The Idea of Progress: An Inquiry into Its Origin and GrowthBury, J. B. (John Bagnell)
Philosophy
The Idea of Progress: An Inquiry into Its Origin and Growth
Bury, J. B. (John Bagnell)
History -- Philosophy; Progress
Bacon illustrated his view of the social importance of science in his
sketch of an ideal state, the New Atlantis. He completed only a part of
the work, and the fragment was published after his death. [Footnote: In
1627. It was composed about 1623. It seems almost certain that he
was acquainted with the Christianopolis of Johann Valentin Andreae
(1586-1654), which had appeared in Latin in 1614, and contained a plan
for a scientific college to reform the civilised world. Andreae, who was
acquainted both with More and with Campanella, placed his ideal society
in an island which he called Caphar Salama (the name of a village in
Palestine). Andreae's work had also a direct influence on the Nova
Solyma of Samuel Gott (1648). See the Introduction of F. E. Held to his
edition of Christianopolis (1916). In Macaria, another imaginary state
of the seventeenth century (A description of the famous Kingdoms of
Macaria, 1641, by Hartlib), the pursuit of science is not a feature.]
It is evident that the predominating interest that moved his imagination
was different from that which guided Plato. While Plato aimed at
securing a permanent solid order founded on immutable principles,
the design of Bacon was to enable his imaginary community to achieve
dominion over nature by progressive discoveries. The heads of Plato's
city are metaphysicians, who regulate the welfare of the people by
abstract doctrines established once for all; while the most important
feature in the New Atlantis is the college of scientific investigators,
who are always discovering new truths which may alter the conditions of
life. Here, though only in a restricted field, an idea of progressive
improvement, which is the note of the modern age, comes in to modify
the idea of a fixed order which exclusively prevailed in ancient
speculation.
On the other hand, we must not ignore the fact that Bacon's ideal
society is established by the same kind of agency as the ideal societies
of Plato and Aristotle. It has not developed; it was framed by the
wisdom of an original legislator Solamona. In this it resembles
the other imaginary commonwealths of the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries. The organisation of More's Utopia is fixed initially once for
all by the lawgiver Utopus. The origin of Campanella's Civitas Solis is
not expressly stated, but there can be no doubt that he conceived its
institutions as created by the fiat of a single lawgiver. Harrington,
in his Oceana, argues with Machiavelli that a commonwealth, to be
well turned, must be the work of one man, like a book or a building.
[Footnote: Harrington, Oceana, pp. 77-8, 3rd ed. (1747).]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account