The actual secrets of the Freemasons were rooted in their myths and rituals, not in any hidden knowledge of nature that they were able to impart. Nonetheless, the press connected them with occult philosophy from the start. A satirical advertisement or “Divertisement” published in the newspaper Poor Robin's Intelligencer for 10 October 1676 makes the point uproariously, adding a political twist to it:
These are to give notice, that the Modern Green-ribbon'd Caball, together with the Ancient Brother-hood of the Rosy-Cross; the Hermetick Adepti, and the Company of accepted Masons, intend all to Dine together on the 31 of November next, at the Flying-Bull in Wind-Mill-Crown-Street; having already given order for great store of Black-Swan Pies, Poach'd Phoenixes Eggs, Haunches of Unicorns, &c. To be provided on that occasion; All idle people that can spare so much time from the Coffee-house, may repair thither to be spectators of the Solemnity: But are advised to provide themselves Spectacles of Malleable Glass; For otherwise ‘tis thought the said Societies will (as hitherto) make their Appearance Invisible.104
The Green-Ribbon Club, which met at the King's Head tavern in Chancery Lane, was composed of opposition Members of Parliament, most of whom later became Whigs. The duke of Buckingham, whose interest in alchemy and astrology has already been noted, was a leading member.105
By lumping an opposition club together with the Rosicrucians, Hermeticists and Freemasons, the newspaper writer was suggesting not just that they were all secret cabals, but that they shared the same sort of fantastical notions, such as about eating imaginary dishes or becoming invisible. The mention of coffee-house idlers is also worth noting. Sites for business, political discussion and cultural exchanges as well as leisure, coffee-houses were springing up throughout the fashionable parts of London in the 1670s.106 They often provided newspapers for their clients, so Poor Robin's Intelligencer was actually making fun of some of its own readers.
The presence among their Fraternity of Elias Ashmole demonstrates that not all Freemasons were crypto-republicans. In fact, as the English lodges had little or no central organization before 1717, it would be unwise to make any broad generalizations about their religious or political dispositions at this time. Most likely, each lodge adopted a political tenor according to the views of its members. In London, the lodges may well have had a general affiliation with the emerging Whig Party. Whether occult philosophy was actually discussed in them is another matter, to which no satisfactory answer can be given, as evidence is entirely lacking. Perhaps the most surprising aspect of the 1676 “Divertisement” is that the author expected readers to recognize all of these groups, including the Freemasons. Like coffee-houses, they were already a part of literate culture in London and the provinces, and they were there to stay.
The hidden wisdom of Kabbala Denudata lost its appeal within a few years. The mysteries of Freemasonry, on the other hand, continued to fascinate both initiates and “cowans,” or non-Masons, for generations to come. Because they remained private associations, the lodges were not in danger of losing their secrets to the public, so long as members kept their mouths shut. Paradoxically, however, Freemasonry would soon develop a dependence on publicity. While they did not want their rites and practices to be revealed to the world, the attention given to them by the press (and in coffee-house conversations) helped Masons to maintain their profile within English and Scottish society. Freemasonry became a strange mixture of secrecy and publicity, of ritualism and tolerance, of the traditional and the innovative.
To return to our original question: how integrated were occult philosophy and science in the intellectual life of the late seventeenth century? The short answer is that their integration was uneven and their position insecure. On the one hand, we might point to the interest taken in them by so many major scientific and philosophical figure of the late 1600s: Hartlib, Beale, Boyle, Newton, Aubrey, More, Glanvill, Locke. On the other hand, the results of that interest were limited. The dangers of transgressing the limits of “disinterest” or religious orthodoxy kept opinions private and experiments hidden from public scrutiny. In the atmosphere of fear and suspicion after 1660, occult thinking provided the defenders of religious authority with an easy target, which could be attacked even if it could not be suppressed.
The occult made definite contributions to the knowledge of the late seventeenth century, but its influence was usually disguised. Alchemy, astrology and ritual magic never enjoyed the respectability that so many of their practitioners craved. This could be seen as early as the 1680s in the field of medicine. In spite of the widespread use of pills and nostrums that had their origins in Paracelsian theories and alchemical experiments, most doctors continued to rely on older Galenic theories of the humours, and on techniques derived from them, like bleeding.107 The practical results of alchemy were praised, but its “higher” aims aroused the suspicions of many observers, and it was never established as a formal course of study at any of the universities in the British Isles. The enormous popularity of astrology served to associate it with vulgar forms of learning and, apart from John Goad, no leading intellectual of the period devoted much attention to it. Ritual magic was too close to diabolism to be openly espoused. As for philosophical trends like Neoplatonism, Hermeticism or Kabbalism, they were the subjects of heated debate among scholars, and were likely to be condemned in strong terms whenever they verged on heterodoxy, which they frequently did. Prophets who drew upon occult philosophy were denounced as sectarians, and their messages reached only small audiences.
In spite of its widespread appeal, therefore, the occult was continually relegated to the sidelines of late seventeenth-century thought. Its nemesis remained religious orthodoxy, but it had gained a further adversary in the Hobbesian materialism that denied the possibility of disembodied spirits, and it was increasingly seen as incompatible with natural science. The new dawn that had excited so many occult enthusiasts in the 1650s had soon been overshadowed by opposition and doubt. Even before the Glorious Revolution, therefore, occult thinking was entering a period of eclipse, a retreat from publicity back into the private realm. Only after the pillars of orthodoxy began to shift in the mid-eighteenth century would this period of relative darkness end, and an occult revival begin.
PART TWO
ECLIPSE, 1688–1760
CHAPTER FOUR
A Fading Flame
IN 1688, the Catholic King James II fled from his kingdoms, losing his throne to his Protestant son-in-law William of Orange and his daughter Mary in what became known as the Glorious Revolution. Nothing in this political change would have signalled imminent catastrophe to those who were interested in occult philosophy and science. On the contrary, many adherents of the occult were sectarians or heterodox Anglicans. They might be seen as beneficiaries of the revolution, which ushered in a Parliamentary Act of Toleration that encompassed mainstream Protestant groups. Within a decade of 1688, however, occult thinking was suffering from a severe loss of intellectual energy and by 1715, it appears to have been in a state of decline. Why did this happen?
To begin with, we should consider what “decline” actually meant. It translated into fewer works on alchemy, less respect for astrology and the virtual disappearance of ritual magic among the educated. The publication of alchemical books in English had peaked between 1650 and 1675, with ten or more works appearing in some years. While the trade in newly published alchemical texts slowed down over the next quarter-century, up to a half-dozen new publications might become available every year. After 1700, this was reduced to a couple of volumes annually, and by the 1710s many years passed without any new book coming onto the market at all. Of course, educated people also read Latin. Alchemical publications in that language (including those printed outside Britain) similarly declined after 1700, but less dramatically.1 Because English and Scottish alchemists had access to older works, as well as to foreign publications, we should be cautious in asserting that there was an overall decline in the number of volumes available to readers. On the other ha
nd, British publishers, always on the lookout for commercially lucrative possibilities, clearly perceived the alchemy market as being less strong after 1700 than it had been in the previous half-century. They gradually gave up on an area of publishing that was no longer viewed as profitable.
Astrology was a different case. It suffered a further loss of prestige, but not of popularity. The number of almanacs published in England remained at more or less the same level throughout the period, so there was no drying-up of the public thirst for predictions.2 Serious studies of astrology, however, became rare. Few bothered to examine whether it worked through natural magic or angelic influence.3 The field was now dominated by John Partridge, an ardent Whig who had gone into exile during James II's reign and returned at the Glorious Revolution. His empirical approach to the celestial art pleased some privileged customers, but it was eccentric: anti-Copernican, firmly opposed to magic and fixated on the “Hileg” or predictor of death. Partridge's politics led to ferocious attacks on him, which he reciprocated. His bitter rival John Gadbury continued to practise his own reformed (and heliocentric) version of astrology, but his clients were of distinctly lower status. The silver age of English astrology ground to a bitter finish in the competition between these two men.4
By the early eighteenth century, a fashionable tone of scepticism about supernatural claims was taking hold among younger intellectuals. It was hotly resisted by orthodox clerics, especially in Scotland, where an Edinburgh University student, Thomas Aikenhead, was hanged for blasphemy in 1697. He had dubbed Scripture “Ezra's fables” and called both Moses and Jesus magicians—a weird conflation of occult lore and irreligion.5 Meanwhile, party politics raised the level of rhetoric concerning the occult to a very high pitch. The Whigs accused their Tory opponents of “superstition,” because some of them argued for the reality of witches or accepted the charms and spells associated with an older type of astrology. In exchange, the Tories accused Whigs who practised alchemy or supported astrology of being “enthusiasts” and “fanatics.” Party conflict was a crucial factor in determining the destiny of occult thinking after 1688, but it was only one strand among several that contributed to the decline. The precarious intellectual position of occult philosophy, evident since at least the 1660s, was arguably the underlying reason for its loss of momentum. Never having enjoyed the respectability and authority that it craved, the occult slid into retreat after 1688 because its place in an altered society became even more insecure.
Perhaps the hardest blows to fall on occult learning were the deaths of respected intellectuals: Robert Boyle died in 1691, Elias Ashmole in 1692, Henry Coley in 1695, John Aubrey in 1697, Samuel Jeake the younger in 1699. The alchemical publisher William Cooper barely survived the Glorious Revolution and his last known works date from 1689. Other major figures, like Thomas Vaughan, George Starkey, Robert Moray, John Heydon, William Lilly, John Webster and William Andrews, did not live to see the Revolution. Sir Isaac Newton, of course, outlived them all, but he turned away from alchemy in the first decade of the eighteenth century. No scholars of similar stature emerged to replace these men, indicating how the occult had failed to establish itself as a recognized field of inquiry. At the same time, it cannot be argued that scientific endeavour benefited. On the contrary, the Royal Society shed much of its own reforming zeal after 1689, becoming more like a gentlemen's club.6 The publication of Newton's Opticks in 1704 effectively marked the end of an era of burning scientific questions.
If it lacked giants, the period after 1689 saw the popularization of science through periodicals like The Athenian Mercury, published by John Dunton between 1690 and 1697. In its pages, a group of writers answered questions from the public, often concerning scientific matters. Their views summed up the impact of the new scientific philosophy. The Athenian Mercury never discussed alchemy, and was contemptuous of the astrology found in almanacs, “the best of which more often miss than hitt.”7 It issued a brief, dismissive reply to a pointed inquiry by Samuel Jeake that was designed to cast doubt on the heliocentric theory.8 Asked whether charms had any real force, the writers replied that “if there's any thing in ‘em, abstracted from Fancy … it must be Diabolical—but they can't do no more than the Devil himself, who can only represent the Object, not force the Will to embrace it.”9 Surprisingly, given this assumption that diabolic power was restricted, the journal fully accepted the reality of ghostly apparitions, to which a whole issue was devoted on Halloween 1691.10 It also endorsed belief in witchcraft, reprinting as evidence testimony from the Salem witch trials. Admittedly, not all readers of The Athenian Mercury trembled at the thought of ghosts or witches. One of them wrote that belief in the Devil's works was “against the Essence of God Almighty … and scarce any Story of Witchcraft, &c, but has been detected to be Artifice, or Natural.”11 His scepticism, however, seems to have been exceptional.
The opinions of The Athenian Mercury show that at least one major organ of scientific thought did not reject supernatural occurrences, although it tended to see them as caused by the Devil. The emphasis on diabolism was widely reiterated in the aftermath of the Glorious Revolution: for example, by the influential Presbyterian divine Richard Baxter in a 1691 work entitled The Certainty of the World of Spirits. Baxter emulated Glanvill's Saducismus Triumphatus by presenting eyewitness examples of witchcraft, apparitions, spirit voices and other interventions of the Devil. He admitted that angels had a role in human affairs, but hastily added: “I will not desire so to alter the stated Government and Order of God, as to expect here visible Communion with Angels.”12 Such views, which were common to Scots Presbyterian, Anglican and Dissenting clerics, served to bind Protestants together at a moment of deep political division. They posed a challenge to those who espoused occult thinking, because they judged spiritual communication as diabolic.
The resurgence of the Devil in religious writings after 1688 did not reverse the downward trend in witch trials, which in England had already dwindled to almost nothing. Yet it surely contributed to the noticeable decline in works that dealt seriously with occult philosophy. Decline, to be sure, did not mean demise. The continuation of a small stream of new writing on alchemy allowed adepts to find fresh works to excite them, even in the post-revolutionary decades. Astrology continued to guide the hopes and fears of many readers, and the desire to talk with spirits was not extinguished. It would be another ninety years, however, before the occult would begin to regain the public profile that it had enjoyed in the late seventeenth century.
Alchemy between Philosophy and Commerce
The Glorious Revolution initially raised the hopes of the alchemists, but the results of the subsequent two decades can hardly have lived up to their expectations—except perhaps in a commercial sense. Alchemy was already changing into a business before 1688, but in the next two decades it would be transformed from a subject of philosophical speculation to a set of practices valued mainly as a basis for proprietary medicines. As a result, it lost much of its intellectual significance and became tied to the fortunes of ambitious businessmen whose commercial empires extended throughout Britain and abroad. At the same time, the remaining alchemists gradually lost touch with a post-revolutionary culture that emphasized competition, moderation and openness.
This development could not have been foretold in 1689, when alchemy still seemed to be riding high. An impressive illustration was the list of 190 subscribers to an edition of the works of the celebrated German alchemist Johann Rudolph Glauber, discoverer of many useful medicinal compounds. The enormous folio volume, translated by Christopher Peake, writing under the personal title “Philo-Chymico-Medicus,” was one of the last works published by William Cooper. The subscribers included the lord mayor of London, the Quaker William Penn, the president of the Royal College of Physicians and a large number of doctors and surgeons. The handsome book, prepared before the Glorious Revolution, was dedicated to Edmund Dickinson, a noted alchemist who had been physician in ordinary to Charles II and James II. The prefa
ce also praised Dickinson's friend Robert Boyle, “The Honour both of our Age and Country.” The two men had led “Chymistry” out of the dark age, when few were “so much as lightly Tincted with the Hermetick Philosophy.”13 Yet we may wonder how many of the medical practitioners who subscribed to the book were themselves even “lightly Tincted” with Hermeticism. No doubt many just wanted to be associated with the prestigious names of Glauber, Dickinson and Boyle, or with chemical processes that might lead to profits.
The new regime seemed even better disposed to alchemy than the old. A smashing political triumph for the alchemists came in the immediate wake of William and Mary's accession, when the Act of Henry IV outlawing “multiplying,” or the transmutation of base metals into gold, was repealed. As early as 29 April 1689, only two weeks after the new monarchs had been crowned, Robert Boyle wrote to Christopher Kirkby, a merchant and alchemist living in Cornwall, opining “that the act of Henry the 4th has been, and, whilst it shall remain in force, will be, a great discouragement to the industry of skilful men, which is very happily improved in this inquisitive age. And therefore, that the repealing of a law, so darkly and ambiguously penned, will much conduct to the public good.”14 Boyle went on to testify before Parliament that he had witnessed transmutation, which must have excited MPs who were increasingly worried by the lack of silver and gold coinage in a nation on the verge of a major war against France. For them, the removal of legal restrictions on alchemy amounted to sound monetary policy.15 By August 1689, the Whig-dominated Parliament had passed a bill repealing the medieval statute, and King William III had signed it into law (1 W. & M. c. 30). The new Act recognized that “divers Persons have by their Study, Industry and Learning, arrived to great Skill and Perfection in the Art of Melting and Refining of Metals, and otherwise Improving their Ores … and Extracting Gold and Silver out of them,” which must constitute the most explicit legislative endorsement of alchemy ever given in England. Spagyria, however, would now benefit the state, not the individual adept. Any gold or silver made out of copper, tin, iron or lead was to be brought to the Mint in the Tower of London, assayed and used for “the Increase of Moneys.”16
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