Ellen McNiven Hine - Böcker

This study illustrates the significance of Jean-Jacques Dortous de Mairan’s networking in the spread of Enlightenment thought. It focuses primarily on the unpublished correspondence between Mairan and the Geneva scientists, Firmin Abauzit, Gabriel Cramer, Jean Jallabert and Charles Bonnet. Mairan was an assiduous correspondent whose letters reveal the progress of scientific thought in the first three quarters of the eighteenth century. Despite the high regard in which of his contemporaries, he has been, until recently, relatively neglected by Enlightenment scholars. This is the first full-length study devoted to Mairan’s relations with scientists in other countries, to the process of cross-fertilisation in the production of scientific knowledge, and to his considerable influence on the development of scientific thought on key issues. The topics covered in the letters range from the Shape of the Earth and vis vivacontroversies and the medical powers of electricity, to the nature of the Seichesin the Lac du Léman and the origin of monsters. One of the major interests of the correspondence is Mairan’s obvious fascination with Newton. Neglect of his contribution to the history of ideas can be partly explained by the fact that he was unfairly considered a ‘last-ditch’ Cartesian in a triumphantly Newtonian world. The detailed analysis of the letters in this study amply shows a constant preoccupation with both the Opticks and the Principiaand a fairly sophisticated understanding of scientific method. The letters abound in references to other scientists, such as the Bernoullis, Nollet, Dufay and Maupertuis. They provide an exciting, unguarded and ‘behind-the-scenes’ view of scientific developments before they were finalised and appeared in published works. It is particularly revealing, therefore, to compare the letters to Mairan’s contributions to the Mémoires de l’Académie royale des sciences, his early dissertations, and his mature works. Mairan’s unpublished correspondence with Geneva scientists is a treasure-house of information on personalities, ideas and controversies of crucial importance to the international scientific community from 1717 to 1769.

Largely forgotten during the second half of the nineteenth century and throughout most of the twentieth century, Constance de Salm (Constance-Marie de Théis, Mme Pipelet de Leury, later Princess de Salm-Reifferscheid-Dyck,) finally attracted the attention of such scholars as Elizabeth Colwill, Geneviève Fraisse, Huguette Krief, and Christine Planté in the early twenty-first century. However, there has to date been no comprehensive study of her published works, her vast correspondence, and the importance of her cultural exchanges. In this book, Ellen McNiven Hine contributes to the recent upsurge of interest in the literature of this particularly turbulent period in French history. This book considers not only her literary aspirations and claim to fame but also such topics as her contribution to the scientific culture of the period, the extent of the political involvement of a «non-activist» woman, her challenge to what she saw as inequitable provisions in the Civil Code, her championing of women’s progress in literature and the arts, and the role that networking and patronage played in her personal and professional life. Moreover, the study highlights the similarities and differences between her life, writing, and influence and those of other postrevolutionary women such as Mary Wollstonecraft, Germaine de Staël, Margaret Somerville, and Louise Colet.Constance de Salm uses a variety of genres to address issues of particular importance to women, such as equal access to educational opportunities, the cost to women’s health of reproduction, and lack of economic resources for single and widowed women. She displays a surprising modernity in her awareness of the difficulty of resolving relationship, career, and motherhood problems that continue to plague women in the twenty-first century and points to a future in which women will have access to educational and employment opportunities.

The Traite des systemes is a milestone in the intellectual history of the eighteenth century. This is a study of its content, structure, sources and importance. It includes a discussion of Condillac's analysis of good and bad systems, the adequacy of his knowledge and under­ standing of the speculative metaphysics of the preceding century, the effectiveness of his method of attack on seventeenth-century metaphysical systems, his conception of empirical and scientific method, and in particular his understanding of the role of hypotheses, his application of the Newtonian scientific method to politics, physics, and the arts, and, finally, his preoccupation with the meaning of words and with the origin and purpose oflanguage. Speculative metaphysical systems, such as those of Descartes, Malebranche, Boursier, Leibniz and Spinoza, are attacked by Con­ dillac, as are popular superstitions and prejudices, with the weapon of linguistic criticism. It is the systematic use of this weapon which makes the Traite des systemes more than a reflection of his contem­ poraries' antipathy towards speculative metaphysics. In memory of my MOTHER and FATHER ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I wish to acknowledge my indebtedness to several people. I should like first and foremost to thank Dr. W. H. Barber, who has for many years tirelessly given me encouragement and invaluable assistance. I wish to thank also Professors RH. Rasmussen, A. D. Wilshere and C. Wake for their help and their support in the early days of the preparation of this study. lowe special thanks also to Mrs. M. V.