Scuola Dottorale di Ateneo Graduate School Dottorato di ricerca in Lingue, Culture e Società Ciclo XXV° Anno di discussione 2013 Titolo: The Alchemical Apocalypse of Isaac Newton SETTORE SCIENTIFICO DISCIPLINARE DI AFFERENZA: L-LIN/10 Tesi di Dottorato di Zanon Irene, matricola 796168 Coordinatore del Dottorato Tutore del Dottorando Prof. Enrica Villari Prof. Loretta Innocenti CONTENTS List of Illustrations p. 3 List of Figures p. 3 List of Plates p. 5 Introduction p. 6 Chapter I The Hermetic Background p. 21 1.1 Some Problems of Textual Interpretation p. 29 1.2 Hermetic Culture p. 41 1.3 Roger Bacon’s Pansophic Knowledge p. 91 Chapter II Alchemy, Science and Millenarianism p.107 2.1 Alchemy as a Focal Issue in the Development of Modern Science p.107 2.2 “Many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase.” Francis Bacon’s Foreshadowing the Millennium p.122 2.3 The Pansophic Knowledge of Samuel Hartlib and Jan Comenius p.143 2.4 Literary Alchemy and Hexameral Literature: the Heterogeneous Nature of Alchemical Imagery p.158 2.5 Isaac Newton’s Millenarianism: Some Further Considerations p.178 Chapter III Alchemy and Science in Newton’s Opticks p.194 Chapter IV Newton’s Archetype of the Apocalypse p.207 4.1 Preliminary Methodological Considerations p.213 4.2 The Alchemical Archetype of the Apocalypse: the Jungian Model p.225 4.3 The Yahuda Manuscripts: Drafts of a Treatise on Revelation p.234 4.4 Methodological Conclusions p.243 Chapter V The Alchemical Apocalypse of Isaac Newton p.246 Bibliography p.281 Webgraphy p.298 List of Illustrations List of Figures Figure 1. Giovanni di Stefano, Hermes Trismegistus, Siena’s Cathedral, p. 43 c.1482. Reproduced from Matilde Battistini, Astrologia, Magia, Alchimia, Milano, Mondadori Electa, 2004, p. 140. Figure 2. The Serpent Ouroboros. p. 46 Reproduced from Michela Pereira, (ed.), Alchimia. I Testi Della Tradizione Occidentale, Milano, Arnoldo Mondadori Editore, 2006, p. 21. Figure 3. Michael Maier, Tripus Aureus, illustration of Basil Valentine’s p. 48 eighth key. Reproduced from Stanislas Klossowski de Rola, The Golden Game. Alchemical Engravings of the Seventeenth Century, London, Thames & Hudson, 1988, p. 122. Figure 4. Second plate from Altus’ Mutus Liber. p. 51 Reproduced from Altus, Mutus Liber: l’alchimia e il suo libro muto, introduzione e commento di Eugene Canseliet, Roma, Arkeios, 1995, p. 61. Figure 5. Emblem XXXIV in Michael Maier’s Atalanta Fugiens. p. 57 Reproduced from Michael Maier, Atalanta Fugiens, Roma, Edizioni Mediterranee, 2002, p. 189. Figure 6. Emblem XXXI in Michael Maier’s Atalanta Fugiens. p. 59 Reproduced from Michael Maier, Atalanta Fugiens, Roma, Edizioni Mediterranee, 2002, p. 174. Figure 7. Sol Niger. p. 77 Solomon Trismosin, Splendor Solis, Plate XIX, MS. Harley 3469, London, British Library. Reproduced from Alexander Roob, Alchemie & Mystik, Köln, Taschen, 1996, p. 234. Figure 8. Brehm’s diagram illustrating Roger Bacon’s matrix of ideas. p.104 Reproduced from Edmund Brehm, “Roger Bacon’s Place in the History of Alchemy,” in Ambix, Vol. 23, Part I, (March 1976), pp. 53-58, on p. 58. Figure 9. Ouroboros encompassing the symbols of sulphur, salt and p.114 mercury. MS. Add. 25724, London, British Library, XVII century, reproduced from Matilde Battistini, Astrologia, Magia, Alchimia, Milano, Mondadori Electa, 2004, p. 302. Figure 10. Ships trespassing the Pillars of Hercules. p.126 Frontispiece of the first edition of Francis Bacon’ Instauratio Magna (1620), reproduced from Francis Bacon, Novum Organum, With Other Great Parts of The Great Instauration, translated end edited by Peter Urbach and John Gibson, Chicago and La Salle, Illinois, Open Court, 1994. Figure 11. Emblem XLIII in Michael Maier’s Atalanta Fugiens. p.159 Reproduced Michael Maier, Atalanta Fugiens, translated from the Latin by Joscelyn Godwin, Grand Rapids, Phanes Press, 1989, p. 191. Figure 12. Joachim of Fiore’s three ages of the world. p.187 Reproduced from Alexander Roob, Alchimia & Mistica, Köln, Taschen, 1997, p. 75. Figure 13. Fourteenth plate from Altus’ Mutus Liber. p.250 Reproduced from Altus, Mutus Liber: l’alchimia e il suo libro muto, introduzione e commento di Eugene Canseliet, Roma, Arkeios, 1995, p. 135. Figure 14. Agnus Dei. p.272 Reproduced from Robert Adkinson (ed.), Simboli Sacri – Popoli, Religioni, Misteri, Milano, L’ippocampo, 2009, p. 512. Figure 15. The alchemical ram. p.272 Reproduced from Stanislas Klossowski de Rola, The Golden Game. Alchemical Engravings of the Seventeenth Century, London, Thames & Hudson, 1988, p. 262. Figure 16. Fourth plate from Altus’ Mutus Liber. p.280 Reproduced from Altus, Mutus Liber: l’alchimia e il suo libro muto, introduzione e commento di Eugene Canseliet, Roma, Arkeios, 1995, p. 73. List of Plates Plate 1. The polarities between macrocosm and microcosm. Johann Daniel Mylius, Opus Medico-Chymicum, 1618, reproduced here from Alexander Roob, Alchemie & Mystik, Köln, Taschen, 1996, p. 465. Plate 2. The alchemical athanor with symbolic animals. Michael Maier, Tripus Aureus, reproduced here from Stanislas Klossowski de Rola, The Golden Game. Alchemical Engravings of the Seventeenth Century, London, Thames & Hudson, 1988, p. 124. Plate 3. The Opus Magnum as an eyeball. Heinrich Khunrath, Amphitheatrum Sapientiæ Æternæ, 1602, reproduced here from Stanislas Klossowski de Rola, The Golden Game. Alchemical Engravings of the Seventeenth Century, London, Thames & Hudson, 1988, p. 40. Plate 4. The alchemical prima materia as the Apocalyptic beast. Steffan Michelspacher, Cabala, Augusta, 1616, reproduced here from Alexander Roob, Alchimia & Mistica, Köln, Taschen, 1997, p.168. Plate 5. The crucified snake. MS. 3047, Paris, Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal, XVII century, reproduced here from Michela Pereira, (ed.), Alchimia. I Testi Della Tradizione Occidentale, Milano, Arnoldo Mondadori Editore, 2006, plate 18. Introduction Nature and Nature’s Laws lay hid in Night: God said, Let Newton be! and All was Light. Alexander Pope The well-known witty epitaph written by Alexander Pope in honour of Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727) is so effectively striking1 in its literary purpose that it is still actually able to remind us nowadays, within just two lines length, of the impressive, unrivalled contribution to the enlightenment of the vast fields of science made by the works of the greatest English mathematician. But, as far as the acknowledgment of Newton’s scientific discoveries by his contemporaries is largely known and therefore undisputed, the debate among scholars over the great bulk of his non-scientific texts has been of a completely different kind. Ranging from alchemical to theological-mystical and millenaristic contents, up to studies about the sacred cubit of the Jews and scientific enquires into the very nature of the architectonic perfection of Solomon’s Temple, the great amount of Newton’s non-scientific manuscripts indeed helps in revealing us that his mind was even possibly greater than we might have ever guessed. By quoting2 William R. Shea pithy summing up of Newton’s most important life periods we know that “he devoted merely two years, 1664-1665, to mathematics and from that time on would only turn to it when solicited;” the study of optics involved him just “for a brief period around 1670 but he never returned seriously to it again.” Moreover, he applied to 1 Cfr. I. Bernard Cohen and Richard S. Westfall (eds.), Newton: Texts, Backgrounds, Commentaries, New York-London, W. W. Norton & Company, 1995, General Introduction, p. xv: “Surely no one has ever captured this image of Newton better than the poet Alexander Pope, with his famous couplet: Nature and Nature’s Laws lay hid in Night:/ God said, Let Newton be! and All was Light.” This edition will henceforth be referred to as Cohen and Westfall (eds.), Newton. 2 All quotations here are from William R. Shea, “Introduction: Trends in the Interpretation of Seventeenth Century Science,” in M. L. Righini Bonelli and William R. Shea (eds.), Reason, Experiment, and Mysticism, New York, Science History Publications, 1975, pp. 1-17, on p. 6; main edition hereinafter referred to as Righini Bonelli and Shea (eds.), Reason, Experiment, and Mysticism. mechanics and dynamics only “for a short while in the 1690s and then only in the two and a half years that produced the Principia” though “Newton’s interest in alchemy continued unabated between 1670 and 1696, the year he left Cambridge to become Warden of the Mint.” This very short overlook at Newton’s life enables us to hallmark one most important feature: his deep commitment to alchemical studies3 – both in terms of praxis and theoretical approach to it. Besides his alchemical task, Newton had another chief interest for religious studies and millenarianism which occupied him throughout his central years, though nothing of his written production on these subjects was published4 during his lifetime. Actually, until recent5 years and only in part due to the late re-discovery of Newton’s non-scientific manuscripts, these two fields of Newtonian research had remained uncovered by some serious scholarly criticism and, even when some attempts to enquire into them were made, these never6 resulted in a syncretic study of Newton’s alchemy and his millenaristic/theological ideas. 3 Cfr. Richard S. Westfall, “The Role of Alchemy in Newton’s Career,” in Righini Bonelli and Shea (eds.), Reason, Experiment, and Mysticism, cit., pp. 189-232, on p. 195: “Newton’s interest in the art was neither a youthful frolic nor an aberration of senility. It fell squarely in the middle of his scientific career, spanning at the time of most of the achievement on which his reputation rests. Indeed, alchemy appears to have been his most enduring passion.” The nature of Newton’s alchemical studies, along with an explication of fundamental alchemical theories and practices, will be further developed in this study of mine. The general character of this introduction would only therefore provide the description of the structure of my work and its major aims.