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New Light on the Invisible College the Social Relations of English Science in the Mid-Seventeenth Century

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 February 2009

Charles Webster
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Extract

It is difficult to compose an account of the development of experimental science in seventeenth-century England without reference to the Invisible College. Indeed its grandiose title has come to be applied almost indiscriminately to any informal group of scientists, and no doubt this popular usage will continue, regardless of the conclusions reached by this or any other specialist paper. But such popular usage should not obscure the relevance of the Invisible College to certain serious historical problems. First, it is necessary to establish the identity of the scientific group which captured the imagination of the nineteen-year-old Robert Boyle. The College not only provided his initiation into science, but also inspired such strong motivation that Boyle became preoccupied with natural philosophy. For the rest of his life science was pursued not so much as a gentlemanly diversion, but in the spirit of a religious mission. Secondly, the Invisible College is relevant to any appreciation of the factors involved in the remarkable expansion of English experimental science which began shortly before the establishment of the Invisible College in 1646. This movement rapidly generated a whole spectrum of informal scientific groups and culminated with the formation of the Royal Society in 1660.

Type
Research Article
Information
Transactions of the Royal Historical Society , Volume 24 , January 1974 , pp. 19 - 42
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Historical Society 1974

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References

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22 The Office of Address was frequently referred to as a College by Culpeper and Dury; e.g. Letter from Culpeper to Hartlib [March 1646]: ‘I cannot take notice of the extensiones of that colledge you have in your mind …’ Sheffield University Library, Hartlib Papers XIII.

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35 Bodleian, Clarendon MS 75, fos 300–1: autobiographical letter from Worsley to Lady Clarendon; Whitmore, J. B., Notes and Queries, clxxv (1943), pp. 123–28Google Scholar. H.M.C., Ormonde, ii, pp. 256–, 284–85–Temple and Sir William Parsons were signatories of letters on behalf of ‘Chyrurgian-General’ Worsley in 1643. For Temple see Bottigheimer, English Money and Irish Land, pp. 101–8; also Underdown, D., Pride’s Purge (Oxford, 1971), pp. 43, 82Google Scholar: D.N.B.

36 Commons Journals, v, p. 247; 17 July 1647.

37 p. 21 and n. 5.

38 Letters from Culpeper to Hartlib, 31 October and 12 November 1645, 23 February 1646/7, Sheffield University Library, Hartlib Papers XIII.

39 This difference of emphasis is particularly apparent from the long series of letters on the Office of Address composed by Dury in 1646 and 1647. There is no reference to experimental science or Worsley, Hartlib Papers III.

40 For Gerard (1604–1650) and Arnold Boate (1606–1653), see Nieuw Nederlandsch Biographisch Woordenboek, iv, pp. 211–12; SirClark, George, A History of the Royal College of Physicians (Oxford, 1964–1966), i, pp. 262–3Google Scholar, 297. H.M.C., Ormonde, ii, pp. 155–56; Cal. State Paps. Dom., 1649–50, pp. 66, 588; Irelands Natural History, ed. Hartlib, S. (London, 1652)Google Scholar, sigs. A6r–8r; Bottigheimer, , op. tit., p. 177Google Scholar: Boate invested £180, in expectation of a reward of 847 acres. Barnard, T. C., ‘The Social Policy of the Commonwealth and Protectorate in Ireland’ (Oxford D.Phil, thesis, 1972), pp. 332–5Google Scholar.

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44 John Sadler (1615–1674), a London lawyer and from 1650 Master of Magdalene College, was often mentioned in conjunction with Worsley in letters received by Hartlib in 1647. He became a patron of the Office of Address and served on the 1653 Committees for Law Reform, the Advancement of Learning and tithes. His best-known work is Rights of the Kingdom (London, 1649)Google Scholar. It is interesting to note that, probably through involvement with Lady Ranelagh, Worsley was brought into contact with Milton. See French, J. M., The Life Records of John Milton 1639–1651 (New Brunswick, 1950), pp. 9, 10, 183, 214Google Scholar.

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46 Ibid., tome ii, 2.

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48 Irelands Natural History. Being a true and complete Description of its Situation, Greatness, Shape and Nature: of its Hills, Woods, Heaths, Bogs: Of its fruitfull Parts and profitable Grounds, with the severall way of Manuring and improoving the same. With its Heads or Promontories, Harbours, Roades and Bayes; of its Springs and Fountaines, Brookes, Rivers, Loghs: Of its Metalls, Mineralls, Freastone, Marble, Sea-coale, Turf, and other things that are taken out of the ground. And lastly, of the Nature and temperature of its Air and Season, and what disease it is free from and subject unto. Conducing to the Advancement of Navigation, Husbandry, and other profitable Arts and Professions (London, 1652). Edited by Hartlib.

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56 Lords Journals, viii, pp. 573–74; 21 November 1646. ‘To the Right Honourable the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament. The humble Petition of Benjamin Worsley.’ With a Certificate signed by members of the Committee of Aldermen, 7 April 1646. An extended version of Worsley’s petition is given in ‘An Acte for a new way of making Saltpeter’, Hartlib Papers LXXII, 11, which mentions Worsley’s backers as Sir William Courteen, Francis Joyner an d William Hyde.

57 Letter from Hartlib to Boyle, 5 April 1659; Boyle, , Works, vi, pp. 116–17Google Scholar. The papers on saltpetre include two letters from Arnold Boate, sent from Paris in 1653, Sheffield University Library, Hartlib Papers XXXIX, 51.

58 Irelands Natural History, sigs. A3r–4r. This section is usually attributed to Hartlib, but this was actually by Dury.

59 Sheffield University Library, Hartlib Papers XVII (23). This document is anonymous, but there can be little doubt that it was composed by Worsley, possibly in consultation with other members of the Invisible College.

60 Ibid., fo. 1r–v.

61 Ibid., fo. 2r.

62 Ibid., fo. 3r.

63 Ibid., fo. 4V.

64 For later Irish activities of the members of the Invisible College, see Turnbull, G. H., ‘Robert Child’, Publications of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, xxxvii (1959), pp. 21–53Google Scholar and Barnard, op. cit., passim; Cooper, J. P., ‘Social and Economic Policies under the Commonwealth’, in The Interregnum: The Quest for Settlement, 1646–60, ed. Aylmer, G. E. (London 1972), pp. 133–34Google Scholar. Cooper provides an excellent summary of the various approaches to the origin and significance of the Navigation Act.