compare Gibbs, op. cit. (ref. 17), 83 on the “overloaded” concept of phlogiston.

Thomson , op. cit. (ref. 7), 13; Schofield R. E. , “Joseph Priestley, the nature of oxidation and the nature of matter”, Journal of the history of ideas, xxv (1964), 285–94, p. 286.

McKie D. , “Priestley's laboratory and library and other of his effects”, Notes and records of the Royal Society, xii (1956), 114–36; Schofield R. E. , “The scientific background of Joseph Priestley”, Annals of science, xiii (1957), 148–63; Robinson E. , “Priestley's library of scientific books: A new list”, Studies in history and philosophy of science, i (1970), 145–60. The sources are Priestley's claim in Birmingham Reference Library MS 17463, 174684, 399801; “Catalogue of Dr Priestleys Philosophical Books 1782”, in Watt papers, Doldowlod; “Catalogue for compiling the history of experimental philosophy”, in Priestley J. , History and present state of discoveries relating to vision, light and colours (London, 1772); Priestley , Memoirs (ref. 2), 178–84; Dobson's Thomas Catalogue of the library of the late Joseph Priestley (Philadelphia, 1816).

Schofield , op. cit. (ref. 3), 77.

Schofield , op. cit. (ref. 3), 79; Schofield , op. cit. (ref. 16), 14; Schofield R. E. , “Joseph Priestley and the physicalist tradition in British chemistry”, in Kieft L. and Willeford B. R. (eds), Joseph Priestley: Scientist, theologian and metaphysician (Lewisburg, 1980), 92–117, p. 113.

Crosland , op. cit. (ref. 3), 236, 224, 233; McEvoy , op. cit. (ref. 4, 1978, 1979); Guerlac H. , “Chemistry as a branch of physics: Laplace's collaboration with Lavoisier”, Historical studies in physical science, vii (1976), 193–276; Laboucheix H. , “Chemistry, materialism and theology in the work of Joseph Priestley”, Price-Priestley newsletter, i (1977), 31–48.

Christie and Golinski , op. cit. (ref. 4), 255–7; ‘neo-mechanism’ is proposed in Schofield R. E. , Mechanism and materialism: British natural philosophy in an age of reason (Princeton, 1970), 261–73; ‘rational dissent’ is discussed in McEvoy J. G. and McGuire J. E. , “God and nature: Priestley's way of rational dissent”, Historical studies in physical science, vi (1975), 325–404.

Priestley Joseph , Institutes of natural and revealed religion (3 vols, London, 1772–74), i, xxxii. For its composition, see Priestley , Memoirs (ref. 2), 179–80.

Priestley , Memoirs (ref. 2), 37: “Not that I was thought to be unqualified for this employment, but because I was not orthodox. I had proposed to teach the classics, mathematics &c.” Punctuation is as shown.

Crosland , op. cit. (ref. 3), 226 and 230.

Schofield , Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), 2–11; McKie , op. cit. (ref. 20); Badash L. , “Joseph Priestley's apparatus for pneumatic chemistry”, Journal of the history of medicine, xix (1964), 139–55.

Schofield , Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), loc. cit.; Schofield , op. cit. (ref. 20), 152; the sources are Priestley, Memoirs (ref. 2), 18–21, 29, 37–38; Priestley Joseph , Philosophical empiricism (London, 1775), 45. For Matthew Turner, see Thomas Cooper's note in Priestley, Memoirs, 61–62; for his career and that of his son William, see Orange D. , “Rational dissent and provincial science: William Turner and the Newcastle Literary and Philosophical Society”, in Inkster I. and Morrell J. (eds), Metropolis and province: Science in British culture 1780–1850 (London, 1983), 205–30, p. 211.

Cooper Thomas in Priestley, Memoirs (ref. 2), 289; compare Watts R. , “Joseph Priestley and education”, Enlightenment and dissent, ii (1983), 83–100. For Cooper's radicalism, see Schofield , Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), 307–8 and Gibbs , op. cit. (ref. 17), 193.

Christie and Golinski , op. cit. (ref. 4); Schaffer S. , “Natural philosophy and public spectacle in the eighteenth century”, History of science, xxi (1983), 1–43.

McEvoy J. , “Electricity, knowledge and the nature of progress in Priestley's thought”, British journal of the history of science, xii (1979), 1–30.

Priestley Joseph , History of electricity (London, 1767), x–xi; idem, A familiar introduction to the study of electricity (London, 1768); idem, A familiar introduction to the theory and practice of perspective (London, 1770).

Crane V. W. , “The Club of Honest Whigs: Friends of science and liberty”, William and Mary quarterly, xxiii (1966), 210–33; Griffith W. P. , “Priestley in London”, Notes and records of the Royal Society, xxxviii (1983), 1–16 for a thorough survey.

Walker W. C. , “The beginnings of the scientific career of Joseph Priestley”, Isis, xxi (1934), 81–97; Schofield R. E. , “Electrical researches of Joseph Priestley”, Archives internationales d'histoire des sciences, lxiv (1963), 277–86; Seddon to Canton, in Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), 14–15 (18 December 1765).

Priestley T. , A funeral sermon occasioned by the death of the late Reverend Dr Joseph Priestley (London, 1805), 42; Canton to Priestley, 5 April 1766, Royal Society Canton Papers II, 65; Priestley to Canton, 12 November 1767, in Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), 58; Heilbron J. , Electricity in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries (Berkeley, 1980), 427–8; Priestley , History of electricity (ref. 33), 450–1 and 574; Priestley , History of electricity, 3rd edn (2 vols, London, 1775), i, 305–6, and ii, 167–9 and 134–7.

McKie , op. cit. (ref. 20), 115–26; Heilbron J. , Elements of early modern physics (Berkeley, 1982), 149 and 156; Daumas M. , Les instruments scientifiques au 17e et 18e siècles (Paris, 1953), 186n.; Millburn J. R. , Benjamin Martin: Author, instrument maker, and ‘country showman’ (Leyden, 1976), 131–6; Musson A. E. and Robinson E. , Science and technology in the Industrial Revolution (Manchester, 1969).

Priestley , Memoirs (ref. 2), 65; Caven , op. cit. (ref. 13), 9; Gibbs , op. cit. (ref. 17), 46. For studies of instruments and interactions with theory, see Finn B. S. , “The influence of experimental apparatus on 18th century electrical theory”, Proceedings of the International Congress of the History of Science, Paris 1968 (Paris, 1971), vol. 10A, 51–55; Levere T. H. , “The interaction of ideas and instruments in van Marum's work on chemistry and electricity”, in Turner G. and Levere T. H. (eds), Martin van Marum: Life and work (4 vols, Leyden, 1973), iv, 103–22; Eklund J. , The incompleat chymist: An essay on the eighteenth century chemist in his laboratory (Washington D.C., 1975).

Robinson E. , “The Lunar Society and the improvement of scientific instruments”, Annals of science, xii (1956), 296–304 and xiii (1957), 1–8; Schofield R. E. , “Josiah Wedgwood, industrial chemist”, Chymia, v (1959), 180–92; McKendrick N. , “The role of science in the Industrial Revolution: A study of Josiah Wedgwood as a scientist and industrial chemist”, in Teich M. and Young R. M. (eds), Changing perspectives in the history of science (London, 1973), 274–319.

Schofield R. E. , The Lunar Society of Birmingham (Oxford, 1963), 200–2; Mathias P. , The transformation of England (London, 1979), ch. 2; McKendrick , op. cit. (ref. 39), 307–9; Schofield , Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), 203–15.

Schofield , Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), 75–79.

Crosland , op. cit. (ref. 3), 231–2; Schofield , op. cit. (ref. 16), 9–10; for Boscovich's role see Schofield , “Boscovich and Priestley's theory of matter”, in Whyte L. L. (ed.), Roger Joseph Boscovich (London, 1963), 46–53; for Michell see Hardin C. L. , “Scientific work of John Michell”, Annals of science, xxii (1966), 27–47; Parry J. S. , John Michell's theory of matter and Joseph Priestley's use of it (M.Phil, thesis, Imperial College London, 1976); the source is Priestley, History of optics (ref. 20), 385–92 and 786–91.

Schagrin M. , “Early observations and calculations on light pressure”, American journal of physics, xlii (1974), 927–40; Worrall J. , “The pressure of light: The strange case of the vacillating ‘crucial experiment’”, Studies in history and philosophy of science, xiii (1982), 133–71; Cantor G. , “The historiography of ‘Georgian’ optics”, History of science, xvi (1978), 1–21; Steffens H. J. , Development of Newtonian optics in England (New York, 1977), 55–92.

Woolf H. , “The beginnings of astronomical spectroscopy”, in Cohen I. B. and Taton R. (eds), Mélanges Alexandre Koyré (2 vols, Paris, 1964), ii, 619–34, pp. 628–30; Steffens , op. cit. (ref. 43), 55–92; Melvill Thomas , “Observations on light and colours”, in Essays philosophical and literary (2 vols, Edinburgh, 1756), i, 36 and 65–66; “Discourse concerning the cause of the different refrangibility of the rays of light”, Philosophical transactions, xlviii (1753), 261–9.

McKie , op. cit. (ref. 20); Turner A. J. , Science and music in eighteenth century Bath (Bath, 1977), 81–95; Torrens H. , “Geological communication in the Bath area in the last half of the eighteenth century”, in Jordanova L. and Porter R. (eds), Images of the Earth (Chalfont St Giles, 1979), 215–47, p. 242, n. 75. Turner (p. 91) points out that Priestley was also Vice-President of the Bath and West Agricultural Society in 1778.

Herschel to Watson , 5 September and 12 October 1784, Royal Astronomical Society Herschel MSS W 1/1, pp. 119–27; Herschel to Blagden, 18 May 1787, ibid ., 161–4; Herschel William , “What becomes of light?” and “On the central powers of the particles of matter”, in Dreyer J. L. E. (ed.), Scientific papers of Sir William Herschel (2 vols, London, 1912), i, lxix and lxxv–lxxviii; letters of John Michell in Turner, op. cit. (ref. 45), 96–102; McCormmach R. , “John Michell and Henry Cavendish: Weighing the stars”, British journal of the history of science, iv (1968), 126–55; Schaffer S. , “The great laboratories of the universe: William Herschel on matter theory and planetary life”, Journal for the history of astronomy, xi (1980), 81–111; Porter R. , “Herschel, Bath and the Philosophical Society”, in Hunt G. (ed.), Uranus and the outer planets (Cambridge, 1982), 23–34.

For surveys of Lavoisier scholarship, see Smeaton W. , “New light on Lavoisier: The research of the last ten years”, History of science, ii (1963), 51–69 and Crosland M. , “Chemistry and the chemical revolution”, in Rousseau G. S. and Porter Roy (eds), The ferment of knowledge (Cambridge, 1980), 389–416. Studies which make Priestley and Lavoisier the protagonists of the struggle-include Conant J. B. , “The overthrow of the phlogiston theory”, in Conant J. B. (ed.), Harvard case histories in experimental science (2 vols, Cambridge, Mass., 1966), i, 67–115; Toulmin S. E. , “Crucial experiments: Priestley and Lavoisier”, Journal of the history of ideas, xviii (1957), 205–20; Musgrave A. , “Why did oxygen supplant phlogiston? Research programmes and the chemical revolution”, in Howson C. (ed.), Method and appraisal in the physical sciences (Cambridge, 1976), 181–209; McCann H. , Chemistry transformed: The paradigmatic shift from phlogiston to oxygen (Norwood, N.J., 1978).

Kuhn T. S. , “Historical structures of scientific discovery”, Science, cxxxvi (1962), 760–4; Barnes Barry , T. S. Kuhn and social science (London, 1982), 42–43; Brannigan A. , The social basis of scientific discoveries (Cambridge, 1981), 22–26 and 129–33.

Gibbs , op. cit. (ref. 17), 161; Priestley to Keir, 4 February 1778, in Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), 164; Schofield , op. cit. (ref. 16), 8; Priestley Joseph , The doctrine of philosophical necessity illustrated (London, 1777), 283; Priestley , Experiments and observations relating to various branches of natural philosophy (3 vols, London and Birmingham, 1779–86), i, 39.

Ihde A. , “Priestley and Lavoisier”, in Kieft and Willeford , op. cit. (ref. 22), 62–91, p. 78; Schofield , op. cit. (ref. 22), 110.

McEvoy J. G. , “Enlightenment and dissent in science: Joseph Priestley and the limits of theoretical reasoning”, Enlightenment and dissent, ii (1983), 47–68, pp. 57–58.

Open letter from Priestley to the French chemists, 15 June 1796, in Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), 289; Christie J. R. R. , “Joseph Black and John Robison”, in Simpson A. D. C. (ed.), Joseph Black 1728–1799 (Edinburgh, 1982), 47–52, citing Robison to George Black Jr, 1 August 1800, in Robinson E. and McKie D. (eds), Partners in science: Letters of James Watt and Joseph Black (Cambridge, Mass., 1970), 349. Compare Keir's comparison of French chemistry with the Athanasian system in Scientific autobiography, 253.

McEvoy , op. cit. (ref. 51), 58; compare McEvoy, op. cit. (ref. 4, 1975), 319–37.

McEvoy , op. cit. (ref. 4, 1975), 319–24 and 336; John McEvoy uses Siegfried R. and Dobbs B. J. , “Composition: A neglected aspect of the chemical revolution”, Annals of science, xxiv (1968), 275–94; Oldroyd D. R. , “The doctrine of property-conferring principles in chemistry”, Organon , xii/xiii (1976/77), 139–55; Priestley Joseph , “Experiments relating to phlogiston and the seeming conversion of water into air”, Philosophical transactions, lxxiii (1783), 398–434. Richard Watson's comment is in Chemical essays (4 vols, London, 1781–86), i, 167; see Coleby L. , “Richard Watson”, Annals of science, ix (1953), 101–22.

Priestley Joseph , The doctrine of phlogiston established and that of the composition of water refuted , 2nd edn (Philadelphia, 1803), 68 and 103; Priestley , Memoirs (ref. 2), 269–72 (for Cooper's striking list of 19 problems which beset French chemistry); McEvoy , op. cit. (ref. 51), 59; Crosland , op. cit. (ref. 3), 232.

Bostock John , Essay on respiration (Liverpool, 1804), 208, cited in Priestley , Memoirs (ref. 2), 275–6; compare Thomas Cooper's note in Priestley, Memoirs, 62–63n.: “This necessary attention to economy also aided the simplicity of his apparatus and was the means in some degree of improving it in this important respect. This plainness of his apparatus rendered his experiments easy to be repeated and gave them accuracy…. The French chemists have adopted a practice quite the reverse”.

Priestley Joseph , Experiments and observations on different kinds of air (3 vols, London, 1774–77), iii, 41–54; McEvoy , op. cit. (ref. 4, 1978, 1979), (1978) 164–75 and (1979) 25.

Lavoisier Antoine , “Mémoire sur l'existence de l'air dans l'acide nitreux”, Mémoires de l'Académie Royale des Sciences for 1776 (1779), 601–71; Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 57), iii, xxx and ii, 307–8; Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 49), i, 266; McEvoy , op. cit. (ref. 4, 1978, 1979), (1978) 55ff.; Hartog , op. cit. (ref. 17), 30–33. See also Guerlac H. , “Joseph Priestley's first papers on gases and their reception in France”, Journal of the history of medicine, xii (1957), 1–12.

Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 57), ii, 35–90; McEvoy , op. cit. (ref. 4, 1978, 1979), (1978) 164ff.; Ihde , op. cit. (ref. 50), 65; on mercury calx see the interesting comments in Perrin C. E. , “Prelude to Lavoisier's theory of calcination: Observations on mercurius calcinatus per se”, Ambix, xvi (1969), 140–151 and Kohler R. E. , “Lavoisier's rediscovery of the air from mercury calx”, Ambix, xxii (1975), 52–57.

Priestley Joseph , Experiments and observations on air and other branches of natural philosophy (3 vols, Birmingham, 1790), i, 276; Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 54); Lavoisier A. , “Mémoire dans laquel on a pour objet de prouver que l'eau n'est point une substance simple”, Mémoires de l'Académie Royale des Sciences for 1781 (1784), 468; Watt James , “Thoughts on the constituent parts of water and of dephlogisticated air”, Philosophical transactions, lxxiv (1784), 329–57; Cavendish Henry , “Experiments on air”, Philosophical transactions, lxxiv (1784), 119–153 and lxxv (1785), 222–7; Priestley , Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), 226–30, specifically letter to de Luc, 27 December 1783, p. 230. See Edelstein S. , “Priestley settles the water controversy”, Chymia, i (1948), 123–7; Schofield R. E. , “Still more on the water controversy”, Chymia, ix (1964), 71–76; Loding T. H. and Smeaton W. A. , “The ice calorimeter of Lavoisier and Laplace and some of its critics”, Annals of science, xxxi (1974), 1–18; Guerlac , op. cit. (ref. 23).

Christie and Golinski , op. cit. (ref. 4), 246–9.

McEvoy , op. cit. (ref. 4, 1975), 169–86 and 248–9; Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 57), ii, 263–97 and (ref. 49, 1777–86), ii, 369–96; Beddoes Thomas and Watt James , Considerations on the medicinal use of factitious airs (Bristol, 1794), vii. For studies of spa physic, see Patmore J. A. , “The spa towns of Britain”, in Beckinsale R. P. and Houston J. M. (eds), Urbanization and its problems (Oxford, 1968), 47–55; Coley N. G. , “Physicians and the chemical analysis of mineral waters in 18th century England”, Medical history, xxvi (1982), 123–44; Eklund J. , “Of a spirit in the water: Some early ideas on the aerial dimension”, Isis, lxvii (1976), 527–50; Mullett C. F. , “Public baths and health in England”, Bulletin of the history of medicine. Supplement, v (1946), 1–85. For vegetality and meteorology, see Middleton W. E. Knowles , “Chemistry and meteorology 1700–1825”, Annals of science, xx (1964), 125–41; Delaporte F. , Nature's second kingdom: Explorations of vegetality in the 18th century (Cambridge, Mass., 1982); Jordanova L. , “Earth science and environmental medicine: The synthesis of the late Enlightenment”, in Jordanova and Porter , op. cit. (ref. 45), 119–46.

McEvoy , op. cit. (ref. 4, 1978, 1979), (1978) 96–101 and 158–64; Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 57), i, 49–55 and 95–99.

McEvoy , op. cit. (ref. 4, 1978, 1979), (1978) 96–99 on Priestley, op. cit. (ref. 57), i, 105–6 and 141.

Priestley Joseph , “On nitrous air”, Philosophical transactions, lxii (1771), 210; Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 57), i, 110–11; McEvoy , op. cit. (ref. 4, 1978, 1979), (1978) 160–4, 174.

Delaporte , op. cit. (ref. 62), 190.

Parascandola J. and Ihde A. J. , “History of the pneumatic trough”, Isis, lx (1969), 351–61; on Pringle see his Discourse on the different kinds of air (London, 1774), republished in McKie D. , “Joseph Priestley and the Copley medal”, Ambix, ix (1961), 1–22; Singer D. W. , “Sir John Pringle and his circle”, Annals of science, vi (1950), 127–80 and 229–67, pp. 229–47; Mathias , op. cit. (ref. 40), ch. 14; on Macbride see Scott E. , “The Macbridean doctrine of air”, Ambix, xvii (1970), 43–57.

Percival Thomas , Philosophical, medical and experimental essays (London, 1776), 188–204; Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 57), iii, 305–20 and op. cit. (ref. 49, 1779–86), i, 302; Percival's crucial collaboration with Thomas Henry in the establishment of the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society, is in Thackray A. , “Natural knowledge in cultural context: The Manchester model”, American historical review, lxxix (1974), 672–709. See McEvoy , op. cit. (ref. 4, 1978, 1979), (1978) 160.

IngenHousz Jan , Experiments on vegetables (London, 1779), 89; Schofield , Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), 180–6 and 330; Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 49, 1779–86), iii, 25–35; idem, “Observations and experiments relating to equivocal or spontaneous generation”, Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, vi (1809), 119–29; McEvoy , op. cit. (ref. 4, 1978, 1979), (1978) 163–4. Compare Cooper's remarks in Priestley, Memoirs (ref. 2), 421–31; Abrahams H. J. , “Priestley answers the proponents of abiogenesis”, Ambix, xii (1964), 44–71; Farley J. , The spontaneous generation controversy from Descartes to Oparin (Baltimore, 1977).

Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 60, 1790), i, 354–64.

Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 57), i, 216 and ii, 39–40; Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 60, 1790), ii, 55; McEvoy , op. cit. (ref. 4, 1978, 1979), (1978) 164–71; Ihde , op. cit. (ref. 50), 66–67.

Hartog , op. cit. (ref. 17), 32–33; Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 57), ii, 320 commenting on Lavoisier A. , “Mémoire sur la nature du principe qui se combine avec les métaux pendant leur calcination et qui en augmente le poids”, Observations sur la physique, v (1775), 429–33.

Corsini A. , “La medicina all'corte di Pietro Leopoldo”, Rivista CIBA, viii (1954), 1509–40; Venturi F. , “Scienza e riforma nella Toscana del settecento”, Rivista storica italiana, lxxxix (1977), 77–105; Pace A. , Franklin in Italy (Philadelphia, 1958); Mora G. , “Vincenzo Chiarugi and his psychological reform in Florence in the late eighteenth century”, Journal of the history of medicine, xiv (1959), 424–33; Cochrane E. , Tradition and enlightenment in the Tuscan academies 1690–1800 (Chicago, 1961), 151ff.

Moscati Piero , Dei vantaggi della educazione filosofica nello studio delta chemica (Milan, 1784; ed. by Belloni L. , Milan, 1961), has interesting comments on Landriani, 77–86; for Fontana see his Descrizioni di alcuni stromenti per misurare la salubrità dell'aria (Florence, 1784); Knoefel P. , “Famine and fever in Tuscany: Eighteenth century Italian concern with the environment”, Physis, xxi (1979), 7–35. Priestley's comments are in Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), 164–6, 174–5, 159; and op. cit. (ref. 57), iii, xi and 380.

Priestley to Boulton , in Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), 161.

Knoefel , op. cit. (ref. 74), 20–35; Venturi , op. cit. (ref. 73), 97–98; Cochrane , op. cit. (ref. 73), 151–6.

Fontana Felice , “Experiments and observations on inflammable air breathed by various animals”, Philosophical transactions, lxix (1779), 337; idem, “Of the aires extracted from different kinds of waters”, Philosophical transactions, lxix (1779), 432–53; Priestley to Vaughan, 26 March 1780, in Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), 181.

Fontana Felice , Recherches physiques sur la nature de l'air nitreux et de l'air déphlogistiqué (Paris, 1776), 117–28; IngenHousz Jan , “Easy methods of measuring the diminution of bulk taking place on the mixture of common air and nitrous air”, Philosophical transactions, lxvi (1776), 257–67 and “Observations sur la construction et l'usage de l'eudiomètre de M. Fontana”, Journal de physique, xxvi (1785), 339–59; Jean Magellan, Description of a glass apparatus, 3rd edn (London, 1785); Cavallo Tiberio , Treatise on the nature and properties of air (London, 1781), 344ff.

Cavendish Henry , “Account of a new eudiometer”, Philosophical transactions, lxxiii (1783), 106.

Reed H. , “Jan IngenHousz, plant physiologist”, Chronica botanica, xi (1949), 285–396.

IngenHousz Jan , op. cit. (ref. 69), 155 and 278; idem, “Account of a new kind of inflammable air or gas”, Philosophical transactions, lxix (1779), 376–418; idem, “On the degree of salubrity of the common air at sea compared with that of the sea shore and that of places far removed from the sea”, Philosophical transactions, lxx (1780), 354.

Priestley to Fabroni Franklin and Kirwan , 1779–80, Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), 171–9 and 183–5.

This tradition is documented in Shapin S. , “History of science and its sociological reconstructions”, History of science, xx (1982), 157–211, and analysed in Barnes B. , Scientific knowledge and sociological theory (London, 1974), 69–98. A fundamental source is Fleck Ludwik , Genesis and development of a scientific fact (Chicago, 1979), 98–111.

Wilde C. B. , “Hutchinsonianism, natural philosophy and religious controversy in eighteenth century Britain”, History of science, xviii (1980), 1–24, and Shapin S. , “The social uses of science”, in Rousseau and Porter , op. cit. (ref. 47), 93–139.

McEvoy and McGuire , op. cit. (ref. 24).

Heimann P. M. and McGuire J. E. , “Newtonian forces and Lockean powers: Concepts of matter in eighteenth century thought”, Historical studies in physical science, iii (1971), 233–306, pp. 268–81; compare Heimann P. M. , “Voluntarism and immanence: Conceptions of nature in eighteenth century thought”, Journal of the history of ideas, xxxix (1978), 271–83 and “Ether and imponderables”, in Cantor G. N. and Hodge M. J. S. (eds), Conceptions of ether (Cambridge, 1981), 61–84; Schofield , op. cit. (ref. 16), 9.1 have commented on some of this literature in “Natural philosophy” in Rousseau and Porter , op. cit. (ref. 47), 55–91, pp. 58–71.

Priestley Joseph , op. cit. (ref. 20, 1772), 390–4; idem, Hartley's theory of the human mind (London, 1775), xi and xx; idem, Examination of Dr Reid's Inquiry into the human mind… (London, 1774); idem, Disquisitions relating to matter and spirit (London, 1777). See Schofield , op. cit. (ref. 16), 7 and 10; Schofield , op. cit. (ref. 3), 78; Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), 215; Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 49, 1779–86), i, 408.

Christie and Golinski , op. cit. (ref. 4), 246.

Boscovich to Priestley , 17 October 1778, in Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), 169; Priestley to Price, 23 November 1771, ibid., 93–94; Priestley Joseph , A free discussion of the doctrines of materialism and philosophical necessity (London, 1778), 9, 26–28, 231–7; compare Priestley, op. cit. (ref. 33, 1767), ix-x.

Parry , op. cit. (ref. 42), ch. 6; Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 20, 1772), 390–1; idem, op. cit. (ref. 25, 1772–74), i, 11; idem, op. cit. (ref. 87, 1775), xx; idem. Disquisitions (ref. 87, 1777), 26 and 170–3; idem, Free discussion (ref. 89, 1778), 260–80.

McEvoy , op. cit. (ref. 32), 25 n. 11; compare Priestley to Rotheram, 31 May 1774, in Scientific autobiography (ref. 2), 146; Priestley , Hartley's theory (ref. 87, 1775), xi and xviii; Priestley , Examination of Reid (ref. 87, 1774), lvii.

Priestley , Institutes (ref. 25, 1772–74), i, 15–16; idem, Disquisitions (ref. 87, 1777), 16, 108–12, 145–6. Compare Priestley to Caleb Rotheram, April 1778, in Rutt, op. cit. (ref. 2), i, 315: “I was an Arian till I went to Leeds [1769] and my materialism is but of late standing”.

Priestley Joseph , An appeal to the serious and candid professors of Christianity (London, 1770). See Hiebert E. N. , “Integration of revealed religion and scientific materialism in the thought of Joseph Priestley”, in Kieft and Willeford (eds), op. cit. (ref. 22), 27–61, pp. 48–53.

Godwin William , Caleb Williams (1794), ed. by McCracken D. (Oxford, 1970), 339 (on Godwin's “metaphysical dissecting knife”); Locke D. , A fantasy of reason: The life and thought of William Godwin (London, 1980), 19–20 (on Holbach and Priestley); Fitzpatrick M. , “William Godwin and the rational dissenters”, Price-Priestley newsletter, iii (1979), 4–28.

McEvoy and McGuire , op. cit. (ref. 24); Rutt , op. cit. (ref. 2), i, 349–57: “those of us who are called Rational Dissenters” (1769).

For politics and dissent, see Mineka F. E. , The dissidence of Dissent (Chapel Hill, 1944); Lincoln A. H. , Some political and social ideas of English dissent (Cambridge, 1938); Richey R. C. E. , “The origins of British radicalism: The changing rationale for dissent”, Eighteenth century studies, vii (1973–74), 179–92; Ditchfield G. , “The parliamentary struggle on the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, 1787–1790”, English historical review, lxxxix (1974), 551–77. For the radical context, see Norris J. , Shelburne and reform (London, 1963), ch. 11; Jarrett D. , Begetters of revolution: England's involvement with France 1759–1789 (London, 1973), ch. 10; Goodwin A. , The friends of liberty: English democratic movements in the age of the French Revolution (London, 1979), ch. 3; Dickinson H. T. , Liberty and property: Political ideology in eighteenth century Britain (London, 1977), ch. 6. See Priestley , History of the corruptions of Christianity (1782), in Rutt , op. cit. (ref. 2), v, 15, discussed in Canovan M. , “The irony of history: Priestley's rational theology”, Price-Priestley newsletter, iv (1980), 16–25.

Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 60, 1790), i, xxiii; Priestley to Price, 2 October 1778, in Free discussion (ref. 89), 414; idem, Institutes (ref. 25), ii, 312.

Priestley , Free discussion (ref. 89), xxx; Rutt , op. cit. (ref. 2), i, 146 and xxiii, 443–50 (on the failure of the campaign in the mid-1770s and the hopes of millenium). For the link between progress, politics and the millenium, Fruchtman J. , “Politics and the apocalypse: The republic and the millenium in late 18th century political thought”, Studies in 18th century culture, x (1981), 153–64; Hoecker J. J. , “Joseph Priestley as an historian and the idea of progress”, Price-Priestley newsletter, iii (1979), 29–40; Garrett Clarke , “Joseph Priestley, the millenium and the French revolution”, Journal of the history of ideas, xxxiv (1973), 51–66. For the parliamentary campaign, see Barlow R. B. , Citizenship and conscience (Philadelphia, 1962), 171–220.

Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 57), ii, 323; idem, Disquisitions (ref. 87), 109–10.

Priestley Joseph , Reflections on the present state of inquiry in matters of religion (Birmingham, 1785), 40–41 and Priestley , op. cit. (ref. 49, 1779–86), i, xxiii. For the citation in Parliament, see Barlow , op. cit. (ref. 98), 237 n. 33. For Hartley's importance, see Marsh R. , “The second part of Hartley's system”, Journal of the history of ideas, xx (1959), 264–73. For radical responses, see Money J. , Experience and identity: Birmingham and the West Midlands 1760–1800 (Manchester, 1977), 145–8: “if we don't all get to heaven, it shan't be thrown in his teeth”.

Priestley , Memoirs (ref. 2), 448–63 and 372n. For civic humanism see Pocock J. G. A. , The Machiavellian moment (Princeton, 1975), ch. 14 and Robbins C. , The eighteenth century Commonwealthman (Cambridge, Mass., 1959).