Robert Boyle (1627-91): A suitable case for treatment?

British Journal for the History of Science

Volumn 32, Issue 3, 1999, Pages 261-275

  Hunter, Michael ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF LONDON   (United Kingdom)

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EID: 0009830591     PISSN: 00070874     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S0007087499003647     Document Type: Article

References (55)

1. For information on this milieu, see especially Nicholas Canny, The Upstart Earl, Cambridge, 1982.
2. Quoted in Michael Hunter, 'How Boyle became a scientist', History of Science (1995), 33, 59-103, 65. The text in question will be published in full in the forthcoming Pickering edition of Boyle's Works. For an earlier attempt to understand Boyle's early development, which also draws on this text, see Malcolm Oster, 'Biography, culture and science: the formative years of Robert Boyle', History of Science (1993), 31, 177-226. However, for a critique of Oster's interpretation, see Hunter, as above.
3. Quoted in Michael Hunter, 'How Boyle became a scientist', History of Science (1995), 33, 59-103, 65. The text in question will be published in full in the forthcoming Pickering edition of Boyle's Works. For an earlier attempt to understand Boyle's early development, which also draws on this text, see Malcolm Oster, 'Biography, culture and science: the formative years of Robert Boyle', History of Science (1993), 31, 177-226. However, for a critique of Oster's interpretation, see Hunter, as above.
4. R. E. W. Maddison, The Life of the Hon. Robert Boyle, London, 1969, 12n.
5. M. Hunter (ed.), Robert Boyle by Himself and his Friends, London, 1994, 16.
6. Jonathan Swift, A Tale of a Tub and Other Satires (ed. Kathleen Williams), London, 1975, 193. For Boyle's writings of this period, see The Early Essays and Ethics of Robert Boyle (ed. John T. Harwood), Carbondale and Edwardsville, 1991.
7. Jonathan Swift, A Tale of a Tub and Other Satires (ed. Kathleen Williams), London, 1975, 193. For Boyle's writings of this period, see The Early Essays and Ethics of Robert Boyle (ed. John T. Harwood), Carbondale and Edwardsville, 1991.
8. Quoted in Hunter, op. cit. (2), 66; for further details of this shift, see ibid.
9. Quoted in Hunter, op. cit. (2), 66; for further details of this shift, see ibid.
10. For recent accounts of this from different points of view, see Rose-Mary Sargent, The Diffident Naturalist: Robert Boyle and the Philosophy of Experiment, Chicago, 1995; and Steven Shapin and Simon Schaffer, Leviathan and the Air-Pump: Hobbes, Boyle and the Experimental Life, Princeton, 1985.
11. For recent accounts of this from different points of view, see Rose-Mary Sargent, The Diffident Naturalist: Robert Boyle and the Philosophy of Experiment, Chicago, 1995; and Steven Shapin and Simon Schaffer, Leviathan and the Air-Pump: Hobbes, Boyle and the Experimental Life, Princeton, 1985.
12. Philosophical Transactions (1668), 2, 592; on the issue generally, see Shapin and Schaffer, op. cit. (7).
13. Philosophical Transactions (1668), 2, 592; on the issue generally, see Shapin and Schaffer, op. cit. (7).
14. See Antonio Clericuzio, 'A redefinition of Boyle's chemistry and corpuscular philosophy', Annals of Science (1990), 47, 561-89; Alan Chalmers, 'The lack of excellency of Boyle's mechanical philosophy', Studies in the History and Philosophy of Science (1993), 24, 541-64; and the various essays in M. Hunter (ed.), Robert Boyle Reconsidered, Cambridge, 1994.
15. See Antonio Clericuzio, 'A redefinition of Boyle's chemistry and corpuscular philosophy', Annals of Science (1990), 47, 561-89; Alan Chalmers, 'The lack of excellency of Boyle's mechanical philosophy', Studies in the History and Philosophy of Science (1993), 24, 541-64; and the various essays in M. Hunter (ed.), Robert Boyle Reconsidered, Cambridge, 1994.
16. See Antonio Clericuzio, 'A redefinition of Boyle's chemistry and corpuscular philosophy', Annals of Science (1990), 47, 561-89; Alan Chalmers, 'The lack of excellency of Boyle's mechanical philosophy', Studies in the History and Philosophy of Science (1993), 24, 541-64; and the various essays in M. Hunter (ed.), Robert Boyle Reconsidered, Cambridge, 1994.
17. See Jan W. Wojcik, Robert Boyle and the Limits of Reason, Cambridge, 1997.
18. Quoted in Michael Hunter, 'Robert Boyle and the dilemma of biography in the age of the Scientific Revolution', in Telling Lives in Science: Essays on Scientific Biography (ed. Michael Shortland and Richard Yeo), Cambridge, 1996, 115-37, 123.
19. Hunter, op. cit. (4), 46, 48.
20. Hunter, op. cit. (11). See also Lawrence Principe, The Aspiring Adept: Robert Boyle and his Alchemical Quest, Princeton, 1998.
21. Hunter, op. cit. (11). See also Lawrence Principe, The Aspiring Adept: Robert Boyle and his Alchemical Quest, Princeton, 1998.
22. Michael Hunter, 'Casuistry in action: Robert Boyle's confessional interviews with Gilbert Burnet and Edward Stillingfleet, 1691', Journal of Ecclesiastical History (1993), 44, 80-98, 86.
23. Canny, op. cit. (1), 13. The sculpture of Boyle on the tomb at Dublin is reproduced in Maddison, op. cit. (3), plate 5. See also Amy L. Harris, 'The funerary monuments of Richard Boyle, Earl of Cork', Church Monuments (1998), 13, 70-86, 83 (though Boyle's name is erroneously given as 'Roger'). I am grateful to David Hickman for this reference.
24. Canny, op. cit. (1), 13. The sculpture of Boyle on the tomb at Dublin is reproduced in Maddison, op. cit. (3), plate 5. See also Amy L. Harris, 'The funerary monuments of Richard Boyle, Earl of Cork', Church Monuments (1998), 13, 70-86, 83 (though Boyle's name is erroneously given as 'Roger'). I am grateful to David Hickman for this reference.
25. Canny, op. cit. (1), 13. The sculpture of Boyle on the tomb at Dublin is reproduced in Maddison, op. cit. (3), plate 5. See also Amy L. Harris, 'The funerary monuments of Richard Boyle, Earl of Cork', Church Monuments (1998), 13, 70-86, 83 (though Boyle's name is erroneously given as 'Roger'). I am grateful to David Hickman for this reference.
26. Hunter, op. cit. (4), 32. For a discussion of this text, see Michael Hunter, 'Alchemy, magic and moralism in the thought of Robert Boyle', BJHS (1990), 23, 387-410.
27. Hunter, op. cit. (4), 32. For a discussion of this text, see Michael Hunter, 'Alchemy, magic and moralism in the thought of Robert Boyle', BJHS (1990), 23, 387-410.
28. See Michael Hunter, 'The conscience of Robert Boyle: functionalism, "dysfunctionalism" and the task of historical understanding', in Renaissance and Revolution: Scholars, Craftsmen and Natural Philosophers in Early Modern Europe (ed. J. V. Field and F. A. J. L. James), Cambridge, 1993, 147-59.
29. R. Boyle, The Works of Robert Boyle (ed. Thomas Birch), 2nd edn., 6 vols., London, 1772, iv, 36.
30. Quoted in Michael Hunter and Edward B. Davis, 'The making of Robert Boyle's Free Enquiry into the Vulgarly Receiv'd Notion of Nature (1686)', Early Science and Medicine (1996), 1, 204-71, 220.
31. Boyle, op. cit. (18), v, 315-16; Royal Society of London, Archives, Boyle Papers 10, fol. 17.
32. See Michael Hunter, 'Mapping the mind of Robert Boyle: the evidence of the Boyle Papers', in Archives of the Scientific Revolution: the Formation and Exchange of Ideas in Seventeenth-Century Europe (ed. Michael Hunter), Woodbndge, 1998, 121-36, 128-9.
33. Boyle, op. cit. (18), iv, 496.
34. See Michael Hunter, 'The reluctant philanthropist: Robert Boyle and the "Communication of Secrets and Receits in Physick"', in Religio Medici: Medicine and Religion in Seventeenth-Century England (ed. O. P. Grell and Andrew Cunningham), Aldershot, 1996, 247-72.
35. R. Boyle, 'Of the Insalubrity and Salubrity of the Air', appended to An Essay of the Effects of Even Languid and Unheeded Motion, in Boyle, op. cit. (18), v, 38-9.
36. R. Boyle, 'Of the Insalubrity and Salubrity of the Air', appended to An Essay of the Effects of Even Languid and Unheeded Motion, in Boyle, op. cit. (18), v, 38-9.
37. Boyle, op. cit. (18), iii, 596.
38. Boyle, op. cit. (18), iv, 2, 153.
39. Michael Hunter, 'Boyle versus the Galenists: a suppressed critique of seventeenth-century medical practice and its significance', Medical History (1997), 41, 321-60, 342.
40. Steven Shapin, A Social History of Truth, Chicago, 1994, 143.
41. Shapin, op. cit. (28), 152.
42. Shapin, op. cit. (28), 180.
43. Shapin, op. cit. (28), 137n.
44. Shapin, op. cit. (28), 156.
45. Shapin, op. cit. (28), 182.
46. Hunter, op. cit. (4), frontispiece and pp. ix-x.
47. See e.g. Maddison, op. cit. (3), frontispiece and plate 21; Shapin and Schaffer, op. cit. (7), 358-9. Faithorne's engraving was also reproduced as the cover illustration of the BSHS leaflet advertising the 'Psychoanalysing Robert Boyle' conference, London, 12 July 1997.
48. See e.g. Maddison, op. cit. (3), frontispiece and plate 21; Shapin and Schaffer, op. cit. (7), 358-9. Faithorne's engraving was also reproduced as the cover illustration of the BSHS leaflet advertising the 'Psychoanalysing Robert Boyle' conference, London, 12 July 1997.
49. Hunter, op. cit. (17).
50. For a complementary reading of this relationship, see Shapin, op. cit. (28), Chapter 8.
51. See R. S. Westfall, 'Short-writing and the state of Newton's conscience, 1662', Notes and Records of the Royal Society (1963), 18, 10-16.
52. Frank Manuel, A Portrait of Isaac Newton, Cambridge, MA, 1968, esp. Chapters 7, 14. Cf. M. Hunter, Times Literary Supplement, 4 March 1994, 8.
53. Frank Manuel, A Portrait of Isaac Newton, Cambridge, MA, 1968, esp. Chapters 7, 14. Cf. M. Hunter, Times Literary Supplement, 4 March 1994, 8.
54. See above, nn. 14, 21.
55. Pending the appearance of the New DNB, I would be happy to supply anyone interested with a copy of this article, on application.