Voices Calling for Reform: The Royal Society in the Mid-Eighteenth Century — Martin Folkes,John Hill,and William Stukeley

See Miller David P. , ‘“Into the valley of darkness’: Reflections on the Royal Society in the eighteenth century”, History of science, xxvii (1989), 155–66, and Sorrenson Richard , “Towards a history of the Royal Society in the eighteenth century”, Notes and records of the Royal Society, 1 (1996), 29–46. Their work has been further developed by a recent special issue of The British journal for the history of science, xxxii (1999), which Sorrenson has guest edited, with a collection of five new essays (Larry Stewart, Andrea Rusnock, John Gascoigne, David P. Miller, Richard Sorrenson) under the encompassing title, “Did the Royal Society matter in the eighteenth century?” Sorrenson restates his case there “that the Royal Society mattered very much in the eighteenth century …”, “Introduction”, 130–2, p. 131.

Miller , op. cit. (ref. 1), 156.

Sorrenson , op. cit. (ref. 1), 30.

Ibid., 33.

See for example Hall Rupert , The revolution in science, 1500–1750 (London, 1983), Stimson Dorothy , Scientists and amateurs: A history of the Royal Society (New York, 1949) or Weld Charles , A history of the Royal Society (2 vols, London, 1848). Heilbron J. L. , Physics at the Royal Society during Newton's presidency (Los Angeles, 1983), 40 in part questions this interpretation with respect to Folkes, but given the focus of his book does not take it any further.

Remarks and collections of Thomas Hearne , edited by Salter H. E. , ix (Oxford, 1914), 379. Diary, 8 December 1727: “On Thursday, Nov. 30th last, was a great struggle at the Royal Society, Lond., to get out Sir Hans Sloane from being President of the Royal Society, Martin Folkes, Esq. (a Cambridge man as to Education), opposing him.”.

Philosophical transactions, xxxiv (1727), dedication “To Martin Folkes, Esq; Vice-President of the Royal Society”. This was the last volume Jurin edited; his loyal support of Folkes cost him his position as Secretary after Sloane's victory. For a recent study of Jurin's activities as Secretary see Rusnock Andrea , “Correspondence networks and the Royal Society, 1700–1750”, The British journal for the history of science, xxxii (1999), 155–69.

“You must have heard of the Philomats' putting up Mr. Fowlks for President of the Royall Society, in opposition to Sir Hans Sloane. They were positive in their success, but lost it on Thursday last. It has been the whole talke of the town; and there has been as much canvassing and intrigue made use of, as if the fate of the Kingdome depended on it. The Society will suffer by it, which I am sorry for …”, Turner D. (ed.), Extracts from the literary and scientific correspondence of Richard Richardson (Yarmouth, 1835), 284: Richardson to William Sherard, 14 December 1727; and Hearne , op. cit. (ref. 6), ix, 379.

Rousseau G. S. , The letters and papers of Sir John Hill (New York, 1982), Letter 32, 46. Henry Baker to William Arderon, 2 July 1751.

Birch Thomas , “Memoirs of the life of Martin Folkes Esq., late President of the Royal Society”, British Library, Add. MS 4222 ff. 30v-31. The only extensive document of Folkes's of a personal nature to survive is the journal he kept during his tour of Germany and Italy, Bod. MS Eng. misc. c.444. See Maddison R. E. W. , “A note on the correspondence of Martin Folkes, P.R.S.”, Notes and records of the Royal Society, x (1954), 100–9.

Stukeley William , The family memoirs, i, ed. by Lukis W. C. (Surtees Society, lxxiii (1882)), 99–100. Folkes appears to have inherited the Hillingdon estate through his mother; see Stukeley , Bodleian Library, MS Eng. misc. e.135 f. 6, which refers to Folkes's “Norfolk estate”. The idea that Folkes was a student at Saumur University as has been variously claimed is a mistake; his tutor, Cappel, had been professor of Hebrew there until its suppression in 1695.

Nichols John , Literary anecdotes of the eighteenth century; comprizing Biographical Memoirs of William Bowyer, Printer, FSA. and Many of his Learned Friends (8 vols, London, 1812–18), ii, 592.

Birch , op. cit. (ref. 10), ff. 22r–22v.

Smith Robert , A compleat system of opticks (Cambridge, 1738), Preface, p. vi.

Folkes to Sloane, undated, British Library, Sloane MS 4058 f. 340.

Stukeley , op. cit. (ref. 11), 99–100.

Birch , op. cit. (ref. 10), f. 24.

Lyons Henry , The Royal Society, 1660–1940: A history of its administration under its charters (Cambridge, 1944), 172.

Birch , op. cit. (ref. 10), ff. 25–26.

Ibid., ff. 25–26.

Ibid., f. 26.

The record of the Royal Society of London for the Promotion of Natural Knowledge (4th edn, London, 1940), 142.

Evans Joan , A history of the Society of Antiquaries (Oxford, 1956); a recent detailed account of the process and costs of incorporation has, however, been published: Pugh R. B. , “Our first charter”, The Antiquaries journal, lxii (1982), 347–55.

On North, Ducarel, and Vertue, see the Dictionary of national biography.

Quoted in Evans , op. cit. (ref. 23), 83.

“Introduction: Containing an historical account of the origin and establishment of the Society of Antiquaries”, in Archaeologia: Or miscellaneous tracts relating to antiquity, i (London, 1770), p. xxxviii. Isaac Disraeli in his Calamities and quarrels of authors (London, 1881), 341–2, remarked on the longstanding antagonism between the two societies, observing sagely: “there was … much of that unjust contempt between the parties, which students of opposite pursuits and tastes so liberally bestow on each other. The researches of the Antiquarian Society were sneered at by the Royal, and the antiquaries avenged themselves by their obstinate incredulity at the prodigies of the naturalists….”.

Pugh , op. cit. (ref. 23), 350.

Nichols , op. cit. (ref. 12), v, 433. North to Ducarel, 24 May 1750. Theobold first made a motion at the Society of Antiquaries on 26 April 1750 “that there might be a Committee chosen to consider of some ways and means in order to gain a Charter for this Society”. Society of Antiquaries, Minute Book: Typescript, vol. vi.

Nichols , op. cit. (ref. 12), v, 434. North to Ducarel, 18 August 1750.

Library British , Add. MSS 23091, f. 149. Vertue to Maurice Johnson [?], 8 September 1750.

Nichols , op. cit. (ref. 12), ii, 712. Vertue to Ducarel, 15 March 1750/51.

Society of Antiquaries, Minute Book: 14 March 1750/51: Typescript, vol. vi.

Philip Carteret Webb (1700–70), MSA 1747, FRS 1749; Joseph Ayloffe (1709–81), MSA and FRS 1732; Daniel Wray (1701–83), FRS 1729, MSA 1741; Jeremiah Milles (1714–84), MSA 1741, FRS 1742.

Nichols , op. cit. (ref. 12). Vertue to Ducarel, 15 March 1750/51.

See Sorrenson , op. cit. (ref. 1), 37.

Original MS in Archaeologia: Or miscellaneous tracts relating to antiquity, i (1770) interleaved with notes by Richard Gough and miscellaneous MSS, Bodleian Library, Gough Gen. top. 22. North to Ducarel, 20 March 1750/51.

Nichols , op. cit. (ref. 12), v, 442. North to Ducarel, 21 March 1750/51. On 7 November 1751 Webb reported to the Antiquaries that he was already “in Dispurse of upward of £280” and was desiring another £200 from funds. Society of Antiquaries Minute Book: Typescript, vol. vi.

Original MS in Archaeologia: Or miscellaneous tracts relating to antiquity, i (1770) interleaved with notes by Richard Gough and miscellaneous MSS, Bod. Gough Gen. top. 22. George North to Ducarel, 4 April 1751.

Ibid.

Op. cit. (ref. 26), p. xxxix.

Richard Gough, MS annotation, ibid.

Birch , op. cit. (ref. 10), ff. 30r–31v.

Weld , op. cit. (ref. 5), i, 482.

See Birch , op. cit. (ref. 10), ff. 22–56v.

Ibid., f. 32.

de Fouchy Grandjean , Eloges des Académiciens de l'Académie Royale des Sciences, morts depuis l'an 1744 (Paris, 1761), 323–37.

Nichols , op. cit. (ref. 12), v, 455–6. North to Ducarel, 6 July 1752. “Job” in this context may be defined as “A public service or trust turned to private gain or party advantage”, as in Pope's couplet, “Who makes a Trust or Charity a Job, And gets an Act of Parliament to rob”. Oxford English dictionary, 2nd edn, n. 2, 3.a.

Nichols , op. cit. (ref. 12), ii, 688. Cole to Ducarel, 13 April 1754.

Ibid., ii, 689. Cole to Ducarel, 11 May 1754.

Ibid. , ii, 690. Cole to Ducarel, 10 July 1754. Folkes's death led to divisions in the Antiquarian Society, one outsider reporting that they “have had some dispute about choosing a new President in the place of my very worthy and much valued friend Martin Folkes”. John Nixon to Ducarel (?), 23 July 1754; ibid., iii, 533.

Ibid., ii, 589–90.

On John Hill see Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 9), whose first volume of biography has appeared and the second volume is in progress.

Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 9), 1–9.

Fraser Kevin , “John Hill and the Royal Society in the eighteenth century”, Notes and records of the Royal Society, xlviii (1994), 43–67, p. 44.

The story is too complicated and lengthy to be recounted here; see Rousseau G. S. , “John Hill, universal genius manqué: Remarks on his life and times, with a checklist of his works”, in Lemay J. A. Leo Rouseau G. S. , The Renaissance man in the eighteenth century (Los Angeles, 1978), 44–129, pp. 86–89.

Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 9), Letter 51, 62–63. Peter Ascanius to Linnaeus, 7 April 1755.

See Dictionary of national biography.

One of Sloane's first acts as President had been to tighten up the rules for election of new Fellows. See Heilbron , op. cit. (ref. 5), 36.

Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 9), 23–24.

Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 55), 113.

Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 9), 25–27.

List of Subscribers Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 55), 113–14.

Mann Abbé , Mémoires de l'Académie de Bruxelles, iv (Brussels, 1783), “Life of John Turberville Needham”.

Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 9), 18–24. Da Costa succeeded Francis Hauksbee, junior, as clerk to the Royal Society in February 1763, but used his position to embezzle from the Society and was dismissed in December 1767 and imprisoned in 1768.

Hill John , “A dissertation on Royal societies”, The British magazine, v (1750), 104–13, p. 104. See ‘Dr. Abraham Johnson’, Lucina sine concubitu, a letter addressed to the Royal Society; in which is proved that a woman may conceive and be brought to bed without any commerce with man (London, 1750), and ‘Richard Roe’, A letter to Dr Abraham Johnson, on the subject of his new scheme for the propagation of the human species: In which, the reflections that author has cast upon the Royal Society of London, are answered. By a fellow (London, 1750).

Hill , op. cit. (ref. 65), 111.

Ibid., 110.

Ibid., 112.

Ibid., 112–13.

Philosophical transactions, xlii, no. 469 (1742–43), 419; read to the Society, 10 and 17 March 1742/3.

Hill , op. cit. (ref. 65), 111.

Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 9), 28, 33–34.

McClellan James E. III , Science reorganized: Scientific societies in the eighteenth century (New York, 1985), 113.

Ibid.

This was Christoph Jacob Trew (1695–1769); see Rousseau G. S. , “John Hill and the other Royal Society in Germany: London, Nuremberg, and the establishment of an alternative society”, forthcoming. In 1770 Hill wrote to Trew, proposing an alternative Royal Society for which Hill had long ago drawn up the most detailed plans. However, Trew had died in 1769, unbeknownst to Hill.

British Library, Sloane MS 4052, ff. 342–3. Folkes to Sloane, 11 May NS 1733.

Hill John , A dissertation on Royal Societies. In three letters from a nobleman on his travels, to a person of distinction in Sclavonia (London, 1750), 17.

Ibid., 17 and 9.

Ibid., 18–19.

Bodleian Library, MS Eng. misc. e.132, f. 42. Stukeley's diary, 22 February 1753. As is to be expected of any large group that meets regularly, friends sat together and factions emerged. When Stukeley wrote in support of da Costa's bid for the position of clerk to the Society, he noted, “I know he has very many friends. All my corner of the room unanimous …”, Nichols , op. cit. (ref. 12), iv, 506. Stukeley , letter to unnamed person, 21 January 1763.

Hill , op. cit. (ref. 77), 28. See Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 9), Letters 27–30 for Arderon and Baker's responses to Hill's attacks. Arderon's letter on the dwarf was given on 14 June 1750 and is published in Philosophical transactions, xlvi, no. 495 (1750), 467–70.

For the club's longer, informal antecedents see Geike Archibald , Annals of the Royal Society Club: The record of a London dining-club in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries (London, 1917); see also Weld , op. cit. (ref. 5), i, 491–4.

Geike , ibid., 29–30; Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 9), 27.

Hill , op. cit. (ref. 77), 33–34.

Ibid., 34–35.

Ibid., 38–39.

Lyons , op. cit. (ref. 18), 161.

British Library, Add. MS 23096, f. 23v; George Vertue's copybook; this comment must have been written some time between the death of Richmond on 5 August and Folkes's election to president in November. In his diary in April 1751 Stukeley recorded a list of thirty “nobleman & great personages dead in little more than a twelvemonth”, though with the exception of the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Montagu he considered “most of 'em good for nothing, profaners of the sabbath”. Bodleian Library, MS Eng. misc. e. 130, f. 44.

For a new intellectual biography of Stukeley see Haycock D. A. B. , “Dr William Stukeley (1687–1765): Antiquarianism and Newtonianism in eighteenth-century England”, Ph.D. thesis, University of London, 1998.

There is no biography but see Rousseau , op. cit. (ref. 9) and the forthcoming sequel.

Bodleian Library, MS Eng. misc. e.667/1, f. 11.

Stukeley William , “Memoirs of Sr. Isaac Newton's Life …”, Royal Society of London, MS 142, f. 6; see also Library Bodleian , MS Eng. misc. e.667/1, f. 11r.

Stukeley William , The commentary's, diary, and common-place book of William Stukeley (London, 1980), 57.

King's College, Cambridge, Keynes MS 136. Stukeley to John Conduitt, 26 June 1727.

Stukeley , op. cit. (ref. 92), f. 12.

Ibid., ff. 16–17.

Bodleian Library, MS Eng. misc. e.129, f. 5.

Stukeley , “On the causes of earthquakes” and “Concerning the causes of earthquakes” in Philosophical transactions, xlvi (1750), 641–6 and 657–9. These papers, which were published in the wake of interest that followed the London earthquakes of 1750, were expanded and published separately by Stukeley as The philosophy of earthquakes, natural and religious, or an inquiry into their cause, and their purpose (London, 1750). The third (1756) edition of this book was reprinted in John Bevis's The history and philosophy of earthquakes, from the remotest to the present times: Collected from the best writers on the subject by a member of the Royal Academy of Berlin (London 1757). Stukeley's paper stood alongside ones by Martin Lister, Robert Hooke, John Woodward, Georges Buffon, and Stephen Hales.

See Weld , op. cit. (ref. 5), i, 514–16.

Quoted in Weld , op. cit. (ref. 5), i, 526.

Bodleian Library, MS Eng. misc. e.129, f. 56.

Bodleian Library, MS Eng. misc. e.129, f. 68. Andrea Rusnock refers to the “Committee of Papers” established in 1752 to assist with “the growing responsibilities that had traditionally been shouldered by the secretaries” but the date does not match Stukeley's remark. Rusnock , op. cit. (ref. 7), 157–8.

Stukeley did attend some meetings, and three notebooks bound together survive for the period 1740–42, Bodleian Library, MS Eng. misc. e.124.

Bodleian Library, MS Eng. misc. e.129, f. 51.

Spalding Gentleman's Society Letters Packet 88, quoted in Fraser , op. cit. (ref. 54), 49. Stukeley to Maurice Johnson, 13 April 1751.

Their collaboration is explored by Rousseau in the forthcoming biography.

Bod. MS Eng. misc. e.130, f. 81. Stukeley's diary, 31 October 1751.

Bod. MS Eng. misc. e.130, f. 39. Stukeley's diary, 14 March 1751.

Folkes's speech on this occasion is recorded in the Society's Journal Book, vol. xxi. Harrison, though, did not receive prize money from the Board of Longitude until 1758. Stukeley called Harrison “that excellent genius at clock-making, who bids fair for the golden prize due to the discovery of the longitude”. Quoted in Weld , op. cit. (ref. 5), i, 508.

Bodleian Library, MS Eng. misc. e.130, f. 75. Stukeley's diary, 28 August 1751: “We celebrated the dedication of my library, present, the p'sident Mr Folks, Mr Fleetwood, Dr Parsons, Mr Pond, Mr de la Costa, Mr Baker, Mr Sherwood sen.r & jun.” This group is the one to which Hill had ingratiated himself a few years earlier, especially in the “Wednesday afternoon” meetings, and Stukeley's diaries contain many other examples of their congregation during these months, often at his home.

Stukeley , op. cit. (ref. 11), 99–100. Rawthmell's Coffee House, Henrietta Street, Covent Garden, and the Mitre Coffee House, Fleet Street, where the Society of Antiquaries met before 1777. Rawthmell's figures in Hill's A dissertation on Royal Societies, where it is described as “A Coffee-House near Covent-Garden, where the People who esteem themselves wiser than the rest of the Company [i.e. Folkes and his friends], are separated from them by a Curtain”; see Hill , op. cit. (ref. 77), 35, footnote.

See Sorrenson , op. cit. (ref. 1), 38.

Stukeley , op. cit. (ref. 11), 99–100. John Byrom recorded in his journal in 1736 a Mr Johnson telling him that “Martin Folkes talked strangely against religion …”, The private journal and literary remains of John Byrom , ii/1, ed. by Parkinson Richard (Chetham Society, xl (1856)), 23. Folkes told da Costa, who was Jewish, that “we are all citizens of the world, and see different customs and tastes without dislike or prejudice, as we do different names and colours”. Nichols , op. cit. (ref. 12), v, 635. Folkes to da Costa, 28 August 1747.

Keynes MS 132, King's College Cambridge. Craig to John Conduitt, 7 April 1727.

Bodleian Library MS Eng. misc. e. 131, f. 66. Stukeley's diary, 9 November 1752.

Ibid., f. 83. Stukeley's diary, 7 December 1752. Hauksbee as clerk to the Society would have been responsible for overseeing voting.

Ibid., ff. 18–19. Stukeley's diary, 23 January 1752.

British Library Add. MS 28535, f. 68, quoted in Pool P. A. S. , William Borlase (Truro, 1986), 138. Borlase to da Costa, 20 January 1752.

Bodleian Library MS Eng. misc. e.132, f. 38. Stukeley's diary, 15 February 1753.

Ibid., f. 73. Stukeley , diary, 3 May 1753; Stukeley had written these papers in response to a long letter to the Society by M. Peyssonel and they were read at the Society on 14 May and 11 June 1752; his friend Dr James Parsons also gave a paper largely in agreement with Stukeley on 18 June. They were, in fact, both wrong. See Bod. MS Eng. misc. e.131, ff. 47–65. Stukeley's belief that corals were plants, and the failure of his papers to appear in the Philosophical transactions, has been a source of mirth to Weld and Piggott. But Parsons's paper was published in volume xlvii, pp. 505–13, drawing his conclusion that “Whatever bodies shall be found to carry the appearances and characteristic marks of vegetables … certainly will pass with me for such, till stronger evidence shall evince the contrary” (p. 513).

Bod. MS Eng. misc. e.132, f. 77. Stukeley's diary, 5 July 1753. This paper had been given on 3 May 1753.

Bod. MS Eng. misc. e.131, ff. 29–30. Stukeley's diary, 27 February 1752.