Art and the Celebration of Science (1660-1730)
St. Bride's Church, Fleet Street, London, built 1701-3, designed by Christopher Wren. After the fire that devastated London in 1666, Christopher Wren became England's principle architect. His church designs reflect contemporary ideals of reason and clarity. Churches, Wren argued, should be unicellular: there are to be no hidden or dark areas that would compromise the suggestion of rational lucidity. There is no chancel to separate the priest from people in a "popish" fashion and the light, from large windows of clear glass, is evenly present throughout the structure, an appropriate architectural metaphor for a "reasonable" Christianity.
The Royal Society
"The Royal Society of London for the Promotion of Natural Knowledge" was founded in 1660 under the patronage of Charles II who proceeded to underfund it. The purpose of the Royal Society was to promote investigation of the natural world after the empiricist, experimental model advocated by Francis Bacon (1561-1626). It gained an international reputation largely thanks to the presidency and influence of Isaac Newton (1642-1727). By the 1740's, however, it had become little more than a gentleman's club. Thomas Spratt, Bishop of Rochester and the Society's first historian identified the sociology of the Society and its chosen discourse:
Thus they have formed that Society, which intends a Philosophy, for the use of Cities, and not for the retirements of Schools; to resemble the Cities themselves, which are compounded of all sorts of men, of the Gown, of the Sword, of the Shop, of the Field, of the Court, of the Sea; all mutually assisting each other.
They have exacted from all their members a close, naked, natural way of speaking; positive expressions, clear senses, a native easiness, bringing all things as near the mathematical plainess as they can; and preferring the language of Artisans, Countrymen, and Merchants before that of Wits and Scholars.
We have here an ideal of the "public sphere" as a arena of rational discourse directed at the aquisition of useful knowledge and the improvement of civic life. Other - and more important - institutional forms of this ideal include the "coffee houses" and periodicals and journals such as the Tatler (1709), the Craftsman (1726), and the Gentleman's Magazine (1727). The Royal Society lies at the beginnings of the "bourgeois public sphere," the development of which involved a "process in which the state-governed public sphere was appropriated by the public of private people making use of their reason" (Habermas) for the purpose of political and cultural debate and criticism. Despite the democratizing tone of Spratt's language, however, the Royal Society was a thoroughly elitist body that excluded tradesmen and functioned to control British science.
Two Poetic Celebrations
The first of the two poems below appeared as the preface to Thomas Spratt's history of the Royal Society (he is the historian referred to in the final stanza). A number of features are worth noting. Cowley deploys throughout the language of biblical history which serves to stage and interpret the historical and, indeed, salvific, importance of the new science and its representative body. The metaphor of the "minor" now liberated from "guardians" turned "usurpers" is derived from St. Paul and here appropriated to philosophy. In variant forms, including guardian-minor, tutor-child, adulthood-pupillage, this "coming-of-age" metaphor is, like that of light itself, one of the foundational metaphors of "Enlightenment" writers. When Kant used it in the famous essay "What is Enlightenment?" (see text reader), he was drawing on a literary tradition at least a century old.
By reinterpreting the Fall narrative, Cowley provides the Society's comittment to empiricism (the insistence that all knowledge is dependent upon sense experience) with an interesting theological justification. The "forbidden fruit" is the attempt to derive knowledge "without the Sences aid," thus attempting to be like God who alone "can find all Nature in his Mind." Empiricism underlies aesthetic theory, too, thus painting demands exact attention to "the real object," not the images of "Fancy" or "Memory" but "the Natural and Living Face."
The second poem, James Thompson's celebration of Isaac Newton, also expresses scientific enthusiasm and exalts the "liberating" role of empiricism. The work contrasts with Cowley's, though, in the relative absence of biblical language. The frame of salvation history has disappeared before the display of Nature as a vast design illuminated by Newton's "philosophic sun" like the interior of a Wren church. The temporal order is determined not by biblical reference but through contrast between "ancients" and "moderns," Newton and "the triumphs of old Greece and Rome." Thompson's poetry, significantly, drew criticism from his contemporaries as tending toward deism.
Abraham Cowley (1618-67), "To the Royal Society"
PHILOSOPHY the great and only Heir
Of all that Human Knowledge which has bin
Unforfeited by Mans rebellious Sin,
Though full of years He do appear,
(Philosophy, I say, and call it, He,
For whatsoe'er the Painters Fancy be,
It a Male-virtue seems to me)
Has still been kept in Nonage till of late,
Nor manag'd or enjoy'd his vast Estate:
Three or four thousand years one would have thought,
To ripeness and perfection might have brought
A Science so well bred and nurst,
And of such hopeful parts too at the first.
But, oh, the Guardians and the Tutors then,
(Some negligent, and some ambitious men)
Would ne' re consent to set him Free,
Or his own Natural Powers to let him see,
Lest that should put an end to their Autoritie..
That his own business he might quite forget,
They' amus'd him with the sports of wanton Wit,
With the Desserts of Poetry they fed him,
In stead of solid meats t' encrease his force;
In stead of vigorous exercise they led him
Into the pleasant Labyrinths of ever-fresh Discourse:
In stead of carrying him to see
The Riches which doe hoorded for him lie
In Natures endless Treasurie,
They chose his Eye to entertain
(His curious but not covetous Eye)
With painted Scenes, and Pageants of the Brain.
Some few exalted Spirits this latter Age has shown,
That labour'd to assert the Liberty
(From Guardians, who were now Usurpers grown)
Of this old Minor still, Captiv'd Philosophy;
But 'twas Rebellion call'd to fight
For such a long-oppressed Right.
Bacon at last, a mighty Man, arose
Whom a wise King and Nature chose
Lord Chancellour of both their Lawes,
And boldly undertook the injur'd Pupils cause.
Autority, which did a Body boast,
Though 'twas but Air condens'd, and stalk'd about,
Like some old Giants more Gigantic Ghost,
To terrifie the Learned Rout
With the plain Magick of true Reasons Light,
He chac'd out of our sight,
Nor suffer'd Living Men to be misled
By the vain shadows of the Dead:
To Graves, from whence it rose, the conquer'd Phantome fled;
He broke that Monstrous God which stood
In midst of th' Orchard, and the whole did claim,
Which with a useless Sith of Wood,
And something else not worth a name,
(Both vast for shew, yet neither fit
Or to Defend, or to Beget;
Ridiculous and senceless Terrors!) made
Children and superstitious Men afraid.
The Orchard's open now, and free;
Bacon has broke that Scare-crow Deitie;
Come, enter, all that will,
Behold the rip'ned Fruit, come gather now your Fill.
Yet still, methinks, we fain would be
Catching at the Forbidden Tree,
We would be like the Deitie,
When Truth and Falshood, Good and Evil, we
Without the Sences aid within our selves would see;
For 'tis God only who can find All Nature in his Mind.
From Words, which are but Pictures of the Thought,
(Though we our Thoughts from them perversly drew)
To things, the Minds right Object, he it brought,
Like foolish Birds to painted Grapes we flew;
He sought and gather'd for our use the True;
And when on heaps the chosen Bunches lay,
He prest them wisely the Mechanick way,
Till all their juyce did in one Vessel joyn,
Ferment into a Nourishment Divine,
The thirsty Souls refreshing Wine.
Who to the life an exact Piece would make,
Must not from others Work a Copy take;
No, not from Rubens or Vandike;
Much less content himself to make it like
Th' Ideas and the Images which lie
In his own Fancy, or his Memory.
No, he before his sight must place
The Natural and Living Face;
The real object must command
Each Judgment of his Eye, and Motion of his Hand.
From these and all long Errors of the way,
In which our wandring Predecessors went,
And like th' old Hebrews many years did stray
In Desarts but of small extent,
Bacon, like Moses, led us forth at last,
The barren Wilderness he past,
Did on the very Border stand
Of the blest promis'd Land,
And from the Mountains Top of his Exalted Wit,
Saw it himself, and shew'd us it.
But Life did never to one Man allow
Time to Discover Worlds, and Conquer too;
Nor can so short a Line sufficient be
To fadome the vast depths of Natures Sea:
The work he did we ought t' admire,
And were unjust, if we should more require
From his few years, divided 'twixt th' Excess
Of low Affliction, and high Happiness.
For who on things remote can fix his sight,
That's alwayes in a Triumph, or a Fight?
From you, great Champions, we expect to get
These spacious Countries but discover'd yet;
Countries where yet in stead of Nature, we
Her Images and Idols worship'd see:
These large and wealthy Regions to subdue,
Though Learning has whole Armies at command,
Quarter'd about in every Land,
A better Troop she ne're together drew.
Methinks, like Gideon's little Band,
God with Design has pickt out you,
To do these noble Wonders by a Few:
When the whole Host he saw, They are (said he)
Too many to o'rcome for Me;
And now he chuses out his Men,
Much in the way that he did then;
Not those many whom he found
Idely extended on the ground,
To drink with their dejected head
The Stream just so as by their Mouths it fled:
No, but those Few who took the waters up,
And made of their laborious Hands the Cup.
Thus you prepar'd; and in the glorious Fight
Their wondrous pattern too you take:
Their old and empty Pitchers first they brake,
And with their Hands then lifted up the Light.
lo! Sound too the Trumpets here!
Already your victorious Lights appear;
New Scenes of Heaven already we espy,
And Crowds of golden Worlds on high;
Which from the spacious Plains of Earth and Sea;
Could never yet discover'd be
By Sailers or Chalda'ans watchful Eye.
Natures great Workes no distance can obscure,
No smalness her near Objects can secure;
Y' have taught the curious Sight to press
Into the privatest recess
Of her imperceptible Littleness.
Y' have learn'd to Read her smallest Hand,
And well begun her deepest Sense to Understand.
Mischief and true Dishonour fall on those
Who would to laughter or to scorn expose
So Virtuous and so Noble a Design,
So Human for its Use, for Knowledge so Divine.
The things which these proud men despise, and call
Impertinent, and vain, and small,
Those smallest things of Nature let me know,
Rather than all their greatest Actions Doe.
Whoever would Deposed Truth advance
Into the Throne usurp'd from it,
Must feel at first the Blows of Ignorance,
And the sharp Points of Envious Wit.
So when by various turns of the Celestial Dance,
In many thousand years
A Star, so long unknown, appears,
Though Heaven it self more beauteous by it grow,
It troubles and alarms the World below,
Does to the Wise a Star, to Fools a Meteor show.
With Courage and Success you the bold work begin;
Your Cradle has not Idle bin:
None e're but Hercules and you could be
At five years Age worthy a History.
And ne're did Fortune better yet
Th' Historian to the Story fit:
As you from all Old Errors free
And purge the Body of Philosophy;
So from all Modern Follies
He Has vindicated Eloquence and Wit.
His candid Stile like a clean Stream does slide,
And his bright Fancy all the way
Does like the Sun-shine in it play;
It does like Thames, the best of Rivers, glide,
Where the God does not rudely overturn,
But gently pour the Crystal Urn,
And with judicious hand does the whole Current Guide.
'T has all the Beauties Nature can impart,
And all the comely Dress without the paint of Art.
James Thompson (1700-1748):
"A Poem Sacred to the Memory of Sir Isaac Newton"
SHALL the great soul of Newton quit; this earth,
To mingle with his stars; and every muse,
Astonish'd into silence, shun the weight
Of honors due to his illustrious name?
But what can man? - Even now the sons of light,
In strains high-warbled to seraphic lyre,
Hail his arrival on the coast of bliss.
Yet art not I deterr'd, tho' high the theme,
And sung to harps of angels, for with you,
Ethereal Flames! ambitious, I aspire
In Nature's general symphony to join.
And what new wonders can ye show your guest!
Who, while on this dim spot, where mortals toil
Clouded in dust, from Motion's simple laws,
Could trace the secret hand of Providence,
Wide-working thro' this universal frame.
Have ye not listen'd while he bound the Suns,
And Planets to their spheres! th' unequal task
Of humankind till then. Oft had they roll'd
O'er erring Man the year, and oft disgrac'd
The pride of schools, before their course was known
Full in its causes and effects to him,
All-piercing sage! who sat not down and dream'd
Romantic schemes, defended by the din
Of specious words, and tyranny of names;
But, bidding his amazing mind attend,
And with heroic patience years on years
Deep-searching, saw at last the System dawn,
And shine, of all his race, on him alone.
What were his raptures then! how pure! how strong!
And what the triumphs of old Greece and Rome,
By his diminish'd, but the pride of boys
In some small fray victorious! when instead
Of shatter'd parcels of this earth usurp'd
By violence unmanly, and sore deeds
Of cruelty and blood, Nature herself
Stood all subdu'd by him, and open laid
Her every latent glory to his view.
All intellectual eye, our solar Round
First gazing thro', he by the blended power
Of Gravitation and Projection saw
The whole in silent harmony revolve.
From unassisted vision hid, the Moons
To chear remoter planets numerous pour'd,
By him in all their mingled tracts were seen.
He also fix'd the wandering Queen of Night,
Whether she wanes into a scanty orb,
Or, waxing broad, with her pale shadowy light,
In a soft deluge overflows the sky.
Her every motion clear-discerning, He
Adjusted to the mutual Main, and taught
Why now the mighty mass of water swells
Resistless, heaving on the broken rocks,
And the full river turning; till again
The tide revertive, unattracted, leaves
A yellow waste of idle sands behind.
Then breaking hence, he took his ardent flight
Thro' the blue Infinite; and every Star,
Which the clear concave of a winter's night
Pours on the eye, or astronomic tube,
Far-stretching, snatches from the dark abyss,
Or such as farther in successive skies
To fancy shine alone, at his approach
Blaz'd into Suns, the living centre each
Of an harmonious system: all combin'd,
And rul'd unerring by that single power,
Which draws the stone projected to the ground.
0 unprofuse magnificence divine!
o Wisdom truly perfect! thus to call
From a few causes such a scheme of things,
Effects so various, beautiful, and great,
An universe compleat! and 0 belov'd
Of heaven! whose well-purg'd penetrative eye,
The mystic veil transpiercing, inly scan'd
The rising, moving, wide-establish'd frame.
He, first of men, with awful wing pursu'd
The Comet thro' the long Eliptic curve,
Till, to the forehead of our evening sky
Return'd, the blazing wonder glares anew,
And o'er the trembling nations shakes dismay.
The heavens are all his own; from the wild rule
Of whirling Vortices, and circling Spheres,
To their first great simplicity restor'd.
The schools astonish'd stood; but found it vain
To keep at odds with demonstration strong,
And, unawaken'd, dream beneath the blaze
Of truth. At once their pleasing visions fled,
With the gay shadows of the morning mix'd,
When Newton rose, our philosophic sun.
Th' aerial flow of Sound was known to him,
From whence it first in wavy circles breaks,
Till the touch'd organ takes the meaning in.
Nor could the darting Beam, of speed immense,
Escape his swift pursuit, and measuring eye.
Even Light itself, which every thing displays,
Shone undiscover'd, till his brighter mind
Untwisted all the shining robe of day;
And, from the whitening undistinguish'd blaze,
Collecting every ray into his kind,
To the charm'd eye educ'd the gorgeous train
Of Parent-Colours. First the flaming Red
Sprung vivid forth; the tawny Orange next;
And next delicious Yellow; by whose side
Fell the kind beams of all-refreshing Green.
Then the pure Blue, that swells autumnal skies,
Ethereal play'd; and then, of sadder hue,
Emerg'd the deepen'd Indico, as when
The heavy-skirted evening droops with frost,
While the last gleamings of refracted light
Dy'd in the fainting Violet away.
These, when the clouds distil the rosy shower,
Shine out distinct adown the watry bow;
While o'er our heads the dewy vision bends
Delightful, melting on the fields beneath.
Myriads of mingling dies from these result,
And myriads still remain-Infinite source
Of beauty, ever-flushing, ever-new!
Did ever poet image ought so fair,
Dreaming in whispering groves, by the hoarse brook
Or prophet, to whose rapture heaven descends!
Even now the setting sun and shifting clouds,
Seen, Greenwich, from thy lovely heights, declare
How just, how beauteous the refractive Law.
The noiseless Tide of Time, all bearing down
To vast Eternity's unbou'nded sea
Where the green islands of the happy shine,
He stem'd alone; and to the source (involv'd
Deep in prim~val gloom) ascending, rais'd
His lights at equal distances, to guide
Historian, wilder'd on his darksome way.
But who can number up his labors? who
His high discoveries sing? when but a few
Of the deep-studying race can stretch their minds
To what he knew: in fancy's lighter thought,
How shall the muse then grasp the mighty theme?
What wonder thence that his Devotion swell'd
Responsive to his knowledge! for could he,
Whose piercing mental eye diffusive saw
The finish'd University of things,
In all its order, magnitude, and parts,
Forbear incessant to adore that Power
Who fills, sustains, and actuates the whole.
Say, ye who best can tell, ye happy few,
Who saw him in the softest lights of life,
All unwith-held, indulging to his friends
The vast unborrow'd treasures of his mind,
Oh speak the wondrous man! how mild, how calm,
How greatly humble, how divinely good;
How firm establish'd on eternal truth;
Fervent in doing well, with every nerve
Still pressing on, forgetful of the past,
And panting for perfection: far above
Those little cares, and visionary joys,
That so perplex the fond impassion'd heart
Of ever-cheated, ever-trusting man.
This, Conduitt, from thy rural hours we hope;
As thro' the pleasing shade, where Nature pours
Her every sweet, in studious ease you walk;
The social passions smiling at thy heart,
That glows with all the recollected sage.
And you, ye hopeless gloomy-minded tribe,
You who, unconscious of those nobler flights
That reach impatient at immortal life,
Against the prime endearing privilege
Of Being dare contend, say, can a soul
Of such extensive, deep, tremendous powers,
Enlarging still, be but a finer breath
Of spirits dancing thro' their tubes awhile,
And then; for ever lost in vacant air?
But hark! methinks I hear a warning voice,
Solemn as when some awful change is come,
Sound thro' the world - "'Tis done!-The measure's full;
"And I resign my charge.- Ye mouldering stones,
That build the towering pyramid, the proud
Triumphal arch, the monument effac'd
By ruthless ruin, and whate'er supports
The worship'd name of hoar antiquity,
Down to the dust! what grandeur can ye boast
While Newton lifts his column to the skies,
Beyond the waste of time. - Let no weak drop
Be shed for him. The virgin in her bloom
Cut off, the joyous youth, and darling child,
These are the tombs that claim the tender tear,
And Elegiac song. But Newton calls
For other notes of gratulation high,
That now he wanders thro' those endless worlds
He here so well descried, and wondering talks,
And hymns their author with his glad compeers.
0 Britain's boast! whether with angels thou
Sittest in dread discourse, or fellow-blest,
Who joy to see the honor of their kind;
Or whether, mounted on cherubic wing,
Thy swift career is with the whirling orbs,
Comparing things with things, in rapture lost,
And grateful adoration, for that light
So plenteous ray'd into thy mind below,
From Light Himself; Oh look with pity down
On humankind, a frail erroneous race!
Exalt the spirit of a downward world!
O'er thy dejected country chief preside,
And be her Genius call'd! her studies raise,
Correct her manners, and inspire her youth.
For, tho' deprav'd and sunk, she brought thee forth,
And glories in thy name; she points thee out
To all her sons, and bids them eye thy star:
While in expectance of the second life,
When Time shall be no more, thy sacred dust
Sleeps with her kings, and dignifies the scene.