Robert Boyle (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) Cite this entry Search the SEP • Advanced Search • Tools • RSS FeedTable of Contents• What's New• Archives• Projected ContentsEditorial Information• About the SEP• Editorial Board• How to Cite the SEP• Special CharactersSupport the SEPContact the SEP ©Metaphysics Research Lab,CSLI,Stanford University  Open access to the SEP is made possible by a world-wide funding initiative. Please Read How You Can Help Keep the Encyclopedia FreeRobert BoyleFirst published Tue Jan 15, 2002; substantive revision Tue Jul 11, 2006Boyle was one of a leading intellectual figures of the seventeenthcentury. He was a dedicated experimenter, unwilling to constructabstract theories to which his results had to conform. "Our Boyle,"Oldenburg wrote to Spinoza, "is one of those who are distrustfulenough of their reasoning to wish that the phenomena should agree withit" (Hall & Hall 1965-1977, 2:38). Boyle, a champion of both thecorpuscularian doctrine and the Baconian method of natural history,preferred to report the results of his experiments, including negativeresults, and frequently lamented the fact that we lacked "histories"(collections of experimental results and accurate observations) invarious fields of scientific endeavour. He performed so manyexperiments that he was able, at one "time to loose … at oncenear five centuries of Experiments of my own" (BP 9:28). Nor was thisan isolated loss; nonetheless the number, variety and scope of hisexperiments were such that he carried on working and publishing withno particular difficulty. "His books," as Huygens remarked to Leibnizimmediately after Boyle's death, "are full of experiments" (Huygens1888, 10:239). Moreover, experiments were exactly what he wasinterested in, he had a certain missionary zeal in spreading thecorpuscularian gospel, but he was not himself interested in detailedsystem building,[1] a fact that was commonly noted. Leibniz told Huygens that he was"astonished" that Boyle "who has so many fine experiments, [had] notcome to some theory of chemistry after meditating so long on them. Yetin his books, and for all the consequences that he draws from hisobservations, he concludes only what we all know, that everythinghappens mechanically. He is perhaps too reserved. Excellent men shouldleave us even their conjectures; they are wrong if they wish to giveus only those truths that are certain" (Leibniz to Huygens, Dec. 29,1691, in Huygens 1888, 10:228). Boyle was ahead of his time. In thenext century d'Alembert wrote "the taste for systems … is todayalmost entirely banished from works of merit … a writer amongus who praised systems would have come too late" (d'Alembert 1751, 94).[2]Boyle was a corpuscularian, a term he employed to paper over thedifferences between believers in a vacuum, and believers in a plenum,given that both of them agreed that the explanation of naturaloccurrences should be solely in terms of particles of matter, theirmotion and interaction. Boyle consistently refused to pronounce on thequestion of whether these minima naturalia should beconsidered atoms, in the strict sense of that term, or not.[3]Even a metaphysical non-corpuscularian such as Leibniz agreed withBoyle in practical terms. "However much I agree with the Scholastics inthis general and, so to speak, metaphysical explanation of theprinciples of bodies," he wrote to Arnauld in July 1686, "I am ascorpuscular as one can be in the explanation of particular phenomena,and it is saying nothing to allege that they have forms or qualities"(Gerhardt 1875, 2:58, trans. Mason 1967).Boyle's scientific range was wide. Besides his well known work inmechanics, medicine, hydrodynamics and a wide variety of experimentswith his vacuum pump, he was interested both theoretically andpractically in alchemy (see Principe 1998, Clericuzio 2000, Newman andPrincipe 2002), where his interest seems to have been fueled more byhis constant desire to acquire knowledge of God and the world than byany desire for riches. He "cultivated Chymistry with a disinterestedmind," seeking the improvement of his own knowledge, "thegratifying the Curious & the Industrious; and the Acquistof some useful helps to make good & uncommon Medicins."[4] As a corpuscularian he believed that transmutation was physicallypossible. As a person he believed that it actually occurred. Hebelieved that in his own laboratory gold had been transmuted into a"baser metal" with a specific gravity about two thirds of that ofgold, and since he was, he said, more interested in the luciferousaspect of discovery than the lucriferous, he found the process equallyinteresting in either direction.[5]During the course of his life he sought constantly to improve thelot of humanity. He was interested in the improvement of agriculturalmethods, in the possibility of extracting fresh water from salt, in theimprovement of medicines and medicinal practice, in the possibility ofpreserving food by vacuum packing, and in a number of other usefulresults, actual or potential, of experimental philosophy. He viewed histheological interests and his work in natural philosophy as forming aseamless whole and constantly used results from the one area toenlighten matters in the other. (On the relation between science andreligion in Boyle's thought see Hunter 2000.)Convinced that Christianity was the religion instituted by God,Boyle was concerned that the Bible should be widely promulgated and hedevoted time and energy to having it translated into a variety oflanguages such as Irish, Turkish, and various native Americanlanguages. He viewed such conversion attempts as being on all fourswith his attempts to find more efficacious medicines for:To convert Infidels to the Christian Religion is a work ofgreat Charity and kindnes to men. I. In regard of the evills it freesthem from, such as, (1) the gross errors and prejudices they hadentertain'd before they were instructed in it. (2ly) The vices andpolutions they securely liv'd in, before they receiv'd the Gospel;some of which were unworthy of men as such; othersvery prejudicial to humane society's; and others verymischievous to the vicious persons themselves; and others<againe> great hinderances to the discovery and reception ofusefull and noble truths. (3ly) The unexpressible Infelicitys thatattend the greatest part of such Infidels & wicked Persons, in thefuture state. II. The Christian Religion brings mankind diverse positive Benefits,such as are, more cleare and extensive knowledg of God, and divinethings; the Remission of Sins; the Favour of God; severall graces andvertues suitable to mens respective needs and conditions; and aboveall, a happy Immortality in the Life to come. (Boyle Papers [BP]5:73-4; BOA §3.7.4, p 301)1. Life2. Religious Views3. Boyle's World View4. Laws of Nature5. Boyle's Law6. Perception and the SoulBibliographyOther Internet ResourcesRelated Entries1. Life[6]Robert Boyle was born in Lismore, in Ireland, on the January 25,1627. He was his parents' fourteenth, penultimate, child, and the lastto survive to adulthood. Boyle was the youngest son and, after hissister Margaret died when he was 10, the youngest child of the family.Boyle speaks fondly of his parents, but he could not have known themwell. His mother died in childbirth a few weeks after Boyle's thirdbirthday, and he last saw his father just before he and his brotherFrancis left for a continental tour when Boyle was twelve.Like many children Boyle had his share of near escapes from seriousinjury as a child, but the time and Boyle being what they were he sawin each of them the hand of God. Michael Hunter has pointed out that"the spiritual autobiography, aimed at chronicling God's purpose forthe individual in question by recounting providential escapes,spiritual trials and conversion experiences," was "a characteristicgenre of autobiographical writing in seventeenth-century England"(Hunter 1994a, xx), and Nicolas Canny notes that "The invocation ofprovidence as an explanation for accidental or chance happenings inthis life was so commonplace among sincere Protestants in the earlyseventeenth century that it had come to be considered irreverent orprofane not so to attribute them" (Canny 1982, 28). But, though commonenough, there is no doubt that, in Boyle's case at least, theprotestations were sincere. He continued to believe in this divineattention, though in a more intellectual realm, throughout his life. In1663 he wrote,And though I dare not affirm … that God discloses toMen the Great Mystery of Chymistry by Good Angels, or by NocturnalVisions … yet perswaded I am, that the favor of God does (muchmore than most Men are aware of) vouchsafe to promote some MensProficiency in the study of Nature (Boyle Works [BW], 3:276, Birch1772, II:61).[7]In Geneva on his continental tour Boyle underwent what he clearly feltto be a conversion from nominal or at least unthinking Christianity tocommitted Christianity. One summer night, he "was suddenly waked in aFright with such loud Claps of Thunder … & every clap… both preceded & attended with Flashes of lightning sonumerous … & so dazling, that [he] began to imagine… the Day of Judgment's being come." This led him to vow that"all further additions to his life shud be more Religiously &carefully employ'd." Realizing the inefficacy of a promise exactedunder duress, Boyle repeated the performance under a serene andcloudless sky "so solemnly that from that Day he dated his Conversion;renewing now he was past Danger, the vow he had made whilst he fancy'dhimselfe to be in it: that tho his Feare was (& he blush't it wasso) the … occasion of his Resolution of Amendment; yet at leasthe might not owe his more deliberate consecration … of himselfeto Piety, to any less noble Motive then that of it's owne Excellence"(BP 37:181r-v, Hunter 1994a, 16).The promise seems never to have been broken, and indeed the laterBoyle stressed the need to have an examined faith. He pointedout that "usually, such as are born in such a place, espouse theopinions true or false, that obtain there" (BW, 12:421, Birch 1772,VI:712), indeed, "the greatest number of those that pass forChristians, profess themselves such only because Christianity is thereligion of their Parents, or their Country, or their Prince, or thosethat have been, or may be, their Benefactors; which is in effect tosay, that they are Christians, but upon the same grounds that wouldhave made them Mahometans, if they had been born and bred in Turky"(BP 7:233, BOA §3.7.5, pp 301-2). Boyle felt that more wasrequired of the thinking believer. Locke agreed: often a child'snotion of God does more "resemble the Opinion, and Notion of theTeacher, than represent the True God" (Essay, 1.14.13).Hard on the heels of Boyle's enlightenment, doubts about his faithbegan to trouble him,[8] and these "distracting Doubts of some of theFundamentals of Christianity" continued: "never after did thesefleeting Clouds, cease now & then to darken … the clearestserenity of his quiet: which made him often say that Injections of thisNature were such a Disease to his Faith as the Tooth-ach is to theBody; for tho it be not mortall, ‘tis very troublesome" (BP 37:182r,Hunter 1994a, 17).Leaving Switzerland, Boyle, along with Marcombes and his brothercrossed the Alps and entered Italy in September 1641 where, inFlorence, he spent the winter. "In Italy he read over thelives of the ancient philosophers with the utmost attention,"presumably in Diogenes Laertius, and "[t]he sect, which then struck himmost, was that of the Stoics; and he tried his proficiency in theirphilosophy, by enduring a long fit of the tooth-ach with great unconcernedness."[9] Still in Italy he had (in the winter of 41-42) what seems to havebeen one of the very few sexual encounters of his life. Writing abouthimself in the third person as Philaretus (sometimes P., or Filaretus)he says:Nor did he sometimes scruple, in his Governor's Company, tovisit the famousest Bordellos; whither resorting out of bare Curiosity,he retain'd there an unblemish't Chastity, & still return'd thenceas honest as he went thither. Professing that he never found any suchsermons against them, as they were against themselves. The ImpudentNakednesse of vice, clothing it with a Difformity, Description cannotreach, & the worst of Epithetes cannot but flatter. But tho P. werenoe Fewell for forbidden Flames, he prov'd the Object of unnaturallones. For being at that Time not above 15, & the Cares of the Worldhaving not yet faded a Complexion naturally fresh enuf; as he was onceunaccompany'd diverting himselfe abroad, he was somewhat rudely presstby the Preposterous Courtship of 2 of those Fryers, whose Lust makes nodistinction of Sexes; but that which it's Preference of their ownecreates; & not without Difficulty, & Danger, forc't a scapefrom these gown'd Sodomites. Whose Goatish Heates, serv'd not a littleto arme Filaretus against such Peoples specious Hyprocrisy; &heightn'd & fortify'd in him an Aversenesse for Opinions, which nowthe Religieux discredit as well as the Religion (BP 37:184r-v, Hunter1994a, 20).Leaving Italy Marcombes and the two boys found on arrival inMarseilles that the monies the Great Earl had been in the habit ofsending were no longer to arrive and that, indeed, the last quarter'spayment had been held up by Cork's London agent. Moreover, there was aletter from the Earl, unaware of the mischance affecting the quarterlypayment, telling them that, as a result of the rebellion in Ireland, nomore money was to be forthcoming: in the "dangerous and poore estatewhereunto by gods providence" he had been reduced, he had "with muchdifficulty gott together two hundred and fifty pounds by selling ofplate," but to pay Marcombes' bills punctually as he had in the past "Iam noe waies able." So he advised Marcombes to use the money to bringthe two boysout of some meet port in France to land either at dublin,Corke, or Youghall, (for all other Cities and Sea townes are possessedby the enemy), or else my two sonnes [must] travaile into Holland, andputt themselves into entertaynement under the service and conduct ofthe Prince of Orange; for they must henceforward maintayne themselvesby such entertaynements as they gett in the warres (Earl of Cork toMarcombes 9 March 1641/2, Maddison 1969, 47).In the event Francis decided to return to Ireland, arriving in timeto fight in the Battle of Liscarrol (September 3, 1642), at whichanother Boyle brother, Lewis, was killed. Meanwhile Robert decided thathis health and lack of money ruled out a return to Ireland, and his agemade soldiering in Holland an untempting and indeed implausible prospect.[10] He therefore decided to accept Marcombes'offer of hospitality in Geneva, and did not make his way to Englanduntil the summer of 1644.Before leaving Geneva Boyle had a conversation with FrançoisPerreaud (1572-1657), who later wrote Démonographie, outraité des démons, which Boyle then arranged to havetranslated into English by Peter du Moulin (the younger, 1601-1684). Ina letter prefixed to the English edition Boyle recalled that "theconversation I had with that pious Author during my stay atGeneva, and the present he was pleased to make me of thisTreatise before it was printed, in a place where I had opportunities toenquire both after the writer, and some passages of the booke, did atlength overcome in me (as to this narrative) all my settledindisposedness to believe strange things." (BW 1:15) Acceptance of atleast the possibility of diabolic or angelic intervention wascommon among the intelligentsia in the second half of the seventeenthcentury. Cudworth pointed out one expedient reason for the belief:all these Extraordinary Phænomena, ofApparitions, Witchcraft, Possessions, Miracles, andProphecies, do Evince that Spirits, Angels or Demons,though Invisible to us, are no Phancies, but Realand Substantial Inhabitants of the World; which favours not theAtheistick Hypothesis; but some of them, as the Higher kind ofMiracles, and Predictions, do also immediatly enforce theacknowledgment of a Deity: a Being superiour toNature, which therefore can check and controul it; and whichcomprehending the whole, foreknows the most Remotely distant,and Contingent Events (Cudworth 1678, 715).[11].In a manuscript draft ("Loose papers whence some things are to beextracted for the Discourse of the causes of Atheism") Boyle consideredthree objections that might be made against such a belief: theimplausibility of the standard means of bringing about suchintervention; the unreliability of the witnesses; and the impossibilityof incorporeal beings interacting with matter. He agrees that the firstobjection, "urg'd with great confidence, and not without much show ofReason" is a strong one, but suggests that "we men understand verylittle of the nature, customes, & government of the Intelligentcreatures of the spirituall world: and particularly what concernes theFalne Angells or bad Daemons. And therefore they being themselvesinvisible to us, and capable of working in wayes that our sences cannotdiscerne; and being Agents of great craft & long experience; tis nowonder that many of their actions, thô never so pollyticklycontrived & carried on, should seem irrationall to us: who know solittle of their particular inclinations & designes, and the subtil& secret methods in which they carry them on."The second objection he also accepts, though not wholly: "thôupon particular & cogent proofe I beleeve some of them to be true… yet I reject or distrust far the greatest part, as not beingsoe attested." The third he rejects as being simply inconsistent, forthe human soul is accepted as incorporeal, and it works (though we knownot how) on matter (BP 2:105, BOA §3.5.21, pp 257-8).When Boyle arrived back in England in mid-1644 at the age of 17 hewas quickly reunited with his sister Katherine who seems immediately tohave re-adopted the semi-maternal role she had no doubt often playedafter the death of their mother. She was concerned in a variety ofother ways to look after his welfare, both spiritual and worldly. Shewas, for example, the immediate cause of his getting to know themembers of the Hartlib circle.[12]At this time Boyle settled in Stalbridge (on an estate left to himby his father) and occupied himself mainly in writing or planning worksin ethics and theology. Much of his time during the early part of thisStalbridge period was spent in moral philosophy — "My Ethicsgo very slowly on," he wrote to his sister Katherine on March 30, 1646(BC 1:34) — and there was at this stage no reason to think that hewould become one of the great natural philosophers of his time. (Seefurther, Hunter 1995b.) He already approximated to the "lay-bishop"that Aubrey, quoting Anthony Walker, was later to find him to be. Hewas, in fact, a serious, somewhat priggish young man, though he oftengave signs of light-heartedness both as a boy and in later life. Afterhis death Gilbert Burnet claimed that "As for Joy, he had indeednothing of Frolick and Levity in him," a judgement accepted by StevenShapin, but this fails to allow for the lighter moments that Boyleundoubtedly enjoyed.[13]At Stalbridge, about 1649, Boyle began to be interested inexperimenting, but was hindered by the fact that he could not obtain afurnace. Stalbridge was far enough away from tradespeople who couldmake such an item and the furnaces Boyle ordered tended to arrive"crumbled into as many pieces, as we into sects," leaving Boyle toattempt "such experiments, as the unfurnishedness of the place, and thepresent distractedness of my mind, will permit me" (BC 1:50).Boyle was troubled throughout his life by the fragmentation ofChristianity. Among "the giddy multitude … this multiplicity ofreligions will end in none at all," he wrote to John Mallet in 1652,[14] and at the very end of his life heexpressed in his Will the wish that the Boyle lecturers should, when"proveing the Christian Religion against notorious Infidels(viz), Theists, Pagans, Jews and Mahometans, not [descend]lower to any Controversies that are among Christians themselves."[15]Eventually, however, a furnace did arrive, and Boyle found himself"so transported and bewitch'd [as to] fancy my Laboratory a kind ofElysium … . I there forget my Standish and my Bookes and allmostall things" (Boyle to Katherine Ranelagh, Aug 31, 1649, BC 1:83)..Boyle was never a student at a university. Nor was he ever a fellowof an Oxford College, though that too has been claimed on his behalf(Dutton 1951, 20), but it was to Oxford that he removed after his timeat Stalbridge, and it was there that his interest in natural philosophyflowered. Before taking up residence in Oxford however he paid twolengthy visits to Ireland during the early 50s (for a year from June1652, and then for eight months from Oct 1653), and it was from that"illiterate country" that he wrote to Clodius, probably toward the endof his second Irish visit, in the spring of 1654:For my part, that I may not live wholly useless, oraltogether a stranger in the study of nature, since I want glasses andfurnaces to make a chemical analysis of inanimate bodies, I amexercising myself in making anatomical dissections of living animals:wherein (being assisted by your father-in-law's friend DrPetty, our general's physician) I have satisfied myself of thecirculation of the blood, and the (freshly discovered and hardlydiscoverable) receptaculum chyli, made by the confluence of the venae lactae;[16] and have seen (especially in thedissections of fishes) more of the variety and contrivances of nature,and the majesty and wisdom of her author, than all the books I everread in my life could give me convincing notions of (BC1:167).It was also during this period, no doubt in large part due toCromwell's extremely harsh treatment of the Irish, that Boyle's Irishproperties were made secure and began returning rents to him,ultimately reaching almost £3000 p.a., Hooke told Aubrey. Thefact that Boyle's friend Petty conducted the survey on which thedisposal of the lands was based can hardly have been to Boyle'sdisadvantage.On October 12, 1655, Katherine was in Oxford investigating thesuitability of possible lodgings for Boyle. He was to lodge with theapothecary John Crosse, whom Birch felt worthy of mention because hehad "a great acquaintance with Dr. John Fell,"[17] and thequestion was, which was the best room for his purposes, and how was itto be furnished?My Brother,It has pleased god to bring us safe to oxford & I am lodged at MrCrosses with designe to be able to give you from experience an accoumptwhich is the warmest roome, & indeed I am satisfied with neither ofthem as to that poynt, because the doores are placed soe just by theChimeys that if you have the benifit of the fier you must venturehaveing the inconvenience of the wind, which yet may be helped ineither by a folding skreen & then I think that which lookes intothe garden wilbe the more Comfortable… (BC 1:193).The house in question stood on the site where the Shelley Memorialnow stands, and his two rooms there seem to have served Boyleadmirably, though he later set up a retreat at Stanton St John's, wherehe could retire when the press of society grew too great in Oxford.In Oxford Boyle's tremendous output of works in philosophy,theology, and experimental philosophy began. It was here that hepublished New Experiments Physico-Mechanical, Touching the Springof Air and its Effects, Certain Physiological Essays, The ScepticalChymist, Some Considerations touching the Usefulness of ExperimentalNatural Philosophy, and a number of others including TheOrigine of Forms and Qualities.Boyle's years in London (from 1668 to his death) saw thecontinuation of his experimental work, along with a number of works onphilosophy and theology, including The Excellency of Theology,Compar'd with Natural Philosophy, Considerations About theExcellency and Grounds of the Mechanical Hypothesis, the FreeEnquiry into the Vulgarly Receiv'd Notion of Nature, theDiscourse of things above Reason, Disquisition about the FinalCauses of Natural Things, and The Christian Virtuoso.In 1691 Katherine died, and Boyle, whose health throughout his lifehad been poor, died the following week.2. Religious ViewsThe seventeenth century is notable not only for the number but alsofor the variety of arguments which were offered to prove God'sexistence. Although writers such as Pascal and Bayle felt sucharguments to be both unnecessary and unavailable, demonstrations ofGod's existence were felt by many to be not only possible butdesirable, since they were necessary in the fight against atheism.[18]Descartes, as is well known, felt that God's existence could be, andepistemologically had to be, demonstrated, and offered a variety ofproofs to provide such a demonstration. His version of the ontologicalargument, his proof from the supposed innate idea of God, his prooffrom the need for an eternal conscious being,[19] and his proof fromthe need for continuing creation, all found supporters in the laterseventeenth century, though the first two were generally held to beunlikely to convince anyone.Apart from a brief reference to it in the printed works Boyle doesnot mention the ontological argument (BW 9:413; Boyle 1772, 4:461-2).This distancing was not uncommon at the time. Ralph Cudworth, thoughclearly fascinated by the ontological argument, recognized that mostwould "Distrust, the Firmness and Solidity of suchthin and Subtle Cobwebs," and offered analternative argument in the hope that it would prove more "Convictiveof the Existence of a God to the Generality" (Cudworth 1678,725).The language of the ontological argument was acceptable, even whenthe argument's validity was rejected. Gassendi, for example, agreedthat God is that than which nothing greater can be conceived, butdenied the validity of the argument which offers this as its mainpremise (See further Osler 1994, ch. 2).Nor was the argument from innate ideas more popular. After hisdialogue character Cuphophron has espoused it, Henry More has his downto earth Hylobares burst out:Well, Cuphophron, you may hug your self in yourhigh Metaphysicall Acropolis as much as you will, anddeem those Arguments fetched from the frame of Nature mean and popular:but for my part, I look upon them as the most sound and solidPhilosophicall Arguments that are for the proving the Existence of aGod (More 1668, 53).[20]Boyle, too, held that design arguments were both available and themost likely to persuade rational, open-minded hearers. Such argumentswere intended to form a large part of a book on atheism, something heworked on throughout his adult life but never published, though partsof it were used in various other works of a theological nature.[21] Boyledid, however, leave a plan of the intended work, and in the manuscriptremains — seven volumes of correspondence, forty-six volumes ofmiscellaneous papers and eighteen volumes of notebooks — there arestill a number of unpublished fragments and some longer selectionswhich he intended for this work.Boyle intended "the little Tract about Atheism" to have threesections:In the First of these, the Author represents some Reasonswhy it should not be thought strange if it be found somewhat difficultto demonstrate the Existence of a Deity. 1 The First of these Reasons is, that by reason of theselfe existence and Primity of God, his Essence cannot be Causable. 2 The Vitious Affections & Habits and the depravd frame of mindto be met with in most Atheists do very much indispose them to beconvinc'd by the proofes of a Deity that might other wise besufficient.3 Since God is a Being whose Nature is the most singular of all,there must necessarily belong to him divers things, not to beparalleld.4 The Difficulty of such speculations as belong to theContemplations of Gods Attributes keeps the generality of Atheists& Libertines from being qualifyed for such Enquiries.In the second section <the Author> haveing premisd, that theforegoing Reasons make it Equitable not to expect metaphysical or rigidDemonstrations of a Deity, but to be content with a moral one, if nobetter can be had, proceeds to the mediums whereof such a Demonstrationcan be made up. Such as areThe innate Idea of a Deity The general Consent of mankind. (To one of which or both may bereferrd the Epicurean Anticipation.)The Reproaches or Boadings & Disquieting Terrors of a GuiltyConscienceThe Fabrick & Conservation of the world, especially ofAnimalsThe Nature & Propertys of the Soul of ManThe Lawes of its Union with the Body[22]The Universal Providence that directs the Affairs of Mankind.Supernatural Effects whether of good or Evil Spirits (as theirApparitions Action Oracles Predictions &c)The Patefactions that God has made of himselfe by true miracles. (Towhich Prophecies are reduc'd.)The Third section is spent in shewing some of the Reasons why theArguments proposd in the Second are often unprevalent.1 And among the Intellectual Impediments the First is, That Atheistsoften injuriously attribute to the notion of a Deity the fond Opinionsor rash Assertions of unskillfull men.2 Atheists on the other side do sometimes no less injuriously fathertheir owne Errors & mistakes on the notion of a Deity.3 They do not equitably consider the Nature of the Thing to beproved, & the necessity that thence arises, that the Theory of theDivine Attributes should be lyable to specious Objections.4 They do not duely consider, that their owne Hypothesis is lyableto some of the same difficulties & Objections, and to others thatthey cannot solve.5 The Objections are more popular & easy that are to be madeagainst the notion of a Deity than the Answers to those Objections& the Arguments which prove that Notion.Well, that was the plan, and Boyle certainly thought that the designarguments he intended for section two should convince the open-minded.Moreover, he thought, such arguments should particularly convince thosewho were knowledgeable about nature, who knew enough about thedetails of the world to be impressed by the intricacy of thepresumed workmanship. "[T]here are," he wrote, "positive Reasonsafforded by Philosophy to prove a Deity, namely … the CartesianIdæa, the Originall of Motion, the use of Parts in Animalls,especially the Eye, the valves of the heart, the musculi perforantes& perforati,[23] & the temporary [parts][24] of a foetus <& the Mother>."The argument from design, said Kant, "always deserves to bementioned with respect. It is the oldest, the clearest, and the mostaccordant with the common reason of mankind" (Kant 1781, A623/B651).But, he pointed out, there was a problem with it, a problem which infact had already been pointed not only by David Hume,[25] but byBoyle's younger contemporary, Charles Blount, who wrote,could we conclude any thing from Miracles, yet wecould never thence conclude of the Existence of God. For sincea Miracle is Work limited, and never implies any but a certainand limited Power: most certain and evident it is, that from such anEffect we cannot rightly infer the Existence of a Cause whose Power isinfinite, but at most of a Cause whose Power is greater: Isay, at most; because from many Causes concurring there mayfollow some Work, whose Force and Power is indeed less than the Powerof all its Causes put together, but far greater than the Power of anyone of them taken singularly (Blount 1683, 11).To a large extent Boyle accepted these points. He notes explicitlythat none of the proofs he was prepared to offer amounted to ademonstration of God's existence, and indeed he felt that ademonstration was not possible. A demonstration wastypically held to proceed from necessarily true premises (oftenAristotelian principles[26]) via a valid argument to a necessarily true conclusion, and part ofwhat was at issue was whether we should be looking for a demonstrationof God's existence, or something less which would nonetheless still beuseful in the fight against atheism . "To haue the Science of athing," said Pierre du Moulin the elder, "two certainties arerequired. The one is, that the thing be certaine of it selfe andvnchangeable. The second is, that the perswasion which wee haue of itbe firme and cleare" (Du Moulin 1624, 162). Gassendi agreed, as didArnauld and Nicole in the Port Royal Logic (Gassendi 1658, Canon XVI,144; Arnauld 1662, part IV, ch 8, 323-4, pagination as in the 5th,1683 edition).The persuasive alternative to a demonstration was sometimes styled aproof, but often people spoke of moral demonstrationsas opposed to strict, or mathematical, demonstrations. Boyle wrote:besides the Demonstrations wont to be treated of in vulgarLogick, there are among Philosophers three distinct, whetherkinds or degrees, of Demonstration. For there is aMetaphysical Demonstration, as we may call that, where theConclusion is manifestly built on those general Metaphysical Axioms,that can never be other than true; such as Nihil potest simul esse& non esse … &c. (Nothing can both be and not be atthe same time) There are also Physical Demonstrations, wherethe Conclusion is evidently deduc'd from Physical Principles; such as… Ex nihilo nihil fit … &c. (From nothing,nothing comes) which are not so absolutely certain as the former,because, if there be a God, He may (at least for ought we know) be ableto create & annihilate Substances …. And lastly, there areMoral Demonstrations … where the Conclusion is built,either upon some one such proof cogent in its kind, or someconcurrence of Probabilities, that it cannot but be allowed, supposingthe truth of the most receiv'd Rules of Prudence and Principles ofPractical Philosophy. And this third kind of Probation, though it come behind thetwo others in certainty, yet it is the surest guide, which theActions of Men, though not their Contemplations, haveregularly allow'd them to follow (BW, 8:281; Boyle 1772, 4:182-3).This moral certainty, Locke remarked, "is not only as great as ourframe can attain to, but as our Condition needs" (Locke 1690,4.11.8).When we look in detail at Boyle's discussions of the various moraldemonstrations outlined in his proposed second section it becomes clearthat he fancied some considerably more than others. He often mentionsthe importance of conscience, but concentrates, as far as proofs go, onvarious design arguments, on arguments based on the incorporeality ofthe human soul, and on arguments involving miracles. Unlike theclerical authors of the time he pays little or no attention to thearguments from "the innate Idea of the Deity," from "the generalConsent of Mankind," or from "the Universal Providence that directs theAffairs of Mankind."Boyle did not expect his (or anyone's) proofs to convince mostatheists:you need not thinke it strange, that I never pretended toconvert resolved Atheists. For, besides the difficulty of treatingclearly and cogently of such abstruse subjects as are many that relateto Atheism; the Will and Affections have so great an influence uponsome mens Understandings, that ‘tis almost as difficult to make thembeleive, as to make them Love, against their Will.And it must be a very dazzleing Light, that makes an impression uponthose that obstinately shut their Eyes against it. ‘Tis not by Godsordinary workes, but by his Extraordinary Power, that such men must bereclaimd to an acknowledgement of his <Existence>. For they thatwould find the Truth, especially in matters of Religion, must bediligent Inquirers after it, and may be strictExaminers of it, but must not beresolved Enemies to it. For tosuch, if to any, God is a Sun, that is not to be discover'd but by<his> owne Light (BP 2:64, BOA §4.6.9 , p 384).Boyle was aware that most believers held their belief oninsufficient grounds (see BP 4:60, BOA §3.7.5, pp. 301-2), butfelt himself fortunate in that sound philosophy showed that thereligion to which he was born was the correct one. For Boyle, miracles(in particular the miracle of Pentecost) were a crucial factor inopting for Christianity. The Christian miracles, he felt, clearly borethe stamp of God upon them. There were, he agreed, other miracles orapparent miracles, but the miracles which purported to establishChristianity were neither pretenses nor diabolical, and theywere miraculous. Locke believed that "Mahomet having none toproduce, pretends to no miracles for the vouching of his mission," butBoyle was aware of the argument that the Koran itself ismiraculous (in view of the disparity between it and what mightreasonably be expected of its author in the absence of divineinspiration). He felt, not that this argument was inappropriate, butthat it failed the test empirically:[T]he Saracens, press'd with their Religions beingdestitute of attesting Miracles, … reply, That though there wereno other Miracle to manifest the Excellency of their Religion …,yet the Alcoran it Self were sufficient, as being a Lasting Miraclethat transcends all other Miracles. How Charming its Eloquence may bein its Original, I confesse my self too unskilfull in the ArabickTongue, to be a competent Judge … but the Recent Translations Ihave seen of it in French, and … Latin, elaborated by greatScholars, and accurate Arabicians, by making it very Conformable to itsEastern Original, have not so rendred it, but that Persons that judgeof Rhetorick by the Rules of it current in these Western Parts of theWorld, would instead of extolling it for the Superlative, not allow itthe Positive Degree of Eloquence; [and] would think the Style asdestitute of Graces, as the Theology of Truth … .[27] Boyle does not deny that the style could have been miraculous, andindeed he runs a formally similar argument concerning the Apostles andthe miracle of Pentecost: the Apostles' "Hearers … knew it was<not> naturally possible, that uninspir'd Persons, and especiallyilliterate Fishermen, should <grow> able, in a trice, to make<weighty> discourses to many differing Nations, in theirrespective Languages" (BP 7:99, BOA §3.6.29, p. 390). Boyleaccepts, and indeed uses, the form of the Koran argument: itis the premise he disputes.Boyle is ambivalent about the function of miracles. Generally heregards them as being philosophically relevant after we have a proof ofGod's existence, something which natural theology will afford us.(Boyle fastens on two main types of design arguments: those involvingthe complexity of animate beings, particularly very small animate beings,[28] and those which highlight the need toexplain the origin and continuing function of natural laws: God mustnot only sustain God's creatures, Boyle argues, he must also sustainthe regularities which we recognize as lawlike.)Having convinced ourselves of God's existence through theconsiderations which natural theology makes available to us, andrealizing that God is likely to institute a religion to make his natureand requirements known to us, we look to miracles to see whichinstituted religion is the correct one. However, though in generalBoyle argues that accepting something as a miracle presupposesGod's existence, and so miracles are to be used to institutethe correct religion rather than to ground its metaphysical basis, hedoes sometimes urge an argument from miracles which will yield notmerely the correctness of Christianity, but the acceptability ofreligious belief as such. Briefly: we have good historical testimonyfor the occurrence of miracles, but miracles are possible only if Godintervenes in nature (and thereby exists) (BP 5:106-7, BOA §3.8.3,pp. 310-12).3. Boyle's World ViewBoyle had a straightforward notion of creation. First of all God, at aparticular, fairly recent, point in absolute time, made matter. Boylewas an admirer of "our Irish St. Austin"(BC 1:40),James Ussher, archbishop of Armagh, who famously propounded what seemsto us, though not to his contemporaries, to be a very late date (4004b.c.) for creation. Boyle saw "no just reason to embrace theiropinion, that would so turn the two first chapters ofGenesis, into an allegory, as to overthrow the literal andhistorical sense of them" and, noting the implausibility of the claimsof "some extravagant ambitious People, such as those fabulousChaldeans, whose fond account reach'd up to 40000 or 50000years," held that "Theology teaches us, that the World is very farfrom being so old by 30 or 40 thousand years as they … havepresum'd: and does, from the Scripture, give us such an account of theage of the World, that it has set us certain Limits, within which solong a Duration may be bounded, without mistaking in ourReckoning. Whereas Philosophy leaves us to the vastness ofIndeterminate Duration, without any certain Limits at all" (BW, 8:21;Birch 1772, IV:11). Revelation gives us (1) truths of which we wouldotherwise be ignorant, such as "the order and time of the Creation ofthe World and of the first man and woman"; (2) details of truths whichwe can otherwise obtain "but very dimly, incogently, anddefectively"such as … That the World had a beginning, that ‘tisupheld and govern'd by Gods general concourse & providence; thatGod has a peculiar regard to mankind; and a propitious one to good men;that he foresees those future things, we call contingent: thatmens souls shall not dye with their bodyes, and many other articles ofthe Philosophers, as well as the Christians Creed (BP 7:242, 4:10-12,BW 14:268-9).Additionally there are (3) "hints" which lead us to truthswe would otherwise miss, such as "that whatever men have generallybeliev'd, Vegetables had their Origine independent from the Sun, theearth having producd all kinds of plants a day before God made thatLuminary" (BP 7:243, 4:15, BW 14:271). Moreover,it ought much to recommend many of the things thatRevelation discovers to us, that they are congruous, and if I may sospeak Symmetrical to what reason it self teaches us; and thisSupernatural Light does not only confirm, but advance and compleat thetruths discoverable by the light of nature. For God has so excellentlyorderd the discoverys he makes of Theological <Veritys> by meerreason, and by the holy Scriptures, that what Revelation superadds toReason, does both very well agree with it, and supply what was wantingto it, that from them both might result as compleat a body ofTheological Verities, as is either necessary or fit for us in ourMortal State (BP 7:245-6, 4:23, BW 14:275). (See further MacIntosh1992.)Unsurprisingly, then, Boyle makes a point of attempting to bring hiscreation story into line with a literal interpretation of the Genesisstory. God, he believes, could have started things off earlier orlater, but chose not to. Having created matter, he broke it up andstarted it moving. Sometimes Boyle says he broke it up bystarting it moving.[29] Then he gave it laws, since the"casual justlings of atoms" would not, Boyle thinks, have given rise tothis world.[30] Hooke, explicating Genesis, argued for thesame ordering. For Boyle and Hooke, that is, a world without laws isnot only possible, our world was such a world for a time. In theprevious century Konrad Daspodius held that comets "drift withoutlaws," but by 1686 Leibniz was writing, "God does nothing out of order,and it is impossible even to feign events which are not regular."[31] Leibniz's point was that just as any‘random’ sequence of points will determine a curve(actually an infinite set of curves, but Leibniz only needed the lesserclaim), so any sequence of events will conform to a regular pattern.Generalizing, we might say that just as points underdetermineequations, so facts underdetermine theories.It should be noted however that for Leibniz, as for a number of hiscontemporaries, not all such laws need be laws of nature.[32] Malebranche, for example, in hisDialogues on Metaphysics, offered no fewer than five distincttypes of law: "general laws of the communication of motion, …laws of the union of soul and body, … laws of the union of thesoul with God, with the intelligible substance of universal Reason,… general laws which give good and bad Angels power over bodies,… finally, the laws by which Jesus Christ received sovereignpower in Heaven and on earth, over minds as well as bodies, not only todistribute temporal goods … but to diffuse(répandre) internal grace in our hearts" (Entretienssur la Métaphysique, in Malebranche 1962, 12:319-320).[33]Boyle's position is an intermediate one between the claim that someobjects or events are lawless, and the claim that lawlessness isimpossible. For Boyle, physical objects do exhibit nomologicalregularities, but this is a contingent fact about the world, or rather,for Boyle was cautious about generalizing, about the spatio-temporalportion of it we occupy. He agrees, however, that there are laws thatare not laws of nature, with the laws of interconnectionbetween body and soul providing, for him, an obvious example. Thisinterconnection also provides a clear example of a state which Godconstantly preserves.After having made matter, started it moving, and given it laws, Godthen formed the matter into particular structures and shapes, includingcertain "seeds." Then he added some "seminal" principles. Boyle doesnot clearly indicate whether or not these are a special subclass ofnatural laws affecting matter, or whether they are in some way what hesometimes calls "supra-mechanical," though he does point out that ifthere is a mechanism for animal inheritance, then it would seem torequire a framing intelligent agent (BW, 12:445-6, Birch 1772,VI:728-9. Anstey 2002 provides a full discussion of the issue.). Hisolder contemporary Harvey, much admired by Boyle, was in no doubt aboutthe matter, pouring scorn on those who talkAs if (forsooth) Generation were nothing in the world but ameer separation, or Collection, or Order of things. I do not indeeddeny that to the Production of one thing out of another, theseforementioned things are requisite, but Generation herself is a thingquite distinct from them all … (Quoted Toulmin and Goodfield1962, 146).All this holds for the corporeal universe, as opposed to the threesorts of incorporeal creatures God created or, in our case, continuesto create: angels, evil demons, and human souls: the good, the bad, andthe imprisoned.[34] The angels were created "before thevisible World … was half compleated," but God creates new humansouls daily, and moreover works a "physical miracle" to attach them totheir respective bodies (BP 7:243, 4:14, BW 14:271; BP 2:62).[35]Sometimes Boyle felt that although humans are made in God's image they,like other created beings, are "at their best but umbratile, andArbitrary Pictures of God their Creatour" (BP 4:4, BOA §2.2.38, p.145). Elsewhere, however, he offers a more traditional account of thesoul as the image of God:The Christian virtuoso considers the rational soul, notbarely as it guides the motions of that living engine, we call thebody, but as it is a kind of imprisoned angel, that bears the image ofGod, and is capable of knowing, both ourselves and him; and by aconsciousness of her being his production, is capable ofacknowledgeing, loving, and obeying him, and referring to his glory allthe excellencies she discovers, both in herself, and in the body she isunited to; by which just reference, she is, by his goodness, in hisdivine Son, made capable of becoming incomparably more knowing, thanhere she is, and eternally happy with him (BW, 12:504, Birch 1772,VI:775).Although humans are made in the image of God, they are considerablyless clever than the angels,[36] and since it is quite possible that God'sprimary end in making the universe was to provide a universe for theangels, and not centrally for humans, it is thereby quite possible thatthe universe will be too complicated for us to understand:[I]f God be allowed to be, as indeed he is, the Author ofthe Universe, how will it appear that He, whose Knowledge infinitelytranscends ours, and who may be suppos'd to operate according to theDictates of his own immense Wisdom, should, in his Creating of things,have respect to the measure and ease of Humane Understandings; and notrather, if of any, of Angelical Intellects? So that whether it be toGod or to Chance, that we ascribe the Production of things, that waymay often be fittest or likelyest for Nature to work by, which is noteasiest for us to understand (BW, 3:257, Birch 1772,II:46)."[W]e presume too much of our own abilities," Boyle wrote, c. 1680,"if we imagine that the omniscient God can have no other Ends in theframing & managing of Things Corporeal, than such as we Men candiscover" (Boyle MS 198, fol. 120, BP 7:116, BOA §3.6.3, p 267).It follows at once that while simplicity may often be our best guide asto what working hypothesis to choose, we should not think it to beinevitably a reliable guide to truth.Why did God create the universe in this piecemeal way? What isBoyle's rationale for thinking that God didn't just start off bycreating matter in motion with the proper directed velocities andletting it give rise to the present world in its own good time? Or whynot suppose that he created the present world as a goingconcern? Boyle doesn't tell us, but two points stand out.First of all, it certainly fits the fact that Boyle has a verylimited view of omnipotence.[37] Here he is, for example, bemused by theswiftness of God's creative ability:As great a Number & variety of parts as a living HumaneBody consists of, ‘tis highly probable that the Lump of Stupid[38] matterout of which they were fashion'd, was contriv'd into this admirableSystem; if not in a moment, yet in a very short time. For the sacredstory relates, that man was not created till <about> the end ofthe six dayes work; and since in One day God created all the fourfooted Beasts, (wilde & tame,) and all the numerous Reptiles thatcreep upon the Earth after their kind; ‘tis no way improbable thatamong so great a multitude of differing species of Animals, orLiving Engines, that were made in one Part of the same sixth day, Godshould make a Humane Animal in an extreamly short time, not to sayin a trice (BP 4:85, BOA §2.2.68, p 161). [Here andthroughout in quotations, the emphasis is in theoriginal.]Doing things step by step, fairly quickly, and with moderatesuccess, was quite enough to excite Boyle's admiration for the Almightyand, though he had certainly read Descartes's Principles (inwhich Descartes remarks explicitly that although God couldhave let things work their way from a very different initial state tothe present world, in fact God started the world off inmedias res), it is quite possible that the alternative did notstrike him as likely: he was not, after all, a mathematician, or even amathematical physicist.[39]Given this, and the fact that motion was not natural to matter, buthad to be added to it, it would seem plausible to Boyle that Godcreated matter first, and then gave it a push, particularly since thepush had to be precisely fine tuned in order to yield just the world wenow have. (That matter is not naturally in motion forms the basis ofone of Boyle's criticisms of Epicurus. Boyle takes Epicurus to holdthat motion is an innate property of matter. How then, asksBoyle, are we to explain the fact that it is lost or changed as aresult of collision between particles? (BP 2:5, BOA §4.1, p 340).)Additionally, Boyle notices that no system of laws can offer a completeexplanation: we also need an account of the initial parameters.[40] Butthen, since they are logically distinct, why not have themchronologically distinct as well?Secondly, there are, perhaps, historical reasons. For Boyle isconscious of himself as building on past views, and such viewstypically treated matter as giving rise to the present world, and, inthe case of some past thinkers, at least, as having existed in aconstant state for some time before the initiating changes that led tothe present world occurred. The notion of a piecemeal creation, thatis, fits Boyle's views of God's abilities, fits Genesis, andfits the views of previous thinkers. Probably we do not need to lookfarther for an explanation for his adopting such a view.(b) What kind of world is it that God created?God created a material world in time and space, but what kind ofmatter, what kind of space, what kind of time? As to the matter, Boyleagreed with contemporaries such as Huygens and Newton that "Matter [is]in its own Nature but one."[41] However Boyle, cautious as ever,explicitly allows God the possibility of creating matter which isnot like ordinary matter, and instituting laws which are quiteunlike the laws that obtain on earth. His views are worth quoting atlength:[T]he World must every way have bounds, and consequently befinite; or it must not have bounds, and so be …infinite. And if the World be bounded, then those that believea Deity,[42] to whose Nature it belongs to be ofinfinite Power, must not deny that God was, and still is,[43] able tomake other Worlds than this of ours. … Now if we grant, with some modern Philosophers, that God has madeother Worlds besides this of ours, it will be highly probable that hehas there display'd His manifold Wisdom, in productions very differingfrom those wherein we here admire it. And even without supposing anymore than one Universe, as all that portion of it that is visible tous, makes but a part of that vastly extended aggregate of bodies: Soif we but suppose, that some of the Celestial Globes, whether visibleto us, or plac'd beyond the reach of our sight, are peculiar Systemes,the consideration will not be very different. For since the fix'dstars are many of them incomparably more remote than the Planets,‘tis not absurd to suppose that as the Sun, who is the fix'dstar nearest to us, has a whole Systeme of Planets that move abouthim, so some of the other fix'd Stars may be each of them the Centre,as it were, of another Systeme of Celestial Globes … . Now, incase there be other Mundane Systemes (if I may so speak) besides thisvisible one of ours, I think it may be probably suppos'd that God mayhave given peculiar and admirable instances of His inexhausted Wisedomin the Contrivance and Government of Systemes, that for aught we knowmay be fram'd and manag'd in a manner quite differing, from what isobserv'd in that part of the Universe that is known to us. …[H]ere on Earth the Loadstone is a Mineral so differing in diversaffections, not onely from all other Stones, but from all otherbodies, that are not Magnetical, that this Heteroclite[44] Mineral scarce seemsto be Originary of this World of ours, but to have come into it, by aremove from some other World or Systeme … .Now in these other Worlds, besides that we may suppose thatthe Original Fabrick … into which the Omniscient Architect atfirst contriv'd the parts of their matter, was very differing from thestructure of our Systeme; besides this, I say, we may conceivethat there may be a vast difference betwixt the subsequentPhænomena, and productions observable in one ofthose Systemes, from what regularly happens in ours,though we should suppose no more, than that two or three Laws of LocalMotion may be differing in those unknown Worlds, from the Laws thatobtain in ours (BW, 10:172-3, Birch 1772, V:138-139).Boyle, that is, sees three distinct possibilities: the initial setup may differ, the matter involved may differ, and the laws in questionmay differ. Moreover the laws, as well as the matter, could have beenformed differently by God, and could indeed vary from part to part ofthe current universe within the universe. Clearly the case ofvarying laws and the case of varying matter may run into each other,but Boyle treats them as distinct possibilities, and gives as anexample the possibility of a combination of conservation andnon-conservation possibilities: we can envisage bodies with the "powerof exciting Motion in another Body, without the Movents loosing itsown." Were this to be the case the resulting phenomena would be"strangely diversifyed." Moreover, God may have made a universe, or apart of this universe, which was such that "some parts ofmatter [would] be of themselves quiescent … anddetermin'd to continue at rest till some outward Agent force it intomotion [while] other parts of the matter [may have] a Power… of restlessly moving themselves, without loosing that power bythe motion they excite in quiescent bodies. … Nor is it soextravagant a thing, as at first it may seem, to entertain suchsuspicions as these. For in the common Philosophy, besides that theNotion and Theory of Local Motion are but very imperfectly propos'd,there are Laws or Rules of it not well, not to say atall, establish'd."[45]Boyle does not use the terminology of absolute space and time, buthe remarks that God could have made the world earlier:Nor was it his Indigence, that forc't him to make theWorld, thereby to make new Acquisitions, but his Goodnesse, that presthim to manifest, and to impart his Glory; and the goods, which he soover-flowingly abounds with. Witness his Suspension of the World'sCreation, which certainly had had an earlier Date, were the Deitycapable of Want, and the Creatures of Supplying it (BW, 1:97, Birch1772, I:270).Boyle's general view about both space and time is that since theyarePrimary & Heteroclite … ‘tis noe wonder that ourLimited & Imperfect understandings should not be able to reach to afull & clear comprehension of them, but should be swallowd up withthe <Scruples &> Difficulties that may be suggested by a<bold &> nice Inquiry into things, <to> which thereseemes to belong a kind of Infinity (BP 2:53).He also remarks about the world thatif it be Finite [which Boyle allows as apossibility], then ‘tis not in a place (such as the Schools define)after the manner of other Bodys, since there is no ambient Body whoseinward surface determines it; and we may conceive it to move severalwayes, as upwards or downwards, and yet not to change place, because(as was just now said,) it is in none, and all its Extream parts maykeep the same situation in reference to one another (BP 1:64).[46]Moreover, there is arigid and Philosophical Notion … of rest, which fordistinction sake may be called Absolute or Perfect Rest; which importsa continuance of a Body in the same place precisely, andincludes an absolute Negation of all local Motion, though never so slowor imperceptible; … in this rigid sense of the word Rest, Idurst not affirm, that there are any Bodies at Rest in the Universe (atleast for any long time) but willingly [allow] it to be made a Problem,whether there be any or no; … perhaps I [incline] to theNegative part of the Question (BW, 6:194, Birch 1772, I:444).[47]Again, Boyle writes: "Suppose a Ball were in motion, & all theworld should be on a sudden annihilated about it; why may not themotion of that Ball be continu'd? there being nothing to stop it; &if it be continu'd, we have a motion where the mobile dos not quitt theneighborhood of som bodys, and approach nearer to others" (BP 1:3).We have, then, Boyle's view that a body can continue "in the sameplace precisely," that the whole (finite) universe might movein space, and that God could have created the world earlier than hedid. Such views do not at least amount to a rejection ofabsolute space and time. Boyle's contemporary, Leibniz, who did rejectabsolute space, explicitly drew the conclusion that a finite universecould not move as a whole in space, and could nothave been created earlier in time.[48]The universe God created, then, contains a number of finiteincorporeal entities, for whom the writ of physics does notrun, and a number of material entities, compounded as far as we areaware, of the same matter in every case, set in a space and timeindependent of them, and subject to a number of God given laws.4. Laws of NatureOn a number of occasions Boyle assures us that "God [is] the Authorof the universe & free Establisher of the Laws of motion, whosegenerall Concourse is necessary to the conservation & Efficacy ofevery particular Physicall Agent" (BP 2:132). The trouble is, he seemsto have thought that this remark was fairly transparent, and does nottrouble to explain it to us. Moreover, he tends to use much the samephraseology on each occasion he discusses the issue. It was acommonplace of the time that Boyle was no stylist — it was obvious attimes to Boyle himself — but though even the obsequious Budgellremarked that Boyle was "too wordy and prolix," in this case at leasthe was not wordy enough (Budgell 1732, 124).It is tempting to suppose that Boyle must have had some reasonablywell thought out views on the question of how God sustains theworld. He was after all one of the most impatient of thinkers when itcame to fake or non-explanations, and he was in general very aware ofthe danger of letting verbal ‘explanations’ get in the wayof real ones. He objected against the scholastics, for example thatto explicate a Phænomenon, being to deduceit from something else in Nature more known to Us, than the thing to beexplain'd by It, how can the imploying of Incomprehensible (or at leastUncomprehended) substantial Forms help Us to explain intelligibly Thisor That particular Phænomenon? For to say, that such anEffect proceeds not from this or that Quality of the Agent, but fromits substantial Form, is to take an easie way to resolve alldifficulties in general, without rightly resolving any one inparticular; and would make a rare Philosophy, if it were not far moreeasie than satisfactory … (BW, 5:351-2, Birch 1772, III:46-7).[49]On the other hand, in theology he was more likely than elsewhere tolet things get by, since he was convinced in advance that histheological picture was the right one, and he was used to stiflingdoubts about theological claims. Writing about himself in the thirdperson as a young man he speaks of the "fleeting Clouds" of doubtswhich never ceased "now & then to darken /obscure/ the clearestserenity of his quiet: which made him often say that Injections of thisNature were such a Disease to his Faith as the Tooth-ach is to theBody; for tho it be not mortall, ‘tis very troublesome" (BP 37:182r).(These doubts persisted: see Hunter 1990, 410.)Moreover, he had a well worked out doctrine concerning thelimitations of reason, and often points out that we should not expectfully to understand God's workings, for God is, after all, "<aBeing> of a most Primary and most singular Nature" (BP 2:107, 2:37,BOA § 4.1, p 357). (For Boyle on the limits of reason see Wojcik1997.) Furthermore, he was willing to admit the impossibility of ourunderstanding — at least given the present limitations on ourintellects — even quite ordinary and lawlike matters, e.g., the way inwhich the human soul and human body interact. How God could havecreated the world, and how it is that he can intervene in it, arematters as mysterious to us as how mind and body can interact, and thatis a total mystery.Sometimes, Boyle remarks, our ignorance of things has to do simplywith our lack of knowledge of the inner or hidden workings of a thing.He offers his, and indeed the century's, standard example of clockswhich may have various internal mechanisms to produce the same outereffects. Thus he remarks that "we know in general, that digestion ismade by some Menstruum or subtile substance in the Stomach;thô we know not the particular nature of that substance, (aswhether it be Acid, Urinous, &c.)". Sometimes, though, ourignorance is of a deeper, richer variety:sometimes … we are not able to conceive theModus of a thing, soe much as in general, or, as tothe possibility of it, (abstracting from the positive Proofsthat such a thing is) as, when we cannot conceive, how the RationalSoul can stop or determine the motions of the <humane> Body. Andin this latter case, our not knowing the Modus of a thing, isusually more than a bare Ignorance, and inclines us to frame Objectionsagainst the Truth or Existence of the thing: because oftentimes theIncomprehensiblenes of the Modus, is grounded upon some thingthat we conceive to be in the case, repugnant to the Laws or Course ofNature, or to some Dictate of right Reason: as, in the instance newlymention'd, it seems repugnant to the nature of things, that anImmaterial substance, not being Impenetrable, can resist or reflect themotion of a Body &c (BP 1:129, 7:155v, BOA §3.5.19, p255).Boyle was impatient with the Cartesian suggestion that we might beable to alter the direction though not the quantity of motion, not forLeibniz's reason that the notion of quantity of motion required aconfusion between momentum and kinetic energy,[50] but for thestraightforward reason that interfering with the directed velocityrequired as mysterious an interaction as altering the ‘quantityof motion’ would. He was aware of the Cartesian claim "that therational Soul doth [not] give any motion to the parts of the Body, butonly guide or regulate that which she finds in themalready" (BW, 9:379, Birch 1772, IV:416), but that, he felt, did notreally solve the problem, for that interaction was as mysterious as anenergy introducing one: "I do as little conceive how the motions of theConarion can work upon an Immaterial soul, as how any otherpart of the Body can do it. Nor do I conceive how an Immaterial Soulcan work upon the Conarion its self, more then it can upon anyother part of the Body" (BP 1:128 BOA §3.5.15, p 253), and henotes that it will not "suffice to object, that the human will does, inthese cases, not produce any new motion, but only determine[s] themotions of the spirits, and by their means of the locomotive organs.For to put a check, at pleasure, to the motion of a body, that doesalready actually move in one line, and determine its motion to continuein another, that is perhaps differing from it, or even opposite to it;to do this, I say, without opposing to the moving body, some otherbody, which, by its resistance and situation may change its formercourse, is not a mechanical operation" (BW, 12:480, Birch 1772,VI:756). A change of direction, just as much as a change in the‘quantity of motion,’ is in fact as mysterious andinexplicable, if done by incorporeal means, as the introduction ofenergy into the system would be.5. Boyle's LawMany of us learned at school that Boyle's Law holds for ideal gasesand can be summarized as PV = k, where k is a constant, and P and V arepressure and volume respectively. This law does stem from Boyle's work,but it is not what Boyle took himself to have demonstrated.[51]Boyle was arguing specifically against a Jesuit scientist,Franciscus Linus, who claimed, not that ordinary atmospheric air doesnot have any pressure (a spring), but that its pressure was notsufficiently powerful for it to do all the things it does in fact do.So Boyle decided on an experiment to show the way in which, as we wouldsay, the pressure and the volume of the air vary, when the air is, inBoyle's words, either ‘compressed or dilated.’He and his assistant, at the time Robert Hooke, made a J shaped tubeand began to make a few measurements, but "were hindered fromprosecuting the trial at that time by the casual breaking of thetube."Subsequently they made another, larger, better piece of apparatus,and taking particular care that the measurements should be accurate,tested the hypothesis "that supposes the pressures and expansions to bein reciprocal proportion." The results are set out, with misprints, intwo tables, and Boyle's conclusion was that the experimental findingsmatched the predicted results very well in the case of compression,less well in the case of rarefaction. Boyle suggested that thedivergence from the expected result in the case of rarefaction may havebeen due to "some little aerial bubbles in the quicksilver" ("so easyis it in such nice experiments to miss of exactness," he added).Now, what did Boyle take himself to have shown? First, that thereis, as a matter of experimental fact, a spring to the air: this is notin the sense in which Boyle understands the term, any longer anhypothesis: it is now obvious from the experimental results: whatexplains, or purports to explain this fact will be a theory or anhypothesis, but the result itself is in no sense an hypothesis. AsBoyle said…to determine whether the motion of restitution inbodies proceed from this, that the parts of a body of a peculiarstructure are put into motion by the bending of the spring, or from theendeavour of some subtle ambient body, whose passage may be opposed orobstructed, or else its pressure unequally resisted by reason of thenew shape or magnitude, which the bending of a spring may give thepores of it seems to me a matter of more difficulty, than at firstsight one would easily imagine it. Wherefore I shall decline meddlingwith a subject, which is much more hard to be explicated than necessaryto be so by him, whose business it is not … to assign theadequate cause of the spring of the air, but only to manifest, that theair hath a spring, and to relate some of its effects (BW, 1:166, Birch1772, I:12).Secondly, Boyle takes himself to have shown that, for atmosphericair, within the limits of his experimental set-up, "the pressures andexpansions [are] in reciprocal proportion," or, as we would say,pressure and volume vary inversely. He doesn't take himself to haveshown anything more than this. He does remark that further experimentsmay show that the relationship holds outside the boundary conditionsimposed by the experimental set-up, but the experiments he has justmade certainly don't show that. What Boyle expressly said was,till further trial hath more clearly informed me, I shallnot venture to determine, whether or no the intimated theory will holduniversally and precisely, either in condensation of air, orrarefaction: all that I shall now urge being, that…the trialalready made sufficiently proves the main thing, for which I hereallege it; since by it, it is evident, that as common air, when reducedto half its wonted extent, obtained near about twice as forcible aspring as it had before, so this thus comprest air being further thrustinto half this narrow room, obtained thereby a spring about as strongagain as that it last had, and consequently four times as strong asthat of the common air (BW, 3:60, Birch 1772, I:159).Thus Boyle's Law, for Boyle, was not a universal generalizationabout ideal gases: it was a strictly limited claim about common oratmospheric air. Boyle did add that "there is no cause to doubt, thatif we had been here furnished with a greater quantity of quicksilverand a very strong tube, we might, by a further compression of theincluded air, have made it counter balance the pressure of a far tallerand heavier cylinder of mercury."But he did not claim that the same ratio between pressure and volumewould hold in such more extreme cases. Nor did he claim that there areno limits to the possible compression. It is worth stressing that Boylehad this limited view of his result, for Shapin and Schaffer 1985suggest thatThe work Boyle undertook in reply to Linus was …done … with a specially constructed J-shaped tube in whichpressures higher than atmospheric could be attained. Using thisapparatus Boyle showed that if he compressed air twice as strongly asusual he could produce twice as strong a spring. He concluded that theprocess could go on indefinitely, so that there were no limits to thepower of the air's spring (Shapin and Schaffer 1985,168-9).But Boyle was quite happy not to draw such conclusions, simplybecause his experiments didn't allow that kind of jump. There are otherimportant ways in which he thought that generalizations about naturemight fail of universality. He had a very healthy notion of thecomplexity of the world, and an acute sense of the difficulties towhich even apparently simple experiments could give rise, and perhapsin consequence had more sympathy than stricter theologians for theproblems which universe construction might involve, even for theAlmighty.6. Perception and the SoulTwo distinct notions of the soul occupied centre stage in theseventeenth century. One, stemming from Plato and the Pythagoreans,with theological trimmings by Augustine, had been given immenseprestige by Descartes' championing of it. This view was what Geach hascalled the "savage superstition ... that a man consists of two pieces,body and soul, which come apart at death." Geach adds, "thesuperstition is not mended but rather aggravated by conceptualconfusion, if the soul-piece is supposed to be immaterial" (Geach 1969,38).The second main account, stemming from Aristotle, had been takenover and made Christian by St Thomas Aquinas.[52] In this account thesoul was, though incorporeal, not simply a separate bit attached to thebody, but was the form of the individual animal in question, whetherhuman or not. Aquinas presented arguments to show that human souls weresubsistent in view of various capacities they had, and proceeded fromthere to argue for the possibility of the continuing existence of humansouls in the absence of the body. He was, however, clear that the humanperson (even when the person in question was Christ in human form) wasnot merely a soul with an attached body, but was the body informed bythe soul: if your soul alone were to survive death you would not.Bodily resurrection is essential to the survival and immortality ofhumans.Cartesians and Thomists alike believed on scriptural grounds thatthere were actual cases of separated souls, namely, the angels, fallenand unfallen, so the possibility that the human soul might itself besubsistent was simply the possibility that it might sufficientlyresemble an already accepted ontological group: despite the problemsthat substance dualism raises, a number of which presented themselvesclearly to Boyle, there was no general problem concerningincorporeal entities, and there were, Boyle felt, strong arguments forthe incorporeality of the human soul.For Boyle, as for other leading seventeenth century figures,perception was a matter of information entering the brain as a resultof causal interaction between the perceiver and the perceived object.Arriving at the brain the information was processed by a subsystem orset of subsystems devoted to presenting it to the cognitive system, andto storing it thereafter. The initial processing was done by a system,the common sense, that combined the inputs from the varioussense organs (left eye + right eye; eyes + ears; etc.) and it was thenimagined — that is, an image was formed in the brain though,as Kepler and Descartes noted explicitly, the image was not a literal,optical, image. That apart, seventeenth century thinkers accepted ingeneral outline the position which had already been set out in thethirteenth century by Roger Bacon, who was in turn simply collating theviews of earlier Islamic writers on the subject, though of course thedetails, particularly the details of the causal interaction betweenpercipient and perceived, varied from writer to writer (See furtherLindberg 1976, MacIntosh 1983, and Sutton 1998).Imagination was a matter of material images being formed in thebrain. But, it was held by Boyle and others, we have knowledge ofthings which are literally unimaginable — that is, they cannot beaccurately represented by a corporeal image in the central nervoussystem. There were a variety of reasons for this belief. First it washeld that there were things which were too large, and things whichwere too small to be imagined, that is, imaged. Hence somenon-material faculty was needed to account for thisability. Additionally, there are things which are not image-ablebecause they cannot be represented accurately by any physicalsystem. Boyle's stock example in this area, though not his onlyexample, is the incommensurability of the sides and diagonal of asquare. Since √2 is irrational no discrete (corpuscular) systemcan accurately represent both. But we do have knowledge ofsquares. Therefore we must be employing a non-material system. Also,there were things such as Descartes' chiliagon which, while they couldbe represented physically, could not (as experience shows) berepresented accurately by our physical imaging system.Additionally (a familiar Aristotelian point), our ability to abstract— to consider universals and not merely particular instances— was held to provide further evidence for the incorporeality ofthe soul and hence for the possibility at least of humanimmortality.Boyle also noted, as did his contemporary Henry More, the CambridgePlatonist, the occurrence of ecstasies. Boyle, like More, took theexistence of ecstasies seriously and, accepting the literal meaning ofthe term, thought that such experiences showed the actuality ofnon-corporeal, out-of-body, experiences. Boyle indeed offers the caseas a refutation of the Aristotelian view that images are required forhuman thinking. Locke was more cautious on the issue: "whether that,which we call Extasy, be not dreaming with the Eyes open, Ileave to be examined."[53]Thus, for Boyle, souls were almost certainly Cartesian souls, thoughas mentioned earlier he hesitates about whether or not the human soulmay not be a substantial form (BW, 5:300, Birch 1772, III:12).Given that souls are incorporeal adjuncts of the body, it followsthat they are not materially destructible, and that the lawsof interaction between soul and body are not laws of naturalphilosophy. Why grass looks green is a feature of the worldwhich God decided upon and upholds. His reasons for this decision, saysBoyle, were no doubt weighty, but they are, as to us, arbitrary (see,e.g., BP 2:62, BOA §3.5.1, p 247; 2:105, BOA 3.5.21, p 258; 9:40;36.46v). Now, if our souls are non-material, that demolishes at leastone philosophical barrier to a belief in an after-life such as ispromised by Christianity. 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M., 1992, "Robert Boyle's Alchemical Secrecy: Codes,Ciphers and Concealments," Ambix, 39, 1992, 63-74–––, 1994a, "Boyle's alchemical pursuits," inHunter 1994b, 91-105–––, 1994b, "Style and Thought of the EarlyBoyle: Discovery of the 1648 Manuscript of Seraphic Love,"Isis, 85, 1994, 247-260–––, 1995, "Virtuous Romance and RomanticVirtuoso: The Shaping of Robert Boyle's Literary Style," Journalof the History of Ideas, 1995, 377-397–––, 1998, The Aspiring Adept: Robert Boyleand his Alchemical Quest, Princeton: Princeton University Press,1998Roger, Jacques, 1982, "The Cartesian Model and Its Role inEighteenth-Century ‘Theory of the Earth’", in Lennon 1982,95-112Rogers, G. A. J., 1996, "Science and British Philosophy: Boyle andNewton," in Brown, S.,(ed.), British Philosophy and the Age ofEnlightenment, London and New York: Routledge, 1996, 43-68Ruby, J. E., 1986, "The Origins of Scientific "Law"," Journalof the History of Ideas, 47, 1986, 341-359Schupbach, W., 1982, The Paradox of Rembrandt's ’Anatomyof Dr. Tulp,’, Medical History, Supplement No. 2; London:Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine, 1982Shanahan, T., 1988, "God and Nature in the Thought of RobertBoyle," Journal of the History of Philosophy, 26, 1988,547-569Shapin, S., and Schaffer, S., 1985, Leviathan and theAir-Pump: Hobbes, Boyle, and the Experimental Life, Princeton:Princeton University Press, 1985Shapin, S., 1993,"Personal development and intellectual biography:the case of Robert Boyle," The British Journal for the History ofScience, 26, 1993, 335-346–––, 1994, A Social History of Truth,Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994Sleigh, R. C., 1990, Leibniz and Arnauld, New Haven: YaleUniversity Press, 1990Sutton, J., 1998, Philosophy and Memory Traces: Descartes toConnectionism, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998Thomas, K., 1973, Religion and the Decline of Magic,Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973Toulmin, S., and Goodfield, J., 1962, The Architecture ofMatter, London: Hutchinson, 1962Wilson, C., 1995, The Invisible World: Early Modern Philosophyand the Invention of the Microscope, Princeton: PrincetonUniversity Press, 1995Wintroub, M, 1997, "The looking glass of facts: collecting,rhetoric and citing the self in the experimental natural philosophy ofRobert Boyle," History of Science, 35, 1997, 189-217Wojcik, J., Robert Boyle and the Limits of Reason, NewYork: Cambridge University Press, 1997Wolloch, N., 2000, "Christiaan Huygens's Attitude Toward Animals,"Journal of the History of Ideas, 61, 2000, 415-432 Other Internet Resources The Robert Boyle Project (Michael Hunter, U. London/Birkbeck College)This is absolutely the first place to go. The page is not only valuablein itself, but is provided with a multitude of useful, relevant links,including: Robert Boyle Work-diaries Project. Bibliography of recent publications on Boyle (Part of On the Boyle newsletter) The text of Boyle's Degradation of GoldA brief, but accurate, account of Boyle (in French)Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Ralph Cudworth in The Cambridge PlatonistsRelated Entries afterlife | Arnauld, Antoine | atheism and agnosticism | Bayle, Pierre | Descartes, René | Gassendi, Pierre | Hume, David | Kant, Immanuel | laws of nature | Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm | Malebranche, Nicolas | matter | mental imagery | miracles | omnipotence | ontological arguments | Pascal, Blaise | perception: the problem of | Plato | providence, divine | Spinoza, Baruch | theology: naturalAcknowledgmentsThe editors would like to thank Peter Anstey for agreeing to jointhe author J. J. Macintosh as a co-author and to be responsiblefor this and future updates. Copyright © 2006 byJ. J. MacIntosh<macintos@ucalgary.ca>Peter Anstey<peter.anstey@stonebow.otago.ac.nz> |
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