Huygens’ stargazing scientists: the idea of science in Cosmotheoros

This paper deals with the book Cosmotheoros (1698), in which Christiaan Huygens presented his concept of a universe made up of many inhabited planets. Recent interpreters of this work have focused especially on cosmological issues presented in the book. Cosmotheoros, however, comprises also various philosophical ideas. In this paper I want to focus on the concept contemplator coeli – stargazer. The stargazer was the embodiment of the philosophical ideal of the contemplative way of life that appeared in classical philosophy and astronomy. I want to argue that Huygens followed on from the idea of the stargazer and used it in his hypothetical construction of extra-terrestrial life. At the same time, however, he altered this idea in such a way that it corresponded better to the ideals of science at the end of the seventeenth century. In Huygens’ concept, the noble contemplator coeli turned into the modern scientist who works with other scientists on the advancement of mankind’s knowledge of nature. Huygens’ stargazers are a good example of how strikingly the basic assumptions of knowledge of nature in the early modern period changed with regard to classical antiquity.     

Milton’s Euripides and the superior rationality of the heathen

ABSTRACT

If arguments have always been made either that Milton maintains the primacy of the Bible over classical literature, or that he often presents classical sentiments as congruent with the biblical, one claim that has rarely been made is that Milton is willing to assert the truth of classical literature over that of the Bible. This article argues that there are moments in the canon that show him capable of doing precisely this, with particular reference to the invocation of his favourite Greek dramatist, Euripides. The article considers Milton’s reading and interpretation of Euripides in his early poetry and prose, before examining more closely the citation of Euripides in two of the prose works which bear heavily on the question of how politically and religiously radical Milton was: The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates and De Doctrina Christiana. The turn to Euripidean authority over the biblical reveals Milton’s willingness to subject Scripture to the test of pagan wisdom, if he judges that wisdom to have superior claims to rationality. This willingness derives from the development of his ethical thought in the 1630s and early 1640s, and from his understanding of classical, patristic and contemporary authorities, including John Selden.     

Practical Hagiography: James of Voragine’s Sermones and Vita on St Margaret of Antioch

Abstract

In addition to his exceedingly popular Legenda Aurea, James of Voragine wrote in another hagiographical genre: sermons on the saints. The Sermones de sanctis likewise became immediately popular, as his Dominican brothers used James’s model sermons to learn to preach about the saints in a format that would provide the laity with intelligible and practical theological instruction. James’s corpus gives us a rather unusual opportunity to compare the ways in which a single author manipulates multiple hagiographical genres, and his writings on St Margaret of Antioch allow us to explore how a medieval preacher used a historically disputed saint — a dragon-fighter — to provide a practical model of sanctity to his lay audience. I compare the representations of Margaret in James’s sermones and vita, arguing that James adapted certain features of Margaret’s saintly example in the vita to instruct the audience of his sermons about proper Christian virtues and actions. As a point of comparison, I explore a sermon by Évrard of Val des Écoliers in which the Augustinian teaches his audience a practical skill — how to pray — through Margaret’s example.     

Samuel Tissot’s Traité de l’épilepsie—250 years old

A quarter of a millennium ago, Samuel Tissot (1728–1797), a Swiss physician who had achieved a substantial European reputation, authored a monograph entitled Traité de l’épilepsie. The book was translated into several European languages and appeared in various editions over the following 70 years, although an English-language version was never published. In his Traité, Tissot provided a thorough account and critical analysis of the previous relevant literature concerning epilepsy, added data from his own experience in practice, and raised issues, some of which remain important today. The appearance of the book was propitious, occurring during the period of the European Enlightenment, when medicine was increasingly divesting itself of ancient modes of thinking and veneration for the opinions of great names from the remote past. At least in Western Europe, the Traité de l’épilepsie became an intellectual launching pad for the considerable expansion in knowledge of epilepsy that occurred over the century or longer that followed its publication.     

A marriage,a battle,an honour: the career of Boniface of the Hucpoldings during Rudolf II's Italian reign, 924–26

This article investigates the events of Rudolf II's military campaign in Italy (922) and considers the political ramification of this, both immediately thereafter and subsequently during the rule of Rudolf. Particular attention is paid to the career of Boniface of the Hucpoldings: an Italian aristocrat who attained prominence thanks to his close relationship with Rudolf. The Hucpoldings belonged to the aristocratic elite of the Carolingian empire, came to Italy under Lothar I (c.847) and tried to settle there. Until now, scholars have underestimated their role in the wider context of the early medieval Italian kingdom. This study will stress how Boniface's career was a turning point in the lineage's development, and how his political achievements were essential for his kinship's further hegemony.     

Hobbes on the supernatural from The Elements of Law to Leviathan

Hobbes's unusual religious views in his classical work, Leviathan, are often seen as a product of his attempt to reconcile Christianity with his philosophical materialism. Yet given Hobbes's materialistic view in his earlier works too, this explanatory framework alone is not sufficient for grasping distinctive features of Leviathan. This article remedies this lacuna by paying close attention to an understudied aspect of the development of Hobbes's religious theory from The Elements of Law to Leviathan: his treatment of the supernatural and, particularly, of matters of faith known by supernatural revelation as opposed to natural reason. I argue that over time Hobbes developed an epistemological analysis of supernatural revelation and refined his argument about the sense in which matters of faith are supernatural and about the extent to which they are found in the Bible. It was not materialism per se but the more sophisticated analysis of the supernatural in Leviathan that enabled Hobbes to admit the sphere of the supernatural to a much smaller extent than in De Cive and to discuss in detail what he sees as a matter of faith and beyond the scope of philosophy in De Cive.     

Persian Monshi,Persian Jones: English Translations of Saʿdi’s Golestān from the Late Eighteenth to the Mid-Nineteenth Centuries

From the seventeenth century, Mosleh al-Din Sa?di Shirazi (d. 1291), a key figure in Persian classical literature, became the center of Europeans’ attention: his name appeared in travelogues and periodicals, and selections of his tales were published in miscellaneous Latin, German, French, and English works. To follow Sa?di’s impact on English literature, one needs to search for the beginning of the “Sa?di trend” and the reasons that led to the acceleration of the translation process of his works into the English language in the nineteenth century. This article examines the role of the British educational institutions in colonial India in the introduction of Sa?di and his Golestān to the English readership, and, in parallel, it uncovers the role of the Indo-Persian native scholars (monshis) who were involved in the preparation of translations. The article discusses how the perception of the British towards Sa?di’s literature developed in the first half of the nineteenth century and how their approach towards the translation of the “text” and its “style” evolved in the complete renderings of the Golestān.     

Machiavelli's scientific method: a common understanding of his novelty in the sixteenth century

This paper argues that Machiavelli's method, his inductive and comparative use of history and experience for political analysis, and his fashioning of historical-political analysis as ‘science’, played an important and still unrecognised role in his reception in the sixteenth century. It makes the case that Machiavelli's inductive reasoning and stress on historia and experientia offered a model for scientific method that open-minded sixteenth-century scholars, eager to understand, organise and augment human knowledge (scientia), could fit to their own epistemology. By focusing on the question of method—a crucial issue for sixteenth-century contemporaries—the paper offers more than a key to the understanding of Machiavelli's positive reception. It also helps in apprehending the crucial importance of Lucretius to Machiavelli's scholarship; the role of the late Renaissance fascination with historia in his reception; and the breadth of appropriation of his method exactly in the decades when anti-Machiavellianism became official politics all over Europe. These claims are sustained through the cases of Machiavelli's early translators and promulgators; the French legal humanists and historiographers; the Swiss, Italian and French scholars engaging with medicine, Paracelsism and astronomy; the authors of political maxims from all over Europe; and finally Francis Bacon.     

John Milton and the Beard-Hater: encounters with Julian the Apostate

ABSTRACT

This is a study of John Milton and Julian the Apostate, last of the pagan emperors. It follows two trajectories. The first takes as its subject Julian’s “School Edict” of 362 AD, which barred Christians from traditional classical education; while the second concerns a literary text by Julian himself, the Misopogon or “Beard-Hater,” in which he ironically attacked his own aversion to Antiochene Christianity, including the performance of plays. These discussions offer an opportunity to re-examine Milton’s comments on early Christian views of drama, as well as his own drafts for sacred dramas. All these discussions turn on the question of how the Christian is to approach pagan literature, one of the oldest intellectual debates within Christianity. I argue that Milton’s attitude to Greek literature as an entire process was shaped by his attitude to this specific debate, and that this can be seen afresh by viewing it through the eyes of its most powerful critic in antiquity, Julian the Apostate. I also furnish an account of the early-modern editorial tradition of Julian.     

The uses and abuses of ‘secular religion’: Jules Monnerot's path from communism to fascism

From starting his intellectual career as a surrealist, communist and co-founder of the Collège de Sociologie in 1937, Jules Monnerot (1911–95) ended it as a candidate for the Front National in 1989. In this article I offer an explanation for the unexpected trajectory of this thinker whose work is little known in the English-speaking world. Without overlooking the idea that the infamous College encouraged such tendencies, I argue that the notion of ‘secular religion’, as Monnerot developed it in his Sociology of Communism (1949), goes some way to explain his gradual radicalization from Cold Warrior to fascist, a path that otherwise seems unlikely for a French intellectual after World War II. In order to emphasize the unusualness of Monnerot's case, I contrast it with that of his erstwhile collaborator, Georges Bataille. I show that accusations of fascism often levelled against Bataille should be more accurately directed at Monnerot, indeed that the fascism inherent within the College of Sociology was brought out not by Bataille but by Monnerot. Monnerot's case is unsettling first because his definition of ‘secular religion’ contributed to his pro-fascist stance; and second, because it forces us to rethink what is meant by ‘philosophy after Auschwitz.’ This term usually brings to mind scholars such as T.W. Adorno, Emil Fackenheim or Emmanuel Levinas. Monnerot provides a rare example of a thinker whose fascism only developed after the Holocaust, a shocking response that demands the attention of all those interested in the relationship between religion and politics.     

Review articles/Besprekingsartikels

Abstract

Swiss missionary Henri Alexandre Junod has been widely recognised for his extensive entomological, botanical, linguistic and anthropological contributions regarding southern Africa. However, shortly after publishing his most acclaimed work, The Life of a South African Tribe, Junod wrote a little-studied novel, Zidji: étude de m?urs sud-africaines, in which he endeavoured to give a detailed portrayal of South African Society. Interestingly, he chose fiction as the best vehicle for conveying what he saw as the 'truth' of the situation. As the only novel written by Junod this is a unique piece of writing in relation to his other work and its study shows that it is essential to an understanding of Junod. In Zidji he attempts to give a complete picture of South African society at the beginning of the twentieth century by recounting a black convert's experiences of what Junod considered to be the three main influences acting upon black society of the time, that is, tribal life (paganism), the mission station (Christianity) and white society (civilisation). By considering his depiction of South Africa, in particular his presentation of 'civilisation', further light is shed on his sentiments and perspective of the missionary encounter, social change and race relations in South Africa.     

Planting an Asylum for Religion: Berkeley's Bermuda Scheme and the Transmission of Virtue in the Eighteenth‐Century Atlantic World

Following the aftermath of the South Sea bubble, George Berkeley grew disenchanted with British morality and turned his attention to a new project: a missionary college in Bermuda. Not only did he personally lobby friends and government officials, but he also worked tirelessly to persuade the public of his scheme's value. To this end, he published his plan under the title A Proposal for the Better Supplying of Churches in Our Foreign Plantations (1724) and at the height of this enthusiasm wrote his only (existent) poem “America, or the Muse's Refuge” (1725/26). These verses were premised upon a classical commonplace, the notion of a translatio imperii and translatio religionis: the belief in the constant westward migration of empire and religion that provided the foundation of his plan. Through a contextual reading of these two pieces, this paper examines Berkeley's contributions to early eighteent‐century missionary activity in the Atlantic world.     

An abbot between two cultures: Maiolus of Cluny considers the Muslims of La Garde‐Freinet

In July 972, Muslim raiders from the citadel of Fraxinetum (modern La Garde‐Freinet) abducted Abbot Maiolus of Cluny and his entourage as they crossed the Great Saint Bernard Pass (Mons Iovis) in the western Alps. This article analyses a little‐known letter that Maiolus sent to his Cluniac brethren to secure payment for his release. Interwoven with biblical passages drawn from the Book of Samuel and the Psalter, the abbot's ransom letter provides the rare opportunity to examine how one of the most influential Christian leaders of the tenth century perceived his Muslim captors and their religion.     

Canadian Philosophy: A Dialectical Exploration

This article inquires into the difference between philosophy as a universal practice and philosophy as a cultural product; its aim is to establish a case for there being Canadian philosophy. Philosophy as a practice can exhibit a dialectical framework. The practice can pursue both universal truths and cultural variations in expressions of those truths. Each philosophical endeavor requires the other to be meaningful. No matter how abstract a “truth” may be, an example always creates cultural relevance. The article introduces the example of an early Canadian philosopher, whose work is documented in the book by Leslie Armour and Elizabeth Trott, The Faces of Reason: An Essay on Philosophy and Culture in English Canada, 1850-1950. John Watson (1847–1939) was the most prolific and well-known contributor to philosophy in early Canada, pursuing universal questions and yet responding to the circumstances of his new home in developing Canada and, in doing so, contributing to Canadian cultural interpretations of philosophical questions. This article uses his example to conclude that the study of philosophy in Canada must include Canadian philosophy.     

“This Remarkable Piece of Antiquity”: Epic Conventions in Shelley’s Oedipus Tyrannus; or,Swellfoot the Tyrant

ABSTRACT

Shelley’s Swellfoot the Tyrant has recently begun to gain the concerted attention of critics, who have noted the play’s signature blend of low and high, of ephemeral, late Regency politics with the classic genres of Sophoclean tragedy, Aristophanic comedy, and mock epic. But Austin Warren’s famous and widely accepted definition of mock epic as “not mockery of the epic but elegantly affectionate homage, offered by a writer who finds [the serious epic] irrelevant to his age” does not describe Shelley’s earnest goal of immediate political reform in authoring Swellfoot. Instead, the play evinces Shelley’s unique, conscious reconfiguration of four conventions characteristic of the high, classical epic: the “prosperous breeze”; the epic simile; katabasis or descent into the underworld; and divine intervention. I argue that Shelley’s comic adaptation of these epic conventions reflects his serious aim of helping effect reform through Swellfoot and embodies his absorption of the concept of Shakespeare’s history plays as an experimental hybrid of dramatic forms with epic subjects, gained during his earlier reading of A. W. Schlegel’s Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature. Though the immediate suppression of Swellfoot prevented its relevance in its own historical moment, it comprises a singular hybrid of Aristophanic satire and Sophoclean tragedy with high epic conventions, while ironically also identifying Shelley as a proponent of the French neoclassical theory of the epic’s consciously didactic purpose propounded by Le Bossu.     

Princely longing for Europe: Constantine II Brâncoveanu's Mogoşoaia Palace (1702) and the creation of a European identity

Trapped among the Austrian, Russian and Ottoman empires, the reign of Constantin II Brancoveanu, Prince of Wallachia, was a constant balancing act between the West and the East. To further his political and cultural ambitions, Constantin initiated and supported an artistic movement, known today as the Brancovenesc style, of which his residence, the Mogosoaia Palace, stands as a prime example. The architecture and ornamentation of the palace makes use of elements from both Eastern – Byzantine and Ottoman – and Western – Renaissance and Baroque – European artistic traditions, merging them into an organic whole. The aim of this article is to explore the artistic strategies employed throughout the palace by arguing that they explicitly, as well as implicitly, construct an inclusive European identity. Starting from the premise that the palace acted as a place of cultural encounter between the East and West, the analysis will focus on how the decoration implies a space of transition through subjects such as metamorphosis and the double-headed eagle. Also, the importance given to spaces such as the entrance foyer and loggia suggests their role as critical spaces evoking the ambiguous concept of the parergon, which in turn challenges the emerging Enlightenment idea of the West as properEurope and the East as not quite Europe.     

Die Embryologie im Spannungsfeld zwischen Tradition und Empirie

Already in classical antiquity people dealt with the principle of formation, developing different theories. Researchers in the renaissance, working in the conflict zone between tradition and experience, tried to prove one or the other of these theories by the means of new observations, especially of chicken development. Aldrovandi was the first to see the real principle of formation of the hen's egg, i. e. the blastodisc, but he didn't recognize the importance of his discovery due to his close adherence to Aristotle in the theoretical field. Fabricius even thought that traditional knowledge was of more importance than his own excellent observations. Parisano was the first to succeed in making a correct interpretation of the function of the blastodisc, but only by holding to a ‘false’ classical theory. Harvey combined his attempt to restore the developmental theory of Aristotle with a religious interpretation postulating God's intervention in all development. Subsequent to atomism, Highmore evolved a two seed theory of development, which in his view made a permanent engagement of God superfluous. Also the first observations using the microscope did not contribute to any improvement in developmental theory. Malpighi used them to confirm the theory of epigenesis, whereas Croone attributed to a piece of blastoderm the proportion of a whole embryo to demonstrate his ovistic theory of preformation. The founder of animalculism Leeuwenhoek, an amateur researcher, was at first not influenced by the trends of the scientific community. He postulated that the spermatozoa, which he discovered, contained perfect miniature animals. His investigations are a good example of where prejudices can lead, even when the observations are excellent. In the 17th century the tension between experience and tradition shifted in favour of experience, but a final solution had not by any means been reached.     

Countering the hegemony of the Irish national canon: the modernist rhetoric of Seán O'Faoláin (1938–50)1

ABSTRACT. The telling and re‐telling of national history has long been recognised in studies of nationalism as one of its key legitimising and mobilising strategies. In this article I illustrate how a rhetorical approach can effectively explore this dynamic and emotive dimension of nationalist ideology by examining the rhetorical strategies in the Irish liberal intellectual, Seán O'Faoláin's, attempts to reconstitute the popular canon of Irish history in the 1930s and 1940s. More specifically, I show that contrary to depictions of O'Faoláin as a European liberal who employed rational argument to undermine and encourage the rejection of Irish nationalism and its emphasis on rhetorical narratives of the past, O'Faoláin's challenge to the Irish national canon reveals that he himself mobilised historical narrative to promote his own modernist version of Irish liberal nationalism and demonstrated in the process that he was one of the most skilful rhetors of his day.