Francis Bacon: From Magic to Science

Paolo Rossi

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9780415474955
• eBook ISBN: 9781135028091
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Philosophy History & Theory

Originally published in 1968. This volume discusses Francis Bacon's thought and work in the context of the European cultural environment that influenced Bacon's philosophy and was in turn influenced by it. It examines the influence of magical and alchemical traditions on Bacon and his opposition to these traditions, as well as illustrating the naturalist, materialist and ethico-political patterns in Bacon's allegorical interpretations of fables.

Notes

INTRODUCTION

1. Bush, 1.

2. Willey, 42.

3. ‘Dr Wallis’ Account of Some Passages of his Own Life’, Peter Langfot's Chronicle, Oxford, 1725, pp. 161–4.

INTRODUCTION TO THE ENGLISH EDITION

1. P. H. Kocher, ‘Bacon on the Science of Jurisprudence’, FHI, 1957, 1, pp. 3–26; G.J. Ducasse, ‘F. Bacon's Philosophy of Science’, Theories of Scientific Method by R. M. Blake, G. J. Ducasse, and E. H. Madden, Seattle, 1960; R. Hooykaas, ‘De Baconiaanse traditie in de natuurwetenschap’, Alg. Nederk. Tijdschr. Wijsb. Psycol, 1960–1, pp. 181–201; R. F. McRae, The Problem of the Unity of Science, Bacon to Kant, Toronto, 1961; R. E. Larsen, ‘Aristotelianism of Bacon's N.O.’, FHI, 1962, 4, pp. 435–50. I have published the following studies on Bacon's philosophy in Rivista critica di storia della filosofia, 1957: ‘Per una bibliografia degli scritti su F. Bacone’ (pp. 75–89) and ‘Sul carattere non utilitaristico della filosofia di F. Bacone’ (pp. 22–40). I have analysed Bacon's attitude to the mechanical arts inI filosofi and the relation of his induction to theartes memorativae inClavis Universalis. Two articles have just gone to press: ‘Bacone e Galilei’ will appear in the second book of Saggi su Galileo Galilei, a cura del Gomitato Nazionale per le celebrazioni nel IV centenario della nascita, Gonsiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Rome and ‘Bacone e la Bibbia’ will appear in Reformation and Philosophy, Polska Akademia Nauk, Warsaw.

NOTES TO CHAPTER I

1. Trans. J. M. Cohen, Penguin Books, 1955, p. 92.

2. See Hall, 45–51, 129 seq., 217–43; E. Callot, La Renaissance des Sciences de la vie au XVIe siécle, Paris, 1951.

3. For the importance of experiments and the influence of technology on philosophy and scientific research see A. C. Crombie, Augustine to Galileo, London, 1952, pp. 274–7. The cultural significance of these technical writings is not stressed in A. Wolf's important study, A History of Science, Technology, and Philosophy in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, London, 1950, or in History and Technology, ed. C. Singer, E. J. Holmyard, A. R. Hall, and T. I. Williams, Oxford, 1957, III. H. Butterfield, The Origins of Modern Science, London, 1949, gives an historical study of the ‘internal expansion’ of science and more or less ignores the link between technology and science and the ‘external expansion’ of science. In this respect the chapter on the development of experimentalism in the seventeenth century is particularly disappointing. E. A. Burtt, The Metaphysical Foundations of Modern Physical Science, London, 1950, suffers from the same limitations.

4. For the situation in England see J. U. Nef, Industry and Commerce in France and England 1540–1640, Ithaca (N.Y.), 1957. In the following works (which are all invaluable for an understanding of English economy in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries) the author comes to the same conclusion:The Rise of the British Coal Industry. London, 1932, and ‘The Progress of Technology and the Growth of Large Scale Industry in Great Britain 1540–1640’, Economic History Review, V, 1934–5, pp. 3–24. Also G. N. Glark, Science and Social Welfare in the Age of Newton, Oxford, 1937, of which the chapter ‘The Economic Incentives to Inventions’ is more especially relevant. For the relation of the new scientific attitude to English society see the article by one of the best authorities on the subject: R. K. Merton, ‘Science, Technology and Society in Seventeenth Century England’, Osiris, IV, 1938, pp. 360 seq., and the review of this article by R. F. Jones in Isis, XXI, 1940, pp. 438–41;idem, ‘Science and Criticism in the Neo-Classical Age of English Literature’, The Seventeenth Century and ‘Puritanism, Science and Christ Church’, Isis, XXXI, 1939, pp. 65–7, where the author discusses among other things the relation between the new scientific attitude and religion and literature. On the organization of scientific research see Yates, 95–104; H. Brown, Scientific Organizations in Seventeenth-Century France, Baltimore, 1934; M. Ornstein, The Role of Scientific Societies in the Seventeenth Century, New York, 1938; Hall's chapter referring to this question is particularly enlightening. H. Brown, ‘The Utilitarian Motive in the Age of Descartes’, Annals of Science, London, I, 1936, pp. 182 seq.; P. M. Schuhl, Machinisme et philosophic, Paris, 1947, makes a brief but interesting contribution to the problem, especially pp. 23–42. Some relevant texts in British Scientific Literature in the Seventeenth Century, ed. N. Davy, London, 1953.

5. For Agricola see n. 7. Vanoccio Biringuccio, De la pirotechnia, Venice, 1540. Besson, Theâtre des instrumens mathématiques, Lyons, 1579. Fausto Veranzio, Machine novae, Venice c. 1595. Vittorio Zonca, Novo teatro di machine et edificii, Padua, 1621. Giacomo Strada de Rosberg, Dessins artificiaux, Frankfurt-am-Main, 1617—18. Benedetto Castelli, Delle misure dell'acque correnti, published posthumously in Rome in 1628. Apart from the studies on these works already quoted see: A. P. Usher, A History of Mechanical Inventions, New York, 1929; R. J. Forbes, Man the Maker, A History of Technology and Engineering, London, 1950; R. Dugas, Histoire de la mecanique, Neuchatel, 1950.

6. Agricola's real name was George Bauer (1494–1555).

7. Agricola, De ortu et causis subterraneorum, Italian trans., Venice, 1550, p. 519V.

8. ibid., p. 520.

9. idem, De re metallica, Italian trans., Basel, 1563, preface, p. 6.

10. ibid. On this subject see Thorndike, I-V; Hall, 31. Also F. A. Pouchet, Histoire des sciences naturelles au moyen âge, Paris, 1853; C. H. Haskins, Studies in the History of Medieval Science, Cambridge, 1927; L. White, Jr., ‘Technology and Invention in the Middle Ages’, Speculum, IV, 1940, pp. 141 seq.

11. G. M. Bonardo, La Minera del Mondo, Venice, 1589.

12. ibid., p. 10, 57V.

13. See C. T. Onions, ‘Natural History’, Shakespeare's England, Oxford, 1950, I, p. 477.

14. See n. 9 above.

15. p. 4.

16. p. 5.

17. ibid.

18. p. 4.

19. p. 1.

20. p. 22.

21. For the influence of technical research on art and culture see A. Banfi, Galileo Galilei, Milan, 1949, pp. 31 seq. For a more general view of the historical situation mentioned here see I filosofi.

22. Sir Humphrey Gilbert, (1539?-83), Queen Elizabethes Academy, ed. F. J. Furnivall, Early English Text Society, 1869. Gf. The Voyages and Colonising Enterprises of Sir Humphrey Gilbert, Hakluyt Society, 1940, II. For Gilbert's pedagogical work see W. H. Wood-ward; Studies in Education during the Age of the Renaissance 1400–1600, Cambridge, 1906, pp. 295–306.

23. Gilbert, p. II.

24. See Caspari, 1–27. P. N. Siegel, ‘English Humanism and the New Tudor Aristocracy’, FHI, 1952, 4, pp. 450–68.

25. Thomas Starkey, A Dialogue between Reginald Pole and Thomas Lupset, ed. K. M. Burton, London, 1948, p. 26. (cit. Caspari, 118)

26. Antony a'Wood, Historia et antiquitates universitatis oxoniensis, Oxford, 1647, I, 62; II, 108.

27. For Bernard Palissy (1510–98) see L. Audiat, Bernard Palissy, Paris, 1864; E. Dupuy, Bernard Palissy, Paris, 1894; for Palissy's works:Discours admirables, Paris, 1580;Recepte veritable, La Rochelle, 1553. Both have been reprinted in A...

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Introduction
• Introduction to the English edition
• I The Mechanical Arts, Magic, and Science
• II The Refutation of Philosophies
• III The Classical Fable
• IV Logic, Rhetoric, and Method
• V Language and Communication
• VI Rhetorical Tradition and the Method of Science
• List of Abbreviations used in the Notes
• Notes
• Index