The New Philosophy and Universal Languages in Seventeenth-century England: Bacon, Hobbes, and WilkinsIn all three, a more perfect language comprises both a model and a means for achieving a more perfect philosophy, and that philosophy, in turn, a vehicle for promoting political authority in the state. Those three projects are the new philosophies of Lord Chancellor Bacon, Thomas Hobbes, and Bishop John Wilkins, all of which can be usefully understood in the broader context of the century's cultural politics and in the more specific circumstances of the century's fascination with the construction of a universal language. Bacon, Hobbes, and Wilkins construct philosophies out of deeply held convictions about the need to provide a saving form of knowledge to remedy cultural crises. |
Contents
Preface | 9 |
Reconfiguring | 29 |
Natural Philosophy and the Politics of Jacobean Intervention | 55 |
Copyright | |
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according achieve action appears argues argument authority Bacon body called Cambridge century character Charles civil claims Comenius common concern consequences construct contemporary create credibility cultural definitions described designed desire differences discourse discussion divine domain early economic effort England English especially essay established fact fear figures forms Francis Hobbes Hobbes's human Ibid ideas ideology important interest James John kind king knowledge learning Leviathan linguistic logic London matter means metaphor mind monsters monstrous names natural philosophy notions objects once origins Parliament perfect political possible practical problems promise provides questions reason relations represents Restoration rhetoric Royal Society scientific secure seventeenth seventeenth-century significance signs similar social Society's sovereign specific speech supplies theory things thought tion tradition truth turn understanding universal language University Press vocabulary Wilkins Wilkins's writes