Abstract
Seventeenth-century “mechanical philosophy”, particularly its Cartesian form, challenged the long-standing belief in final causes as explanatory principles of the order of nature. To many it also seemed to threaten the idea that the world was ruled by Providence. Reactions took many forms. One of them, natural theology, or physico-theology, exerted a pervasive influence on the image of nature for a long time. Order, abundance, variety, compensation and contrivance were key concepts in the attempts to defend a basically optimistic view of what was traditionally called the “economy of nature”. But then an old question returned: how could providential order be reconciled with the existence of suffering, death and destruction? Attitudes towards the problem of evil interacted in various ways with attitudes towards the teleological order of nature. The economy of nature was, in fact, the moral economy of nature. Science and natural philosophy were imbued with moral meaning. The more nature was known, the more God’s, and nature’s, ways to the human being were vindicated. This belief became a tacit assumption which also influenced authors who cannot, strictly speaking, be described as natural theologians or apologetic writers. Its influence lasted for a long time, and survived the so-called Darwinian revolution.
For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world
are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made,
even his eternal power and Godhead
—Paul, Romans, 1: 20
This is the best of all possible worlds, in which the maximum variety coexists with the maximum order.
In the face of this principle all objections drawn from evils that one sees reign in the world dissolve
—Madame du Châtelet
Variety is life. Uniformity is death
—Benjamin Constant
Il mondo è bello perché è vario
(Variety is the spice of life)
—Italian proverb
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Notes
- 1.
Man’s soul was a separate substance of its own. How it could act on the quite different substance of the body remained an open problem (generally referred to as ‘Cartesian dualism’) for a long time for Cartesians themselves.
- 2.
The literature on the Scientific Revolution is enormous. For a well-balanced overall view of the “birth of modern science”, see Rossi (1997).
- 3.
- 4.
For instance, Lovejoy used it rather freely in his seminal The Great Chain of Being (1936, repr. 2001). Hodge (1972) uses “popular theodicy” when discussing Robert Chambers’ Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation (1844), and Martin and Watkins (2019: 403) call “Darwinian theodicies” the views of those who explained evil as necessary to evolutionary progress. Leibniz defined “theodicy” as the “doctrine of the justice (that is, the wisdom and goodness) of God”. On Leibniz’ theodicy, see Belaval (1975), Theis (1987), Latzer (1993, 1994), Rutherford (1995), Mormino (2005a, b), Hick (2007), Antognazza (2009, 2014), Rateau (2008). On theodicy in the broad sense, and in general on the problem of evil after Descartes, see Landucci (1986), Fonnesu (1994), Nadler (2010), and Neiman (2015). A very useful overview of the eighteenth-century debates is Fonnesu (2006).
- 5.
Mandelbrote (2020: 75) reports that the Newtonian lexicographer and instrument maker Benjamin Martin enumerated in vol. 5 of his General Magazine of Arts and Sciences (1755–1765) fifteen forms of physico-theology: Helio-theology, Planeto-theology, Seleno-theology, Cometo-theology, Astro-theology, Aero-theology, Hydro-theology, Geo-theology, Phyto-theology, Zoo-theology, Ornitho-theology, Ichthyo-theology, Insecto-theology, Herpeto-theology, and Anthropo-theology. Mandelbrote concludes: “Physico-theology had come to mean any particular study of nature that shed light on divine design”.
- 6.
- 7.
The classical reference on Timaeus is Cornford (1935). The figure and the role of the Demiurge has been the subject of a number of different interpretations, from Aristotle onwards: was he a god or a craftsman, or both? See Solmsen (1963), Leinkauf and Steel (2005). A well-documented, updated and concise discussion is Rossi Monti (2014).
- 8.
- 9.
To mention only a few reference works in an enormous literature: Cassirer (1991) (orig. 1944); Larson (1979, 1994), Löw (1980), Lenoir (1982), Fabbri Bertoletti (1990), Friedman (1991), Friedman and Nordmann (2006), Sloan (1979, 2006), Steigerwald (2006a, b), Zammito (2017), Gambarotto (2018). Lenoir’s thesis that Kant’s “teleomechanism” was largely adopted as a regulative approach in the German life sciences has been criticised for overestimating Kant’s influence on empirical scientists (Richards 2002: 229; Zammito 2012). The relation between Kant and vitalism in biology (as represented in Germany mainly by the so-called Göttingen school) is also under constant revision by historians. Another big problem is that of the way Kant was interpreted by the Naturphilosophen, particularly Schelling. On Goethe and Kant, see at least Beyer (1975), Schmidt (1984), Giacomoni (1993) (but in this case, too, the literature is very vast).
- 10.
And on the possible gradual derivation of present forms from original forms generated “by one primal mother”. This hypothesis was “a daring adventure of reason”, but there were few “archeologists of nature” to whom “it had not at times presented itself” (Kant 2000, § 80, and note). See Lovejoy (1968).
- 11.
I say “creative” because Goethe himself did not conceal his doubts concerning Kant’s view of teleology as a regulative principle (Jardine 1988: 330–331).
- 12.
Hume’s warning is often conflated with George Edward Moore’s (1903) criticism of the “naturalistic fallacy”. However, this is incorrect, for the simple reason that Moore had a quasi-Platonic view of good, which was not at all the case with Hume.
- 13.
- 14.
There is a vast and complex debate on Plotinus, Neoplatonism and their relation to Plato’s philosophy of nature. In addition to works mentioned in note 7 see Deck (1967), Baltes (1976–1978), Wagner (2002), Opsomer (2005), Chiaradonna and Trabattoni (2009), Wilberding and Horn (2012), Armstrong (2013). Here again, a useful discussion is offered by Rossi Monti (2014).
- 15.
To make just one reference in a vast specialist literature, see Pinsent (2018).
- 16.
- 17.
Natural evil has often been identified with physical evil, but the two should not be confused. Indeed, a distinction between them was a matter of controversy since Bishop William King (1702) and Leibniz (1710) introduced their tripartite classification of evil in the early eighteenth century. For a discussion of such complex subject and its no less complex implications, see Antognazza (2014).
- 18.
Here it is sufficient to mention some classical works bearing, directly or indirectly, on the relations between the new science, divine design and the natural philosophies of Christian scientists: Houghton (1942), Cassirer (1932; Engl. tr. 2009); H. Fisher (1953), Hurlbutt (1965), Boas Hall (1966), Casini (1967, 1969), Westfall (1973), McGuire (1972), Pacchi (1973), Sina (1976). On deism see Orr (1934) and Lechler (1965; 1st ed 1841). On physico-theology, in addition to works mentioned in text, see Philipp (1957, 1967), Barth (1971), Trepp (2020). A key primary source is Fabricius (1725) (in particular Chap. 8). Glacken (1967; repr. 1990) is still an important reference on the ‘ecological’ aspects of physico-theology.
- 19.
It is worth noting that Linnaeus added to Oeconomia naturae a note containing some quotations from Seneca, the first of which said: “Nature, Fortune, Providence and Fate are manifestations of a sole and same God, who acts in various ways in human affairs”.
- 20.
Olaus Söderberg was one of Linnaeus’ students. Doctoral students acted as their tutor’s mere respondentes, that is they expounded and defended the theses of the praeses. The contents of their dissertations should thus be attributed to Linnaeus. Hereafter, however, the dissertations collected in the Amoenitates academicae (1749–1785) will be referred to by both the name of Linnaeus and the individual respondens, in order to facilitate their location in the collection. The same dissertation will appear twice in the reference list: under Linnaeus’s name and under that of the discussant.
- 21.
Ray (1691): 4–6; Lesser 1742: 122. For Lesser (1692–1754) there are 765 species of insects (including earth worms and water worms, starfish, but excluding slugs, snails, and “shells”), 500 kinds of birds, 1000 “water dwellers”, and 150 snakes (ibid.: 177–122). Lesser’s other physico-teleological works include his influential Testaceo-theologia (1741). On Ray, see Raven (1950), Gillespie (1987), Zeitz (1994), Brooke (2000).
- 22.
Ray (1691): 120–121, 166–167. In fact, the figure in one of Leeuwenhoek’s better-known calculations was 2,730,000 (letter to the Royal Society dated 23 April 1677, excerpts of which are given in Leeuwenhoek 1695: 40–41). Leeuwenhoek was the author of many other calculations on the quantity of animalcules (first observed by him in 1677) in the seminal liquid of various animals and the capacity for the geometrical multiplication of animals and plants (see, for example, 1696: 103; 1697: 15–17, 206–207, 236–237). In his letter of 25 April 1679 he calculated that cod’s milk contains 150 billion animalcules, to wit, more than 10 times the maximum number of men (estimated at 13,385,000,000) that the earth could supposedly contain (1697: 8–11). On this aspect of Leeuwenhoek’s work, see Egerton 1968. Galen’s calculation cited by Ray is in De foetuum formatione, VI, 4.7.
- 23.
For example, Galen’s calculation was taken up by Mersenne (1623, col. 103; cf. Barth 1971: 269), then by Wilkins ([1675] 1693: 81), and by many others until William Paley (1802: 133–134). Hume could not fail to mention it in his Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion (Hume 1992, part XII: 455). Leeuwenhoek’s calculations were also popular, albeit to a lesser extent: see, for example, Cheyne (1705) and Abbé Noël-Antoine Pluche’s Le spectacle de la nature (9 tomes, 8 volumes, 1732–1750), which enjoyed enormous success and was reprinted many times until 1888 and translated into many languages.
- 24.
Bonnet took his cue from the following passage in Johann Heinrich Lambert’s (1728–1777) Cosmologische Briefe über die Einrichtung des Weltbaues (1761): “All globes are inhabited and […] all the space in the universe is filled as far as possible with globes. Spaces and gaps could not be left empty in such a perfect work […] Do we not actually see the earth itself all full of life and movement, and Nature everywhere intent on fecundating, and giving life (organiser)?” Bonnet cited from the French translation by J.B. Mérian, Système du monde. Lettres cosmologiques (Berlin 1770), Chap. 3: 24–25. If the earth is full of life why, asked Lambert, should the universe not be full of planets and comets? If the universe is full of planets and comets, says Bonnet, why should it not be full of life?
- 25.
We will return to the strong connection between the principle of plenitude and Bonnet’s, and many others, theory of emboîtement, according to which all the generations of a species were boxed up in original germs (see below: 2.14). It is interesting to note the analogy between this theory of generation and another implication of the principle of plenitude. Leibniz wrote: “There is also nothing to preclude the existence in the universe of animals resembling that one which Cyrano de Bergerac encountered in the sun. The body of this animal being a sort of fluid composed of innumerable small animals, that were capable of ranging themselves in accordance with the desires of the great animal, by this means it transformed itself in a moment, just as it pleased; and the dissolution of continuity caused it no more hurt than the stroke of an oar can cause to the sea” (Theodicy, § 343, in Leibniz 1998). Leibniz was referring to the libertine writer, and famous swordsman, Cyrano de Bergerac’s Les Estats et Empires du Soleil (1662, posthumous). By imagining inhabited worlds Cyrano, like others before and after him, was giving literary expression to an idea to which Leibniz himself would give a metaphysical formulation, as we shall see in § 6. There was a revival of interest in the issue of the plurality of worlds in England as late as 1833, when the philosopher William Whewell admitted that they could exist, although he rejected this idea in 1853 (see Brooke 1977; Yeo 1979, 1986, 1993; Rupke 1983: 213–215).
- 26.
The words “per variar natura è bella” do not come from the works of the Italian poet Torquato Tasso. On the history of this expression, which enjoyed a remarkable success in Italy and abroad, and of its equivalent in modern Italian, “il mondo è bello perché è vario” (literally, the world is beautiful because it is varied), see Pasini (2012) and Becchi (2020).
- 27.
The idea that there are no two identical leaves in the world is a classical topos. We find it, for example, in Seneca’s letter CXIII to Lucilius. On this page of Voltaire it is worth noting that the idea of the infinite diversity of created things is associated with the immutability of the laws of nature, the inscrutability of Providence (or destiny), and universal compensation (“chance does not exist: everything is trial, or punishment, or reward, or providence”). The idea that a plurality of inhabited worlds was a sign of divine power was also old, even if, obviously, not shared by everyone. For example, the Right Rev. John Wilkins (1614–1672), Bishop of Chester, wrote in 1638: “There may be many other species of creatures beside those that are already known in the world; there is a great chain betwixt the nature of men and angels: it may be the inhabitants of the planets are of a middle nature between both these. It is not improbable that God might create some of all kinds, that so he might more completely glorify himself in the works of his power and wisdom” (Wilkins 1802, vol. 1: 102).
- 28.
Grew (1701): 101. See also Derham (1713), Book V, Chap. 9; Book I, Chap. 6; Book V, Chap. 2: 327. The argument of the variety of human faces was already in the Jesuit Leonard Lessius’ De providentia numinis et animi immortalitate libri duo adversus Atheos & Politicos (Amsterdam 1617: 109 ff). It was taken up by Mersenne who extended it to social differences: if all men were rich, application and diligence would count for nothing (1623, Ratio XXIX). The praise of variety is also a major issue in the physician George Cheyne’s Philosophical principles of natural religion: containing the elements of natural philosophy, and the proofs for natural religion, arising from them (1705–1715). Cheyne was an advocate of lacto-vegetarian diet as a treatment of obesity (first of all his own) and the author of the famous The English Malady (1733), in which he dealt with many nervous diseases. On Cheyne’s natural philosophy, see Casini (1967).
- 29.
On the principle of plenitude in the period following that covered in Lovejoy’s classical study, particularly in the nineteenth-century England, see Yeo (1986).
- 30.
Leibniz, Remarques sur le livre de l’origine du mal publié depuis peu en Angleterre, § 7, in Leibniz (1998): 414; Théodicée, § 118 (ibid.: 190). As Lovejoy remarked, this idea was already present in Thomas Aquinas, who wrote that it was false to say that, “since an angel is better than a stone, therefore two angels are better than one angel and a stone […] Although an angel, considered absolutely, is better than a stone, nevertheless two natures are better than one only; and therefore a universe containing angels and other things is better than one containing angels only; since the perfection of the universe is attained essentially in proportion to the diversity of natures in it, whereby the divers grades of goodness are filled, and not in proportion to the multiplication of individuals of a single nature” (cit. in Lovejoy 2001: 77). Lovejoy (ibid.: 362, note 32) also pointed out that the same principle was enunciated by Kant in his Allgemeine Naturgeschichte und Theorie des Himmels (1755), where he said that it was of more consequence to nature to conserve lice as a whole species, worthless as they might be considered, than to conserve a small number of members of a superior species. On the basis of similar considerations many naturalists argued that all species were equally dear to the Creator, that all contributed to the order and beauty of creation, and that the loss of even a single one would damage the entire system. On this same basis some ruled out the extinction of species altogether: see below, Chaps. 4, 5.
- 31.
Bolingbroke countered the arguments of the French mathematician, physicist and philosopher, and president of the Berlin Academy of Science, Pierre-Louis Moreau de Maupertuis (1698–1759). Chapter 2 of Maupertuis’ Essai de philosophie morale (1749) bore the title “In ordinary life the quantity (la somme) of evils outweighs the quantity of goods”. On Maupertuis, see Tonelli (1987).
- 32.
Whewell (1833): 38. Whewell’s book was the third of the Bridgewater Treatises, a series of eight essays by different authors published in execution of the last will and testament of the Earl of Bridgewater, who left 8000 pounds sterling for the publication of works on “the Power, Wisdom and Goodness of God as manifested in the works of Creation”. On the Bridgewater Treatises, see Topham (1998).
- 33.
“Mayo (Philosophy of Living) quotes Whewell as profound because he says length of days adapted to duration of sleep of man!!! Whole universe so adapted!!! & not man to Planets––instance of arrogance!!” (Darwin 1987, Notebook D: 49). Darwin wrote these words between 23 and 27 August 1838, commenting on the doctor and physiologist Herbert Mayo’s The Philosophy of Living (1837: 136), which referred to Whewell.
- 34.
Anonymous review of Louis Cotte, Leçons d’histoire naturelle sur l’industrie des animaux, pour servir de suite aux le lecons élémentaires naturelle, à l’usage des enfants et des jeunes gens (1799) in Magazin encyclopédique, V année, t. II, 1799: 554–555.
- 35.
- 36.
The role of ichneumons as “moderators” of the excessive reproduction of Phalaena strobilella had been pointed out by Wilcke and Linnaeus (1760: 26–27), who referred to the observations of another of Linnaeus’ disciples, Daniel Rolander. Ichneumons were mentioned by Darwin’s grandfather Erasmus in his Temple of Nature (1803, Canto IV: 131, lines 33–34) as one of numberless instances of the ever-raging war of nature: “The wing’d Ichneumon for her embryon young/Gores with sharp horn the caterpillar throng”.
- 37.
Derham (1713: 419) mentioned the “Ichneumon-Fly” which “wounded those Nymphae [of insects] and darted its Eggs into them, and so made them the Foster-Mother of its young”. The geologist Charles Lyell, who exerted a strong influence on Darwin, drew heavily from Kirby and Spence (as well as from Wilcke and other Linnaeans) for examples of destructive insects acting as “benefactors” of different species of vegetables and beings “peculiarly instrumental in preserving [their] present abundance”. Ichneumons afforded “a good illustration of the checks and counterchecks which nature has appointed to preserve the balance of power amongst species” (Lyell 1830–1833, II: 133). As we shall see in Chap. 6, Darwin mentioned them as an instance of cruelty which raised doubts on the goodness of God.
- 38.
I am quoting from the second, much larger edition of the work. More himself translated it into Latin (1679), which ensured it a wider circulation.
- 39.
On the question of evil in the eighteenth century, see: Cassirer (1932; Engl. tr. 2009), Kremer (1909), Tsanoff (1931), Hazard (1941, 1946), II, Chap. 3; Crocker (1959, 1963), Meisters et al. (2018), and Chignell (2019). On theodicy, see: Kremer (1909), Wegener (1909), Lempp (1910), Totok (1949, 1986), Mormino (2005a, b), Antognazza (2014).
- 40.
- 41.
This is a revised text of Clarke’s Boyle Lectures (1719). He held another series of these lectures, or sermons, the following year, published in 1721 as Enquiry into the Cause and Origin of Moral Evil.
- 42.
- 43.
Opinion approved by Ray (1691: 127–128), who referred to Cicero. It is interesting to note that More used an anthropomorphic argument to warn against excesses of anthropocentrism. We should not, he argued, see a utility for man in all the characteristics of animals: they also have right to their personal pleasure and also to some frivolity. “Thus fittingly does Nature gratifie all Creatures with accommodations sutable to their temper, and nothing is in vain. Nor are we to cavil at the red pugger’d attire of the Turkey, and the long Excrescency that hangs down over his Bill, when he swells with pride and anger; for it may be a Receptacle for his heated blood, that has such free recourse to his head, or he may please himfelf in it as the rude Indians, whose Jewels hang dangling at their Noses. And if the bird be pleasur’d, we are not to be displeased, being always mindful that Creatures are made to enjoy themselves, as well as to serve us, and it is a gross piece of Ignorance and Rusticity to think otherwise” (More 1655, Book 2, Chap. 11: 139; original spelling, as in subsequent quotations).
- 44.
Here is the whole passage: “And indeed Man seems to be brought into the world on purpose that the rest of the Creation might be improved to the utmost usefulness and advantage; For were it not better that the hides of Beasts and their Flesh should be made so considerable use of as to feed and cloathe Men, then [sic] they should rot and stink upon the ground, and fall short of so noble an improvement, as to be matter for the exercise of the wit of Man, and to afford him the necessary conveniences of life? For if man did not make use of them, they would either dye of Age, or be torn apieces by more cruel Masters […] And being furnish’d with fit Materials to make himself weapons, as well as with natural wit and valour, he did bid battel to the very fiercest of them, and either chased them away into solitudes and deserts, or else brought them under his subjection, and gave laws unto them; under which they live more peaceably, and are better provided for (or at least might if Men were good) then they could be when they were left to the mercy of the Lyon, Bear and Tyger. And what if he do [sic] occasionally and orderly kill some of them for food? their [sic] dispatch is quick, and so less dolorous then the jaw of the Bear, or the teeth of the Lyon, or the tedious Melancholy and sadness of old Age, which would first torture them, and then kill them, and let them rot upon the ground stinking and useless”. (More 1655, Book 2, Chap. 8: 116–117)
- 45.
There have been many versions of the argument that man’s dominion over the animals he feeds on is not only morally acceptable but also advantageous for them. See below, Chap. 4.
- 46.
Derham quotes Pliny (Natural History, VIII, 55): “Benigna circa hoc Natura, innocua & esculenta animalia foecunda generavit” (beneficent nature endowed the edible animals she had generated with great fertility). See also Plato, Protagoras: 320d–321b. Cf. Ray 1691: 101–102; Grew 1701: 99; and many others.
- 47.
- 48.
Linnaeus not only recognised the inevitability of the circle but also justified it in terms of the circularity of natural processes, which was itself a proof of God’s greatness. As the observer gradually advances in his knowledge of nature, he glimpses order “in the great confusion”, an order so admirable that, “struck by admiration, he admits that it is difficult and indeed vain to search for a beginning and an end in the divine works, as […] everything moves in a circle” (Wilcke and Linnaeus 1760: 18). On Linnaeus’ view of nature, see Hagberg (1952), von Hofsten (1957), Querner (1980), Petry’s Introduction to Linnaeus 2001 (which contains a rich bibliography).
- 49.
- 50.
Kirby and Spence (1815–1826), 1: 176, 194. Darwin made a pencil mark in the margin next to both examples in his copy of the work (University Library, Cambridge).
- 51.
On Paley see Le Mahieu (1976).
- 52.
- 53.
Cf. Wilcke and Linnaeus (1760): 17–18: “If a man, naked as at the moment of creation or when he was newborn, but endowed with mature judgment as in the best period of his life, found himself fallen into this world, […] and contemplated carefully, with all his senses, the terraqueous globe almost as if it were a new refuge, he would observe that the earth is covered with innumerable different vegetables which, mixed with each other in the greatest confusion, are treated wretchedly by worms, insects, fish, amphibians, birds and mammals. He would see that not only do these beings devour the most beautiful flowers but that they, exercising an extraordinary reciprocal tyranny, tear each other apart without pity. In short, he would see nothing but a war of all against all (bellum omnium in omnes) and would find himself undefended and so exposed to the violence of the majority of beings that, hesitating and uncertain, he would hardly find a place, if any, where he could feel protected”.
- 54.
Order is the purpose, and reproduction, conservation and destruction are the means. “In order for natural things created to persist over time in a continuous series, the wisdom of the supreme Divinity has arranged for all living beings to do their utmost uninterruptedly to generate new individuals, and all natural things reciprocally to offer each other help to favour the conservation of all species, and, lastly, death and destruction of the one always to serve the re-establishment of the other” (Biberg and Linnaeus 1749: 2). Cf. Linnaeus 1767–1770, I: 18: “The economy of nature consists of generation, conservation and destruction, so that the work of the Creator is conserved intact, and all of Nature conspires to this end […] The destruction of the one becomes the restoration of the other, when, due to a shortage of corpses [to feed on], life finds sustenance through the fatigues of the hunt. Hence the universal robbery, because the liveliest escape thanks to their weapons, and their defences, and to diverse movements or exhalations, while the weak succumb and the most vigorous flee rapidly. Thus the work of nature shines in perennial luxuriance”.
- 55.
“The main activities of the citizens of Nature are: (1) to multiply their species, so that there are enough members to perform its functions; (2) to maintain the balance between animal species and vegetable species, so that the general proportion is preserved; to prune plants annually, so that every year the scene is renewed; to repress the wrong [sorts of] creatures, so that the regular ones are not ousted; to remove the sick, the dead, impurity, dirt, whatever is stagnant, acid or putrid, so that the splendour of the palace shines; (3) to avoid death, so that the society does not remain deserted” (Linnaeus 1767–1770, I: 18).
- 56.
Earlier, however, Linnaeus had said the opposite: “Wild beasts have not been created for the sustenance of other creatures at all, but the weakest in function of the rapacious; and thus the tiger has not been created for the cow, nor the vultures for the hen, but the contrary. All the work of creation proceeds in the same way from insects, birds and quadrupeds to man” (Söderberg and Linnaeus 1748: 548). But the context makes it clear that he had food relations in mind, and not the hierarchy of duties and prerogatives. In this sense should be also interpreted the statement that “animals support themselves on vegetables, vegetables on minerals (terrestribus), minerals on the earth” (Linnaeus 1767–1770, I: 10; cf. Pan Suecicus, § 5, in Ramsbottom 1959: 156). Whatever the case, many considered Linnaeus’ ‘official position’ to be the one presented in the passage cited in the text. Suffice it to mention here the illustrious example of Kant (Critique of the Faculty of Judgement, § 82) and that of the Scottish naturalist John Fleming (1822, I: 52). Fleming’s passage referring to Linnaeus caught Darwin’s attention, who made a mark in the margin of his copy of the work (Darwin Archives, University Library, Cambridge). On Fleming, see Rehbock (1985).
- 57.
On the beneficial effects of the “law of poison”, see also Linnaeus’ Pan Suecicus (1749) in Ramsbottom (1959): 156, 163.
- 58.
- 59.
Söderberg and Linnaeus (1748): 550, 552, 563. Cf. Gedner and Linnaeus (1752): 234): “We have been created for the glory of the Creator, which only manifests itself if we know Him through Revelation, or through Nature, which is the work of creation”. And Biberg and Linnaeus (1749: 56–57): “If we follow the series of things created and consider with what forethought they have been made one for another, we see that all things have in the end been made for man, so that, admiring the works of the Creator, he exalts His glory and jointly enjoys all the things he needs to spend life in comfort and joy”.
- 60.
The Sami inhabitants of Lappland, where he made an important voyage of exploration, enjoyed perfect health because they were ignorant of “inflaming alcoholic beverages, tobacco, tea, coffee, sugar, silk, most spices” (Koerner 1999: 71, 75, 130). Linnaeus criticised luxury food and fashionable habits, including almonds, oysters, raisins, wall-paper, music concerts, maid servants, oil paintings, plaster, “large windows”, “coffee and chocolate, jams and confections, wines and lemonades, jewels and pearls, gold and silver, silk and pomade, dances and parties, music and theater”. He was in favour of bans on import of foreign food, and its replacement by homeland products. Coffee, for instance, was not only a plant that could never be successfully planted in Sweden, since its homeland was on the equator, but also, as Koerner sums it up (ibid., 130), “a French fashion and therefore a moral and medical hazard”. It could be replaced by a brew of “boiled water mixed with burnt peas, beechnuts, almond, beans, maize, wheat, or toasted bread”.
- 61.
For example, lice absorb the excess humours on children’s heads; dogs prefer to leave their foul-smelling and infected excrement on stones or tree trunks or other elevated places, so that plants are not corrupted; insect bites force quadrupeds to move and to keep their legs exercised; mosquito larvae deodorise and purify stagnant water by “eating up the putrefaction”; and so forth (Biberg and Linnaeus 1749: 55).
- 62.
Rediscovered in 1844, they were partially published in 1848 by Elias Magnus Fries (2nd edn. 1878), then in a revised and expanded edition by Knut Hagberg in 1878 (2nd edn. 1960). The complete edition was edited by A.K.E. Malmeström and L. Gustafssson (Linnaeus 1968). German and English translations are available (Linnaeus 1981, 2001, respectively). On the story, the characteristics, the contents of the manuscript and its sources, see Geoffroy (1861), Malmeström (1926 (in particular, 171–186, 191–208, 236–246), 1942, 1981), Gustafsson (1981), Lepenies (1981, 1982), Petry in Linnaeus (2001).
- 63.
On the Lisbon earthquake, see below, Chap. 3.
- 64.
The English translation (1983, repr. 1994) of Lindroth (1965–1966) bore the title The Two Faces of Linnaeus. Perhaps “bivalence” or “ambiguity” would be better than the “duplicity”, which I used. Whatever term we find appropriate, Linnaeus remains a profoundly enigmatic figure. On Linnaeus’ religiosity, see also Malmeström (1926, 1942).
- 65.
As we saw, Linnaeus expressed himself differently in 1752. Diaeta naturalis and other writings contain some even less orthodox opinions. In his Clavis medicinae duplex, exterior et interior (1766), for example, Linnaeus represented the soul as a material substance, inseparable from the body and located between the cerebellum and the medulla oblongata. Not surprisingly Linnaeus incurred criticism by some theologians: see Ehnmark (1951–1952), Wikman (1970): 20, 93; Lindroth (1994).
- 66.
Particularly Seneca. Cf. Wikman (1970: 88): “We have here, then, purely Stoical virtues in a Christianized paraphrase”.
- 67.
The influence of Leibniz and Wolff was mediated by the astronomer Anders Celsius (1701–1744) and the mathematician Samuel Klingenstjerna (1698–1765). Among the physico-theologians who influenced Linnaeus were the already cited Musschenbroek and Derham (whose Physico-Theology had two Swedish editions, in 1736 and 1760), the physiologist and theologian Johann Albert Fabricius (1668–1736), who translated into German Derham’s Astro-Theology (1728) and Physico-Theology (1730), and another German, the already cited pastor Lesser, author of the Insecto-Theologia (1738) and the Testaceo-Theologia (1744), who corresponded with Linnaeus. Between 1740 and 1760 Sweden witnessed a blossoming of physico-theological writings, many of which were imbued with Wolffism. One of the most representatives of this literature was Carl Gustav Löwenhielm (1701–1768). He divided the study of universal economy in oeconomia divina, or naturalis (stora naturliga oeconomien), oeconomia publica (allmänna hushållning) and oeconomia privata (enskilte hushållning). He placed great emphasis on the balance of nature (Lepenies 1982: 18). Linnaeus also drew on the Theologisk og historisk Afhandling om den guddomelige Giengiaeldelses Ret eller just talionis divinum (Theological and Historical Treatise on the Divine Right of Compensation or jus talionis divinum, Copenhagen 1758) by Christian Friis, which was translated into Swedish in 1763. On Linnaeus’ physico-theological sources, see also Ehnmark (1951–1952), Frängsmyr (1971–1972), and Petry in Linnaeus (2001).
- 68.
On Paracelsism in Sweden, see Lindroth (1943). In Linneaus’ Clavis there are also traces of numerology and Pythagoraeanism, which suggests that his use of dichotomies and pentatomies was anything but instrumental. Other examples are given by Lindroth 1994. Linnaeus’ language reveals traces of hermeticism, and of an initiatory notion of natural philosophy. He considered himself not just the prince of botanists, but as God’s anointed. Finally, one should not underestimate the influence of the Lutheran theologian Johann Arndt’s (1555–1621) Vom wahren Christentume (1605–1610), which ran through many editions and reprints, was translated into Swedish in 1647, and generated much controversy.
- 69.
Svagelski (1981: 185–220) argued that compensation was not a cardinal concept in Buffon’s view of nature, as Buffon often stressed imbalances in compensation. It seems excessive, however, to devote refined analysis to what often turns out to be more of a rhetorical topos than a philosophical concept, which Buffon used—like its contrary—as it suited him.
- 70.
“Le cochon” (in Histoire naturelle, 5, 1755: 102–103). Hereafter Buffon’s Histoire naturelle (1749–1767, 15 vols.) will be referred to as HN. Buffon then goes on to say: “[The pig] obviously has useless parts, or rather parts of which it cannot make use, digits in which all the bones are perfectly formed and which nevertheless do not serve any purpose. Nature is therefore very far from submitting to final causes in the composition of beings; why should she not add superabundant parts sometimes, since she so often misses putting essential parts there? […] Why does one want each part to be useful to the others and necessary to the whole in each individual? Is it not enough that, placed together, they do not harm each other? […] All that can subsist together survives; and perhaps there are, in the majority of beings, fewer related, useful, or necessary parts than indifferent, useless, or superabundant ones” (ibid.: 103–104; English transl. in Roger 1997: 292–293). Whenever possible, I have used the translation of Buffon’s texts in Roger (1997), with only a few minor alterations.
- 71.
“Les toucans”, in Histoire naturelle des oiseaux (Buffon 1770–1783), 7, 1780: 109–110.
- 72.
In spite of his criticism of anthropocentrism, Buffon often got carried away by his love for rhetorical effect, to the point of indulging in anthropomorphic vocabulary, especially in his descriptions of animals. Vivid instances are given in Roger (1997: 282–283), who remarks that, by doing so, Buffon was not consistent with his own view of animals. Far from humanising them, he considered them as “mere machines, only insensitive automata”: they had feelings, “even in a higher degree than we have”; they had sensations, and even “consciousness of their current existence”, but they did not think (Buffon 1753: 40–41).
- 73.
We can imagine how Bonnet would have reacted to other examples of beneficial compensation in the Histoire naturelle. To mention only one of them, Buffon (1766: 357) says that fierce animals reproduce rapidly and hence have always been a danger for man, but fortunately Nature has only made timid animals intelligent enough to unite in groups.
- 74.
- 75.
Buffon compared the invasions of mice, locusts and so forth to the great barbaric invasions: “In times when man was still half savage and, like animals, subject to all the laws, and also to the excesses, of nature, have we not witnessed these floods of the human species, the Norse, the Alans, the Huns, the Goths, the peoples, or rather the tribes of animals with human face, without a home and without a name, emerge suddenly from their caves, advance like wild herds, overwhelm everything without any other strength than numbers, ransack cities, overturn empires and, after having destroyed nations and devasted the earth, repopulate it with men equally new and even more barbarous than themselves?” (Buffon 1756a: 248). For Buffon these great movements of men, like the great invasions of mice and locusts, are only “small vicissitudes in the normal course of living nature”.
- 76.
That is, the two types of death are more or less necessary according to whether the species are more or less “crowded”.
- 77.
The notion of a constant quantity of life on earth is an outcome of Buffon’s doctrine of matter and life. The quantity of life is constant because the quantity of “organic molecules” is fixed. They are the indestructible units of living matter. They are able to unite to inorganic matter to form organised bodies. They can be assimilated by the organisms and pass continually from one body to another, thus renewing life. The body of every animal or vegetable is a “mould” (moule), which “assimilates the organic molecules of all animals or vegetables destroyed by death or consumed by time, without distinction”. The inorganic parts which entered into the composition will revert to the common mass of inorganic (brute) matter; the organic parts, which are “perennial”, will be taken up by organized bodies. First, they are sucked up by plants, and then absorbed by animals that feed on vegetables. They serve to the development, maintenance and growth of both animals and vegetables, they constitute their life, and, circulating continually from body to body, animate all organised beings. On the earth, in the air and in the water therefore there is “a given quantity of organic matter that nothing can destroy; at the same time there exists a given number of moulds able to assimilate it, that are continually destroyed and renewed, and the total number of these moulds or individuals is always the same, always proportionate to the quantity of living matter. If such matter were superabundant, if it were not, at all times, employed in equal measure and absorbed entirely by existing moulds, new one would be formed, and new species would appear, because the living matter cannot remain inactive, indeed is always active, and it is sufficient that it unites with organic parts for it to form organised bodies. The form of Nature itself depends on this vast combination, or rather on this invariable proportion” (Buffon 1765: vii–viii, ix). On the concept of organic molecules, see Casini 1958; on Buffon’s theory of life and reproduction, see Roger’s seminal work (1971: 527–584) and Gayon ed. (1992).
- 78.
The obstacles to human population growth are abandonment, mutilation, infanticide, abortion and religious celibacy.
- 79.
The imprint (empreinte) or mould (moule) is the “type” of a species. “Its main features are carved in indelible and perennial characters”, but its “accessory touches” vary, as “no individual is identical to another and no species exists without a great number of varieties” (Buffon 1765, ix–x). The question of whether Buffon was an evolutionist is extremely tricky, all the more so because he changed the meaning he attached to the terms “species” and “genus” (Roger 1997: 325–329) without warning the reader. Fortunately, it is not my job to deal with the question. I can only refer to Daudin’s (1926) classical work, Casini (1958), Barsanti (1983, Chap. 2), Sloan (1973, 1976, 1987), and above all Roger (1997) (esp. Chap. 19).
- 80.
I have used the English translation of this text in Roger (1997): 241.
- 81.
Virey contributed to Charles-Nicolas-Sigisbert Sonnini de Manoncourt’s 1798–1814 edition of Buffon’s Histoire naturelle and wrote many articles for the Nouveau dictionnaire d’histoire naturelle he edited (1st edn., Paris, Déterville, 1803–1804; 2nd edn. 1816–1819). He also published an Histoire naturelle du genre humain (1800).
- 82.
A voracious reader, Virey pushed his strong tendency to eclecticism to the point of endorsing contradictory opinions “with the same force of persuasion”, to the point of deserving the definition of “champion of volte-face” (Blanckaert 1988: 99, 125; same judgement in Rey 1988: 33, and Laurent 1988: 61). He seems to have been the first to use “évolution” in the modern sense, and he was the first critic of Lamarck (Corsi 1987). In his Discours Virey rejects spontaneous generation, vindicating an immaterial “life principle”, final causes and the providential design of an “infinitely intelligent Supreme Cause”. He believed in the radical separation of brute matter and animate matter; yet he argued that the “moral” was nothing but “the physical which escapes vulgar eyes”. He attributed sensibilité to the most elementary forms of animality and saw even in vegetables an “obscure sensitivity”, a “sort of instinct”, “a sort of life, or rather a sort of spirit, conservative and provident, as in animals” (Virey 1801: 13, 33–34).
- 83.
It is no coincidence that Virey manifested sympathy for Bernardin de Saint-Pierre (see below, § 15), albeit specifying that he considered many of his opinions untenable (Virey 1801: 12, note).
- 84.
The law of Sparta is also mentioned by Rousseau (1992: 21), who can hardly be described as a supporter of competitive capitalism.
- 85.
On Virey’s equation of physical beauty and moral superiority, and that of ugliness and physical and spiritual inferiority, see Blanckaert’s (1988: 156–157) shrewd remarks.
- 86.
“Ephemeral roses that shine for the space of dawn” is a reference to the famous line of François de Malherbe’s Consolation à M. du Périer sur la mort de sa fille (1599): “Mais elle était du monde, où les plus belles choses /ont le pire destin; /et, rose, elle a vécu ce que vivent les roses, /l’espace d’un matin”. Virey (1799: 36–37) has the same message as the passage quoted in text, but with a slightly different pitch: “The end that nature imposes on all beings that she has created is the maximum possible reproduction. As it is necessary to destroy in order to live, when the total of dying organised bodies is higher, the general quantity of life must increase in the same proportion, in order to re-establish equilibrium. We live only to destroy, and to form beings of which we will then become the prey: this a universal yoke, which unquestionably weighs on all our heads, and the river of life drags us without respite towards our last dwelling place in the ocean of death. For nature living is only nourishing oneself in order to reproduce: this is the inevitable circle that she forces us to take. Weak instruments of its immortal operations, momentary springs that move a hidden machinery, mortal and pitiful toys in her tyrannical hands, dare we believe ourselves her rivals!”
- 87.
‘Animalculists’ believed that the organism was preformed in one of the “sperm worms”, whereas “ovists” believed that the organism was preformed in the egg (ovum).
- 88.
- 89.
Spallanzani, “Judgement, and Rebuttal of Sperm Worms” (“Sentenza, e confutazione de’ vermicelli spermatici”, draft of a lesson at the University of Pavia (probably November 1791, Biblioteca Municipale “A. Panizzi” of Reggio Emilia; Mss. Regg. B 98, 23v).
- 90.
Needham (1750): 155. On Needham, see Roger (1971): 503–520. Obviously, the argument of waste also affects those who only attribute a nutritive function to tiny animals (Bonnet) or a stimulating function (Spallanzani: see Bonnet to Spallanzani, 29 November 1780, in Bonnet 1971, 409). On the disagreement between Bonnet and Spallanzani regarding the role of seminal liquid in fertilisation, see Bernardi (1986). According to Needham, matter is a compound of two agents, both of them simple and unextended, a principle of movement and a principle of resistance, which act one against the other. As a consequence, all effects in the universe are but the result of action and reaction, and “the life of the universe is a counter-balanced action” (cit. in Starobinski 1999: 47). Starobinski suggests that in these words there can be an echo of Cudworth’s doctrine of immaterial “plastic natures” charged by God to move matter in a regular and ordered way. He also sees in these and other statements of Needham “the source of the idea of compensation, which will be upheld by authors of optimist systems such as Antoine de La Salle or Pierre-Hyacinthe Azaïs” (ibid.: 47, 371 note 78).
- 91.
- 92.
- 93.
The entire passage is full of warlike images and military terms. On Bayle, see the secondary literature in note 16.
- 94.
Svalgelski (1981) discusses all four in detail. La Salle, Azaïs and Robinet are discussed in Rosso (1954a, b, 1969, 1977). On La Salle, see Thuillier (1964). On Azaïs, see Schwieger (1913). On Formey, see Crispini (1989). On Robinet, who is the most studied, see also Damiron (1858–1864), II: 480–539; Vernière (1954), II: 642–652; Roger (1971): 642–657; Solinas (1987). In De la nature Robinet also developed the idea of nature as a gradation of beings, from stones to man, formed by the variations of a single “prototype”. The prototype was “a germ which tends naturally to develop itself”. Each degree of development is a variation of the prototype, “a new combination of the primitive universal plan”. The only difference between stone, plant and animal is “the measure in which they participate in that essence. […] A stone, an oak, a horse, a monkey, a man are graduated variations of the prototype which began to form itself with the least possible number of elements”. See Crocker (1968: 134–135), from which these quotations are taken. We will return to Robinet in Chap. 4. According to Berthelot (1929), it was from Robinet that Goethe drew his influential idea of the prototype of animal form Urthier (“original animal”). Hegel identified the Urthier with Man. Man, he said, is “the unit of measure” of the other forms of life, because it is only the most complex, developed and “perfect” that can be the basis on which rationally to understand the less developed: “it makes no sense to start from infusoria” (Enzyklopädie der philosophischen Wissenschaften, § 368 Z, in Hegel 1970, vol. 9: 502–516). It was conceptual understanding, not empirical explanation in terms of efficient causes, that Hegel pursued. Philosophy could not in the least dispense with taking into account the results of science. Quite the contrary, its task was to bring them to the conceptual unity towards which they all “instinctively conspired”, by revealing their inner logic and rationality, and by connecting them in a general system. In striving after this achievement, it brought to light what scientists themselves often neglected, or were unaware of, because they did not reflect enough on the very categories and concepts they used. This is why Hegel, who rejected the “highly talented Frenchman” Lamarck’s transformism, also objected to the conceptual foundations of Cuvier’s fixism: it is impossible, he said, to establish clear-cut separations between genera, as living nature is too rich and varied to allow such rigid distinctions (ibid., §§ 250–251). As regards Lamarck, his theory of adaptation was ingenious and interesting from an empirical point of view, but faulty from the perspective of conceptual understanding: “However, as often as a thick coat of fur may be found to go together with northerly latitudes, and that the structure of a fish is to be found to go together with water, and that the structure of birds goes together with air, nevertheless the concept of a thick covering of fur is neither contained in the concept of the north, nor does the concept of the sea contain the concept of the structure of fish, nor does the concept of air contain the concept of the structure of birds” (Hegel 2018: 152). Hegel (1970, vol. 2, § 249, § 252 Z: 37–40) did use “evolution” and “involution” in relation to the “stages of nature”, but he had a conceptual structure, not an actual transformation, in mind. Likewise, he did not object to the notions of a scale of organic forms and of a successive appearance of them on earth, provided they were understood in a merely ideal sense, as in the case of Goethe’s metamorphosis of plants, which he accepted (ibid., vol. 9, § 345 Z: 411). Life could not be explained by mechanical or chemical laws. This digression on Hegel and the sciences is much indebted to Bodei (1975), Chap. 2.
- 95.
In a 1792 address to the Convention nationale, Bernardin de Saint-Pierre advocated the institution of a ménagerie in addition to the botanical garden and the cabinet of comparative anatomy, on the grounds of political and moral as well as scientific reasons (Rey 1992; Blanckaert et al. 1997; Baratay and Hardouin-Fugier 1998; Spary 2000; Baratay 2010; Serna 2017). On Bernardin de Saint-Pierre, see Maury (1896), Roule (1930). For a general discussion of the moral and social aspects of the French debate in this period on the relations between natural history, the treatment of animals, their domestication and the image of man’s place in nature, see Piazzesi (2023). I am very grateful to Benedetta Piazzesi for allowing me to read her manuscript before publication.
- 96.
Unlike Newton, La Salle held that the reaction occurs when the action has ceased (1788, 1: 132–133).
- 97.
To be fair, we should note that La Salle applies these recommendations to himself. “My complexion, cold and slothful”, he wrote when presenting himself to the reader in the Preface, “suffers from long stagnation and peace; unrest and a war are necessary for my health” (La Salle 1788, I: xiii). On the widespread belief that war is a beneficent stimulus and a remedy against man’s softening up, see La Vergata (1990), Chap. 3, § 4.
- 98.
The edition of the first volume of Robinet which I used bears the indication “troisième edition” and the date 1766. The second volume bears the date 1763. The third and fourth bear the date 1766.
- 99.
Then work and physical and intellectual effort are necessary: “the gods sold every thing to mortals at the price of labour; not out of envy, but from kindness, for the greatest enjoyment of existence, the sensation of active striving powers, lies in this very struggle, in this striving after the comforts of ease” (Herder 1966: 219). However, Herder argues that “Want alone, even when there is no deficiency of powers in a nation to obey it’s demands, seems equally incapable of producing civilisation: for as soon as the Indolence of man has rendered him contented under his Necessities, and both together have begotten the child he names Convenience, he persists in his condition, and cannot be impelled to improve it without difficulty” (ibid.: 202). On the ethics of effort and the theme of human laziness and the “need for a whip”, see La Vergata (1990), Chap. 3, § 4.
- 100.
Verra (1971: 49). Verra emphasises the importance for Herder’s philosophy of history of the concept of nemesis he developed in his Nemesis (1785) and Gott (1787), in which Herder credited the Swiss mathematician and physicist Johann Heinrich Lambert for giving that “fundamental law” a physical and mathematical formulation.
- 101.
For instance Erasmus’ “asserting the progression of every other race of animal from some lower species” and his “absurd notion […] of Man’s having progressed from an Ouran Outang state” (cit. in King-Hele 1984: 144). In his “Notes of Stillingfleet” Coleridge coined the verb “to darwinize” to refer to such wild “mode of reasoning”: “What! did Sir W[alter] R[aleigh] believe that a male and female ounce (and, if so, why not two tigers and lions, &c.?) would have produced, in course of generations, a cat, or a cat a lion? This is Darwinizing with a vengeance” (Coleridge 1875: 423). Coleridge was commenting on Stillingfleet’s reporting of Raleigh’s “prudent caution, that men ought not to take animals of a mixed nature, as mules or hyenas, nor such as differ in size and shape from each other, as the cat of Europe and ounce of India, into the several species of animals”. On Erasmus Darwin, see Potter (1925), Robinson (1954), Garfinkle (1955), Harrison (1971), Hassler (1973a, b), King-Hele (1977, 1986, 1999, 2014), McNeil (1987), Uglow (2002). A concise presentation is Weber (2014). Elliott (2003) argues that Erasmus influenced Herbert Spencer’s development more than Spencer acknowledged.
- 102.
E. Darwin (1803), I: lines 3–4, 377; II: lines 8, 33; IV: line 146. See also expressions such as “eternal war the Gout and Mania wage” (II: line 361) and such like. Not to mention poetic metaphors such as “warring winds” (I: line 53) or “struggling ships” (I: line 360).
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La Vergata, A. (2023). Abundance and Variety. In: Images of the Economy of Nature, 1650-1930. Evolutionary Biology – New Perspectives on Its Development, vol 7. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-31023-2_2
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