Essay Review: Revisions of Science and Magic: From Paracelsus to Newton: Magic and the Making of Modern Science,Occult and Scientific Mentalities in the Renaissance

There are indications of a new Conservative school of historiography. Cf. Michael Heseltine's recent reference to “the foreseeable past” (The Guardian, 10 March 1983).

Yates F. A. , Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic tradition (London and Chicago, 1974); Pagel W. , Paracelsus: An introduction to philosophical medicine in the era of the Renaissance (second edn, Basle and New York, 1982); Walker D. P. , Spiritual and demonic magic from Ficino to Campanella (London, 1958); for Rattansi, see below (ref. 38); Debus A. G. , The English Paracelsians (London, 1965); Rossi P. , Francis Bacon: From magic to science (London and Chicago, 1968). Bibliographical references are not intended to be exhaustive.

Hall A. R. , The revolution in science 1500–1750 (London and New York, 1983); Hesse M. , “Reasons and evaluation in the history of science”, in Teich M. and Young R. (eds), Changing perspectives in the history of science (London, 1973), 127–47; Rossi P. , “Hermeticism, rationality and the Scientific Revolution”, in Bonelli M. L. R. and Shea W. R. (eds), Reason, experiment and mysticism in the Scientific Revolution (New York, 1975), 247–74.

See also the recent discussion by Simon Schaffer in “Making certain”, Social studies of science, xiv (1984), 137–52.

Webster John , The displaying of supposed witchcraft… (London, 1677).

Thomas Keith , Religion and the decline of magic (London, 1971), 418.

In this respect, see Charles Webster's marvellous “Paracelsus and the demons: Science as a synthesis of popular belief”, in Scienza, credenze occulte, livelli cultura (Florence, 1982), 3–20.

Yates F. A. , “The Hermetic tradition in Renaissance science”, in Singleton C. S. (ed.), Art, science and history in the Renaissance (Baltimore, 1967), 255–74.

Yates , op. cit. (ref. 2).

Westman R. , “Magical reform and astronomical reform: The Yates thesis reconsidered”, in Westman R. and McGuire J. E. , Hermeticism and the Scientific Revolution (Los Angeles, 1977).

See the important review by Schmitt C. S. , “Reappraisals in Renaissance science”, History of science, xvi (1978), 200–14; also by Rattansi P. M. , in Journal of the history of philosophy, xix (1981), 392–6; and Wood P. B. , in The British journal for the history of science, xiii (1979), 70–72.

Yates F. A. , The Rosicrucian enlightenment (London, 1972); see the critical review by Vickers Brian , “Frances Yates and the writing of history”, Journal of modern history, li (1979), 287–316.

Corsi Pietro , “History of science, history of philosophy and history of theology”, in Corsi P. and Weindling P. (eds), Information sources in the history of science and medicine (London, 1983), 3–28, p. 16. For a model work of history in this respect, see the excellent (but badly translated) Astrology in the Renaissance: The zodiac of life , by Garin Eugenio (London, 1983).

O'Keefe Daniel L. , Stolen lightning: The social theory of magic (Oxford, 1982), 14.

Schmitt , op. cit. (ref. 11).

See Hesse Mary , Revolutions and reconstructions in the philosophy of science (Brighton, 1980), Part 2.

Skinner Quentin , “Meaning and understanding in the history of ideas”, History and theory, viii (1969), 3–53, pp. 32, 37; this paper has a close bearing on my own.

See Thompson E. P. , The poverty of theory and other essays (London, 1978).

Rabb Theodore K. , “Coherence, synthesis, and quality in history”, Journal of interdisciplinary history, xii (1981), 315–32, p. 331 (author's emphasis).

Horton Robin , “African traditional thought and modern science”, Africa, xxxvii (1967), 50–71, 155–87; reprinted (slightly abridged) in Wilson B. R. (ed.), Rationality (Oxford, 1970).

Horton R. , “Tradition and modernity revisited”, in Hollis M. and Lukes S. (eds), Rationality and relativism (Oxford, 1982), 201–60, p. 226.

Evans-Pritchard E. E. , Witchcraft, oracles and magic among the Azande (Oxford, 1937).

See Bowden M. E. , “The scientific revolution in astrology: The English reformers, 1558–1686” (unpub. Ph.D. thesis, Yale University, 1974).

Gellner Ernest , “The savage and modern mind”, in Horton R. and Finnegan R. (eds), Modes of thought: Essays on thinking in Western and non-Western societies (London, 1973), 162–81. It is perhaps significant that Professor Gellner recently introduced a paper by a distinguished visiting academic on the ‘third force’ in early modern England — i.e., magicalmillenialists, after Aristotelians and mechanists — by describing the first group as “nutcases”.

See Hunter Michael , Science and society in Restoration England (Cambridge, 1981); Jacob M. C. , The Newtonians and the English Revolution, 1689–1720 (Brighton, 1976).

Levy-Bruhl is mentioned (but not discussed) by Vickers in a bibliographical note (78) on p. 53.

MacDonald Michael , “Anthropological perspectives on the history of science and medicine”, in Corsi and Weindling (eds), op. cit. (ref. 13), 61–80, p. 64.

Thompson E. P. , “Anthropology and the discipline of context”, Midland history, i (1972), 41–55.

Geertz Hildred , “An anthropology of magic and religion I”, 71–89, and Thomas Keith , “An anthropology of magic and religion II”, 91–109, in Journal of interdisciplinary history, vi (1975).

The choice of Saussure as a scientific ally is an odd one, given the profoundly anti-realistic tendencies of structuralism; see Giddens Anthony , Central problems in social and political theory (London, 1979), ch. 1. For a more measured assessment of Wilkins's epistemology, see Hacking Ian , The emergence of probability (Cambridge, 1975), 80–83.

My analysis would also explain Vickers's ambiguous reference on p. 13 to “the rehabilitation of the occult [and] its proponents” (he means Pagel and Rattansi), and two remarkable instances where he upbraids D. P. Walker for failing to make it sufficiently clear that Walker is “merely summarizing” sixteenth century views on magic, not “endorsing” them (pp. 119 and 159, n. 44).

Jung C. G. and Pauli W. , The interpretation of nature and the psyche (London, 1955). The material on mandala configurations in dreams is in vol. xii of Jung's Collected works.

E.g., Midelfort H. C. Erik , Witch-hunting in Southwestern Germany 1582–1684 (Stanford, 1972). See also the discussion in Hirst P. and Woolley P. , Social relations and human attributes (London and New York, 1982), 211–58; and an excellent review of the evidence in a forthcoming manuscript by Hirst Paul (Birkbeck College, London) entitled “Is it rational to reject relativism?”.

Rattansi P. M. , “Paracelsus and the Puritan Revolution”, Ambix, xi (1963), 24–32.

I owe this point, concerning Giles and Heydon , to Simon Schaffer.

Brewster David Sir , Memoirs of the life, writings and discoveries of Sir Isaac Newton (Edinburgh and London), ii, 374–5.

Keynes Maynard , “Newton, the man”, Newton tercentenary celebrations [of the Royal Society] (Cambridge, 1947), 27.

Rattansi P. M. , “Newton's alchemical studies”, in Debus Allen G. (ed.), Science, medicine and society: Essays to honor Walter Pagel (2 vols, New York, 1972), ii, 167–82; idem, “Some evaluations of reason in sixteenth and seventeenth century natural philosophy”, in Teich and Young (eds), op. cit. (ref. 3), 148–66.

Again, these references are not exhaustive. (For a bibliographical phenomenon comparable to the Newtonian one, see discussion of the controversial De Selby corpus in O'Brien F. , The third policeman (London, 1967), especially notes on pp. 101–3, 125–9 and 144–9. I am indebted for this suggestion to Suzanna Curry.)

Westfall R. S. , “Newton and the Hermetic tradition”, in Debus (ed.), op. cit. (ref. 38), ii, 183–98; idem, “The role of alchemy in Newton's career”, in Bonelli and Shea (eds), op. cit. (ref. 3), 189–232; Dobbs B. J. T. , The foundations of Newton's alchemy, or “The hunting of the greene lyon” (Cambridge, 1975); for Rattansi, see op. cit. (ref. 38). On Dobbs, see Figala Karen , “Newton as alchemist”, History of science, xv (1977), 102–37. See also Debus A. G. , “Alchemy and the historian of science”, History of science, vi (1967), 128–37.

Cohen I. Bernard , “The Principia, universal gravitation, and the ‘Newtonian style’, in relation to the Newtonian Revolution in science: Notes on the occasion of the 250th anniversary of Newton's death”, in Bechler Zev (ed.), Contemporary Newtonian research (Dordrecht, 1982), 21–108. Bechler is critical of Cohen's position, arguing that “Metaphysics is both a starting point and the final aim of Newton's physics…” (p. 13).

Ashmole Elias , Theatrum chemicum Britannicum (London, 1652), 446–7.

McGuire J. E. , “Neoplatonism and active principles: Newton and the Corpus Hermeticum”, in Westman and McGuire , op. cit. (ref. 10); see also the reviews cited in ref. 11 above.

Casini P. , “Newton: The classical scholia”, History of science, xxii (1984), 1–23.

Rattansi P. M. and McGuire J. E. , “Newton and the ‘pipes of pan’”, Notes and records of the Royal Society of London, xxi (1966), 108–43.

Skinner , op. cit. (ref. 17), 37. It is tempting to recall in this connection McGuire's suggestion that Newton was merely employing Hermetic terminology as a means of “legitimation” (op. cit. (ref. 43), 132); unfortunately, this would leave Newton's very considerable Hermetic-alchemical studies unexplained.

In any case, Casini's dating appears to be erroneous; references to the Chaldean and Pythagorean philosophies appear in a draft preface for the first edition of the Principia (1687) and in his draft of System of the world (1685); see Schaffer , op. cit. (ref. 53, below), 26–27 and note 55.

Castillejo D. , The expanding force in Newton's cosmos (Madrid, 1981).

McGuire , op. cit. (ref. 43), 119.

Webster Charles , From Paracelsus to Newton (Cambridge, 1982), 100.

Hunter , op. cit. (ref. 25).

Rattansi (1972), op. cit. (ref. 38), 174.

Schaffer S. , “Newton's comets and the transformation of astrology”, a paper given at a conference on the history of mediaeval and Renaissance astrology at the Warburg Institute, March 1984; I am hoping to have these papers published before long.

Barnes B. , Interests and the growth of knowledge (London, 1977). It is not necessary, in appreciating Barnes's work, also to take on board his commitment to philosophical relativism, combined with an overly empiricist approach to the social sciences. (See also Abercrombie Nicholas , Class, structure and knowledge (Oxford, 1980).)

Ginzburg C. , The cheese and the worms: The cosmos of a sixteenth century miller (transl., London, 1980); also see his more recent The night battles: Witchcraft and agrarian cults in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries (transl., London, 1983).

Burke P. , “A question of acculturation?”, in Scienza…, op. cit. (ref. 7), 197–204.

Thomas , op. cit. (ref. 4).

E. g., Shapin S. , “The politics of observation: Cerebral anatomy and social interests in the Edinburgh phrenology disputes”, in Wallis Roy (ed.), On the margins of science: The social construction of rejected knowledge (Keele, 1979), 139–78; idem, “Social uses of science”, in Rousseau G. S. and Porter Roy (eds), The ferment of knowledge: Studies in the historiography of eighteenth century science (Cambridge, 1980), 93–139.

As Shapin notes (op. cit., 1980 (ref. 58), 107), Rattansi's work falls between, or in, both types; e.g., his “The social interpretation of science in the seventeenth century”, in Mathias Peter (ed.), Science and society 1600–1900 (Cambridge, 1972), 1–32.

Schaffer S. , “Making certain”, op. cit. (ref. 4), 149. See also idem, op. cit. (ref. 53), and idem, “Natural philosophy”, in Rousseau and Porter (eds), op. cit. (ref. 58), 55–92.

Schaffer S. , review of Webster, op. cit. (ref. 50) in The British journal for the philosophy of science, xxxv (1984), 194–9, p. 192.

Dreyfus Hubert L. and Rabinow Paul , Michel Foucault: Beyond Structuralism and hermeneutics (Brighton, 1982).

Hirst P. , “Witchcraft today and yesterday”, Economy and society, xi (1984), 428–48; Hirst is here, in part, reviewing Brian Easlea, Witch-hunting, magic and the new philosophy (Brighton, 1980).

Larner C. , Enemies of God: The witch-hunt in Scotland (London, 1981).

See the writings of Antonio Gramsci; and also Larrain Jorge , The concept of ideology (London, 1979).

History workshop, ix (1980), 3.

Vovelle M. , Idéologies et mentalités (Paris, 1983). See also the review by Higonnet Patrice , Times literary supplement (14 Oct. 1983), 1141.

Burke Peter , “Measure of mentalities”, Times literary supplement (8 July 1983), 723.

Thompson , op. cit. (ref. 28).

Thomas , op. cit. (ref. 29), 104. See also Butler Jon , “Magic, astrology and the early American religious heritage”, The American historical review, lxxxiv (1979), 317–46.

This point is developed in Wrightson Keith , English society 1580–1680 (London, 1982).

For an important chapter in its development, see Hutchison Keith , “What happened to occult qualities in the scientific revolution?”, Isis, lxxiii (1982), 233–53.

The following references, which have come to my attention only since completing this paper, have a direct bearing on its subject: Clark Stuart , “French historians and early modern popular culture”, Past and present, c (1983), 62–99; Kerr Howard and Crow Charles L. (eds), The occult in America: New historical perspectives (Chicago, 1983); Obelkevitch James (ed.), Religion and the people 800–1700 (Chapel Hill, NC, 1979) (see especially the editor's introduction); Revue de synthèse, cxi-cxii (1983): “Journée ‘Histoire des sciences et mentalités’”; and the work of Roger Cooter, including “Phrenology: The provocation of progress”, History of science, xiv (1976), 211–34; idem, “Deploying ‘pseudo-science’: Then and now”, in Hanen M. P. Osier M. J. , and Weyant R. G. (eds), Science. pseudo-science and society (Waterloo, Ont., 1980), 237–72; and idem, Cultural meaning and popular science (Cambridge, 1985).