Early Modern Intellectual Life: Humanism,Religion and Science in Seventeenth Century England

A slightly different version of this paper was delivered at the International Workshop on “Fifty years of the Merton Thesis”, sponsored by Tel Aviv University and the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute in May 1988.

For a brief survey of this issue see God and nature: Historical essays on the encounter between Christianity and science , ed. by Lindberg David C. and Numbers Ronald L. (Berkeley, 1986), 1–18. See especially Westfall R. S. , Science and religion in seventeenth century England (New Haven, 1958).

Merton Robert K. , “Science, technology, and society in seventeenth century England”, Osiris, iv (1938), 360–632; Hill Christopher , “Puritanism, capitalism, and the scientific revolution”, Past and present, xxix, (1964), 88–97; idem, Intellectual origins of the English Revolution (London, 1965); Stimson Dorothy , “Puritanism and the new philosophy in seventeenth-century England”, Bulletin of the Institute of the History of Medicine, iii, (1935), 321–34; Jones R. F. , Ancients and moderns: A study of the rise of the scientific movement in seventeenth-century England , 2nd edn (St Louis, 1961). See also Webster Charles , The Great Instauration: Science, medicine and reform 1626–1660 (London, 1975).

Most of the Past and present contributions were collected in The intellectual revolution of the seventeenth century, ed. by Webster Charles (London, 1974).

Shapiro Barbara , “Latitudinarianism and science in seventeenth-century England”, Past and present, xl (1968), 16–40; idem, John Wilkins, 1614–78: An intellectual biography (Berkeley, 1969); idem, Probability and certainty in seventeenth-century England: The relationship between natural science, religion, history, law and literature (Princeton, 1983); Kemsley D. S. , “Religious influences in the rise of modern science: A review of criticism, particularly of the Protestant-Puritan ethic theory”, Annals of science, xxiv (1968), 199–226; Jacob J. R. and Jacob M. C. , “The Anglican origins of modern science: The metaphysical foundations of the Whig constitution”, Isis, lxxi (1980), 25–67. See also Cope Jackson , Joseph Glanvill, Anglican apologist (St Louis, 1956). Another source of the latitudinarian-science linkage is to be found in the history of epistemology. See Van Leeuwen Henry G. , The problem of certainty in English thought 1630–1690 (The Hague, 1963). Many historians of science ignored the religion-science, Puritan-science issues.

For recent discussion of the intellectual history see Bouwsma William J. , “Intellectual history in the 1980s: From history of ideas to history of meaning”, Journal of interdisciplinary history, xii, (1981), 179–93; LaCapra Dominick and Kaplan Steven L. (eds), Modern intellectual history: Reappraisals and new perspectives (Ithaca, 1985); Toews John E. , “Intellectual history after the linguistic turn: The anatomy of meaning and the irreducibility of experience”, American historical review, xcii, (1986), 879–908. Cf. also Shapiro Barbara , “Latitudinarianism, science and society and the practice of intellectual history” (paper, William Andrews Clark Library Conference, on “Latitudinarianism, science and society”, April 1987).

See Kuhn Thomas , “Mathematical versus experimental traditions in the development of physical science”, Journal of interdisciplinary history, vii (1976–77), 1–31.

Curtis Mark H. , Oxford and Cambridge in transition 1558–1642: An essay on changing relations between English universities and English society (Oxford, 1959).

Mathematics was included as part of the humanist programme.

See Popkin Richard , The history of scepticism from Erasmus to Spinoza (Berkeley, 1979); Schmitt Charles B. , Cicero Scepticus: A study of the influence of the “Academica” in the Renaissance (The Hague, 1972); idem, “The rediscovery of ancient scepticism in modern times”, in Burnyeat Miles (ed.), The skeptical tradition (Berkeley, 1983), 225–52. The revival of scepticism played a larger role in France than England. See also Osler Margaret J. , “Certainty, scepticism, and scientific optimism: The roots of eighteenth century attitudes toward scientific knowledge” in Probability, time, and space in eighteenth-century literature, ed. by Backsheider Paula (New York, 1979), 3–28.

See Kargon Robert , Atomism in England from Hariot to Newton (Oxford, 1960).

See Shapiro Barbara , “History and natural history in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century England: An essay on the relationship between humanism and science”, in Shapiro Barbara and Frank Robert , English scientific virtuosi in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries (Los Angeles, 1979), 1–55; Levine Joseph M. , Dr Woodward's shield: History, science, and satire in Augustan England (Berkeley, 1977); Levine Joseph M. , Humanism and history: Origins of modern English historiography (Ithaca, 1987); Hunter M. C. W. , “The Royal Society and the origins of British archaeology: I”, Antiquity, lxv, (1971), 113–21; Mendyk Stan A. E. , ‘Speculum Britanniae’: Regional study, antiquarianism, and science in Britain to 1700 (Toronto, 1989).

See for example Sidney Philip Sir , An apology for poetry, ed. by Robinson Forrest G. (New York, 1970).

See Ferguson Wallace K. , The Renaissance in historical thought (Cambridge, MA, 1948). Not all humanists accepted the tripartite division. Some favoured cyclical theories of history.

Some, however, felt that future progress in natural philosophy required recovering the ancient hermetic wisdom. See also Osler Margaret J. , “Baptizing Epicurian atomism: Pierre Gassendi on the immortality of the soul”, in Religion, science and world view: Essays in honor of Richard S. Westfall, ed. by Osler Margaret J. and Farber Paul L. (Cambridge, 1985).

For the rhetorical orientation of humanism see Gray Hanna , “Renaissance humanism: The pursuit of eloquence”, Journal of the history of ideas, xxiv (1963), 497–514; Bouwsma William , The interpretation of Renaissance humanism , 2nd edn (Washington, D.C., 1961); Siegal Jerrold E. , Rhetoric and philosophy in Renaissance humanism (Princeton, 1968); Kristeller Paul Oskar , Renaissance thought and its sources, ed. by Mooney Michael (New York, 1969).

The Platonic dialogue, however, was directed at the disclosure of truth rather than the exploration of different positions.

Shapiro , Probability and certainty (ref. 4); Van Leeuwen , The problem of certainty (ref. 4); Shapin Steven and Schaffer Simon , Leviathan and the air pump: Hobbes, Boyle and the experimental life (Princeton, 1986). See also Osler , “Certainty, scepticism and scientific optimism” (ref. 9); Farr James , “The way of hypothesis: Locke on method”, Journal of the history of ideas, xlviii, (1987), 51–92; Rogers G. A. J. , “Descartes and the method of English science”, Annals of science, xxix (1979), 237–55; Rogers G. A. J. , “The bases of belief: Philosophy, science and religion in seventeenth century England”, History of European ideas, vi (1985), 19–39.

Dear Peter Robert , Mersenne and the learning of the schools (Ithaca, 1988); Joy Lynn , Gassendi. The atomist: Advocate of history in an age of science (Cambridge, 1987).

See Shapiro , Probability and certainty (ref. 4), 61–66; Wood P. B. , “Methodology and apologetics: Thomas Sprat's History of the Royal Society”, The British journal for the history of science, xiii (1980), 1–26. Hunter M. C. W. , “The Royal Society and the origins of British archaeology: II”, Antiquity, xlv, (1971), 187–92. Neither Renaissance humanists nor English virtuosi consistently conformed to the value system they defended. On more than one occasion acrimonious controversy punctuated scientific, scholarly and literary exchange.

See Hacking Ian , The emergence of probability (New York, 1975); Nelson Benjamin , “The early modern revolution in science and philosophy: Fictionalism, probabilism, fideism and Catholic ‘prophetism’”, Boston studies in the philosophy of science, iii, (1964–66), 1–39; Rossi Paolo , Philosophy, technology and the arts in the early modern era (New York, 1970); Shapiro , Probability and certainty (ref. 4), passim; Patey Douglas L. , Probability and literary form: Philosophic theory and literary practice in the Augustan age (Cambridge, 1984); Daston Lorraine , Classical probability in the Enlightenment (Princeton, 1988); Steadman John , The hill and the labyrinth: Discourse and certitude in Milton and his near contemporaries (Berkeley, 1984).

Neither tradition jettisoned traditional logic. The humanist reforms of Agricola, Melanchthon and Ramus combined elements of logic, rhetoric and dialectic. The new genre of rhetorical dialectics had the result of separating thought from style. Style thus became the central focus of the reformed rhetoric. As rhetoric became identified with style, it became vulnerable to critics who viewed it as “empty rhetoric” or mere ornamentation. The development of the humanist dialectical tradition, designed to incorporate and simplify what was valuable from the scholastic dialectical tradition, thus contributed to the unanticipated later attack on rhetoric. For a discussion of the new dialectics see Gilbert Neal , Renaissance concepts of method (New York, 1960); Vasoli Cesare , La dialettica e la retorica dell' Umanesimo (Milan, 1968); Jardine Lisa , Francis Bacon: Discovery and the art of discourse (Cambridge, 1974); Dear Peter , Mersenne (ref. 18), 9–47; Patey Douglas , Probability and literary form (Cambridge, 1984). The relationship between the new rhetorical dialectics and the attack on rhetoric as embellishment has not yet been adequately investigated. The virtuosi did not wish to eradicate the teaching of logic but denied that it was an appropriate instrument with which to acquire knowledge of the natural world.

See Shapiro , Wilkins (ref. 4), 206–23; Shapiro , Probability and certainty (ref. 4), 227–66; Knowlson James , Universal language schemes in England and France: 1600–1800 (Toronto, 1975); Cohen Murray , Sensible words: Linguistic practice in England 1640–1675 (Baltimore, 1977).

See Curtis , Oxford and Cambridge in transition (ref. 7); Shapiro Barbara , “The universities and science in seventeenth-century England”, Journal of British studies, x (1971), 47–82; Frank Robert G. Jr , “Science, medicine and the universities of early modern England: Background and sources”, History of science, xi, (1973), 194–216, 239–69; Frank Robert G. Jr , Harvey and the Oxford physiologists (Berkeley, 1980); Feingold Mordechai , The mathematician's apprenticeship: Science, universities and society in England 1560–1640 (Cambridge, 1984); Gascoigne John , “The universities and the scientific revolution: The case of Newton and Restoration Cambridge”, History of science, xxiii, (1985), 391–434; idem, “Politics, patronage, and Newtonianism: The Cambridge example”, The historical journal, xxvii, (1984), 1–24. For a different view see Costello W. T. , The scholastic curriculum at early seventeenth century Cambridge (Harvard, 1958); Jardine Lisa , “The place of dialectic teaching in sixteenth century Cambridge”, Studies in the Renaissance, xxi, (1974), 31–62.

Bacon Francis , The advancement of learning (1605), ed. by Kitchin G. W. (London, 1973).

Language, however, was a shared interest. The virtuosi's attack on amplified and metaphorical language and their concern with developing a universal character and language are well known. We still need to know more about how literary demands for a less amplified and less metaphoric style interacted with the critique of the virtuosi.

Levine Joseph M. , Humanism and history: Origins of modern English historiography (Ithaca, 1987); Levine , Dr Woodward's shield (ref. 11); Hunter , Antiquity (ref. 11), 113–21; Shapiro Barbara , “History and natural history in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century England” (ref. 11); Mendyk Stan A. E. , ‘Speculum Britanniae’: Regional study, antiquarianism and science in Britain to 1700 (Toronto, 1987). See also Ferguson Arthur B. , Clio unbound: Perception of the social and cultural past in Renaissance England (Durham, North Carolina, 1979). See also Tinkler John F. , “The splitting of humanism: Bentley, Swift, and the English Battle of the Books”, Journal of the history of ideas, 1 (1988), 453–72.

Bacon's theoretical comments on history, both civil and natural, occur in works we traditionally label scientific, yet his own historical productions, particularly his study of the reign of Henry VII, fit easily into the canon of humanist historiography. Bacon's philosophy of science owes much to law and to rhetoric.

See Bacon , Advancement of learning (ref. 24).

Galileo Galilei , “Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina”, in Discoveries and opinions of Galileo, ed. by Drake Stillman (New York, 1957), 173–216.

Galileo Galilei , Dialogue on the two great world systems , ed. by Drake Stillman (Berkeley, 1953). See Moss Jean Dietz , “Galileo's rhetorical strategies in defense of Copernicanism”, in Galluzzi P. (ed.), Novita, ceselti e crisi del sapere (Florence, 1984), 95–103. Although Descartes's vision of natural philosophy was not that of the empiricists, his rhetorically sophisticated Discourse on method was designed to appeal to a broad, non-scientific audience.

See Jones R. F. , The seventeenth century: Studies in the history of English thought and literature from Bacon to Pope (Stanford, 1951); Cope , Glanvill (ref. 4); Adolph Robert , The rise of the modern prose style (Cambridge, MA, 1968); Christianson Francis , “John Wilkins and the Royal Society's reform of prose style”, Modern language quarterly, vii, (1946), 279–90; Williamson George , “The Restoration revolt against enthusiasm”, in his Seventeenth century contexts (Chicago, 1969), 202–40; Croll Morris , Style, rhetoric and rhythm , ed. by Patrick J. Max (Princeton, 1966); Gordon Ian A. , The movement of English prose (London, 1980); Vickers Brian , “The Royal Society and English prose style”, in his Rhetoric and the pursuit of truth: Language change in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries (Los Angeles, 1985), 1–76.

The virtuosi's attack on the deceptiveness of certain linguistic and rhetorical practices is capable of two quite different interpretations. The first is that the critiques of Bacon, Wilkins, Glanvill and Sprat were attacks on rhetoric and the literary arts generally. The second is that they believed only that natural philosophy and scientific explanation and description must be shorn of poetic and amplified language. The latter position is compatible with a sparer yet rhetorically effective language for use in civil affairs, literary genres, sermons and historical writings. I would suggest that many though by no means all of the English scientific fraternity held the second position. In any event it was widely held and became the early eighteenth century norm via the latitudinarian sermons of John Tillotson, Wilkins's famous son-in-law, who became Archbishop of Canterbury.

See Spiller Michael R. G. (ed.), An introduction to ‘Concerning natural experimental philosophies’, Meric Casaubon and the Royal Society (The Hague, 1980). But see Hunter Michael , Science and society in Restoration England (Cambridge, 1981).

See Levine , Humanism and history (ref. 11). Literary men ridiculed the scholarly antiquary despite his humanist pedigrees. Levine's important study not only emphasizes the importance of seventeenth century humanism but suggests the uneasy and complex relationship between different strands of historical scholarship.

If from our vantage point many scholastic theologians would seem to fall into our third group, many sixteenth century humanists and seventeenth century naturalists accused them of belonging to the second. For a discussion of the problem in the ancient world see Cochrane C. N. , Christianity and classical culture (Oxford, 1940).

See Morgan John , Godly learning: Puritan attitudes towards reason, learning, and education, 1560–1640 (Cambridge, 1986); idem, “Puritanism and science: A reinterpretation”, The historical journal, xxii (1979), 535–60.

See Westfall , Science and religion in seventeenth century England (ref. 1); McAdoo H. R. , The spirit of Anglicanism: A survey of Anglican theological method in the seventeenth century (London, 1965); Reedy Gerard , The Bible and reason: Anglicans and Scripture in late seventeenth century England (Philadelphia, 1985).

See Shapiro , Probability and certainty (ref. 4); cf. also Henry John , “Roman Catholicism and the ‘motive forces of the new science’” (paper, International Workshop on “Fifty years of the Merton thesis”, May 1988, sponsored by Tel Aviv University and the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute). This latitudinarian strain was not always translated into a generous public policy. The other side of the Anglican insistence on comprehension was conformity. If Church polity, dogma and ceremony belonged to the realm of human choice as long as they did not directly violate Scripture, it was not difficult to insist on conformity. Anglicans and even latitudinarians thus sometimes advocated or accepted coercive measures. The argument for conformity also helps to explain why some mid-century latitudinarians were willing to accept and conform to changes in religious and political regimes. If they argued for the principle of conformity, they also imposed it on themselves. The role of reason and the balance between reason and Scripture, or the Book of Scripture and the Book of Nature has been well-explored from the 1650s onward. We are only beginning to see the connections between the latitudinarian strains in sixteenth and early seventeenth century Anglicanism and the epistemological and scientific concerns of Restoration latitudinarian virtuosi. Cf. Richard Olsen, “Richard Hooker and the roots of the latitudinarian movement” (Conference paper, “Latitudinarianism, science, and society”, William Andrews Clark Library, Los Angeles, April 1987). For the importance of the probabilist theory of knowledge for John Donne see Brown Meg Lota , ‘“In that the world's contracted thus’: John Donne and Renaissance casuistry” (Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, Berkeley, Department of English, 1987). See also Van Leeuwen , The problem of certainty (ref. 4).

On the whole both groups leaning in the direction of voluntarism and in connection with faith emphasized the will over the intellect. The humanists, however, were not attracted to natural theology. The natural theology of the English scientists owed something to the scholastic tradition but was formulated in such a way as to be compatible with voluntarism.

English Puritans to some extent shared these views but their greater emphasis on faith and on the weaknesses of reason and the moral and intellectual faculties, as well as their greater confidence in their ability to correctly ascertain Scriptural prescriptions regarding the Church, religious ceremony, theological dogma and the norms of correct behaviour reduced their concern with and focus on the products of natural knowledge. When the Puritans were able to establish an institution of higher learning at Harvard suited to their outlook on the learned world, they chose to transmit study of the learned languages, Ramism and scholasticism rather than the new science. Harvard became more receptive to the new sciences only as Puritanism moved in the direction of more rationalism and Unitarianism.

Erasmus-Luther , Discourse on free will, ed. and trans. by Winter E. G. (New York, 1961), 7. See also p. 101.

Bush Douglas , Science and English poetry (Oxford, 1945); Willey Basil , The seventeenth century background: Studies in the thought of the age of relation to religion (Oxford, 1934); Baker Herschel , The wars of truth: Studies in the decay of Christian humanism in the earlier seventeenth century (Cambridge, MA, 1956).

Nicolson Marjorie Hope , Voyages to the Moon (New York, 1948); idem, Science and imagination (New York, 1956); idem, The breaking of the circle: Studies in the effect of the ‘new science’ on seventeenth century poetry (New York, 1960); Rousseau G. S. , “Till we have built Jerusalem: The Berkeley Symposium and the future of literature and science”, Annals of scholarship: Metastudies of the humanities and social sciences, iv (1986), 1–22.

Cochrane Eric , “Science and humanism in the Italian Renaissance”, American historical review (1976), 1039–57; Westman Robert , “Humanism and scientific roles in the sixteenth century”, Humanismus und Naturwissenschaften , ed. by Schmitz Rudolph and Kraft Fritz , Beitrage zur Humanismusforschung , vi (Nuremburg, 1980), 83–99. See also Rose Paul , The Italian renaissance of mathematics (Geneva, 1975); McLean Antonia , Humanism and the rise of science in Tudor England (New York, 1972); Reeds K. M. , “Renaissance humanism and botany”, Annals of science, xxxiii, (1976), 519–42; Gadol Joan Kelly , “The unity of the Renaissance humanism, natural history and art”, in From the Renaissance to the Counterreformation: Essays in honor of Garrett Mattingly , ed. by Carter C. H. (New York, 1955), 29–55; Dear , Mersenne (ref. 18); Mandrou Robert , From humanism to science 1480–1700 , trans. by Pearce Brian (London, 1978); Rousseau , “Till we have built Jerusalem” (ref. 43). For a different view, see Toulmin Stephen , Cosmopolis: The hidden agenda of modernity (New York, 1990). Toulmin, whose assessment of the relationship of humanism and science is somewhat reminiscent of Bush, Baker and Willey, focuses on the Cartesian tradition in the sciences.