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Home , William Whewell

CHAPTER TEN

WILLIAM WHEWELL: LYELL'S LABOURS AND IDEAS

Although Lyell and Sedgwick are usually seen as champions of antagonistic theories of , they actually share more in their scientific outlooks than is often supposed. Their religious suppositions are very much the same and, as honest and believers, both join in a battle to "free the from Moses." Even their respective defences of uniformity and seem at times to merge so much as hardly to merit the name of controversy. Such seems to be the conclusion of the of science William Whewell. Lyell's research was a major influence on Whewell's geological thinking. He reviewed the first and the second volume of Principles, and, although not disposed to accept the theory of uniformity, he discusses Lyell as no other in the long sections on geology in both the History of the Inductive (1837) and its sequel the Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences ( 1840). William Whewell, son of a carpenter, born in 1794, was Lyell's senior by only three years. He was not an original contributor to the science of geology, but his extensive knowledge of the physical sciences included geology. Much practical geology he no doubt picked up during the many field tours with Sedgwick.1 Whewell's entrance in 1811 at Trinity College, , as a sizar, was followed by a long and successful career there, which culminated in his nomination to the influential post of Master of Trinity after Christopher Wordsworth's resignation in 1842. As a fellow of Trinity he had to take clerical orders, but he showed none of the reluctance to theological studies that Sedgwick felt, and his learning in this field led to the prestigious appointment of Professor of Moral Philosophy in 1838. More interesting for our present purpose is that Whewell filled the post of Professor of Mineralogy, which he kept for four years from 1828. In the preceding year he had been elected a fellow of the Geological Society of London, and, when Lyell resigned the presidential chair in 1836, Lyell and Murchison, later seconded by Sedgwick,2 asked Whewell to fill the chair for the next two years. Although Whewell accepted in the end, he had reservations about his suitability for the post. To James David Forbes (1809-1868), Professor of at Edinburgh, he writes about the Geological

1 For Whewell's knowledge of geology, see also Ruse, "William Whewell: Omniscientist," pp.106-110. 2 See letter to Sedgwick, October 6,1836 in LLW ii.245-47; see also LLW, i.97. WILLIAM WHEWELL: LYELL'S LABOURS AND IDEAS 13 3

Society ' s decision to make him its president "which I fear you will think no great argument of their wisdom."3 It is true that the Geological Society was hard pressed for a candidate, but the choice was not a bad one. The President of the Society had to deliver an anniversary address in which he briefly discussed the progress of the science during the past year. Whewell was the originator of the valuable Reports of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, founded in 1831. He urged W. Vernon Harcourt at its foundation to model the Reports on the Presidential Speeches of the Geological Society.4 Moreover, as author of a work on the history of geology, which Lyell knew Whewell was preparing, he seemed the right candidate. Whewell's knowledge of the progress of science was much respected among professional geologists. Whewell's wide interest in the natural sciences led to his two philosophical treatises on the inductive sciences, and, not insignificantly in the present context, he is responsible for one of the eight Bridgewater Treatises: and General , Considered with Reference to Natural (1833). Whereas Lyell accepted elements of as an unquestionable afterthought in his scientific investigations, and Sedgwick believed that natural theology was the active principle behind his science which confirmed the of the believer, Whewell was a systematic thinker of natural theology who applied it to geology in that truly philosophical which is generally missing in Lyell and Sedgwick.5 Whewell thought highly of Lyell's Principles but firmly contested the latter's notions of uniformity. He reviewed the first volume for The British Critic. This review led Lyell, who had thanked Whewell "for the great service you have done all geologists, and me in particular, by your splendid article,"6 to recommend him to John Gibson Lockhart, then editor of the Quarterly Review, for a review of the second volume. Lyell urged Whewell that I am, moreover, interested for my own sake in the job's not falling into the hands of some journeyman performer, whose clumsy puff (to please the publisher) will be much less creditable to me than the overhauling which I am prepared to expect from you.7 The second volume of Principles impressed Whewell even more than the first and he agreed to write the review for the Quarterly} Whewell's attitude to Lyell's work is ambiguous. There is a strange mixture of admiration for his methods and sharp criticism of his principles

'February 20, mi,LLW\\252. 4 Letter to Harcourt, September 1,1831,ΖΖ,0ΊΠ27. 5 For a discussion ofWhewell 's evaluation of natural theology as areligious principle, see Brooke, "Indications of a Creator: Whewell as Apologist and ." 6 LL WW. 108-9. 7 Lyell to Whewell, November 10,1831, Wilson, , p.327. 8 The first volume was reviewed in the British Critic in 1831 (henceforward Review 1831 ), the second in the Quarterly Review in 1832 (henceforward Review 1832).