“A Scholar and a Gentleman”: The Problematic Identity of the Scientific Practitioner in Early Modern England

It is not clear from the context in The prelude whether Wordsworth pointed to “scholars” and “gentlemen” as two categories of individuals (as well he might have done in relation to contemporary Cambridge) or as two aspects of all the individuals concerned.

Additional late eighteenth century uses appear in an editorial comment in a 1796 edition of Walton's Izaak Lives (for which see p. 300 and ref. 95 below), and a review of Della Crusca's Poetry of the world in the 1788 volume of the Monthly review (as quoted in Roper D. , Reviewing before the Edinburgh, 1788–1802 (London, 1978), 77–78). The latter was kindly brought to my attention by Graham Richards.

See, e.g., Newman John Henry , Discourses on the scope and nature of university education … (Dublin, 1852), 175–83. Newman here identified “a gentleman's knowledge” and the role of the university in supplying it, though I have not located his use of the relevant commonplace.

Winstanley William , The lives of the most famous English poets (London, 1687), 191. I thank Janet Browne for this reference. Antonia Fraser (Cromwell: The Lord Protector (New York, 1973), 659) quotes (without specifying a source) an almost identical form of words applied to the regicide clergyman Dr John Hewett in the Interregnum. I thank Philip Kitcher for bringing this reference to my attention.

Clearly, both the gentle and the learned worlds in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries interacted internationally and many of their attributed characteristics were common to several national settings. My concern is with the situation in England. I use sources deriving from non-English contexts when such sources were important for Englishmen, whether in translation or not. Where there is evidence that English patterns importantly diverged from those elsewhere or that the English accounted themselves different in relevant respects from other nationalities, I draw attention to such evidence. I make no claims of the sort that the English were unique or that every culture was the same. Recent reaction to work of the same general form evidently dictates that what is obvious should now be explicit as well.

My use of this notion bears only partial resemblance to that of sociologists, e.g. Mulkay M. , Science and the sociology of knowledge (London, 1979), 71–72, 93–95, and Gilbert G. N. Mulkay M. , Opening Pandora's box: A sociological analysis of scientists' discourse (Cambridge, 1984), 40, 56–62, and, following Mulkay Gieryn T. F. , “Boundary-work and the demarcation of science from non-science: Strains and interests in professional ideologies of scientists”, American sociological review, xlviii (1983), 781–95, p. 783.

Merton R. K. , Science, technology and society in seventeenth-century England (New York, 1970; orig. publ. 1938); Weber M. , The Protestant ethic and the spirit of capitalism, trans. by Parsons Talcott (New York, 1958; orig. publ. 1904–5), esp. pp. 72, 181–2; also Gieryn T. F. , “Distancing science from religion in seventeenth-century England”, Isis, lxxix (1988), 582–93, pp. 583–7 (for a claim about Durkheimian inspiration). For culture as the stock of legitimations, see Mary Douglas in, for example, Cultural bias (London, 1978); How institutions think (Syracuse, N.Y., 1986), esp. pp. 45–47, 63, 112; Risk acceptability according to the social sciences (New York, 1986), esp. 67–68; and see an overview by several of her colleagues: Thompson M. Ellis R. Wildavsky A. , Cultural theory (Boulder, Col., 1990), esp. ch. 1.

Skinner Q. , “Some problems in the analysis of political thought and action”, in Tully J. (ed.), Meaning and context: Quentin Skinner and his critics (Cambridge, 1988), 79–118, p. 117 (orig. publ. 1974); also idem, “Language and social change”, in ibid., 119–32, pp. 131–2, and idem, “The idea of a cultural lexicon”, Essays in criticism, xxix (1979), 205–24, p. 215. For an independent analysis of motives as both situated repertoires for describing and evaluating action and as determinants of action, see Mills C. W. , “Situated actions and vocabularies of motive”, American sociological review, v (1940), 904–13.

For a survey of the courtesy genre, see, for example, Mason J. E. , Gentlefolk in the making: Studies in the history of English courtesy literature and related topics from 1531 to 1774 (New York, 1971; orig. publ. 1935), and, for the relationship between some of this literature and macro-social change, see Elias N. , The civilizing process, i: The history of manners: Ii: Power & civility, trans. by Jephcott E. (New York, 1982; orig. publ. 1939), esp. i, ch. 2.

The institucion of a gentleman (London, 1555), sig. A.iii.

Epictetus , Epictetus his manuell , trans. by Healey J. (London, 1616), 91 (quoted in Ustick W. L. , “Changing ideas of aristocratic character and conduct in seventeenth-century England”, Modern philology, xxx (1933), 147–66, p. 149). Cf. Epictetus, The discourses and manual …, ed. by Matheson P. E. (2 vols, Oxford, 1916), ii, 235. The place of neo-Stoicism in early modern English social thought needs fuller treatment, especially in relation to ethical theory and its practical use in justifying social roles; see, e.g., Oestreich G. , Neostoicism and the early modern state, ed. by Oestreich B. Koenigsberger H. G. , trans. by McLintock D. (Cambridge, 1982), and Kraye J. , “Moral philosophy”, in The Cambridge history of Renaissance philosophy, ed. by Schmitt C. B. (Cambridge, 1988), 303–86, pp. 360–74.

Einstein L. , The Italian Renaissance in England (New York, 1902), chs 1–2; Caspari F. , Humanism and the social order in Tudor England (Chicago, 1954), esp. pp. 10–14, 80, 136–52; Kelso R. , The doctrine of the English gentleman in the sixteenth century (Urbana, Ill., 1929), esp. pp. 111–48.

Pettie George , “Preface” to Stefano Guazzo, The civile conversation of M. Steeven Guazzo , trans. by Pettie George Young Bartholomew , ed. by Sullivan Edward Sir (2 vols, London, 1925; orig. publ. in Italian in 1574 and in English in 1581, 1586), i, 8–9; see also Stone L. , The crisis of the aristocracy 1558–1641 (Oxford, 1965), 672, and, for the general humanist stress on education for the nobility, see Skinner Q. , The foundations of modern political thought (2 vols, Cambridge, 1978), i, 241–3.

Castiglione Baldessare , The book of the courtier, trans. by Singleton C. S. (Garden City, N.Y., 1959; orig. publ. 1528; orig. English trans. 1561), 67.

Shakespeare , Hamlet, III, i.

Translator's preface to Gassendi Pierre , The mirrour of true nobility and gentility, trans. by Rand W. (London, 1657), sig. A4 (quoted in Levine J. M. , Dr. Woodward's shield: History, science, and satire in Augustan England (Berkeley, Calif., 1977), 120), and idem, Humanism and history: Origins of modern English historiography (Ithaca, N.Y., 1987), 86 (for Gassendi) and 126–31 (for education and English humanism generally). This latter text was brought to my attention (by David Philip Miller) after the present paper was substantially completed; but see chs 3–7 for excellent materials relating to my theme.

Cleland James , The instruction of a young noble-man (Oxford, 1612), 134–9.

The rich cabinet furnished with varieties of excellent discriptions, exquisite characters, witty discourses, and delightfull histories, deuine and morrall … wherevnto is annexed the epitome of good manners, extracted from Mr. Iohn de la Casa, … (London, 1616), 76r.

Braithwait Richard , The English gentleman (London, 1630), sig. Nnnr. For Puritan views of bookish learning, see Morgan J. , Godly learning: Puritan attitudes towards reason, learning, and education, 1560–1640 (Cambridge, 1986), esp. p. 71: “The greatest danger of learning … was that it would become an end in itself, the focus of the scholar's endeavour, not subordinated to godly utility.”.

Peacham Henry , The complete gentleman …, ed. by Heltzel V. B. (Ithaca, N.Y., 1962; orig. publ. 1622), 28–29, 145. On self-fashioning, see Greenblatt S. , Renaissance self-fashioning: From More to Shakespeare (Chicago, 1980). On Peacham's place in the English culture of virtuosity, see Houghton W. E. Jr , “The English virtuoso in the seventeenth century”, Journal of the history of ideas, iii (1942), 51–73, 190–219, esp. p. 67. On the Arundel circle of virtuosi, see Levine , Humanism and history (ref. 16), 83–87, and Howarth D. , Lord Arundel and his circle (New Haven, Conn., 1985).

Stone , op. cit. (ref. 13), 672–7; Caspari , op. cit. (ref. 12), 5–13; Kelso , op. cit. (ref. 12), 113–14; Zeeveld W. G. , Foundations of Tudor policy (Westport, Conn., 1981); and see Hexter J. H. , “The education of the aristocracy in the Renaissance”, in idem, Reappraisals in history: New views on history and society in early modern Europe, 2nd edn (Chicago, 1979), 45–70, pp. 61–65.

See, e.g., Curtis M. H. , Oxford and Cambridge in transition 1558–1642: An essay on the changing relations between the English universities and English society (Oxford, 1959); Stone L. , “The educational revolution in England, 1560–1640”, Past and present, xxviii (1964), 41–80; idem, “The size and composition of the Oxford student body 1580–1910”, in The university in society , ed. by Stone L. (2 vols, Princeton, N.J., 1974), i, 3–110; McConica J. , “Scholars and commoners in Renaissance Oxford”, in ibid., i, 151–81; Kearney H. , Scholars and gentlemen: Universities and society in pre-industrial Britain 1500–1700 (Ithaca, N.Y., 1970); Morgan , op. cit. (ref. 19), ch. 11.

The phrase about “seminaries” is from Mullinger J. Bass , The University of Cambridge (3 vols, Cambridge, 1873–1911), ii, 250; the latter phrase is from Curtis, op. cit. (ref. 22), 56 (cf. 61, 82). For statistics, see Stone , “Size and composition” (ref. 22), and McConica, op. cit. (ref. 22).

Hexter , op. cit. (ref. 21), 50.

Kearney , op. cit. (ref. 22), 23–25; Stone , “Educational revolution” (ref. 22), 70.

Quoted in Stone , “Educational revolution” (ref. 22), 76.

Quoted in Hexter , op. cit. (ref. 21), 50.

Curtis , op. cit. (ref. 22), 128–44; see also Kearney , op. cit. (ref. 22), 38–39; Stone , “Educational revolution” (ref. 22), 70.

Earle John , Microcosmographie, facsimile edn of autograph manuscript (Leeds, 1966; comp. 1628), f. 81.

Ward Seth , Vindiciae academiarum (Oxford, 1654), 50; see also Feingold M. , The mathematicians' apprenticeship: Science, universities and society in England, 1560–1640 (Cambridge, 1984), 30.

Stone , op. cit. (ref. 13), 674.

Hexter , op. cit. (ref. 21), 46–49.

Quoted in Stone, “Educational revolution” (ref. 22), 74. For relevant statistics, see McConica , op. cit. (ref. 22); Stone , “Size and composition” (ref. 22); Hexter , op. cit. (ref. 21), 54.

For the “explosion”, see Stone , op. cit. (ref. 13), 676; Cecil quoted in Kearney , op. cit. (ref. 22), 25 (see also pp. 26–30 and Curtis , op. cit. (ref. 22), 129–31, 135, 143–4).

For the careers of university graduates, see Hexter , op. cit. (ref. 21), 55–56; for universities as vehicles of social mobility, see Kearney , op. cit. (ref. 22), 33, and Curtis , op. cit. (ref. 22), 271; for remarks on the particular effects of university residence on commitment to science, see Frank R. G. Jr , “Science, medicine, and the universities of early modern England: Background and sources”, History of science, xi (1973), 194–216, 239–69, pp. 198–9. A more fine-grained account than can be offered here would discuss the learned professions (and trade) as occasional repositories of the gentry's younger sons, the role of the universities in facilitating such moves, and the consequences of a professional career for gentle status; see, e.g., Earle P. , The making of the English middle class: Business, society and family life in London, 1660–1730 (London, 1989), esp. 60–75, 88–89. And, for the possibility of making it to a gentleman's identity through a medical career in late eighteenth century England, see especially Porter R. , “William Hunter: A surgeon and a gentleman”, in William Hunter and the eighteenth-century medical world, ed. by Bynum W. F. Porter R. (Cambridge, 1985), 7–34, esp. pp. 29–31.

McConica , op. cit. (ref. 22); Stone , “Size and composition” (ref. 22). The distinction between gentlemen and scholars was (and to varying extents remains) visible in college costume.

For career patterns of university fellows in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, see Holmes G. , Augustan England: Professions, state and society, 1680–1730 (London, 1982), 36–40. Fellowships were normally held for ten years after taking the B.A., while the graduate was awaiting a college living, at which point they would be resigned for a clerical career. But fellows holding professorships or readerships were in a separate category of career academics, especially those content to remain celibate.

For a fuller account, see Shapin S. , “‘The mind is its own place’: Science and solitude in seventeenth-century England”, Science in context, iv (1991), 143–70, pp. 148–50.

The opposed attributes of ‘scholar’ and ‘gentleman’ were frequently inscribed within the standard literary form of the collection of ‘characters’ — Brief sketches of the virtues and typical behaviours of different social types (‘the merchant’, ‘the mathematician’, ‘the pedant’, ‘the zealot’, ‘the citizen’, etc.). The genre was inherited from Antiquity (esp. Theophrastus's Characters), and early modern practitioners included inter alia Jean de la Bruyère, John Selden, Samuel Butler, John Earle, and the anonymous author of The rich cabinet. Thus, the literate classes had readily available to them standardized portrayals of the supposed attributes of gentlemen and men of learning.

E.g., Moran B. T. , “Princes, machines and the valuation of precision in the sixteenth century”, Sudhoffs Archiv, lxi (1977), 209–28; idem, “Science at the court of Hesse-Kassel: Informal communication, collaboration and the role of the prince-practitioner in the sixteenth century”, Ph.D. thesis, University of California at Los Angeles, 1978; Westman R. S. , “The astronomer's role in the sixteenth century: A preliminary study”, History of science, xviii (1980), 105–47; Biagioli M. , “The social status of Italian mathematicians, 1450–1600”, History of science, xxvii (1989), 41–95; idem, “Galileo's system of patronage”, History of science, xxviii (1990), 1–62; idem, “Galileo the emblem maker”, Isis, lxxxi (1990), 230–58.

For antagonism between the knight and the scholar, see Kelso , op. cit. (ref. 12), 111–13. On the seventeenth century English universities perpetuating the image of the scholar as cleric, see Kearney , op. cit. (ref. 22), 168–9.

Recent accounts of Galileo as court-philosopher depict him using the social ambiguity of his position in ambitious attempts to establish himself as a person of substance and honour, a courtier whose work flattered the prince-patron in a way exactly analogous to the role of other courtiers; see esp. Biagioli , “Galileo's system of patronage” (ref. 40) and idem, “Galileo the emblem maker” (ref. 40). Nevertheless, it remains unclear how that attempt was perceived by his princely patrons and even more uncertain how plausible was the argued association of the life of honour and the philosophical role. For example, much Italian and French courtesy literature specifying who could and could not instigate a duel put scholars, professionals and philosophers outside the well-born community of honour and resentment. Duelling did, however, become more prevalent among the rising classes of seventeenth century England as a way of publicly displaying entitlement to gentle status. See Bryson F. R. , The point of honour in sixteenth-century Italy: An aspect of the life of the gentleman (New York, 1935), 33; Kiernan V. G. , The duel in European history: Honour and the reign of aristocracy (Oxford, 1989), esp. 102–3, 133–4; and Billacois F. , The duel: Its rise and fall in early modern France, trans. by Selous T. (New Haven, Conn., 1990), 26–33 (for contrast between English and French conceptions).

Pace Richard , De fructu (Basel, 1517), quoted in Hexter , op. cit. (ref. 21), 46 (cf. Kelso , op. cit. (ref. 12), 113); Rich cabinet (ref. 18), 134v; Cleland , op. cit. (ref. 17), 134–5; Burton Robert , The anatomy of melancholy , ed. by Dell F. Jordan-Smith P. (New York, 1927; orig. publ. 1628), 273 (see also pp. 266–7). Castiglione (op. cit. (ref. 14), 67) alleged that the French “not only do not esteem, but they abhor letters, and consider all men of letters to be very base; and they think it is a great insult to call anyone a clerk”.

For discussions of the bases of gentle standing in the English setting, see, for example, Laslett P. , The world we have lost (London, 1965), ch. 2; James M. , English politics and the concept of honour 1485–1642 (Oxford, 1978), esp. 58–63; Wrightson K. , English society 1580–1680 (London, 1982), ch. 1.

Castiglione , op. cit. (ref. 14), 109, 139 (for decorum); 43–44, 98, 154 (for genteel sprezzatura, or nonchalance, and the avoidance of affectation); 111 (for criticism of displays of melancholia); Elias , op. cit. (ref. 9), i, 80–4 (for courtesy); cf. Giovanni della Casa, Galateo or the book of manners, trans. by Pine-Coffin R. S. (Harmondsworth, 1958; orig. publ. 1558), 93–97. See also Kelso , op. cit. (ref. 12), 83–85 (for greater English stress on civic usefulness compared to Italian emphasis on personal perfection) and 94–96 (for magnanimity). For enthusiasm as “vulgar”, see Ustick , op. cit. (ref. 11), 150.

Guazzo , op. cit. (ref. 13), i, 56, 114, 164. (In sixteenth and seventeenth century usage, ‘conversation’ meant not only face-to-face verbal exchange, but all forms of relations involved in living in society.) Among many seventeenth century injunctions to decorum in the courtesy literature, see Cleland , op. cit. (ref. 17), 171–3, 188; [Antoine de Courtin], The rules of civility; or, certain ways of deportment observed amongst all persons of quality … (London, 1685; orig. publ. in French 1671; orig. English trans. 1673), esp. pp. 4–5. For a survey of the idea of decorum, see Childs F. A. , “Prescriptions for manners in English courtesy literature, 1690–1760, and their social implications”, D.Phil. thesis, Oxford University, 1984, esp. pp. 46–59, 65–67, 95, 193–201; Kelso , op. cit. (ref. 12), 83–84; Greenblatt , op. cit. (ref. 20), 162–3; Brauer G. C. Jr , The education of a gentleman: Theories of gentlemanly education in England, 1660–1775 (New York, 1959), ch. 5.

Brocchieri M. F. B. , “The intellectual”, in Medieval callings , ed. by Le Goff J. , trans. by Cochrane L. G. (Chicago, 1988), 180–209, pp. 205–6; Trevor-Roper H. , “Robert Burton and The anatomy of melancholy”, in idem, Renaissance essays (Chicago, 1985), 239–74, pp. 257–8. For Aristotle on melancholy, see Problems, ed. and trans. by Hett W. S. (2 vols, London, 1957), ii, 155 (Book XXX. 10–13).

E.g., Burton , op. cit. (ref. 43), 259, 458–60; Guazzo , op. cit. (ref. 13), i, 16–52. For the iconology of scholarly solitude, see, for example, various portrayals of Saints Anthony, Jerome and Augustine (e.g., Fra Filippo Lippi, Catena, Botticelli, Carpaccio, Titian, van Reymerswaele); Vermeer's L'astronome (Louvre); Gerrit Dou's Astronomer by candlelight (Getty Museum); Rembrandt's Philosophe en méditation (Louvre). General comments on the representation of intellectual solitude are in Shapin, op. cit. (ref. 38), 143–7.

See, e.g., Shakespeare's usage in Love's labour's lost, III, i (“A domineering pedant o'er the boy”) and Twelfth night, III, ii (“like a pedant that keeps a school”).

de Montaigne Michel Eyquem , “Of pedantry”, in The complete essays of Montaigne, trans. by Frame D. M. (Stanford, Calif., 1965; orig. English trans. 1580), 97–106, pp. 98, 100–1.

Guazzo , op. cit. (ref. 13), i, 33; Montaigne , op. cit. (ref. 50), 98; Burton , op. cit. (ref. 43), 262; Lingard Richard , A letter of advice to a young gentleman leaving the university concerning his behaviour and conversation in the world , ed. by Erb F. C. (New York, 1907; orig. publ. 1670), 3; Bryskett Lodowick , A discourse of civill life , ed. by Wright T. E. (Northridge, Calif., 1970; orig. publ. 1606), 13. (The Bryskett text is basically a free and synthetic translation of sixteenth century Italian texts by Giraldi, Piccolomini, and Guazzo.) See also an excellent treatment of a Latin comedy called Pedantius, produced at Trinity College, Cambridge in 1581, in Levine, Humanism and history (ref. 16), ch. 5.

Ascham Roger , The scholemaster (London, 1570), 5v. On the prevalence of injunctions against too deep a study of mathematics for gentlemen, see Feingold , op. cit. (ref. 30), esp. pp. 29–30, 190–3.

Bacon Francis , “Of studies”, in The moral and historical works of Lord Bacon, ed. by Devey J. (London, 1852), 136–7.

Montaigne , op. cit. (ref. 50), 106.

Bryskett , op. cit. (ref. 51), 13.

Evelyn John , Publick employment and an active life prefer'd to solitude, and all its appanages … (London, 1667), 83, 93. For this text as part of a Restoration argument over the active v. contemplative life, see Vickers B. , “Public and private life in seventeenth-century England: The Mackenzie-Evelyn debate”, in idem (ed.), Arbeit, Musse, Meditation: Betrachtungen zur ‘Vita activa’ und ‘Vita contemplativa’ (Zürich, 1985), 257–78.

Butler Samuel , “The abuse of learning: Fragments of a second part”, in idem, Satires and miscellaneous poetry and prose, ed. by Lamar R. (Cambridge, 1928), 80.

Burton , op. cit. (ref. 43), 261.

Milton John , “The seventh prolusion: A speech in defense of learning delivered in the [Christ's] College chapel”, trans. by Hartmann T. R. , in The prose of John Milton , ed. by Patrick J. M. (London/New York, 1968; comp. 1632), 15–28, pp. 19–20; for criticism of schoolmen's pedantry, see ibid., 23–24.

Wotton Henry Sir , A philosophical survey of education or moral architecture and aphorisms of education, ed. by Kermode H. S. (London, 1938; orig. publ. 1651), 25.

Ellis Clement , The gentile sinner, or England's brave gentleman …: Both as he is, and as he should be, 5th edn (Oxford, 1672; orig. publ. 1660), 26.

Edward, Lord Herbert of Cherbury, The autobiography, 2nd edn revised, ed. by Lee S. (London, 1906), 26, 35. The history of early modern science still needs a detailed study of the rhetorical and social forms of disputation in the universities.

Milton John , “Of education, to Master Samuel Hartlib …”, in idem, Complete poetry & selected prose (New York, 1950; orig. publ. 1644), 663–76, pp. 666–7. Note the contemporary resonance of ‘generous’ as pertaining to nobility, the defining characteristic of the ‘gentle’.

For Ramism as pragmatic humanism, see Grafton A. Jardine L. , From humanism to the humanities: Education and the liberal arts in fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Europe (Cambridge, Mass., 1986), ch. 7; for the English Ramist reform programme, see Kearney , op. cit. (ref. 22), ch. 3; for Paracelsian-sectarian attacks on the universities, see ibid., ch. 7, and Debus A. G. , Science and education in the seventeenth century: The Webster-Ward debate (London, 1970); and, for identification of alchemical discourse as “pedantic”, see, e.g., Gilbert William , De magnete, trans. by Mottelay P. F. (New York, 1958; orig. publ. 1600), 1.

Ward , op. cit. (ref. 30), 33.

Quoted in Meyer R. W. , Leibnitz and the seventeenth-century revolution , trans. by Stern J. P. (Chicago, 1952), 96. On the urban siting of new chemical practice, see Hannaway O. , “Laboratory design and the aim of science: Andreas Libavius versus Tycho Brahe”, Isis, lxxvii (1986), 585–610; cf. Shapin S. , “The house of experiment in seventeenth-century England”, Isis, lxxix (1988), 373–404.

Hobbes Thomas , Behemoth: The history of the causes of the civil wars of England, ed. by Molesworth W. (New York, 1963; orig. publ. 1668), 51, 53, 75.

Hobbes Thomas , Leviathan (Harmondsworth, 1968; orig. publ. 1651), 115, 117.

A fuller version of this general argument, and the evidence in the following several paragraphs, is in Shapin, op. cit. (ref. 38), 150–5. For a recent appreciation of the humanist contribution to the seventeenth century scientific movement (unfortunately not available to me when the present paper was written), see Shapiro B. , “Early modern intellectual life: Humanism, religion and science in seventeenth-century England”, History of science, xxix (1991), 45–71.

Bacon Francis , “The advancement of learning”, in The philosophical works of Francis Bacon , ed. by Spedding J. Ellis R. L. Heath D. D. (5 vols, London, 1857–8), iii, 253–491, pp. 268–71, 313. Bacon here rhetorically played with the etymologically pure meaning of pedants as “teachers and preceptors”. For a parallel citation of philosopher-princes, see Milton , op. cit. (ref. 59), 21, and, for a general seventeenth century tendency to posit a Golden Age of gentlemen-scholars, see Brauer , op. cit. (ref. 46), 59.

Elyot Thomas , The boke named the governour (London, 1907; orig. publ. 1531), 51–52, 207; see also Skinner , op. cit. (ref. 13), i, 243.

Bacon , op. cit. (ref. 70), 273, 277, 280, 314; see also idem, op. cit. (ref. 53), 136.

Bacon , op. cit. (ref. 70), 282–95. On the Baconian reforms of natural philosophy as civic humanism, see Martin J. , “‘Knowledge is power’: Francis Bacon, the state, and the reform of natural philosophy”, Ph.D. thesis, Cambridge University, 1988, esp. chs. 4–5; also Prior M. E. , “Bacon's man of science”, in Roots of scientific thought, ed. by Wiener P. P. Noland A. (New York, 1957), 382–9.

The study of gentlemanly norms and conduct in the early Royal Society has developed rapidly in recent years. In the paragraphs below I offer new materials, as well as drawing upon my own previously published work and excellent studies by Dear Peter Schaffer Simon Golinski J. V. , Robert Iliffe and others: See especially Shapin S. , “Pump and circumstance: Robert Boyle's literary technology”, Social studies of science, xiv (1984), 481–519, esp. pp. 502–7 (on “manners in dispute”); idem, “O Henry [essay review of Oldenburg, Correspondence]”, Isis, lxxviii, 417–24; idem, op. cit. (ref. 66); idem, “Who was Robert Hooke?”, in Robert Hooke: New studies, ed. by Hunter M. Schaffer S. (Woodbridge, Suffolk, 1989), 253–85; idem, “The invisible technician”, American scientist, lxxvii (1989), 554–63; Shapin S. Schaffer S. , Leviathan and the air-pump: Hobbes, Boyle, and the experimental life (Princeton, N.J., 1985), chs 2, 4, 6; Schaffer S. , “Making certain”, Social studies of science, xiv (1984), 137–52; Dear P. , “Totius in verba: Rhetoric and authority in the early Royal Society”, Isis, lxxvi (1985), 145–61; Golinski J. V. , “Robert Boyle: Scepticism and authority in seventeenth-century chemical discourse”, in The figural and the literal: Problems of language in the history of science and philosophy, 1630–1800 , ed. by Benjamin A. E. Cantor G. N. Christie J. R. R. (Manchester, 1987), 58–82; idem, “A noble spectacle: Research on phosphorus and the public cultures of science in the early Royal Society”, Isis, lxxx (1989), 11–39; Iliffe R. C. , “‘The idols of the temple’: Isaac Newton and the private life of anti-idolatry”, Ph.D. thesis, Cambridge University, 1989; idem, “‘In the warehouse’: Privacy, property and priority in the early Royal Society”, unpublished typescript (1991).

Detailed analyses of the Society's social composition indicate the predominance of the gentry and aristocracy, and, despite much utilitarian rhetoric, the paucity of merchants and tradesmen: Hunter M. , The Royal Society and its Fellows 1660–1700: The morphology of an early scientific institution (Chalfont St Giles, Bucks, 1982), 5 (quoting letter from Francis Vernon to Henry Oldenburg, 1 May 1669). Of course, my argument about the advertised suitability of the new practice for gentlemen does not necessarily depend upon any given statistical state of affairs concerning the Society's social composition, though, as I shall show, a striking exemplar of the aristocratic experimental philosopher provided resources for public legitimization.

Sprat Thomas , The history of the Royal Society of London (London, 1667), 404–9, 417.

Ibid., 331–2. For an account of attitudes towards traditional learning in the early Royal Society, see Hunter M. , Science and society in Restoration England (Cambridge, 1981), ch. 6.

Quoted in Hunter M. , John Aubrey and the realm of learning (New York, 1975), 41.

Glanvill Joseph , Scepsis scientifica: Or, confest ignorance, the way to science (London, 1885; orig. publ. 1665), pp. liii–liv, lix–lx.

Sprat , op. cit. (ref. 76), 26–27; for melancholy see also pp. 16–17, 21, 336, 345, 417.

Shapin , “Pump and circumstance” (ref. 74), esp. pp. 502–7; idem, op. cit. (ref. 66), esp. pp. 395–9.

Glanvill , op. cit. (ref. 79), 201–2; for Scholasticism as litigious and as the philosophy of base and servile men, see also 136–42, 196–8. Cf. idem, Essays on several important subjects in philosophy and religion (London, 1676), 31–32; idem, Plus ultra: Or, the progress and advancement of knowledge, since the days of Aristotle … (London, 1668), 148–9.

Glanvill , op. cit. (ref. 79), pp. lix–lx. Glanvill seems to have been unusually attuned to the ideal conjunction between knowledge, piety, and manners. In his disputes with the Aristotelian cleric Richard Crosse, Glanvill took his adversary to task for conduct “so little agreeing with the Discretion of a Wiseman, the Charity of a Christian, or the Civility of a Gentleman” (Plus ultra (ref. 82), “Preface”, sig. [A7]). For the Glanvill-Crosse controversy, see Jacob J. R. , Henry Stubbe, radical Protestantism and the early Enlightenment (Cambridge, 1983), 78–84.

On Boyle's social standing and predicament during the Civil War years, see Jacob J. R. , Robert Boyle and the English Revolution: A study in social and intellectual change (New York, 1977), ch. 2, though the stress there on Boyle's sharp break with the main lines of Renaissance ethical theory now seems overstated. The major source for Boyle's early moral and social views is now The early ‘Essays’ and ‘Ethics’ of Robert Boyle, ed. by Harwood J. T. (Carbondale, Ill., 1991).

The claim that Christianity underwrote commitment to the common good was widespread in English Puritan circles, and was forcefully expressed by Bacon: … never in any age has there been any philosophy, sect, religion, law, or other discipline, which did so highly exalt the good which is communicative, and depress the good which is private and particular, as the Holy Christian Faith…. [I]t decides the question touching the preferment of the contemplative or active life … (Francis Bacon, “De augmentis scientiarum”, in Philosophical works (ref. 70), v, 7–8). For Christianity and civic responsibility among the English gentry, see Kelso , op. cit. (ref. 12), 57; Brauer , op. cit. (ref. 46), 15–16; Walzer M. , The revolution of the saints: A study of the origins of radical politics (Cambridge, Mass., 1965), ch. 7.

Here the Englishness of this pattern can be stressed, since in no other country was Christian piety so widely (if hardly universally) associated with an idea of gentility; see, e.g., Ustick , op. cit. (ref. 11), 154–63. Moreover, English commentators themselves routinely insisted upon the moral integrity of the English gentleman compared to his French and Italian counterparts; see, e.g., Einstein , op. cit. (ref. 12), ch. 4; idem, Tudor ideals (London, 1921), 69; Childs , op. cit. (ref. 46), 89–93; Lingard , op. cit. (ref. 51), 22–23.

Glanvill , Plus ultra (ref. 82), 93.

Burnet Gilbert , “Character of a Christian philosopher, in a sermon preached January 7. 1691–2, at the funeral of the Hon. Robert Boyle”, in idem, Lives, characters, and an address to posterity , ed. by Jebb J. (London, 1833), 325–76, quoting pp. 333, 348, 352, 360–1, 367. For details of Boyle's moral relations with Burnet, see Hunter M. , “Alchemy, magic and moralism in the thought of Robert Boyle”, British journal for the history of science, xxiii (1990), 387–410.

[ Ramesey William ], The gentlemans companion: Or, a character of true nobility, and gentility … by a person of quality … (London, 1676; comp. 1669), 15. For arguments against ‘dogmatism’ and ‘contentious disputes’ in general, see ibid., 71–74.

Burnet Gilbert , Thoughts on education, ed. by Clarke J. (Aberdeen, 1914; comp. c. 1668), 61, 70.

Wotton William , Reflections upon ancient and modern learning (London, 1694), 353–5. For recent overviews of the “ancients” v. “moderns” debate, see Hunter , op. cit. (ref. 77), 159–61, and Levine , Humanism and history (ref. 16), ch. 6, and, for imputations of pedantry in those controversies, see Iliffe R. , “Author-mongering: The ‘editor’ between producer and consumer”, unpubl. typescript (1991), 34–35.

Ramesey , op. cit. (ref. 89), 131–2. Also on the list were works of Copernicus, Galileo, Descartes, Henry More, William Harvey, Walter Charleton, Thomas Willis, Kenelm Digby, Thomas Browne, Joseph Glanvill, and Robert Hooke — “his Micrography, and the rest of our New Experiments“.

Defoe Daniel , The compleat English gentleman , ed. by Bülbring K. D. (London, 1890; orig. comp. c. 1728–29), 228, 191–2, 65, 69. Defoe also exempted some few other English gentlemen from the general indictment: England has “some of the greatest men that ever the world produced, exquisite in science, compleat in the politest learning, bright in witts …; no science, no commendable study, no experimentall knowledge, no humane attaintment, but they excell in …” (ibid., 89–90).

Anon, editor's note in The original works of William King, LL.D (3 vols, London, 1776), ii, 98.

Zouch Thomas , (ed.), Walton's lives (York, 1796), 480n.–481n., quoted in editor's note in Burnet, op. cit. (ref. 88), 367n.

See, e.g., Porter R. , English society in the eighteenth century (Harmondsworth, 1982), esp. ch. 6. In this connection it is relevant that the English universities in the period from the Restoration to the mid-eighteenth century were experiencing a decline in their student numbers and fortunes. As Porter notes, “It was grinding tutors and slumbrous pedants who made an academic career in the colleges: The great scholars of Georgian England … were not dons” (ibid., 179). On the conservatism of the universities and on their continuing significance as clerical seminaries c. 1700, see Kearney , op. cit. (ref. 22), ch. 10; Holmes , op. cit. (ref. 37), 34–42; and Gascoigne J. , Cambridge in the age of the Enlightenment: Science, religion and politics from the Restoration to the French Revolution (Cambridge, 1989), esp. pp. 17–19.

Defoe , op. cit. (ref. 93), 203; see also Brauer , op. cit. (ref. 46), 67.

Lingard , op. cit. (ref. 51), 9; Courtin De , op. cit. (ref. 46), 28–29; Petrie Adam , Rules of good deportment, or of good breeding (Edinburgh, 1720), 46, 58. For surveys of attitudes towards learning and pedantry in the late seventeenth century courtesy literature, see Childs , op. cit. (ref. 46), 78, 215–18; Brauer , op. cit. (ref. 46), ch. 3.

Butler Samuel , Characters and passages from note-books, ed. by Waller A. R. (Cambridge, 1908), 136–7.

Butler Samuel , “Satyr upon the imperfection and abuse of human learning part 1st”, in idem, op. cit. (ref. 57), 68.

Walker Obadiah , Of education especially of young gentlemen (Oxford, 1673), 112, 249–51; see also Brauer , op. cit. (ref. 46), 66–68; Hunter , op. cit. (ref. 77), 160.

Temple William , “An essay upon the ancient and modern learning”, in The works of Sir William Temple, Bart. (4 vols, London, 1814; orig. publ. 1690), iii, 444–86, pp. 484–6. And for a late seventeenth century critique of humanistic arrogance and humanists' contribution to pedantry, see LeClerc Jean , Parrhasiana, or, thoughts upon several subjects (London, 1700), 181–3 (quoted in Southgate B. C. , “‘No other wisdom’? Humanist reactions to science and scientism in the seventeenth century”, The seventeenth century, v (1990), 71–92, p. 87).

Cooper Anthony Ashley , 3rd Earl of Shaftesbury, Characteristics of men, manners, opinions , times, ed. by Robertson J. M. (2 vols in I. Indianapolis, Ind., 1964; orig. publ. 1711), i, 53, 81, 88, 196, 214.

The spectator, no. 105, 30 June 1711, in The spectator , ed. by Bond D. F. (5 vols, Oxford, 1965), i, 436–8.

Addison Joseph Steele Richard , The tatler, ed. by Aitken G. A. (4 vols, London, 1898), i, 148 (17–19 May 1709); 176 (26–28 May 1709); iv, 245–7 (28–31 October 1710); see also (on pedants) iii, 235 (11–13 April 1710); iv, 49 (25–27 July 1710).

Johnson Samuel , The rambler, ed. by Bate W. J. Strauss A. B. (vols iii-v of 15 vols, Works, New Haven, Conn., 1958–85), v, 36–37 (10 April 1750); 151–3 (12 November 1751); see also (on scholarly seclusion and incivility) v, 70–75 (17 September 1751) and v, 176–81 (3 December 1751).

Philip Dormer Stanhope, Earl of Chesterfield, Letters to his son and others (London, 1984; comp. c. 1746–53), 16, 71, 136, 145, 184, 191, 263, 270–1.

Locke John , Some thoughts concerning education (Cambridge, 1899; orig. publ. 1693), 74, 129, 153; see also Brauer , op. cit. (ref. 46), 59, and Frank op. cit. (ref. 35), 253.

Locke , op. cit. (ref. 108), 166, 169–70; see also Stone L. , “Practical wisdom for élite boys”, Times literary supplement , 2–8 March 1990, 229–30. For the central importance of Boyle's corpuscular and mechanical philosophy in Locke's work, see Alexander P. , Ideas, qualities and corpuscles: Locke and Boyle on the external world (Cambridge, 1985). For reasons indicated above I cannot wholly agree with James Secord's judgement that in Some thoughts concerning education “Locke had strongly emphasized the need for young gentlemen to obtain a cultured acquaintance with science”: Secord J. A. , “Newton in the nursery: Tom Telescope and the philosophy of tops and balls, 1761–1838”, History of science, xxiii (1985), 127–51, p. 131, though Secord's paper is a brilliant analysis of scientific texts for children, especially of “the professional and mercantile middling orders”, in this period; see particularly perceptive comments on the changing depiction of science vis-à-vis the aristocracy from the middle of the eighteenth to the middle of the nineteenth century (pp. 143–5).

E.g., Syfret R. H. , “Some early reactions to the Royal Society”, Notes and records of the Royal Society, vii (1950), 207–58; idem, “Some early critics of the Royal Society”, ibid., viii (1950), 20–64; Nicolson M. H. , Science and imagination (Ithaca, N.Y., 1956); and the synoptic treatment in Hunter, op. cit. (ref. 77), esp. ch. 6. Schwartz R. B. , Samuel Johnson and the new science (Madison, Wisc., 1971), ch. 4.

Wotton , op. cit. (ref. 91), “Conclusion”, as quoted in Syfret , “Early critics”, op. cit. (ref. 110), 44; for sensitivity to the power of the “wits'” ridicule, see also Sprat, op. cit. (ref. 76), 417–19. And, for the point of view of an “ancient” scholar, see Temple , op. cit. (ref. 102), 485–6.

Butler , “Pædants”, in idem, op. cit. (ref. 57), 166.

Butler , “The elephant in the moon”, in ibid. , 3–30; see also Nicolson , op. cit. (ref. 110), 170–1.

Butler , op. cit. (ref. 57), 33. Of course, according to Pepys, Charles II also wanted to know what his philosophers had done apart from weighing the air, and Thomas Shadwell repeated what must by then have been a very stale joke in The virtuoso of 1676. For the King's view of the Royal Society, see, e.g., Middleton W. E. K. , “What did Charles II call the Fellows of the Royal Society?”, Notes and records of the Royal Society, xxxii (1977), 13–17, and Hunter , op. cit. (ref. 77), 130–1; for Shadwell, see The virtuoso , ed. by Nicolson M. H. Rodes D. S. (Lincoln, Neb., 1966), 110 (V.ii); Syfret , “Early critics”, op. cit. (ref. 110), 54–55, 58–59.

Shadwell , op. cit. (ref. 114), 22 (I.i), 68 (III.iii). For the background to this play, see Nicolson Rodes , op. cit. (ref. 114), “Introduction”, pp. xi–xxvi. Historians have claimed that Gimcrack was modelled on Robert Hooke. Most plausibly, he is a pastiche of a number of well-known Royal Society figures. There are certainly large dollops of Boyle in the character: His title (Sir Nicholas) points towards an aristocratic model, and his Puritanical piety closely follows Boyle's. There are also quite specific references in the play to Boyle's published work.

King William , “Useful transactions in philosophy, and other sorts of learning …”, in idem, op. cit. (ref. 94), ii, 57–178 (orig. publ. 1709), pp. 98–99 (for Boyle's phosphorus); 103–14, 121–5 (for Leeuwenhoek); 135 (for dregs); idem, “A journey to London, in the year 1698. After the ingenious method of that made by Dr. Martin Lister to Paris …”, ibid. (orig. publ. 1699), i, 198 (for cats).

Wilkins John , as quoted in Syfret , “Early critics”, op. cit. (ref. 110), 55; see also Nicolson , op. cit. (ref. 110), ch. 6; Harwood J. T. , “Rhetoric and graphics in Micrographia”, in Robert Hooke: New studies , ed. by Hunter M. Schaffer S. (Woodbridge, Suffolk, 1989), 119–47, esp. pp. 139, 142; and Shapin S. , “Who was Robert Hooke?”, in ibid., 253–85, esp. pp. 277–8.

The tatler (ref. 105), iii, 31 (10–12 January 1709/10); iv, 110 (24–26 August 1710).

Ibid., iv, 209–10 (10–12 October 1710). For satire of “Sir Nicholas Gimcrack”, see ibid. , 112–13, 133–8, and for additional criticism of Royal Society science as trivial and useless, see ibid., 171–2, 320–6.

[ Astell Mary or Drake? Judith ], An essay in defense of the female sex in which are inserted the character of a pedant, a squire, a beau, a virtuoso (London, 1696), quoted in Levine , Dr. Woodward's shield (ref 16), 125. Here, as elsewhere, critics often had in view specific individuals, whose actual behaviour at times was more than equal to any caricature. John Woodward was very widely pointed to as the pattern of a vain and pompous virtuoso; William King reserved special odium for Martin Lister and Hans Sloane; and, as I note below, Butler, Swift and others had merry sport with Boyle's pious philosophy. For Woodward, see ibid., chs 5–7; for female virtuoso, see Nicolson , op. cit. (ref. 110), 186–93. Scientific culture in specifically female society has, arguably, been treated more fully in recent years than in a specifically masculine context; see, among many examples, Phillips P. , The scientific lady: A social history of woman's scientific interests 1520–1918 (London, 1990); Shteir A. B. , “Linnaeus's daughters: Women and British botany”, in Women and the structure of society: Selected research from the Fifth Berkshire Conference on the History of Women , ed. by Harris B. J. McNamara J. K. (Durham, N.C., 1984), 67–73.

Shaftesbury , op. cit. (ref. 103), ii, 253.

Levine , Dr. Woodward's shield (ref. 16), 125 (my emphases).

Shaftesbury , op. cit. (ref. 103), i, 193–6; cf. Butler , op. cit. (ref. 99), 276: “The end of all Knowledge, is to understand what is Fit to be don; For to know what has been, and what is, and what may be, dos but tend to that.”.

Syfret , “Early critics” (ref. 110), 56–58; Houghton , op. cit. (ref. 20). For an overview of the new science in relation to its alleged utility, see Hunter , op. cit. (ref. 77), ch. 4.

Shadwell , op. cit. (ref. 114), 47 (Il.ii).

Ibid., 114, 119 (V.ii, V.iii).

Temple , “Some thoughts upon reviewing the essay of ancient and modern learning”, in idem, op. cit. (ref. 102), iii, 487–518, pp. 516–17 (comp. c. 1695). For an appreciation of the seventeenth century literary and moral case against scientistic ambition, see Southgate , op. cit. (ref. 102).

Swift Jonathan , Gulliver's travels , ed. by Starkman M. K. (New York, 1962; comp. 1721–25; orig. publ. 1735), 175; see also Nicolson , op. cit. (ref. 110), 110–54, 193–9, and Christie J. R. R. , “Laputa revisited”, in Nature transfigured: Science and literature, 1700–1900, ed. by Christie J. R. R. Shuttleworth S. (Manchester, 1989), 46–60.

The tatler (ref. 105), iv, 134 (5–7 September 1710).

King , “The transactioneer”, in idem, op. cit. (ref. 94), ii, 1–56 (orig. publ. 1700), esp. pp. 16, 32, 49; idem, “Useful transactions” (ref. 116), passim; Temple , “Some thoughts” (ref. 127), 516–17.

Butler , “A virtuoso”, in idem, op. cit. (ref. 99), 81; cf. Levine , Dr. Woodward's shield (ref. 16), 124; Syfret , “Early critics” (ref. 110), 60.

The tatler (ref. 105), iv, 326 (7–9 December 1710).

Temple , op. cit. (ref. 127), 517.

King , “The transactioneer” (ref. 130), 17.

Shadwell , op. cit. (ref. 114), 111 (V.ii). Cf. Boyle Robert , “Some observations about shining flesh, both of veal and of pullet …”, in idem, Works, ed. by Birch T. (6 vols, London, 1772), iii, 651–5 (orig. publ. 1672).

Shadwell , op. cit. (ref. 114), 19 (I.i).

Butler , “An occasional reflection on Dr. Charleton's feeling a dog's pulse at Gresham-College. By R. B. Esq.”, in idem, op. cit. (ref. 57), 341–3; Swift Jonathan , “A meditation upon a broom-stick: According to the style and manner of the Honourable Robert Boyle's Meditations. Written in the year 1703”, in idem, The prose works , ed. by Davis H. (14 vols, Oxford, 1939–69), i, 239–40; letter from Duke of Buckingham to Earl of Rochester, July 1677, in The letters of John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester , ed. by Treglown J. (Chicago, 1980), 146–7. See also Shadwell , op. cit. (ref. 114), 18 (I.i) for Boyle's meletetiques (or meditational techniques).

Shaftesbury , op. cit. (ref. 103), i, 50–52; cf. Redwood J. , Reason, ridicule and religion: The age of Enlightenment in England 1660–1750 (Cambridge, Mass., 1976), esp. pp. 39, 84–86.

Butler , “A philosopher”, in idem, op. cit. (ref. 99), 57–58. The reference is to Walter Charleton's text of 1654.

Swift , op. cit. (ref. 128), 161–2.

For structural conditions bearing on the expectation of “militant combativeness” in the world of learning, see, for example, Hall A. R. , Philosophers at war: The quarrel between Newton and Leibniz (Cambridge, 1980), esp. pp. 2–7.

Levine , Dr. Woodward's shield (ref. 16), esp. pp. 81–91. In a later period, Sir John Hill served as a publicly recognized exemplar of a “dizzard” naturalist; see Rousseau G. S. , “John Hill, universal genius mangué: Remarks on his life and times, with a checklist of his works”, in Lemay J. A. L. Rousseau G. S. , (eds), The Renaissance man in the eighteenth century (Los Angeles, 1978), 45–129.

Both quoted in Levine, Dr. Woodward's shield (ref. 16), 123–4.

Swift , op. cit. (ref. 128), 161.

Darrell] [William , The gentleman instructed, in the conduct of a virtuous and happy life …. Written for the instruction of a young nobleman …, 8th edn (London, 1723; orig. publ. 1704–12), 15. This general form of injunction was evidently quite standard in the contemporary courtesy literature; see, e.g., Petrie , op. cit. (ref. 98), as quoted on p. 301 above.

Johnson , The rambler (ref. 106), v, 71–75 (17 September 1751).

Allen D. E. , The naturalist in Britain: A social history (London, 1976), esp. chs 2–3; Porter R. S. , “Science, provincial culture and public opinion in Enlightenment England”, British journal for eighteenth-century studies, iii (1980), 20–46; Miller David Philip , “The Royal Society of London 1800–1835: A study of the cultural politics of scientific organization”, Ph.D. thesis, University of Pennsylvania, 1981, 42–46; Levine , Humanism and history (ref. 16), chs 3–4; Mendyk S. A. E. , ‘Speculum Britanniae’: Regional study, antiquarianism, and science in Britain to 1700 (Toronto, 1989), esp. pp. 239–44.

Examples are Schofield R. E. , The Lunar Society of Birmingham: A social history of provincial science and industry in eighteenth-century England (Oxford, 1963); Thackray A. , “Natural knowledge in cultural context: The Manchester model”, American historical review, lxxix (1974), 672–709; Metropolis and province: Science in British culture, 1780–1850, ed. by Inkster I. Morrell J. (London, 1983).

By the late nineteenth century, scientific naturalists like John Tyndall were once more urging support of science “Not as a servant of Mammon” but “as the strengthener and enlightener of the mind of man”. Gieryn analyses apparently inconsistent repertoires for legitimating science as reflections of “an unyielding tension between basic and applied research”, but, more fruitfully, also sees the renewed stress on virtue as a situated rhetorical tool for demarcating a particular strand of science from mere mechanic empiricism (op. cit. (ref. 6), 787).

For historically changing social locations of moral authority and technical knowledge, see Heyck T. W. , The transformation of intellectual life in Victorian England (London, 1982), ch. 3.

Schaffer S. , “Genius in romantic natural philosophy”, in Romanticism and the sciences, ed. by Cunningham A. Jardine N. (Cambridge, 1990), 82–98.

Yeo R. , “Genius, method and morality: Images of Newton in Britain, 1760–1860”, Science in context, ii (1988), 257–84; Iliffe , “‘Idols of the temple’” (ref. 74), chs 5–6; Shapin , op. cit. (ref. 38), 155–60.

Newman , op. cit. (ref. 3), 180–1; Carlyle Thomas , “Signs of the times”, in idem, Selected writings , ed. by Shelston A. (Harmondsworth, 1971), 59–85, esp. pp. 64–71 (orig. publ. 1829).

James Moore persuasively argues that Charles Darwin in the years immediately after his removal to Down in 1842 was experimenting with his entitlement to the recognized role as “squarson-naturalist”: Moore J. R. , “Darwin of Down: The evolutionist as squarson-naturalist”, in The Darwinian heritage, ed. by Kohn D. (Princeton, N.J., 1985), 435–81, esp. pp. 440–3.

Few modern commentators on these matters have been as maliciously perceptive as Simon Raven, e.g., The decline of the gentleman (New York, 1962), 10–11, 180–1.