ANTONIO CLERICUZIO

GASSENDI AND THE ENGLISH MECHANICAL

PHILOSOPHERS

ESTRATTO
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Anno XV - 2018
 GALILÆANA
Studies in Renaissance
and Early Modern Science

As indicated by its new subtitle – Studies in Renaissance and Early

Modern Science – the objective of Galilaeana is to publish studies on the
life and work of Galileo, as well as research not directly pertaining to Gali-
leo, but which nevertheless focuses on related figures and themes from the
early modern period. Galilaeana is sponsored by the Museo Galileo and is
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An index of all past issues of Galilaeana, including the tables of con-
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 INDEX

Announcement. The Discovery of the Autograph Manuscript

of Galileo’s Letter to Benedetto Castelli . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Pag. V

FOCUS: ATOMS AND LIGHT IN THE XVIIth CENTURY

Antonio Clericuzio, Gassendi and the English Mechanical Philo­

sophers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . » 3
Gregorio Baldin, Points, Atoms and Rays of Light: History of a
Controversy from Mersenne to Hobbes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . » 31
Simone Guidi, Lux sive qualitas. Incorporeità ed estensione della
luce nell’aristotelismo iberico e italiano di primo Seicento . . . . » 61

STUDIES

Luca Ciancio, «An Amphitheatre Built on Toothpicks»: Galileo,

Nardi and the Hypothesis of Central Fire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . » 83
Francesco Barreca, Luis de Granada’s Introduttione del sim-
bolo della fede as a Possible Source to Galileo’s letter to Piero
Dini March 23, 1615 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . » 115
Marjorie O’Rourke Boyle, Galileo and the Case of Psalm 19 . . » 137
Andrea Strazzoni, The Medical Cartesianism of Henricus Re­
gius. Disciplinary Partitions, Mechanical Reductionism and
Methodological Aspects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . » 181

TEXTS & DOCUMENTS

Alfonso Mirto, Manfredo Settala: Lettere ai Fiorentini . . . . . . . » 221

IV INDEX

OBITUARIES

Stefano Caroti, Germana Ernst (1943-2016) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Pag. 267

Roberta Ferro, Gli ‘stili di pensiero’ di Eraldo Bellini . . . . . . . . » 275

ESSAY REVIEWS

Dario Tessicini, On the Origins of Copernicus’s Heliocentrism . . » 287

Leonardo Anatrini, Science in the Margins. Reading Purposes of
Galileo’s 17th-Century Scholars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . » 301
Galilæana, XV, 2018, pp. 3-29

Antonio Clericuzio 1

GASSENDI AND THE ENGLISH MECHANICAL PHILOSOPHERS

SUMMARY
Recent research has paid increasing attention to the variety of ver-
sions of the mechanical philosophy, showing that it is not to be regarded
as a single and homogeneous philosophical approach to the investigation
of natural phenomena. The mechanical philosophers disagreed on cru-
cial topics, as the divisibility of matter, the origin of motion, the existence
of void, the role of final causes, the reductionist approach to the study
of natural phenomena. The reception of Gassendi’s theory of matter in
England sheds light on the different types of mechanical philosophy that
flourished in the second half of the 17th century. Gassendi’s ‘moderate’
mechanism and his combination of atomism with empiricism were re-
sponsible for the rapid and widespread diffusion of his ideas in England.
Natural philosophers who rejected speculative approaches and stressed
the importance of observations and experiments found Gassendi’s phi-
losophy congenial to their views. Boyle opposed philosophical systems
since they would hinder the growth of knowledge. Walter Charleton
and Robert Boyle adopted a relevant feature of Gassendi’s theory of
matter, notably the hierarchy of corpuscles. Like Gassendi, Boyle did
not endorse the reductionist approach to the investigation of natural
phenomena like Descartes’ and Hobbes’. Boyle maintained that natural-
ists could profitably employ intermediate theories, i.e., explanations of
natural phenomena not resorting to the ultimate constituents of bodies.

Keywords: Gassendi, atomism, mechanical philosophy, vacuum, Hobbes, Char-

leton, Boyle, Evelyn, Descartes, Newton.

Università degli Studi Roma Tre, Dipartimento Studi Umanistici: antonio.clericuzio@

uniroma3.it. Earlier versions of this paper were delivered at a seminars held at the Univer-
1

sity of Bergamo (2017) and at the University of Cagliari (2018). I am indebted to all partici-
pants for their comments. I am also grateful to Pietro Corsi and to Franco Giudice for their
valuable comments. For permission to quote from the Boyle Papers I thank the Council
of the Royal Society of London. The research was supported by a grant from MIUR (Prin
2015: Galileo’s Science and Myth in Europe between XVII and XIX Centuries).
4 ANTONIO CLERICUZIO

1. Introduction: types of mechanical philosophy

In his synthesis of early modern natural philosophy, Stephen Gaukr-

oger maintained that «Mechanism existed in many varieties... and it is dif-
ficult to characterize in the abstract since it is driven by a number of dif-
ferent considerations, and as a result each major variety seems to depart
from a feature of mechanism central to the others».1 Despite the efforts
to construct an ideal type to describe the mechanical philosophy, it is
apparent that it escapes clear-cut definitions. As Schaffer pointed out, «in
important cases like those of Newton and Leibniz, the term “mechanic-
al” seems not to be very apt or useful. The meanings of this term were
accomplished and fixed in the course of disputes between such workers
and cannot easily be stipulated by a historian seeking some transcendent
account of the mechanical philosophy».2 A persistent source of confu-
sion is the view of the mechanical philosophy as a simple and homogen-
eous natural-philosophical programme, aiming at reducing natural phe-
nomena to matter and motion. This definition maps on certain obvious
aspects of mechanism, yet it is too vague a definition as it fails to consid-
er that mechanical philosophers disagreed on relevant issues. This view
is to be found in Sytsma’s recent book on Baxter. In it, we read that the
«Mechanical philosophy was the most successful anti-Aristotelian natur-
al philosophy in the seventeenth century – ultimately winning out over
other alternatives to Christian Aristotelian philosophy such as chymical
philosophy and Italian naturalism».3 I am not claiming that mechanic-
al philosophy is useless as historiographical category. My point is that,
when we refer to the mechanical philosophy, we are to be aware that
it was no monolithic philosophical programme. Indeed, many 17th-cen-
tury natural philosophers defined their philosophy as mechanical, but it

1 Stephen Gaukroger, The Emergence of a Scientific Culture: Science and the Shaping of
Modernity 1210-1685, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2006, p. 260. I disagree with Gaukroger’s
view (p. 354) of Gassendi’s philosophy as a system, very much like Descartes’ and Hobbes’.
Such a view fails to do justice to Gassendi’s probabilism and empiricism.
2 See Simon Schaffer, Godly Men and Mechanical Philosophers: Souls and Spirits in Resto-
ration Natural Philosophy, «Science in Context», 1, 1987, pp. 53-85: 56. See also John Henry,
Occult Qualities and the Experimental Philosophy: Active Principles in pre-Newtonian Matter The-
ory, «History of Science», 24, 1986, pp. 335-381.
3 David. D. Sytsma, Richard Baxter and the mechanical philosophers, Oxford, Oxford Uni-
versity Press, 2017, p. 12. Sytsma gives an oversimplified picture of the mechanical philoso-
phy lumping together diverse views of matter and motion just because in his view «they
all share the ideal of replacing Aristotelian forms and qualities with alternative reductionist
explanations», cit., p. 14. As we shall see, when dealing with natural philosophy, Sytsma’s
book contains many and major flaws.
GASSENDI AND THE ENGLISH MECHANICAL PHILOSOPHERS 5

is reasonable to ask whether they referred to the same thing.4 In order to

grasp the multifarious versions of the mechanical philosophy, we ought
to go beyond the superficial similarities. The mechanical philosophers
often disagreed on a number of topics, as the divisibility of matter, the
origin of motion and the ways of its transmission, the existence of void,
the role of final causes, the reductionist approach to the study of natural
phenomena – just to mention some well-known points of dissent. If we
compare Hobbes’ mechanism with Gassendi’s philosophy, we see that,
despite they rejected the Aristotelian doctrine of forms and qualities and
shared the view that natural phenomena are produced by matter and
motion, they differed on several crucial aspects, including the properties
of corpuscles, the existence of void and the status of incorporeal agents.
Boyle, whom some historians have celebrated as the champion of the
mechanical philosophy, held a very nuanced and complex view of mat-
ter. Like Gassendi, Boyle imposed severe restrictions to the use of mech-
anical explanations in the study of the generation of living organisms.
Boyle saw Descartes’ and the Cartesians’ pursuit of philosophical sys-
tems as a major obstacle to the investigation of nature. He was reluctant
to take a reductionist approach, and stressed that in natural philosophy
one had to adopt different degrees of explanation of phenomena. Like
Gassendi, he was committed to establish intermediate theories – i.e.
explanations not resorting to the ultimate constituents of bodies – as
they could be usefully and satisfactorily employed to account for a wide
range of phenomena.
A study of the reception and of the interpretations of Gassendi’s
natural philosophy in England, notably his ideas about atoms and mo-
tion, as well as his views of life and generation, might contribute to
shed light on the different versions of the mechanical philosophy that
flourished in England in the 17th century. British natural philosophers
pursuing the study of natural philosophy along experimental lines
turned to Gassendi’s philosophy because it stressed the importance
of observations and experiments and did not aim to construct a con-
sistent system, i.e., a set of definitive explanations of natural phenom-
ena. Gassendi’s doctrines were often adopted to revise or to integrate
Descartes’ strict mechanism. Gassendi’s matter theory turned out to

4 Garber convincingly argued that «While there were certainly those among the mod-
erns who designated themselves as mechanists or mechanical philosophers, we cannot use
the term “mechanical philosopher” to designate the moderns indiscriminately». Daniel
Garber, Remarks on the Pre-history of the Mechanical philosophy, in Daniel Garber – Sophie
Roux (eds.), The Mechanization of Natural Philosophy, Dordrecht, Springer, 2013, pp. 3-26: 25.
6 ANTONIO CLERICUZIO

be particularly appealing to pious natural philosophers, since it did not

banish final causes and included entities like semina rerum that enabled
natural philosophers to avoid materialism in the explanation of gener-
ation, while adopting the corpuscular philosophy. The impact of Gas-
sendi’s works in England (as elsewhere) was not, of course, restricted
to the matter theory. British savants turned to Gassendi’s works when
dealing with astronomy, mechanics, medicine, logic and ethics. The
study of the reception of Gassendi’s thought as a whole is beyond the
scope of the present article, which focuses on the reception of his mat-
ter theory.

2. Aspects of Gassendi’s mechanical philosophy

Pierre Gassendi’s theory of matter is well known and there is no

need get into details here. My purpose is to take into account three as-
pects of his mechanical philosophy as they might help understand the
difference with Descartes’ strict mechanism. The first is the origin of
motion, the second is the hierarchical structure of matter, the third the
theory of generation.
1. According to Gassendi, atoms were endowed with motion, i.e.,
with an internal source of activity – a view that evidently was incompat-
ible with Descartes’ theory of matter. Gassendi claimed that motion was
intrinsic to atoms:
It is not absurd to say that matter is active. Rather it is absurd to claim that
it is inert. In fact, those who maintain this view – and at the same time believe
that all natural bodies are composed of one and the same matter – cannot ex-
plain where their vis efficiendi is coming from...5

For Gassendi, God created atoms and provided them with weight,
i.e., an internal motive force. In the subsequent Syntagma Philosophicum
(published posthumously, 1658) Gassendi denied that atoms had an in-
ternal principle of motion, yet some ambiguity on this topic remained in
his theory of matter.6 He maintained that gravity – which he conceived

5 Gassendi, Philosophiae Epicuri Syntagma, repr. in Gassendi, Opera Omnia, 6 vols. Stutt-
gart-Bad Cannstatt, F. Frommann, 1964 (ed. or. Lyon, 1658) [hereinafter as Gassendi, Opera
Omnia], III, 19b: “Neque enim absurdum est facere materiam actuosam; absurdum potius
facere inertem; quoniam qui talem faciunt, et ex ipsa tamen fieri omnia volunt, dicere non
possunt, unde ea, quae fiunt, suam efficiendi vim habeant...”.
6 «Dicimus deinde explodendum esse, quod Atomi a seipsis habeant vim motricem,
seu impetum.», Syntagma Philosophicum, Gassendi, Opera Omnia, I, p. 280.
GASSENDI AND THE ENGLISH MECHANICAL PHILOSOPHERS 7

as propensio ad motum – was a property of atoms.7 It would seem that

Gassendi could not easily dispense with the activity of matter. The ul-
timate source of motion in natural bodies (in res concretae) was in fact the
motion of atoms. Atoms were endowed with gravity and had a natural
tendency to disentangle in the bodies they compose. The constituent
particles are never at rest, their motions are possible because bodies are
made of moving atoms and of small interstitial voids.8
2. For Gassendi, atoms form aggregates that he named moleculae.9
Predictably, he did not provide a clear definition of moleculae and of
their properties. He stated that they occupy an intermediate position
between atoms (endowed with mechanical properties) and the chemical
principles:
Huiusmodi moleculas esse quasi proxima, immediataque principia ignis,
aquae & rerum magis simplicium, cuiusmodi Chymicorum quoque elementa,
Sal, Sulphur, Mercurius & similia dici.10

He went on by stating that bodies were not always resolved into

their constituent atoms, but were often analysed into molecules, or first
concretions of indivisible atoms.11 Molecules are insensible clusters of
atoms having the power of producing sensible qualities such as scents
and flavours.12
3. In the section of Syntagma devoted to generation Gassendi had re-
course to seminal corpuscles, i.e., special kinds of corpuscles originat-
ing not by the fortuitous aggregation of atoms, but from God’s creative

7 «Sunt ergo tres proprietates, de quibus deinceps dicendum sit, magnitudo, Figura, &
Gravitas, seu Pondus, Impetus ad Motum». Ibid., p. 267a. Gravity is defined as «naturalis,
internaque facultas seu vis, qua se per seipsam ciere, movere potest Atomos». Ibid., p. 273.
On the interpretation of Gassendi as a materialist, see Margaret Osler, Divine Will and the
Mechanical Philosophy, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1994, pp. 191-194. See also
Alan Charles Kors, Epicureans and Atheists in France, 1650-1729, Cambridge, Cambridge
University Press, 2016.
8 Syntagma Philosophicum, Gassendi, Opera Omnia, I, 277a.
9 «Heinc ex atomis conformari primum moleculas quasdam inter se diversas, quae
sint semina rerum diversarum», Syntagma Philosophicum, Gassendi, Opera Omnia, I, 282b.
Like Gassendi, Beeckman espoused an articulate theory of matter, a hierarchy of corpus-
cles, maintaining that atoms form complex corpuscular structures. Beeckman called the
primary clusters of atoms homogenea, which differ according to their textures. See Henk H.
Kubbinga, Les premières théories ‘moleculaire’: Isaac Beeckman (1620) et Sébastien Basson (1621).
Le concept d’individu substantiel et d’espèce substantielle, «Revue d’Histoire des sciences», 37,
1984, pp. 215-233.
10 Syntagma Philosophicum, Gassendi, Opera Omnia, I, 472a.
11 Philosophiae Epicuri Syntagma, Gassendi, Opera Omnia, III, 25b.
12 Syntagma Philosophicum, Gassendi, Opera Omnia, I, 475b.
8 ANTONIO CLERICUZIO

act: «Nihil vetat quoque supponere delegisse Deum Atomos speciales,

ex quibus pertexeret hujuscemodi semina».13 Semina, which contain
spirits i.e., the more subtle and active atoms, were formed by God at
the beginning and were composed of special atoms: «ex selectis atomis
prima omnium rerum semina, ex quibus deinceps fieret per genera-
tionem propagatio rerum».14 God endowed semina (i.e., a special kind
of moleculae) with power of organizing matter, as well as «scientia et
industria».15 He unambiguously stressed God’s design in the production
of special kinds of molecules having in them the principle of fecundity
and of organization, i.e., something like a little soul (animula).16 Such
a principle did not come from atoms but was conveyed by God into
seeds themselves at the Creation.17 He surmised that seeds were like
little machines including in themselves smaller ones. Yet, he stressed
that the modus operandi of these machines is beyond our intellect.18 He
went on by saying that God implanted in the seeds an active formative
principle, i.e., the soul – working from inside as a craftsman. Gassendi
described the growth of foetus in terms of attraction of similar atoms
and ruled out the Aristotelian doctrine of epigenesis, leaning towards
preformationism.19 As we shall see, Boyle’s views of generation had
much in common with Gassendi’s.

13 Ibid., I, p. 493b.
14 Ibid, I, p. 280b.
15 Ibid., I, 493b. For Gassendi’s semina, see Hiro Hirai, Le concept de semence dans les
théories de la matière à la Renaissance: de Marsile Ficin à Pierre Gassendi, Turnhout, Brepols,
2005, pp. 463-491.
16 Syntagma Philosophicum, Gassendi, Opera Omnia, II, 262a.
17 Ibid., II, p. 262b: «videtur aliunde foecunditas haec non tam intelligi ex primis Prin-
cipiis, ex quibus semina texerentur, quam ex ipsis seminibus, quae Deus ipse texuerit. Sane
exinde intelligi potest, qui fiat, ut Animula contenta in semine tanta solertia, atque industria
organorum suorum, corporisque totius elaborationem aggrediatur, promoveat, perficiat,
quando tantus est, ac tantae sapientiae, tantae potentiae artifex, qui illam talem condiderit,
talem vim ipsi indiderit, tali corpore, talis contexturae, comprehensam voluerit, ut non tali
modo agere, talemque moliri structuram non posset». Emphasis mine.
18 Syntagma Philosophicum, Gassendi, Opera Omnia, II, 267a. In keeping with his effort
of oversimplifying the picture of early modern mechanical philosophy, Sytsma (cit. note
3), pp. 13-14, claimed that Gassendi explained life mechanically and referred to semina as
machinulae. Sytsma quoted a short passage from Gassendi’s text ignoring other sections of
the same text, where the Author imposed severe limitations to the model of machines in
the explanation of generation.
19 Syntagma Philosophicum, Gassendi, Opera Omnia, II, pp. 275b-278a.
GASSENDI AND THE ENGLISH MECHANICAL PHILOSOPHERS 9

Gassendi and Hobbes

The case of Hobbes is of special interest to our purpose, as it shows
that, though he espoused a mechanistic theory of matter, his views
of matter and motion were at odds with Gassendi’s. Hobbes adopted
a strict mechanistic theory and banished spiritual agents from nature.
Hobbes became acquainted with Gassendi before 1641 – via Mersenne,
who fostered both of them to write objections to Descartes’ Medita-
tiones (1641). Hobbes praised Gassendi’s Disquisitio metaphysica (1644)
and in 1646 Gassendi eulogized Hobbes in a letter that Samuel Sorbière
inserted into the prefatory material of the 1647 edition of Hobbes’ De
cive. Hobbes wrote two letters to Gassendi, one dated 12/22 September
1649, communicating the reception of the Animadversiones, the other,
dated 10/20 July 1654, more personal, asking about his correspondent’s
health.20
It is apparent that Hobbes was familiar with Gassendi’s works when
he had already shaped the foundation to his own version of the mechan-
ical philosophy. Hobbes referred to the supposed influence of Gassen-
di on his philosophy in the reply to his opponent Seth Ward, who had
accused him of plagiarism, maintaining that his explanation of sense
perception «upon the grounds of motion was almost generally received
here before his booke came forth [i.e. The Leviathan], being sufficient-
ly taught by Des Cartes, Gassendus, S.K. Digby, and others, before he
had published any thing in that kind».21 In his reply, Hobbes sought to
downplay Gassendi’s influence maintaining that his views diverged from
those of the Epicureans and that he had formulated his philosophy of
nature before knowing Gassendi’s. Hobbes referred to the publication of
his writings in Mersenne’s Cogitata physico mathematica (1644) to disprove
Ward’s allegation.22 Obviously, Hobbes’ account is to be taken cum grano

20 Noel Malcolm (ed.), The Correspondence of Thomas Hobbes, Oxford, Clarendon,

20072, hereinafter as CH, vol. 1, pp. 178-179; 184-185.
21 Seth Ward – John Wilkins, Vindiciae Academiarum, «An Appendix Concerning what
Mr Hobbs and Mr Dell have written touching the Universities», Oxford, printed by Leonard
Lichfield... for Thomas Robinson, 1654, p. 53.
22 «And for Gassendus, and Sir Kenelm Digby, it is manifest by their writings, that
their opinions are not different from that of Epicurus, which is very different from mine.
Or if these two, or any of those I conversed with at Paris, had prevented me in publishing
my own doctrine, yet since it was there known, and declared for mine by Mersennus in the
preface to his Ballistica (of which the three first leaves are employed wholly in the setting
forth of my opinion concerning sense, and the rest of the faculties of the soul) they ought
not therefore to be said to have found it out before me». Thomas Hobbes, Six lessons, Lon-
don, printed by J.M. for Andrew Crook, 1656, p. 58, repr. in William Molesworth (ed.),
10 ANTONIO CLERICUZIO

salis and the matter is far from being settled yet. There is no agreement
among Hobbes scholars about Gassendi’s influence. According to Pa-
ganini, in the early 1640s Hobbes and Gassendi converged in the oppo-
sition to the Cartesian theory of knowledge, yet they diverged on the
theory of light. Gassendi held the corpuscular and ‘emissionist’ theory
of light, while Hobbes saw light (and vision) as the outcome of the lo-
cal motion in the medium.23 Others, like Karl Schuhmann, dismissed
Gassendi’s influence on Hobbes, maintaining that the latter had already
shaped his system when he met the former in Paris, and suggested that
it is possible that Hobbes influenced Gassendi’s ethics.24 Sarasohn gave a
more detailed and convincing account of their relationship, arguing that
their influence might have been reciprocal:
Therefore, I suggest that the relation between Hobbes and Gassendi went as
follows: Hobbes developed a psychology in which human behavior is determined
by the motion of external objects; Gassendi produced an atomistic and material-
istic physics; Hobbes formulated a complete materialism in which he combined
Gassendi’s atomistic model and his own deterministic philosophy to equate ana-
logically inertial motion and human behavior; and Gassendi reacted against Hob-
bes’ materialism by interpolating much more theology in his physics.25

In order to assess the relationship between Hobbes and Gassendi, it

is necessary to take into account the role of atomism in Hobbes’ natu-
ral philosophy. There is little doubt that Hobbes read Epicurus and Lu-
cretius before having known Gassendi. Furthermore, there is evidence
that Hobbes was exposed to the renewal of atomism – before knowing
Gassendi’s work – via the Cavendishes and their entourage, including
Walter Warner, whose writings on atomism were never published but
circulated among natural philosophers.26 It is likely that one of those
who introduced Hobbes to atomism was Sir Kenelm Digby, whom he

Thomas Hobbes English Works, 11 vols., London, John Bohn, 1839-1845 [hereinafter as EW],
vol. VII, pp. 340-341. On the quarrel between Hobbes and Ward, see Jan Prins, Ward’s
polemic with Hobbes on the sources of his optical theories, «Revue d’Histoire des Sciences», 46,
1993, pp. 195-224.
23 Gianni Paganini, Hobbes, Gassendi e la psicologia, in Andrea Napoli – Guido Canzia-
ni (eds.), Hobbes oggi, Milano, Franco Angeli, 1990, pp. 351-446.
24 Karl Schumann, Hobbes und Gassendi, in Rolf W. Puster (ed.), Veritas filia temporis?,
Berlin, Walter de Gruyter, 1995, p. 168.
25 Lisa T. Sarasohn, Motion and morality: Pierre Gassendi, Thomas Hobbes and the me-
chanical world-view, «Journal of the History of Ideas», 46, 1985, pp. 363-378: 370-371; 375.
26 On Warner, see Jan Prins, Walter Warner (ca. 1557-1643) and his notes on animal organ-
isms, Utrecht, privately published, 1992. See also Arrigo Pacchi, «Hobbes e l’Epicureismo»,
in Id. – Agostino Lupoli (ed.), Scritti hobbesiani, Milano, Franco Angeli, 1998, pp. 29-46.
GASSENDI AND THE ENGLISH MECHANICAL PHILOSOPHERS 11

became acquainted with in the early 1630s. This brings us to the thorny
issue of Hobbes and atomism, which we will sum up very briefly. In the
De Corpore (1655) Hobbes adopted a ‘plenist’ physics and ruled out the
indivisibility of the corpuscles. There is however evidence that Hobbes’
attitude towards atomism changed in time. In Tractatus opticus I and and
Tractatus opticus II (both of them written in 1640) Hobbes held a me-
chanical view of nature.27 His theory of light transmission as contained
in the two tracts of 1640 presupposed the existence of interstitial small
empty spaces, i.e., Epicurus’ vacuum disseminatum, which Gassendi had
reassessed with new arguments taken from experiments. Despite Hob-
bes’ acceptance of vacuola, his explanation of light and vision was at
odds with the atomists’. The so-called Short tract on first principles (an
anonymous work, undated and published in 1889 as Hobbes’) might be
considered an exception as it adopted the emanationist theory of light
(which in fact Hobbes did not hold in other works). Yet, Hobbes schol-
ars have convincingly questioned the authorship of the Short Tract, sug-
gesting that the author was not Hobbes, but Robert Payne.28 Payne was
familiar with Gassendi’s works, notably De apparente magnitudine solis
(1642), which he examined in detail, as attested by his surviving anno-
tated copy. In his work, Gassendi explained vision as the outcome of
the transmission of ‘membranulae’.29 By contrast, Hobbes stated that
the action of a luminous body was a motion propagated to the eye
through the contiguous parts of the surrounding medium, and neither
the object, nor parts of it traveled.30 For Hobbes, the luminous body ex-
pands and contracts, like the heart. Every luminous body expands into
a greater volume, and then it contracts again, having a continuous sys-

27 «Omnis actio est motus localis in agente, sicut & omnis passio est motus localis in
patiente. Agentis nomine intelligo corpus, cuius motu producitur effectus in alio corpore».
Hobbes, Tractatus Opticus I, part of it was published by Mersenne in Universae geometriae
mixtaeque mathematicae synopsis, 1644, p. 567, repr. in Thomae Hobbes Malmsburiensis Opera
philosophica quae latine scripsit omnia, ed. Sir William Molesworth, 5 vols, London, J. Bohn,
1839-1845 (hereinafter as OL).
28 On the authorship of the «Short tract», see Timothy Raylor, Hobbes, Payne, and
A Short Tract on First Principles, «The Historical Journal», 44, 1, 2001, pp. 29-58, and Noel
Malcolm, «Robert Payne, the Hobbes Manuscripts, and the “Short Tract’”», in Aspects of
Hobbes, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2002, pp. 80-140.
29 See Gassendi, Opera Omnia, III, pp. 425-426. Cf. Malcolm (cit. note 28), p. 114.
Payne read Gassendi’s Animadversiones and in a letter to his friend Gilbert Sheldon of April
29 1650 he eulogised Gassendi’s philosophy, see William N. Clarke, “Illustrations of the state
of the Church during the Great Rebellion, «Theologian and Ecclesiastic», 6, 1848, p. 171.
30 Tractatus opticus I, in OL, vol. V, pp. 217-218. Cf. Franco Giudice, The most curious
of sciences: Hobbes’s Optics, in Kinch Hoekstra – Aloysius P. Martinich (eds.), The Oxford
Handbook of Thomas Hobbes, New York, Oxford University Press, 2016, pp. 149-168.
12 ANTONIO CLERICUZIO

tolic and diastolic motion.31 To make this motion possible, Hobbes had
recourse to small empty spaces among particles of matter. As he put it
in the Tractatus opticus II, such a movement could not have occurred,
nor could it be imagined, if one did not admit the existence of small
void spaces, whose existence was easy to imagine.32 Hobbes reassessed
this theory in 1643, in his answer to Thomas White’s De mundo (1642).
For Hobbes, the Sun, as a luminous body, expanded and contracted,
and this movement generated light. This motion required small vacu-
ums in the interposed parts. Then he moved on and stated that it was
impossible to prove that all spaces were filled with bodies.33 Hobbes’
letters to Mersenne of 1648 testified to his shifting views of vacuum.
Whereas in the letter of February 1648 he was somehow positive about
the existence of void, in the letter he wrote in May he rejected it. In the
letter of 7/17 February 1648 Hobbes sent his views concerning Etienne
Noël’s Le plein du vide, where the Jesuit had rejected the existence of
void at the top of the tube in the Torricellian experiment. For Noël, the
ethereal parts of air penetrate glass, filling the apparently empty part of
the tube. Hobbes argued that Noël’s arguments
would not remove the possibility of a vacuum, since the supposition of a
vacuum accounts for those experiments more simply and more elegantly... So
to sum up my opinion about the vacuum, I still think what I told you before:
that there are certain minimal spaces here and there, in which there is no body...

Hobbes continued by resorting to arguments taken from the motion

of corpuscles, maintaining that small empty spaces are to be found in
nature, because the sun, fire and other heat-producing bodies agitated
bodies which are next to them, and dissipate their component parts by making
them strike against one another. Certain small empty spaces are necessarily
formed by this action.34

Hobbes’ views of void changed in the subsequent letter of 15/25

May 1648. Hobbes ruled out the vacuists’ interpretations of the Tor-

31 Tractatus Opticus I, in OL, 5, p. 218.

32 «...id quod neque fieri potest, neque concipi, nisi concedatur posse dari vacuum,
saltem per vim; dari autem vacuum facile est imaginari.», Tractatus Opticus II (BL, Ms. Har-
ley 6796), published in Franco Alessio, Thomas Hobbes Tractatus Opticus, «Rivista critica di
storia della filosofia», 18, 1963, pp. 147-228: 148.
33 Hobbes, Critique du De mundo de Thomas White, ed. by Jean Jacquot and Harold W.
Jones, Paris, Vrin, 1973, chapter IX, § 2, p. 161.
34 CH, vol. 1, p. 167.
GASSENDI AND THE ENGLISH MECHANICAL PHILOSOPHERS 13

ricellian experiment, implicitly criticizing Gassendi’ view of vacuum

coacervatum:
All the experiments which you and others have made with mercury do not
prove that a vacuum exists, because when the subtle matter which is in the
air is pressed, it will pass through the mercury, and through any other fluid or
molten body whatsoever – just as smoke passes through water.35

In the De corpore Hobbes rejected the existence of vacuum by re-

sorting to an experiment that he deemed as «unanswerable», namely
the operation of the gardener’s watering-pot. The vessel has an open-
ing on the top and small holes in the bottom. When it is filled with wa-
ter and the top opening is stopped, the water does not descend. When
the top hole is opened, water flows as air can occupy the space left by
water. This shows that water could not have driven down the air below
since there was no vacuum below and all space was full.36 Hobbes had
recourse to this experiment in his letter to Sorbière of 6/16 February
1657, where he reiterated his anti-vacuist view. Here Hobbes sought to
find a compromise with the atomists’ doctrine by stating that what Epi-
curus called vacuum might be identified with Descartes’ materia subtilis
and with what he himself defined as the «extremely pure substance»,
whose parts were not atoms as they could be further divided.37 Hobbes
never held the indivisibility of the smallest units of matter. He called
his corpuscles atoms, yet he stated that they could be further divided
into smaller parts, though the smaller the particles, the more difficult
the division. In De corpore, he unambiguously rejected the Epicurean
view of atoms as «infinitely hard» bits of matter.38 In the Dialogus physi­
cus de natura aeris (1661), written against Boyle and the Fellows of the
Royal Society, he argued that hardness was produced by the motion of
constituent corpuscles. In the same work he rejected Gassendi’s hook
and eye mechanism as it would be incompatible with the transmission
of light:
Moreover, what reason can be offered for the transparency of those bod-
ies through which all visible bodies appear no less distinctly than through the
purest air? If glass consisted of hard particles, hooked, entangled, or with pores

35 CH, vol. 1, p. 173.

36 Hobbes, De corpore, chapter XXVI, § 2 (Engl. trans.: Elements of philosophy, the first
section, concerning body, EW, p. 309).
37 CH, vol. 1, p. 445.
38 Hobbes, De Corpore, chapter XXVI, § 3 (Engl. trans.: Elements of philosophy the first
section, concerning body, EW, p. 312).
14 ANTONIO CLERICUZIO

disconnected in whatever way, it would be impossible for rays of light to pass

through the transparent sphere without various refractions, by which the ar-
rangement of the parts would be disturbed, and vision would become con-
fused, which daily experience shows to be false.39

It is therefore apparent that despite their mutual esteem and their

common commitment to replace Aristotelian natural philosophy with
a new one grounded on matter and motion, Hobbes and Gassendi held
different views of matter. Hobbes was no atomist and Gassendi did not
share Hobbes’ materialism (notably his view of the soul). In addition,
Gassendi’s theory of generation, postulating the existence of seminal
principles endowed with a degree of cognition, was incompatible with
Hobbes’ mechanism. Hobbes’ undiluted mechanism and its reductionist
approach had little appeal to the scientific community flourishing in Eng-
land (especially in Oxford and London). The contrast was not confined to
the role of experimental investigations and to the existence of incorporeal
agents. It involved the interpretation of the mechanical philosophy and
its explanatory power. As Schaffer pointed out, for Restoration natural
philosophers «Efficient causes could be vital and spiritual, and analogized
with the action of human soul, harmony, congruity, and sympathy».40 As
we shall see, Oxford physiologists investigated living organisms by having
recourse to corpuscular theories and to chemical experiments. Some, but
not all of them, adopted mechanical explanations, yet their explanations
included causative powers located in active vital spirits.

Walter Charleton
A major impulse to the dissemination of Gassendi’s philosophy came
from Charleton, who produced a translation of parts of Gassendi’s Ani-
madversiones. A physician and an eclectic natural philosopher, Charleton
was a prolific writer who published books on a number of topics, includ-
ing natural philosophy, medicine, antiquarianism.41 A royalist, he joined

39 OL, vol. IV, p. 281; 286, Engl. trans. in Simon Schaffer – Steven Shapin, Leviathan
and the Air-Pump: Hobbes, Boyle, and the Experimental Life, Princeton, Princeton University
Press, 1985, pp. 385-386; 390.
40 Schaffer (cit. note 3), p. 65.
41 For Charleton, see Lindsay Sharp, Walter Charleton’s Early Life, 1620-1659, and Re-
lationship to Natural Philosophy in Mid-Seventeenth Century England, «Annals of Science», 30,
1973, pp. 311-340. Sabina Fleitmann, Walter Charleton (1620-1707), «Virtuoso», Frankfurt am
Main and New York, Peter Lang, 1986; Emily Booth, A Subtle and Mysterious Machine. The
Medical World of Walter Charleton (1619-1707), New York, Springer, 2005.
GASSENDI AND THE ENGLISH MECHANICAL PHILOSOPHERS 15

the English exiles in France and became acquainted with Descartes’ and
Gassendi’s philosophy. In the 1650s he sent to the press four books deal-
ing with atomism and Epicureanism. In 1652 he published The Darkness
of Atheism, where he promoted the physico-theology, resorting to the
philosophies of Descartes and Gassendi; in 1654, he sent to the press
the influential Physiologia Epicuro-Gassendo-Charletoniana, largely based
on Gassendi’s Animadversiones. In 1656, he released Epicurus’ moral, a
translation of Epicurus’ ethics including an apology of his moral, and, in
1657, The immortality of human soul, a dialogue criticizing Lucretian doc-
trines. Here we will focus on The Darkness on Atheism and on Physiologia.
Charleton was committed to defending the mechanical philoso-
phy from the allegation of impiety, a task that became urgent in the
1650s as the political and religious conflicts, as well as the publication of
works supporting materialism and the mortalist heresy, such as Richard
Overton’s Mans Mortallitie (1643) and Hobbes’ Leviathan (1651), gener-
ated anxiety among theologians and pious philosophers, notably Hen-
ry More.42 In Antidote against atheism (1653) More rebuked the atheists,
the enthusiasts and libertines and rejected the mechanical philosophy,
namely the view that natural phenomena could be explained exclusive-
ly in terms of matter and motion, excluding the action of a spiritual
substance. In his sermons and lectures (read before 1650) John Smith
(1618-1652), who introduced Descartes in the teaching of philosophy at
Cambridge, opposed the view that motion is inherent in matter – a topic
that, as we shall see, Boyle was particularly keen to address.43 A Puritan
and a religious writer, Richard Baxter attacked Gassendi, Descartes and
all mechanical philosophers as «Somatists and Epicureans».44 One more
censure of Gassendi came in 1660 from Henry More, who reiterated
his attacks on the philosophy of Epicurus (which he styled a ‘foolery’),
claiming that he preferred Descartes’ philosophy. He further dismissed
Gassendi’s attempt to ‘baptize’ Epicureanism, stating that he
was much amazed that a person of so commendable parts as P. Gassendus
could ever have the patience to rake out such old course rags out of that rotten
dunghill to stuffe his large volumes withall.45

42 Catherine Wilson, Epicureanism at the Origins of Modernity, Oxford, Oxford Univer-

sity Press, 2008, pp. 144-148 and Kenneth Sheppard, Anti-Atheism in early modern England: the
atheist answered and his error confuted, Leiden, Brill, 2015, pp. 105-117.
43 John Smith, “A short discourse of atheism”, in Selected discourses, London, J. Flesher,
1660, p. 48.
44 Sytsma (cit. note 4), pp. 53-54.
45 Henry More, An Explanation of the Grand Mystery of Godlines, London, J. Flesher,
1660, «To the reader», p. vii.
16 ANTONIO CLERICUZIO

The Darkness of Atheism opens with a reaction to what the author saw
as the spreading of impious views contained in the many tracts pouring
from the unrestricted press. As the civil war had undermined the au-
thority of the Church, «the most execrable heresies, blasphemous en-
thusiasms, nay even profes’t Atheism have enter’d upon us, without any
considerable opposition». England – he claimed– «at this unhappy day
fosters more swarms of Atheisticall monsters» than any other nation.46
Charleton’s censure of Epicurean atomism censured both the irreli-
gious and subversive motifs of the
old Romance of the spontaneous result of the World from a casual segregation
and disposition of that abysse of atoms, which rowled up and down, to and fro,
by an impetuous and continual inquietude, estuation, or civil war, caused by
their ingenite propensity to motion, in the range of the infinite space.47

Charleton found the doctrine of atoms a better tool than the Per-
ipatetic philosophy to explode atheism, and to this end he resorted to
Gassendi’s works. He also endorsed relevant aspects of Descartes’ phi-
losophy, including the ontological argument.48 Charleton paid a tribute
to Gassendi stating that «the leaves of whose most learned Works, we
blush not to confesse our selves to have been so conversant in, that we
have sullyed them by often revolution».49
Following Gassendi, Charleton argued that God created ex nihilo
«such a proportionate congeries, or just mass of Atoms, as was neces-
sary to the constitution of the Universe».50 The rehabilitation of atom-
ism entailed the rebuttal of Epicurus’ doctrine, namely
That Atoms had, from all eternity, a faculty of Motion, or impetuous ten-
dency, inherent in them, and received not the same from any forreign princi-
ple, or impression extradvenient.51

Yet, Charleton did not follow Descartes’ concept of inert matter, and
he rather aligned with Gassendi’s view as contained in the Animadver-
siones, arguing that «Atoms in the instant of their creation received im-

46 Walter Charleton, The Darkness of Atheism dispelled by the light of nature: A physico-
theologicall treatise, London, printed by J[ohn] F[lesher] for William Lee, 1652, «Advertisement
to the reader», unpaginated.
47 Ibid., p. 43.
48 Ibid., pp. 4-5.
49 Ibid., «Advertisement to the reader», unpaginated.
50 Ibid., p. 47.
51 Ibid., p. 46.
GASSENDI AND THE ENGLISH MECHANICAL PHILOSOPHERS 17

mediately from God a faculty of self-motion».52 God – he stated – guided

their motions and «cast them into that excellent composure or figure,
which the visible World now holds».53
In order to stress the role of divine providence in the natural world,
Charleton adopted Gassendi’s theory of seminal principles, i.e., corpus-
cles endowed by God with formative power, a kind of scientia. For Char-
leton, atoms, «as they are in their naked and incomplex nature» cannot
account for the origin of living organism. He explained generation by
means of special corpuscles created by God with
formative virtue which... immediately designes this or that parcel of matter for
such or such a part, another for another, and so spins it out into an uniform
labyrinth of members, at last weaving all those into an ingenious figure, in all
points resembling the Protoplast or first genitor of that species.54

Largely based on Gassendi’s Animadversiones, Charleton’s Physiologia

played a relevant part in the dissemination of Gassendi’s ideas in Eng-
land.55 Charleton followed Gassendi’s view of materia actuosa, arguing
that particles of matter «are indefinently motive, and in perpetual en-
deavour of emergency or exsilition».56 Like Gassendi, Charleton made
conjectures about the shapes of atoms and resorted to the notion of mo-
leculae. He surmised that atoms of fire were small and spherical, atoms
of cold («frigorifick atoms») tetrahedral or pyramidal, while salts were
formed of cubical atoms.57 Atoms combined together to form aggre-
gates, which he called «moleculae, or first concretions of atoms». Char-
leton (like Gassendi) maintained that molecules were the «proxime and
immediate principles» of the four elements and of the chemical princi-
ples.58 Charleton explained the physical properties of bodies by means
of the shape and motion of atoms, the small empty spaces within them
and the textures of atoms. Those bodies – he concluded – having void
spaces interposed among particles and lax connection of atoms – can

52 Ibid., p. 47.
53 Ibid., p. 44.
54 Ibid., p. 63.
55 For a comparison between Gassendi’s Animadversiones and Charleton’s Physiologia,
see Fleitmann (cit. note 40), pp. 416-417.
56 Walter Charleton, Physiologia Epicuro-Gassendo-Charletoniana..., London, printed
by Thomas Newcomb for Thomas Heath, 1654, p. 125.
57 Ibid., pp. 297, 306-307, 31-32, 119.
58 Ibid., p. 426. For Gassendi’s notion of molecule, see Antonio Clericuzio, Elements,
Principles and Atoms. A Study of Atomism and Chemistry in the Seventeenth Century, Dordrecht,
Kluwer, 2000, pp. 63-71.
18 ANTONIO CLERICUZIO

be easily separated into their constituent parts. If the texture is compact

and atoms are at rest, bodies – as Gold – were stable and could hard-
ly be separated.59 Fluidity was a consequence of the motion of atoms,
which in turn was due to their smooth surfaces and to the presence of
small voids. Firmness occurred when atoms, «being uncapable of rowl-
ing upon each others in superfice, both in respect of the ineptitude of
their figures thereunto, and the want of competent inane spaces among
them».60
In Book 1 of the Physiologia, Charleton dealt at length with vacuum.
He had no doubt about the existence of vacuum disseminatum (i.e., small
empty spaces among particles of matter), yet he did not align with
Gassendi to assess the existence of vacuum coacervatum and expressed
some reservations about the vacuist interpretation of the Torricellian
experiment. He claimed that particles of air might have penetrated the
pores of glass and that light might have passed through as well. Then
Charleton maintained that
the tube might be made of some metal, or other material, whose contexture
of atomical particles is so dense and compact, as not to permit the trajection
of the beams of light.

Yet, he claimed that atoms of heat and magnetic effluvia might have
entered the space left by mercury therefore preventing the vacuum coa-
cervatum. Charleton however rejected both the horror vacui and the Carte-
sian anti-vacuist arguments as entailing the existence of ether, which he
viewed as a petitio principii. As we shall see, Boyle arguments concerning
vacuum had much in common with Charleton’s.61
Like other British physiologists, Charleton did not aim at explaining
physiological phenomena in mechanical terms. He made this point clear
in Natural History of Nutrition (1659), where he dealt with natural mo-
tion. He ruled out

59 «So that where their Connexions and complications are but lax, and easily exsoluble,
as in all Animals, all Plants, and some Metals, there do they sooner and more easily expede
themselves, and so in short time totally dissolve the Concretions, which they composed.
But, where they are bound to a more lasting peace, by more close compaction, and recip-
rocal complications, as in Gold and Adamants; there their inhaerent propensity to motion
is so supprest, as that they cannot disengage themselves each from other, without great
difficulty...» Charleton (cit. note 55), p. 432.
60 Ibid., pp. 318-320; cf., Gassendi, Animadversiones (cit. note 5), pp. 333-335.
61 Charleton (cit. note 55), p. 43.
GASSENDI AND THE ENGLISH MECHANICAL PHILOSOPHERS 19

that opinion of Decartes and his disciple Regius... that the influx of Animal
Spirits by the nerves, is necessary to the performance of all Natural Motions
and actions done in the body.

He maintained that «all parts of the body have a certain natural sense
or feeling».62 Willis too impose severe restrictions to the use of mecha-
nism in medicine, claiming that the mechanical philosophy was to be
praised as it dispensed with occult qualities, yet it was too speculative to
be of any use in natural philosophy. As he put it:
it undertakes mechanically the unfolding of things, and accommodates nature
with working tools; as it were in the hand of an Artificer, and without running
to occult qualities, sympathy, and other refuges of ignorance.

Nonetheless, he cast doubts on the mechanical philosophy, prefer-

ring the chemical theory of principles:
but because it rather supposes, than demonstrates its principles, and teaches
of what figure those elements of bodies may be, not what they have been,
and also induces notions that are extremely subtle and remote from the sense,
and that do not sufficiently conform with the phenomena of nature, when we
descend to particulars, it pleases to me to give my sentence to the... opinion
of Chymists... affirming all bodies consist of Spirit, Sulphur, Salt, Water and
Earth.

Their motions and proportions can explain «the beginnings and end-
ings of natural things».63

Robert Boyle
Samuel Hartlib and his correspondents were instrumental in the ear-
ly dissemination of Gassendi’s works in England. Willian Rand, one of
Hartlib’s associates, a physician and a follower of Jan Baptista van Hel-
mont, translated Gassendi’s life of Peiresc into English (1657). As we
read in the «Epistle dedicatory» (addressed to his kinsman John Evelyn),
Rand undertook the traslation of Gassendi’s work on Benjamin Wors-

62 Charleton, Natural History of Nutrition, Life and and Voluntary Motion, London,
printed for Henry Herringman, 1659, p. 124.
63 Thomas Willis, De Fermentatione, in Id., Diatribae duae, London, Tho. Roycroft,
impensis Jo. Martin, Ja. Allestry, & Tho. Dicas, 1659, p. 4. Sytsma ignores this statement
of Willis’ and does not hesitate to include Willis among the mechanical philosophers, see
Sytsma (cit. note 4), p. 49.
20 ANTONIO CLERICUZIO

ley’s and Samuel Hartlib’s suggestion. Rand stated that ten years had
gone since Hartlib «put the Latine book into my hand».64
Samuel Hartlib and his correspondents stimulated young Robert
Boyle’s interest in the works of the French natural philosophers. In May
1647 Boyle wrote to Hartlib that Gassendi was his favourite philosopher.
In turn, in 1648, Hartlib sent him news about Gassendi’s work. In 1648-
1649 Boyle became familiar with Gassendi’s Institutio astronomica (1647),
as attested by his references to Gassendi’s astronomical computations,
to be found in the second Essay of The Usefulness of Natural Philosophy.
This work was published in 1663, but, as the author stated, part of it was
written when he was «scarce above 21 or 22 years old», i.e 1647-8.65 A few
years later (ca. 1651-1652), Boyle wrote a tract on atoms, which he left
unfinished. A later endorsement on the manuscript reads: «These Papers
are without fayle to be burn’t». Boyle’s tract starts as follows: 66
The Atomicall Philosophy invented or brought into request by Democri-
tus, Leucippus, Epicurus, & their Contemporaries, tho since the inundation of
Barbarians & Barbarisme expell’d out of the Roman world all but the casually
escaping Peripateticke Philosophy, it have been either wholly ignor’d in the Eu-
ropean Schooles or mention’d there but as an exploded systeme of Absurdities
yet in our lesse partiall & more inquisitive times it is so luckyly reviv’d & so
skillfully celebrated in divers parts of Europe by the learned pens of Gassen-
dus, Magnenus, Des Cartes & his disciples our deservedly famous Countryman
Sir Kenelme Digby & many other writers...

As we have elsewhere shown, in this early essay Boyle did not en-
dorse a reductionist atomism, but a qualitative version of atomism.67
In the fourth and fifth Essays of The Usefulnesse, part 1, possibly written
about 1653, Boyle voiced his anxiety with the atheistic implications of
atomism. He set out to reject a number of Epicurean tenets on atoms

64 Gassendi, The Mirrour of True Nobility and Gentility, Being the Life of the renowned Nico-
laus Claudius Fabricius, Lord of Peiresk, Englished by W. Rand, London, printed by J. Streater
for Humphrey Moseley, 1657, sig. A3r. On Rand, see DNB sub voce.
65 Robert Boyle, The Usefulnesse of Natural Philosophy, part 1 (1663), in Michael Hunter –
Edward B. Davis (eds.), The Works of Robert Boyle (14 vols), London, Pickering & Chatto,
1999-2000, 3, pp. 220-221 (hereinafter as Boyle, Works). For the date of composition of
part I of The Usefulness, see ibid., p. xix (editors’ introductory notes) and p. 195. Boyle’s
references are to Gassendi, Institutio astronomica, Paris, apud Ludovicum de Heuqueville,
1647, pp. 127-134 and 205-209.
66 «Of the Atomicall Philosophy», published in Boyle, Works, 13, pp. 225-235: 227. On
this tract, see Antonio Clericuzio, A Redefinition of Boyle’s chemistry and corpuscular philoso-
phy, «Annals of Science», 47, 1990, pp. 561-589: 568-571.
67 Clericuzio (cit. note 66), p. 569.
GASSENDI AND THE ENGLISH MECHANICAL PHILOSOPHERS 21

to be found in Lucretius’ poem, by employing arguments both Gassendi

and Charleton had used. Yet, when dealing with the motion of atoms,
Boyle distanced himself from Gassendi, by opposing the latter’s view
(as contained in Animadversiones) that matter was active and sided with
Descartes stating that matter was inert and its essence was extension.68
Motion – Boyle stated in The Usefulness of Natural Philosophy – was im-
pressed by God and guided by him in order to produce the universe:
Motion is no way necessary to the essence of matter, which seems to con-
sist principally in extension. For matter is no less matter when it rests, then
when it is in motion; and we daily see parcels of matter pass from the state of
motion to that of rest, and from this to that...[...] The great mass of lazy mat-
ter was created by God at the beginning and by him put into swift and various
motion, whereby it was actually divided into small parts of several sizes and
figures, whose motion and crossings of each other were so guided by God, as
to constitute, by their occursions and coalitions, the great inanimate parts of
the universe...69

This topic crops up again in Boyle’s correspondence with Spino-

za – via Oldenburg. The latter wrote to Spinoza on 3 April 1663:
he [i.e., Boyle] replies that he has made use of the Epicurean principles, which
have it that motion is innate to the particles, for it was necessary to use some
hypothesis to explain the phenomenon. Although he uses it to maintain his
own opinion against the chemists and the schoolmen, showing that the facts
can be well accounted for on that hypothesis, he does not, for that reason,
make it his own.70

Boyle reassessed this view of motion in The Origin of Forms and Qual-
ities (1666), where he wrote that «the origin of motion in matter is from
God».71 There is no doubt that in this essay Boyle rejected the Epicurean
view of active matter, not atomism as such.72 Boyle’s main concern in

68 As we have seen, in Syntagma Philosophicum, Gassendi took a cautious position

about the ultimate origin of matter’ activity, claiming that human intellect was unable to
give a definitive answer to this question.
69 Boyle, Works, 3, pp. 252-253.
70 Henry Oldenburg, The Correspondence of Henry Oldenburg (ed. A.R. Hall and
M. Boas Hall), 13 vols., Madison, University of Wisconsin Press, London, Mansell; London,
Taylor & Francis, 1965-1986, vol. 2, p. 42. Sytsma quotes only the first part of Oldenburg’s
statement ignoring what he said about Boyle’s own view of innate motion. The result is a
misrepresentation of Boyle’s position on this subject, see Sytsma (cit. note 4), p. 44.
71 Boyle, Works, 5, p. 306.
72 Dmitri Levitin, The Experimentalist as Humanist: Robert Boyle on the History of Philos-
22 ANTONIO CLERICUZIO

writing the fourth and fifth essays of The Usefulness, bearing the title of
«Containing a Requisite Digression concerning those that would exclude
the Deity from intermeddling with Matter», was to distance his corpus-
cular theory from the atheistic implications he found in the philosophy
of Epicurus. Like Charleton, Boyle was concerned with the spreading of
Epicureanism in England. As he subsequently wrote in The Excellence of
Theology (1674), Epicurus «has nowadays so numerous a sect of natural-
ists to follow him».73 The theory Boyle associated with the Epicureans
was that atoms have “emanative” attributes, flowing immediately from
matter, such as gravity or the internal self-moving power, a view that
Robert Hooke and William Petty had espoused. In a lecture delivered at
the Royal Society, Petty had maintained that atoms were endowed with
gravity and attractive power.74
It is well-known that Boyle saw his corpuscular philosophy as a via
media between Cartesianism and Gassendi’s atoms. He stated that, de-
spite the different views on relevant topics, «both parties agree in de-
ducing all the phenomena of nature from matter and local motion.»
He avoided disputes over the existence of vacuum and the divisibility of
matter, as – he pointed out – they «seem to be rather Metaphysical than
physiological notions».75 On the existence of vacuum Boyle was very
cautious, and did not assert that vacuum was produced in the Torricellian
tube or in the air-pump receiver. He rejected the horror vacui, but did
not take sides, as he deemed the arguments of plenists like Descartes

ophy, «Annals of science», 71, 2014, pp. 148-182: 162-163, maintained that Boyle changed his
mind on Epicurus’ atomism because he ruled out the «Epicurean reductionism»: Levitin’s
view is unsubstantiated. As we have seen, Boyle’s essay on atoms did not contain a reduc-
tionist version of atomism, and Boyle’s arguments against Epicurus (as contained in The
Usefulness) were unambiguously aimed at rejecting the Epicurean tenets that Boyle saw as
incompatible with Christian religion.
73 Boyle, Works, 8, p. 48. In this work Boyle praised Gassendi’s translation of Epicurus’
life. For the association of modern libertines with Epicurus’ philosophy, see Reason and
Religion 1675, Id., Works, 8, p. 237.
74 Royal Society Boyle Papers, 2: f. 4 (Hand: possibly R. Bacon), see John J. Macintosh,
Robert Boyle on Atheism, Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 2005, pp. 339-340. For Hooke’s
theory of the innate motion of atoms, see above, Antonio Clericuzio, The Mechanical Phi-
losophy and the Spring of Air. New Light on Robert Boyle and Robert Hooke, «Nuncius», 13, 1998,
pp. 69-75. William Petty, Discourse made before the Royal Society the 26. of November, 1674,
concerning the use of duplicate proportion in sundry important particulars together with a new
hypothesis of springing or elastique motions, London, 1674, pp. 121-135. Petty’s Discourse was
castigated by Thomas Barlow (who in 1675 became Bishop of Lincoln) as impious. Barlow
saw Gassendi’s atomism as the source of Petty’s theory of self-moving atoms, see Rhodri
Lewis (ed.), William Petty on the Order of Nature: An Unpublished Manuscript Treatise, Tempe,
Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2012, pp. 1-9.
75 Certain Physiological Essays (1661), Boyle, Works, 2, p. 87.
GASSENDI AND THE ENGLISH MECHANICAL PHILOSOPHERS 23

were not grounded on experiments, but on philosophical tenets that

experience had not confirmed. Against the vacuists’ outlook, he main-
tained that light and magnetic effluvia could penetrate the evacuated
air-pump receiver. He took the Cartesian objection on board, namely,
that «the receiver devoy’d of air may be replenished with some ethereal
matter». Yet, he argued, the existence of such ethereal matter is presup-
posed, not demonstrated by experiments. He thus declared that by
vacuum «I understand not a space, wherein there is no body at all, but
such as is either altogether, or almost totally devoid of air».76
As we have seen, Boyle did not share some features of Gassendi’s
atomism, yet his natural philosophy had much in common with the
French philosopher’s This becomes apparent if we take into account the
following topics, central to both their philosophies of nature, i.e, volun-
tarism, probabilism, teleology, reductionism and the seminal principles.
We shall examine these topics in some detail.
Like Gassendi, Boyle emphasized the contingency of natural phe-
nomena, arguing that since God’s general concourse
is necessary to the conservation and efficacy of every particular physical agent,
we cannot but acknowledge, that, by with-holding his concourse or changing
these Laws of Motion, which depend perfectly upon his Will, he may invalidate
most, if not all the Axioms and Theorems of natural philosophy...77

Therefore, he maintained, the Laws of Nature were to be understood

as «notional rules», because a law was a rule of action according to which
an intelligent and free agent was bound to regulate his actions. But inani-
mate bodies were utterly incapable of understanding what a law is.78

76 New Experiments (1660), Boyle, Works, 1, pp. 197-198; 163. Boyle stated: «I refused to
declare myself, either pro or contra in that dispute.» Notion of Nature, Id., Works, 10, p. 534.
On Boyle and vacuum, see Shapin – Schaffer (cit. note 39), pp. 45-46.
77 Reason and Religion (1675), Boyle, Works, 8, pp. 251-252.
78 «I must freely observe, that, to speak properly, a Law being but a notional rule of
acting according to the declar’d Will of a Superior, ‘tis plain, that nothing but an intellectual
being can be properly capable of receiving and acting by a law. For if it does not understand,
it cannot know what the Will of the Legislator is; nor can it have any intention to accom-
plish it, nor can it act with regard to it; or know, when it does, in Acting, either conform to
it or deviate from it. And ‘tis intelligible to me, that God should at the beginning impress
determinate motions upon the parts of Matter, and guide them, as He thought requisite,
for the primordial constitution of things: and that ever since he should, by his ordinary and
general concourse, maintain those powers, which he gave the parts of matter, to transmit
their motions thus and thus to one another» (Notion of Nature, Boyle, Works, 10, p. 457. For
Gassendi’s view, see Syntagma Philosophicum, Gassendi, Opera Omnia, I, p. 494a. On Gassen-
di’s voluntarism, see Osler (cit. note 7), pp. 48-56; 163-166.
24 ANTONIO CLERICUZIO

Boyle followed Gassendi in rejecting intermediate agents between

God and the physical world, and adopted the French philosopher’s argu-
ments against the anima mundi.79 God created the world and maintained
it with His general concourse without the assistance of a «vice-gerent».80
Boyle imposed restrictions to human reason not just in religion, but
in philosophy too, as attested by the vexata quaestio about the infinite di-
visibility of matter.81 At an early stage of his career, Boyle spelled out his
view on the limits of scientific explanations maintaining that the utmost
naturalists
can attain to in their explications is that the explicated phenomena may be pro-
duced after such a manner as they deliver, but not that they really are so... It is a
very easy mistake for men to conclude, that because an effect may be produced
by some determinate causes, it must be so, or actually is so.82

He went on by providing a picture of Epicurus as a philosopher

who opposed dogmatism and unlike some modern naturalists (possibly
Thomas Hobbes) refrained from pretending «to know the true and ade-
quate cause of things». He insisted that
Epicurus himself, as appears by ancient testimony and by his own writings,
was more modest, not onely contenting himself, on many occasions, to pro-
pose several possible ways whereby a phaenomenon may be accounted for, but
sometimes seeming to dislike the so pitching upon any one explication, as to
exclude and reject all others.

Finally, referring to Epicurus’ followers (evidently Gassendi), he stated

that
Some modern philosophers that much favor his doctrine, do likewise im-
itate his example, in pretending to assign not precisely the true, but possible
cause of the phenomenon they endeavor to explain.83

79 For Gassendi’s rejection of Anima Mundi, see Syntagma Philosophicum, in Gassendi,

Opera Omnia, I, p. 334a. For a thorough analysis of the early modern debate on the soul of
the world, including Gassendi’s views, see Dmitri Levitin, Ancient Wisdom in the Age of the
New Science, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2015, pp. 398-418.
80 In The excellency of the mechanical hypothesis (1674), Boyle rejected those «general
agents, as the Platonic Soul of the World, or the Universal Spirit, asserted by some Spagyr-
ists» (Boyle, Works, 8, p. 109).
81 Reason and Religion, Boyle, Works, 8, pp. 250-251, and Things above reason, Id., Works,
9, p. 367.
82 The Usefulnesse, Boyle, Works, 3, pp. 255-256.
83 Ibid., p. 256. Boyle’s statement disproves Levitin’s thesis that Boyle opposed Epi-
curus philosophy not because it was impious, but because he saw it a «dogmatic Atom-
GASSENDI AND THE ENGLISH MECHANICAL PHILOSOPHERS 25

Boyle aligned with Gassendi in criticizing Descartes’ nescience about

final causes, and acknowledged that it would have been a presumption
to claim that the human intellect was able to achieve a complete under-
standing of God’s ends in the creation, yet he opposed Descartes’ view
that we could not discover them at all. One of the ends that God had
proposed to himself at the Creation was that intelligent creatures should
have appreciated the beauty and the goodness of the world.84 The inves-
tigation of living organisms supported the argument that final causes
were knowable. In the study of plants and animals – he claimed – in-
vestigating the final causes is both permissible and useful. Following
a well-established tradition, Boyle wrote that anatomy revealed God’s
ends, as attested by the anatomy of the eye. In addition, the considera-
tion of the ends provided no little advantage to anatomists, as it was con-
ductive to the discovery of the uses of bodily parts, and brought about
important discoveries, as attested by Harvey’s understanding of the use
of the valves in the veins.85
Like other mechanical philosophers, Boyle believed that the simplest
(though not indivisible) particles of bodies (prima or minima naturalia)
were endowed with «catholick affections», i.e., size, shape and motion.
He repeated that the phenomena of our world were produced by mo-
tions of insensible particles of matter. Yet, in the investigation of natural
phenomena (and notably in his chemical investigations), Boyle was some-
how reluctant to frame hypotheses on the shape of simple corpuscles
and on their motions. He often had recourse to compound corpuscles,
i.e., primary concretions of corpuscles, which – he stated – were rarely
broken and remained unchanged in nature. Boyle rejected the Cartesian
explanations grounded on the shapes of particles. He also took issue
with Gassendi’s explanation of cold that grounded it on atomi frigoris
having pyramidal or cubic shape.86 Despite this contrast with Gassendi,
which was based on Boyle’s commitment to experimentalism and nota-

ism». Levitin (cit. note 78), p. 380. On Gassendi’s probabilism, see Delphine Bellis, Nos in
Diem Vivimus: Gassendi’s Probabilism and Academic Philosophy from Day to Day, in S. Charles –
P. Junquiera Smith (eds.), Academic Scepticism in the Development of Early Modern Philosophy,
Cham, Springer, 2017, pp. 125-152.
84 A Disquisition about the Final Causes of Natural Things (1688), Boyle, Works, 11, pp. 87-
88; 95.
85 Ibid., 11, pp. 125-130.
86 In The History of Cold, Boyle argued that experimental evidence disproves Gassendi’s
theory that cold is the effect of corpuscles of nitre containing “semina frigoris”. See Boyle,
Works, 4, pp. 376-378. For Gassendi, see Syntagma Philosophicum, Gassendi, Opera Omnia, I,
p. 399b.
26 ANTONIO CLERICUZIO

bly to chemical experiments, Boyle’s matter theory showed some rele-

vant affinity with the one espoused by Gassendi. Though the latter had
recourse to imaginary shapes of atoms to explain a number of natural
phenomena, yet, in his investigation of the vexata quaestio of the forma
mixti, he gave prominence to compound corpuscles, i.e., moleculae. As
we have seen, Gassendi (and Charleton) saw moleculae as the proximate
constituents of the chemical principles, as well as of metals.87 Although
Boyle refrained from formulating a detailed theory about the composi-
tion of corpuscles, his views on this topic can be found in a number of
printed works and in manuscript notes. In The Origin of Forms and Quali-
ties he closely followed Gassendi’s theory of matter, by arguing that
there are also multitudes of corpuscles, which are made up of the coalition of
several of the former minima naturalia; and whose bulk is so small, and their ad-
hesion so close and strict, that each of these little primitive concretions or clusters
(if I may so call them) of particles is singly below the discernment of sense, and
though not absolutely indivisible by nature into the prima naturalia that com-
posed it, or perhaps into other little fragments, yet, for the reasons stated above,
they very rarely happened to be actually dissolved or broken, but remained entire
in a great variety of sensible bodies, and under various forms or disguises.88

Boyle distanced himself from the reductionist approach of strict

mechanists like Descartes and Hobbes. In Certain Physiological Essays
(1661) he maintained that though the explanations based on the mechan-
ical affections of matter were «more satisfactory to the understanding»,
yet – he stated – there are many phenomena that could not be accounted
for by them. Some phenomena are «deduced from the more obvious
and familiar qualities or states of bodies, such as heat, cold, weight, flu-
idity, hardness, fermentation, & c., though these themselves do probably
depend upon those three universal ones [bulk, shape and motion]». His
conclusion (echoing Gassendi’s view) was that «There are oftentimes so
many subordinate causes between particular effects and the most gen-
eral causes of things, that there is left a large field, wherein to exercise
mens industry and reason».89

87 Ibid., p. 472a.
88 Boyle, Works, 5, p. 326. See also Royal Society Boyle Papers, xvii, fol. 154v and xxii,
fol. 120r, published in M. Boas Hall, Boyle’s Method of Work: Promoting his Corpuscular Philos-
ophy, «Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London», 41, 1987, pp. 111-143.
89 Boyle, Works, 2, pp. 21-23. Gassendi did not share Descartes’ reductionist project.
Gassendi denied that explanations of natural phenomena are always to be deduced from
the primary mechanical properties of invisible corpuscles, see Syntagma Philosophicum, Gas-
sendi, Opera Omnia, I, 265b.
GASSENDI AND THE ENGLISH MECHANICAL PHILOSOPHERS 27

Following Gassendi and Charleton, Boyle had recourse to seminal

principles to explain generation. Gassendi’s theory of semina seems to
undermine a relevant tenet of the mechanical philosophy, i.e., the ho-
mogeneity of matter, as it stated that the seminal corpuscles acted with
some kind of knowledge. In Syntagma philosophicum Gassendi wrote that
God created seminal principles «ex selectis Atomis» and that «nothing
forbids to suppose that God chose special atoms (atomos speciales) and
interwove with them these seeds and put together the molecules». Semi-
na – Gassendi stated – were endowed by God with knowledge (scientia)
and activity (industria).90 Boyle was less confident than Gassendi about
the explanatory power of semina in the generation of minerals (though
he had espoused it in his early works).91 As Anstey has shown in his valu-
able investigation of this topic, Boyle’s aim was to rebuke the Epicurean
(and Aristotelian) views of the generation of living organisms.92 Like
Gassendi, Boyle saw semina as having a special status in the Creation, as
at the beginning God created the «great Mass of lazy Matter... and semi-
nal Principles of animated Concretions» – seeds being coalitions of sim-
ple particles.93 In the fragment of the essay on spontaneous generation,
Boyle opposed the view of generation as the outcome of mechanical
shuffling of corpuscles and stated that God «made the Protoplasts or
first Individualls of each kind of liveing Creatures, and lodg’d the semi-
nall Principles he thought fit in certain portions of matter».94 Although
he was not explicit about the generation of living organism, he seemed
to lean towards preformationism (which Gassendi had hinted at). This
might be deduced from what Boyle wrote in the essay on spontaneous
generation, i.e, that «the seminal matter might containe a delineation &
epitome of this modell».95 Boyle did not provide an explanation of the
modus operandi of the seminal principles, yet, we can infer that he did not
account for it in strictly mechanical terms. Boyle did not conceive the
seminal principles as ordinary corpuscles. God created a special kind of

90 See Syntagma Philosophicum, Gassendi, Opera Omnia, I, pp. 280b and 493b.
91 Clericuzio (cit. note 58), pp. 126-128.
92 Peter Anstey, Boyle on seminal principles, «Studies in History and Philosophy of Bio-
logical and Biomedical Sciences», 33, 2002, pp. 597-630: 606.
93 The Usefulness, Boyle, Works, 3, 253; 245-246.
94 «Essay on Spontaneous generation», Boyle, Works, 13, p. 287. For Boyle’s view of
spontaneous generation see Anstey (cit. note 91), pp. 614-619.
95 “Essay on Spontaneous generation”, Boyle, Works, 13, p. 278; see also High vener-
ation, Boyle, Works, 10, 172. For Gassendi’s theory of generation, see Antonia Lolordo,
Pierre Gassendi and the Birth of Early Modern Philosophy, Cambridge, Cambridge University
Press, 2007, pp. 186-202.
28 ANTONIO CLERICUZIO

corpuscles, having the power to organize parcels of matter. Yet, unlike

Gassendi he did not maintain that semina were endowed with knowl-
edge. Boyle did not deny that the growth of the living organism was the
outcome of matter and motion, yet, he maintained that God was the
ultimate source of the «plastick, or formative power» contained in seeds.
Matter, qua matter, had no generative power.96

Conclusions

At a close analysis it has become apparent that English mechanical

philosophers held diverse views of matter and motion. Following Gas-
sendi’s philosophy a number of mechanical philosophers adopted a criti-
cal attitude towards Descartes’ strict mechanism. Historians have rightly
focussed their attention on the complex vicissitudes of Cartesianism in
England, from the early reception with Henry More, up to the early
decades of the eighteenth century. On the other hand, only few studies
have paid attention to the impact of Gassendi’s philosophy, which, as we
have seen, aroused great interest among British philosophers, in particu-
lar Hobbes and other émigrés in France during the Revolution and the
Interregnum. Hobbes shared Gassendi’s rejection of Descartes’ dualism,
yet his mechanical philosophy had little in common with the Gassendi’s
theory of matter. Charleton adopted Gassendi’s atomism and was in-
strumental in the dissemination of Gassendi’s atomism by translating
part of the Animadversiones in his Physiologia. Though he did not endorse
the existence of atoms and void, Boyle adopted significant aspects of
Gassendi’s matter theory, notably his theory of moleculae and of semi-
nal principles, besides sharing the probabilistic view of science as well
as the emphasis on the empirical investigation of natural phenomena.
Charleton and Boyle adopted Gassendi’s views of matter and method
as an integration – and often as a correction – of Cartesian mechanism.
Boyle’s view of final causes and of generation were evidently indebted
to Gassendi’s teachings.
Gassendi the empiricist was seen as complementing Bacon’s teach-
ings, since the French philosopher combined the theory of atoms with
an investigation of nature based on the direct observation of phenom-
ena. Unlike Descartes, Gassendi did not rule out explanations based on
the observable properties of bodies. Gassendi attached particular impor-

96 The Christian Virtuoso, Boyle, Works, 12, p. 444.

GASSENDI AND THE ENGLISH MECHANICAL PHILOSOPHERS 29

tance to the aggregates of atoms, or molecules, and stressed the role of

textura atomorum as the explanans for a wide range of phenomena. Char-
leton and Boyle followed this approach and sketched a hierarchy of cor-
puscles similar to the French philosopher’s. For Boyle, the simplest par-
ticles form aggregates of the first order, quite similar to the molecules
of Gassendi. This hierarchy of particles was adopted and thoroughly
developed by Newton, whose juvenile notebook («Questiones quaedam
Philosophiae») shows that an early stage of his career he opted for Gas-
sendi’s atomism that he knew via Charleton’s Physiologia. Like Gassendi
and Charleton, Newton attached particular importance to interstitial
voids in his investigations of the microscopic structure of bodies, which
were grounded on the experimental study of the optical properties of
bodies. Whereas Boyle was rather reluctant to adopt highly speculative
mechanical explanations resorting to the shapes of corpuscles, such as
Descartes’ screw-shaped particles or Gassendi’s hooked atoms, Newton
ruled out without hesitation the shapes of atoms familiar to the mechan-
ical philosophers and made void and interparticulate forces the ground
of most natural phenomena.
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