Volume 25, Number 19 · December 7, 1978
Scientists in Society
By Christopher Hill
Robert Boyle and the English Revolution
by J.R. Jacob
Burt Franklin, 240 pp., $18.95
The Newtonians and the English Revolution: 1689-1720
by Margaret C. Jacob
Cornell University Press, 288 pp., $16.50
One of the more tedious historical controversies of recent years has been over the relationship of Puritanism to the origins of modern science in England, and in particular of the Royal Society, founded in 1662. R. K. Merton, in a brilliant study some forty years ago, suggested a close connection. But 'Puritanism' is an elusive word: any statement about it is apt to be predetermined (whether overtly or not) by the definition of the word 'Puritan' which is used. Margot Heinemann has neatly shown that the statement 'Puritans opposed the theater' usually assumes a definition of 'Puritan' as 'a man opposed to the theater.' The best-known enemies of the theater in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century England were in no usual sense of the word Puritans.
Review, 3027 words
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