The Sensorium of God

by Stuart Clark

  In the quadrangle, laundry hung from windows. There were shadowy figures in the cloisters.

  ‘There’s Robert Hooke,’ said Newton.

  The hunchback was talking to two young men. Both were tall and slim, and dressed in such similar cuts and colours that Newton thought they could be twins.

  ‘But we must talk to you about the tenancy agreement,’ one was saying.

  ‘The tenancy agreement,’ echoed the other, a half-beat behind.

  ‘Not this again. Tell the governors that I will not move out.’

  ‘Please see reason, Mr Hooke.’

  The men were so tall that Hooke’s eye-line was level with their lacy neckcloths. He stepped back. They followed. ‘Stand off, sirs, so that I may see your faces.’ There could be no doubting his peevish mood. ‘There’s nothing wrong with this building. It’s stood for more than a century and it will stand for another. It will not be torn down now on a whim.’

  ‘But the building is so outmoded, and it is largely unoccupied.’

  ‘Yes, unoccupied.’

  Hooke remonstrated. ‘The professors are still here. If you and the trustees cannot let the rest of the rooms, it’s hardly a failing on my part. This is my home. I have given everything to this college, made it not just my home but also that of the Royal Society. The Royal Society. Do you want the French to overtake us in matters of natural philosophy?’

  The two bailiffs exchanged mystified glances.

  ‘Of course you don’t. Now, gentlemen, if you will excuse me.’ Hooke pushed in between them.

  ‘Mr Hooke,’ Newton said. He planted his words with enough fake alacrity to let Hooke know he had witnessed the attempted eviction.

  Unexpectedly, Hooke’s grey cheeks rose in a smile. ‘Solved the movement of the Moon yet?’

  ‘Oh, not quite.’

  ‘Flamsteed tells me you’ve been begging for observations again. It must be a real cross to bear when your theory cannot solve a simple thing like the movement of the Moon.’

  Newton strode past the professor, Fatio trailing behind. ‘I take it your chambers are open.’

  There was an embarrassed silence in Hooke’s draughty sitting-room as Fatio drew to his conclusion. The men pulled their chins, studied their feet, did anything to avoid making eye contact. Newton’s blood boiled. He stood up, deliberately rattling his chair.

  ‘Congratulations, Mr Fatio. One of the most promising lines of reasoning I have ever heard.’ He disregarded Halley’s look of surprise and said, ‘I’m sure the other Fellows wish to join me in congratulating you.’

  There was a faltering round of applause, which soon died away.

  ‘Fellows!’ called out Halley, bouncing to his feet. ‘Before you depart, I have an announcement. We must celebrate the engagement of our very own John Flamsteed to Margaret Cooke, spinster of Barstow – and eight years his junior.’

  The Astronomer Royal crossed his arms, displaying knuckles swollen with arthritis. ‘You are a wretched creature, Mr Halley. You belittle the sanctity of my marriage with your inappropriate comments.’ His crisp enunciation conveyed no humour.

  ‘But I meant no harm. I just didn’t know you still had it in you . . .’ The joke died on Halley’s lips.

  Flamsteed rose. ‘You drink too much, you swear too much, and you have too much of an eye for the ladies.’

  ‘Say what you like about my drinking and swearing, but I am happily married.’

  ‘I see now that my early faith in you was woefully misplaced.’ Flamsteed headed stiffly for the door.

  ‘Mr Flamsteed, before you go’ called Newton. ‘You have been kind enough to send me observations in the past.’

  ‘I’m always willing to help a fellow philosopher.’

  Newton stifled a snort of derision. Flamsteed was trying to pass himself off as a peer. Still, needs must . . . ‘I find I must ask for more to propel my lunar theory to completion. It strikes me that such a theory will be the perfect proof of your observing skill. It will show everyone that you are the most accurate observer of the heavens who has ever walked God’s Earth.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Newton. I will send you observations and my own lunar computations, which I believe you will find most useful.’

  ‘Oh, I’m not interested in your computations,’ said Newton. ‘All I require are raw, accurate observations. I found a number of mistakes in your last data.’

  Flamsteed looked deflated. ‘Mistakes?’

  ‘Yes, mistakes. Figures so wildly divergent from the others that they can only be mistakes. Please check them next time. I must have accurate figures. And keep your computations, I will do the rest. I will even send back my computations so that you may use them in the completion of your star catalogue.’

  Flamsteed gaped.

  ‘Do you have nothing to say? Let me know, plainly and honestly, whether this arrangement pleases you or not.’

  ‘I think I do not like this arrangement.’

  ‘Why hoard your observations when they can be useful to me now?’ Newton growled. ‘Let me prove your reputation, because so far, Mr Flamsteed, you have published so little that you have given no one any reason to believe you are actually achieving anything at Greenwich.’

  Flamsteed’s face contorted. ‘Very well, Mr Newton, I will tell you plainly: I choose to publish my observations in my own way, in my own time, when I am satisfied with them. And you can see them at the same time as everyone else. Once more, I bid you a good evening, gentlemen.’

  ‘That’s both of us in his bad books now,’ said Halley with a grin.

  Newton ran his fingers along the cold lead of the window frame in Fatio’s sitting-room. Even with his jacket wrapped around his shoulders, he felt the chill of the night. Outside, London slept beneath the Moon.

  He could sense the solution to its orbit, as if the equations were in the corner of his vision, perceptible but lacking detail. He knew he could not finish the computation without accurate data. It was a scandal that Flamsteed had not yet published a catalogue after working for more than twenty years.

  Newton pressed his palm against the glass. His head was filling with chatter again: perhaps a new mixture for the furnace, or a fresh interpretation of a biblical passage. He struggled not to waste these fleeting gifts of insight, but there was only so much that he could do.

  ‘You’re still up.’

  He looked round towards the voice. Fatio was wearing shirt and hose, his hair disarranged.

  ‘Sleep evades me,’ said Newton.

  ‘Is your bedroom not to your liking?’

  ‘It’s fine, thank you.’

  ‘Cognac, that’s what you need.’

  ‘I wish you wouldn’t drink so much,’ Newton said tentatively.

  ‘I wish you wouldn’t worry. A little drink is good for the nerves.’ Newton found the naivety painful but could not bring himself to correct the boy. ‘I feel trapped by my work, maybe even a little apprehensive.’

  ‘You? Why?’

  Immediately Newton regretted the confession. How could he make Fatio understand? The blackness of those desperate times writing the Principia; the torture of trying to make sense of all the revelations. How could he go through that again? Yet how could he stop now?

  Newton turned back to the window. There was another fear gnawing away at him. ‘You’re a young man, Nicolas. I fear marriage may take you.’

  ‘I will never marry for anything other than love, Isaac, and I think there is a reason at work in my very soul that means I will never marry.’

  Newton searched Fatio’s face. ‘What is that reason?’

  ‘I think you know.’

  At that moment Newton knew of nothing beyond an impossible longing for the young man in front of him.

  Fatio put down his glass and embraced his friend. Newton’s body reacted so powerfully that he began to shake. He gripped Fatio, surprised at the insubstantial nature of him. He relished the intoxicating sensations for a moment, then fell back as he realised how obvious his arous
al must be to Fatio.

  ‘There is nothing to feel ashamed about, Isaac. Nothing improper has happened between us . . .’

  But Newton could hear the unspoken ‘yet’ in Fatio’s voice. He composed himself. ‘John Locke has returned to England. I will be leaving to visit him in the morning; Mr Huygens has put us in touch, as he promised he would.’

  ‘You didn’t say.’ Fatio looked hurt.

  ‘I didn’t want to upset you before your presentation today.’

  ‘May I come with you?’

  Newton turned his back. ‘I don’t think that would be a good idea.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Mr Locke and I have things to discuss that you will find tedious.’

  ‘I see.’

  There was a rustle of movement. When Newton turned around, Fatio had disappeared.

  32

  High Laver, Essex

  John Locke was a stick of a man. Swaddled in donkey-brown robes, he wore a high-necked white chemise of the type worn by learned men to have their portraits painted. ‘It’s pretentious of me, I know,’ he confessed, leading Newton through to the back of the house, ‘but I’ve grown rather fond of their comfort.’

  Topping Locke’s small body was a heart-shaped face that seemed to exaggerate the size of his brain. His hair was a silken bonnet of white and his deep-set eyes projected a doleful acceptance of all he regarded. He moved carefully, but not inflexibly like so many men of his age.

  ‘It’s good of you to come and visit me out here.’ His voice was soft but strong. He showed Newton into an austere room that overlooked a terrace and a garden ringed by trees. Beyond the lawn his visitor could see an extensive vegetable patch.

  ‘You’re no further than Cambridge,’ said Newton, ‘and I’m getting rather tired of that journey.’

  ‘I heard of their refusal to accept your appointment as Master of King’s College, despite the King’s express wish.’

  Newton waved the matter aside. ‘There are other positions far from Cambridge, but I’m not here to talk about that. Of all the letters I have received about the Principia, yours have intrigued me the most.’

  ‘Then I am honoured. I thought my inability to follow your geometry would send me to the bottom of the pile.’

  ‘There are more things than geometry that interest me.’

  ‘Indeed.’ An ambiguous expression crossed Locke’s face.

  There were few pieces of furniture in the room. It could have passed for a monk’s cell if not for the glass-paned doors that led out on to the terrace. A maidservant entered and handed them glasses of cordial. Locke waited several heartbeats after her departure before saying, ‘I think that one of the things we can agree on is that religion can take many forms, even within the same Church.’

  Newton sipped the sweet drink, forcing Locke to continue.

  ‘I have advocated a form of religion that stresses reason above emotion, because I think in the fervour to promote one’s belief heady emotions can lead to great injustices.’

  Newton gave a slight nod.

  ‘Think of the tragedy of Galileo,’ continued Locke. ‘Such destructive emotions directed against him when all he spoke of were his observations. Absolutism in the scriptures can be as dangerous as absolute monarchy, do you not agree?’

  ‘Religion should be one’s armour, not one’s sword,’ Newton said.

  ‘Quite so, yet I fear others may suffer his fate unless we can change society for the better. We need reason to guide us, not passion, and to do that observations are paramount. We must see the world as it really is, not as we imagine it to be. Even the lowliest beggar can imagine a world filled with food and comfort, but that doesn’t make it happen because he has no power to change the world. A King can make things happen because he has people and money at his disposal. So these two individuals, of such different stations in life, are unlikely to agree on whether life is equitable. Yet turn to nature, and both beggar and king can agree on hearing the call of a blackbird on a summer’s evening, or seeing the brief fire of a meteor. In our observations of nature, we find something that every rational man can agree upon.’ Locke’s eyes fixed on Newton.

  ‘I agree,’ said the professor.

  ‘Your method of observation, hypothesis and experiment would seem to me to be the way to guide our society to a more rational state of being. We’ve taken good steps recently with the abolition of the divine right of monarchy. I venture that constitutional monarchy under the arbitration of Parliament is the most important step towards the perfection of England since Henry Tudor’s split with Rome. Never again will a king or queen be able to hide behind God’s grace to justify intolerable actions. It’s a great step towards rationality. We need to take others, of course.’ Locke’s expression intensified. ‘I don’t mean to patronise you, Mr Newton, but your new method for investigating nature. .. I wonder whether you comprehend how influential you could become? A new philosophy, to bring us to a true understanding of God.’

  Newton was unbalanced by Locke’s gaze. ‘You keep an austere home,’ he said, trying to buy time.

  ‘It helps me think clearly. It’s too easy to end up placing too much value on things, do you not think? Pictures? Sculptures? We fail every time we value things too highly.’

  Newton picked his words carefully, grasping Locke’s intent. ‘Clutter. I sometimes think that the Second Commandment has been rather long forgotten.’

  ‘Idolatry,’ agreed Locke. ‘A problem, I believe, for centuries.’

  ‘Since the fourth century?’

  ‘The defeat of Arius.’ Locke stepped closer. Newton followed. The two men clasped each other’s arms.

  ‘I thought I was the only one,’ said Newton.

  Locke tightened his grip. ‘Rest assured, you are not alone.’

  The forest air was perfectly still and cool enough to be refreshing. It pushed through Newton’s lungs, loosening his arms and shoulders. Soft moss cushioned his feet and the pungency of wild thyme filled his nostrils.

  ‘When did you know?’ asked Locke as they walked.

  ‘At the height of my battle with Hooke over the origin of colours. His ignorant bluster disturbed me so much that one evening I turned to the Holy Book for solace. As I was reading Proverbs I found a paradox. Christians believe that “The Lord created me at the beginning of his work” refers to Jesus. If that is the case, then Christ cannot be as fully divine as the Father, and so the doctrine of the Trinity is false. I saw it as clearly as if a blindness in me had been cured.’ He could still recall the dagger of fright that had pierced him at that moment. ‘I read on, looking for my error, but found only confirmation: “There is one God and one mediator between God and men: the man Jesus Christ”; “The head of every man is Christ, the head of every woman is the man, and the head of Christ is God”; “He shall be called the son of the most high”,’ quoted Newton. ‘Within a matter of days, my faith in the Trinity had been completely undermined. So I turned to the theologians who justified it and found only perversions of the truth in their words.’

  ‘We have taken similar paths,’ said Locke, his face dappled in the light.

  ‘Imagine how I have lived with the horror of this knowledge ever since – a Fellow of Trinity College! My dilemma reached its crisis when the Senate began reminding me that I was approaching my deadline for ordination. How could I become an Anglican minister when I no longer believed that the Father and the Son were of the same divine substance?’

  ‘And that’s why you went to petition the King in London.’

  ‘You’re well informed.’

  ‘I heard of your stand before Jeffreys. What I cannot fathom is how you persuaded the King to agree to your dispensation. You can hardly have revealed your views.’

  ‘I let him know that I was bound to an older doctrine than that of the Anglican Church.’

  ‘And he assumed you meant Catholicism.’ Locke’s eyes widened. ‘You deceived the King of England?’

  ‘I spoke nothing but th
e truth.’

  ‘Extraordinary!’ Locke shook his head in admiration. ‘We have much to discuss, including how we are to progress our thinking. Will you stay the week?’

  Newton hesitated. Fatio would be expecting him – or perhaps not, after their fractious parting. He felt guilty as he recalled their argument. He turned to Locke. ‘I’d be delighted.’

  In the days that followed Newton grew to love the simplicity of the house. Locke was right; it was perfect for contemplation. The house library was as well stocked with theology as Newton’s own, and, in deference to the bare working room, Newton rationed himself to taking in one book at a time.

  One afternoon, looking out at the wagtails chasing unseen insects across the lawn, he found his mind drifting back to the plague summer of 1666, when Cambridge had been abandoned and he had returned to Woolsthorpe and his mother. That had been the last time he had enjoyed this sense of unbridled scholarship – more than twenty years ago.

  That evening, as he and Locke sat drinking coffee, he asked, ‘How many like us are there?’

  ‘Not enough, yet. I know of only a small number, but there is a way for us to test who else may be sympathetic.’

  ‘How?’ ‘A pamphlet. Write me a simple argument that presents the evidence.’

  ‘Publish? I should be damned as a heretic.’

  ‘I can arrange for it to be anonymous.’

  ‘But I risk catastrophe.’

  ‘I’ll send the manuscript to friends in the Netherlands, have it translated into French and published in France. The French will no doubt flare up, thus guaranteeing its being brought to the attention of all countries. We sit back and gauge the reaction.’

  Newton felt as if he had fallen into a trap. ‘Is this the reason for inviting me here?’

  ‘Look how far you’ve moved already: Principia, the constitutional monarchy. Surely the next step would be the return of the true Church?’

  Courage and fear battled inside Newton. He had long tried to imagine this moment. He had envisaged it occurring later in his life, after he published his final treatise on natural philosophy, but perhaps now was as good a time as any. He was forty-nine; time was no longer his greatest ally, although – God be praised – he had yet to feel any pangs of mortality.