Preface

Summary

In 1939 Abraham Wolf published his History of science, technology and philosophy in the eighteenth century. Since that time much has changed in the history of science, but no new general study of eighteenth-century science has appeared. The present book is intended to fill the gap — or perhaps a slightly different gap. Wolf's book emphasized technology and instrumentation, whereas mine emphasizes science and ideas. It is impossible to include within the compass of one small volume all of the detail that appeared in Wolf's two large ones. Instead I have outlined the major events in the development of eighteenth-century science, with an eye toward indicating the directions that modern scholarship has taken. In particular, I have attempted to trace the emergence of modern scientific fields. The treatment is not technical, although in some cases (as in the chapter on chemistry), it has been necessary to give an account of actual experiments in order to make the modern interpretations clear.

The history of eighteenth-century science appears in this book as part of the Enlightenment, which means that the viewpoint tends to be French, some might say unremittingly French. My only excuse is that because France was the center of the Enlightenment, my account seemed to flow most naturally from that source, although I would be the first to admit that other viewpoints could be found that would be equally valid.