Lady Ranelagh: The Incomparable Life of Robert Boyle's Sister 9780226731742

Citation preview

Lady Ranelagh

A series in the history of chemistry, broadly construed, edited by Carin Berkowitz, Angela N. H. Creager, John E. Lesch, Lawrence M. Principe, Alan Rocke, and E. C. Spary, in partnership with the Science History Institute

Lady Ranelagh The Incomparable Life of Robert Boyle’s Sister

Michelle DiMeo

The University of Chicago Press Chicago and London

The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637 The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London © 2021 by The University of Chicago All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations in critical articles and reviews. For more information, contact the University of Chicago Press, 1427 E. 60th St., Chicago, IL 60637. Published 2021 Printed in the United States of America 30 29 28 27 26 25 24 23 22 21

1 2 3 4 5

ISBN-13: 978-0-226-73160-5 (cloth) ISBN-13: 978-0-226-73174-2 (e-book) DOI: https://doi.org/10.7208/chicago/9780226731742.001.0001 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: DiMeo, Michelle, author. Title: Lady Ranelagh : the incomparable life of Robert Boyle’s sister / Michelle DiMeo. Other titles: Synthesis (University of Chicago. Press) Description: Chicago ; London : The University of Chicago Press, 2021. | Series: Synthesis | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2020038658 | ISBN 9780226731605 (cloth) | ISBN 9780226731742 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Ranelagh, Lady. | Boyle, Robert, 1627–1691—Family. | Women scientists—Great Britain—Biography. | Women physicians—Great Britain— Biography. | Women intellectuals—Great Britain—Biography. | Science—Great Britain—History—17th century. | Medicine—Great Britain—History—17th century. | Great Britain—Intellectual life—17th century. | Great Britain—Religion— 17th century. | LCGFT: Biographies. Classification: LCC Q143.R26 D337 2021 | DDC 509.2 [B]—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020038658 ♾ This paper meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992 (Permanence of Paper).

In memory of my incomparable parents, Danny DiMeo and Judy Puleo Winikates

Contents

List of Illustrations ix Note on Conventions xi Introduction

1

1

Birth, Childhood, and Marriage (1615– 42)

17

2

Early Days in the Hartlib Circle (1642– 48)

37

3

Formative Years in Natural Philosophy and Medicine (1649– 56)

61

4

Return to Ireland (1656– 59)

5

Death of the Hartlib Circle and Birth of the Royal Society (1658– 67)

91

115

6

Plague, Providence, and Medical Practice (1665– 67)

7

Robert Boyle Moves In (1668– 90) Conclusion: Death and Legacy

163

195

Acknowledgments 209 Appendix: Boyle Family Genealogy Notes 215 Bibliography 249 Index 273

213

137

Illustrations

Figure 1

Boyle Monument at St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin. 24

Figure 2

Thomas Phillips, Athlone Bridge and Castle, 1685. 32

Figure 3

Portrait of Katherine Jones, Lady Ranelagh. 41

Figure 4

Copy of a medical recipe book compiled by Lady Ranelagh, “My Lady Rennelagh’s Choice Receipts.” 80

Figure 5

Coat of arms for Jones, Viscount Ranelagh, from John Lodge’s Peerage of Ireland. 112

Figure 6

Letter from Lady Katherine Ranelagh to Samuel Hartlib, 1659. 118

Figure 7

Robert Boyle, dedication to his sister Ranelagh, Occasional Reflections upon Several Subjects, 1665. 143

Figure 8

Richard Blome, map of the parish of St. James, Westminster, 1685. 164

Figure 9

Johann Kerseboom, The Shannon Portrait of the Hon. Robert Boyle F.R.S., 1689. 169

Figure 10

Plaques commemorating Robert Boyle and Lady Ranelagh at Lismore Castle, Ireland. 206

Note on Conventions

Calendar

I have used the “New Style” calendar throughout the book, taking January 1 (not March 25) as the start of the new year. As such, though Lady Ranelagh was born on March 22, 1614/15, I have stated her birth as March 22, 1615. However, I have not made a full conversion to the Gregorian calendar, which would mean adding ten days to the English dates. For the international letters in the Hartlib Papers archive that include both dates— the English and continental— I have retained this. Therefore, some letters will include dates such as May 5/15, 1658. When only one date is given, the English New Style calendar is implied. Transcriptions

For ease of reading, contractions have been silently expanded, superscripts removed, and u/v, i/j, and ye/the modernized. Apart from this, I have retained the original spelling, punctuation, and midsentence capitalization for all manuscript transcriptions. However, many letters exist only as printed copies or are available in helpful modern editions. In these cases, I quote from the copy and adopt their style.

Introduction

W

hen Robert Boyle and Katherine Jones, Lady Ranelagh died within one week of each other in December 1691 after having lived together for the previous twenty-three years, Bishop Gilbert Burnet struggled to eulogize the great natural philosopher without also acknowledging his formidable sister. Noting that “she lived the longest on the publickest Scene, she made the greatest Figure in all the Revolutions of the Kingdoms for above fifty Years, of any Woman of our Age,” he concluded, “Such a Sister became such a Brother.”1 It is not hard to find praise of “the Incomparable Lady Ranelagh,” as her contemporaries often called her, in the letters and diaries of those who knew her. John Evelyn referred to her as “a person of extraordinary Talents,” and to Henry Oldenburg she was “that very noble and pious Lady Ranelagh.”2 She is one of a few early modern women we know to have lived a public intellectual life without attracting criticism. Moreover, her influence on Robert Boyle was significant and spanned his entire life— a point acknowledged by his contemporaries and, for centuries after, his biographers. When one considers the high public reputation Lady Ranelagh enjoyed in her own time, it may seem surprising that she remains a shadowy figure today. From historians of science to scholars of women’s writing, and from Boyle specialists to historians of medicine, Lady Ranelagh is recognized as a woman of great intellect and piety. Nevertheless, the details of her life, network, and influence on her brother have been difficult to define.

2

•

Introduction

This is because, unlike Robert Boyle, Lady Ranelagh did not publish her works and made no provisions to preserve her manuscripts after her death. A seventeenth-century woman could often be an active participant in the intellectual culture of her time, but the decision to plan actively for her memorialization through the collation of a personal archive was considered by her contemporaries to be inappropriate.3 However, there are a few examples to the contrary. For instance, Ranelagh’s sister Mary, Countess of Warwick, was fortunate that her household chaplain, Thomas Woodroffe, preserved and annotated her extensive body of manuscripts after her death to use her virtuous life as an example for other women. The result is that we have several extant historical accounts of the countess’s life, even though she was a much less influential figure than her sister.4 In order to tell Lady Ranelagh’s story, historians must travel to the archives of her male relatives (held in four countries), or they must sift through the few scattered manuscript diaries, recipe books, and letters written by her family members and friends. What such a search reveals is that more than one hundred letters written by Ranelagh, several dozen letters written to her, a manuscript treatise, a copy of her recipe book, and hundreds of contemporary comments about her are extant. As well, modern scholarly editions of the works and correspondence of Robert Boyle, along with the digitization and transcription of the Hartlib Papers archive held at the University of Sheffield, have exposed a multitude of new references to Lady Ranelagh over the last two decades. Even within these modern resources, though, many obscure references to Ranelagh require a contextual knowledge of the source material as well as her biography in order to link them to her. This is because either she is not mentioned by name or her name was misspelled or truncated by one of her contemporaries. In both print and manuscript works written by her brother Boyle or other members of their shared intellectual circle, contemporaries would often refer to her as “my lady” or use a sobriquet like “Sophronia”; but we can now confidently assume that these are references to Lady Ranelagh thanks to circumstantial evidence. Modern editors have identified some of these references and have been using this new information to improve metadata records, footnotes, and indexes. Still, my research has uncovered many additional references to Lady Ranelagh that other editors and col-

Introduction

•

3

lections professionals had not observed, leaving me to wonder how many more I also must have missed. This book draws on a wealth of archival material to recreate the intellectual life of one of the most respected and influential women in seventeenthcentury Europe. What emerges is that not only did Lady Ranelagh help Boyle shape some of his philosophical publications and collaborate with his experimentation with chemical medicine, but that she was also an intellectual authority in her own right, composing her own theological and political treatises and corresponding with an international network comprising the most influential men and women of her time. Antonia Fraser once said, “Sister Ranelagh incarnated the masculine ideal of a good woman” and that “her learning therefore, far from being a disturbing quality, became an added grace.”5 While Fraser is correct that it was Ranelagh’s iconic piety which allowed her to develop a public intellectual reputation, and that Ranelagh’s deep love for and support of her brother was widely known, Fraser’s characterization downplays the bold, sarcastic, and outspoken part of Ranelagh’s personality for which she was equally recognized. Still, despite her strong opinions as a reformer during the Commonwealth and as a nonconformist after the Restoration, Ranelagh was able to maintain friendly relations with people of different political and religious views, and with those hailing from diverse backgrounds. She managed to uphold a high public profile and maintain the respect of each ruler and their governments from Cromwell through to William and Mary, demonstrating a talent for being politically savvy and a shrewd understanding of how to adapt to new environments. By studying Ranelagh’s intellectual life against the backdrop of a developing scientific culture and changing political structures, we witness both the evolution of her thoughts and the ways in which social status, religious identity, and gender shaped her ability to effect social change and participate in natural philosophy. We also see not only how her early intellectual ambitions were often entwined within Robert Boyle’s emerging identity as a natural philosopher, but also how she moved more explicitly toward medicine, politics, and religious advocacy when Boyle’s interests turned increasingly toward experimental philosophy. This methodology follows Michael Shortland and Richard Yeo’s Telling Lives in Science, which argues

4

•

Introduction

for “the importance of personal identities and life histories in the cultural history of science.”6 This book considers Lady Ranelagh’s interests in theology and politics alongside her practice of chemistry and medicine; as well, it positions her gender as only one important demographic that must be considered equally alongside others. Consequently, it offers a more complete picture of how gender and science intersected in seventeenth-century England. Additionally, the rare opportunity to analyze a brother and sister who were engaged in natural philosophy at a time traditionally considered to be a period of rapid intellectual development almost exclusively for men allows us to aim our attention at how and when gender became an indicator of success or limitation. In other words, when issues of social status, religious identity, and familial connections are removed from the equation— all of which might otherwise taint a comparison between natural philosophers— we are better able to consider the question of gender. Boyle and Ranelagh’s story also adds to a longer history of women who worked behind the scenes to support and shape their male family members who published scientific books and essays, held academic or institutional posts, or formulated theories that advanced their field of study.7 Ranging from the well-known collaboration of Caroline Herschel with her older brother William, to the lesser-known Winkelmann-Kirch family, in which Maria Margaretha and her daughters conducted important astronomical observations that were presented by male family members to Berlin’s Academy of Sciences, there are plenty of stories in the history of science where the household fostered intellectual collaboration and growth between brother and sister, husband and wife, or mother and child.8 Eschewing gendered theories of science and nature that can result in anachronisms, this book builds on the foundational work of historians of science such as Margaret Osler and Sarah Hutton, among others, who position questions of gender within a historically sensitive assessment of wider cultural and intellectual norms.9 Indeed, the fact that Lady Ranelagh’s life spans almost the entirety of the seventeenth century makes her an excellent case study for charting the development of science over the period traditionally known as the Scientific Revolution. Most historians now take issue with the term revolution in this context because it seems to indicate a sharp dismissal of ancient

Introduction

•

5

and medieval methods, when in reality many earlier ideas either influenced the development of new theories or coexisted with them. Still, the early modern period (roughly the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries) was a time of great scientific discovery and advancement. Building on the works of Francis Bacon and others, philosophers began testing old and new theories with physical experiments, positing new and corrected systems of belief based on evidence they created or witnessed, not exclusively on texts they had read. The telescope afforded a new view of the sun and stars, which eventually led to Ptolemy’s geocentric system being replaced by new, heliocentric models of the cosmos. Advances in physics and anatomy in the early modern period challenged Aristotelian understandings of both the microcosm (humankind) and the macrocosm (the universe), which paved the way for changes as diverse as new medical treatments and Isaac Newton’s law of universal gravitation. Sixteenth- and seventeenthcentury chemical experiments and agricultural developments increased people’s understanding of their physical world, whereby studies of matter could flourish.10 The latter half of the seventeenth century also witnessed the birth of many scientific societies across Western Europe, including the Accademia del Cimento in Florence, the Royal Society in London, and the Académie des Sciences in Paris.11 In the next two paragraphs, I wish to consider specific scientific terminology that I use throughout this book. The English words science and scientist are products of the nineteenth century, and the phrase most commonly used by Ranelagh’s contemporaries to describe their scientific practice was natural philosophy. This is the term I will use most often throughout this book because its broader scope more accurately summarizes the diverse subjects in which the siblings were engaged. Natural philosophy was the study of nature, but it often drew on philosophical traditions and religious motivations that would later become separated from scientific inquiry. Various formal scientific disciplines had also not yet been defined or separated, so natural philosophers could explore chemistry alongside subjects such as physics, astronomy, botany, or engineering. Likewise, while Robert Boyle used to be known as the father of chemistry, more recent studies of his intellectual life have eschewed such limited categorization, positioning his chemistry within a wider study of natural philosophy. In

6

•

Introduction

his own time Boyle became known as the “English philosopher,” and his experimentation intimately wove together his theoretical reflections on nature with the observations he witnessed through trials. His latest biography, written by the world-renowned Boyle expert Michael Hunter, has the subtitle Between God and Science, positioning Boyle within an intellectual framework that blends theological and philosophical inquiry with experimentation.12 While he is most often remembered today for what scholars now call Boyle’s law (which states that the pressure and volume of a gas are inversely proportional when temperature is held constant), Robert Boyle’s contribution to the development and practical application of Francis Bacon’s guidelines for experimentation were equally significant. By defining a framework for sharing and testing empirical observations that supported mechanical views of nature, Boyle helped invent the modern scientific method.13 I also frequently refer to Boyle as a chemist. While the word may sound slightly outdated within Boyle studies today, his work within chemistry was as influential as it was diverse. Lawrence Principe’s foundational work, The Aspiring Adept, provided a new reading of Boyle’s Skeptical Chemist and revealed that it was Boyle’s eighteenth-century editors and biographers who attempted to expunge his alchemical experiments from the archival record.14 Scholarship over the last two decades has convincingly grounded early modern alchemy in a rich international and intellectual past.15 We now know that Boyle was one among many experimenters who sought after the philosophers’ stone in an attempt to transmute base metals into gold. Ranelagh’s newly discovered manuscripts suggest that she shared his interest in the subject. Historians of chemistry, spearheaded by recent etymological work by Principe and William Newman, have advocated that modern scholars use the early modern spelling chymistry to refer to chemistry and alchemy, as the fields had not yet diverged from each other.16 This approach is valuable in many situations, but here I have chosen to use the modern terms alchemy and chemistry instead of chymistry and the technical language of chrysopoeia and spagyria that accompany it. This is primarily because I need a language to distinguish between the different types of chemistry practiced by Ranelagh that will be understandable to a twenty-first-century audience of nonspecialists. Still, I use the terms

Introduction

•

7

chemistry and alchemy with caution and remind the reader that those in Boyle and Ranelagh’s circle used both words loosely and interchangeably.17 Ranelagh incorporated chemical ingredients and processes into her domestic medical practice as did many early modern women,18 but she was also writing in new alchemical genres such as the transmutation history and using van Helmont’s prized ens veneris to cure children of rickets. Basic chemistry increasingly became a part of a gentlewoman’s duties, some even using dedicated stillrooms for crafting medicines or including “sweet secrets” in the meal’s banquet course; however, Ranelagh’s engagement with questions concerning the philosophers’ stone suggest she had an inquisitive approach that reached beyond the practical into the theoretical and experimental— something seen with only a few of her female peers, such as Queen Christina of Sweden and Anna Maria Zieglerin.19 While this is the first book-length biography of Lady Ranelagh, it builds on several shorter foundational accounts about her. The first essay to sketch out the life of “The Incomparable Lady Ranelagh” was published by Kathleen M. Lynch in 1964. Helpfully documenting the various archival repositories she consulted in order to begin piecing together Ranelagh’s political profile, Lynch wrote the first account not only of Lady Ranelagh’s more intellectual pursuits but also of many of the details of her childhood and marriage. Decades passed before historians and literary scholars returned to some of the archives Lynch mentioned. When they did, they discovered some new material as well, thanks to improved cataloging and digitization efforts in these libraries and archives. Unfortunately, they also learned that some of Lynch’s uncataloged sources had been lost.20 Forty years after Lynch’s publication, Sarah Hutton wrote the first entry for Lady Ranelagh to appear in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, a brief but excellent starting point of reference which began to illuminate the depth and breadth of Ranelagh’s intelligence, influence, and networks. Around the same time, several graduate students— most notably, Elizabeth Anne Taylor (later Betsey Taylor Fitzsimon)— also began incorporating readings of Lady Ranelagh’s manuscripts into nuanced doctoral dissertations with comprehensive bibliographies that helped future scholars like myself begin identifying fruitful archives; however, much of this remains unpublished.21 Others such as Ruth Connolly and Carol Pal reworked parts

8

•

Introduction

of their dissertations and published journal articles and book chapters. Connolly produced a series of essays that focused on the intersection of religion and politics in Ranelagh’s works, correcting Lynch’s early assumption that Ranelagh was a Royalist. Connolly was the first to link Ranelagh’s radical Protestantism to her identity as an intellectual, contending this devotion helped define Ranelagh’s involvement in several high-profile religiopolitical cases.22 Pal contextualized Ranelagh’s letter writing within a larger international network of female correspondents, demonstrating the interconnectivity of these women as well as illuminating Ranelagh’s significant role within the Hartlib circle: a diverse, self-selecting group united around their common pursuit to learn, organize, and distribute all useful knowledge for the benefit of society.23 My own earlier work focused on Ranelagh’s science and medicine, providing detailed readings of the three recipe books associated with her and reflecting on her rhetorical strategies for crafting medical authority in her letters.24 The first essay to begin charting Ranelagh and Boyle’s shared intellectual pursuits appeared in a special issue of the Intellectual History Review dedicated to Boyle.25 The challenge for the twenty-first-century scholar who specializes on Lady Ranelagh is that she truly was a “Renaissance woman” who seemed to know everyone and everything: alchemy, medicine, political theory, theology, languages, philosophy, and more. As scholars today tend to specialize within narrower disciplines, it is difficult to exhaust Ranelagh’s wide breadth of knowledge and experience. Within the history of science, Lady Ranelagh has often made a cameo as the sister of Robert Boyle or a patroness of the Hartlib circle. This practice began with Charles Webster’s Great Instauration in 1975 and continued through Steven Shapin’s works in the 1980s and 1990s. However, the known lack of source materials on or by her appears to have dissuaded them and others from pursuing her any further. Lynette Hunter’s influential essay “Sisters of the Royal Society,” published in 1997, suggested that Ranelagh played a more significant role in science and medicine than was previously thought and argued that Ranelagh’s recipes were a domestic form of chemical practice akin to the experiments her brother was demonstrating in the Royal Society and his laboratory. Hunter also used one of Boyle’s recipes for the “Spirit of Roses” to show that he, too, made household dis-

Introduction

•

9

tillation remedies, probably in collaboration with Ranelagh. Historians of science rarely cite this piece; instead, they usually refer to Webster if Lady Ranelagh’s name requires a footnote in their work. However, Hunter’s essay made a significant impact in feminist historiographies and literary studies and is still cited frequently in those disciplines today. While many of Hunter’s findings have since been corrected or refuted (including the suggestion that Boyle’s “Spirit of Roses” recipe can be used as evidence of his shared domestic practice with his sister), the piece was significant for raising Lady Ranelagh’s profile among a new generation of scholars just as questions of domestic experimentation, female correspondence networks, and recipe circulation were beginning to be acknowledged as contributions to empirically based science.26 To address some of the gaps above and offer a more holistic account of her intellectual development, this book attempts to weave together the disciplinary strands that have been written on Ranelagh’s life. Such a book is possible only thanks to the more focused scholarship that precedes it. By considering Lady Ranelagh’s advocacy for nonconformists as being connected to her medical practice, for example, and by analyzing her wider political network alongside her alchemical correspondence with the Hartlib circle, we can better understand how she saw natural philosophy as an extension of these other programs aimed at improving society. It is my hope that this book will raise the profile of this accomplished female intellectual in a variety of disciplines and spark new research that will expand our understanding of Lady Ranelagh even further. Indeed, while this is the first attempt at a comprehensive intellectual biography, it does not claim to be the final word on Lady Ranelagh. As I write this, I am aware of a new generation of graduate students and early career scholars— most significantly, Evan Bourke— who are continuing to find new references to Lady Ranelagh and are applying new methodologies to understand Ranelagh’s intellectual role in society. This new research has been facilitated by the recent creation of the RECIRC database at NUI Galway and improvements to the Hartlib Papers catalog provided by the WEMLO and Cultures of Knowledge projects.27 Taking the form of an intellectual life, this book progresses chronologically, beginning with her birth in 1615 into the most prestigious Anglo-

10

•

Introduction

Irish family of the early seventeenth century and concluding with her death in London in 1691. Because her archival records are fragmentary, I do not necessarily give equal weight to all aspects of her life. The story we can tell is limited by the extant evidence that we can access today. It can also be difficult to make assertions related to shifts in her intellectual thought or changes over time when so few pieces of evidence exist. While the challenge for scholars new to Boyle (my former graduate student self included) concerns the sheer amount of extant material, the obstacle for Lady Ranelagh is the opposite. Young Boyle scholars may complain about his prolific publication record, verbose form of expression, and voluminous archive of manuscripts. This can make it hard to read and comprehend his works in their entirety and leaves the scholar questioning possible oversights, as Boyle may have addressed a topic again somewhere else but they just missed it. The opposite is true with Lady Ranelagh, where there are so few references related to her that we Ranelagh scholars often find ourselves citing the same few documents in multiple articles and hoping that we haven’t overstated a claim based on one small piece of evidence. Throughout this book I try to reflect consciously on such places where the assertions I can make are limited by the available archival materials, much like Sarah Hutton did in her intellectual life of Anne Conway.28 Chapter 1 covers Ranelagh’s birth in Youghal, Ireland, and her upbringing in the home of the Great Earl of Cork. Cork’s bold personality and tendency to explain life’s successes and failures in providential terms instilled in the young girl a fear of an omnipotent— but still kind— God. Her mother died when she was a teenager, and she became a surrogate mother to her youngest brother Robert, who was only three at the time of their mother’s death. She married and lived mostly in Ireland until the outbreak of the Irish Rebellion, when she was trapped in Athlone Castle for roughly one year. These early experiences provided a solid foundation for many values that would persist throughout her entire life, including her strong Protestantism and commitment to molding her younger brother into an intellectually and morally grounded man. Upon moving to London at the outbreak of the English Civil Wars, Lady Ranelagh became involved in the international circle surrounding Samuel Hartlib— the intellectual network in which she would be most

Introduction

•

11

active. The second chapter explores her entry into what is now called the Hartlib circle and her rising fame in England’s capital. The earliest dated references to her in the Hartlib Papers archive regard her moral guidance of Dorothy Moore and John Dury, as well as her reputation as a nonconformist woman of excellent judgment. The latter led to her invitation to witness the spiritual prophecies of the young Londoner Sarah Wight. Ranelagh was already a well-known figure in London when her teenage brother Robert returned from a grand tour of the Continent, and Ranelagh introduced him to key figures who would prove helpful to him and would discourage him from joining the Royalist army or court. As the civil wars raged on, Ranelagh also wrote a series of political letters to influential figures one step removed from Charles I in an attempt to generate a peaceful conclusion to the war. The summer of 1649 has been called a “turning point” for Robert Boyle, when he turned his attention away from only exploring explicitly moral and ethical issues and began experimenting with the chemistry for which he would become known. Chapter 3 shows that Ranelagh experienced a similar intellectual shift that resonated with the Hartlib circle as a whole. In addition to experimenting with chemical ingredients and procedures in her own domestic medical practice, she even hosted meetings in her home concerning William Rand’s proposal for a new chemical society of medical practitioners, one that would counter the Galenic College of Physicians. Over the next decade, Ranelagh and Boyle corresponded frequently about the intersection of natural philosophy and ethics, and Ranelagh continued to read and comment on drafts of her brother’s works that would later be published. She also shipped chemical equipment to him when he resided at the Boyle family estate in Stalbridge and, once she was certain that he had outgrown the solitary space he occupied in Dorset, helped him get settled into his new life in Oxford, going so far as to travel to Oxford to select his room for him and ensuring that he had access to a laboratory. Furthermore, Ranelagh expanded her own intellectual network within the Hartlib circle and beyond, learning Hebrew from William Robertson, who would later be appointed lecturer in Hebrew at Cambridge University, and hosting in her house Menasseh ben Israel, the first Jewish man admitted reentry into England in over 350 years, during his brief visit to the country.

12

•

Introduction

Shortly after Boyle had embarked on a short trip to Ireland, Ranelagh made her own return to the country of her birth to pick up where her brother left off in reclaiming lost Boyle family estates, as well as to begin negotiating a settlement from her estranged husband. Chapter 4 covers the nearly three years she spent in Ireland in the late 1650s and demonstrates that it was a time of growth for her. Ranelagh’s location allowed her to develop a deep intellectual relationship with the mathematician Robert Wood. She commented on and then advocated for his proposal to decimalize the currency and worked with him and Miles Symner to complete Hartlib’s project on Irelands Naturall History after the Boate brothers, physicians Gerard and Arnold, died. Such projects concerning agriculture and planting may have been what brought her into contact with John Beale, who proposed to dedicate a horticultural book on physic gardens to Ranelagh and exchanged with her lengthy discourses concerning dreams. Ranelagh’s time in Ireland appears to have been more fruitful than Boyle’s because she moved there as an already active member of the Hartlib circle and leveraged the connections and benefits afforded by this well-connected group. After Oliver Cromwell died, Ranelagh decided there was no longer reason for her to remain in Ireland, and she returned to London. Chapter 5 considers Ranelagh’s life during the tumultuous years immediately following the lord protector’s death and the Restoration of the Stuart monarchy. During this time, she witnessed the death of Samuel Hartlib and the dissolution of the Hartlib circle while her brother Robert Boyle went on to become a founding fellow of the new Royal Society. Though it is common in modern scholarship to treat the foundation of this exclusive society as a point where the door was closed for women, this chapter argues that Ranelagh’s courage and curiosity persisted. In the early 1660s she continued to pursue chemistry in a manner unusual for a gentlewoman, including writing a transmutation history of a famed alchemist called Dr. Butler that circulated widely in manuscript for over a year after she wrote it and that reached as far as the American colonies. After Hartlib’s death and the emergence of the new realities of Restoration society— with its emphasis on conformity and civility— Ranelagh applied her bold personality and esteemed reputation more explicitly to religion, politics, and medicine (the

Introduction

•

13

branch of natural philosophy with the most obvious charitable benefits). She and Boyle collaborated on making and distributing a copper-based chemical remedy to cure children of rickets (which he acknowledged in Usefulness of Natural Philosophy), and she read and encouraged the publication of Boyle’s Origine of Forms and Qualities, a learned endorsement of the new mechanical philosophy she thought could help people better comprehend the world God had created for them. When the plague hit London in 1665, Ranelagh went to live with her sister Mary, Countess of Warwick. She returned as the plague started to abate, but then London suffered from the Great Fire and an unfortunate loss in the Anglo– Dutch War. In chapter 5 we see Ranelagh’s engagement with the series of catastrophic events that shook England over the course of two years, how she interpreted them as a sign of God’s anger, and how she advocated for the toleration of nonconformists. She wrote her only extant manuscript treatise, “Discourse Concerning the Plague,” which critiqued authorities for imprisoning nonconformists whose only crime was following their conscience. She was particularly critical since the dissenters were being incarcerated during a time when disease spread quickly among those in crowded conditions. While Ranelagh did not serve as an active medical practitioner during the plague, chapter 6 shows that she began treating the most elite patients in Restoration London upon her return, including the young Duke of Kendal (son of the future king James II) and the wife of Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon. After two decades of staying with his sister during his trips to London, Robert Boyle finally moved into Ranelagh’s house in 1668. Chapter 7 surveys how they spent the final twenty-three years of their lives together. Ranelagh worked with Robert Hooke to build a laboratory extension onto her Pall Mall house for Boyle’s use, and she regularly dined with Boyle and his guests when they came to visit. In her ongoing advocacy for liberty of conscience, she hosted diverse religious and political authorities, including the lawyer Bulstrode Whitelocke and the Baptist minister William Kiffin. Ranelagh also continued making medical treatments and circulating medical recipes— the success of which may have prompted Boyle to return to a series of medical works he had composed earlier and prepare them for publication.

14

•

Introduction

Ranelagh’s death and legacy looked quite different from Boyle’s, and a comparison of these is explored further in the conclusion to this book. As Carol Pal has argued, the issue is not that early modern intellectual women didn’t exist, but rather that they have “unintentional archives” and show up in places where they are “both unexpected and unlooked-for.”29 Lisa Sarasohn has reflected on historians’ complaints regarding the lack of female voices in the past, suggesting “sometimes a single voice reveals common experiences and concerns.”30 I agree with this assertion; but while she used Margaret Cavendish as this representative figure, I would argue that Lady Ranelagh is a better model, as she more closely embodies the Christian virtue and modesty expected of early modern women. This is not necessarily a “masculine ideal,” to quote Antonia Fraser again; rather, it reflects the deep role of religion and piety in defining early modern social conventions.31 When one considers how Lady Ranelagh was able to blend her evangelical Protestant mindset with the new experimental philosophy, and how this seems to corroborate with what we know about other devout intellectual Englishwomen, including Anne Conway, Lucy Hutchinson, Dorothy Moore, or Mary Evelyn, among others, it seems that many women were engaged with, fascinated by, and supportive of increased inquiry into the world around them. While Lady Ranelagh may have been “incomparable” in terms of her success, excellence, and intellect, many aspects of her life are representative of other early modern women’s, such as her choice to restrict herself to manuscript instead of print and her grounding of natural philosophy in religion. Writing to the philosopher John Locke in 1685, Ranelagh’s contemporary Lady Marsham noted that it had “growne much the Fasion of late for our sex” to print books after death, but until then he should expect to find her thoughts written only in letters.32 If we can begin defining more common characteristics among seventeenth-century intellectual women, we may be able to create a more nuanced understanding of how gender and science intersected in seventeenth-century Europe. Instead of seeing the Royal Society as an institution of exclusion that closed the door on the women who were previously engaging with natural philosophy before its foundation, we can chart out a story of both continuity and change.

Introduction

•

15

The manuscript and oral traditions that Ranelagh embraced were not replaced by learned societies and their emphasis on print publications. Instead, these older methods for creating knowledge continued to overlap with new ones. The Republic of Letters and household salons would flourish across the eighteenth century and would still be considered respectable spaces for debating serious ideas and creating new knowledge. However, scholars today are only just beginning to realize that the methodological frameworks and archival training we have used thus far often fall short of equipping us with the right skills and questions required to recover the extent of these women’s intellectual contributions. The eighteenth-century philosopher Mariangela Ardinghelli is another example of an “in/visible woman” who carefully constructed her international public identity. Writing roughly one century after Ranelagh, Ardinghelli used strategies that shared several parallels with those Ranelagh had previously employed. Paola Bertucci has shown that while Ardinghelli was known in some international epistolary networks, she consciously hid her identity in others and preferred anonymity for her printed translations.33 When considering Ranelagh and Ardinghelli together, we see that neither woman was a victim and neither rebelled against the establishment of formal institutions. Rather, they knew exactly how to develop international public reputations without attracting criticism. However, they did so in a way that may look foreign to us today and which makes it difficult for us to extract the breadth of their contributions from extant archival records. If we look back on the past and assume that gender, science, and institutions should appear the same to our historical actors as they do to us today, we may project an exaggerated narrative of exclusion onto these women— one that does not grant them the agency apparent elsewhere in the historical record. As the new science gained force, there were supporters and critics from both genders. While previous feminist critics argued that women were predominantly critical of the new science, today we can see the many reasons why women would have been curious about and eager to support the new experimental science, especially as the emphasis on empiricism validated procedures and trials they already employed in domestic medical practice.34 Through the life story of Lady Ranelagh— who was intellectually dexterous, politically influential, and spiritually devout— we can

16

•

Introduction

see how one woman engaged with natural philosophy more generally, and chemistry specifically, in a variety of ways across the seventeenth century. As we continue to find, catalog, and digitize more early modern manuscripts, we may locate more women like Lady Ranelagh who were public intellectual figures in their own time, then lost to history almost immediately after their deaths.

Birth, Childhood, and Marriage (1615– 42)

K

1

atherine Boyle would grow up to become one of the most respected intellectual women in early modern England, but her roots began in Ireland as the daughter of the wealthiest Anglo-Irish— “New English”— planter of her day: Richard Boyle, Baron of Youghal, later 1st Earl of Cork. Katherine was the seventh child and fifth daughter of Richard Boyle and his second wife, Catherine Fenton, the daughter of Sir Geoffrey Fenton, principal secretary to the lord deputy of Ireland. The Boyle family resided in County Cork in the province of Munster, located along the southern coast of Ireland. By the mid-seventeenth century, County Cork had Protestant (mostly English) settlers scattered throughout its entirety. Youghal, the small, medieval, walled seaside town in which Katherine was born, was then responsible for much of Ireland’s trade, and its location on the sea provided an easy avenue for communication beyond the island.1 On March 22, 1615, Katherine was born in New College House, on Emmet Street in Youghal, beside the Collegiate Church of St. Mary. Typical of his tendency to embellish, Katherine’s father had turned the former college into a mansion and made significant improvements to the house and grounds. Some of the almshouses around town that he endowed still survive today, though the seventeenth-century version of New College House does not.2 Katherine was baptized in the presence of her godfather, Sir Richard Bolton, and her godmothers, Margaret Fenton (her mother’s younger sister) and one Lady Harris.3

18

•

Chapter One

Katherine’s father already owned significant property throughout the Munster province by the time of her birth, which he first acquired after land was confiscated and redistributed due to the rebellion of the Earl of Desmond, and then by increasing his wealth through two marriages. In 1602, Boyle used £1,000 in gold to purchase 42,000 acres of Munster properties from the famous Elizabethan courtier Sir Walter Raleigh, who had been the principal landowner of these English settlements thanks to a grant from the Crown. At the time of the purchase, Raleigh was imprisoned and used this money to help procure his release. Meanwhile, Boyle worked diligently to clear the land titles to these estates while steadily increasing his wealth through rental income. As his financial status improved, so did his social position, with Boyle securing a series of titles and appointments until finally entering the Irish peerage as Earl of Cork in 1620.4 He later became known as “the Great Earl,” notorious for his imposing personality and for climbing his way out of near poverty in England to become a remarkably wealthy member of the landed gentry in Ireland. After Katherine’s birth, the Boyles would continue building their family. From 1606 to 1629, the couple had a total of fifteen children: eight girls and seven boys. Cork spent much time improving his newly acquired property, Lismore Castle, so it could be enjoyed as a family residence, complete with architectural additions and furnishings imported from England and France. For as large a family as they were, the Boyle children grew up with ample material comforts and had an array of servants and attendants to help with daily household chores.5 Over the doorway of the main entrance to the household there was (and still is) an armorial plaque with the Boyle coat-of-arms together with those of the Fenton family. Below the shield, an inscription reads “God’s providence is our inheritance 1615.” Everything about the carefully integrated house, garden, and estate worked  to advertise the social, political, and economic achievements of Cork.6 The Earl of Cork was also a formidable presence in his household and exercised strict control over domestic decisions and his children’s upbringing, even assuming responsibilities that would typically be handled by the wife. Indeed, while at the beginning of the seventeenth century the husband could choose to delegate household management tasks to his spouse,

Birth, Childhood, and Marriage

•

19

which could grant her considerable power and influence over domestic decisions, Cork appears to have delegated very little to his wife.7 He had a larger-than-life, controlling personality and valued great achievements, the influence of which appears to have manifested itself in his children as some combination of ambition and insecurity. Even though many of Cork’s contemporaries viewed him with suspicion due to his sudden surge in wealth, leading to his reputation for opportunism and greed, his children revered and sought to please him on account of his tendency toward affection. Katherine’s youngest sister Mary remembered him as “one of the best and kindest fathers in the world.”8 Katherine’s own letters to Cork during the late 1630s and early 1640s are filled with endearing language, and some letters between the siblings suggest a level of competition to win their father’s favoritism (a quality of his that they all seemed to notice.)9 In one letter from Lettice Goring to her father, she jealously commented that she thought her “Sistar Jones” must have a spy in her father’s house since Katherine was always so informed of his plans and she was not. She then added that Katherine had “taken so Ill a house for my Brother Dungarvan,” alluding to Katherine’s poor judgment in an attempt to divert their father’s trust and attention to her.10 The Earl of Cork’s religious beliefs also formed some of the earliest intellectual grounding for his children, and evidence of this can be found in many of their writings as adults, including Katherine’s. Indeed, Cork was Katherine’s first intellectual influence. His diaries, letters, and even his selfpromoting autobiography “True Remembrances” reveal a Protestant man with a strong belief in God’s providence.11 Significant life events related to births, deaths, career advances, and marriages were all credited to God’s influence, and Cork (perhaps shrewdly) argued his own success could be attributed to divine guidance. It has been suggested that his success in Ireland led him to become more self-consciously Puritan than he would have been without such prosperity, relying on providential reasoning to present himself as a chosen one in order to refute attacks from contemporaries.12 His belief in an omnipotent God would influence Katherine, remaining with her throughout her life. As an adult, she used providential reasoning to explain wars, illnesses, and deaths, as well as occasionally to support her own accomplishments.

20

•

Chapter One

Indeed, the diverse accomplishments achieved by Katherine and her many siblings are notable. The best known of these success stories is that of the distinguished scientist Robert Boyle, the sibling with whom Katherine was closest. Fourteen years Katherine’s junior, Robert would become a founding fellow of the Royal Society and would postulate a theory on gases later known as Boyle’s law. Retrospectively, we might say that Boyle was the greatest scientist of his generation in England, followed shortly after by Isaac Newton. The other siblings were also ambitious and successful. Roger later became 1st Earl of Orrery and was both a politician and playwright. Mary, later Countess of Warwick, was celebrated during and after her life as an exemplar of private devotion. Richard would become 2nd Earl of Cork and eventually claimed a coveted English peerage title as 1st Earl of Burlington. Lewis, Viscount Kinalmeaky, was known for his significant military ability. Francis, later Viscount Shannon, published moralist tracts during the Restoration.13 Relatively little is known about Alice, Sarah, Joan, and Dorothy, the remaining sisters who lived into adulthood, except that they were married into strategic alliances that their father predetermined.14 Cork’s controlling personality influenced all his children, instilling in them from a young age both an aspiration to succeed and a firm grounding in religion and morality. While Katherine would earn an esteemed international reputation as an intellectual woman, many of her siblings accomplished similarly noteworthy achievements and enjoyed an elevated social status. Gender determined the level of education that the Boyle children received, as was common in the seventeenth century. While they were still young, the Boyle boys were tutored at home, which probably served as the main source of their early education. The Boyle girls were not given the same level of personal tuition; still, they may have gained some additional educational opportunities from Cork’s chaplains who doubled as private tutors.15 And at some point the children— especially the girls— were usually sent away from the home to be raised by foster families. After this arrangement, the boys benefited from expensive educations that would allow them to style themselves as gentlemen, including education at Eton College, England’s premier private school, and a “grand tour” of the Continent to improve their education in Latin, French, logic, and

Birth, Childhood, and Marriage

•

21

rhetoric. Cork does not appear to have provided his daughters with any formal education beyond a grounding in religion and basic manners that would help them become a good wife like his own, whom Cork described as “most religious, virtuous, loving and obedient.”16 However, Katherine’s younger sister Mary recorded in her diary that at the age of ten her father rather unconventionally gave her Philip Sidney’s Arcadia as a gift. If Katherine followed the family tradition, she probably spent her first couple of years in the care of a wet nurse; she then may have been sent to a foster home. There is no documentation of her leaving home until she was contracted to marriage at the age of nine, and it is possible that she could have gained access to additional education through her brothers’ tutors in these early years. The foster families were probably the most important factor shaping the education received by the Boyle girls, and the diversity in standards, tutors, and educational practices in these different homes may have contributed to the gap in acquired knowledge among the Boyle girls in their early adulthood. We know from Mary’s memoirs that, at age three, she was sent to the home of Sir Randall and Lady Cleyton, where she spent ten years and received a basic education that enabled her to read and write in English and French.17 Tenants of the Earl of Cork, the Cleytons lived on a nearby farm and were excellent substitute parents. They had also helped to raise Mary’s older sister Alice and would later take into their care her younger sister Margaret. While historians have presented Katherine’s elder sister Lettice to contrast the more educated Mary, as Lettice appears to have had only a minimal level of literacy at the time of marriage and to have possibly been exposed only to religious texts, it should still be acknowledged that she was taught to write (which was done after one learned to read) and that her education seems standard for a young gentlewoman at the turn of the seventeenth century.18 Most recently, Ann-Maria Walsh has sifted through familial letters from lesser-known Boyle sisters Sarah, Lettice, Joan, and Dorothy to reveal letters written by each in her own hand.19 Furthermore, we now know Ranelagh’s older sister Alice, Countess of Barrymore, maintained a correspondence with the member of Parliament Sir Ralph Verney.20 Walsh’s archival discoveries suggest historians’ earlier assumptions about the sisters’ lack of education may have been overstated.

22

•

Chapter One

On September 20, 1624, nine-year-old Katherine left her family home when she moved to Cole-Orton in Leicestershire, England, to live with the family of Sapcott Beaumont, to whom she was contracted to marry. She made the journey with her maid, her uncle Thomas Boyle, and two family servants named Salisbury and Thomas Badnedge, the latter being the same servant who would later deliver Robert Boyle to Eton.21 Her father gave her a gold jewel with ten diamonds and £20 in cash to pay for her charges. Cork arranged for the party to stay at Maisemore Court in Gloucestershire, which was his cousin Richard Boyle’s property, until Lord Beaumont could collect them.22 Cork sent Lady Beaumont “a Tercell of goshawk” (a male bird of prey), suggesting she may have had an interest in hawking that was still fashionable among the gentry and elite in the early seventeenth century, though often associated with men.23 Katherine’s mother, as a Beaumont descendant, had encouraged the marriage, and Cork appears to have agreed to the union partly because he was pressured by the Fenton family, but also because it promised a fruitful political alliance: Sapcott was the son of Thomas Beaumont, a kinsman to the 1st Duke of Buckingham. Cork had begun negotiating this marriage when Katherine was only seven, completing articles of agreement and land settlements for the jointure of his fifth daughter upon her marriage.24 In 1623 Cork agreed to pay in advance £3,522 of Katherine’s £4,000 dowry.25 From 1624 to 1628, young Katherine lived in the care of the Beaumont family at Cole-Orton, during which time she may have received a Bible with a dedication poem written by the poet and clergyman Thomas Pestell, who was a friend of the Beaumont family. Pestell knew the Beaumont family and was at Cole-Orton during the late 1620s when Katherine was there.26 An extant Bible has also been located that contains a handwritten poem dedicated to a “Lady K C” that includes puns on the name Katherine, and one historian has suggested “Lady K C” may be “Lady K[atherine] C[ork].”27 However, convention dictates that she would have been addressed as Lady Katherine Boyle, making this link less probable. Katherine may have also come into contact with Stephen Jerome, who worked in both the Cork and Beaumont households and preached on the unity of Protestant churches— a philosophy that she would come to endorse in her adult years.28 After Thomas Beaumont died in 1625, the Beaumont family demanded

Birth, Childhood, and Marriage

•

23

an additional £2,000 for Katherine’s dowry. While Cork was prepared to pay the remainder of the previously agreed £4,000, this new demand was a breaking point and the union never materialized.29 In August 1628, Cork and his wife met with their “daughter Kate” at the Lord Digby’s house in Coleshill, Warwickshire. She and her parents then traveled to Cole-Orton to meet with Lady Beaumont and consider the papers of the deceased Lord Beaumont, but they could not reach an agreement on “that unfortunate matche.” As Cork accurately predicted, “I fynde my self in danger to be cozened, by my said wives cozen.”30 The Corks returned to Ireland in October 1628 with Katherine but without her dowry, and Cork claimed that his daughter had “lost the foundations of religion and civility” in which she had been “first educated” during her early childhood years in Ireland.31 Katherine may have received further education during her four years in the Beaumonts’ care, but the extent of that education is unknown. Cork continued to fight for the reimbursement of his dowry payment. Four years later, he would eventually reach an agreement whereby he would receive the £3,522 on May Day 1642, and it should pass to his youngest daughter Margaret, who would then be thirteen and ready for marriage.32 Unfortunately, Margaret would die in 1637 at the age of eight, and it is unknown what happened to the remaining dowry at that point. When Katherine returned to her parents’ household in 1628, the Cork family was primarily residing in Lismore Castle, though her father took extended visits to Cork House in Dublin and Katherine’s younger siblings were scattered among the houses of wet nurses and tutors.33 At some point she must have had the opportunity to meet two new siblings who were born while she was away in the Beaumont household, and with whom she would have intimate lifelong relationships. Her little sister Mary would have been a toddler of about two or three years old, and the latest addition to the family was a baby brother named Robert, who had been born and christened only the year before in Lismore Castle. Their sick and weak mother gave birth to her fifteenth child, Margaret, in 1629 before dying less than a year later, in February 1630. The Countess of Cork was buried with a private nighttime service by Benjamin Culme, Dean of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, on February 16, 1630, in St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin, next to her father and grandfather.34

24

•

Chapter One

The death of his “deerest deer wife” deeply unsettled the earl, who complained of his “unspeakable greef ” and arranged for an elaborate and expensive public funeral for her one month later.35 In his memoir, Cork also presented his wife’s death as an opportunity to reflect on his own sins and to be thankful to God, who was responsible for taking her soul to heaven. Cork worked several years to erect an impressive monument to his deceased wife, which was completed in 1632 and still stands today in St. Patrick’s Cathedral. In the monument, he and his wife are surrounded by their dutiful children (one of which must be a representation of Katherine). Cork later distributed selections of his wife’s jewelry, clothing, and furniture to his daughters, giving Katherine one of her mother’s elaborate petticoats.36 When Margaret died in 1637 at age eight, this left Mary and Robert as the two youngest Boyle children who would live into adulthood. Mary and Robert were only five and three, respectively, when their mother passed away, and the teenage Katherine appears to have assumed the role of surrogate mother for her younger siblings. Katherine had already prepared herself to be the matriarch of another household, so her teenage reentry into

Figure 1 Detail of Kneeling Daughters and Infant Son on the tomb of their mother, erected by their father, the Earl of Cork, in 1632. St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin. (Photo by Andreas F. Borchert.)

Birth, Childhood, and Marriage

•

25

her childhood home was as a strong role model for her younger siblings and as a helper to her father. In a memoir of his childhood, Robert Boyle recalls at least one occasion when Katherine made a moral impression on him: she questioned him about eating plums that he should have saved for his pregnant sister-in-law, and she monitored his behavior to assess if he was lying.37 Robert would continue to look to Katherine for moral direction even in adulthood, and he would later recount many examples of her exemplary actions and wisdom in his essay “Of Sin.”38 The same can be said of Katherine’s influence on Mary, whose diaries spanning 1666 to 1677 make frequent reference to relying on her “sister friend” Katherine.39 Katherine, Mary, and Robert remained intimate throughout their adult lives, sharing a similar religious and moral disposition, and Katherine’s formidable personality suggests she maintained a strong influence on her siblings until the end. Indeed, as late as 1681, the Duke of Ormond begrudgingly commented on Lady Ranelagh’s “influence on her family,” which he noted “is great, even with her brother [Richard Boyle, Earl of ] Corke; as for the other branches she governs them very absolutely.”40 Such conviction and independence later in life was probably born during the unfortunate aftermath of her mother’s early death and her siblings’ concomitant need for a strong maternal figure. On April 4, 1630, less than a month after her mother’s funeral, Katherine, now fifteen, married Arthur Jones, heir to Roger Jones, 1st Viscount Ranelagh, with an initial dowry of £3,000.41 The ceremony took place on a Sunday evening in Dublin, and they were married by the same Benjamin Culme, Dean of St. Patrick’s who presided over the funeral for Katherine’s mother. As part of the marriage agreement, Cork had negotiated with Viscount Ranelagh so that his daughter would receive Doranstown and other lands in Meath that would bring her £500 per year. Cork and Ranelagh then went into further negotiations to agree that if Ranelagh purchased Grangegorman (near Dublin) and added it to Katherine’s inheritance, and if their children produced a male heir and both mother and son lived at least three months, then Cork would pay Ranelagh an additional £1,000 toward the dowry. Cork notes in his diary that this was satisfied (notably, somehow before they had a male child), resulting in Cork feeling assured of his daughter’s financial stability. Cork added fondly that Viscount

26

•

Chapter One

Ranelagh always “dealt nobly and fairly with me.”42 Upon the marriage, Katherine’s father-in-law also gave her several diamonds and a purse with £30 in gold as a more personal token. When Katherine left Cork’s household to join her husband in 1631, Cork noted that he and everyone who knew her was “full of sorrow for our unspeakable and unrecoverable loss.”43 Katherine and her husband traveled regularly between London and Ireland during the first decade of their marriage, but their primary residence was Athlone Castle, where Arthur’s family resided.44 Athlone was an important city due to its central location between east-west communications for Dublin and Galway, but it was also connected to Munster via the River Shannon. By the 1620s, the town was estimated to have approximately two hundred households in addition to the presidency officials, warders, and their families, all of whom lived in the castle. This totaled around 1,300 people, making it about a quarter the size of Dublin or Galway. While predominantly Catholic, Athlone was ethnically mixed with Irish, Old English, and New English. The town and the castle benefited from much building activity and prosperity through the 1630s, and by 1641 the inhabitants of Athlone were described as “rich.”45 Arthur’s father, Viscount Ranelagh, held the office of the presidency of Connaught from 1630. He shared the title with Charles, 1st Viscount Wilmot, who reserved the Crown property in Athlone, including the castle, for use by the presidents of Connaught.46 By the summer of 1632, Katherine was overseeing some of her new family’s financial responsibilities, with her father-in-law even entrusting her with the charge of overseeing his iron chest filled with cash savings.47 Katherine and Arthur produced four children within the first ten years of their marriage. At least two of Katherine’s children were born in the houses of Boyle family members in Stalbridge and London, which indicates that she maintained consistent interaction with her father and her dispersed siblings throughout her late teens and early twenties. The Joneses’ first child, Catherine, was born at Athlone Castle on December 23, 1633.48 Later in life, Catherine would marry Sir William Parsons, and then after his death she would marry Hugh Montgomery, 1st Earl of Mount-Alexander, in 1660. They would have one daughter, Catherine Montgomery, who would later marry Sir Francis Hamilton, 3rd Baronet of Castle Hamilton. Kather-

Birth, Childhood, and Marriage

•

27

ine’s second daughter, Elizabeth, was possibly born in 1635 and would later upset her mother by absconding with and marrying a footman.49 Katherine’s youngest daughter, and the one with whom she appears to have been closest, was Frances, born at Stalbridge in Dorset, England, on August 17, 1639. Frances was born prematurely, and her grandfather Cork described the baby as a “boy-wench,” noting she was hastily christened with the name Frank before the women knew the baby’s gender.50 She continued to be called “Frank” in the family letters and appears to have suffered from a number of illnesses, even in adulthood. Frances would never marry and instead spent the majority of her life living in her mother’s intellectually active household. The Jones’s only son, Richard, was born on February 8, 1641, in the London home of Katherine’s brother Richard Boyle, the future 2nd Earl of Cork.51 Katherine would secure for her only son the best tutors available, including John Milton and Henry Oldenburg, and would try to foster in him a strong sense of religion. Yet despite her own religious conviction, much of this nurturing would be in vain, as he would follow in the unfortunate path of his father and not his mother. Richard would later marry Elizabeth Willoughby and become 2nd and last Earl of Ranelagh, having three daughters who would live into adulthood and become coheiresses: Elizabeth, Frances, and Catherine. Richard would go on to hold a series of political positions under both Charles II and William and Mary, but after decades of corruption and embezzled funds he finally would be expelled from the Commons and prosecuted under Queen Anne. His wife, Elizabeth, would develop a close relationship with his mother, whom she would outlive by only four years. Five months later, he would marry the widow Lady Margaret Cecil, but the marriage would remain childless. Richard is best remembered today as the founder of the notable Ranelagh Gardens in Chelsea, London, situated on the grounds originally adjacent to the Chelsea Hospital and his own Ranelagh House, which he designed for the purposes of pleasure and entertainment.52 Though Katherine appears to have tried making her marriage work over the first decade, it was not a happy union. The Earl of Cork’s politically strategic pairings for his daughters often didn’t end well, and Arthur Jones was known for his crudeness even at the time of their marriage.53 In an undated letter from Sir John Leeke to his friend Sir Edmund Verney, Leeke

28

•

Chapter One

said, “My pretious Katherine is somewhat decayed from the sweetest face I ever saw (and surely I have seene good ones). She is keapte and longe hath bine by the foulest Churle in the world; he hath only one vertu that he seldom cometh sober to bedd, a true imitation of Sir Robert Wroth.”54 The man with whom he was compared, Sir Robert Wroth, was the husband of the poet Mary Wroth. This was another unhappy match much discussed by contemporaries, including the playwright Ben Jonson. Sir John Leeke was a confidant of Mary Wroth, with whom he exchanged letters, but there is no evidence Mary Wroth and Katherine knew each other.55 Despite their difficult relationship, Katherine and Arthur mostly lived together over the period of 1631 to 1642, and the two frequently traveled between Ireland and England, though not always together. Little is known about their exact activities during these years or their length of stay in either country, but some information may be pieced together. In 1631, Katherine accompanied her husband to London, which may have been her first trip to the vibrant city she would later make her home. It is unknown how long they stayed, but by December 1633 she was back in Ireland giving birth to her first child. Nothing is known about where or how Katherine spent the mid-1630s, but Cork’s occasional references to himself or his children visiting with her over these years indicate she mostly was resident in Athlone.56 A letter from Leeke to Verney suggests that the Joneses may have been considering moving to London. Leeke wrote of Katherine, probably in 1635: “A more brayve wench or a Braver spirit you have not often mett with all. She hath a memory that will hear a sermon and goe home and penn itt after dinner verbatim. I know not how she will appeare in England, but she is most accounted of att Dublin. I am much obliged to hir.”57 In her early twenties, prior to her move to England, Katherine’s remarkable intelligence had been already noticed by others. Leeke would have been pleased to know that her high reputation would continue in England as well. Katherine returned again to England in 1638 to join her husband and wouldn’t return to Ireland until 1641, spending those two and a half years with her father or siblings at various locations in London and at the Boyle family estate in Stalbridge.58 At some point during this visit, Viscount Ranelagh summoned Arthur and Katherine back to Ireland. However, in August 1639, the Earl of Cork intercepted this request by sending a lengthy

Birth, Childhood, and Marriage

•

29

and passionate plea for them to stay with him in England. He thanked Arthur for allowing his daughter to visit him “after the long absence of three yeares” and offered several anecdotes of Katherine wanting and expecting to return promptly to Ireland, emphasizing her loyalty to her new family. However, just as the visit time allowed by Viscount Ranelagh had expired and Katherine was supposed to return to Ireland, she realized she was too pregnant to cross the sea. Cork noted that she would have boarded the ship if her husband had, as she wanted to be with him, but instead Cork and his son-in-law agreed that Arthur should stay with her in Stalbridge. Cork blamed this complication on Katherine, who miscalculated the length of her pregnancy; however, the extent to which he elaborated in order to provide a justification for her stay seems to suggest that his criticism actually stemmed from his fear that Viscount Ranelagh might consider Katherine disobedient. Speaking of her miscalculation, Cork even added, “My daughter shall never be one of his Majestye’s Auditors.”59 Notably, this is the only critical commentary on Katherine’s judgment to surface among any of the diverse references to her in the papers of her family and friends, and here it appears Cork added this note not to expose his own low opinion of his daughter but rather to make a last attempt to assuage Viscount Ranelagh’s potential anger. Such a rhetorical strategy allowed Cork to present himself as amenable to Viscount Ranelagh’s wishes instead of to those of his daughter, but in reality he came out ahead because he gained more visitation time with Katherine. The plea was successful and Katherine remained in England. She was in London in October 1639 when her younger brother Francis married Lady Elizabeth Killigrew, one of Queen Henrietta Maria’s maids of honor. The royal family hosted a lavish celebration, and Katherine was one of three of Cork’s daughters who sat with him at the royal table “amongst all the great Lords and Ladies.”60 Despite such extravagant experiences— or perhaps because of them— Katherine was never attracted to life at court as some of her family had been. During her frequent trips to England in the 1630s, Katherine probably found time to visit her childhood friend from Ireland: Lucius Cary, 2nd Viscount Falkland. She first met him, the son of the lord deputy, Sir Henry Cary, in 1624 in Ireland; the two remained in contact thereafter. At some point, the young Katherine may have met his learned writer and transla-

30

•

Chapter One

tor mother, Elizabeth Cary, 1st Viscountess Falkland, who split her time between England and Ireland until she died, in 1639.61 During the 1630s, Lord Falkland hosted meetings in his Oxfordshire estate in Great Tew for a group of learned young men in what came to be known as the Great Tew circle. Regular members who resided with Falkland were Edward Hyde, future Earl of Clarendon, and the philosopher William Chillingworth. Other visitors included Gilbert Sheldon, future archbishop of Canterbury, the philosopher Thomas Hobbes, and the Church of England clergyman Henry Hammond, among many others.62 It is unknown whether Katherine visited Great Tew, but she was associated with the circle through her close lifelong friendships with Falkland and Hyde. Some of her earliest intellectual influences were more politically conservative than the agenda she herself would later come to endorse, but this network also positioned her to have political influence and monarchical connections. Moreover, it provided her with exposure to a wide range of philosophical and sociopolitical viewpoints. Katherine’s marriage continued to decline right through the 1630s. One of her earliest dated extant letters was written from London to her father on October 13, 1640. Though Katherine and Arthur were in England together, they were already spending periods of time living apart, as she explained to her father: “Mr Joneses silence proceeds from his not living here, for having nothing to doe, he made a Jorney to Oxford, to satisfie himselfe in the observation of that Place, from whence he is not yet returned.” She immediately followed this by saying, “I stood by when he read your Lordship’s letter, & heard him Confes himselfe guilty of play to a degree that made him neede your Lordships advice.”63 However, Arthur noted that his brotherin-law, George Goring (married to Katherine’s older sister Lettice), was “at least as faulty”; George Goring was a reckless gambler throughout his life, and their marriage was notoriously unhappy.64 Katherine concluded her letter: “He sayd further there was one part of your letter he understood not, If I did, I desier that sting may be noe more touched.”65 The references are too cryptic to explain with certainty, but the letter implies that Arthur may have been gambling or cheating, if not both.66 Cork’s appeal for a moral redirection does not appear to have materialized. Katherine and Arthur must have returned to Ireland sometime shortly

Birth, Childhood, and Marriage

•

31

after the birth of their son Richard Jones in London in February 1641, probably arriving in the summer or autumn of 1641, just before the start of the Irish Rebellion. When they left, London and Westminster were facing serious political turmoil as Charles I continued trying to negotiate terms with Scotland and the Long Parliament. In May 1641, Charles even conceded to Parliament’s order for the death of Thomas Wentworth, Earl of Strafford, the king’s loyal adviser who had previously served four years as lord lieutenant of Ireland and had targeted the Old English, New English, and Irish alike in his strategies to generate revenue for the Crown. Wentworth was a longtime enemy of Katherine’s father, and Cork noted in his diary that Wentworth’s beheading was “well deserved.”67 The government in Dublin was so preoccupied with events taking place in England between Charles I and Scotland that they were taken by surprise when a group of Irish Catholic landowners began rebelling in the province of Ulster in late October 1641. The rebellion began when a few agitators attacked estates of ancient Catholic families that were inhabited by Protestant settlers. It quickly spiraled out of control of the leaders as more people joined in the attacks and many Protestants were murdered or driven from their homes.68 Momentum grew and spread quickly across Ireland as more uprisings spawned in Connaught, Clare, Leinster, Waterford, and Munster.69 Rebels overtook Lismore Castle, and Cork lost his tenants when they fled back to England. The beleaguered earl retreated to Youghal and eventually died there in 1643 as the war raged on, leaving his children to spend considerable time over the following two decades trying to reclaim Boyle estates that were lost during this unsettled period.70 Cork had divided his massive estate into five parts for each of his surviving sons, but the lands granted to Lewis were redistributed among his surviving brothers when he died.71 At the beginning of the rebellion in October 1641, County Connaught (where Katherine was living) was not threatened to the same extent as many others because it was not a dominant English settlement. As such, there were fewer poor and marginalized locals who might be driven to rebel. Initially, some Irish Catholic and Old English Catholic landowners worked with New English Protestant settlers and agents of the president of Connaught to preserve order against the rebels. They maintained that they would remain loyal to the Crown despite their Catholicism. As president

32

•

Chapter One

Figure 2 Athlone Bridge and Castle, 1685, drawn by Thomas Phillips. This is the earliest topographical representation of Athlone Castle and the only one prior to the nineteenth century. (Courtesy of the National Library of Ireland, MS 3137 [33].)

of Connaught, Katherine’s father-in-law, Viscount Ranelagh, used Athlone Castle to shelter local Protestant family and friends, as some Protestant families who took shelter in secure locations were still robbed or attacked by men who wandered the streets.72 By December, however, the rebels had blockaded the east and west roads out of Athlone and the Old English shifted their loyalties after Ranelagh’s garrison made some poor decisions. At this time, the townspeople of Athlone turned against Ranelagh.73 In mid-January 1642, just as Ranelagh and his family (which almost certainly included Katherine) were crossing the bridge to attend Mass at St. Mary’s Church, the rebels attempted to seize the castle. According to one contemporary, “The lord president being ready to go to church, and the ladies taking coach, one of the Irish soldiers fitting and preparing his musket, it went off unawares; the others who lay ready mistaking this for their signal, poured in their shot upon the castle windows.”74 Because of this mistake, the Ranelagh family and the castle were saved, though the building itself suffered some damage.

Birth, Childhood, and Marriage

•

33

This failed attack was followed by a series of additional assaults on the castle, and Katherine remained trapped in Athlone Castle for roughly one year, spanning the majority of 1642. Her only extant letter from this period is one written to her father immediately after she escaped.75 Although she referred only to herself in it, in the singular first person, it seems unlikely that her four children could have been anywhere else. After all, Protestant houses in the town were being robbed and pillaged, and the other castles in the area had been sieged by rebels.76 Women joined the rebellion both formally as “she-soldiers” and informally in local popular risings; one woman who attempted to carry a message to Viscount Ranelagh was stoned to death by other women of the town.77 The situation in Athlone Castle continued to decline, as they lacked ammunition, food, and money. Starving soldiers grew too weak for service, and by August it was reported that half of Ranelagh’s troops were dying of hunger and the rest were lice-ridden and starving. Rebels thwarted their repeated attempts to send messages to Dublin for help.78 Finally, in October 1642, Viscount Ranelagh reconnected and began negotiations with Sir James Dillon, a leader of the rebel forces who had been an old friend before the rebellion. They agreed to a mutual threemonth cease-fire, and Dillon granted Katherine the right to safely exit Athlone. In a letter she wrote to her father on December 26, 1642, upon reaching safety in Dublin, Katherine explained that she had waited for months, hoping that a friend or family member would escort her out of the besieged castle. However, as time dragged on, her hopes and patience wore thin, and she explained that “the desperatnes of my condition, forced me, to put my selfe into the hands of my enemys, without any other securety for my safe getting out of them.” She only hesitantly accepted the offer from Dillon, but she was relieved to find that he kept his word “most punctually & civilly” and delivered her into the hands of Sir Richard Greenville as he led troops between Dublin and Athlone to assist Ranelagh.79 James Butler, later 1st Duke of Ormond, then sent his own troops to meet Katherine and safely escorted her to Dublin, where he was in command.80 After more than a year of having not heard from her, Cork received an emotional letter from Katherine on February 10, 1643— almost two months after she wrote it— in which she described the details of her “most

34

•

Chapter One

myserable captivety.”81 She reported that she occasionally heard updates about her family from the very Irish rebels who kept her imprisoned, and that these updates included news of her father’s ill health and the death of her brother Lewis, Viscount Kinalmeaky, killed in the Battle of Liscarroll. Despite the national upheaval she was caught up in, it was her father’s health that most worried Katherine. She told him that news of his recovery was “amoungst one of the greatest of those many blessings I must confes to have received from God, [even] in this time of unniversall myserie.” She took Cork’s recovery to be a sign that God supported their side of the war, as her father’s “loss would prove a very sincible one” to this country that he was trying to improve. Similarly, she looked upon the death of her brother Lewis “as a stroke of Gods just hand,” and therefore decided she must “doe nothing but submit to it.” Indeed, she had trouble considering such an honorable death to be a “loss,” as dying while defending their noble cause was “as much god’s as ours a happynes both to those that gett their deaths, that way, & to those that are soe deprived of them.”82 Katherine’s letter to her father invoked an omniscient and omnipotent God who controlled the destinies of humans and hid a deeper message concerning the morality of their actions within their deaths and successes. Her explanation that the opposing fates of her father and brother somehow both indicated God’s support for their fight against the Irish rebels exposes the loose and politically motivated ways in which contemporary issues could be interpreted as acts of providence. The message that noble deaths should be celebrated is a recurring theme in letters she wrote throughout her life and is deeply rooted in this providential outlook she shared with her father, as we observed in Cork’s attempts to understand his wife’s death. Katherine’s intimate experience of the Irish Rebellion, which she only narrowly survived, turned her sympathies against the Irish and led her to believe that the country needed more guidance and structure. Her comments later in life that cast the Irish as unruly or uncivilized, as unsettling as they may be to us today, must be read against this traumatic year of captivity in her late twenties, when she lived in constant fear for her life and those of her family members. News of Katherine’s imprisonment had reached as far as England, where tensions had recently escalated to the point where that country

Birth, Childhood, and Marriage

•

35

was now dealing with its own civil war. Her old friend Lucius Cary, Lord Falkland, wrote to Katherine’s sister-in-law Elizabeth Clifford, at that point Lady Dungarvan, for updates on “my Lady Katherines health (a newes which would alone much enable mee to beare the other Troubles of the Time).”83 Falkland had become a member of Parliament and supported the execution of Charles I’s adviser Thomas Wentworth, Earl of Strafford; however, he was deeply saddened by the English Civil Wars and hoped a settlement would be reached soon. Till the end he remained a committed “constitutional Royalist”— a term reserved for those moderate Royalists who served as Charles I’s advisers and advocated for a monarchy with limited power. But in the autumn of 1643, Falkland intentionally charged the enemy’s line of fire during the first Battle of Newbury, expressing disappointment and helplessness over the direction in which the torn country was heading.84 Shortly after Falkland’s death, Sir Peter Pett was collecting Falkland’s writings and proposed to publish them with a contextual biography. He named Lady Ranelagh as a source of information since she was among those who “had the Honour of his Friendship and frequent Conversation.”85 It is unclear how much Lady Ranelagh contributed to this biography, but Falkland’s death would lead her to petition for a peaceful resolution to the English Civil Wars in order to reduce future bloodshed, as we shall see in the next chapter. The harrowing experience of captivity and near escape prompted Katherine to leave Ireland, a country she described as a “bleeding & well neere ruined Commonwealth.”86 Still, she knew that the life she had ahead of her would not be quite as comfortable as the one she was leaving behind— a life in which she lived in castles, associated with the wealthiest family in the country, and benefited from the service of many attendants. In December 1642 she began making plans to travel into England via Chester, where she would prepare to settle herself “in a way of living suteable to that fortune that it has pleased god to reduce me too, & in which I humblely thanke him I find as much satisfaction, as ever I did in a more plentyfull one.”87 Based on her recent experiences, she wrote of this less materialistic life, “That plenty, or scarsety of the goods of fortune, have nothing to doe with the Content or discontent of the mind, but as our vanety and impatience, or, our wisedome & piety, make them Conduce, to one, or the other.”88

36

•

Chapter One

This conscious rejection of material goods involved accepting a lifestyle very different from the one provided for her by her father or husband, and Katherine again positioned the move to the agency of providence. The decision to leave Ireland was significant, and the lessons she was learning from this adventure— particularly with regard to the possession of wisdom and piety being more personally fulfilling than material possessions— were some that she would carry with her throughout her life. She would later reiterate her sentiment about material goods in a letter she wrote to her brother Burlington in 1667, when her friend Lady Chesterfield died and left behind “a greater stock of Plate & fine goods . . . then has binn owned by any private person here, but she carried none of it with her.”89 On the same subject, she observed that those to whom the goods were bequeathed found more happiness in Lady Chesterfield’s things than they experienced in her company. It would be another reminder to her of the value of “inward wealth,” which “death can’t strip them of,” and would serve as validation of the choices she made in her late twenties.90 When she departed from Ireland in 1642, Katherine was almost twenty-eight years old. She left behind her husband to fight with the army as she and their four children, ranging in age from two to nine, moved to England in search of new opportunities. Being an unconventional choice for a seventeenthcentury woman, it is a move she would find herself repeatedly justifying throughout her life. In a frustrated 1658 letter to her brother Broghill, she would mention her desire to “show the world I left not my lord upon humour, but upon necessity, and that in soe doing I sought privacy and submitted to scarcety, rather then pursued a croud, or designed aboundance to my selfe.” Such fear would stem from her perception that this “may have binn suspected” by some who knew her.91 Indeed, her London location and independent life there would place her firmly in the center of a vibrant group of social reformists: the Hartlib circle.

Early Days in the Hartlib Circle (1642– 48)

K

2

atherine’s decision to leave Ireland for England in December 1642 is a comment on how dire the situation was in the country of her birth. England was certainly no peaceful refuge at this time, as it had just begun its own civil war a few months earlier. Katherine arrived in London at some point in 1643, the same year she became Viscountess Ranelagh when her father-in-law died and her husband, Arthur, succeeded to the title 2nd Viscount of Ranelagh. Upon separating from Arthur and relocating to England, Katherine’s financial state became uncertain, though she must have received some money from him and some support from her wider circle of friends and family. She moved to Queen Street, just off the Thames River near St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, and began hosting her displaced siblings. Her sisters Lady Joan Kildare and Lady Dorothy Loftus had themselves moved with their children to London earlier that year, as both of their homes had been taken over by Irish rebels. Lady Kildare wrote to her father that she and her “five poore children” as well as her sister Loftus and her three children had “nothing in the world to live on.”1 After her sister Lady Alice Barrymore was left a widow in September 1642, Alice and her children also moved into Katherine’s London home until she remarried. Katherine’s sister-in-law Lady Margaret Clotworthy joined them shortly after, and the connections she would have made through the Clotworthy family were probably the first to push her sympathies toward the Parliamentarian cause, which would become a defining part of her

38

•

Chapter Two

identity as the civil wars progressed. Margaret was a Presbyterian who had been imprisoned by Thomas Wentworth, Earl of Strafford, for her religious beliefs. She had married a fellow Presbyterian, John Clotworthy— a union that confirmed John’s place among the New English, who opposed Wentworth prior to the latter’s execution. John Clotworthy had also become a powerful member of Parliament in 1640, sitting on both the Short and Long Parliaments.2 What we call the English Civil Wars (or War) was sometimes called the War of Three Kingdoms by contemporaries, as all three kingdoms ruled by Charles I (England and Wales, Scotland, and Ireland) were overcome by a series of battles, civil wars, and conflicts across the 1640s.3 After Parliament had critiqued his taxation and other royal policies, the king dissolved it in 1629. He began his Personal Rule the same year, when he instituted contentious reforms such as the levy on ship money and a new prayer book for Scotland. The first Bishops’ War between England and Scotland began in 1639 when the Scots fought to limit the Crown’s power in their country. Parliament finally reconvened in 1640 and worked to restrict Charles’s power, overturn many damaging economic and social policies, and condemn some of his most influential advisers. For two years, the king and Parliament engaged in heated disagreements that eventually led to both sides raising armies. The rebellion in Ireland had acted as a catalyst for Royalists and Parliamentarians alike, with Charles becoming more determined to quash demands placed on him and to exert his power while Parliament sought the opportunity to usurp the king’s military rights. Years of violent battles erupted across the nation, which eventually led to the king being tried and publicly executed in the name of the people in January 1649.4 In times of rebellion and national instability, existing social structures tend to loosen and create more opportunities for those normally limited by them, such as women. The historian Carol Pal has recently revealed how seven seventeenth-century women, including Lady Ranelagh, intervened in contemporary political thought, corresponded with men as intellectual equals, and negotiated the balance of female piety with wide-ranging ambition. Ranging in social status from a princess (Elisabeth of Bohemia) to a widowed schoolteacher’s daughter (Bathsua Makin) and spanning in geography from Dublin (Dorothy Moore) to Utrecht (Anna Maria van

Early Days in the Hartlib Circle

•

39

Schurman), Pal presents a diverse range of seventeenth-century women who helped shape intellectual discourse amid wars and social uprisings.5 Other intellectual women, such as Lucy Hutchinson, exerted political agency by manipulated existing genres: she leveraged poetry, translation, parody, and biographical narrative.6 Such research complements studies on women and vernacular print culture in England, where publications by women as pamphleteers, prophetesses, and recipe book compilers began proliferating the market during the interregnum.7 With the lifting of royal censorship and mass civil discord unlike anything anyone had ever experienced, literary genres crumbled and, as Nigel Smith aptly says, “the function of literature itself was reconsidered.”8 War and rebellion can provide a platform for other voices to enter influential debates and political conversations, ranging from local to international. While experiencing the Irish and English civil wars meant personal upheaval and financial distress for Lady Ranelagh, the social and political unrest may have served as a catalyst for her to engage in more intellectual networks and discourses than she would have had if England and Ireland had been stable. Lady Ranelagh arrived in London at a time when she was still young and impressionable, but also mature enough to be confident and already well connected to many influential people. This London of social and political unrest was also one filled with groups and networks dedicated to solving problems and supporting new intellectual objectives. The monarchy continued to weaken, and nonconformist groups motivated by religious impulse were gaining momentum. In essence, it was the perfect backdrop for Lady Ranelagh, a pious and socially conscious gentlewoman, to begin exploring her own intellectual ambitions and developing her own networks. She would soon find her way into exploring science and medicine. Like other natural philosophers of this time, Ranelagh found synergies between these subjects and her ambitions for sociopolitical and moral reform. But how would a pious gentlewoman in mid-seventeenth-century London engender sociopolitical or intellectual change while developing a respected public reputation and evading attacks on her modesty? One doesn’t have to look far into the historical record or recent historiography to find references to the obligation on early modern women to be chaste,

40

•

Chapter Two

silent, and obedient; but research over the past three decades has uncovered myriad women who wrote in a variety of genres and maintained public reputations without attracting criticism.9 These women chose to disseminate their writings primarily via manuscript coteries and networks instead of print publication, as did many esteemed early modern literary figures— in many circles across the seventeenth century, manuscript circulation was still considered a more elite method of publication. Indeed, even “domestic” manuscripts like letters or recipe books often were far from private.10 As we will see with the letters of Lady Ranelagh, many of them were annotated, saved, copied, translated, or circulated internationally, making them quite public. By turning their attention toward the wealth of women’s letters scattered in archives across the world, historians and literary scholars have recently been able to see how women used them as tools to exert agency in a number of spheres.11 Lady Ranelagh and her contemporaries like Lady Brilliana Harley and Mary, Lady Vere, can help us see how Puritan women in particular could use a conventional form like the letter to have their writings celebrated as an extension of their spiritual obligations.12 It was in the 1640s that Lady Ranelagh truly embraced epistolary discourse as a powerful means of disseminating information, influencing the thoughts of others, shaping debates, and solidifying an international network. She would continue to leverage this genre as her preferred form of material and literary expression until her death fifty years later. Letters were also a socially acceptable, successful, and established means for women to enter into political discourse, and Ranelagh specifically chose to engage with events that helped her fulfill her spiritual obligation to promote peace.13 Lady Ranelagh’s political activity during the civil wars took the form of promoting peace by writing persuasive letters to acquaintances who held powerful positions on either side of the party line. At the beginning of the first civil war of 1642– 46, Lady Ranelagh was sympathetic to Charles I and hopeful that he could negotiate an acceptable end to the war. In March 1644, she wrote about this subject to her acquaintance Edward Hyde, knowing that he had the power to influence the king, as he had become an influential political adviser to both Charles and the chancellor of the exchequer. One rhetorical strategy she used was to employ the memory of their shared friend, “that gallant man” Lord Falkland, who had recently died in

Early Days in the Hartlib Circle

•

41

Figure 3 Portrait of Katherine Jones, Lady Ranelagh. The date of the portrait is unknown; it may be a later copy of a lost original. It is now in the possession of the 15th Earl of Cork and Orrery. (Photo by Michael Chevis, Midhurst, England. Reproduced by courtesy of the 15th Earl of Cork and Orrery.)

great despair over the ongoing conflict.14 She asked Hyde to “remember how passionate [Falkland was] for the peace of this kingdome,” adding that she couldn’t “but hope you had an agreement with him in those inclinations that carry’d him on soe strongly to endeavour the peace and preservation of his Countrie.”15 She positioned herself as one of “those that wish peace & the Kings happynes” and offered some very specific advice on how

42

•

Chapter Two

Charles might be reconciled with Parliament.16 The king had called a parliament to Oxford, where he was present with a large number of peers. The Royalists argued that the members of Parliament and peers who remained in London could no longer be considered a parliament. Ranelagh, on the other hand, suggested that the Royalists should acknowledge the London parliament, which would calm the fears of the two Houses while reminding them of the king’s authority. Hyde respected her opinion, saving the message, which he endorsed as “a very sensible letter from Lady Ranelagh.”17 In fact, Ranelagh’s argument aligned with the king’s own; indeed, he wrote to acknowledge “the Lords and Commons of Parliament assembled at Westminster” the same day that she wrote her letter to Hyde.18 Unfortunately, the Houses were angered instead of pacified by this sentiment.19 Yet by 1646, after the war had dragged on for another two years, Lady Ranelagh’s sympathy for Charles had weakened considerably. On July 30, 1646, on neutral grounds at Newcastle, Parliament— led by its forceful Presbyterian contingent— presented Charles I with a settlement. Charles had already been defeated by and surrendered to the Scots, and negotiation was inevitable despite the king’s rejection of several proposals. Among other terms in this peace proposal was the establishment of a Presbyterian church in England, abolition of the English episcopacy, and the requirement that for the next twenty years Parliament would take over the king’s control of the military.20 Charles delayed in delivering an answer, which compelled Lady Ranelagh to accelerate her letter-writing strategy by contacting a near blood relation to the king. Disappointed in his actions, Lady Ranelagh wrote to say as much to Charles’s sister Elizabeth Stuart, exiled Queen of Bohemia.21 When Elizabeth had married Frederick V, Elector Palatine of the Rhine, the union served as an international symbol of Protestant unity. However, after her husband died in 1632, the queen alone presided over her exiled court in The Hague during the Thirty Years’ War, and had both Protestant and Catholic supporters.22 It is unknown how the two women knew each other or for how long, but Lady Ranelagh’s apology for writing another letter after having “so lately addressed myself to Your Majesty” implies that this wasn’t their first correspondence.23 She addressed the queen with a clear demonstration of respect and humility, following all the standard conventions of writing to a social superior, such as using full-

Early Days in the Hartlib Circle

•

43

size folio paper and leaving significant blank space around the address and signature (conventions not present in most of Ranelagh’s extant letters).24 Yet the letter is among Ranelagh’s most forceful, stating in the first sentence that “the affayres of this kingdome are now at a determining point” and appealing to the queen’s “good nature and christianety.”25 Lady Ranelagh invoked a Protestant sentiment by explaining that “the Scotch Minesters spoke language playne enough to put him in mind that he was but a peece of Clay accoumptable for all his actions to that greate king of kings that had sett him up.”26 She explained that the Earl of Clarendon then presented a peace proposal that was so eloquent and passionate that it brought tears to people’s eyes, “but his Majesty was unmoveable.”27 In addition to offering a detailed account of the political situation and an informal update on the royal family, the letter is openly critical of Charles’s unwillingness to compromise with Parliament to secure peace for his nation. Ranelagh was disappointed that “he would rather loose his kingdoms than give them away & part with three Crownes than hurt his Conscience.” The letter does not explicitly ask anything of the queen— it is presented as a news update— but by employing subtle hints on religious responsibility, Lady Ranelagh is appealing to the queen’s Christian conscience in the hope that she would help persuade her brother to make concessions. The queen’s reaction to this letter is unknown, but she must have saved it.28 While she was sometimes critical of her brother’s actions, the queen of Bohemia ultimately supported him until his execution— an event that devastated her.29 When compared with her letter to Hyde only two years earlier, Lady Ranelagh’s letter to the queen of Bohemia delivers a more forceful complaint against Charles, suggesting that Ranelagh had become more sympathetic to the Parliamentary cause. To Lady Ranelagh, Charles’s actions over the past few years had exposed him as one who prioritized his pride over the peace of the nation. Yet one common thread runs between the two letters: the desire for a peaceful negotiation to end the war. As Ranelagh explained to Hyde in 1644, prolonging the war would only make “this kingdom be reduced to a poverty.”30 Two years later, her letter to the Queen of Bohemia explained that an agreed settlement was essential to “spare the bloud of the two kingdoms.”31 The later missive also includes increasingly providential language, as she explained, “We Continueing still a people

44

•

Chapter Two

that wil not accept of the great blessing, peace, from god unless we may have it upon our owne teermes nor thinke any teermes reasonable that wil not alow us a liberty of proceeding in those wickednesses that have drawne on all those mysteries & wil be still more frutefull In produceing such distructive births.”32 She argues that God would be angry and deliver even more punishment if the English people— and particularly the king and his associates— continue to refuse a peace settlement. Indeed, the division between the two sides was the very same destructive behavior that initially provoked God’s wrath, and so refusing a peace settlement would simply allow the devastation to continue. Her political alliances were shaped largely by her religious commitment to maintaining the peace of the nation, and during the civil wars this meant aligning her sympathies with the party she deemed most likely to procure peace. Parliament did claim a victory over the king later in 1646, marking the end of the first civil war, but they never achieved a conclusive negotiation that could reinstate peace. It was around this time, in the mid-1640s, that Lady Ranelagh became associated with the intellectual group that would be the one in which she was most active: the vibrant circle surrounding the intelligencer Samuel Hartlib.33 This correspondence network, now known as the “Hartlib circle,” began in London in 1641 and centered around Samuel Hartlib, John Dury, and Jan Amos Kominski (Comenius). In March 1642, the three signed a pact “concerning what ought to be promoted in the public good for the mutual edification of Christianity.”34 Their core belief, first promoted by Comenius and then espoused by others in the circle, was that education had to be reformed so that the interconnectedness between different branches of knowledge could be exposed and universally accessible. They then began exploiting their impressive range of contacts to establish an international correspondence network that spanned continental Europe, England, Ireland, and the American colonies. Hartlib employed scriveners and translators to copy important letters and treatises that would be circulated to this wide audience. In England, the group included such wellknown figures as John Milton, Robert Boyle, and Henry Oldenburg. From 1642 to 1660, this circle transformed the pessimism inherent in many who lived in this age of civil war and interregnum into an opportunity to realize God’s new kingdom on Earth. Through a combined interest in everything

Early Days in the Hartlib Circle

•

45

from natural philosophy to educational reform, and from husbandry to religious conversion and medicine, the Hartlibians (many of whom were European Protestants, and specifically Puritans supporting the English Parliamentarians) were hopeful that they could craft a more egalitarian and godly society. While the Hartlib circle would become a place for Ranelagh to freely explore and promote natural philosophy, her first entrance into the circle was as a moral and religious figure. It is through the Hartlib Papers archive at the University of Sheffield that we know the most about Lady Ranelagh’s activities during the 1640s and 1650s, as she was an active member throughout the two decades of the group’s existence.35 Her name appears throughout the Hartlib Papers archive roughly two hundred times, and the wealth of information demonstrates her involvement in a wide range of topics, including political negotiations, religious discourses, medical remedies, and natural philosophy.36 Evan Bourke’s recent network visualization of references in the Hartlib Papers ranks Lady Ranelagh as number 6 of 766 people representing “betweenness” connections across the social network: she is one of only two women to feature in the top twenty shortlist and follows immediately behind such expected figures as Hartlib, Dury, Comenius, John Beale, and Johann Moriaen.37 Many of Lady Ranelagh’s lifelong friendships also began during her years in the Hartlib circle, and she probably introduced some of these members to her brother Robert Boyle when he moved to London. She developed a professional and intellectual relationship with the poet and revolutionary John Milton from about 1646. While Milton is notorious for his low opinion of women, he said of Lady Ranelagh, “To me she has stood in the place of all kith and kin.”38 Ranelagh employed Milton as a tutor to her son, Richard Jones, and Milton often encouraged the boy to follow the example of “that most exemplary woman, your mother.”39 Before long she became friends with Hartlib himself, and he had his post delivered to her address as early as 1645, when the two also began occasionally sending their letters to correspondents in a shared parcel.40 Ranelagh’s reputation as a learned woman preceded her, and there are several places in the Hartlib Papers where there is evidence that influential men, such as the wealthy London alderman John Cutler, requested an audience with her.41 References to Lady Ranelagh as “that excellent lady our friend” appear in

46

•

Chapter Two

several letters written between members of the circle, invoking her as a source of intellectual authority even when she was not present and demonstrating that her identity was so well known that they didn’t even need to use her name.42 Carol Pal, Ruth Connolly, and Sarah Hutton have each persuasively argued for Ranelagh’s centrality in the Hartlib circle, and Evan Bourke’s more recent quantitative network analysis, aided by new digital projects such as the RECIRC database and Early Modern Letters Online, make it clear that she was undeniably a central correspondent within this international circle and was much discussed among diverse members of the wider network. As historians move toward acknowledging the influence of the Hartlib circle on seventeenth-century science, technology, and organized knowledge, we must make sure that Lady Ranelagh’s name features as prominently as her male counterparts in this story. We don’t know how Lady Ranelagh initially met Hartlib, but many of her earliest connections to the circle were with individuals whom she probably already knew through her preexisting Anglo-Irish network. The earliest reference to Ranelagh in the Hartlib Papers archive is during a correspondence with Dorothy Moore (later Dorothy Dury), a relative through marriage— an aunt— who shared her strong religious sentiment.43 Dorothy Moore was an Anglo-Irish gentlewoman who had been working with a network of Protestant reformers in the Netherlands. She was in London by 1641, staying in the home of the Dutch physician brothers Gerard and Arnold Boate, and it may have been then that Moore met John Dury, one of the most active core members of the circle.44 By 1643, John Dury needed help convincing Dorothy Moore to marry him, and they both turned to Lady Ranelagh for advice on the prospective union. A lengthy exchange took place between Dury, Lady Ranelagh, and Dorothy Moore from 1643 to 1645, as Moore was unsure whether she might best serve God by marrying John Dury or remaining single. Moore’s letters indicate that she considered Lady Ranelagh to be a spiritual adviser, and one that was explicitly female and could speak with authority about a woman’s responsibility to God. Throughout this correspondence, Ranelagh was not quite thirty years old— three years younger than her aunt Dorothy Moore. While Dury’s and Moore’s letters to Lady Ranelagh concerning their potential marriage may sound like the basis for a private conversation,

Early Days in the Hartlib Circle

•

47

Hartlib annotated, copied, and circulated them among other associates of the circle, thereby helping to establish Lady Ranelagh’s identity among this wider network as an authority on piety. In 1645, Hartlib and Dury agreed that Moore’s reflections on a Christian woman’s obligation to marry, written to Ranelagh for spiritual feedback, could benefit a larger audience. As such, Hartlib printed Moore’s and Dury’s letters to Ranelagh in an anonymous pamphlet without seeking Moore’s consent.45 Entitled Madam, Although My Former Freedom, the pamphlet comprises three of Moore’s and two of Dury’s letters written to Lady Ranelagh; none of her responses were printed. Dury’s, Moore’s, and Ranelagh’s names were erased for the print edition. Hartlib’s decision to print this pamphlet suggests that there may have been a market for Christian women’s intimate letters, but it may also have been a public defense of the marriage and the friendship that preceded it after Moore and Dury had received some critical attention.46 Nevertheless, Moore was angry over Hartlib’s choice to print the pamphlet without her permission, despite his attempt to protect her identity by erasing her name. She wrote to Hartlib to say she never thought she would have reason to quarrel with him, but demanded, “how doe you thincke I am able to beare your printing of that rude indigested paper written to the Lady Ranalaugh?”47 She feared that publicly circulating an unedited document containing private information could discredit their goal to educate Christians about marriage; she would have preferred the public to have no information on the topic rather than to be negatively biased by such a document. After a passionate rant, Moore concluded: “treuly mr Hartlib I have noe pardonne for you. . . . I am in zeal of publick hurt hartily angry with you.”48 While Moore did not express anger when Hartlib edited and circulated her manuscripts among their wider correspondence network, entering into print publication was an entirely different matter. As with many early modern gentlewomen, Moore embraced the selective public circulation of her manuscript writings but hesitated to enter the uncontrolled public sphere and its cheap print publications. John Dury, himself a religious authority in the Hartlib circle, continued to turn to Ranelagh for advice on spiritual, ethical, and intellectual matters after this initial conversation. He considered her a spiritual confidant and guide, and maintained a frequent correspondence with her throughout

48

•

Chapter Two

the latter half of the 1640s— a time when he was debating many theological questions. In 1646, Dury apologized to Hartlib for not yet delivering “the Logicall discourse” he had promised him, “but having fallen upon a Discourse to my Lady Ranalaugh about our walking with God in faith; it hath eaten up all my tyme.”49 Dury’s comment places his theological discourse with Lady Ranelagh on a par with his logical discourse with Hartlib, demonstrating its importance to him and the high respect in which he held her. By the summer of 1644, when Ranelagh had already been active with the Hartlib circle and engaged in London’s parliamentary politics for a couple of years, the teenage Robert Boyle returned from his grand tour of the Continent. He arrived in London via Dover after having been abroad for four years, and it was his sister Ranelagh whom he sought. Boyle did not have her address, but he was able to learn where she lived “by Inquiry,” as she had already established a local reputation by this point. The seventeen-year-old Robert Boyle had been passing as a Frenchman when he was touring Italy, and upon entering his sister’s house in London in his French dress he passed several of his younger relatives who simply “gaz’d at him without knowing him.” Boyle noted later in an autobiographical manuscript that, similarly, he could only guess who they were, indicating how much time had lapsed since he’d last seen the family. He detailed how he wandered through the house looking for a servant to show him to his sister. When passing a woman he did not recognize on the stairs, he asked her where Lady Ranelagh was. As it happened, the woman was Lady Ranelagh herself. Not recognizing him at first, on account of his long absence and his unannounced return to England, Lady Ranelagh had to move closer for an “attentive view.” Once she discerned that it was Robert Boyle, she exclaimed, “Oh! ’tis my Brother” and embraced him “with the joy & tendernes of a most affectionate Sister.” Boyle recalled fondly that “many questions & answers were interchang’d between” them as they made up for lost time. Ranelagh made sure that he was comfortable, providing him with a private apartment in her house, and he stayed for four and a half months.50 During these months that Boyle spent in Ranelagh’s household, his older sister exerted great religious and political influence on him, guiding him in which path to take upon completing his travels. Boyle remembered

Early Days in the Hartlib Circle

•

49

this time in his sister’s household as being significant for two reasons. First, he was persuaded not to join the Royalist army or become tempted to enter the royal court (where he reflected later that he may have become morally corrupt). Second, he was able to “grow acquainted with several Persons of power & interest in the Parliament and their party, which being then very great & afterwards the prevailing One, prov’d of good use, & advantage to him, in reference to his Estate and concerns both in England and Ireland.” Boyle’s time in Ranelagh’s house overlapped with a visit from John and Margaret Clotworthy, and he makes clear that he was indebted to Ranelagh for her wise counsel and influential political network.51 Ranelagh’s political standing and moral integrity helped steer her younger brother in a new direction, and later that year he returned to the Boyle property at Stalbridge in Dorset, which he had recently inherited from his deceased father and where he would spend most of the next decade. There is little evidence of how Boyle and Ranelagh handled the news of the Earl of Cork’s death, but we know that Cork retreated to Youghal during the uprising and died there in September 1643, leaving his sons to settle his estate.52 The Stalbridge estate was isolated in the far southwest of England, about 85 miles from Oxford and roughly 115 miles from his sister’s house in London. As a result, Boyle had few distractions but also little local opportunity for intellectual growth and stimulation. Scholars often refer to the next several years of Boyle’s life in Stalbridge as his “moralist period”— one in which he primarily explored and wrote about ethical issues, with the help of his older sister in London. His letters to Ranelagh consistently refer to the “promised Discourse” on which he was working, suggesting he was fulfilling projects that were shaped significantly by Ranelagh.53 One such reference is in March 1646, when he informed her “my Ethics go very slowly on,” probably referring to Boyle’s Aretology. Similar comments about her influence continue to surface until at least 1649.54 Not living in the same city, Ranelagh and Boyle made ample use of the postal service to exchange letters and manuscript drafts, and one cannot help but wonder how many other letters between the siblings have been lost or removed from the archival record.55 Within the ethical works themselves, Boyle often paraphrased his sister as a source of authority. In the essay “Of Sin,” not published in his life-

50

•

Chapter Two

time, Boyle incorporated many of Ranelagh’s anecdotes to help him articulate his definitions of virtue and reason.56 An untitled essay on piety that Boyle was composing around the same time as “Of Sin” also references a “handsom answer of a Sister of mine.” He explains, “When one told her that the Severity of her Vertu had frihted such and such young Gallants from talking loosely in her Company; presently [she] made answer, That she thought her self very hihly oblig’d to them: for she tooke for a far les honor that they [illeg.] shud keep of their Hats to her then their Vices.”57 This is one of several places where Boyle held up Ranelagh as a model of piety and respectability— virtues he admired in her and that he described here to teach others by her example. To respect her modesty, Boyle never used Ranelagh’s name when referring to her in his publications. These discreet references to “a Sister of mine” are part of the reason her intellectual influence has been retrospectively difficult to identify. In these formative years, Boyle relied on his older sister for intellectual guidance. Lady Ranelagh was not only a driving force behind these ethical treatises, but also a source of feedback: she read drafts of Boyle’s manuscripts and offered constructive criticism. In May 1648, Boyle asked Ranelagh if he could give her “the trouble of perusinge my thoughts in an Essay, entitled, of Divinitie.”58 This essay may have never been written, but she certainly commented on others that were. We know this because in both his published works and his manuscripts, Boyle acknowledged that the reason he did not discard them was because his sister expressed satisfaction with them. He appreciated her help so deeply that he dedicated some of his works to her when they went into print. An earlier version of his essay “The Dayly Reflection,” which was composed during these impressionable years and explains the religious benefits of keeping a reflective diary, is entitled “The Dayly REFLECTOR To my Lady Ranalaugh.”59 (The choice to dedicate this to his sister could also stem from his desire to persuade her to keep a diary. Boyle does not appear to be commenting on her existing practice, nor is there any indication that Ranelagh kept a diary, though their sister Mary Rich, Countess of Warwick, would become an avid diarist.60) “The Dayly Reflection” fits into a wider series of Boyle’s moral treatises in which he advocated ways to control unruly thoughts and work toward the self-knowledge and self-discipline required of higher

Early Days in the Hartlib Circle

•

51

intellectual goals— a belief he clearly thought he shared with his sister.61 Then, in 1648, Boyle apologized that he had not written to his sister any “common Letters” because he was busy writing “a Dedicatorie one” for her, “which may (possibly) have the Happynesse to conveigh Your Name to Posterity.”62 Almost two decades later, in 1665, Boyle finally published some of the meditations composed during this period and dedicated them to Lady Ranelagh. This publication, Occasional Reflections upon Several Subjects, will be discussed in chapter 6. With Ranelagh’s own religiopolitical agenda and her active involvement with the Hartlib circle over this period, she was well positioned to influence her younger brother to pursue an intellectual agenda substantiated by a firm religious foundation. Her location in London meant that she was also geographically situated to expand her own intellectual network and introduce Boyle to important events and people. Indeed, she would have been doing the latter when he stayed in her London home on his extended visits to the city. It was almost certainly Ranelagh who introduced Boyle to the Hartlib circle, as she was already active in this network by 1643, prior to Boyle’s arrival in London and well before the 1647 date of his earliest surviving letter to Hartlib. However, much of what is known about Boyle’s and Ranelagh’s involvement in the circle comes from Hartlib’s diaries, the Ephemerides, which unfortunately do not survive between 1643 and 1648. Still, it appears that Boyle never got as actively involved in the Hartlib circle as did his sister, though he later expressed interest in some projects related to universal language, educational improvements, and civil reform— issues similar to those the circle championed.63 From the autumn of 1646 to the spring of 1647, Robert Boyle began working with a different “philosophical college” that concerned itself only with knowledge “as it hath a tendency to use.”64 This collective has since become known as the “Invisible College,” as it did not have a physical location. However, one letter from Boyle suggests that meetings took place in London.65 The group shared the same moral and intellectual ambitions as the Hartlib circle, but Boyle’s letter describing this network to Hartlib indicates they were two different groups and that Hartlib did not participate in the other.66 Scholars have suggested that meetings of the Invisible College took place in Lady Ranelagh’s home in London, and her geographic

52

•

Chapter Two

location and shared philosophical interests at the time certainly corroborate this possibility.67 However, Boyle’s descriptions of the college are too enigmatic to discern membership or exact meeting locations. He unfortunately makes no reference to Lady Ranelagh’s involvement in his three extant letters on the topic, and the two possible references identified in Lady Ranelagh’s letters must refer to other groups because they date from 1657— long after the Invisible College had dispersed. In Ranelagh’s letter to Boyle where she referred to his “Philosophical Society,” she probably meant his group of experimental philosophers at Oxford.68 There is also a letter translated into German originally from Ranelagh to an unknown correspondent in the Hartlib circle in which she referred to the recipient’s “unsichtbahren societt,” or “invisible society.”69 Though it has been suggested based on the word invisible that Ranelagh meant Boyle’s Invisible College, it would be a stretch to translate societt as “college,” and there is no other distinctive contextual information in this letter that links it to this group that existed ten years earlier.70 As such, it probably refers to another informal network that developed in the interregnum. So was Lady Ranelagh involved in Robert Boyle’s Invisible College of 1647– 48? Perhaps. Again, their shared interests and her geographical location make this very probable. However, we know so little about Boyle’s own involvement in the Invisible College that, given the limited evidence, it would be difficult to say anything more than maybe.71 In addition to providing the young Boyle with spiritual and intellectual guidance, Ranelagh was also an affectionate older sister who provided her brother with the emotional stability of a parent. Boyle wrote in 1646 to their brother Richard, who had succeeded to his title of 2nd Earl of Cork, to say, “I thought I had a very just reason to quarrel with my Sicness, for debarring me the happiness of wayting upon my Sister: but now I am willing to consent to a Reconciliation, since the Enjoyment of her Company must have had so short a Date, as wud have serv’d but to have tauht me the greatness of my Losse.”72 His “dearest, dearest dearest Sister” became his strongest form of support over these early years, and their relationship would turn into a lifelong partnership only strengthened by the fact that Boyle would never marry.73 When the woman whom Boyle’s father had intended for him to marry decided to wed someone else in 1646, Ranelagh

Early Days in the Hartlib Circle

•

53

wrote sympathetically to Boyle that it “set you at libertie from al the apearances you have put on of being a lover which tho they Cost you some paines & use of art were easyer because they were but apearances.”74 While Ranelagh later chided Boyle to bring “a wife of your owne to Stalbridge,” she ultimately supported his decision to live an unmarried life, especially as her own husband became increasingly estranged.75 While Boyle would turn in earnest toward chemistry in 1649, his earliest attempt to build a laboratory at Stalbridge was facilitated by Lady Ranelagh as early as March 1647. Ranelagh helped organize a shipment of chemical equipment so he could begin his own experimental program there. The shipment included “limbecks, recipients and other glasses,” which all arrived unharmed. These were useless to Boyle, however, without “the great earthen furnace . . . concerning which I made bold very lately to trouble you” and which was broken in transit. A devastated Boyle exclaimed to Ranelagh, “I see I am not designed to the finding out the philosophers’ stone, I have been so unlucky in my first attempts in chemistry.”76 The technical vocabulary he employs in his letter demonstrates his confidence that Ranelagh understood the basics of chemistry, and it acknowledged her role in orchestrating the shipment. As we will see in her later attempts to help Boyle build laboratories, she must have continued to encourage her younger brother to pursue chemistry even after his initial defeat. It was in the late 1640s when Ranelagh and Boyle met fellow intellectual and spiritual reformer Benjamin Worsley, who was to become a collaborator with and lifelong friend to both siblings. Worsley had previously trained as a surgeon and continued to experiment with medicine at various points of his life, but during his days in the Hartlib circle he dedicated himself to some of their most ambitious and important projects for social and religious reform. Worsley also had Irish connections, but at this time he situated himself in the heart of the religious revolution in London by taking a house on Coleman Street, which was so famous for its sectarian activities that Boyle referred to it as Worsley’s “heretical street.”77 Residing in London at a time when he was ready to make a career change and was supported by an ambitious network of like-minded individuals, Worsley embarked on a new adventure that would become one of the Hartlib circle’s most active early projects. As the civil wars raged on,

54

•

Chapter Two

there was an increasing demand for saltpeter (potassium nitrate), which was used in gunpowder and fertilizers. Estimates from 1627 suggest that England had imported two-thirds of its supply of saltpeter, so there was a national motivation to establish a more self-sufficient model. Charles had established many ambitious programs, but the Crown’s monopoly over the saltpeter industry collapsed with the onset of war, providing opportunities for new experimenters and projectors.78 Beginning in 1646, Worsley wrote several proposals for a saltpeter production workhouse that claimed its benefits would range from eliminating unnecessary byproduct waste to providing housing and education to poor children. The final proposal was sparse on technical details as to how he intended to actually produce saltpeter, and the chemistry required was still uncertain at the time; however, the proposal was offered in the spirit of the public good and promised to spare individuals of the inconveniences they had previously experienced by “saltpeter-men” digging up and spoiling their cellars and yards. When Worsley’s proposal passed in the House of Lords, Ranelagh wrote to share this “welcome news” with Boyle, who had not heard from Worsley in a while and was dependent on his sister for such updates.79 Boyle wrote to Worsley to express his support for the “pious powder-plot” and to indicate that “my purse, as well as my affection, makes vows for your success.”80 Despite these early successes, Worsley never completed the project— possibly because it lacked the chemical and technical details required to bring it to fruition. However, this incompletion could be because, as the historian Thomas Leng has suggested, the proposal had already served its primary purpose: to establish Worsley’s credentials to patrons within the Hartlib circle and the city of London.81 Indeed, it solidified a bond between these moral reformers, and Ranelagh and Worsley in particular would continue to collaborate on a range of activities that intersected at spiritual, social, and intellectual improvement. The saltpeter project also clarified for Hartlib and Worsley the extent to which state support would be required to substantiate large-scale projects and confirmed that such a buy-in would certainly be required for their next ambitious project. The Hartlib circle’s biggest claim to fame was the Office of Address proposal, which sought to create a publicly funded college situated in London that could serve as a hub for the geographically

Early Days in the Hartlib Circle

•

55

dispersed group. The Office of Address drew ideas partly from Théophraste Renaudot’s Bureau d’adresse and Francis Bacon’s Novum organum (1620) to present strategies for collecting, organizing, and distributing all useful information to the public. From 1646 to 1648, John Dury, Samuel Hartlib, Sir Cheney Culpeper, William Petty, and Benjamin Worsley began drafting proposals and debating the specific parameters. As momentum for the project increased, so did the circle of patrons and promoters, first among whom was Lady Ranelagh, followed swiftly by Robert Boyle.82 Pamphlets were printed then, promoting how this central office with state-appointed agents would solve social problems like poverty and unemployment by offering educational reform and a national system of workhouses. Hartlib’s attempts to secure financial support continued across the 1650s, but he ultimately failed in his goal to create the office. Nevertheless, this proposition to organize new knowledge in a central location with a national endowment was an important forerunner to the Royal Society that would become established in the Restoration, with the two sharing many overlapping members like Robert Boyle, as will be discussed in chapter 5.83 Around the same time, Ranelagh also involved Worsley in a curious matter that held significant religious, political, and philosophical implications: the conversion of Sarah Wight. In the spring of 1647 when this teenage girl became convinced of her damnation, she attempted suicide, refused food, drank very little, and at one point slipped into a lifeless state for eight days. Over several months, Wight purportedly fasted and lapsed into a conversation with God that attracted much public attention: she claimed that divine grace alone sustained her body. Ministers, doctors, and gentlewomen visited her with the goal of ascertaining whether she spoke the truth, with many of their conversations written down by a scribe, or “relator.” Though many thought she would die, Wight miraculously recovered and became a spiritual guide for other women. Aligned with the wider tradition of Puritan conversion narratives, Wight’s near-death experience and religious transformation represented a spiritual death and rebirth necessary for the soul’s marriage to Christ in heaven.84 Ranelagh visited Sarah Wight in her London bedroom on Cannon Street in Tower Hill at least once during her conversion experience, but possibly even twice. Henry Jessey, a pastor of an Independent church in

56

•

Chapter Two

London, published the names of seventy “witnesses” to Sarah Wight’s event in his pamphlet The Exceeding Riches of Grace Advanced, noting that Lady Ranelagh attended with her sister, Lady Margaret Clotworthy. However, Jessey also recorded Ranelagh as visiting on May 19 without her sister, and instead with a Mrs. Fines and a Mrs. Brice. On this occasion, the women questioned the young maid on God’s chosen method for delivering his messages and whether Wight still revered the written word after she had received “the inward teaching of the Spirit.”85 They also questioned Wight on her willingness to live and the weak state of her body. After these more general questions to assess the young woman’s condition, they asked specifically for her opinions on the current state of the Protestant Church, which was broken into many divisions. The relator noted that Wight spoke more rapidly when she answered these final questions, expounding the need for humankind to reconcile divisions through unity of the Protestant Church. Lady Ranelagh is almost certainly also the lady whom the relator mentioned had later sent Benjamin Worsley with a medicinal cordial, but Sarah Wight refused to take it, complaining that it made her sick.86 The name “Dr. Worsley” is invoked in a medical context, but one should not exaggerate a wide distinction between Wight’s medical and spiritual visitors.87 Worsley and many of the other doctors Jessey named are included specifically because they would have been sensitive and spiritually open to this case. It appears that Lady Ranelagh first visited Wight to authenticate the situation before requesting the opinion of a like-minded medical professional in her network with whom she could discuss both the divine message and the medical condition. Similar to the strange encounters of Sarah Wight, occult, mystical, and supernatural forces were a recurring theme in the Hartlib circle and would become a fascination for Robert Boyle as well, with many natural philosophers and medical professionals conceding that some acts were beyond human comprehension.88 The “occult sciences” were focused on revealing the secrets of nature, or occultas res naturae, which was a deeply intellectual and spiritual study in which one must purify one’s mind and spirit to better understand God’s messages.89 Divine intervention afflicting human bodies was both a natural philosophical and spiritual quandary, and Lady

Early Days in the Hartlib Circle

•

57

Ranelagh would have a chance to revisit the topic again in more depth with the miraculous healer Valentine Greatrakes two decades later. Sarah Wight had more witnesses than those Henry Jessey named, but he decided to feature in his sectarian publication only these individuals who were “of esteem amongst many that fear the Lord in London.”90 He included Presbyterians, Independents, Baptists, and other nonconformist radicals who held a variety of politically and spiritually influential positions. Jessey’s choice to feature Lady Ranelagh in this list— one that serves to strengthen a publication advocating for the toleration movement at a time of great divide in London— is indicative of her high public reputation among religious nonconformists in late 1640s London. Significantly, Jessey’s pamphlet and the message delivered by God through the “Empty Nothing Creature” that was Sarah Wight’s body promoted the unity of the churches, something many radicals saw as a requirement and prerequisite for the “new millennium” (that is, the Second Coming of Christ). In the spring of 1647, many Protestant sects were championing their individual ideologies, resulting in a heated pluralistic division among nonconformists rather than an overarching unity for the greater cause.91 At a time of deep unrest when the apocalypse literally seemed to be approaching, the millenarianism movement became increasingly attractive to radicals during the 1640s and 1650s. Calvinist doctrine argued for predestination and the salvation of only a chosen few, and many felt that the Protestant state of England was the elect nation that would form the site of the new millennium.92 Some radical Protestants believed that one precursor to the Second Coming was the unity of Protestant churches, and Ranelagh’s questioning of Wight on this topic reveals both her concern for the political state of London and the first impulse of a radical religious sentiment that she would come to endorse over the next decade. Wight’s divine message to reconcile divisions among the churches would have certainly been endorsed by the Hartlib circle, many of whom were engaged in conversations on this topic around the same time. John Beale wrote to Hartlib sometime later to say that the reason he didn’t share the copy of Jessey’s book with Hartlib is because he saw Lady Ranelagh’s name printed inside it and so assumed that she had already familiarized Hartlib with Sarah Wight’s story.93

58

•

Chapter Two

Throughout 1647, a series of disputes between the Parliamentary army, Charles, and the Scots caused a renewed turn toward violence and gave birth to a motivated radical contingent. Riots and uprisings began again as relations between the king and Parliament hardened, causing the outbreak of a second English Civil War in 1648 wherein many of those opposing the monarchy now sought its abolition.94 Charles’s actions had continued to disappoint Lady Ranelagh, and by 1648 she was no longer optimistic that the king could ever heal divisions in the country and restore peace to the three kingdoms. She began advocating that the monarch be stripped of most powers and that governance should rest with Parliament, the representative of the people. In order to present a sophisticated legal framework that accurately reflected the recent political situation, she appealed to the wider Hartlib circle using the query genre, in which authors take turns publicly listing a series of questions and providing answers.95 As the first author to pose questions on the topic, Ranelagh was the initiator and shaper of this conversation. She sent her initial letter to Hartlib, who in turn forwarded it to Sir Cheney Culpeper, a fellow member of the circle who was interested in both law reform and natural philosophy, particularly chemistry and husbandry.96 Her letter included a list of seven political questions that comprised sophisticated legal propositions such as “Whether upon any Occasion the two Houses have power to make a Law binding to the People without the Royall assent, and wheather they bee to judge of the occasion?”97 The final question asked, “Whether indeed both Houses may Legally levy mony and sequester the Estates of their Opposers, as they have done during this Warr, without and against the Kings Consent?”— a query which Ruth Connolly has identified as being “particularly of Presbyterian political thought.”98 Ranelagh concluded her final question with the insinuation that the king was enforcing his power over the Houses of Parliament by “Interposing his Negative voyce to keepe them from Proceeding without Him.”99 Her questions concern the legal implications of transferring power to Parliament and indicate that while Charles should remain king, he should lose most of his executive powers, including the royal veto. In effect, she was proposing a limited constitutional monarchy wherein the hereditary monarch shares much of his or her power and authority with Parliament.

Early Days in the Hartlib Circle

•

59

Culpeper’s response was long and detailed, spanning two letters, both dating from September 1648. He humbly added to his second missive: “I shall bee glad, if what I writte last weeke, may have given my Lady any Satisfaction in Her Question.”100 Culpeper interpreted the law to mean that both the king and the House of Lords should be subordinate to the House of Commons, proposing that the people should be in control.101 If Lady Ranelagh responded, her letter is no longer extant, and so we cannot confirm whether she agreed with his suggestions for such a radical governmental restructuring. Culpeper’s reference to “my lady” suggests the two already knew each other. That their acquaintance had already been made is also indicated in a manuscript of Boyle’s that Hartlib solicited for Culpeper in the same year, on the sowing of clover grass.102 Over the course of the civil wars, Lady Ranelagh’s viewpoint and sympathies changed significantly, and her diverse network allowed her to reposition her strategies from targeting Royalists like Edward Hyde and Elizabeth of Bohemia for help to drawing on radicals like Sir Cheney Culpeper once it became clear that the seat of political power had shifted. Significantly, this exchange also demonstrates how Lady Ranelagh initiated discussions within the Harlib circle on diverse matters that even extended into politics. Her articulate, learned questions reveal her nuanced understanding of national law that was recognized by both Culpeper and Hartlib, the latter who employed a scribe to copy her questions and may have circulated them to other members of the circle. Boyle himself remained less connected to the Hartlib circle than his sister ever was, and in a letter to Hartlib written as late as 1648, the poet William Waller referred to Boyle as “the brother of that noble Lady Raynello,” demonstrating that he was still best known to many in relation to his more famous sister.103 As the political turmoil of 1648 drew to a close and the king was beheaded in January 1649, Ranelagh began to expand her intellectual pursuits to include medicine and chemistry contemporaneously with her brother Robert Boyle, as we shall see.

Formative Years in Natural Philosophy and Medicine (1649– 56)

T

3

he summer of 1649 has been called a turning point for Robert Boyle— the point at which he shifted from concerning himself with morals and ethics very specifically to dedicating himself to a broader life of chemical experimentation rooted in natural philosophy. The transition was gradual, taking place over the course of several years during which, in his earlier works on natural philosophy, we still encounter a strong moralist tone.1 We can see Boyle’s shift through observing changes in letters between Lady Ranelagh and himself, in his experimental notebooks, and in manuscript drafts of treatises. Significantly, a very similar intellectual shift was occurring for Lady Ranelagh around the same time. While Ranelagh’s interests in education, religion, and politics would persist, her letters and the references to her in Samuel Hartlib’s Ephemerides demonstrate that she began dedicating herself increasingly to questions of natural philosophy and medicine throughout the interregnum. Because Hartlib’s Ephemerides covering 1643 to 1648 are no longer extant, it is possible that her interest began earlier but that the manuscripts are missing.2 However, this shift does align with Boyle’s own transition and that of the wider Hartlib circle. It also lines up with the few extant letters to or from her that date across the 1640s. Like that of the Hartlib circle as a whole, Lady Ranelagh’s interest in science must be seen as an extension of her larger political and religious

62

•

Chapter Three

goals. In the mid to late 1640s, members of the Hartlib circle turned their attention toward natural philosophy, and specifically toward chemistry.3 Francis Bacon’s works from the first quarter of the 1600s finally reached their peak in England, decades after they were written, when those advocating socioreligious reform during the civil wars and interregnum were moved by his suggestions for how to recapture a prelapsarian state of perfection on earth. The reformers believed that the “Great Instauration” of knowledge would be coupled with a new understanding of nature itself, making natural philosophy an essential subject in their larger plans for social reform.4 While recent research has critiqued earlier attempts to link the rise of natural philosophy in England with Puritan doctrine, most historians still agree that the radical musings apparent among diverse Protestant sects at this time played some part in shaping the rise of natural philosophy in England.5 Beginning around 1649 and continuing until the dissolution of the Hartlib circle, Lady Ranelagh involved herself in diverse branches of natural philosophy and experimentation, including horticulture, medicine, and chemistry. The number of places in the Hartlib Papers archive where her name is connected to natural philosophy and medicine increases around 1648 and continues for the next twelve years.6 Apart from sharing with Hartlib a few early recipes that required chemical procedures— such as a distilled Irish hot water commended by physicians and sold to Irish soldiers— Lady Ranelagh’s earliest conversations about chemistry were with her brother Robert Boyle, and it is to these that we now turn.7 While Boyle’s first attempt at chemistry failed in 1647, his “Vulcanian Feat” was finally accomplished in 1649 when he completed the establishment of his first laboratory at Stalbridge.8 In the summer of 1649 he wrote again to his older sister, just as he had written to her about his unlucky failure two years prior— but this time he conveyed the happy news that the “Vulcan has so transported and bewitch’d mee, that as the Delights I tast in it, make me fancy my Laboratory a kind of Elizium.”9 Lady Ranelagh must have written back and encouraged these early chemical explorations or he would not have continued to write letters to her that assumed she understood and supported his work; however, her responses are no longer extant.10 Boyle’s early excitement about experimentation was situated in

Formative Years in Natural Philosophy and Medicine

•

63

longer letters to Lady Ranelagh that also discussed his work on treatises concerning the moral and ethical dimensions of exploring nature. In addition to writing letters about and experimenting with natural philosophy, Ranelagh began encouraging Boyle to publish treatises on the topic, reading and commenting on drafts prior to entering print. However, Boyle started getting so carried away by experimenting in his new laboratory that he apologized to his sister for developing a tendency to “forget my Standish and my Bookes and allmost all things.”11 This new excitement combined with a recent bout of sickness prevented Boyle from delivering to Ranelagh a series of treatises that were of great interest to her, and which she presumably helped shape. From 1647 to 1649, Boyle was working on a powerful essay against secrecy in natural philosophy— particularly medicine— entitled “An Epistolical Discourse . . . Inviting All True Lovers of Vertue and Mankind, to Free and Generous Communication of Their Secrets and Receits in Physick.”12 The tract was composed in the form of a letter by Philaretus (Boyle) to an anonymous professor of secrets called Empyricus, wherein the former attempts to convince the latter of the public need for openly communicating valuable secrets. Hartlib would publish Boyle’s epistle in the 1655 compilation Chymical, Medicinal, and Chyrurgical Addresses, making this Boyle’s first print publication, but he had begun writing this piece seven years earlier.13 In one of his August 1649 letters to Ranelagh, after relaying details concerning his illness, Boyle explained, “In the Intervalls of my Fitts I both began & made some Progresse in the promised Discourse of Publicke-Spiritednesse: but now truly Weakenesse & the Doctor’s Prescriptions have cast my Pen into the Fire.”14 His “Invitation” for openly communicating recipes probably comprised one section in a larger discourse on “Publicke-Spiritednesse” that no longer exists, but in which we know Boyle used examples from the Bible and appeals to morality to support his argument.15 This altruistic piece promoted a core value that was essential to the success of the Hartlib circle’s natural philosophical projects.16 Boyle’s reference to it here as a “promised Discourse” suggests Ranelagh was one source promoting its composition, just as she herself was growing interested in how chemistry and medicine fit into larger plans for educational and social reform. At a time when the Hartlib circle was concerned with the Office of Address and when Lady

64

•

Chapter Three

Ranelagh was actively working to procure recipes for the benefit of the wider circle, she may have encouraged her brother to write a discourse on a subject that extended slightly beyond his current work on the other moral treatises. While “Invitation” advocated for openly communicating natural philosophy, its preachy moral overtone still places it firmly alongside Boyle’s other early ethical writings from the late 1640s that Ranelagh had been busy promoting. Ranelagh’s influence is most apparent in this tract’s emphasis on the philosopher’s obligation to advance the public good, balancing natural philosophy with ethical responsibility. At the same time, Boyle elicited his sister’s help with another transitional text that sat at the cross section of his early interests in morality and his burgeoning interests in experimentation. Excerpts from his treatise “Of the Study of the Book of Nature” would be printed in the first part of Usefulness of Natural Philosophy more than a decade later (1663), but Boyle had intended to “entertain” his sister “with those Morall speculations, with which my Chemicall Practises have entertained mee” in that August of 1649 had he not fallen ill. Boyle’s assumption that he and his sister would both be “entertain[ed]” by reflecting on how his new dabbling in experimental chemistry caused him to reflect on moral questions demonstrates their shared intellectual interests at this time. It also alludes to the probable role Ranelagh had in this composition. When Boyle explained his intention to present a draft to her, he expressed hope that it would not displease her. Since it wasn’t enclosed with his letter, he indicated that this “Discourse of the Theologicall Use of Naturall Filosophy” would ensure that contemplations of nature would contribute to a greater understanding of God’s design.17 While it was still weighed down by heavy moral judgments, “Of the Study of the Book of Nature” was nevertheless Boyle’s first consideration of how the natural world embodied the moral lessons he felt could benefit humankind. The work also professed an antiAristotelian sentiment, noting that the first two chapters of Genesis were a more reliable guide to the principles of natural philosophy than Aristotle and all his followers combined— a viewpoint that he would continue to develop in his later works on natural philosophy, once he had a chance to conduct more of his own experiments.18 The numerous entwined references to natural philosophy and religion

Formative Years in Natural Philosophy and Medicine

•

65

that the teenage Boyle made to his sister throughout his moralist period and at the beginning of his turning point reveal Ranelagh as a significant influence behind the intellectual shift. Throughout his early letters to her, Boyle’s tone is warm and enthusiastic, reflecting on the openness and closeness of the siblings’ relationship, but also deferential and sometimes even obsequious, confirming his desire to fulfill projects she initiated, shaped, or promoted. By way of comparison, his letters to Isaac Marcombes, the tutor who had accompanied him on his tour and who has been acknowledged as one of Boyle’s major influences during these years, refer more vaguely to his “studies” and “Divers little essays” in a manner that suggests Marcombes was not as heavily involved in encouraging their composition as was Ranelagh.19 Lawrence Principe has also observed that the literary tone in these early works was not theoretical or intellectual; instead, these compositions served as an attempt to shape the reader’s opinion and engender action as a result of reading them.20 Works such as “The Study of the Booke of Nature” were intended to heighten piety and virtue through contemplation of God and his creation, while “Invitation” and other drafts of similar contemporary works that would later be published in Usefulnesse of Experimental Philosophy urged the reader to do something useful and avoid idleness.21 The call to pious action and persuasive use of rhetoric was similar to the strategies employed in Ranelagh’s letters during the previous decade, and Boyle would acknowledge this influence in his later dedication to her when he offered his “present Trifles,” published as Occasional Reflections, “to one, that deserves the Noblest Productions of (what she is so great a Mistress of) Wit, and Eloquence. Upon whose Account she is wont to persuade Piety as Handsomly in her Discourses, as she expresses it Exemplarily in her Actions.”22 Given that Boyle’s first introduction to natural philosophy was at least partly influenced by the moralist agenda of his older sister (and she should be recognized as one of his earliest intellectual mentors), it is no surprise that his religious and ethical responsibility would accompany him on his initial foray into this new intellectual territory. It would take Boyle’s introduction to other mentors in the 1650s, such as Nathaniel Highmore and George Starkey, as well as his move to Oxford, to push him further toward the empiricism and observation for which he became known in his experimental trials in adulthood.23

66

•

Chapter Three

In addition to enabling us to see the profound influence Ranelagh had on her younger brother, these references to Ranelagh in Boyle’s early works and letters also allow us to extrapolate information about her own intellectual priorities in the late 1640s. The previous five years saw Lady Ranelagh escaping from the Irish Rebellion only to arrive in London during the outbreak of the English Civil Wars. Seeing her family, friends, and local communities torn apart by war sparked within her a need to promote peace and to advocate for moral and ethical lifestyles. At the close of the 1640s and across the 1650s, as the war drew to an end and the country began settling into its interregnum period, Ranelagh’s activities maintained a religious and political pulse but lacked the same level of urgency. Without an immediate need to fight for her life and the lives of those closest to her, Ranelagh had a bit more space to ponder the natural world and her place within it. This inquisitiveness, backed by religious conviction, manifested itself as a lifelong curiosity to better understand the world around her, and fueled a passion for improving it. Her vast knowledge, critical thinking, and close reading skills made her a reliable source for feedback on philosophical treatises and proposals that originated with both Robert Boyle and various members of the Hartlib circle. Around the same time that she was reading Boyle’s transitional works, Lady Ranelagh was also assisting with a revived Hartlibian proposal with respect to improved techniques of husbandry and fishing in England that had occupied the thoughts of many correspondents including John Dury, Samuel Hartlib, Benjamin Worsley, and Sir Cheney Culpeper.24 They were reviving the proposals of the Huguenot Peter Le Pruvost to negotiate sponsorship from Parliament from 1645 to 1646, but he left England without success in 1647.25 The Hartlib circle took up his proposals in 1649 to see how they might be integrated into some of their latest attempts to gain Parliamentary support, and drafts were circled among members for critique. Le Pruvost’s original design sought to bring Dutch technical advancements to England that could generate more revenue for the state and elevate England’s status as a leader in international Protestantism. Le Pruvost, to use Dury’s words, was “a truly Public spirit, zealous for the Protestant cause.”26 Some members of the circle— such as Worsley who was still busy drafting his own utopian agricultural proposals— considered whether they could

Formative Years in Natural Philosophy and Medicine

•

67

extend the program to place England in the center of a monopoly over foreign trade and allow the nation to use the profits both to its benefit and at the expense of Catholic nations such as Spain and Italy.27 When the circle reconsidered Le Pruvost’s drafts in 1649, Ranelagh was among those who cast a critical eye upon them and urged further discussion within the circle. Dury wrote to Culpeper about “the difficultie which my Lady Ranalaugh did propose unto me concerning Mounsieur Pruvosts ordinance.”28 He recommended that they remove the section she found troublesome prior to the ordinance going before the governing bodies responsible for allowing Le Pruvost to return to the country. While Ranelagh’s edited version of the document no longer exists, Dury’s letter suggests that she was concerned with how an international trading of staple commodities would affect the English market. Culpeper responded that Ranelagh’s comments led him to another question that he had already “made to my Lady,” one that concerned him about all of Le Pruvost’s proposals. He asked how the percentage of money that had been promised to the projector and the surplus of money intended for Parliament would actually be secured, especially in the early days of the project.29 Unfortunately, Ranelagh’s response is no longer extant, but she clearly prompted a sustained public conversation between key members of the Hartlib circle and made recommendations that shaped the final form their proposals would take. The query genre they used for this exchange was an early effort toward collective note-taking used between members of the Hartlib circle that would become more popular with the Royal Society.30 The Hartlib circle had known that Le Pruvost was suspicious of those “whose interest of Profit will carye them astraye from a public good,” but since the success of this utopian project depended on executable goals and monetary gain, they now turned to Sir Cheney and Lady Ranelagh, whose advanced reasoning skills made them obvious sources for advice.31 In addition to Ranelagh’s grasp on foreign trade and the national economy, we must also assume she was able to understand Le Pruvost’s innovations in husbandry and fishing in order to assess the practical applications and economic benefits— otherwise, her opinion would not have been sought after or respected by the circle. These concerns for the implications of international trade and related

68

•

Chapter Three

proposals that sought to make England more self-reliant only increased with the 1651 Navigation Acts, intended to build up the Commonwealth by prohibiting trade with the Dutch Republic, Spain, France, and their colonies.32 As such, Ranelagh joined other members of the circle by turning her attention to projects concerning agriculture and husbandry. Boyle also promised to relate to the circle “a strange experiment of Husbandry,” further confirming that the subject was not only a paid occupation but also a discipline that became increasingly attractive to scholars of natural philosophy.33 As with other branches of natural philosophy, the study of plants and their practical uses had not yet been divided into rigid subdisciplines by the 1650s, so studies of agriculture, husbandry, horticulture, and botany often overlapped.34 The Hartlib circle was active in all aspects of agricultural improvement throughout the interregnum, particularly as many English fields, villages, estates, and gardens had been damaged or destroyed by the civil wars.35 Hartlib’s Ephemerides are filled with agricultural notes, and he recorded in 1652 that “in the field Garden right over my Lady Ranalagh there is the Plant called Virginia-silke (Quaestio, an idem with silk-grasse) which yealds very good silke.”36 Hartlib would have become acquainted with this plant on his frequent visits to Lady Ranelagh’s home, and she may even have brought the specimen to his attention. As the quote demonstrates, Hartlib wondered if this Virginian silk plant was the same as silk-grass, and he mused on the possibility that a plantation of it could increase the production of silk. Shortly after this, Hartlib published The Reformed Virginian Silk-Worm, a tract advising the English on how to produce silk from worms feeding on mulberry tree leaves. It was a method that had been first seen in Virginia and had been “made full proof ” of by “a young Lady in England” that same year.37 Hartlib’s prefatory letter to the publication argued that England’s hope for self-reliance depended in part on advanced new husbandry methods such as this. Ranelagh may have been interested or involved in this publication, and when she returned to Ireland in the late 1650s, her own interests in husbandry and plantation would become even more manifest, as we shall see in the next chapter. Ranelagh’s emerging interests in natural philosophy, religion, and education made her an ideal contact for one young man from Germany who visited England in 1653. Best known for his later role as the first secretary

Formative Years in Natural Philosophy and Medicine

•

69

of the Royal Society, Henry Oldenburg began this early visit to England as a political mission with the intention of negotiation on behalf of his hometown, Bremen. John Milton probably introduced Oldenburg to Lady Ranelagh, which would be a key moment that significantly shaped his future career in England.38 In addition to introducing Oldenburg to many influential people in her learned circle, Lady Ranelagh appointed him as tutor to her son, Richard Jones, in 1656— the same year that Oldenburg appears to have become involved in the Hartlib circle. Oldenburg then began working with Jones in Oxford where Ranelagh must have introduced Oldenburg to her brother Robert Boyle. In May 1657, Oldenburg joined Jones on a three-year grand tour of the Continent.39 During these years abroad, Oldenburg accompanied Ranelagh’s son on visits to courts, universities, and libraries where they met distinguished intellectuals in various fields. It was during these three years that Oldenburg contributed the most to the Hartlib circle, primarily through exchanges with Hartlib, Boyle, and Lady Ranelagh.40 Ranelagh and Oldenburg corresponded with each other so frequently that in August 1659 he wrote to thank Ranelagh’s daughter Frances for her letter because her “Excellent mother” would rather trouble her daughter to write to him on her behalf than leave him “one week unsaluted.”41 In order to strengthen his new intellectual relationships in France, Oldenburg turned to Lady Ranelagh for assistance. As a token of his friendship and as a way of gaining intellectual credentials in a new scholarly circle, Oldenburg promised to share with them two books recently published in England: On the Immortality of the Soul by Henry More and A Treatise on Fermentation and Fevers by Thomas Willis.42 Though Oldenburg lamented to Hartlib that he hadn’t seen “the Gentleman, to whom MyL. Ran. gave those books for to bring them hither for us,” his trust in her to fulfill this task acknowledges the esteem in which he held her and may indicate that he assumed she was familiar with the texts.43 This lifelong friendship was solidified by their early collaboration in the Hartlib circle and shared interest in developing Ranelagh’s son. It would endure after the Restoration, even though Oldenburg’s priorities became consumed by his responsibilities as secretary of the Royal Society. By the mid-1650s, chemical medicine became more central to the Hartlib circle’s ambitions. Charitable schemes of distributing medicines

70

•

Chapter Three

produced through chemical procedures had become relatively common in early modern Europe, extending as far as sixteenth-century German princesses experimenting with chemistry and distributing their medicinal products at court.44 Several members of the Hartlib circle developed overlapping proposals related to chemical medicine, which the correspondents discussed in light of their aim to strengthen their movement through some form of centralization. One group— which possibly included Hartlib’s sonin-law Clodius, Sir Kenelm Digby, and George Starkey— met near Charing Cross in London and proposed to found “a general chemical council” to produce medicinal specifics. Hartlib reached out to gauge Boyle’s interest in joining or financing the venture.45 In addition to collaborating on this proposal, Sir Kenelm Digby had also agreed to help Hartlib and Clodius fund the creation of a “universal laboratory” dedicated to creating chemical medicines and experimenting with alchemy for the good of all humankind.46 Lady Ranelagh was closely associated with many of these men, and her possible involvement with the projects may be one reason why Hartlib wrote to young Boyle: he assumed that Boyle already knew about them through his sister. However, it was a proposal by William Rand that really piqued Ranelagh’s interest. Rand was an unlicensed medical practitioner with a foreign medical degree who was living in London, and he sought to establish a way in which all able physicians could practice without needing accreditation from the College of Physicians. The Commonwealth period was characterized by leniency in many regulations, and the College of Physicians perceived a rise in unlicensed medical practitioners and proposed more aggressive ways of combating their increasing strength. Rand, however, planned to counter the College of Physicians with a scheme to create an alternative college associated with the Chemical Council and College of Graduate Physicians. This chemical association was a kind of forerunner to the short-lived Society of Chemical Physicians founded after the Restoration, but the society would consist of a group that was more heterogeneous and less morally driven, seeking advancement through their Royalist connections to the restored court.47 However, Rand’s college was born out of an idealist concern for the needs of society and was proposed explicitly as a viable alternative to the Galenic-based and more conservative College of

Formative Years in Natural Philosophy and Medicine

•

71

Physicians. Rand and Hartlib met at Lady Ranelagh’s house in the summer of 1656 to discuss the new college, and Rand followed up by sending Hartlib a copy of the “proposition” that they had discussed there. Rand asked Hartlib to “be pleased to comunicate them only to such as yow know are averse to the Colledge.”48 By establishing two colleges, Rand suggested that “the more ambitious, covetous, domineering, & selfish sort of Physitians will evermore joine to the old Colledge. But the more studious, modest, retired, publick & humble spirited will joine to this new societie.”49 While the extent of Ranelagh’s involvement in this proposal is unclear, we know that they met at her house to discuss it before Rand sent it to Hartlib, and that his critique of selfish physicians would match her own medical ethics. Ranelagh’s involvement with Rand and his proposal is one of the earliest references to her thinking about and supporting centralized chemical initiatives for the benefit of society at large, similar to her support for the Office of Address. While most early modern gentlewomen who discussed chemistry did so in the context of its suitability for domestic experiment and local charitable medical distribution, Ranelagh engaged with the subject in a manner more typically exhibited by her male contemporaries, advocating for it in an explicitly public and state-funded manner. Interestingly, it is formal institutions such as the College of Physicians and the Society of Chemical Physicians that many historians critique as the primary source of exclusion for early modern women. However, Ranelagh does not appear to have taken personal issue with such organizations if the greater results would enhance their shared cause and benefit the public. While Ranelagh’s ability to shape intellectual discourse across the Hartlib circle appears to have stemmed primarily from its loose self-organization as a correspondence network, she still backed the circle’s numerous proposals for formalization and centralization, seeing the benefit of state funding and elevated social prestige. Today we may look back and see this as exclusion, but Ranelagh herself seems to have known that she could continue to influence these men through letter writing, conversation, and hosting informal gatherings, even if these men created a more formalized structure. Indeed, she could still wield influence in the same manner as she had for decades, but formalization could provide greater reach for some of her ideas. It can be difficult not to retrospectively apply a modern argument for

72

•

Chapter Three

female exclusion onto this transition, but Ranelagh appears to have found some level of continuity and even improvement when considering institutionalization. Historians have hitherto not considered the irony that a woman could have been involved in the creation of a more exclusive organization for new knowledge, but through Ranelagh we can see that shaping the structure of and continuing to influence national decisions through persuasive conversations and letters could be seen as both empowering and powerful. Ranelagh’s interest in Rand’s proposal extended from her wider passion for medicine, which would continue throughout her life. Her knowledge of the subject developed over the course of the 1650s, fostered by the Hartlib circle, her family, and her broad social network. Indeed, providing medical care for her family was an important part of an early modern gentlewoman’s domestic duties.50 Promoting his own book on the topic, the author Gervase Markham went as far as to say that healthcare was “one of the most principal virtues which doth belong to our English Housewife.”51 Healthcare began in the home. It naturally fell to women because of its associations with charity and caretaking, but also because cookery and medicinal recipes often shared the same ingredients and sometimes were prepared in the same space. The latter fact led to the contemporary term kitchen physick.52 Seventeenth-century English homes had noisy kitchens and dirty backyards— lively spaces where women of different socioeconomic statuses labored on the wide variety of tasks required for the household, ranging from churning butter to scouring pots and pans, from distilling medicines to brewing beer.53 Women were responsible not only for making and administering their own medicines, performing minor surgical operations, and assisting with childbirth, but also for preventing disease through a healthy home, constituted by good hygiene and moral balance, among other factors. Boundaries between mental, physical, and spiritual health were entwined in both Galenic medicine and iatrochemistry, so the proposed causes of and treatments for bodily illness often included some gesture toward a healthy lifestyle that should begin in the domestic context.54 For Ranelagh, her responsibilities for her family’s health and well-being did not end with those family members who physically resided with her. Instead they extended to her siblings dispersed across England and Ireland.

Formative Years in Natural Philosophy and Medicine

•

73

As busy as she was with her variety of Hartlibian projects dedicated to religion, natural philosophy, medicine, and education, Ranelagh continued to maintain this important part of her maternal role. The juggling act was not always an easy one. In one letter to Boyle she commented that her brother-in-law Charles Rich had called her to Leez Priory in Essex to care for her sister Mary at a time that “was very Inconvenient to me,” but she did so partly out of “Conscience in Serviceableness towards her in a time of Such distress.”55 When Boyle was sick with “Visits of a Quotidian Ague” (daily recurring fever) in 1649, he had to insist that Ranelagh not waste her time by visiting him, as she was ready to make the journey from London to Stalbridge.56 Then, in 1652 their sister Mary Rich fell “strangly & extreamely Ill”; when Ranelagh arrived at Leez Priory, she found her listless sister, describing her as “the Carcass of a friend.”57 Mary’s doctors were unsure of the cause of the illness, so Ranelagh resigned herself to the fact that she “must goe blindfolld towards her cure.”58 She stayed with her sister several days, until “by the Drs & al Consents brought her away with me.”59 Clearly everyone had agreed that Ranelagh would be a good source of medical help and spiritual comfort, and she herself noted that at a time of distress, “the company of a poore puretane or Sectary is more acceptable, Then that of the most pleasant & quick Droles in the world”— conflating her religious comfort with her medical assistance in a manner typical of nonconformist and Puritan women.60 After caring for her sister, Ranelagh returned home to London to find “my poore Franke fallen very Ill.”61 An old woman had previously tended to her daughter Frances and led Ranelagh to believe it was the plague, but Ranelagh reported to Boyle on her divine guidance: “God was pleased to give me soe much Courage upon that information, as to resolve not to trust the old womans fumbleing feeling.”62 Upon her own examination, Ranelagh found that Frances had smallpox, and she thanked God for preserving her from her own fear of the illness enough to allow her to stay with her daughter. Her emerging medical expertise and responsibility to her disparate family’s physical and moral well-being first surfaced when she was in her mid-thirties, and her reflections on this responsibility were consistently entwined with her acknowledgement that God enabled her success. Such time-consuming responsibilities also serve to partly reveal why few early modern women were able to pursue ambitious intellec-

74

•

Chapter Three

tual pursuits, and why many of those we know of today were unmarried or childless.63 Yet for women like Lady Ranelagh who struggled with but succeeded in maintaining both a family and diverse ambitions, these domestic contexts and personal responsibilities could be seen as motivating forces that made the success of these projects appear all the more important.64 Much of Ranelagh’s medical knowledge and practice would have been recorded and exchanged in the form of medical recipes, and her shrewd understanding of how to test and leverage the information within them and the networks surrounding them added to her esteemed medical reputation. Collecting and experimenting with recipes was a popular pastime, enjoyed equally by early modern men and women at most levels of the social spectrum. Again, recipes and recipe books are often associated with the household because it was in houses where practitioners could test them for themselves and add their own local adaptations; however, these “domestic papers” had a very real public presence.65 Recipes were written on scraps, added to compilations, traded, gifted, bought, and sold. The plethora of competing medical systems and professional trades also meant that early modern patients intermingled the help of accredited physicians, surgeons, and apothecaries with unlicensed lay practitioners of both genders. In London in particular, the medical marketplace was vibrant and diverse, and Ranelagh’s social status and geographic location allowed her easy access to this world.66 Ranelagh’s knowledge of medicine and experience with recipe trials made her an asset to the Hartlib circle. She joined fellow members of the circle in collecting diverse recipes and “secrets”— an overlapping genre that emerged from the book of secrets tradition that captured technical and craft knowledge.67 Recipes could be collected for multiple reasons, including for practical application, of course, but also out of curiosity and wonder or for the intellectual capital associated with them.68 Not all extant seventeenth-century recipes were necessarily tried by their original authors, but those that were used would continue to evolve in a constant state of flux engendered through that practice, resulting in variations to quantities and ingredients even among recipes sharing the same name.69 Hartlib began collecting chemical recipes in his Ephemerides as early as 1635, but by the 1650s his excitement for recipe collecting grew. He began

Formative Years in Natural Philosophy and Medicine

•

75

conversations with correspondents Theodore Haak and Johann Moriaen about possibly compiling a “Booke of Medicinal Cookery.”70 Hartlib also recognized the need to balance his desire to collect information that could otherwise be lost with his need to manage that information in a manner that would later allow him to find and collate it. In addition to fully formulated recipes and secrets, Hartlib also collected half-formed notes about possible facts or observations from trials being conducted by others in the circle. The initial goal was to capture potentially valuable information in his Ephemerides, but he intended to continue to work toward refining the details of that information for wider distribution.71 Such a systematic way of organizing, testing, and understanding new knowledge was important to defining reliable experiments— a process that would continue later in the Royal Society.72 As such, Hartlib engaged his diverse network of trustworthy correspondents to deliver recipes and observations to him that could be used to advance knowledge and enhance the public good. Lady Ranelagh was among his most trusted contributors. Hartlib’s Ephemerides included several notes on trials, often before he collected the actual recipe, suggesting he showed some concern about minimizing the collection of unproven remedies. Recipe books often included numerous treatments for the same disease, with “Another for the same” being a common title in a list of recipes organized around a particular ailment. Compilers then used a variety of methods for endorsing some of these recipes and recording their practice, ranging from ticks or crosses in the margin to short sentences and names appended to the end.73 Hartlib’s Ephemerides is not a recipe book, but it is in these workdiaries that he amassed helpful information on diverse subjects, including trials for medical remedies. His process for documenting the effectiveness of medicines may be seen in the example of his 1650 quest to learn more about the “Maid’s Physick.”74 Hartlib initially heard about this recipe from John Dury, and the title suggests that it may have originated with a chambermaid or other female household servant. Alternatively, it could mean that it was a medicine intended for a “maid,” or a young woman. Though Hartlib thought it was probably little more than “some specific herb drunk in white wine,” he noted that Dury intended to give the recipe to John Sadler to “make trial of it.”75 Not stopping there, he added, “Also my Lady Ranalagh and

76

•

Chapter Three

Mris Dury are doing the like.”76 It is unclear whether Hartlib meant that Lady Ranelagh and Dorothy Moore were conducting their trials of the “Maid’s Physick” together or each individually, but it shows how multiple members of the circle would test a remedy and report back to Hartlib on their results so he could include the information in his notebooks. Hartlib collected technical information on everything from perfumes to foodstuffs (both necessary for healthy living), but Lady Ranelagh primarily provided him with information on medical cures, much of it stemming from herbal knowledge, household simples, and even folk traditions. She testified that laudanum (opium) could serve as a “miraculous cure” for children who were close to death and that she knew of a German man who had instantly cured a woman of consumption using a purely herbal remedy.77 Hartlib noted that walnut honey was “a most excellent and soveraigne Remedy against a sore throat” and that Lady Ranelagh kept it in bulk, a common practice since many recipes required seasonal ingredients.78 She also relayed to Hartlib that collecting “Star-fal” (“a kind of dew which is gathered in March and April”) could be used to cure worms, and that she had tried “starshot gathered by herbe or snake women in February” to reduce swelling, especially in the throat.79 She even attested to having seen a woman who was suffering from hemorrhoids in pregnancy cured instantly when she sat on a roasted onion.80 Ranelagh’s open-minded approach to medicine was informed by her belief that God had hidden many secrets in nature, which meant that a simple herb could be more effective than the latest complicated chemical procedure. In a letter she wrote to Samuel Hartlib in 1658, after telling him of the benefits of a “distilled water of Arsmart or Lake-Weed” (both common names for the plant waterpepper, i.e., Polygonum hydropiper), which was recommended in many contemporary herbals, she explained, “Who know’s but God may have chosen some such base thing to doe that which all your great præscriptions have not beene able to effect.”81 Her openness to household simples and “specifics”— medicines composed of only a single or a few ingredients used to treat a discrete ailment— may have served as one of Boyle’s first introductions to this branch of medicine, and one that he would begin to endorse over the following decades, as we will see.82 Hartlib also counted on Ranelagh to validate medical recipes because

Formative Years in Natural Philosophy and Medicine

•

77

she maintained personal relations with the leading authorities of their day. For instance, Sir Kenelm Digby was a respected chemical practitioner who was also exchanging recipes with Robert Boyle in the mid to late 1650s, and on at least one occasion his enclosed “secret” included chemical terminology such as “sublimate” (the residue produced by the chemical process of sublimation) and chemical ingredients such as “aqua Calcis” (also known as limewater, or calcium hydroxide).83 When Digby offered Ranelagh a recipe “with most Extraordinary Commendation from his owne experience against festers & inflammation,” she shared it with Hartlib so it could be filed alongside other relevant useful knowledge.84 Ranelagh’s exclusive personal network was particularly helpful when the circle was trying to gather as much veritable information as possible concerning popular recipes that were in wide circulation. Many of these were cure-alls comprising an expensive and ever-changing list of ingredients, and were branded with a distinctive title that sometimes included the name of an authority figure from whom the remedy reputedly derived, such as the “Queen of Hungary’s water.”85 Hartlib sought to collect these recipes as well, but with so many versions in circulation it was important for him to verify their trustworthiness and retrieve what he deemed to be the authoritative version. The “Countess of Kent’s Powder” and “Lucatella’s Balsam” were two such popular recipes that circulated widely and diversely in print and manuscript. Luckily for Hartlib, he could identify and obtain “the right Receipt” for both thanks the Lady Ranelagh’s personal relationship with Elizabeth Grey, Countess of Kent. Like Lady Ranelagh, the Countess of Kent was a well-educated and esteemed authority on medical recipes. She was more than thirty years older than Ranelagh, and the two probably met in the late 1640s when they both lived in London. After Kent died in 1651, William Jarvis compiled and posthumously printed in 1653 A Choice Manual, or Rare Secrets in Physick and Chirurgery Collected and Practised by the Right Honourable the Countess of Kent, Late Deceased, which would remain in print for more than seventy years.86 But during 1649 and 1650, a few years before this popular posthumous work would go to print, the Countess of Kent shared her recipes with Lady Ranelagh, who in turn shared them with Hartlib. When Kent told Ranelagh about “an excellent and never failing Powder for curing the

78

•

Chapter Three

Gout” that she had tried on herself with success, Ranelagh reported it to Hartlib.87 Later, after collecting the Countess of Kent’s own eponymous recipe, Hartlib noted that Kent also promised to give Ranelagh “the right Receipt” for “Lucatella’s Balsam.”88 We might assume there would be no single “right” version of any recipe that circulated so widely, but Hartlib and Ranelagh trusted Kent’s ability to discern the real recipe from those that had been corrupted.89 Then, later that year, Hartlib recorded an observation about the balsam that acknowledged Lady Ranelagh as the source: “inwardly taken or back anointed . . . the urine will smel of it, which shew’s it’s penetrating vertue and therfore good for any aches in the back and against Gravel of the stone.”90 The recipe itself is not recorded here, and the Countess of Kent is not acknowledged. Instead, it appears that Lady Ranelagh was either conducting her own trials or eliciting information from others who were testing the drug. This note on the smell of the urine provided Hartlib with an additional indicator of reliability that could be used to test recipes for Lucatella’s Balsam that were in circulation. Furthermore, the testing and the exchanging of practical knowledge, as seen here between Ranelagh and Kent, demonstrate how effective recipe trials often relied on a network of female experts. The judgment and domain expertise employed by these women helped create systematic and reproducible knowledge in the Hartlib circle that would later be used to lay the foundations for new methods of experimentation. Hartlib and his circle depended on practitioners openly communicating their medical recipes and secrets in order to accelerate the process of establishing efficacy, so Ranelagh helped procure such secrets with the greater goal of openness. She disparaged those whom she said were “of the common opinion of loving more to keepe a Secret, then to doe good by publishing it.”91 Indeed, she sought to change this popular opinion and did so in part by encouraging Robert Boyle to write a discourse concerning practitioners’ moral obligation to share beneficial medical knowledge, as we saw earlier in this chapter. At the same time, she did all she could to extract medical secrets from others, including retrieving one from a surgeon who was able to break kidney stones without fail. While this surgeon would not part with the remedy, he promised to prepare some of the medicine and teach the use of it, which Ranelagh endeavored to learn.92 Her pri-

Formative Years in Natural Philosophy and Medicine

•

79

oritization of the public good over private gain is also seen in the example of her seeking to learn how a woman who was “monstrously swollen by the dropsy” was cured through use of a lady’s water.93 Dr. Theodore Turquet de Mayerne, Europe’s premier physician who held a succession of royal appointments, had previously recommended a procedure for the patient, but the recipe Ranelagh was invested in provided “a far easier way.”94 The woman now had the recipe for the water, but instead of sharing it she was making the water and selling it for three shillings per quart. Ranelagh assured Hartlib that she would “enquire further of her,” but this attempt may not have ended with success.95 Parallel to her work with the Hartlib circle, Ranelagh also maintained at least one of her own recipe books and contributed to recipe collections compiled by other members of the Boyle family. The British Library holds a tall, skinny octavo, probably compiled in the mid-1650s, which bears the phrase “My Lady Rennelagh’s Choice Receipts as also some of Captain Willis who valued them above gold” on the title page.96 “Captain Willis” was in fact the physician Dr. Thomas Willis who had served in the King’s Army from 1644 to 1646. At a later point in the manuscript, the compiler changed “Captain” to “Doctor” to further clarify this attribution.97 The manuscript is written entirely in a man’s hand, the style of which exhibits traces of the secretary hand. He clearly distinguishes between Dr. Willis’s recipes and those of “My Lady.”98 The anonymous compiler was probably more closely associated with Lady Ranelagh than Dr. Willis, as suggested by the intimate use of “My Lady” on the title page and within the book. Because the British Library manuscript is a copy and the original no longer exists, we cannot be certain how faithfully the compiler transcribed Lady Ranelagh’s original recipe book, and therefore we must exercise some caution before we use it to make assumptions about Ranelagh’s collecting interests, network, or experimental practice. However, as seen in figure 4, the compiler did note “thus Captain Willis” and drew a concluding line to mark the place where Dr. Willis’s recipes stopped, indicating at recipe number 166 that he was returning to those of “My Lady,” so we may proceed here with some caution.99 The recipes within this book include more complicated chemical procedures than those Ranelagh offered to Hartlib for inclusion in his Ephemerides.100 Through the use of frequent

Figure 4 Copy of a medical recipe book compiled by Lady Ranelagh, “My Lady Rennelagh’s Choice Receipts,” not in her hand. The copyist notes “My Lady” where he ends copying from Thomas Willis’s recipes and returns to those of Lady Ranelagh (left column, recipe 166). (© The British Library Board. Sloane MS 1367.)

Formative Years in Natural Philosophy and Medicine

•

81

references to the processes of distillation and calcination, to equipment such as limbecks and stills, and to ingredients comprising metals, chemical compounds, and minerals such as white copper, flowers of brimstone, and oil of lapis calaminaris, Ranelagh’s medical collection has a greater number of chemical recipes and makes use of more sophisticated procedures than most early modern household compilations.101 The book concludes with a list of “Our Abbreviations” filled with three pages of symbols, Latin titles, and shorthand, including a key to standard alchemical cipher. Some of these abbreviations do feature in the manuscript, such as a triangle for fire and an upside-down triangle for water, but the list is comprehensive enough to also include the planetary symbols associated with many metals not used in these recipes, such as a drawing of the sun to represent gold. The alchemical abbreviations are typical of other contemporary manuscripts and printed books, such as Sir Kenelm Digby’s A Choice Collection of Rare Secrets and Experiments in Philosophy; but such cipher is rare in a woman’s recipe book. The identification of “our” in “Our abbreviations” is unclear, and it could suggest the anonymous compiler worked with Lady Ranelagh or that he copied Ranelagh’s use of the term “our” to represent her joint practice with another person or circle. The use of “our” also suggests some form of collaborative experimentation. The book contains almost no herbal simples, but there are animal-based recipes, including one detailing the medicinal parts of a wolf ’s body, and a few purges and vomits that draw from conventional Galenic practice.102 The diversity of recipes collected suggest that Ranelagh’s personal interests— and possibly also her actual experimentation— reached more broadly and ambitiously than the practical recipes she offered to Hartlib for the benefit of the greater public good.103 Robert Boyle would later exercise similar editorial decision-making when debating what he should keep in his private recipe collection and what should be made public for the greater good, with much of his hesitation stemming from his fear that complicated procedures could be misunderstood, or that unproven remedies could cause more harm than good.104 It seems likely that Ranelagh exhibited similar discretion here, as most of the recipes which name Ranelagh as an author or source that appear in the letters, recipe books, and diaries of contemporaries are much less complicated than those in this recipe book.

82

•

Chapter Three

Two letter exchanges with Hartlib and Oldenburg a few years later confirm her wider interest in alchemy at this time and demonstrate that she knew when to keep a secret and when to divulge her knowledge to trusted individuals.105 Lady Ranelagh also gave her recipes to her brothers and sisters— especially Robert, Mary, Richard, and Roger— and some of her medical recipes were copied into their own or their family’s recipe compilations. The Wellcome Library in London holds a compilation associated with the Boyle family that is partly written in the hand of her sister-in-law Margaret, Countess of Orrery.106 While scholars had previously surmised that this was Lady Ranelagh’s “Book of Kitchen Physick” based on a tentative suggestion by a library cataloger, a closer comparison of the hands in which it was written, the correspondence copied into the book, and familial attributions attached to the recipes all confirm that it was originally written by sister-inlaw Margaret, and that later generations of the family continued to add to it after her death.107 So while the recipe “Spirit of Roses My Brother Robert Boyle’s Way” cannot be used to support a theory that Boyle and Lady Ranelagh were collaborating with each other (as this was simply a recipe from Boyle that his sister-in-law copied into her recipe book), four of Lady Ranelagh’s recipes are included in this manuscript, and they indicate that she specialized in medical recipes. These relied primarily on plant-based items, most of which could be easily found or grown in a garden (such as agrimony and sage), but that also required some spices or exotic plants, which would have to have been imported or purchased from an apothecary.108 Although Ranelagh certainly shared recipes with Robert Boyle throughout his life, as indicated above, many of his recipe manuscripts are no longer extant, and the printed versions of his recipe books would later erase the names of the original recipe authors.109 Ranelagh’s name also appears next to recipes in manuscripts compiled by others; but what remains today certainly isn’t exhaustive, and locating these attributions can still be difficult. One example is a manuscript held at the Wellcome written in several hands and attributed to a Lady Catherine Fitzgerald (who is probably Ranelagh’s niece and daughter of her sister Joan Fitzgerald, Countess of Kildare). It contains recipes “to pickle pidgeons,” “to make cowslip wine,” and “to pickell mushrooms Lady Ranalaughs way.”110 The compiler does

Formative Years in Natural Philosophy and Medicine

•

83

not use “my” before Lady Ranelagh’s name as she does with some other authors in the book, possibly suggesting she was not intimate with her. The extant recipe books and recipes associated with Lady Ranelagh must represent only a small portion of the full collection she once had. Historians have looked for and suggested connections between Lady Ranelagh and other extant recipe books, but the ties are tenuous. For example, the British Library holds a recipe book with a section entitled “Severall Receipts Copied Out of the Booke of Mad. Jones, 1681,” but by this time she was known exclusively as Lady or Viscountess Ranelagh and not Jones, which in any case was a relatively common surname.111 Among Robert Boyle’s manuscripts at the Royal Society Library is a ninety-six-page “medical commonplace book” written in at least ten different hands and including recipes from a diverse circle dating from 1658 to 1681. One of the hands was previously thought to have been Lady Ranelagh’s, but a closer comparison of significant letters formed in this hand— including the miniscule p, e, and s along with the majuscule B, R, and T— with over fifty of Lady Ranelagh’s own letters shows that these are not the same hands. The original ownership and use of this manuscript is not clear, but some of the notes are written in the hands of Boyle’s amanuenses, and some of the authors cited include people in both Boyle and Ranelagh’s network, such as Dr. Cox. It is possible that she knew of this book and may have helped Boyle collect the information contained within it; there is just no direct evidence of their collaboration in the manuscript itself, since it is not written in her hand and her name is not attached to any of the recipes.112 In addition to collecting recipes and conducting medical trials, Ranelagh also continued to work with the Hartlib circle on matters of religion and education. Around 1650, Dorothy Moore wrote the treatise “Of the Education of Girles,” which, though addressed only to a “Madam,” scholars agree must have been written to Lady Ranelagh, as she shared Moore’s strong religious sentiment and commitment to girls’ access to education.113 In this treatise, Moore argued against the “practise common in schooles to teach them dressing, curling, and such like,” which she disapproved of “namely, because it brings no good to the soule or body of mankind: neither from Religion or Reason hath it a ground.”114 We do not know if Lady Ranelagh ever replied, but she would have agreed with Moore’s

84

•

Chapter Three

emphasis on “Religion or Reason” as the fundamental principles of education. Dorothy Moore and Lady Ranelagh continued to discuss matters related to religion and education throughout their lives, and Ranelagh would assist Moore even after the Restoration, when Moore was trying to reclaim her family lands in Ireland. Moore honored their intimate friendship and intellectual collaboration by naming her newborn daughter DoroKatherina in May of 1654, a combination of their first names Dorothy and Katherine.115 At fourteen years old, this daughter would become the second wife of Henry Oldenburg.116 Lady Ranelagh began learning Hebrew to gain a better understanding of the scriptures, but she also engaged in this training because influential reformers revered the language as the holy tongue in which God first spoke to the world.117 She was not the only learned woman who took an interest in Hebrew in the mid-seventeenth century. Queen Christina of Sweden counted the language among the many she knew, reading Hebrew texts during intense religious and philosophical study.118 Lady Anne Conway’s Hebrew literacy allowed her to explore the Jewish kabbalah in discussions with Henry More and Francis Mercury van Helmont.119 Ranelagh’s own curiosity probably stemmed from an increased interest in Judaism due to the predicted forthcoming millennium, as Hartlib, Dury, Johann Moriaen, and other millenarian members of the circle took on similar ambitions around this time.120 Her success with Hebrew led to her teacher, William Robertson, dedicating to her his first printed guide to understanding the language: A Gate or Door to the Holy Tongue, Opened in English (1653). In his dedicatory epistle to “The Right Honorable The Lady Vice-Countesse Ranalaugh,” Robertson recounted his rewarding experience of having taught Hebrew to her, marveling how she had she gained “proficiency in so short a time.”121 The experience showed him that “the Female sexe is, fully, capable enough of this kinde of learning” and that knowing Latin was not a prerequisite to mastering Hebrew.122 In printing this book and dedicating it to Lady Ranelagh, Robertson hoped that it might serve as “encouragement of other Women of Spirit, and Ladies of honour . . . to make some improvement of their own abilities.”123 His pedagogical goal aimed at improving women’s access to education was clearly aligned with

Formative Years in Natural Philosophy and Medicine

•

85

Ranelagh’s other project with Dorothy Moore, whose own recent success in learning Hebrew also may have inspired Ranelagh.124 In 1655 Robertson printed a sequel to this work, entitled The Second Gate, or the Inner Door to the Holy Tongue. In it, he included a new dedication to Lady Ranelagh that followed one to another member of the Hartlib circle and fellow millenarian, the Cambridge Platonist John Sadler. Robertson explained that Ranelagh was “amongst the greatest . . . encouragement” for him to publish a Hebrew-to-English dictionary to complement his previous grammar of the Hebrew language.125 The feedback she had provided to him was based on her use of Robertson’s first book, and he noted that her progress had been hampered “because of the want of a dictionary, in our own Vulgar Language.”126 Born and educated in Scotland before moving to London in 1651, Robertson held a religious outlook shaped largely by Scottish Presbyterian divines who believed that knowledge of the Hebrew bible was a prerequisite to entering the ministry. He found many powerful patrons among the Puritans of the interregnum and printed six studies of the Hebrew language between 1653 and 1656, at least two of which were endorsed by Ranelagh.127 Lady Ranelagh’s understanding of Hebrew allowed her to contribute to the millenarian projects being initiated by the Hartlib circle at this time, which required a deeper understanding of the Hebrew bible that served as a basis for scriptural prophecies about the Second Coming.128 There are no extant Hebrew manuscripts written in Ranelagh’s hand, but she probably learned the language to facilitate reading. Relying on interpretations of the books of Daniel and Revelation, religious radicals thought that the Second Coming of Christ was eminent and would usher in a new millennium. While providential thought had been a recurring theme throughout Ranelagh’s letters and can be traced to the influence of her father, she first articulated her own belief that God had chosen to spare only a few in millenarian sentiments expressed in letters to her brother Robert Boyle and to Henry Oldenburg in the 1650s. As she explained to Boyle in 1652, “Its a brave thing to be one of those, that shall lift up their heads with joy in Expectation of a present redemption, when all these ruins and Confusions shall be upon the earth.”129 Boyle himself appears to have harbored

86

•

Chapter Three

millenarian rationale at this time as well, with Ranelagh mentioning to him that “your Expectation of seven yeers wil be aboundantly answered & Exceeded” when the “old frame of heven & earth” will be replaced with new ones.130 The number seven held mystical connotations among millenarians, and Boyle’s own letters around this time carry apocalyptic undertones. Their support for schemes to readmit Jews into England suggests an early sibling collaboration on millenarian projects, with Boyle himself commenting that his experimental philosophy might be more productive in the near future because of these projects.131 One of the perceived prerequisites for the Second Coming of Christ was the conversion of all Jews to Christianity. However, a problem presented itself in that Jews were still not allowed in England at the time. With predictions that the new millennium would take place in 1655 or 1656, it became even more urgent to permit them entry into England in order to work toward their conversion.132 Such reasoning led members of the Hartlib circle to collaborate with the learned and influential Menasseh ben Israel, rabbi of the Sephardic congregation of Amsterdam, who was also working to lift the ban on Jews in England. Ben Israel was highly educated and respected across much of Western Europe, with a prolific career in printing books. Oliver Cromwell first invited him to London to discuss reentry of the Jews in 1651, though his admission was not officially granted until 1655 due to delays from the Anglo– Dutch War of 1652– 54.133 Ben Israel’s promotion of Jewish messianism shared some common ground with Christian millenarianism, and he sought reentry of the Jews in England because the prophecies said the messiah would not return until Jews were in all four corners of the world. As such, proponents of millenarian and messianic prophecies worked together to advocate reentry of the Jews to England, but for opposite purposes.134 John Dury and Joannes Moriaen, who were either based in or connected with Amsterdam at this time, helped ben Israel get an audience in England. John Milton’s friend, the millenarian and tolerationist Moses Wall, translated into English ben Israel’s Hebrew text The Hope of Israel (1652) and attached an essay specifically addressing the conversion of the Jews.135 The correspondents of the Hartlib circle helped orchestrate Menasseh ben Israel’s visit to London, and he arrived in the fall of 1655. Cromwell

Formative Years in Natural Philosophy and Medicine

•

87

organized the Whitehall Conference that was held in December 1655 to debate reentry of the Jews. Ben Israel had worked closely with John Dury to draft his Humble Addresses for the lord protector, which circulated prior to the Whitehall Conference. While the members of this conference did not reach a conclusive decision, ben Israel continued to advocate for reentry afterward by building his network of some of the most distinguished religious and political authorities in England, such as the Cambridge professor of Hebrew Dr. Ralph Cudworth.136 Though Dury was still in the Netherlands, ben Israel met with many other members of the Hartlib circle while in London. Significantly, Lady Ranelagh was among this distinguished circle, and he dined at her house at least once, if not more. Henry Oldenburg joined them at Ranelagh’s, but there may have been others from the Hartlib circle also present. Ranelagh may have arranged for his visit in part because of her recent interest in the Hebrew language, but she was probably also involved with the outer circle of Hartlib’s correspondents who were trying to encourage Cromwell’s acceptance of Jews. Ben Israel, on the other hand, would have learned of Lady Ranelagh through their shared network and through Robertson’s dedications. Similar to Ranelagh’s involvement as a witness to Sarah Wight in the previous decade, her visit with Menasseh ben Israel is indicative of the authoritative religious reputation she held both within the Hartlib circle and across the city of London. Her amicable meeting with ben Israel and support for Jewish emigration confirm her sympathy for the Jewish people.137 While Menasseh ben Israel’s London trip and the Hartlib circle’s interest in the readmittance of Jews to England could be seen as driven entirely by millenarian and messianic fervor, it is important to acknowledge that there were also significant political and economic stakes. Cromwell and ben Israel themselves both had political motives behind their prophetic ambitions: ben Israel sought imperial expansion and trade benefits for London “marrano” and Amsterdam Sephardic merchants, while Cromwell recognized the power of the Sephardic Jewish community in helping to establish the Dutch Republic as a commercial power. In his Humble Address, ben Israel repeated his messianic prophecies, but much of his emphasis was on how readmitting Jews to England and its colonies would be profitable to Cromwell’s growing empire. It is no surprise that London’s Embassy of the

88

•

Chapter Three

Dutch Republic opposed this project, as did the London merchants who saw Jews as commercial competition.138 The story serves as a reminder of how religious knowledge and authority often serve as a road to establishing political clout, for both men and women. Ranelagh’s connection with ben Israel also makes her one step removed from fellow chemist and philosopher Queen Christina of Sweden, whose knowledge of Hebrew also had attracted Menasseh ben Israel to her earlier in the 1650s: he suggested he could serve as her adviser on the purchase of Hebrew books and wrote a sonnet in Hebrew in her honor.139 These overlapping political and religious networks were advantageous for intellectuals of the seventeenth century, and Lady Ranelagh’s involvement in these projects positioned her within some of the most influential circles of the Commonwealth period. By the mid-1650s, we see that Ranelagh was already an established public figure in interregnum London, and her brother Robert Boyle was just finally feeling ready to leave his isolated estate at Stalbridge. John Wilkins invited Boyle to join his group of like-minded intellectuals who were meeting in the Warden’s Lodgings at Wadham College, Oxford. The university had undergone a series of changes after the civil wars, and several new appointments led to a growing community of men dedicated to the new philosophy and chemical experimentation.140 When Boyle began discussing with Ranelagh the possibility of his move, she continued her role as surrogate mother and went to Oxford to lodge with the apothecary John Crosse; part of the reason for this stay was to determine which of the two optional rooms would best suit her younger brother. In October 1655, she wrote to Boyle from Crosse’s house because she wanted to “be able to give you from experience an accoumpt which is the warmest rome.”141 Unfortunately, she wasn’t satisfied with either of them because the proximity of the doors to the chimneys would result in draftiness when he put on the fire. While this may seem like an overprotective maternal concern to some, her attention to architectural layout, temperature, and the draftiness of air was rooted in contemporary belief systems promoting health and well-being.142 Concerned for Boyle’s mental health as well, Ranelagh encouraged the move so Boyle could access the resources necessary for his intellectual development. Thus she concluded, “You are here much desired & I wish you here as soone as you Can. For I think you would have

Formative Years in Natural Philosophy and Medicine

•

89

both more liberty & more Conversation than where you are, & both those wilbe necessary both your health & your usefulness.”143 It is unknown which men met with Lady Ranelagh to express their wish for Boyle to join them there, but Dr. Thomas Willis, John Locke, Christopher Wren, and Robert Hooke had already joined Wilkins in Oxford by the time of her visit.144 Ranelagh’s assistance eased Boyle’s transition to Oxford. He moved into Crosse’s house on the High Street a few months later and enjoyed the use of his chemical laboratory there.145 Boyle’s move to Oxford followed shortly after his two-year stay in Ireland— his only visit back to the country of his birth. He had hoped for a “short and necessary stay” in which he could settle issues related to the family estates that would allow him to return to England.146 But it seems Boyle was unable to settle his financial matters to his satisfaction before he left the country in the summer of 1654, and his sister would return to Ireland with the same mission only two years later, soon after she ensured that Boyle had settled into Oxford. Leveraging the religious, medical, scientific, and political knowledge and networks she had been developing as a central member of the Hartlib circle, Ranelagh returned to Ireland to advance both personal familial and large-scale national— and even international— projects.

Return to Ireland (1656– 59)

L

4

ady Ranelagh’s opinion of Ireland was tainted by her near escape from the Rebellion of 1642. Her last trip there thirteen years prior had ended in her fleeing the country filled with fear, anger, and disappointment. However, much had changed respecting AngloProtestants in Ireland by September 1656 when she decided to leave London and return to the country of her birth.1 After the Rebellion of 1642, the Long Parliament had begun confiscating the land of the Irish Catholics and reserving it for new Protestant adventurers and soldiers; however, wider turmoil in both countries meant that Irish reform moved slowly, until the execution of the king and establishment of the English Commonwealth in 1649. Oliver Cromwell made settling Ireland with English Protestants one of his top priorities, and under this new regime any recommendations made by the Dublin government had to be approved in Westminster. Cromwell was aggressive, transplanting landless Catholics to Connaught and expanding available plantations by sequestering land in all four of the country’s provinces. The administrators tasked with dispersing this land among Protestants included in their distributions both new adventurers and those who had previously held land in Ireland. The change to Ireland was dramatic, with Catholics’ share of the land falling from 59 percent in 1641 to 20 percent in 1660, most of which was isolated to the rugged terrain of Connaught.2 The Boyle family held many estates in Ireland, and across the 1650s the

92

•

Chapter Four

siblings who had left the country now took turns visiting Ireland to negotiate their hold over them.3 The time was ripe for the Earl of Cork’s descendants, as Cromwell began establishing agricultural initiatives in Ireland that would assist Britain’s expanding colonial empire and trade network while reviving Irish exports of cattle, sheep, and butter.4 As a woman, Lady Ranelagh did not inherit her father’s property when he died in 1643, but her role in reclaiming the Boyle family estates in the following decade probably emerged because of the political influence she held among powerful men in Ireland at that time. The final will of the Earl of Cork, drawn up in 1642, distributed land among his sons, but he went further to foster unity between his children by emphasizing that his eldest son should provide lodging and entertainment to his younger brothers and their heirs when they visited his house in Dublin. Custom would dictate that Cork’s married daughters should not be a concern for him, and he must have assumed that his daughter Katherine had married well enough and would be taken care of by the Ranelagh family. However, more than a decade after Cork’s death and Ranelagh’s separation from her husband, her brothers included her in their family estate struggles and seemed to expect from her a level of investment comparable to what they would see from their male siblings. Across the early 1650s, the Boyle brothers Robert, Richard, and Roger met regularly in Ireland to discuss the lands and possible lease arrangements, with Robert Boyle eventually leaving the country for good in 1654 to spend time in London and Stalbridge before relocating to Oxford.5 After Ranelagh arrived in Ireland— nearly two years after Boyle’s departure from there— her brother followed up with her about six months later by providing his sister with a list of the lands he owned in Connaught so she could further pursue securing them.6 By the time of her return to Ireland, many of Ranelagh’s associates and family members now held powerful positions in England and Ireland, providing her with an opportunity to leverage their assistance toward her efforts. In 1653, Oliver Cromwell officially took over as lord protector, and in 1655 he sent his son Henry Cromwell to Ireland to act as governor. Ranelagh’s brother Roger, Lord Broghill, had been working in Munster to enhance the Cromwells’ initiatives, and by the time Ranelagh was leaving for Ireland, Broghill held a seat in the Privy Council and had just

Return to Ireland

•

93

been appointed to the committee responsible for transplanting the Irish to Connaught.7 Several of her contacts in the Hartlib circle, such as Benjamin Worsley and William Petty, also held influential positions and were involved in projects that Cromwell supported. Indeed, across the mid-1650s, Ireland was central among the Hartlib circle’s colonial land settlement projects as they strove for profitable agricultural improvements that could make England self-supportive.8 Those closest to Lady Ranelagh in London felt her absence, with the poet John Milton saying that her leave caused him “no ordinary regret.”9 The journey would have involved traveling west across a couple hundred miles of land before boarding a boat to head westbound across the sea into Ireland. She took her unmarried daughters Frances and Elizabeth with her. It is not entirely clear whether her eldest daughter, Catherine, accompanied them or whether she was already married to her first husband, Sir William Parsons, 2nd Baronet of Bellamont. The marriage probably took place in Ireland where he was living, however, in which case Catherine would have joined her mother and sisters on their outbound journey. Indeed, it is possible one impetus for Ranelagh’s return to Ireland was to deliver an unmarried Catherine to her fiancé.10 Ranelagh’s son Richard did not join them because he was still enjoying his grand tour of the Continent with Henry Oldenburg. Ranelagh and her daughters probably left London at some point in October, and then on November 5, 1656, William Petty wrote to Samuel Hartlib to let him know that Lady Ranelagh had arrived safely. Petty also noted that Ranelagh had brought him news of Robert Boyle’s illness and Hartlib’s piles, indicative of her constant intimacy with them and her continued role in locating the best medical cures for those closest to her.11 Though it was her brother Roger, Lord Broghill, who held prominent political positions in Ireland in the 1650s, he achieved this in part by relying on Lady Ranelagh’s counsel and the respect we have already seen she was afforded in key circles of power. Even prior to her living in Ireland, Roger had asked Ranelagh to intervene in Irish politics on his behalf when negotiations were taking place between the English and the Irish Independents in the 1640s. Roger clumsily attacked key Irish politicians and then rescinded his remarks as the political pendulum swung back and forth. To get himself

94

•

Chapter Four

out of the sticky situation he created, he used his sister’s network and solid reputation within both parties to help elevate his own. Murrough O’Brien, Earl of Inchiquin, then president of Munster, remarked sarcastically to Sir Philip Percivalle that “never [a] man did perform a sister’s undertaking in his behalf better than he [Broghill] has done, that is to say . . . the quite contrary way.” When writing to Ranelagh herself, however, Inchiquin was much more careful, noting that while it was “unusual” to write to a sister concerning her brother, he wanted her to hear the story from Inchiquin himself because of his respect for her: “perhaps you may imagine that the malice I bear him [Broghill] might be of force to lessen the honour I owe to your ladyship, which really, Madam, I shall ever nourish.”12 Men in political seats of power— particularly in Ireland— could not conduct typical business when a Boyle family member was involved without reaching an understanding with Lady Ranelagh. Such a position of authority and respect was certainly rare for a gentlewoman, as demonstrated by this reflection upon having to operate “the quite contrary way.” After Broghill went to Scotland to serve as lord president of the council in Scotland, he again relied on his sister for political assistance, but this time as an intermediary with Oliver Cromwell. When Broghill wanted to spend some time in England in 1656, Ranelagh asked Cromwell for permission on her brother’s behalf; Broghill followed up with a letter to Cromwell noting that she had “moved your Highness in my behalf.”13 Ranelagh worked closely with her brothers as a political partner and advocate, finding a comfortable way to negotiate on their behalves without overstepping social boundaries. While the Boyle family estates may have technically belonged to her brothers and not to her, and while her brothers held positions of political power that she could not, she was instrumental in helping them succeed and was often the one to maintain control over such affairs in all but legal terms. As we have seen, the arrangement was welcomed by her brothers and respected by her male contemporaries. In addition to the wider Boyle family concerns, Lady Ranelagh also had personal business to finish with her estranged husband in Ireland. It is unclear whether she or her daughters decided to visit Lord Ranelagh on this trip, but he was still residing in Ireland at this time, and it was on this trip that she began pursuing a settlement from him related to their separa-

Return to Ireland

•

95

tion. It may have been that the couple tried resolving their differences after many years had passed and that it was then that Lady Ranelagh finally decided the marriage was damaged beyond repair. Though some early modern women who separated from their husbands bore a stigma that could lead to them being shunned by their social circles, Lady Ranelagh’s notorious piety, combined with Lord Ranelagh’s reputation for hostility, meant that her marital difficulties never tarnished her intellectual reputation or network. Lord Ranelagh’s greed and anger was known to extend as far as irrational plans enacted with the explicit aim of spiting others, resulting in one contemporary commenting that “his ‘melaces’ [malice] is great.”14 Lady Ranelagh also had the advantage of Cromwell’s personal interest in her case. Under the English law of coverture, all property and custody of children were technically the husband’s in the event of a separation, though in extreme cases a woman could attempt to navigate England’s complex legal system, with its various jurisdictions and courts. Yet from 1644 to 1660, the old ecclesiastical court system was abolished and judicial administration was replaced by chaotic appeals to Parliament to verify petitions and agreements. Many private agreements sprang up in the 1650s as a result, and Ranelagh’s case was among them; the void of judicial structure provided her with an opportunity thanks to her connections with Cromwell and other prominent Commonwealth politicians. However, the Commonwealth’s failure to ever achieve establishing a new system meant the whole process was mired by a state of confusion for over a decade, and Ranelagh’s case would drag on throughout it.15 Though her focus in Ireland was primarily personal financial matters prompted by her favorable political connections, Lady Ranelagh also used her Irish relocation to help advance Hartlibian projects based in Ireland and took this opportunity to meet with diverse Anglo-Irish intellectuals living there. Her time in Ireland appears to have been a formative intellectual endeavor, which is in contrast to that experienced by her brother Robert Boyle, who, as we have seen, had been there for most of the two years between June 1652 and July 1654. In June 1652, a young Robert went to Ireland to look after the Boyle family estates. He had hoped to continue pursuing the chemistry he was newly enamored of, but he found it difficult to do so there. He complained by letter to Samuel Hartlib’s son-in-law

96

•

Chapter Four

Clodius that in Ireland theories of chemical spirits were misunderstood and chemical instruments were difficult to find, making it “hard to have any hermetick thoughts . . . and impossible to bring them to experiment.”16 Boyle was never as active a member of the circle as Ranelagh was, and Hartlib’s few attempts to engage Boyle in his project on the natural history of Ireland went nowhere. What made Ireland an opportunity for Ranelagh rather than a hindrance is that she leveraged all the benefits of being a respected correspondent in the Hartlib circle, connecting with old Hartlibian acquaintances upon her arrival and embracing Hartlib’s new ideas and connections with eagerness. By the time of her relocation to Ireland in 1656, she had been active in the Hartlib circle for just over a decade. Once in Ireland, she maintained frequent correspondence with those members still residing in England or on the Continent. Significantly, her new geographic position also allowed her physical access to the lands and people being discussed abroad, as Ireland had become a focal point for many Hartlibian plans. The circle had been involved in plans for developing Ireland from 1649 that continued for over a decade, with Patricia Coughlan having aptly noted that they “perceived Ireland as literally a God-given opportunity for scientific enquiry, experiment and the practical execution of their various schemes.”17 Those members of the circle with connections with Ireland were involved in a range of projects for “improvement” that included religious conversion, planting settlements, and writing Irelands Naturall History, the first natural history of the region written in the English language.18 Ranelagh may have been involved in many of these projects before leaving for Ireland, but by relocating there at the height of their Irish activity she began taking a more central role. She also developed closer relationships with key members of the Hartlib circle in Ireland, especially the mathematician Robert Wood, who had an interest in economics— particularly, the political economy of Ireland. Wood, an active member of the Hartlib circle in the late 1650s, would later become a fellow of the Royal Society.19 Ranelagh’s work on reclaiming the Boyle family estates meant that the Hartlibian plans for planting and husbandry in Ireland were a natural extension of her personal interests and priorities. Arnold and Gerard Boate, the Dutch physician brothers living in London, were the original promot-

Return to Ireland

•

97

ers of the natural history project, the first volume of which was completed by 1650 and published in 1652. Ranelagh may not have been involved in this project contemporaneously with the Boate brothers, but she was connected to them well enough that she possessed a copy of their secret medical recipe book shortly after their deaths. The book was explicitly not to be shared outside the Boate family, since one of the sons planned to take over his father’s medical business.20 After both Boate brothers died in 1650, Hartlib sought new successors for the project and approached Robert Child, William Petty, Miles Symner, and Robert Wood.21 Wood and Symner took over in the late 1650s, addressing practical recommendations for husbandry and mining that were purportedly to serve the “Common Good of Ireland”; however, even they noted it was “more especially, for the benfit of the Adventurers and Planters therein.”22 This work overlapped with Lady Ranelagh’s extended stay in the country. She became involved in the project initially through her relationship with Robert Wood but then worked with both men, possibly even being partly responsible for introducing Symner to the Hartlib circle.23 Symner was also involved in the government’s project to survey Ireland, balancing it with his post as the first professor of mathematics and fellow at Trinity College Dublin.24 Wood, Ranelagh, and Symner worked closely together to help realize Hartlib’s goal to complete the Naturall History project. In July 1657, Wood took a copy of a “Proposal for planting Ireland” to Lady Ranelagh, which Symner planned to later collect from her. The multitude of references to Ranelagh in Wood’s letters during this time demonstrates that he considered her an intellectual partner in this exercise, assisting him by reading proposals, meeting for extended discussions, circulating drafts and books among her wider correspondence network, and making recommendations for when manuscripts should be published.25 Symner eventually took over as the principal contributor to the project, with his firsthand knowledge of Ireland improving the overall quality of the work, even if his official posts left him little time to work on it.26 The circle’s larger goals for what they considered to be the improvement of Ireland matched Ranelagh’s own religious, political, and intellectual ambitions, and her knowledge of and contacts in the country would have made her an asset to the circle’s plans in the late 1650s. While other scholars have rightly linked the Hartlib

98

•

Chapter Four

circle’s Irish agricultural projects to England’s larger imperial ambitions, Ranelagh’s involvement provides a rare example of how an elite woman could collaborate with key male figures to improve the economy and expand overseas trade.27 Most of the information about Ranelagh’s activity during these years in Ireland can be gathered not from her own letters, but instead from Wood’s letters to Hartlib. Wood spent the latter half of the 1650s traveling between England and Ireland, as in addition to posts in Ireland he held fellowships at Lincoln College, Oxford, and at Oliver Cromwell’s New College in Durham.28 Wood and Ranelagh started corresponding only a few months before she left for Ireland. Wood thanked Hartlib for introducing them to each other in May, and by June she was already “that excellent lady our friend.”29 Though Wood overlapped with Robert Boyle at Eton College and then in Wilkin’s Oxford group, it was Hartlib who introduced Wood to Ranelagh in advance of her Irish trip. Once Wood and Ranelagh both lived in Ireland, they were able to supplement their correspondence with ample visits, and Wood mentioned to Hartlib in March 1657 that he spent over an hour discoursing with her.30 There are seventeen references to Ranelagh in Wood’s letters to Hartlib from November 1656 to March 1659, representing almost half of all references to her in the Hartlib Papers archive during her time in Ireland.31 To save money on postage, Hartlib began combining parcels of books and proposals to them both, which Wood enjoyed because it gave him “the happinesse of an opportunitie to wayte upon the incomparable Lady Ranalaugh” when he went to collect his post.32 The full range of topics that they discussed is sometimes difficult to infer, but many letters mentioned circulating proposals to her for comment or integrating her responses into his works.33 Wood’s letters frequently mentioned him collaborating with Ranelagh, such as one from July 1657 where he told Hartlib that he gave Lady Ranelagh a copy of a proposal and planned to “object” to her comments if necessary.34 Wood also solicited Lady Ranelagh’s advice with another Hartlibian project that he initiated: the decimalization of the currency. England did not embrace decimalized currency until 1971, but almost three hundred years earlier Robert Wood advocated against the complicated duodecimal system based on shillings, pence, and farthings (which were a 20th, 240th,

Return to Ireland

•

99

and 960th part of a pound, respectively).35 Wood, interested in applying his mathematical skills to improve society and stimulate the economy, recommended a simpler system whereby coinage could be based on one hundred units. He also recognized how this proposed economic system could advance abstract mathematics, particularly when considering “Artifical Numbers or Logarithmes . . . which are applicable only to this decimal way.”36 The draft of the pamphlet, entitled “Ten to One,” was addressed to Cromwell and his advisers and argued that monetary reform should stem from mathematical principles.37 Though Wood had grown dissatisfied with the proposal by April 1657, having become personally disinterested in the topic and doubting its benefit to the public, Hartlib took an interest in it and encouraged Wood to show Lady Ranelagh. When Wood did so, he commented on “that excellent judgement [of ] my Lady Ranulaugh” who “was pleased to passe a sentence of approbation upon it, as to publick use.”38 In fact, she was so impressed that she immediately sent it to her brother Broghill and Wood was left without a copy of his own. By August 1657, Wood had to admit to Hartlib that even though the paper was “well approved” by “the Mathematick Professors, & others” at Lincoln College, Oxford, as well as by Petty and Symner in Dublin, he was no longer interested in pursuing this issue further.39 Significantly, Ranelagh’s “excellent judgement” is mentioned alongside that of the mathematics professors at Oxford. The depth and diversity of the topics for which Wood sought the opinion of “our right honourable Lady” offers further proof that her reputation as “the incomparable” stemmed not only from her moral guidance and spiritual wisdom, but also from her intellectual handle on various branches of natural philosophy. Unfortunately, the proposal itself does not appear to have reached Cromwell, but it circulated widely within these circles of prominent reformers in England and Ireland before Wood stopped it. It was probably when she was in Ireland that Ranelagh became acquainted with another Hartlibian correspondent who shared her interests: the Herefordshire clergyman John Beale. Beale did not engage with the Hartlib circle until the late 1650s, at which point he became active discussing with them matters of theology, agriculture, and natural philosophy— interests he would continue to pursue as a fellow of the Royal Society after 1663. He became one of Lady Ranelagh’s closest correspondents around

100

•

Chapter Four

1657, and the ease with which they communicated and the intellectual rigor of their discourse continued after the Restoration.40 Beale and Ranelagh were engaged in discussions on everything from prophetic dreams to the Apostles’ Creed, but it was his interest in agriculture that coincided most directly with her work on Irish settlements and could serve as a natural extension of the Irish natural history project. Beale was attracted to Francis Bacon’s suggestion that agriculture would be the most fundamental of the sciences in creating a useful natural philosophy, and various aspects of natural history dominate his letters throughout the 1650s.41 Beale, like Hartlib, elevated husbandry above manual labor, seeing it as “true and real Learning and Natural Philosophy.”42 During the Commonwealth, such agricultural projects also held religio-economic prestige: farmers who could harness the fertility that God had bestowed upon the soil could help build a prosperous nation.43 Beale’s best-known text, Herefordshire Orchards, a Pattern for All England (1657), was printed by Hartlib with Beale’s initials on the title page; further, Beale proposed two books on horticulture, concerning gardens for pleasure and for medicine. The latter of these included a proposed dedication to Lady Ranelagh. Unfortunately, neither book ever made it to print, possibly because Beale suppressed them when he heard of John Evelyn’s similar work on the “Elysium Britannicum.”44 Though the manuscript is undated, it was probably in the late 1650s when Beale offered Hartlib these two lengthy proposals for books on gardening, “A Physique Guarden” and “A Garden of Pleasure.” He wanted Hartlib to judge “whether it bee usefull, & worthy of the publique view.”45 The full title page of the former would have been “A Physique Guarden and the Preparation of Composts Fit for All kinds of Gardens. And Fit for Experiments of Generall Use,” endorsing the practical benefits of medicinal plants and lay experimentation. Beale told Hartlib that he intended to “bestowe a preface on it, or a dedication to the right honorable the Vi[scountess] Ra[nelagh] in Ireland.”46 The addition of “in Ireland” after her name shows that by this point her Irish residence was becoming a defining characteristic of her identity within the circle. He then listed thirty-nine chapter titles ranging from discussions of Virgil to general gardening advice as to which plants are suitable for different types of soil. The thirty-eighth chapter, “That Hee is neyther worthy

Return to Ireland

•

101

of a Garden, nor a true owner of it, That hath not the use of the Lymbec to extract oyles, salts, spirits &c,” plainly notes that garden owners cannot reach their maximum potential without the basic chemical equipment required to produce medicines, explicitly linking agriculture to chemistry and medicine.47 Beale’s proposed dedication to Lady Ranelagh confirms that she had an interest in the practical applications of plants and that Beale knew she would approve of his ambition to extend access to and knowledge of medicinal herbs beyond exclusive scholarly circles. The proposal presents horticulture as an extension of chemistry, suggesting that equipping the public with a combined practical knowledge of horticulture and basic chemical medicine would yield the greatest intellectual and economic benefits. While physic gardens were popular throughout continental Europe in the sixteenth century, it was not until 1621 that England established its first physic garden in Oxford.48 Throughout the seventeenth century, most physic, or “botanic,” gardens were attached to universities and served as a space for physicians to learn about the medicinal properties of herbs throughout the course of their training.49 Though it is possible that some owners of country houses dubbed their modest collections of herbs a “physic garden,” most early modern domestic gardens did not have such rigid distinctions and combined herbs used for cookery, medicine, and aromatic flavoring.50 However, Beale saw the need for expanding the use of a physic garden beyond such elite circles, noting, “If I fayle of accommodation to the publique, tis much against my good meaning. I am very willing to be an incendiary to inflame the world with the Love of profitable knowledge. And I scarse knowe any kind of knowledge more profitable than this.”51 He also emphasized, “My purpose is to make the study, as well of Ladyes, as of Scholars,” and perhaps the dedication to Lady Ranelagh was partly to encourage a female readership.52 Beale and Ranelagh also collaborated on the subject of dreams. This time, instead of Beale producing the text and dedicating it to her as he did with the physic garden book, Ranelagh took a more active role in shaping the conversation and probably even initiated it by writing a manuscript discourse of her own. Beale held a lifelong interest in prophetic dreams, which he discussed with members of the Hartlib circle as well as old friends from

102

•

Chapter Four

Somerset with whom he remained in contact, such as the Reverend John Oliver, minister of Montacute. Ranelagh may have known about this interest when she sent Beale her own discourse and proposal on dreams, but this first half of the conversation is not extant. Yet in May 1657, Beale told Hartlib, “I have now spent a whole day in meditating upon the right honorable the Lady Ranalaghs discourse & proposalls concerning Dreames.” Beale’s thoughtful response, entitled “Dreames,” is twelve pages long, with writing filling both the front and back. Nevertheless, he lamented that it was only “an abstract of an answer” and that he hoped it would “one day bee more compleated.” Ranelagh’s proposal prompted Beale to “chase after all kinds of literature,” and his learned response drew from a variety of ancient sources, including the Bible, Aristotle, and “the Wisedome of the Easte,” perhaps offering some indication as to the source materials Ranelagh used to spark the discussion. Ranelagh’s own interest in dreams probably stemmed from the question of whether they were vehicles through which God could communicate, similar to her related interest in prophecy, as seen in the case of Sarah Wight and her endorsement of Menasseh ben Israel. Beale’s own discourse included many prophetic and mystical stories, some of which he had experienced himself. Ranelagh’s discourse may also have disclosed more on her ideas regarding the secrets of nature, as some natural philosophers— including her brother Robert Boyle and his collaborator George Starkey— believed that God could transmit alchemical secrets through dreams. Indeed, Beale’s discourse includes a story of a man who was bedridden for twenty-five years who learned in a dream of an herb with therapeutic properties that, upon waking, he made into an oil salve and “suddenly had a miraculous recovery.”53 Since Beale’s “response” is written more as a standalone treatise than a direct reply to a previous discourse, it is almost impossible to read it for clues to what Lady Ranelagh’s piece may have said; however, Beale’s philosophical tone, which draws on his knowledge of theology and natural philosophy, suggests that Lady Ranelagh’s treatise probably engaged with similar concepts. Then, about two weeks later, Beale approached Hartlib with another discourse on dreams with “reservednes and caution,” asking Hartlib not to circulate the manuscript to the larger network. Such a precaution was of course necessary, given Hartlib’s notorious tendency to

Return to Ireland

•

103

broadly circulate manuscripts without first seeking permission from the author. Beale elaborated that they should “not exclude our right honorable Lady,” but he asked Hartlib to be wary of including anyone else beyond her.54 As the initiator of the conversation, Ranelagh remained in the inner circle of the ongoing discussion, with Beale not only respecting but also seeking Lady Ranelagh’s contribution. The letters that passed between Lady Ranelagh and John Beale wove together the subjects of natural philosophy and religion— matters inextricably linked for both of them. Speaking about Ranelagh to Hartlib, Beale once said, “Some branches of Wisedome Shee may receive from the learned Doctors & from bookes; & some branches shee must accept from the experiences of saints, yea of Gods little ones, even babes, & sucklings,” suggesting that a well-rounded education, combining intellectual and spiritual guidance such as this, would protect her.55 Their relationship may have begun when she was based in Ireland, but their intellectual and spiritual explorations continued after the Restoration of the monarchy as the Hartlib circle was dissolving, with one lengthy discourse from Beale to Lady Ranelagh concerning the Apostles’ Creed dating from September 1660.56 Around the same time as Ranelagh’s exchange with Beale and Hartlib concerning dreams, Peter Figulus was translating Ranelagh’s letters into German so they could reach the Hartlib circle’s wider network on the Continent. While these letters include some personal notes on individuals she had recently met and comments concerning letters or books she had received by post, they mostly contain her thoughtful reflections on the strengths and weaknesses of human nature and the moral judgments of those who misuse their power. Ranelagh expresses frustration with contemporary conflicts between the church and the government and provides examples of peaceful resolutions during times of war and tyranny. It is not always clear which country or individual she is critiquing, but it may be the very generality of these sentiments that Figulus thought would appeal to a more diverse international audience. While these letters advocated that those in power should make political decisions informed by their moral duty, she ultimately knew that God would correct the situation if the leaders failed to do so themselves.57 These letters date mostly from between

104

•

Chapter Four

October 20, 1656, and January 18, 1657, but Figulus mentions that he is still working on translating her letters as late as November 1658.58 One of her translated letters is written to an unnamed correspondent in Dublin, and all letters that were translated were written while she was residing in Ireland, demonstrating that her location and contacts in the country appear only to have advanced her international reputation at this time. While these translations and her discourse on dreams were written around the same time, there also may be an intellectual thread between them, connecting them in more than just chronology. Ranelagh’s providential message carried prophetic undertones not missed by her contemporaries, as we will see shortly. Ranelagh’s relocation to Ireland also allowed her easier access to William Petty, and their shared interests at this time and closer geographic proximity suggest the two would have had plenty of opportunities to interact. In addition to his medical expertise and chemical experimentation, in the late 1650s William Petty was establishing his reputation thanks to his work on the Down Survey. He also replaced Benjamin Worsley as surveyor general of Ireland, making him responsible for forfeited estates. Ranelagh may have worked with him directly when trying to negotiate Boyle family settlements, but Petty was associated with the Hartlib circle as well and shared the group’s utilitarian ambitions. Sir Cheney Culpeper had introduced Petty to the circle in January 1647, and five years later Petty’s letter to Hartlib included references to their shared friend, Lady Ranelagh. Then, by 1656, it was Petty who told Hartlib of her arrival in Dublin.59 Robert Boyle had also just engaged in a series of anatomical lessons with Petty during his recent visit to Ireland in 1654, and while there is no indication that Petty extended these lessons to Ranelagh two years later, this offers a further point of connection between them.60 The experiences Petty gained during these years working on the survey of Ireland and with the Hartlib circle influenced his more mature work later in life, including the development of a system of statistical analysis he called “political arithmetic.” The opportunity to collaborate in Ireland resulted in Ranelagh and Petty identifying many shared interests and networks, and it created a foundation that allowed them to continue to support each other until his death in 1687.61 While in Ireland, Lady Ranelagh also continued to collect medical

Return to Ireland

•

105

recipes and share them with Hartlib. She must have traveled with at least some of the recipe collection she amassed in England, because in September 1658 she wrote to Hartlib from Lismore to provide her three best remedies for “sharpe hott humors.” The note begins with a detailed recipe entitled “Sir Kenelme Digbyes Secret,” which Ranelagh assured Hartlib was “given me by Sir Kenelme Digby, with most Extraordinary Commendation from his owne experience against festers & inflammation.”62 Digby himself was not in Ireland, so the recipe must have been collected prior to her departure and taken with her. Indeed, the aforementioned copy of Ranelagh’s recipe book, now held in the British Library and which was probably compiled in the mid-1650s, also includes four recipes from Sir Kenelm Digby.63 However, the recipe that Ranelagh gave to Hartlib is different from these and may have been copied from a recipe book that is no longer extant. It involves chemical processes and ingredients, beginning with an explanation of how to make aqua calcis, or limewater, and then advising how to prepare the sublimate with spring water to make a medicinal water to be used as an external or internal remedy. The other two recipes Ranelagh included rely on common household ingredients such as eggs, wheat flour, cream, or wood soot to make external poultices— one of which Ranelagh “experienced,” or tried, herself, demonstrating the range of her own knowledge and the diversity of practices she endorsed.64 The process by which the letters containing medical recipes traveled from London to Lismore and then back to England demonstrates a more complex international transfer of medical knowledge than can be gained by looking exclusively at her extant recipe book. In April 1658, Hartlib, Ranelagh, and Robert Boyle also discussed spiritual and magical matters by letter, analyzing the “famed story” of Lionel Cranfield, Earl of Middlesex, who was visited by a ghost. Ranelagh was still in Youghal at the time, and she wrote to Hartlib about Middlesex making a pact with the devil before drunkenly stumbling into a coach when “an Appearance of a Woman all in white came into it, & sat downe by My Lord in the Coach.”65 Later that month, Hartlib summarized the tale to Boyle, who was collecting data on ghostly apparitions and demonic activities. The testimony was questionable due to the drunken state of the source, so Hartlib was collecting additional accounts to share with Boyle and Ranelagh.

106

•

Chapter Four

Hartlib told Boyle that he would be sending additional information to Ranelagh along with “some other books,” thereby ensuring that she stayed connected to the issues that most concerned her even though she was not in England.66 Not only did Boyle and Ranelagh continue to share intellectual interests in the late 1650s, but they collected this information independent of each other and Hartlib served here as the siblings’ link. Ranelagh’s position in Ireland also allowed her to build relationships with foreign visitors to the country and to pass their medical secrets on to Hartlib, meaning she could reciprocate and provide benefits afforded by her location. One such individual was the French surgeon known as Monsieur Fountaine who practiced in Dublin and boasted of a medicine that could break kidney stones without fail— a remedy of particular interest to Hartlib, since he was suffering from painful stones. Ranelagh explained to Hartlib that “hee is of the common opinion of loving more to keepe a Secret, then to doe good by publishing it. But hee hase promised to prepare some of the Medecin, and teach the use of it which I am endeavouring to get from him.” Hartlib then had a scribe copy another extract from a letter dated four days later; significantly, this must have been written to Hartlib by one of Ranelagh’s daughters, as it reads: “My Mother has spoken to the Gentleman she writ to you of, and hee dose positively under-take the curing of the stone if it bee in the kidneys.” This may be the only reference to Ranelagh’s daughters in the Hartlib Papers archive, and it offers further proof that she may have involved them, particularly Frances, in her intellectual pursuits and networks. (As we learned in the previous chapter, Frances also wrote to Henry Oldenburg on behalf of her mother.) Finally, on February 20, Ranelagh informed Hartlib that “the Gentleman that hase the Secret for the Stone made mee a visit.” She assured Hartlib that he seemed “very sober” but still refused to part with the exact recipe for how to make the water. However, she included notes on dosage and efficacy, and said that the man promised to offer more once Hartlib could confirm whether his stones were in his bladder or kidney. No further information is included, but her notes are copied in both Hartlib’s hand and a scribe’s, indicating that they may have circulated even further. Ranelagh’s commitment to openness and to preserving Hartlib’s health led her to persevere in

Return to Ireland

•

107

her pursuit to find and collate the latest medical cures, even involving her daughter when necessary.67 While Robert Boyle had complained to Hartlib’s son-in-law, Clodius, of his time in Ireland because of its dearth of chemical knowledge and his inability to properly conduct chemical experiments, no such negative comments about Ireland exist in Ranelagh’s extant letters during her stay there a few years later.68 Unlike her younger brother, Ranelagh had ample existing connections and local knowledge of the land and people that allowed her to thrive. However, few writings by her on any subject exist from these years, and this chapter’s assessment of her intellectual life has relied almost entirely on responses to her letters that are no longer extant and on comments others made about her. In contrast to Robert Boyle, who had been raised in England and whose two years in Ireland in the 1650s were essentially the only time he lived in the country as an adult, Ranelagh had spent a larger portion of her life in Ireland and may never have left were it not for the Irish Rebellion. However, like Boyle, the majority of her time in the country over these years does not appear to have been concerned with chemistry. Rather, living there turned her toward subjects more suited to the regional climate. While Boyle used his time in Ireland to partner with William Petty to learn more about anatomy, Ranelagh developed her knowledge of applied mathematics and agriculture while maintaining interests in domestic medicine, theology, and prophecy. She also made an effort to supplement her resources if she couldn’t find them locally, and in the summer of 1657 she wrote to Boyle and asked him to send her peony roots so she could plant them there. Peony roots were used in a wide range of household recipes, but they were particularly useful in medical preparations, ranging from powders to treat convulsions to waters for the eyes.69 Ranelagh took advantage of her local environment and reached out to her family and friends in England when necessary. In addition to introducing her to new contacts in Ireland, her relocation allowed her to maintain her vibrant international correspondence network. While many of the letters she and Hartlib exchanged over these years are no longer extant, we know that the friends remained in frequent contact through ample references to their (now missing) letters found in

108

•

Chapter Four

the correspondence of other members of the circle, particularly those from Robert Wood.70 Hartlib also continued to collect Ranelagh’s letters with his own and send them together to Henry Oldenburg, despite the fact that they no longer lived in the same country.71 The three-way correspondence between Hartlib, Ranelagh, and Oldenburg does not appear to have been affected by Ranelagh’s move to Ireland, but Oldenburg’s own continental travels meant that he would sometimes fall out of contact because he lacked a permanent address for receiving post.72 Ranelagh’s time in Ireland appears to have been fruitful, and she might have stayed longer had national events not played out in a way that disadvantaged her yet again. The unexpected death of Oliver Cromwell on September 3, 1658, unsettled the nation and destabilized his supporters, including many members of the Hartlib circle. Like many, Ranelagh was shocked at the news of his death. A week after the momentous event, she wrote to her brother Roger, Lord Broghill, noting that Cromwell had just “a few days before shooke all Europe by his fame and forces,” but he was not “able to keepe an ague from shakeing him, nor to keepe himselfe from being shaken into his grave by a few fits thereof.”73 He probably died from complications following an attack of tertian ague, a form of malaria that was then common in Western Europe. She suggested the event should come as a reminder of the “vanity of man in his best and highest estate,” for, in her esteem, all humankind’s greatness and power is mortal and incomparable to that of its maker.74 Her providential outlook, a recurring theme in her letters, always led her to seek cryptic messages in unexplainable events that might give a clue to their deeper meaning. As for Cromwell himself, she had to “confess his performances reached not the makeing good of his professions”; still, she feared he would prove to be better than whoever would follow.75 Her brother Broghill shared her concern, and in one letter to her he mentioned that his greatest fear in all this uncertainty was that it could provide another opportunity for that “old Common enemye”— the Stuarts.76 The instability of both Ireland and England also meant that many of the Hartlib circle’s plans could face difficulties and setbacks, particularly in their strides toward the reunification of the Protestant churches. This goal fit with the circle’s other projects for creating a godly utopia, including the

Return to Ireland

•

109

conversion of Jews and the fall of the papacy, and they saw England as the flagship country to lead this Protestant domination. Ranelagh may have first been exposed to this idea in her childhood home: Stephen Jerome, chaplain for the Earl of Cork and tutor to his children in the 1620s, considered the unity of the Israelites to be a model for Protestants, and thought Ireland could become an “Irish-English Israel.”77 By 1657, Ranelagh also supported John Dury’s work toward the unification of Protestant churches on the Continent, hoping that it might “give a more fatal blow to Rome and the whole anti-Christian hierarchy with the guidance and spirit of God’s word than any fleet or army could.”78 However, the death of Oliver Cromwell and with it the destabilization of England and Ireland meant that these plans could probably not materialize. Peter Figulus, the correspondent who had recently been translating Ranelagh’s letters, wrote to Hartlib from Amsterdam in November 1658 about his concern for the “whole Protestant Cause & poore distressed Churches abroade.” A religious authority himself, Figulus turned to guidance in the form of “Prophecies both of that late pious Prelate, as also of your most wise & godly sybilla Lady Viscountesse Ranalaugh, her pious & truly Religious considerations both upon the present & future state of Protestant Churches & people, might indeede become true of our owne fault.” Here Ranelagh’s piety and understanding of church structures are mentioned alongside comparable traits demonstrated by Archbishop James Ussher, a Protestant leader of international repute. By “sybilla,” or sibyl, Figulus places Ranelagh in a lineage of female prophets dating to antiquity. He feared that God might punish England, the Low Countries, and all Protestant nations because they neglected to use the means he had just given them to defend themselves and improve their “Common safety,” instead using them for individual gain. Figulus’s comments offer some indication that Ranelagh may have predicted God’s punishment of the Protestants for not working collectively toward the common good— that is, Protestant unity— and that Cromwell’s death may have been the first indication of an impending downfall.79 Ranelagh’s beliefs in prophecy and providence surfaced repeatedly over her life, but this is the only place in which it appears she may have delivered a prophecy of her own— and a successful one at that. Unlike

110

•

Chapter Four

the prophetess Sarah Wight, whom Ranelagh visited a decade earlier and whose authority ironically rested in the state of her near lifeless body, Ranelagh’s respectability as a prophet appears to have stemmed from her outspoken and morally sound reputation in the same way as Archbishop Ussher’s. The means by which she may have received this prophecy are unclear, but it may be related to the series of letters with Beale considering prophecy through dreams that she had been composing around the same time that Figulus was translating her letters. The current political climate only drew more attention to her religious discourses, and Figulus noted to Hartlib that he “made in dutch the Extracts hitherto sent mee of the Letters of the Viscountesse: which Monsieur de Geer delighteth in.”80 By “dutch” Figulus meant “high Dutch,” or German (Deutsch), and Lawrence de Geer was a noted reformer and patron of Comenius who lived in Amsterdam and recently had helped Comenius to settle there.81 Through this translation, Ranelagh’s reputation as a female prophet who endorsed the unity of Protestant churches could spread to other Protestant countries. It is unclear how the prophecy initially reached Ranelagh, but it may have been through a dream, since the dating of this reference overlaps with her correspondence with Beale about God communicating through dreams.82 Cromwell’s death and the government upheaval that followed also disturbed Lady Ranelagh quite profoundly, as she was still working with her political contacts with the Protectorate to negotiate a legal separation and settlement from her estranged husband. Oliver Cromwell had taken an interest in Ranelagh’s case, but she lamented that he died before she “received the fruits of that applycation.” His death also disturbed her work on the Boyle family settlements— another government transition would mean that those closest to her holding powerful political appointments would lose their posts. Upon Cromwell’s death, she decided to begin preparations to return to England; there was “noething to be donn here in my affayres one way or other, friends having first donn their best therein in vaine.”83 While Ranelagh herself did not claim any particular affinity for Ireland, and while her opinion of Irish people was primarily negative due to the hostile political climate, historians today must retrospectively acknowledge the positive influence Ireland nevertheless had on her intellectual development. While splitting her time between Dublin, Lismore, and

Return to Ireland

•

111

Youghal, she appears to have sustained the international correspondence network she developed as a Londoner and to have expanded her intellectual interests. Being in Ireland brought her new opportunities to engage in initiatives with Robert Wood and Miles Symner, to develop expertise that John Beale and Samuel Hartlib explicitly sought, and to cultivate relationships that would become important later in her life, such as that with William Petty. Such connections and opportunities confirm the work of Irish historians such as Nicholas Canny who have argued that the intellectual revolution in Restoration England is partly indebted to work that had developed in Ireland over the preceding decades.84 On February 15, 1659, Lady Ranelagh left Ireland to return to England with her brother Lord Broghill and two of her daughters. Prior to boarding the boat, she left her sister-in-law, the Countess of Cork, with a batch of ten items, predominantly letters, papers, and bills concerning her unfinished business with her husband and the Boyle family lands in Ireland. Ranelagh was taking precautions that the financial and legal advances she made while in Ireland would not be overturned in the event of her death, and that her children would be taken care of. The rough journey back to England probably made her thankful that she had taken such measures, as a terrifying storm forced the ship onto a shoal. Lord Broghill dramatically cried out, “We are al gonn god have mercy upon our soules,” and Ranelagh prepared her children to make peace with death. Thankfully, however, the ship eventually regained control, and they were able to complete their voyage.85 Lady Ranelagh may have returned to Ireland at other points in her adult life, particularly because her daughter Catherine resided there and her son Richard would go on to hold various Irish political appointments. We know that she returned at least once more, in 1670, around the time when her husband died.86 Yet regardless of whether she resided there or not, her Anglo-Irish identity stayed with her. When Hartlib sent one of her tracts to John Winthrop Jr. in the American colonies in 1660, he mentioned that it was “written unto me by a most incomparable lady (Viscountess Ranalaugh) of an Irish extraction.”87 In this particular case, Hartlib may have called attention to her Irishness in order to lend further weight to the narrative itself, which took place in Ireland; but it also suggests that her contemporaries saw her as having Irish heritage. While Ranelagh does not

112

•

Chapter Four

Figure 5 Coat of arms for the Jones family as viscounts of Ranelagh, as seen in John Lodge’s eighteenth-century Peerage of Ireland. Two griffins hold the family crest above the Jones family motto (which can be loosely translated as “my strength comes from heaven”). (Courtesy of the National Library of Ireland, J 929721.)

reference her national identity in any of her letters, her connections with Ireland were evident through her Ranelagh Irish peerage and the Boyle and Jones family names. Her brother Robert Boyle may have come to be known as the “English philosopher,” but he also lived in Ireland far less than she did. In the same way as we may see comments on Boyle’s Englishness as lending further weight to his accomplishments as a natural philosopher, we should see comments on Ranelagh’s Irishness as bringing her further credibility on subjects concerning the practical application of utilitarian Baconian

Return to Ireland

•

113

principles, as her Irish connection made her an authority on husbandry, practical mathematics, and international Protestantism and conversion. Her investment in Ireland would surface most substantially again in the 1680s, when she would work with Robert Boyle to create an Irish vernacular translation of the Bible and would lend her support to William Petty’s attempts at rebuilding Irish colonies under James II.88 But upon arriving in England in the spring of 1659— just as Richard Cromwell was beginning his short period as lord protector— her attention turned away from Ireland and toward issues that were a more immediate priority in London.

Death of the Hartlib Circle and Birth of the Royal Society (1658– 67)

L

5

ady Ranelagh continued faithful correspondence with fellow members of the Hartlib circle despite her difficult familial affairs as well as setbacks to the Hartlibian agenda due to the bumpy government transition of the late 1650s and early 1660s. The millenarian ambitions of the Hartlib circle began losing momentum when it became clearer that England had failed to reform itself in the way they had hoped; still, several correspondents continued their active dialogue on and inquiry into diverse topics, many of which broadly related to natural philosophy. Across this transitional period we see how Ranelagh broadened her chemical interests and supported her younger brother Robert Boyle’s intellectual development while maintaining her own active religiopolitical agenda. Tracing Ranelagh’s intellectual pursuits over the course of this historically significant decade allows a rare glimpse into the life of a female natural philosopher closely associated with the birth of the Royal Society. In the final year of the interregnum, Ranelagh was still a valuable contributor to scientific discussions taking place within the Hartlib circle. In March 1659, John Beale encouraged Ranelagh’s participation in the testing of scientific instruments via a letter to Hartlib that noted, “You may tell her of all our Opticall Instruments coming abroade, & allmost fitted for her owne hand, & use.”1 The larger context of the letter shows that Beale is referring to a telescope— an instrument with which he conducted many wellreceived experiments and on which he became known as an authority. Rob-

116

•

Chapter Five

ert Boyle had also been using telescopes throughout the 1650s and would receive a new one two months later, in May 1659.2 While the two most important optical instruments developed in the seventeenth century— the microscope and the telescope— would become available on the open market later in the 1660s and could then be afforded by the more affluent families in England, this reference dating from 1659 makes Ranelagh one of the earliest known women to have been interested in the instrument. During the spring and summer of that year, Ranelagh also contributed to two chemical discussions taking place in the Hartlib circle, one of which prompted her to compose a manuscript treatise about “Butler’s stone” that was copied and internationally disseminated. Stories of the alchemical adept Dr. Butler and his creation of the philosophers’ stone (an alchemical substance that, among other things, can be used to turn base metals into precious metals such as gold or silver) circulated throughout Europe in the late 1650s and early 1660s, with many chemists trying to reproduce it.3 An early and famous account of Dr. Butler is one by the controversial Flemish chemical physician Jan Baptist van Helmont, first published in Latin in his lengthy compendium Ortus Medicinae (1648). In this account, Butler’s stone is entirely medicinal, operating by the method of “irradiation,” whereby the philosophers’ stone would strengthen the archeus and thus cure all diseases. Van Helmont claimed to have befriended this “certain Irish-man called Butler,” and he offered some suggestions as to the metallic and chemical properties of Butler’s “certain little stone.”4 Robert Boyle was familiar with van Helmont’s Ortus by 1652, when he was reading it with the prominent American chemist George Starkey as they worked together to prepare van Helmont’s ens veneris, or “essence of copper.”5 Boyle also discussed it later in The Sceptical Chymist (1661) and Usefulness of Natural Philosophy (1662– 63).6 In May 1659, Oldenburg procured a recipe from a French natural philosopher who tried recreating the stone by following van Helmont’s vague steps, and he sent it to Robert Boyle for examination.7 On April 5, 1659, Lady Ranelagh participated in this international speculation about the philosophers’ stone by writing a lengthy narrative to Hartlib on “what I know of Butlers story.”8 The letter conforms to the transmutation history genre, a witness testimony offering what one knows about an alchemist who claims he can make the philosophers’ stone. As the

Death of the Hartlib Circle and Birth of the Royal Society

•

117

historian William Newman has explained of the genre, “The profusion of names, dates, and places makes these reports sound almost like a baroque parody of an early modern scientific transaction.”9 Ranelagh began the extraordinary tale by naming “Dr Daniel Higgins an Irish man & a Physitian” as her source, and explained that the manuscript included everything she knew about Butler, who “was so famous for a splendid way of living without any visible estate, & for some Medecins.” The lengthy letter spans the recto and verso of two full folios and details how Higgins enlisted himself as Butler’s servant in an attempt to learn his secret. Through conversations with others, Higgins learns that, as a child, Butler had been kidnapped by pirates and “sold to the Basha [Pasha] of Tunis, who was himselfe a great Philosopher.” During his captivity, he stole a box of the Pasha’s secret powder and escaped. Butler and Higgins later went together to Orleans, where Butler purchased lead and the two labored for hours every night. Ranelagh confirmed that “Higgins assured me, that he did soe melt & refine & order the lead that he brought it to be very pure silver & malleable, & then nothing wanted but to adde the tincture which Higgins greedely longed to see given.” Just as the metal reached the point at which the secret powder could be added, Butler sent Higgins away on an errand. Higgins stood outside on a stool and watched through a window as Butler worked on the metal, but he noisily fell off his stool just as Butler was about to add the powder, causing the latter to stop. While Higgins never saw the philosophers’ stone in action, he reports that Butler was later arrested and some gold found in his pockets was “found perfectly good” upon examination, and that he eventually died in a shipwreck. Ranelagh’s testimony on Dr. Butler was so important that copies circulated to the American colonies, and Boyle eventually made reference to it in a print publication. Though no scribal copy of Ranelagh’s testimony exists, we know that there was one through a reference in a letter of March 16, 1660, from Hartlib to John Winthrop Jr., who was living in New England. Winthrop had a longtime interest in alchemy, a practice that he perceived to be an important element in his plans for social reform.10 Hartlib explained, “I have sent you a copy of a true relation concerning the famous Buttler written unto me by a most incomparable lady (Viscountess Ranalaugh) of an Irish extraction.”11 Hartlib’s letter to Winthrop is a lengthy discourse on

118

•

Chapter Five

Figure 6 Letter from Lady Katherine Ranelagh to Samuel Hartlib, 1659, concerning the famed alchemist Dr. Butler. The letter is in her hand with her signature, and it includes some of the corrections Hartlib made prior to circulating it. ( James Marshall and MarieLouise Osborn Collection, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University.)

chemistry, with Lady Ranelagh’s enclosed story being one of many chemical updates. Stylistic choices and physical clues in Ranelagh’s original manuscript suggest she wrote it with the intention of making it public.12 Hartlib’s changes to punctuation and capitalization show his own editorial contribution prior to public dissemination. Further, the date of Winthrop’s

Death of the Hartlib Circle and Birth of the Royal Society

•

119

letter confirms that Ranelagh’s narrative was still circulating nearly one year after she originally composed it, and that her writings not only circulated throughout Europe but also reached as far as the American colonies. Three years after Ranelagh originally composed her treatise, Boyle made an indirect reference to it when discussing Butler’s stone in Usefulness of Natural Philosophy (1662). Toward the end of his lengthy narrative and immediately after discussing van Helmont’s “Butler,” he mentions “an eminent and strange testimony given to Butler’s Secrets, by our famous Country man, Dr. Higgins, whose confession you will not doubt, if you consider how rare a Physitian and Chymist he was, how familiarly he lived in the same House with Butler, and how studiously, at last, they endeavoured to take away each others Life.”13 Boyle’s “memorable Story” is undoubtedly Ranelagh’s retelling of Dr. Higgins’s account of Butler, as his identification of the source and description of the narrative match Ranelagh’s story.14 In fact, Dr. Higgins is such a distinctive reference that the editors of the modern edition of Boyle’s works were unable to identify him at all without having this reference from Ranelagh’s manuscript. Therefore, though the “Butler’s stone” that Ranelagh describes concerns the transmutation of metals and the one discussed by van Helmont is medicinal, Boyle himself drew a direct parallel between them in Usefulness of Natural Philosophy by discussing Ranelagh’s Butler story shortly after van Helmont’s Butler story. This example also demonstrates that there may be more references to Lady Ranelagh that scholars have missed in Boyle’s works because her name is not directly attached to them. A few months after she composed her Butler treatise, Ranelagh was also included in an exclusive chemical recipe exchange between Oldenburg, Hartlib, and her brother Robert. Within a letter from July 1659 that Oldenburg wrote to Hartlib, he enclosed a “Chymicall proces of vitrioll” in exchange for a secret Hartlib previously sent to him. Oldenburg promised to keep Hartlib’s recipe a secret and asked him to do the same with this one: “communicate it to none, but noble Mr Boyle, who, I am sure, upon my desire will impart it to none but MyLady Ranalaugh, which is a person, that can keep a secret as well, as any I know.”15 The letter contains an enclosure entitled “Processus in opere philosophico Vitriolis. For Mr Hartlib,” which translates as “the method in the philosophical work of vitriol.”16

120

•

Chapter Five

What follows is a sophisticated chemical procedure in Latin that Oldenburg obtained from an unnamed source. This chemical process was carried out over several months; Oldenburg detailed each step with technical language (such as “cucurbit” and “phial,” which are types of vessels) and assumed his readers’ understanding of standard chemical procedures, including distillation and creating a hermetical seal. The trial walks through the process of spagyria (by which a material is separated into its component principles and then recombined into a more purified, active form) and included the Paracelsian tria prima (sulphur, mercury, and salt) as key ingredients. At the conclusion of the trial, Oldenburg quoted his anonymous source as having said, “I took one grain of it [the final substance] and projected it upon an ounce and a quarter of mercury, which I changed into the purest silver. . . . It did not yet perform the work of the red tincture since it only changed mercury and lead into silver although (after parting) three grains of gold appeared in the silver.”17 Oldenburg was in Paris with Richard Jones, Ranelagh’s son, when he composed this letter, and the contents are typical of others sent to Boyle and Hartlib from this period, all of which were preoccupied with chemical recipes and procedures, as well as with Oldenburg’s accounts of meetings he had with esteemed European intellectuals.18 His reference to Ranelagh as one who can “keep a secret as well, as any I know,” also suggests he had previously communicated secrets to her.19 The enclosed chemical process is entirely in Latin, revealing Oldenburg’s assumption that Ranelagh could read Latin. He was not alone in thinking this: one of John Beale’s letters to Ranelagh the following year also had Latin biblical quotations casually interspersed throughout it.20 Such exchanges suggest that by 1659, ten years into her chemical experimentation, Lady Ranelagh’s interest in chemistry reached beyond the practical applications associated with a housewife’s domestic duties, which often include the processes of sublimation, fermentation, calcination, and distillation required for making medicines, foodstuffs, and sugar-craft preparations.21 Chemistry had long been thought a practical discipline and often had feminine associations; consequently, many of the experimental philosophers of the 1650s and 1660s attempted to elevate their work by disassociating it from the commonplace work of others. In his most famous work, The Sceptical Chymist (1661), Boyle offered a hierarchy of

Death of the Hartlib Circle and Birth of the Royal Society

•

121

chemical practitioners, admitting that he did not look “with the same eyes on the opinions or performances of vulgar Chymists, and Chemical Philosophers.”22 In 1653, Benjamin Worsley confessed to Hartlib, “I have laid all considerations in chemistry aside, as things not reaching much above laborants, or strong-water distillers, unless we can arrive at this key” (an alchemical reference to discerning the radical dissolution of minerals and metals).23 John Beale made reference to “the vulgar Art of Lady-Chymistry” in a letter to Hartlib from March 1659, clearly distinguishing between the experimental methods of the virtuosi and the more practical applications of the subject often done by women.24 Interestingly, this was the same month in which he encouraged Ranelagh’s experimentation with the telescope— another scientific endeavor not considered suited to women and thereby positioning her as an exception. Ranelagh’s extraordinary intellect and piety, both acknowledged in equal proportions by fellow members of the Hartlib circle, allowed her to overstep traditional gender boundaries to pursue more typically masculine branches of natural philosophy that were more theoretical and experimental, sharing with other philosophers and virtuosi in their broad exploration of nature to reveal God’s message. Like other reformers associated with the Hartlib circle, Lady Ranelagh still considered experimental chemistry a part of her agenda in 1659. She was no longer making prophetic statements about the Second Coming of Christ, as that opportunity and the dates of the supposed new millennium had passed; but she did maintain an intellectual interest in the branches of natural philosophy that the circle initially linked to societal improvement and a greater understanding of what they perceived to be God’s grand design. However, as the disorganization of her country dragged on, Ranelagh began losing hope. The future of England’s political and legal structure was uncertain in May 1659, as Richard Cromwell resigned from the Protectorate and handed power to the Rump Parliament. Such turmoil would once again affect her and her family personally, but it also had national implications for the projects she endorsed. Ranelagh had discussed legal reform with Sir Cheney Culpeper a decade earlier, and now she worked with other members of her correspondence network to revisit the subject within the new political climate. Less than a week after Richard Cromwell resigned, Hartlib mentioned to Boyle that he had “large letters” from John Beale

122

•

Chapter Five

“concerning the reformation of English laws and lawyers” that Boyle’s “excellent sister” had requested.25 The letters are no longer extant, but Beale and Ranelagh collaborated on this “argument” at a time of rapid and unpredictable change.26 This period of turmoil left Ranelagh feeling disillusioned about the direction in which England was headed. In January 1660, Ranelagh lamented to Samuel Hartlib about the “disappointment, division, poverty, shame and confusion” she witnessed in “men’s spirits.”27 Still, she found it necessary to continue promoting one of the primary goals of the Hartlib circle: the advancement of learning. One day in January of 1660, she told Hartlib that she expected to hold a meeting at her house later that day, where she would be joined by the mathematician Robert Wood, the economist William Potter, her brother Robert Boyle, and “another ingenious person, in order to the carrying on of that work (Education of Children).”28 Robert Wood had been associated with Durham College (popularly known as Oliver Cromwell’s College): an institution modeled on Eton that offered an alternative curriculum to the one offered by the established universities, and which lost support after the death of Oliver Cromwell.29 Unlike Ranelagh’s work with Dorothy Moore on educational reformation in the 1640s, which specifically addressed female students, the source wherein the brief quotation above originates does not elaborate on whether girls would also be included in this proposal.30 While Ranelagh acknowledged that some of her contemporaries may have thought focusing on children’s education was not particularly important, she advocated that educated children would lead to a generation of intelligent and moral adults. Reflecting on the present poor state of the nation, she argued, “If in the beginning of our professions to a reformation in these last 18 years we had fallen to this practice, and paid as many schoolmasters as we have done military officers . . . we had by this time reaped better fruits of our labours and expences.”31 Like Comenius, John Dury, and Hartlib himself, Ranelagh firmly believed education could engender social change. When the monarchy was peacefully restored in May 1660, most English people breathed a sigh of relief and celebrations filled London. Some even explained the unlikely event in providential terms.32 After twenty years of political division, war, and uncertainty, Charles II returned from over

Death of the Hartlib Circle and Birth of the Royal Society

•

123

a decade of foreign exile to rule the country that had publicly beheaded his father in 1649. The new English monarchy and government aimed to heal the fractured kingdom while also ensuring that the past would not repeat itself. However, this national stability as well as many of the laws that followed— particularly the enforcement of religious uniformity— eventually diminished the reformers’ hopes of instilling a socioreligious utopia in England and led to the disintegration of many radical groups once prominent during the interregnum. This religiopolitical shift led many members of the Hartlib circle to focus more and more on discussions of religion, expressing a mixture of concern and hope for what would follow under the leadership of the new king. John Beale initiated several theological treatises and debates during these first few months, when Charles II suggested a willingness to grant some liberty of conscience, allowing individuals the freedom to follow their own religious and ethical beliefs. Over August and September 1660, Lady Ranelagh, Robert Boyle, Benjamin Worsley, and Samuel Hartlib exchanged letters and treatises regarding what the reformed Church might look like and debated which congregations should be included. Though Ranelagh’s responses are no longer extant, Beale asked her to “interrogate” his complex argument, which was based on the Apostles’ Creed and quoted heavily from the scriptures in Latin, assuming she could engage with this language.33 Further, over 1660 and 1661, Robert Boyle encouraged Thomas Barlow, John Dury, and Peter Pett to write essays that would contribute to the debate on liberty of conscience— a topic that also greatly concerned his sister.34 The more formalized “Royal Society for Improving Natural Knowledge” was founded in London in November 1660, though it was not granted a royal charter until July 1662. Similar academies were being founded across Western Europe, first in Italy, then in Germany and France.35 The original proposal for the Royal Society professed an attachment to the Baconian openness and empirical organization of knowledge popular in the Hartlib circle over the previous two decades, but the society explicitly avoided sectarian and political dimensions that had fractured the country during the civil wars and interregnum.36 Although many fellows who had been involved in educational and entrepreneurial projects did bring these to the new society, historians have debated the extent to which Restoration nat-

124

•

Chapter Five

ural philosophers sought to distance themselves from their interregnum forerunners. No matter the likenesses, there were certainly more formalities required to join the Royal Society than there were to be part of the Hartlib circle. Hartlibians were an eclectic self-selecting group of interested individuals with no official membership structure. By contrast, one had to be elected a fellow of the Royal Society in order to participate. From the start the society was socially selective, with few merchants, even fewer tradesmen, and no women elected. To some extent, the exclusivity was due to the annual subscription rate of £2.12.0 per year, which would have been beyond the means of a craftsman, technician, seaman, or applied mathematician. Still, those men who were elected were not necessarily chosen for their interest in or knowledge of natural philosophy; many other criteria, including court connections and financial contributions, might have lain behind their nomination. The budding society was also anxious to enroll as many powerful individuals and aristocrats as possible to secure a respectable reputation for the new philosophy.37 While today it may seem strange to think that some natural philosophers contested the idea that observation and experiment could reveal matters of fact, many philosophers— including Thomas Hobbes and Margaret Cavendish, among others— challenged the new science. These critics disputed the philosophical foundation on which the new science rested and questioned the reliability of witnessing based on the limits of human understanding of nature.38 Among the twelve men known as founder fellows of the Royal Society were four members of the Hartlib circle: Robert Boyle, Sir William Petty, Theodore Haak, and John Wilkins. Several associates of the Hartlib circle also joined the Royal Society within its first few years, including Henry Oldenburg, John Beale, John Wallis, John Winthrop Jr., and Sir Kenelm Digby.39 Lady Ranelagh’s only son, Richard Jones, became a fellow in 1663.40 The push to increase the prestige of experimental philosophy meant a decrease in the diversity of experimenters. While women had previously been able to participate in informal scientific circles, across Europe they were excluded from membership of these new societies. It is this moment in the seventeenth century, when science became “institutionalized,” that Londa Schiebinger has identified as the “turning point” when women were excluded from the field, sparking a new wave of twentieth-century

Death of the Hartlib Circle and Birth of the Royal Society

•

125

feminist criticism in the history of science.41 However, recent research has suggested that the transition and professionalization which ultimately excluded women and decreased diversity among experimenters actually took place over a much longer period, and that it was not directly related to the founding of the Royal Society. Though women did not participate in formal academies, just as they did not (apart from the very rare exception) attend universities, they did continue preparing medicines, perfecting chemical techniques, writing about and debating the latest philosophies, and testing new instruments, all by using the household as the primary place of experiment and learning.42 Though Lady Ranelagh was well respected in several overlapping intellectual networks of the previous two decades, and though she was connected to the Royal Society through family and friends, she was not involved with the society in any formal way. One could argue that there is no reason she should not have been elected to the Royal Society except that she was a woman, and that this is perhaps the first direct evidence of a gendered limitation to her ability to practice natural philosophy to the fullest possible extent. While no one in the Hartlib circle had discriminated against her and many had actively sought her opinion on various subjects, those Hartlibians who became fellows of the Royal Society (apparently) did not propose her for election. At first glance, this seems to fit the “big picture” model of women’s exclusion after the foundation of male-only institutions. However, by positioning Ranelagh’s intellectual transition within a larger narrative of her life, we may craft a different story that grants her more agency, demonstrating how biography is a valuable methodological tool for historians.43 For starters, many male members of the Hartlib circle did not join the Royal Society. After the Restoration, those involved in intelligence networks such as the Hartlib circle could either seek election as fellows of the Royal Society, or work on natural philosophy in a more limited capacity outside the society. Many of the more adaptable, moderate members were happy to join the Royal Society. However, some of the more radical ones never showed an interest in joining, and others, such as Hartlib himself, appear to have been excluded.44 Thomas Sprat, the first official historian of the Royal Society, may have overstated his claims that the society spe-

126

•

Chapter Five

cifically avoided the Puritan “enthusiasm” of interregnum natural philosophy, but this sentiment, echoed by others, demonstrates the society’s desire during its early years to raise its reputation by distancing itself from revolutionary religious ideologies of the previous decade.45 Hartlib, Dury, and Worsley were radicals whose interest in natural philosophy was intrinsically linked with their plans for socioreligious reform, and their ambitions may have been too explicitly political for the fellows of the Royal Society, who sought stability during these early Restoration years. Mark Greengrass has pointed out that after the Restoration, Hartlib was “readily parodied as a fanatic and a ‘projector,’ someone seeking to make a quick fortune at the public expense.”46 Another example is John Dury, who lost his librarianship under Charles II and filed many petitions for funding that went unanswered; he left England early in 1661 and lived abroad for the rest of his life, continuing to write religious discourses from the Continent.47 While Benjamin Worsley continued working as secretary to the Council of Trade, he was unable to pursue elements of his more radical agenda for socioreligious reform, and his questionable reputation and lack of resources made him incompatible with the experimental sophistication of many of his contemporaries.48 Worsley never joined the Royal Society or the Royal College of Physicians, but he continued to pursue agricultural projects and began describing himself as a medical doctor.49 Lady Ranelagh clearly remained sympathetic to and maintained a relationship with these three spiritual allies from her visionary days in the interregnum. When Hartlib became ill and impoverished in 1661, Lady Ranelagh tried to secure for him financial assistance from the Crown, though he died shortly after, in March 1662.50 Ranelagh and Worsley also maintained a close friendship until he died in the autumn of 1677.51 Then, in 1678, when John Dury was ill and making provisions for his death (which would follow in two years), he noted, “I have let the Lady Ranelagh Dowager know the state of my Religious negotiation, & in what postur I desire to stand for the further persecution thereof,” confirming that the two remained close spiritual confidants until his death and that he entrusted her with great responsibility.52 Instead of joining the Royal Society, these reformers used their religious beliefs to shape new projects for social reform they saw as more appropriate to the country’s evolving social and political

Death of the Hartlib Circle and Birth of the Royal Society

•

127

climate. There also may have been an element of this spiritual righteousness in Ranelagh, who maintained a strong nonconformist Protestant conviction until her own death. Yet while Ranelagh maintained relationships with these men who did not join the Royal Society, she also had strong ties to many who did. The most obvious, of course, is her brother Robert Boyle, but also her son, Richard Jones, and her dear friend Henry Oldenburg, among others mentioned above. Indeed, when Oldenburg died shortly before Worsley in 1677, Ranelagh wrote to Boyle about the “remove of our true, honest, and ingenious friends,” revealing how friendships that began during the interregnum carried on despite some members joining the new formal societies and others not.53 An understanding of how such complexities functioned in the everyday lives of individuals suggests that the founding of the Royal Society and exclusion of women from science was not as black-and-white as earlier scholarship has made it out to be.54 While some members in Ranelagh’s network lost political power and influence after the Restoration, for others these grew, as we will see in the following chapters. Ranelagh herself knew how to employ social networks to her own benefit and how to maintain her own reputation as a devout woman and intellectual authority, learning to adapt to the new political climate the same as her fellow contemporaries, male and female, were doing. Though she was not a part of the Royal Society, Ranelagh assertively engaged with other political causes and intellectual projects throughout the Restoration, demonstrating that she was not a silent victim excluded from creating new knowledge and shaping public opinion. One of the high-profile cases she supported emerged just after the Conventicle Act, part of the Clarendon Code, went into effect in 1664. While the Clarendon Code was named after Ranelagh’s old friend Edward Hyde, who had been elevated to Earl of Clarendon and lord chancellor shortly after the Restoration, in reality Clarendon had been fighting against the harsh laws aimed at controlling nonconformists. Clarendon may have confided in Lady Ranelagh about national issues on their frequent visits in April 1664, only one month before this “Act to prevent and suppress Seditious Conventicles” would pass.55 The Conventicle Act prohibited religious congregations of more than five people unless they used the Anglican prayer book.

128

•

Chapter Five

As elements of the Clarendon Code were instituted, Ranelagh’s close relationship with Clarendon made her an obvious intermediary for nonconformists of diverse sects. This may be seen shortly after the act went into effect, when twelve General Baptists were imprisoned and charged with “a sentence of death & Confiscation . . . for but the suspicion of their haveing mett at a Conventicle.”56 The friends of the prisoners appealed to William Kiffin, one of the wealthiest and most influential Baptist figures in England until the 1690s, for help. Kiffin drafted a petition for Charles II, but he sought Clarendon’s advice and influence prior to taking it before the king. He tried first to connect with Clarendon at Worcester House, but when they missed each other, Kiffin went to Lady Ranelagh for help. She then wrote directly to Clarendon about this “sad story,” and informed him of Kiffin’s intentions to present a petition to the king. The level of Clarendon’s involvement after this point is unknown, but Kiffin was able to report directly to Charles II and obtained a reprieve for all twelve prisoners.57 As this example shows, Lady Ranelagh continued to intervene on contentious political issues after the Restoration by exploiting her personal connections and writing persuasive letters and treatises that would help those in need. The Restoration did not suppress the vivacity of her ambitions; it became a time when she used her piety and intellect to promote a more tolerant socioreligious environment for all, and her sympathies extended to Baptists. At the same time that Ranelagh increased her advocacy for the toleration of nonconformists, Robert Boyle continued developing his reputation as a natural philosopher. This is not to suggest he turned away from his interest in religion and improving society; indeed, he maintained these commitments throughout his life. However, he generally preferred to avoid the high-profile political cases in which Ranelagh engaged herself. Boyle had a talent for adapting to new environments, and he preferred to explore socioreligious questions with more meditative, intellectual reflection.58 He was still residing mostly in Oxford in the early 1660s. During this time he exchanged frequent letters with his sister, and she continued to encourage him to write more treatises. Though his only publication to date had been Hartlib’s anonymous printing of the tract “Invitation to a Free and Generous Communication of Secrets and Receipts in Physick,” in 1659 Boyle finally published his first book, Some Motives or Incentives to the Love of

Death of the Hartlib Circle and Birth of the Royal Society

•

129

God, commonly called Seraphic Love. His first scientific book, New Experiments Physico-Mechanical— which offered the results of experimental trials he conducted with the air pump he acquired in 1659— was published the following year.59 This series of events helped launch Robert Boyle’s professional career, and Ranelagh remained active in encouraging her brother to pursue his interest in natural philosophy. From this point onward, Ranelagh’s interest in natural philosophy appears to become even more entwined with her brother’s rather than independent from it. Across the Restoration, we mostly learn of Ranelagh’s interests in natural philosophy through Boyle’s letters and works. There are a number of reasons this may have been. First, it could be that Ranelagh continued corresponding with a wider network on topics of natural philosophy, but that these archives no longer exist. The Hartlib Papers archive stops after 1660, and the Restoration records for her and many of her correspondents are patchy. Second, it could be a sign that Ranelagh was adapting to the social conventions of new Restoration networks, which increasingly relied on print dissemination instead of manuscript circulation. Few elite women employed print for fear of damaging their reputations, but Ranelagh had the benefit of a brother who could print their shared ideas.60 While one should not extend this logic so far as to assume Ranelagh was behind all of Boyle’s print publications, one can find evidence of the siblings’ continued collaboration on Boyle’s works that concerned topics of interest to Ranelagh.61 With Ranelagh’s keen interest in the practical, social, and religious benefits of natural philosophy, it is no surprise that Robert Boyle drew on her expertise when composing volume 2, section 1 of Some Considerations Touching the Usefulnesse of Experimental Naturall Philosophy (1663), which focuses primarily on medical recipes. The “Theologicall Use of Naturall Filosophy” was a subject Boyle and Ranelagh had discussed as early as August 1649, when he was composing the treatise “Of the Study of the Book of Nature.”62 Though Usefulness was published in 1663, much of the writing dates from the previous decade, and large sections were sent to the printers in 1660 and 1661.63 Usefulness was Boyle’s first substantial publication articulating the religious value of the new experimental philosophy, and much of it focuses on practical medical applications. Dedicated to Ranelagh’s

130

•

Chapter Five

only son, Richard Jones (known in this publication as Pyrophilus), Usefulness contains many references to “that Excellent Person your Mother” or “a great and excellent Lady (a near Kinswoman, Pyrophilus, of yours and mine).”64 Boyle dedicated several works to his nephew in the early 1660s, including Certain Physiological Essays (1661) and Colours (1664).65 With such dedications, we can assume that brother and sister would have discussed the subject matter covered by these books as well as why such philosophical inspiration would have been important for helping to shape the young man. Jones had recently married coheiress Elizabeth Willoughby and returned as member of Parliament for Roscommon in Ireland, so he still offered some hope to his mother and uncle that he could secure himself a respectable future.66 In Usefulness, Boyle’s account of the herbal and chemical remedies Ranelagh endorsed corresponds with the diverse range of remedies found in her own letters, as well as the copy of her recipe book that survives in the British Library.67 He refers to her using several chemical remedies, including “Helmont’s Laudanum Opiatum,” “Sir Walter Raliegh’s Cordial,” and “Colcotharine Flowres.”68 Sir Walter Raleigh’s Cordial was a popular remedy circulating across the seventeenth century, so the reference does not suggest she got it directly from him; however, as we have already seen in chapter 1, Raleigh did know their father quite well, as the Great Earl bought Lismore Castle from Raleigh in 1602.69 Ranelagh’s esteemed medical reputation and frequent use of these innovative chemical remedies also allowed Boyle to invoke her name as a credible source when he tried justifying the usefulness of more dubious remedies. Before relating the benefits of “Juice of Horse-dung,” Boyle acknowledged that “there are not any Medicines to be taken into the Body, more cheap and contemptible then the Excrements of Men and Horses.”70 However, to support his position that this remedy had some virtue, he noted, “You, Pyrophilus, and I, know a great Lady, who though very neat, and very curious of her Health, and wont to have the attendance of the skilfullest Physitians, scruples not, upon occasion, to use as I have known her to do, in Silver Vessels, this homely Remedy, and prefer it to divers rich Cordials, and even to what some Chymists are pleas’d to call Essences or Elixirs.”71 Boyle used a similar strategy later when discussing sympathetic medicine, a contentious form of application that

Death of the Hartlib Circle and Birth of the Royal Society

•

131

cured by unknown means. Here he described Ranelagh as “very far from credulous” before explaining her success using a sympathetic medical remedy to cure jaundice.72 Throughout Usefulness of Natural Philosophy, Boyle also made frequent reference to the medical practice he shared with his sister, demonstrating that the two worked closely together even before they lived in the same house. Gilbert Burnet later noted that Boyle’s chemistry was “a Charity to others, as well as an Entertainment to himself, for the Produce of it was distributed by his Sister, and others, into whose hands he put it.”73 One noteworthy example can be found in her highly successful treatment of children suffering from rickets, which involved her distribution of a chemical remedy with which Boyle had been experimenting. Rickets, a softening of the bones now known to be caused by vitamin D deficiency, was considered a new disease in the seventeenth century. It had become a popular subject of study by English physicians trying to formulate therapies consistent with academic medical theories. One recent study of the disease, with a second edition just released in 1660, had used the new methodology of empirical trials, but the physician authors tied their findings on therapeutic cures to support traditional Galenic systems.74 By printing their own recommendations for rickets and using these to support the use of chemistry in medicine and the usefulness of the mechanical philosophy, the siblings were engaging in these contemporary medical debates. Boyle’s recommendation for rickets— his famed ens veneris, or “Colcotharian Flowers,” was a copper compound cryptically described first by van Helmont.75 The procedure involved many chemical techniques, including calcination and sublimation, which eventually produced a yellowish sublimate that Boyle advocated should be taken as a few grains dissolved in liquid and drunk at bedtime. Described as a “potent Specifick for the Rickets,” the remedy was used by Ranelagh, who “cur’d perhaps a hundred, or more, Children of that Disease, divers of who were look’d upon as in a desperate condition.”76 Boyle also reminded “Pyrophilus” that this “slight preparation of Colcothar” was “lately taught you, and presented Her by us; And by which (we having made and distributed, at Her desire, a considerable quantity of it) several other Persons have freed Children from that disfiguring Sickness.”77 This suggests that Boyle and his nephew taught the

132

•

Chapter Five

remedy to Ranelagh, and that she administered it directly to the sick. The following reference to them making and distributing more “at Her desire” also shows an ongoing partnership between the three, with shared responsibilities and roles. The fact that Richard Jones was collaborating with his mother and uncle on medical matters also demonstrates that Boyle and Ranelagh tried cultivating in him their experimental interests and charitable ambitions. Later Boyle gave further details on Ranelagh’s distribution of his ens veneris when referring to “an Excellent Person” who “cures the Rickets . . . by prescribing no other Remedy then the single use of the above describ’d Colcotharine Flowres, which I presented Her.”78 The phrase “Excellent Person” is a vague gender-neutral term, and it only becomes clear that he is referring to Lady Ranelagh through his additional note that he “presented it [to] Her.” As the dose could range anywhere from two or three grains to as many as thirty grains, depending on the patient’s body, administering it took a considerable amount of knowledge and responsibility. With the success Ranelagh witnessed, she returned to Boyle and requested that he make and distribute more of it. It is worth noting that while Ranelagh used it as a specific remedy to cure rickets, Boyle had suggested that ens veneris offered a host of other benefits, including an ability to cure “an invetterate headache.”79 Reports of its success intrigued the philosopher Anne Conway, who was desperate to ameliorate her own headaches: she borrowed a friend’s copy of Usefulness of Natural Philosophy in 1664 so she could read about the remedy, and later she asked her husband to procure some ens veneris from Boyle himself.80 These two pious intellectual women must have known of each other, but there is no direct evidence that they ever met, nor are there comments about each other in their extant letters. On Boyle’s long trips away from Oxford, he stayed in his sister’s new home on Pall Mall, and contemporaries sent mail for him to Ranelagh’s address there as early as January 1665.81 During this time— a period of significant change and conflict in the medical profession— the siblings explored and developed a shared theory and practice of medicine. While the College of Physicians was firmly in control in 1640, across the civil wars and interregnum the organization had to adopt a range of strategies to adapt to the changing political structure and to remain relevant. Empirical methods and chemical ingredients were clearly gaining popularity among both

Death of the Hartlib Circle and Birth of the Royal Society

•

133

patients and those in power. Even with the restoration of the monarchy in 1660 the college did not return to the comfortable position it held two decades earlier; instead, many members of Charles II’s court, and the king himself, supported methods introduced by the new philosophy. This resulted in an angry pamphlet war in the mid-1660s, with proponents of the old medical system defending themselves against attacks from chemical practitioners who aligned medicine with the new philosophy.82 While Boyle did not explicitly engage in the pamphlet war, he spent time in the mid-1660s further developing the theoretical foundation for, and practical applications of, the medical topics he recently explored in Usefulness of Natural Philosophy. Similar to her role in his earlier theoretical works, Ranelagh read these drafts and offered critical appraisal and encouragement. New anatomical discoveries and philosophical systems of thought were challenging the way people understood the body, and across Europe several competing ideas emerged. One of Boyle’s important contributions to the ongoing debate, The Origine of Forms and Qualities (1666), critiqued scholastic natural philosophy, which still relied on Aristotelian modes of inquiry. By contrast, Boyle offered a systematic theory of matter that argued for the benefits of the mechanical philosophy. While Aristotelian philosophy tried to define natural phenomena with convoluted explanations respecting elements, qualities, and forms, Boyle argued that the mechanical philosophy— which considered the world as a great machine and the components within it as consisting of matter in motion— offered a reasonable alternative. Though Origine of Forms was not published until 1666, he had a draft of it ready by summer 1665, which he discussed with Lady Ranelagh and Henry Oldenburg.83 In a letter dated July 29, 1665, Lady Ranelagh expressed her “satisfaction In heareing you had neere finished your treatise of, Substantial Formes.”84 She enthused that Boyle’s latest work: will yet soe much further Explicate your notion, of figures & texture as to help the considering part of mankind, to a cleerer prospect into this greate frame of the visible world, & therein of the power & wisedome of its great maker, than the rough draughts wherein it has heatherto been represented In the Ignorant & whole sale philosophie, that has soe long,

134

•

Chapter Five

by the power of an Implicite fayth in the Doctrine of Aristotle & the Schooles, gonn currant in the world, has ever binn able to assist them towards.85

Not only did Ranelagh endorse Boyle’s latest work on natural philosophy, but she also presented herself as someone who understood and agreed with the new mechanical philosophy. And she saw the practical benefits of his theories: Boyle would help the more inquisitive members of society better understand God and the world he made by replacing the oldfashioned, incorrect philosophical ideas that still dominated traditional education. In many ways, supporting Boyle’s work allowed Ranelagh to continue the natural philosophical agenda that she had promoted via manuscript circulation during the Hartlib circle’s active days; but now she encouraged her brother’s voracious use of print to reach a somewhat different and wider audience. While Ranelagh never published her own works, she remained an instigator and editorial force behind her brother’s publications. If natural philosophy could not lead to a social revolution in the way that she had hoped it could ten years earlier, perhaps Boyle’s theoretical endorsements of the mechanical philosophy could engender an intellectual shift that would allow humankind a better grasp and appreciation of God’s design. The quote also demonstrates Ranelagh’s understanding and promotion of the mechanical philosophy, as well as her comprehension of the Aristotelian mode being taught to male scholars. Because she herself didn’t publish on medicine— despite her strong opinions, elite reputation, and wide patient base— this quote provides evidence of her stance on the contemporary medical conflict. Possessing such knowledge also suggests she understood the philosophical underpinnings of her own experimentation with medical recipes and other forms of practical science, elevating her above some of the other chemical technicians and gentlewoman practitioners from whom Boyle sought to distance himself. Boyle never advocated for pure empiricism without grounding in philosophy, and this suggests Lady Ranelagh felt the same. Robert Boyle stayed with his sister on Pall Mall during the spring of 1667, and he was at the Royal Society in April 1667 when they hosted Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle, the first woman to formally visit

Death of the Hartlib Circle and Birth of the Royal Society

•

135

this male-only institution.86 Margaret Cavendish was unconventional in her complete disregard for piety and social norms, and among other works of fiction and poetry she published bold critiques of the new experimental philosophy.87 Walter Charleton, a fellow of the Royal Society, arranged for her visit after Cavendish indicated that she wanted to be invited, and Robert Boyle was asked to prepare an “entertainment” for her, which included a demonstration of the air pump and some chemical experiments. Cavendish made the event into a spectacle much like those described in her books: she kept the society, and her growing public audience, waiting as she arrived late, and then offered condescending approval of the experiments she witnessed.88 Being a dramatic public event, Cavendish’s visit, like Cavendish herself, was much discussed by contemporaries. Samuel Pepys noted in his diary around this time that he unexpectedly ran into Cavendish “with her coaches and footmen all in velvet,” and commented that “all the town-talk is now-a-days of her extravagancies.”89 Two weeks after Cavendish’s visit to the Royal Society, when London gossip was still dominated by talk of Cavendish, Ranelagh expressed her disapproval of the duchess’s immodesty in a scathing assessment sent to her brother, Lord Richard Burlington: “By al the Caracters I heare given her I am resolved she scapes Bedlam onely by being too rich to be sent theather but she is madd enough to convay the title to the place of her Residence, whose boldnes & profannes is allowed to pass for wit.”90 As a modest gentlewoman who carefully crafted an intellectual reputation grounded in piety, Ranelagh did not see an ally in Cavendish. Instead, this comment suggests she both disapproved of Cavendish’s ostentatious behavior and remained unimpressed by the intellectual quality of her arguments. Boyle was almost certainly a fellow critic, and he must have been one of the sources who commented to Ranelagh about Cavendish’s “character” at that meeting at the Royal Society earlier that month, suggesting that the two women had not met. However, such discussions between the siblings would have taken place in person since Boyle was staying at her house at this time, and so no archival record remains. If judged solely by the written works left behind, neither sibling appears to have spent much time thinking about Cavendish outside of this isolated event.

136

•

Chapter Five

The juxtaposition of Lady Ranelagh and Margaret Cavendish highlights two extreme choices available to elite Englishwomen interested in natural philosophy in the latter half of the seventeenth century. While Cavendish may be better remembered today than Ranelagh is, and while many feminist scholars may use Cavendish’s compelling biography and bold writings to support an argument for female exclusion from the sciences, or women’s critiques of the new experimental philosophy, it is important to remember that Cavendish was an eccentric exception who cannot be seen to represent early modern women more generally. Instead, as the case of Lady Ranelagh shows, pious intellectual women were still able to effect social and intellectual change without damaging their reputations by holding meetings in their houses, circulating works in manuscript, composing persuasive letters, and promoting the publications of men. Women generally did not perceive this be a limitation; rather, it helped them conform to the modesty they sought as pious Christians. National laws and social conventions also reinforced gendered virtues and created cultural norms for women that may seem strange or exclusionary to us today. But just as women’s reputations could be damaged by accusations of sexual promiscuity, the opposite was also true: women could wield intellectual power by developing honorable reputations.91 Though Ranelagh chose not to publish original works and did not participate in the Royal Society, she should not be seen as someone who shied away from the public sphere. Many of her activities after the Restoration were still public, such as involving herself in controversial, high-profile political cases. By harnessing the influential connections she had established in previous decades, Ranelagh advocated for social improvements and the toleration of religious nonconformists, just as she had during her time in the Hartlib circle— only now, her strategy for doing so depended less on organized knowledge and experimental philosophy. As Robert Boyle’s reputation continued to grow in this new community, Ranelagh supported and promoted her brother to develop further the methods of inquiry and experimentation with which he had fallen in love. Ranelagh and Boyle would continue to complement each other, sharing intellectual and religious ambitions but allowing one or the other to take the public lead when appropriate.

6

Plague, Providence, and Medical Practice (1665– 67)

A

cross 1665 and 1666, London experienced a series of significant manmade and natural disasters that destroyed lives, rocked national stability, and invoked in many a fear of God and a distrust of the nation’s governing bodies. The trouble began around April 1665, when the worst plague outbreak in England since 1348 began taking over the country. During the warm summer months, the disease spread with alacrity and peaked in September, when it was claiming the lives of roughly eight thousand people per week. The overcrowded city of London was hit the hardest, losing an estimated 15 percent of its population before the disease finally tapered off in 1666. Like many Londoners, Lady Ranelagh took her children and fled the city sometime before July 29, 1665, just as the disease picked up its pace. She found some relief with her younger sister Mary Rich, Countess of Warwick, about forty miles outside of London in Leez Priory, a Tudor mansion in Essex. Ladies Warwick and Ranelagh had always maintained an intimate relationship throughout their lives, and Warwick’s diaries often note her participation in medical and spiritual activities with her “sister friend” Ranelagh.1 By September 1665, when her brother Burlington said he might leave Ireland for London, Ranelagh tried to persuade him not to because England— particularly London— was in a state of crisis. She warned him of “the dreadful spreading of that infection from London that is there more distructive than any Plauge ever was before.”2 Thankfully, her own escape to Leez Priory protected the health of

138

•

Chapter Six

her whole family, as she reports that the plague was always at least four or five miles away.3 She stayed away from London until at least January of the following year, but she may have stayed longer.4 The spreading of the epidemic meant that the Boyle family became even more dispersed than usual, and Lady Ranelagh, who was acting as the matriarch for both her immediate and extended family, found it increasingly difficult to communicate with her siblings, whose well-being she felt obliged to oversee. Her letters shifted from displaying hints of anxiety to exposing near desperation as she attempted to learn about her brothers’ health. One letter she wrote to Burlington complained of low paper stock due to an increase of the disease in London, and another explained that postal delivery was slower than usual because she missed the messenger on the “safe” route.5 But her greatest worry was for the safety of Robert Boyle, with whom she briefly lost contact due to postal complications and his own relocation. In November 1665, she wrote Boyle a letter that began with a forceful and elaborate plea for him to respond to her, as she didn’t know if he had left Oxford and was worried about his health. She lamented, “I have not therefore sat still under this unsatisfaction, but have twice or thrice wrote to you, by the way of London, not having had any opportunity in that time to send to you more directly from hence, till now Mr. Jessop’s going to Oxford gives me this.”6 Isolated at Leez with few other intellectuals around, Ranelagh read Boyle’s books as a source of company and stimulation: “To repair to myself, your absence, as much as I can . . . I entertain myself with your books,” which she also started lending to the “few studious persons” she met while at Leez.7 While these letters to Boyle and Burlington both include a forceful maternal plea for her brothers to take care of themselves and keep her abreast of their travels, those written to Boyle are more elaborate and emotional. Further, she frequently integrates into Boyle’s letters an investment in her younger brother’s spiritual and physical well-being with a concern for his intellectual growth and satisfaction, demonstrating their sustained emotional and philosophical bond. Although the plague personally affected Lady Ranelagh, she also engaged with it intellectually, commenting extensively on the political and religious consequences she witnessed. Even before the outbreak, Ranelagh had joined a growing contingent of society that was disappointed by what

Plague, Providence, and Medical Practice

•

139

they interpreted as the king’s immorality, which they believed promoted a culture of extravagance and enjoyment. Charles II had married the Infanta of Portugal, Catherine of Braganza, on May 22, 1662, but he publicly continued his affair with the married Barbara Palmer, Countess of Castlemaine. Further, while the peaceful Restoration of the monarchy had appeared a joyous public event, it very quickly resulted in the country steeping itself in hostility toward those with alternative religious views. In August 1662, the Act of Uniformity officially sanctioned the provisions that had been brewing for the past two years by overly simplifying the country’s religious divisions into two camps— conformists and nonconformists. Laws such as the Elizabethan Act against Conventicles, which punished nonconformists with imprisonment that could result in death or banishment if the parties did not conform after three months, were enforced in unprecedented ways.8 As discussed in the previous chapter, Ranelagh remained close to the action, becoming involved in a high-profile case of 1664 to negotiate the release of twelve General Baptists who were sentenced to death.9 Within this environment, Ranelagh dedicated herself to improving conditions for fellow nonconformists as she continued practicing medicine and distributing remedies— a form of natural philosophy that benefited the public directly. Despite her strong opinions, Lady Ranelagh continued to associate with many Royalists after the Restoration and had enough influential Royalist connections to maintain a persuasive position. Her old friend Lord John Berkeley, a faithful Royalist throughout the English Civil Wars and interregnum, was rewarded with places as lord commissioner of the admiralty and lord president of Connaught, in Ireland.10 Her brothers also secured comfortable positions: in particular, Richard Boyle, Earl of Cork, who had also remained a Royalist throughout the civil wars and interregnum, was appointed lord treasurer in Ireland in 1661 and received the English Earldom of Burlington in 1665.11 Her other brother, Lord Broghill, was favored by Charles II at the beginning of his reign, receiving the Irish Earldom of Orrery in September 1660.12 Robert Boyle declared his allegiance to the new monarchy in June 1660 and was kindly received by many of its most prominent members, including the lord chancellor and the lord high treasurer. Later that year, he was appointed to the newly formed Council

140

•

Chapter Six

for Foreign Plantations.13 Yet Ranelagh’s most important relationship was with that of her old friend Edward Hyde, who became lord chancellor and Earl of Clarendon, enjoying a position of high influence in the early years of Charles II’s reign. Charles I had nominated Hyde to care for his young son, and almost twenty years later Hyde’s loyalty was rewarded. While Ranelagh maintained close relationships with these influential men, she was not intimate with the royal family and tried to distance herself from the court as much as possible. In a letter to her sister-in-law the Countess of Orrery, she apologized for not having written earlier, explaining that she had “binn taken up in an Imploymt very extraordinary to me.”14 This extraordinary employment was “wayteing upon hir Majesty who was pleased to persue me with much repeated gracious quarelings at my not comeing to pay hir that duty & soe many invitations to come that to fence my self from great rudeness to=wards hir to whome I owe so much defference I went that day & could not get home til late.”15 As we know, Ranelagh was never fond of life at court, demonstrated early on by her having previously persuaded the then-teenage Robert Boyle to avoid the court of Charles I for fear that he would be “exposed to the manifold & great temptations of a Court.”16 With Charles II’s licentiousness and extravagance, Ranelagh’s moralistic lifestyle would have been even less suited to this court than the previous one. With the imprisonment of nonconformists and the spreading of the plague, many peaceful individuals were trapped in overcrowded and unsanitary conditions in the mid-1660s. While their family and friends were able to flee the city, these people were left behind as the plague rapidly spread and claimed the lives of those surrounding them. It is probably in 1665 when Ranelagh composed her only extant manuscript treatise, “Discourse Concerning the Plague,” which exists in a fair copy in her hand in a volume of the Boyle Papers held in the Royal Society Library. The contents page, likely written by one of Boyle’s secretaries, calls it “The Plague of London from the Hand of God”— an apt title summarizing the providential theme in this treatise and across Ranelagh’s family correspondence on the topic.17 Probably intended for private circulation, the “Discourse” offers an intelligent and impassioned plea for the toleration of nonconformists during the epidemic. Ranelagh positioned herself in direct oppo-

Plague, Providence, and Medical Practice

•

141

sition to the Conventicle Act of 1664, which imprisoned nonconformists holding illegal religious meetings. She argued that these overcrowded, plague-infested prisons “were murdering holes to those whose offences are meeteing together to pray.”18 The treatise offers a sophisticated reading of conflicts between secular law and the law of God as understood by an individual’s conscience.19 Though Ranelagh never appears to have left the Church of England, she maintained relationships with prominent nonconformists, advocated for liberty of conscience, and attended some illegal conventicles.20 In the treatise she used the scriptures affirmed by the Church of England and presented herself to her readers as a fellow Anglican to stress the similarities between conformists and nonconformists.21 The treatise further develops some of the ideas Ranelagh held in the previous decade, such as the need for a Protestant union based on the similarities between the different churches.22 It is unknown how widely Ranelagh’s manuscript circulated or if additional copies were made. However, her personal contact with Clarendon would have been a natural starting point, as they were in regular correspondence at this time and she had previously appealed to him on common grounds when she strove to bring about a peaceful conclusion to the civil war in 1644.23 It is worth noting that Boyle also became interested in liberty of conscience after the Restoration, when he persuaded John Dury and Peter Pett to publish pieces on the subject.24 Such work may have been inspired or influenced by his sister’s passion for and knowledge of the issue. The minister Benjamin Denham wrote to Boyle in 1667 to say that he visited Lady Ranelagh on a few occasions and that he had “received from her mouth, more Religious discourses in one halfe houre, then I have done with some Bishops table in ten.”25 He went on to admit to Boyle that Ranelagh had “cleerely made mee of her mind, That Relaxing Somewhat of the Penal lawes to Some sober non Conformists, whod not drive but bring them to Church, or at last to a sober Condescention.”26 Liberty of conscience and religious toleration across the Protestant spectrum was a life project for which she consistently leveraged her own power and influence.27 The sudden and inexplicable mass deaths across the country caused many— including Ranelagh— to reflect on the wrath of God, viewing the epidemic as a divine judgment against humanity. Ranelagh had previously

142

•

Chapter Six

expressed providential and millenarian thoughts when she was active with the Hartlib circle, and her dissatisfaction with her country’s actions both before and during the plague led her to believe this was God’s punishment to humankind.28 Regarding the subject of “the great Judgment now in this nation,” she turned to Robert Boyle in July 1665, requesting that he publish more spiritual works because “the general feare struck by this Plauge into al sorts of people, does surely prepare the harts wherein it lodges with less resistance to heare of a God & the things of another life than before that preparation they would have binn apt to have heard them with.”29 Earlier that year, Boyle had published an edition of spiritual reflections (which he had originally composed in the late 1640s but only published now) and Ranelagh suggests here that she wanted more publications like this. Entitled Occasional Reflections upon Several Subjects, it was dedicated to Lady Ranelagh. Using the sobriquet “Sophronia” to associate her with the Greek words for “temperance” and “wisdom,” he noted that he was publishing “the trifles you called for” because of her encouragement.30 When the book met with some criticism, Boyle would not reveal the name of the critic to Ranelagh for fear that it would suggest she was not so “Competent a Judg.”31 However, Ranelagh herself dismissed the critique and celebrated Occasional Reflections, requesting that Boyle compose more spiritual works to help repair society’s weak state. Though she chose to circulate her own theological treatises via scribal publication, she saw the benefits of Boyle using the printing press and must have recognized the weight his name carried by the mid-1660s. A second edition of the book was issued in 1669 with the same text as the first edition, but with corrected pagination.32 While Boyle’s dedication honored Ranelagh’s piety, he also admired her intelligence and talent for writing. The manner in which he did so is revealing and worth considering here in the context of her larger biography. Noting that Sophronia is “so great a Mistress of . . . Wit, and Eloquence,” Boyle added (approvingly) that she “might, if her Modesty did less confine her Pen to Excellent Letters, both make the Wits of our Sex envy a Writer of Hers.”33 As we have seen at several points in her life so far, Ranelagh’s preferred genre was the letter. Whether she was writing a political letter directly to the king’s sister with the hope of ending civil war or participating in a larger letter-writing network that was grappling with the larger

Plague, Providence, and Medical Practice

•

143

Figure 7 Robert Boyle’s dedication to his sister Ranelagh, known here as “Sophronia,” in Occasional Reflections upon Several Subjects, 1665. (Courtesy of Science History Institute.)

philosophical issues shaping their collective imagination, Ranelagh used letters to effect public change. However, as Boyle says, Ranelagh chose to protect her “Modesty” by “confin[ing] her Pen to Excellent Letters.” She experimented with a few manuscript treatises that extended beyond the letter, but also circulated these within selective manuscript coteries instead of entering the print publication market. Boyle, as a man, did not have to worry about protecting his modesty in the same manner as his sister.34 While the choice to print in the late seventeenth century was fraught with issues of credibility and piracy that should not be ignored, it still provided

144

•

Chapter Six

opportunities to Ranelagh’s male friends and family members.35 Henry Oldenburg began editing the Royal Society’s new journal Philosophical Transactions just as printed books allowed Robert Boyle to reach audiences he didn’t already know personally. Publications like the Transactions— which was launched the year Boyle stated his sister preferred manuscript letters— would become increasingly important to the new science. It began as a way of disseminating varied news to a wider community, similar to what Oldenburg witnessed and participated in with the Hartlib circle. Yet edited versions of letters or summaries of experiments performed in these exclusive spaces would eventually make the Philosophical Transactions the place to lay claims on new knowledge.36 Scholars of women in the history of science have pointed to the development of institutions like the Royal Society as closing the door on women, but less has been said about how the increasing emphasis on print to formalize knowledge claims also eliminated women from many conversations. The Republic of Letters would continue to have an intellectual impact well into the eighteenth century, and Ranelagh herself would continue to leverage letters for powerful means, as we shall see. However, Boyle’s timely comment about his sister’s writing preferences points to one way in which the siblings would experience and shape their changing society in different manners due to gender. But we are getting ahead of ourselves a bit. By September 1665, Ranelagh was less optimistic that the plague would spark spiritual change in her society. She wrote to Burlington about a servant who used to say that, through their current actions, society was going to bring about some terrible judgment from God. She then lamented that she found “that opinnion too sadly confirmed by effects this being but a begining of many other myseries that wilbe the natureal consequences thereof unless it have a speedy stop put to it. which we apeare not at al in the way of getting donn.”37 The plague decreased a bit by winter, and in January 1666 she told Burlington that “when it has pleased god to make soe great an abatement of the Plauge at London,” she planned to return there. However, she noted that she would do so more happily if “we were like to doe soe reformed at the rate we ought to be for having had soe distructive a judgement amongst us.”38 Unfortunately, God’s providential message appeared to have been lost on the great majority. She found little change in those who had “binn soe Mercyful pre-

Plague, Providence, and Medical Practice

•

145

served both in our persons & famelly from faling under the stroake of it.”39 As such, these survivors should return to their abandoned homes “with just feares that yet worse things wil come upon us.”40 Ranelagh returned to London at some point in the winter or early spring of 1666, when the plague began to abate. The frequency with which Ranelagh linked social commentary with providential language suggests she saw her primary responsibility during the plague as helping society spiritually, but not necessarily medically— an objective that helps us understand why she may have fled London rather than stay to assist the sick. This conjecture is further confirmed by her own manuscript discourse and promotion of Boyle’s Occasional Reflections. Given her interest in medicine and her passion for helping society, her favoring of spiritual health over physical wellness may seem odd. However, her action— in this case, leaving London— was not at all uncommon. Unless one had a civic mandate to stay in the city (such as the magistrates and clergy), early moderns of most Protestant religious sects generally agreed that fleeing the city was essential for guarding themselves against illness. Certainly women of her social status would have left London, and even many physicians fled. In protecting themselves from the plague, Londoners were fulfilling their Christian duty to preserve life, which was a gift from God.41 Medical advice publications assumed most individuals, especially the poor, would care for themselves during an epidemic, just as they had done before the time of crisis. Most early modern manuscript recipe books also contain household remedies to treat those affected, reflecting the domestic role of prevention and treatment. The copy of Ranelagh’s recipe book in the British Library includes an herbal drink for the plague, but it is not among the more popular diseases for which she collected treatments, possibly because she was fortunate enough to have escaped needing one for herself or her family.42 While Lady Ranelagh’s response to plague was typical, some of the more radical chemical physicians in her network did stay behind in London. They attempted to use the plague as a means for demonstrating the effectiveness of their chemical medicines at the expense of the Galenic tradition, which they hoped to expose as ineffective and uncharitable. The consequence, however, was that many of these revolutionaries— including

146

•

Chapter Six

many members of the Society of Chemical Physicians— died of the plague, probably resulting in greater harm than good for the chemical medical revolution.43 Though Ranelagh had previously worked with individuals associated with the proposed Society of Chemical Physicians, including William Rand, she (similar to her brother Robert) did not join those in that wider network, such as George Starkey, who turned the plague into a political opportunity to champion chemical medicine.44 The plague slowed down in the early spring of 1666, and people began cautiously returning to London. Despite the smaller numbers of chemical physicians due to significant loss during the plague, the medical pamphlet war continued. However, the chemical physicians were now clearly on the defensive.45 Though Ranelagh was not an active medical practitioner during the plague, her passion for medicine certainly had not declined. As we saw in the previous chapter, she was critiquing Aristotelian philosophy in the summer of 1665 and helped Boyle usher his bold endorsement of the mechanical philosophy, The Origine of Forms and Qualities, into publication the following year. Shortly after her return to London once the plague subsided, she joined a growing group of both learned and celebrity contemporaries taking interest in the famous Irish “stroker,” Valentine Greatrakes, who reputedly cured patients just by touching them. Greatrakes was from the same part of southern Ireland as the Boyle family, and in August 1665 he was already described as being “particularly aquainted” with her brother Roger Boyle, Earl of Orrery. It was in January 1666, at the height of his popularity in Ireland, when Greatrakes accepted an invitation to travel to England to attempt to cure Lady Anne Conway of her chronic, debilitating migraines. While he did not succeed in her case, he reportedly healed hundreds of others around Ragley Hall in Warwickshire, quickly becoming a celebrity and attracting the attention of many influential scholars.46 Similar to Conway’s request for Boyle’s ens veneris, the Greatrakes event also suggests Conway’s network overlapped with Lady Ranelagh’s in the mid-1660s.47 Boyle and Ranelagh were both interested in the debate surrounding Greatrakes, which considered whether his healing powers derived from divine miracle or natural phenomena. In fact, in March 1666, Henry Stubbe implicated Boyle in the debate by dedicating to him a pamphlet on

Plague, Providence, and Medical Practice

•

147

Greatrakes which suggested that the latter’s rare ability could be explained both naturally and miraculously— an argument Boyle unhappily refuted by letter, though he may have never sent it.48 But Ranelagh herself had already hosted Greatrakes. Her Anglo-Irish connections and deep interest in religion and medicine made her house a natural hub for Greatrakes’s London visits in 1666. On March 5, 1666, the chemical physician Daniel Coxe wrote Boyle a lengthy letter, complaining, “My head is so full of proclamations Concerning Greatrix that I must necessarily vent them before I can reassume my Chimical Commerce.”49 Coxe had observed Greatrakes’s work in several locations around London by then, but he noted that the first time he ever saw Greatrakes performing cures was in Lady Ranelagh’s house. This is the earliest dated reference connecting Lady Ranelagh and Coxe; they would continue to strengthen their intellectual partnership. Only a few people were actually touched by Greatrakes on this particular occasion, and only Ranelagh’s brother-in-law, Charles Rich, Earl of Warwick, “seem’d to bee Considerably relieved on his stroaking expecially in his upper parts.”50 Then, in April 1666, while Boyle was staying at Lady Ranelagh’s London house on his extended stay away from Oxford, Greatrakes returned to offer more trials. Boyle recorded the events that transpired there in his workdiaries from April 6 to 16, 1666. “My Sister R.” is named as one of Boyle’s reliable witnesses, along with Dr. Sydenham, Dr. Whichcote, and Dr. Fairclough.51 Not only does the diary demonstrate that Ranelagh’s house was the intellectual hub for these events, but it also offers a rare glimpse into the household and the role of her servants. On Easter Day, Boyle reported that everyone was about to sit down for supper when they noticed Ranelagh’s youngest daughter, Frances, was missing. Ranelagh asked why Frances did not come down and learned from Mrs. Margaret Manning (presumably one of the servants or the lead woman at the time) that Frances had a violent headache. Boyle suggested that she should try Greatrakes’s stroking cure, which she did. Frances later reported finding relief from her headache, but complained that it left her feeling “very giddy.”52 While we cannot discern Ranelagh’s reaction to Greatrake’s methods (we learn of her involvement in this esteemed intellectual network only through references to her in the extant letters and workdiaries of male friends and family mem-

148

•

Chapter Six

bers), we can safely assume she would have contributed to these vibrant debates based on her extant examinations of similar phenomena and the use of her daughter as a test subject. However, as the conversations took place within her house, there is no archival record of this. Later that year, on September 2, another catastrophe hit London. A fire started in the house of the king’s baker on Pudding Lane, near London Bridge. It raged for days, with the wind carrying it through London’s tightly packed streets. By September 6, 1666, the fire was finally extinguished, but it is estimated to have burned around 13,200 houses, eighty-four churches, and forty-four company halls. While only four people were officially killed by the fire, approximately a hundred thousand people were left homeless— an estimated one-sixth of London’s population. With Ranelagh’s disappointment that the plague had not spiritually transformed her country, it is not surprising that she saw the Great Fire of London as God’s further punishment of the nation’s iniquities. She wrote a letter to Boyle about the fire a few days after it was extinguished, letting him know that they were all safe. She explained that she had “since taken to myself the mortification of seeing the desolutations, that God, in his just and dreadful judgement, has made in the poor city, which is thereby now turned indeed into a ruinous heap, and gave me the most amazing spectacle, that ever I beheld.” She found “poor families and persons . . . in the fields unhoused” and told her brother that she “dispensed [his] charity” to them. The form this charity took is not clear, but it shows the siblings sharing social responsibility and materials before they would physically move in together two years later. After relaying an update from her old Hartlibian friend Benjamin Worsley, the letter concluded: “All our news here are the sad stories of undone people, and of those we have great abundance, but scarcity enough of pity towards them, whose wants will increase, as the charity of those, that now relieve them, will tire.” She mentioned a possible short-term solution to make a “city of huts” and create work for poor tradesmen and laborers to keep them from being idle, as some (including her, it seems) feared that the time at leisure would make the displaced poor angrier and disorderly.53 The fire must have affected the Royal Society as well. When the lord mayor and the Court of Aldermen’s offices were burned, they took over Gresham College and asked the society to temporarily relocate. Ranelagh

Plague, Providence, and Medical Practice

•

149

delivered this update to her brother the same day as they held the council meeting, explaining that “Gresham college is now Guild-hall, and the Exchange and all.” She noted that, according to her “small observation[,] . . . if the philosophers and the citizens become one corporation, henceforward, it may be hoped our affairs may be better managed, than they have been, unless the citizens should prove the prevailing party, which, as the worst, it is most like to do in this world.”54 Ranelagh’s sarcastic and informed opinion demonstrates her continued hesitance to fully trust the general public as well as her disdain for those currently in political power. It also shows a respectful optimism for the country’s natural philosophers. While she was not intimately connected to the Royal Society in the same way she had been to the Hartlib circle, she certainly still respected it and found value in having leaders who were grounded in philosophical education. St. Paul’s Cathedral was among the many London buildings that were largely destroyed by the fire. In the process of its rebuilding, reports emerged that the body of a bishop, who had been buried there two hundred fifty years ago, was found and had not decayed. Upon learning about the event, Ranelagh wrote a technical description of the body to Boyle, explaining that the bishop had not been embalmed, but that his body was still intact, including his skin, tongue, and beard. Ranelagh probably heard the story from Henry Oldenburg— still a close friend even after he became busy as secretary of the Royal Society— because four days earlier, he had given a similar report on the bishop’s body to the Royal Society.55 Though not a fellow herself, Ranelagh’s exchanges with several fellows show that she still participated in some intellectual discussions that took place in the society. The particular curiosity of the bishop’s unspoiled remains must have also provoked her interest in the possibility of miracles and prophecies and how they relate to the human body, as is also suggested by her earlier interest in the cases of Sarah Wight and Valentine Greatrakes. As plague and fire destroyed London, the second Anglo– Dutch War was also being fought. Since March 1665, the English were vying for control over international trading routes and posts dominated by the Dutch. While England’s triumphant Battle of Lowestoft in mid-1665 resulted in national support for the king and the war, the following year of plague, fire, and rebellions in Scotland led to public criticism of lavish wartime

150

•

Chapter Six

expenses. Ranelagh’s series of letters to her brother Burlington spanning 1666 and 1667 documented the events, always offering detailed political reports laced with informed personal opinions. The source from which she gained her information is not clear, but at least once she noted that she learned about the intentions of the Dutch fleets and French king “from one who has good foraine intelligence.”56 While Ranelagh’s letters to Burlington were fully engaged with national and international issues, they were not devoid of personal news. Ranelagh had been instrumental in arranging a marriage for Burlington’s daughter, Henrietta, to the Earl of Clarendon’s son Laurence Hyde, later 1st Earl of Rochester. The Countess of Burlington kept in close contact with her sister-in-law during these negotiations, and she carefully noted Ranelagh’s meetings and advances in her diary until the marriage finally took place in June 1665.57 With his daughter married into the Clarendon household, Lord Burlington now had a personal interest in Clarendon’s reputation and position during 1666 and 1667, when Clarendon became the target of several accusations. As such, Ranelagh’s letters to her brother written during this fateful year detail Clarendon’s downfall by weaving together decisions made in Parliament, public opinion, and her own opinion about her close friend. Clarendon went from being one of the most powerful men in the country to suffering from impeachment and banishment within just a few years. He was an easy target for both the conservatives and the revolutionaries, and his tendency to be more sympathetic to Presbyterians than Catholics made his political views appear outdated by about twenty years. But in some ways, so were Ranelagh’s. Though the two certainly would have disagreed on some major political and religious matters, they both shared a critical view of Charles II’s immoral court and opposed many elements in the series of laws passed from 1661 to 1665 to suppress nonconformists.58 Ranelagh maintained her friendship with Clarendon until the end of his career, and whenever she was present in his household she gave Burlington familial updates on Henrietta’s well-being, noting that she was acting gracefully and was loved by her new family.59 This entwining of the Boyle and Hyde families is just one example of how Ranelagh often became involved in familial matters that also harbored deep political implications. Women still could not hold seats of political power in the Restoration,

Plague, Providence, and Medical Practice

•

151

but even in the face of laws that restricted their formal participation in the courts, they could wield power through political advocacy and petitioning. Ranelagh leveraged her intimate relationships with her brother Burlington and the lord chancellor to procure legal settlements and to advance bills. In January 1666, Ranelagh wrote to Burlington concerning a case that would be taken to court the following month regarding the estate of one Mistress Roberts. Clarendon, who had not yet fallen from grace, would have the last say in this judgment. The identity of “Mistress Roberts” cannot be determined with any certainty, though she may have been some relation to Lady Ranelagh’s associate John Robertes. The House of Lords had recommended that Mistress Roberts should be granted the estate, but Clarendon was hesitant because there was no precedent. Ranelagh explained the situation in detail to her brother and asked for his help, beginning by saying “For my part I assure my selfe hee wil doe whats just but they feare some bodys behaviour to him may not dispose him to be obligeing to them.” There was some concern that Clarendon might be inclined to rule on behalf of the lawyers of England and “dissmise them [the estates] to the Common law,” which would be detrimental to Mistress Roberts: “She & her children wilbe ruined.” Ranelagh notes this is why her brother’s “intercession is humblely begged & with the more confidence because you wil thereby but perfect an obligeing worke you have already begun in speakeing to my Lord Chancellor for them.”60 While Ranelagh herself felt confident that Clarendon would make the right decision, she upheld her word that she would ask Burlington to speak to him on behalf of Mistress Roberts. As this example demonstrates, she often used her relationships with powerful male friends and family to influence important decisions. Lady Ranelagh may have also taken an interest in Mistress Roberts’s case because of the parallels with her own fight to reclaim her estate from her estranged husband, which Burlington helped her settle only a few months later. Burlington’s connections to the monarchy through his earldom, and his powerful political position in Ireland as its lord treasurer, allowed him to negotiate directly with Lord Ranelagh on behalf of his sister. Burlington’s diary records several instances of him meeting with Lord Ranelagh, and Lady Ranelagh’s letters to her brother during these years include acknowledgements of his ongoing assistance. On September 28,

152

•

Chapter Six

1666, Burlington recorded that “my Lord of Rannelagh and I concluded of some articles of agreement: between my Sister and him”; and then, on October 3, 1666, he noted that he went to Lord Ranelagh’s house to sign the articles of agreement on behalf of his sister. He specifically mentioned that some money was for “my two neeces Jones” and the rest was “being put into the lot,” presumably referring to a land settlement.61 It is unclear whether this settlement was reached through official channels or arranged privately. Regardless, the financial arrangement must have come as a great relief to her. The plague, fire, and war that led London into a state of political, religious, and social disorder in the mid-1660s were, understandably, the dominant events in Ranelagh’s correspondence throughout these years. However, the other primary topic she discussed was medicine— not in the context of the plague, but rather in the context of her own role in treating several extreme cases of various illnesses. After the monarchy was restored, some larger social and economic changes took place during the Restoration that led to more uniformity within the medical establishment. This was partly the result of increased prices of medical education coupled with a reduction in land transfers, which meant fewer families could afford a medical education and thus led to the creation of “medical dynasties.”62 Additionally, even as the medical pamphlet war came to a close by 1668, academic physicians fully realized the threat of the empirical science endorsed by the Royal Society, acknowledging that they could not wholly incorporate empirical methods without rethinking the value of some academic medical traditions.63 Still, patients’ access to medical care remained diverse well into the eighteenth century, with apothecaries, surgeons, and unaccredited healers all offering a wide range of services that could be used at varying points in a patient’s lifetime. While some historians have previously argued that the increased professionalization of medicine led to a devaluing of unaccredited healers, recent studies spanning the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries across Europe have documented more women providing care not just for their immediate families, but also for their communities and the poor.64 Household medicine was not just the first port of call for patients, but often was integrated among other professional options throughout the course of one’s sickness and even

Plague, Providence, and Medical Practice

•

153

reintroduced as a final choice when all else had failed.65 Over the second half the seventeenth century, English vernacular healthcare books by and for women proliferated the market while women continued to compile domestic manuscript recipe books filled with medical remedies. Ranelagh continued providing healthcare for her family and immediate circle during the Restoration, but her far-reaching patient and professional network appears to have extended beyond that of most gentlewomen. As we shall see, she was held in great esteem by some of the most exclusive residents of Restoration London and often practiced medicine alongside distinguished physicians. Ranelagh served as a trusted healthcare provider and facilitator for the wider Boyle family, including both local and distant family members. In Occasional Reflections, Robert Boyle acknowledged Ranelagh as his “excellent sister . . . who was almost always with him during his Sickness.”66 While Burlington had been helping his sister negotiate a marriage settlement from her estranged husband, she returned the favor by serving as her brother’s medical adviser and facilitator over April and May of 1667, when his wife, Elizabeth, experienced a severe convulsion that left her speechless. The illness was dramatic enough for Lady Burlington to note the event in her own brief diary, in which she explained that she was asleep in bed when a convulsion seized her “with such a stupefaction that if my Dear Lord had nott bin awake in all probabilitye I had dyed in it I being senceless for some time.”67 Lord Burlington promptly reached out to his sister by letter, and Ranelagh began serving as a hub for medical intelligence: she collected and distributed prescriptions and remedies in both written and material form, and she offered skilled advice as to where Lady Burlington could find or create medicines. Ranelagh also sent sal ammoniac (usually predominantly a mixture of ammonium salts, predominantly ammonium chloride) from their brother Robert, as well as pills she obtained from Dr. William Quartermain and a prescription from Dr. Daniel Coxe.68 Coxe’s remedy was probably also chemical— he was deeply entrenched in Helmontianism and had been corresponding with Boyle about it the previous year.69 Little is known about the theoretical underpinnings of Dr. Quartermain’s practice, but at this time he was physician-in-ordinary to Charles II.70 In one letter, Ranelagh noted that Robert Boyle also recom-

154

•

Chapter Six

mended using “Spirit of Hartshorn” for convulsion fits, but she couldn’t send any to the Burlington household because Boyle “was soe destetute of any.”71 Instead, she recommended: “But if out of your Parkes you would send up hornes either of stags or Buckes old or new I would have sperit made for & sent to her.”72 Both Ranelagh and Boyle used these remedies to great effect throughout the 1660s, and Boyle later endorsed in print the use of Spirit of Hartshorn to “cure the Fit” in women.73 Indeed, when he later published Of the Reconcileableness of Specifick Medicines (1685), which outlines chemical and mechanical explanations for why many popular medical remedies worked, Boyle used these ammonia salts as examples when arguing for the effectiveness of perfumes and fragrant odors.74 By early May 1667 Lady Burlington had still not fully recovered, and Lady Ranelagh followed up with additional medical recommendations, including the “rare remedy” “Mistletoe of the Oak” that their sister Lady Warwick used.75 However, Warwick reported that “she has not one dose here & but a litle at Leese locked up,” so Ranelagh assured her brother, “I am confident some might be found upon the old Oakes in your parts if diligent search were made.”76 In the same letter, Ranelagh also reported the physicians’ disagreement over Lady Burlington’s treatment plan: “Since Dr Quarterman is for her takeing the waters & Dr Cox doubts their being proper for her I beg you consider wheather it were not best to have them consulte together & send downe what they thereupon resolve.”77 Eventually, Boyle was able to speak with the doctors separately, and on May 11, Ranelagh promised that before her next letter she would strive “to make them meete & set down their opinnions joyntly.”78 However, in the meantime, Ranelagh herself recommended that her sister-in-law “may frequently take the Powder sent by Dr Cox” and the sal ammoniac Ranelagh sent from Boyle, “which she may use not onely for smeling to but inward takeing as sperit of harshorne onely not soe many drops of this.”79 The extensive letter exchange shows Ranelagh forwarding a wide range of medical treatments— everything from herbal simples to medicinal waters to chemical smelling salts— with no distinction between methods or sources. While Ranelagh herself appears to prefer the chemical methods that originated with Coxe and Boyle, she seriously considered and presented all available options. Her sister Warwick’s household remedy was

Plague, Providence, and Medical Practice

•

155

included along with those originating with doctors, with no differentiation between them. In fact, Ranelagh returned to Lady Warwick’s treatment after forwarding the remedies that originated with Coxe and Robert Boyle, which suggests she made no clear distinction between lay and professional knowledge. The “medical promiscuity” that characterized early modern Europe can be demonstrated by Ranelagh’s oversight of her sister-in-law’s treatment.80 Furthermore, while providing medical consultation by letter to her sister-in-law in Dublin, Ranelagh was simultaneously caring for Burlington’s grandson in London as he recovered from smallpox. Burlington’s son wrote to him that “the Dr thinkes him past danger” but that “this childes sicknesse has hindred mee from visiting any body but my Aunt Ranelaugh.”81 When a Boyle family member fell ill, whether they were near or far, they turned to Lady Ranelagh for help. In the midst of dealing with her brother’s family’s illnesses, Ranelagh was called to join the royal family when sickness also struck their household. The young Duke of Kendal, Charles Stuart— son of James, Duke of York (the king’s brother, and later James II) and his first wife Anne Hyde (Clarendon’s daughter)— died in May 1667, just before his first birthday. As a confidant of Clarendon even in these later tumultuous years in his political career, Ranelagh remained in the household to offer support to him and his family throughout his grandson’s death. In the same series of letters to her brother Burlington that discussed her sister-in-law’s illness, Ranelagh offered her brother detailed narratives of the sicknesses at court. Of baby Kendal’s death, she explained, “I was there when hee lay in his death pangs.”82 Baby Kendal had started screaming in pain and suffering convulsions, causing the king and the Duke of York to run into the room. Seeing the baby in this violent state, they asked the doctors if there was something they could do to help, but the doctors replied that they had done all they could. Disappointed by the professional response, Ranelagh offered a bold and ironic assessment to her brother: “Such Phisitians of noe valew & myserable comforters are the greatest & most skilful of creatures in a dyeing houer.”83 She reports that the child took some Mistletoe of the Oak, which allowed him to sleep quietly for about two hours, but then he experienced another fit and died. Interestingly, this remedy is the same as that recently recommended by her sister Lady Warwick to treat the fits

156

•

Chapter Six

experienced by their sister-in-law Lady Burlington, and here it is not clear who administered it to Kendal: Ranelagh or the physicians. Ranelagh’s assessment of the young Duke of Kendal’s treatment reveals that her attitudes toward medicine had not changed much since the 1650s, when she harbored a distrust of ordinary doctors who diagnosed illnesses based on book learning. She herself put greater faith in the power of empirical evidence. Protestant ethics also thoroughly informed her medical practice, and she was disappointed that the royal doctors would not venture beyond the standard treatment plan or strive to relieve Kendal’s discomfort before he died. Witnessing this dramatic medical encounter must have helped solidify some of Ranelagh’s opinions on professional medicine, and Robert Boyle would similarly articulate an angry sentiment. In a manuscript treatise that he would suppress from publication, Boyle critiqued Galenic physicians in an uncharacteristically bold follow-up to his recent medical publication Usefulness of Natural Philosophy (1663), as we shall see in the next chapter.84 While attending to the Duke of Kendal in his illness, Ranelagh was joined by the highly esteemed Dr. Thomas Willis, one of the leading Oxford physiologists and experimental philosophers who had just moved to London that year. She took the opportunity to ask him what he thought of her sister-in-law “takeing the Scarborough waters [presumably the water recommended by Dr. Quartermain] but his answere was that hee being wholely a stranger to those waters could give noe judgment about them.”85 Ranelagh’s relationship with Dr. Willis is scantly documented, but when this conversation is read alongside their shared treatment of baby Kendal and the recipe book in the British Library that has both of their names on the title page, it suggests the two shared similar spaces as medical authorities.86 By the time Willis was treating Kendal, he had grown interested in neuroanatomy and neurology, and it was probably through him that Ranelagh learned of the baby’s autopsy. In the postscript of the same letter to her brother quoted from above, Ranelagh added: “The Duke of Kendal being opened his head was found ful of watter & the membrane that incloses the braine so fastened to the skul that it could not move. al his other parts sound.”87 The reference might suggest that Lady Ranelagh was present at

Plague, Providence, and Medical Practice

•

157

the Duke of Kendal’s autopsy, but it seems more probable that she had received a detailed account of the procedure from one of her professional friends who attended. An autopsy was a messy procedure reserved for medical professionals, and some physicians deferred to surgeons for such bloody practices. In one other rare seventeenth-century manuscript reference to a woman documenting her father’s autopsy, Grace Blome makes it clear that the notes on the procedure reached her afterward and that she was not present for it: “His Body was Opned by Dr. Fuller Mr. Nicols assisting.”88 In the case of Kendal, due to Willis’s interest in neuroanatomy, he probably wanted to examine the child’s brain himself. Ranelagh’s description of the autopsy is presented with a professional tone similar to that she used approximately one decade earlier in a letter to Henry Oldenburg, about an elderly French woman’s autopsy, without displaying a hint of emotion or discomfort.89 It also demonstrates that the physicians treated her as a colleague and shared such professional information with her. To Ranelagh, Kendal’s death was a further manifestation of God’s anger: “A very emminent & smart judgment of god upon the Royal famelly & in them upon the nation. god send it may be soe layd to hart as to answere gods end that his hand may not continue to be longer stretched out against us in anger.”90 Kendal was, after all, the king’s nephew, and Ranelagh personally witnessed the king’s distress over the death. Yet while her tone in this letter combines the professionalism of a medical practitioner with the harsh judgment of a religious zealot, she was not unsympathetic to the family. Instead, she reflected on the sadness that these events brought to the Clarendon family and the royal court, and she recognized that it would be “wholely unseasonable” for her to talk to Clarendon about a family affair concerning her sister-in-law Burlington. Further, her characteristically harsh assessment of the physicians who gave up prematurely unites her knowledge of medicine with a compassionate understanding of human frailty and the ethical responsibilities of physicians. Throughout Kendal’s decline, his older brother, the Duke of Cambridge, James Stuart, was also severely ill. After Kendal died on May 25, 1667, Ranelagh felt that “his brother is too like very speedely to folow him the Drs haveing small hopes of his recoverie.” A week later, on June 1, Ranelagh reported that sadness still shrouded the court and Clarendon House, mourn-

158

•

Chapter Six

ing the loss of Kendal and fearing the death of Cambridge. The latter was in a very weak state, and many were surprised he was even still alive. Ranelagh reported that because the doctors judged young Cambridge’s case “pretty desperate,” they gave him a mercury-based medicine— a harsh treatment known for sometimes doing more harm than good. Yet she noted that the doctors still had only “a very partiall knowledg of the roote of his disease” and little hope for his recovery.91 Though Ranelagh had previously distanced herself from the court, by June 1, 1667, she now described it as “a Royal Hospital” and noted, “I have in this mourning time binn almost a constant courtier there. (My lookes & dress being fittest for such seasons).” Here she clarifies that her position was expected to be that of a mourner— a supportive role more typical of an aristocratic woman among royals— rather than a practitioner. Still, her ability to weave her medical and spiritual views of bodily illness with the political and national ramifications of the events shows her engaging as an intellectual observer more than as a mourner. When she does comment on the emotional state of the family, it is with sympathy, but also with some emotional distance: “& really its a moveing thing to see the sadnes of her Highness which is very deepe & serious. but not wilde & passionate.” She follows the comment with a thoughtful, moralistic reflection on how all mortal creatures are subject to the same diseases, regardless of their station in life, and that “death shews that they are not differenced one from another in nature but by circumstantial & accidentall things.”92 On the same day in another part of London, Burlington’s son Charles, now Viscount Dungarvan, also wrote a letter to his father to excuse his aunt, Lady Ranelagh, for not following through on her intention to speak with Lord Clarendon about “the Craven Regiment,” a military unit controlled by Lord William Craven. He explained that he had waited on the king and had been most other places in London, but he would not go to Clarendon House until summoned. However, he confided to his father: “I am told that my Ld. Chancellor does not thinke it proper to have my Aunt Ranelagh consulted with about what relates to the businesse of the country, but I would not upon any account yet your Lordship should take notice of this to any boddy; but I thought it fitt (that having bin told such a thing) your Lordship may make so much use of this intimation, as to

Plague, Providence, and Medical Practice

•

159

observe hereafter whether it bee so or no.”93 Across Ranelagh’s entire extant archival record, this is one of very few times when a contemporary suggested that Ranelagh had perhaps overstepped boundaries. Indeed, she had been communicating with Clarendon for almost twenty years by this point, often on religious and political matters that affected the state of the nation; and we know that he previously took Ranelagh’s political advice. The fact that this comment exists in a private document between father and son, and that it contains the hint of clandestine information, is suggestive of the wider influence and power that Ranelagh had in the summer of 1667, as well as of the unstable ground on which Clarendon stood by this point. Dungarvan himself appears uncertain as to how Clarendon actually felt about Ranelagh’s involvement in political affairs, and there are no related notes in Clarendon’s extant archival records to corroborate the rumor Dungarvan had heard. It could be that Ranelagh carefully navigated her role in medicine but, at least on this occasion, overstepped the conventional boundary for women’s political involvement. However, Ranelagh herself seemed unaware of any potential missteps and remained close to the action when another misfortune hit London later that June of 1667: Dutch invasion. The Dutch fleets took advantage of London’s vulnerable state and invaded the narrow, winding River Medway to burn several vacant English ships and vessels before capturing and towing away their unattended flagship, the Royal Charles. Ranelagh wrote a detailed account, gathered “from eye witneses,” in a letter to her brother Burlington that began with “I am very sorry we have onely the relation of Englands unhappyness to entertaine.” Using specific names, dates, and numbers, she explained the Dutch attack, their capturing of the English ships, and her country’s response and tentative plans. She was thankful that more men and their families had not been killed, and she relayed the possibility of an English counterattack by land since they could not fight at sea. Then she added, “Whatever the final conclusion be the beginning is a rebuke from god to the nation,” and she noted that “the immediate disposeings of god seeme to reproach us for those profanneties, Blasphemys, & oaths & Curses.” Like her explanation for the great plague and fire, Ranelagh assumed such a dramatic— and seemingly impossible— defeat must have been divine punishment. It was

160

•

Chapter Six

just after the Dutch raid on the Medway that the young Duke of Cambridge finally died, and Ranelagh reported his death as “both a Publick & private loss.”94 This was only one month after his brother had died, and just before Cambridge would have turned four years old. The series of catastrophes and the timing of Cambridge’s death seemed to confirm to Ranelagh and many of her contemporaries that God continued to look disapprovingly upon England. While Ranelagh spent the spring of 1667 interacting with a circle of elite medical practitioners and reporting on the practices they used, later that summer she herself was being called in as a lead medical practitioner. On July 29, she was “summoned to take care of my poore litle Lord Digbye at Chelsey by haveing word sent me that he was there sick of the meassels. Wheather I went & carryed Dr Cox with me.”95 Lord Digby was probably the son of the Catholic Royalist George Digby, 2nd Earl of Bristol, and his wife, Anne (née Russell), as they had a house in Chelsea at this time and Lady Ranelagh was acquainted with Lady Bristol.96 This connection is interesting because the Earl of Bristol was active in the movement to impeach Lady Ranelagh’s friend Lord Clarendon. Significantly, the Bristol family called on Lady Ranelagh as their first choice of medical practitioner outside of the family— much in the same way they might have called on a physician. Strikingly, when summoned she brought Dr. Daniel Coxe to assist her, while convention might dictate a reverse hierarchy.97 Coxe and Boyle’s collaboration on chemical medicine has previously been acknowledged, but Coxe’s partnership with Lady Ranelagh has gone unnoticed. With their collaborations related to Valentine Greatrakes, Lady Burlington, and Lord Digby, Ranelagh and Coxe appear to have shared a close working partnership centered around medicine in the mid-1660s. This was after Coxe had become a fellow of the Royal Society in 1665 and independent of the working relationship he developed with Boyle. A week after she was summoned, Lady Ranelagh was “sent for” again, and this time it was to treat Lady Clarendon. While it was characteristic of Lady Ranelagh to maintain friendships with a diverse group of individuals, it is significant that she was treating illnesses for members of two households (Clarendon and Bristol) that were fiercely opposed to each other in the summer of 1667. The need to preserve health engendered circles of

Plague, Providence, and Medical Practice

•

161

medical care and cooperation that could transcend political divisions and bring together people who would otherwise have little cause to interact. Upon arrival at Clarendon’s, Ranelagh “found her just out of a Convulsion fit . . . that had almost quite taken away both her speech & sence.” She reported that there were no doctors present, so she “ventured to give her something that did a little waken her.” Judging the weak condition of her patient, Ranelagh proposed that they should have “the best Drs in towne sent for.” She never names them, but explains that they came and “appointed her several remedies but nothing has wrought.” Lady Clarendon’s fit continued all night and “appeared to be much of a Palsey & too like an Apoplexsy.” Though the doctors had lost hope, Ranelagh stated, “yet I act by the Proverbe that says as long as there is life there is hope, & a large bottle of sperit of Hartshorne that I procured has for some time by being held under her nose waked her.”98 One contemporary, Richard Allestree, notes that this proverb was a “common saying” at this time, and versions of it can be found in dozens of early modern printed books, ranging from vernacular translations of Ecclesiastes 9:3– 10 to Erasmus or Cicero.99 As such, it would be difficult to identify precisely where Ranelagh may have first encountered this proverb. Still, one thing is clear: unlike the doctors, Ranelagh held strong religious beliefs that informed her ethics as a medical practitioner. She could not give up on Lady Clarendon while she was still alive. Ranelagh’s care for Lady Clarendon continued until the latter finally passed away on August 9, 1667. As she explained in a letter to Burlington, “I have binn very little from Claringdon House, paying my last attendance to that poor lady who never so far recovered that fit I told you of then till she died.” Lady Clarendon never recovered “speech or sence,” despite the medicines that the doctors agreed, upon consult, would be best. Still, Ranelagh noted, “None of al [their medicines] had soe visible an operation as to wakening & rouseing her, as a very large bottle of very quick sperit of harts horne that I procured for her, held under her nose which the doctors confessed was as proper as any thing that could be used to her.” She then advised Burlington that he should keep a good stock of the remedy to treat his wife. She suggested that half a pint would be sufficient (as this was how much they used for Lady Clarendon), and mentioned that she knew some-

162

•

Chapter Six

one who “lately stilled it in good quantety & seling it for 5s an ounce.”100 At this point, after having personally witnessed the effectiveness of Spirit of Hartshorn, Ranelagh more forcefully endorsed the remedy that her brother Robert Boyle had suggested for their sister-in-law three months earlier. Clarendon’s choice to call in Ranelagh as a medical authority provides an interesting contrast against his previous comments two months earlier, which suggested he did not want to discuss national politics with Lady Ranelagh, if we believe that Clarendon did initiate this. Clearly, medicine was still seen as an appropriate application of feminine knowledge and involvement. This appears to have held true even if Ranelagh’s own medical practice may have been exceptional in that she treated some of the most elite patients in Restoration London and worked alongside the most esteemed chemical physicians. These two years over 1666 and 1667 represent a well-documented slice of Lady Ranelagh’s life that can be partly narrated through her own words, thanks primarily to the extensive series of letters to her brother Burlington that are held in the British Library. Through them, we see a politically influential woman with a robust intellectual network and an esteemed medical practitioner who viewed life through a providential filter. These events in the mid-1660s demonstrate that her Pall Mall house was already an intellectual hub before Robert Boyle moved in, and that her formidable reputation carried on well after the dissolution of the Hartlib circle.101 The stimulation, convenience, and stability that Lady Ranelagh’s house offered Boyle on his visits led him to move permanently to London in 1668. We will turn now to explore how their collaboration continued over the next two decades when they shared a home.

Robert Boyle Moves In (1668– 90)

W

7

hile Robert Boyle had frequently stayed with Lady Ranelagh in London over the last decade, he permanently moved from Oxford into her Pall Mall home in 1668.1 It is no wonder Boyle was drawn to it. Separate from the profound relationship he had with his sister, her physical location was ideal. Pall Mall was a thoroughfare lined with stately properties, and her house was on the southwest side overlooking the royal gardens of St. James’s Palace, with its exotic birds and animals. In 1671, the king’s mistress, Nell Gwynn, would move to 79 Pall Mall, which gives some indication of the street’s fashionableness and its close proximity to the restored royal court.2 Ranelagh received the houses at numbers 83– 84 Pall Mall from her brother-in-law Charles Rich, Earl of Warwick, in 1664 and soon after began a series of renovations to make the two houses into one.3 Though it is no longer standing today, it was on the site now partly occupied by the Royal Automobile Club.4 Dr. Thomas Sydenham, with whom Boyle and Ranelagh each had a professional relationship by this time, had been living in Pall Mall since 1660 and had previously loaned Lady Ranelagh money.5 Upon her relocation to this address, Sydenham began renting her former property, partly as a way of alleviating her outstanding £100 debt to him. Her relationship with Sydenham does not appear to have been a close friendship, perhaps parly because his difficult personality sometimes annoyed her. Indeed, she referred to him simply as “the doctor” in her letters to Boyle; however, Sydenham had

164

•

Chapter Seven

just dedicated his Methodus curandi febris to Boyle, and all three shared an interest in empirical approaches to medical treatment.6 Sydenham would later take Boyle with him on some patient visits and the information they gathered was presumably shared with Lady Ranelagh, either directly from Sydenham or via Boyle. Lady Ranelagh’s house must have been quite grand both outside and inside: we know of at least one landscape painting by the court artist Hendrick Danckerts on the chimneypiece of one of the rooms.7 It is unclear how comfortably she lived prior to moving here, as she had struggled for years to arrange an appropriate settlement with her husband, but this move appears to have helped her regain her financial standing. In August 1665, Ranelagh also told Boyle that she “got a lodging at Newington greene,” about four and a half miles northeast of her Pall Mall residence, though

Figure 8 Detail of St. James’s Square, taken from Richard Blome’s map of 1685. Lady Ranelagh’s house was on the south side of Pall Mall overlooking the King’s Garden, at the southwest corner of St. James’s Square. Recent research by Yelda Nasifoglu has estimated that the property directly below the M in Pall Mall on this map represents the approximate location. (© The British Library Board. Maps Crace Port 12.2.)

Robert Boyle Moves In

•

165

it is unclear how this property was used.8 When Boyle eventually moved into Pall Mall with Ranelagh, he would also bring his own wealth with him, which he was already accustomed to using as “collateral security” when his sister had previously needed to negotiate loans.9 Thankfully, Ranelagh’s financial state was on the upswing, as she had finally secured her divorce settlement in the autumn of 1666 thanks to advocacy from her other brother, Burlington.10 By 1668, many of the Oxford experimentalists in Boyle’s circle had moved to London, including John Locke, Richard Lower, and Thomas Willis. Henry Oldenburg already lived conveniently near the Pall Mall address, and many others in their circle were a short walk or coach ride away. Not only did Restoration London provide a place for natural philosophy to thrive, but the city was also the home of his intellectual and spiritual companion, his sister Ranelagh. Boyle had been considering this move for two years before actually doing it, but at least one friend and then a second— Ranelagh herself— would finally convince him the time was right. On an occasion in 1666 when Boyle was enjoying an extended stay with his sister Mary Rich at Leez, Dr. Daniel Coxe reminded him that it was his other sister who was related to him “more nearly by Embelisments [sic] of mind & Congruity of Disposition than bloud.” Calling her “the Excellent though absent Sophronia,” Coxe commented that Ranelagh had reciprocated Boyle’s deep love for her and even transcended it. His use of Boyle’s name “Sophronia” would have reminded Boyle of his own professed love for and debt to his sister, which he had announced in his print dedication to her just published the previous year.11 Everyone in Boyle and Ranelagh’s circle recognized the emotional and intellectual bond between them, and Coxe knew that invoking Lady Ranelagh would be one of the most effective ways to lure Boyle to London permanently.12 Continuing her support of her younger brother’s interest in experimentation and his need for occasional solitude, Ranelagh ensured that Boyle had his own suite of rooms as well as a laboratory on the premises, similar to what she had already done when he moved to Stalbridge and Oxford.13 Across seventeenth-century England, most experimentation took place somewhere in the household, such as the kitchen, study, bedchamber, or stillroom.14 Yet by the last quarter of the century, custom laboratory

166

•

Chapter Seven

spaces dedicated to the production of natural knowledge were becoming the norm at institutions, as the value of reproducing experiments before witnesses who could help establish matters of fact was gaining credibility.15 Ranelagh assured Boyle that her servant Thomas was looking out for charcoal for him and that, prior to his arrival, she would “gladly receive your order to put my back-house in posture to be employed by you” so that he would “lose no time after.”16 Boyle’s laboratory was built on the backside of Ranelagh’s house and was possibly within it, as his workdiaries mention that witnesses were called in from adjacent rooms. The laboratory may have had its own entrance, and it became an essential stop on the travel itinerary for foreign intellectuals, government officials, and commercial entrepreneurs.17 The biographer John Aubrey noted how easy it was for foreigners to visit Boyle’s “noble laboratory,” and John Evelyn once commented that Boyle was “seldom without company.”18 Boyle increasingly distanced himself from the Royal Society during these years, with the crowd instead coming to him at Lady Ranelagh’s house. Within the lab, he worked with various technicians who wrote down notes as Boyle experimented and dictated. However, many of the technicians are nameless in the manuscripts, and Boyle did not see them in a partnership role. These individuals may have lived in the servants’ quarters in the Pall Mall house.19 When expanding the Pall Mall home to accommodate Boyle’s laboratory, Ranelagh hired their shared acquaintance Robert Hooke and took a leading role in overseeing the architectural renovations. Boyle and Hooke had worked together in Oxford since the 1650s, and Hooke may have occasionally stayed in Ranelagh’s home on his visits to London.20 He had been appointed as the Royal Society’s curator of experiments in 1662 and then had moved to Gresham College’s lodgings in London after they appointed him professor of geometry.21 During the 1670s, when the majority of the Pall Mall renovations happened, Hooke and Ranelagh worked closely together, even if they sometimes aggravated each other. Robert Hooke dined at Lady Ranelagh’s more than thirty times in the year 1677 alone— visits when Hooke not only met with Robert Boyle, but also with Ranelagh.22 A typical entry in Hooke’s diary consists of a brief sentence, such as “Dind with Mr. Boyle and Lady Ranelaugh” in October 1675, or his statement from January 1678 that he was “at Mr. Boyles, spoke with him and Lady

Robert Boyle Moves In

•

167

Ranalaugh about books.”23 Hooke’s slippage between references to being “at Mr. Boyles” or “at Lady Ranalaughs” suggests that he saw the house as equally belonging to both of them, and confirms that he engaged with both siblings on these visits. Yet it is clear that Ranelagh took a leadership role in the renovation project and sometimes did meet with Hooke without Boyle to advance the construction. Across April 1677, Hooke was drafting a contract for Lady Ranelagh and noted that “she agreed to signe” it.24 Ranelagh also introduced Hooke to her son Richard and helped with his renovation of Chiswick House, often hosting meetings in her house or accompanying them on coach trips to the property.25 Though Hooke and Ranelagh worked closely together, Hooke’s diary includes some snide remarks about Lady Ranelagh, possibly suggesting either she treated him like a tradesman or she expressed disapproval of some personal choices he made, as it was around this time when Hooke was engaged in a sexual relationship with one of his servants.26 One night in 1674 Hooke noted: “Dind at Lady Ranalaughs. Never more.”27 This remark leaves us to wonder what she said to him even while it underscores that her outspoken personality was as vivacious as ever. However, Hooke did return, and he completed the projects to her satisfaction. When Boyle discussed his domestic experiments in his published works and workdiaries, he often mentioned “lady witnesses” or “ladies in the household,” some of which might be references to Ranelagh’s witnessing of his experiments. In his Memoirs for the Natural History of Humane Blood (1684), Boyle remembered one of his earlier attempts to discover whether blood contained any vital spirit. He explained that for one year he kept in his house some human blood in a glass vial, which he believed was hermetically sealed. The purpose was to see “whether any Spirits would first ascend.” However, “when the Blood came to be expos’d to the contact of the Air, the stink was so great and offensive, especially to some Ladies that liv’d in the house, that we were fain to have it hastily thrown away.”28 Boyle does not provide the date that he conducted his experiment, so we cannot be entirely sure that this is a reference to Ranelagh and her household. However, the experiment must have taken place in a location where he lived with ladies for an extended period of time, and these women must have had enough awareness of his activities to suggest that he throw away

168

•

Chapter Seven

the blood. In any case, this honest account demonstrates that being intimately connected with Boyle’s experiments was not always glamorous, and offers some personal insight into what Ranelagh must have tolerated. Spending the final twenty-three years of their lives together allowed Ranelagh to more easily play an active role in nurturing her younger brother, who had now established himself as the leading natural philosopher of his day. Previously, many scholars have dismissed Ranelagh’s involvement, referring to her as a hostess who may have been present but not intellectually engaged, or disregarding her in a manner that does not correspond with the facts we have pertaining to her life. Stephen Shapin, for example, has suggested that Ranelagh was not “concerned with the quotidian processes of chemical and pneumatic work that went on” in Boyle’s laboratory.29 However, Ranelagh had been actively involved in various branches of natural philosophy for twenty years before Boyle moved into her house, both with her own projects and through supporting her brother’s early chemical initiatives, as we have seen. Shapin’s dismissal is indicative of a larger problem regarding sparse source materials, particularly over these years, and this is a conclusion he reached after having acknowledged that “it is difficult to retrieve her role from Boyle’s texts.”30 While everyone wants to know what happened in that Pall Mall home with its attached laboratory— a space shared at a time when Boyle and Ranelagh were each mature adults with esteemed reputations and intellectual agendas of their own— the reality is that finding definitive answers is unlikely. Until they began living together, Ranelagh and Boyle’s letters gave testimony to their collaboration and became one of the best sources for revealing their partnership. Ranelagh’s letters show, for example, that she read Boyle’s works before they were published and that they discussed the exchange of equipment and ingredients. However, living in close geographic proximity negated the need for letters, which means that the extent to which they worked together does not appear to have been recorded with the same regularity. While in 1666 Ranelagh used a letter to thank Boyle for sending her a bag of limes (a common ingredient in many medical recipes, such as limewater), by 1668 she could ask and thank him for limes in person, as this exchange would take place within their shared physical space.31 However, documenting the later years in

Robert Boyle Moves In

•

169

Figure 9 The Shannon Portrait of the Hon. Robert Boyle F.R.S., 1689, painted by Johann Kerseboom (d. 1708). At least eight copies of this portrait are known to exist. (Courtesy of Science History Institute.)

their lives is not only a problem that concerns the sibling relationship, but a problem that exists for each of them in isolation as well. In Robert Boyle’s most recent biography, Michael Hunter has noted the scarcity of personal records dating from Boyle’s later years.32 The same may be said of Lady Ranelagh’s archival record, with the last substantial series of correspon-

170

•

Chapter Seven

dence being the exchange with her brother Burlington in the late 1660s. From 1668 through 1690, there is very little material in her own hand. As such, the limited paper trail concerning the details of the siblings’ collaboration should not lead us to believe that Ranelagh stopped being involved in her brother’s development as a natural philosopher after he moved in. Rather, she must have continued and even increased her influence over his spiritual and intellectual life, but such exchanges were not written down. While the sparse source material presents a challenge to scholars, it is not an insurmountable one. Ranelagh certainly must have engaged with Boyle’s experimental agenda, yet her interest in his natural philosophy seems to have remained driven primarily by its spiritual and its practical potential. This initially became clear through the bulk of her activity in the Hartlib circle and her influence on Boyle’s earliest publications.33 Over these final two decades of her life, Ranelagh primarily dedicated herself to administering medicines and advocating for peace and religious toleration. However, this is not to say that she wouldn’t have taken an interest in some of the more complex and theoretical works that Boyle produced later in life. As we saw through her endorsement of The Origine of Formes and her comment about needing to “entertain [herself ] with [Boyle’s] books” when there were “few studious persons” around, Ranelagh took pleasure in considering how her brother’s philosophical advances could engender improvements to society.34 She had always advocated for educational reform and intellectual advancement, believing the power of new knowledge could create more engaged and useful citizens.35 And as we saw in her response to the damage done to Gresham College by the fire of London, she elevated philosophers above other groups such as lawyers in her assessment of how to repair her broken city.36 Indeed, her political and religious motivations remained entwined with her intellectual agenda and educational advocacy, so she certainly would have engaged in some way with Boyle’s contributions to the new science. Therefore, we will now turn more explicitly to Lady Ranelagh’s wider biographical narrative, drawing on Boyle where necessary to develop her story, rather than the other way around. By doing so, we see that Ranelagh’s intellectual network and political influence remained strong and continued to diversify until the end of her life. We can also piece together a big pic-

Robert Boyle Moves In

•

171

ture that reveals where she continued to drive her own projects outside of Boyle’s and where the two converged. Such a focus reminds us that in her later years, despite her younger brother’s growing significance, Ranelagh was not just “Boyle’s sister.” When Boyle moved into her house in 1668, Ranelagh was fifty-three years old and had already lived in London for two and half decades. While the two collaborated on many endeavors over the remainder of their lives (surely even more than we can document with confidence today), Ranelagh herself maintained the powerful reputation and authority she had worked to establish for herself by this point in her life. Boyle certainly rose to prominence in these later years, but it would run counter to available evidence to suggest that Ranelagh’s impact must have shrunk while his grew. Around the end of December 1669 or early January 1670, Ranelagh’s husband, Arthur, Lord Ranelagh, died. This may have been what prompted her return to Ireland with her daughter Frances at this time, as she probably would have attended his funeral.37 The Ranelaghs had never reconciled their differences; significantly, his will includes no mention of his estranged wife. He bequeathed £2,000 in marriage portions to his unmarried daughters, Elizabeth and Frances, if they married with the consent of two of the following three people: their brother Richard; Sir John Cole (executor of the will); or their older sister Catherine (by then Lady Mount-Alexander, having married Hugh Montgomery, first Earl of Mount-Alexander, after the death of her first husband, Sir William Parsons.) Convention dictates that unmarried daughters would become the joint responsibility of the mother and eldest son with the death of the father, but Arthur divested his wife of all responsibility. Since Elizabeth appears to have married her footman husband without gaining the approval of others, it is unclear if or how the payment reached her and her husband, whose name is incompletely recorded as “—— Maultster, Valet de Pe.”38 While her husband’s death probably did not negatively affect her emotional state, across the 1670s she witnessed the deaths of many friends and family members that certainly did. Frances— her daughter who had never married and who lived with her throughout her adult life— died in Lady Ranelagh’s Pall Mall house on March 28, 1672. She was buried in the crypt at St. Martin-in-the-Fields, and the poet Andrew Marvell wrote the epi-

172

•

Chapter Seven

taph for her tomb, which was later also included in the folio edition of his works.39 Marvell and Ranelagh may have met through one of their mutual friends, such as John Milton. Marvell also had connections to many in her Anglo-Irish circle, including Sir William Petty and Ranelagh’s brother Roger, Earl of Orrery. As well, Marvell and Ranelagh were both witnesses to Valentine Greatrakes’s miracles in 1666. His epitaph commends Frances for being “a virgin chaste, / In this age loose and all unlaced.”40 While she lived in a society where “vice is so allowed,” Marvell celebrated “that her soul was on heav’n so bent / No minute but it came and went.”41 This commentary on Frances’s decision to remain unmarried and to dedicate her life to God may also be a reflection of the priorities endorsed by her mother, who must have approved Marvell’s epitaph before it was written in stone. While in the 1640s Ranelagh had supported Dorothy Moore’s choice to marry John Dury— not seeing this as being in conflict with Moore’s dedication to God— Ranelagh’s own negative experiences in marriage, coupled with the immorality rampant in Restoration society, must have resulted in her later endorsing her daughter’s desire to live an unmarried spiritual life. The death of her daughter who shared her home and disposition must have deeply impacted Lady Ranelagh, and this tragedy was followed by her eldest daughter, Catherine, dying three and a half years later, on October 8, 1675.42 As we learned in the previous chapter, when her friends Benjamin Worsley and Henry Oldenburg died around September 1677, Ranelagh wrote to Boyle from her sister Mary’s house, regarding “the remove of our true honest ingenious friends.”43 She further explained, “My experience . . . has taught me that its safer to have those uneasy things to us soe farr touched upon as to beget some vent for such sorows rather than by smothering them within our selves to continue to us a longer exersise under them.”44 Her “experience” with death by this point may be in reference to the passing of her daughters. The suggestion of venting sorrows echoes Puritan doctrines for grieving in the early seventeenth century, whereby people and especially women were encouraged to find a balance between allowing themselves to mourn and silently accepting God’s will.45 When Oldenburg died, he left behind no will and his wife died shortly after, resulting in Boyle paying for his funeral and making a financial contribution

Robert Boyle Moves In

•

173

to help with their young children, Sophia and Rupert, until they were appointed a new guardian.46 The decade would close with the deaths of two of Ranelagh’s closest siblings: Mary Rich, Countess of Warwick, in April 1678 and Roger Boyle, Earl of Orrery, in October 1679. Contemporary religious figures quickly worked to memorialize Warwick as the personification of Solomon’s virtuous woman and an exemplar of Christian living. Boyle and Ranelagh served as executors of her will and, in this capacity, they encouraged Anthony Walker, rector of Fyfield, Essex, and a close friend of Warwick’s, to publish the sermon he delivered at her funeral.47 Such a publication must have helped Ranelagh and Boyle grieve and celebrate their sister’s memory, but it also fulfilled their religious impulse to endorse Christian values and teach others how to live a life of piety through example. Throughout these intense years of loss and grief, Ranelagh took strength from her religion and continued to advocate for the religious and political causes in which she believed, particularly liberty of conscience. Ranelagh maintained that “one of the most unquestionable rights belonging to man as man” was an individual’s freedom to pursue their own faith and style of worship.48 This conviction dates back to at least 1657, if not earlier. She continued advocating toleration for Protestant nonconformists throughout the 1670s and attended some of their meetings. Her open-mindedness to the variances among these sects is in part what makes Ranelagh’s particular branch of Protestantism difficult to define, as Ruth Connolly has already determined. While she appears never to have formally left the Church of England, she nevertheless attended Presbyterian services and advocated for the rights of other nonconformist groups, including Quakers and Baptists.49 In January 1670, Bulstrode Whitelocke recalled dining with Colonel William Kiffin at Lady Ranelagh’s house, where they “had private discourse about Liberty of Conscience, to which she was a great friend.”50 Kiffin had been a friend of Oliver Cromwell and remained a nonconformist in London, and a major Baptist leader, after the Restoration.51 By the mid1670s, Lady Ranelagh was traveling to attend conventicles “about Holborn In great Russel street in new Southampton buildings” where the eminent nonconformist minister Richard Baxter was preaching.52 Among other shared views, Lady Ranelagh would have been attracted to Baxter’s active

174

•

Chapter Seven

promotion of solidarity between different Protestant denominations— a cause that Lady Ranelagh had championed for decades. While Ranelagh and Boyle shared an intellectual interest in natural philosophy, equally strong was their devout Protestantism, which remained a driving force for both of them throughout their lives. Boyle continued advancing his chemical program, but in the 1670s and early 1680s he also turned to evangelism. Over this decade he began writing texts that reconciled religion with experimentation, publishing Discourse of Things above Reason in 1681 and writing drafts for what would later be published as The Christian Virtuoso (1690). Boyle argued that empirical methods could be used to expose God’s design and that a better understanding of the natural world could be employed to strengthen human appreciation for the divine. He also engaged with contemporary debates concerning the limits of human reason, theoretically aligning himself more with nonconformists in these cases, though without directly announcing such an alliance. While there is no explicit evidence that Ranelagh collaborated with Boyle on these works as she had done with the moralist tracts he composed during his youth, it seems very plausible that she read drafts or encouraged their composition in one of the siblings’ many shared moments in the household. Ranelagh was exploring religiopolitical ideas and remained actively involved in nonconformist circles around the same time, so it would be shortsighted to think that Boyle would not have discussed these works with her. Additionally, Ranelagh’s international network allowed her to keep abreast of Protestant developments taking place on the Continent and in the American colonies. Her personal connection to prominent individuals shaping current events meant that she was often the source for relaying news to her family members. This of course included her brother Burlington, to whom she wrote in July 1675 after receiving “a letter from a good hand from the Hague” relaying that the elector of Brandenburg defeated the Swedish army.53 The Dutch War, or Franco– Dutch War, had been raging since 1672 as Louis XIV tried to gain French possession of the Spanish Netherlands. France under Louis XIV was the dominant military power in Europe, and the Swedish allied with them and invaded Dutch territories. When the Swedish army planned to reunite in the small town Fehrbellin

Robert Boyle Moves In

•

175

on the Rhine, Frederick William, elector of Brandenburg, led his men into a bloody battle that resulted in more Swedish than Brandenburger casualties. Ranelagh heard the story firsthand through a contact at The Hague, but this person’s identity is unknown. After relaying a report of the Battle of Fehrbellin to Burlington, Ranelagh added, “Its sad thatt Protestants should thus distroy one another but since some of them were to be killed its wel they fel who had taken his partty who has drenched all Europe (almost) in blood.”54 While her preference would be for no Protestants to die in war, she felt that in this case the Swedish deserved to lose for taking the side of an aggressive monarch like Louis XIV. Such comments are reminiscent of her attempts to negotiate a quick ending to the English Civil Wars three decades earlier. Ranelagh supported whatever methods were necessary to end war since prolonging it would only mean the deaths of more Protestants, who should be protecting the life God gave them. This is in line with her tolerationist stance more generally, which prohibited the use of war or violence as a means of spreading Christianity.55 Lady Ranelagh’s network continued to extend to the American colonies as well. Her zealous religious mindset made her a natural ally of John Eliot, who was working on converting to Protestantism the indigenous people in the American colonies. Eliot had established many small conversion communities around Boston called “praying towns.” He trained these communities in English manners, provided them with a Bible translated into the Algonquin tongue, and taught them the basic ethics of Christianity.56 Boyle served as governor of the New England Company, a post he had since 1662, which established a strategy for converting indigenous people through the use of Bible translations in their languages. However, after the outbreak of King Philip’s War in 1675 (a conflict between indigenous people and white colonists) the Massachusetts Council turned against all native tribes, and in October 1675 it ordered Eliot’s Christian converts to be contained on Deer Island in Boston Harbor.57 Once Eliot visited the converts, he wrote to his contacts in England about the appalling conditions he witnessed, with many people dying of starvation, cold, and sickness. Roughly half the Christian Native Americans either died or were captured to be sold in the slave trade over the winter of 1675/76. When the war ended in May 1676, the remaining indigenous people were allowed to return to Massachusetts.

176

•

Chapter Seven

After having survived the harsh winter without adequate food or shelter, they were in poor health. Eliot wrote about these atrocities to both Robert Boyle and Lady Ranelagh in separate letters, engaging them each individually as his partners in this mission.58 In the summer of 1676, Lady Ranelagh replied to Eliot about the “trials & sufferings of your poore praying Indians,” saying she was glad they were no longer on “the Island of their distresses.” She was critical of the colonists’ actions because she believed that those in power should be responsible for upholding Christian principles if they expected “those under power” to comply with their superiors’ ethics. She also offered medical advice for Eliot’s care for the native people, saying, “We here find bleeding excelent good to prevent coughs from growing to a dangerous height.” Her recommendation of bloodletting suggests she was like many of her professional contemporaries in that she was still endorsing some treatments rooted in Galenism well into the Restoration period. As well, it confirms that her knowledge of available medical options still spanned beyond the household remedies that she created and distributed herself or with her brother. Ranelagh continued the letter by comforting Eliot with her confidence that “the lord direct you to the best meanes for your sick & make himselfe the great Phisitian to Cure all your distempers”— still relegating ultimate medical authority to God himself and accepting the fate of providence. Not only was Ranelagh sympathetic to Eliot’s mission, but she was also concerned with the political and philanthropic aspects of events taking place in the American colonies. Jill Lepore has shown that most of the white settlers had no sympathy for those confined to Deer Island, with Daniel Gookin and John Eliot being the notable exceptions. She has suggested, “Not a few colonists believed confinement was too good a treatment for Indians, Christian or not.”59 As such, Lady Ranelagh was among a select group of people in American history who sympathized with and offered medical recommendations to treat the indigenous people confined to Deer Island. Her commentary on the colonists and the indigenous people also illuminates her frame of reference, sympathizing with professed Christians and those actively living in accordance with Christian values, regardless of the color of their skin, national identity, or position within a social hierarchy.

Robert Boyle Moves In

•

177

Ranelagh’s support for evangelical missions such as Eliot’s led to her working more closely with Boyle to develop another religious conversion initiative in the 1680s— this one aimed at Irish Catholics. While consistently sympathetic to Protestants of all kinds, Lady Ranelagh had been less sensitive to the needs of Catholics. Yet letters and activities of the early 1680s suggest that she now saw potential in evangelizing Irish Catholics. As we saw above, Boyle’s own evangelism was occupying him with several Bible translation projects, working with John Eliot to translate the Bible into Algonquin and with Thomas Hyde and Thomas Marshall on a translation into the Malayan language.60 Ranelagh may have been in the background of these projects, as she was corresponding with Eliot at the same time, but all we can confirm definitively is that she was directly involved in the Irish vernacular translation project that Boyle also began pursuing around this time. Boyle initiated this project with Andrew Sall in 1678, printing in 1682 translations of the New Testament in a special new font created and funded by Boyle. After Sall’s death in 1682, Boyle collaborated with Narcissus Marsh, provost of Trinity College, Dublin, on an accompanying Gaelic translation of the Old Testament. Lady Ranelagh stepped in to encourage the participation of Bishop Anthony Dopping, which resulted in him playing a significant role in seeing this project through to completion. In her correspondence with Bishop Dopping in the 1680s, she asserted that an Irish vernacular translation of the Bible could be used to expunge Ireland of its Catholicism. In so doing, she contributed to contemporary debates concerning the use of the Irish language in achieving conversion.61 Her support stemmed from her belief that the “poore Irish” lacked the “spiritual advantages” that God’s providence had provided to English Protestants.62 The translation project received a range of responses, with the angriest critique coming from Edward Wolley, the bishop of Clonfert, who argued that the translation was not permitted under the Act of Uniformity.63 Wolley thought that Irish Catholics were beyond help— a belief that may not have always been so foreign to Lady Ranelagh. However, her involvement in the project shows a progression in her thought: while still critical of the state of Ireland and the Catholic people, she suggested the problems stemmed from misguidance and lack of access to education. Ranelagh’s correspondence with another politico-religious figure that

178

•

Chapter Seven

was busy shaping the American colonies— William Penn— adds further depth and nuance to her involvement in colonial projects as well as to her opinions of Ireland and Irish Catholics. It is unclear how Ranelagh and Penn met, but it was probably through their Irish connections. Ranelagh was about thirty years older than Penn, but his father, Admiral Sir William Penn, had extensive Irish landholdings in County Cork and patrolled coastal Irish cities like Youghal in his naval post as vice admiral of Ireland.64 In 1683, William Penn wrote to Boyle from Philadelphia to inform him both of the indigenous people he had met and the useful medicinal plants which “some chemists intend an observation upon.” After his signature Penn added, “Pray give my respects to the lady Ranelagh,” confirming he knew her by this point.65 Boyle and Penn maintained a correspondence across the 1680s, and Boyle remained governor of the New England Company until 1689, when he resigned because he refused to comply with new laws requiring him to take the Oath of Allegiance.66 Over the same period of time, Ranelagh also maintained her own correspondence with Penn, with three copy letters (only one of which has a year) surviving today in the Society of Friends Library in London.67 The letters suggest a genuine friendship between the two, with Ranelagh sometimes beginning simply with a casual “Sir” and closing by identifying as his “affectionate friend” who presents her service to his wife. These three letters demonstrate that the two discussed a wide range of subjects, including medicine, religious toleration, and the state of Ireland. Penn trusted Ranelagh’s judgment, and she used the high esteem in which she was held to introduce him to others in her network. One such person was Sir Michael Cole, “a very intelligent and honest person” who had just left Ireland. Cole offered to give Penn “an account of the state of that poor country” in order to encourage Penn to continue promoting English interests there. Ranelagh commented on Cole’s good character and noted that she recommended him to Penn “without fearing to lose any credit with you by him when you know him.”68 Ranelagh’s correspondence with Penn also demonstrates some complexity in her views on Irish Catholics. In a letter dated August 4, 1688, Ranelagh appealed to Penn’s Quakerism and his well-known advocacy for religious toleration when asking him to continue supporting an Irish

Robert Boyle Moves In

•

179

Catholic gentlewoman with a “sad and particular” case.69 Significantly, the letter dates just a month and a half after James II’s son was born, which had renewed the Catholic threat in England because the king now had a viable Catholic heir. The letter begins with Ranelagh acknowledging Penn as an “honored Friend” and that she was “very glad . . . God has by his providence brought my Lady Clanmalie’s concerns under your care.”70 Lady Clanmalie’s identity is unknown, as the copyist left a blank after “Lady C,” which was later filled in with pencil indicating it was “Clanmalie.”71 She may be Anne O’Dempsey, 3rd Viscountess Clanmalier, who had been receiving pensions from the king.72 In the letter, Ranelagh expressed relief and gratitude to Penn for being “God’s instrument for her relief.”73 The careful expressions Ranelagh used clarify that the woman in question was Catholic, noting that she is “pious in her way.”74 Ranelagh continued, saying she herself had “been long convinced that no differing professions in religion should keep us from exercising justice and charity to each other, since the general laws of humanity and much more of Christianity, oblige us to pay those duties to all.”75 While this may sound like the same sentiments that Ranelagh used previously to argue for liberty of conscience among all branches of Protestantism, her next statement makes it clear that Lady Clanmalier is Catholic: “Since there is no so effectual way to recommend the true and best religion to those who are not yet of it, as our exceeding towards them and all others in those real performances which are the convincing testimonies to the consciences of all.”76 This may be a reflection on the challenges associated with her and Boyle’s recent attempts at conversion through Bible translations. Regardless, commenting on Lady Clanmalier’s piety, virtue, and worthiness, Ranelagh was clearly convinced by this woman’s religious conviction even if Clanmalier’s views differed from those she and Penn shared. The literary historians Ruth Connolly and Amelia Zurcher have demonstrated how Ranelagh viewed hypocrisy— the expression of words and actions that are not aligned with the soul’s convictions— as the opposite of liberty of conscience.77 While Ranelagh clearly extended her belief in liberty of conscience to all Protestant groups, this letter suggests that in some cases she even valued sincerity in Catholic individuals, allowing them space to have their own relationships with God. However, it is unlikely that her toleration ever extended to Catholicism

180

•

Chapter Seven

more broadly, as wide spread toleration of Catholicism conflicted with the belief that Protestantism was the only Christian religion.78 In addition to religion, the other subject to which Lady Ranelagh remained dedicated until her death, and with which she continued to collaborate with her brother Robert was medicine. By the mid to late 1670s, new work by Continental physicians such as Marcello Malpighi and Nicolas Steno combined anatomical discoveries with corpuscular theories of matter, making it easier to reconcile medical theory with the mechanical philosophy.79 Boyle and Ranelagh’s neighbor, Thomas Sydenham, advanced empirical approaches to diagnosing diseases and prescribing medicines for treatment, with his Observationes medicae (1676) becoming a standard medical textbook. Yet while professional medicine increasingly incorporated new methodologies from the new science, patients continued to seek relief from a wide variety of medical practitioners, including men and women from their own social networks and empirics practicing outside the College of Physicians. Ranelagh continued to care for sick family members and remained a source for those who sought relief. Her medical network extended as far as her social network, and these individuals relied on her expertise until her final days. When William Penn’s child became sick, Ranelagh responded by sending Penn some “prescriptions” and “things” (presumably the medicines themselves, or key ingredients so he could make the remedy). The child found relief, and Penn responded by sending Ranelagh a “reward” that she described as both “plentiful” and “very good.” She assured Penn that she wanted to help his child out of pity and charity, not “covetousness” for the “returns you have made me.” But above all, she thanked him for the letter he included in the parcel, which must have included religious meditations on contemporary events, though his original letter is no longer extant. Ranelagh’s response to Penn’s meditations included millenarian overtones: “Indeed this begins to grow a day of the revelation of the mysteries of Antichrist, and of the treachery of its instruments, He who discovers will in His due time sweep away, and bring in His own furniture, which will be faith, love, humility and integrity.” She noted that only when these characteristics abound in men would “wars and miseries . . . cease from the earth, but not before.”80 Penn and Ranelagh’s friendship was born of

Robert Boyle Moves In

•

181

mutual intellectual respect, and this letter shows how Ranelagh’s medical practice and network often blended with her desire to improve society by spreading God’s message. In addition to the letter, it is unclear what Penn sent Ranelagh as thanks for her medical treatment, but monetary payment to a gentlewoman for such charitable services would have been unusual. In addition to practicing medicine on her own, once Robert Boyle moved in with Ranelagh, extant letters— some by Ranelagh, others by Boyle— to sick family members reveal that the two continued sharing diagnostic information, agreeing on remedies for treatment, and borrowing each other’s ingredients. When their niece was sick, their sisterin-law Margaret Boyle, Countess of Orrery, wrote to Lady Ranelagh for advice. Ranelagh replied by saying that she read the letter to Robert and he thought “anti-scurbutical” medicines would be best. She then offered an extensive list of various medicines to treat scurvy and how to administer them.81 It is not clear in this letter where Boyle’s advice ends and Ranelagh’s begins, which is characteristic of these letters more generally. For instance, in a letter to her brother Lord Burlington in 1667, Ranelagh promised to send “two smale Botles of sperit of Sal Armoniacke” to treat her sick sisterin-law, which she says she procured from “My Brother Robin,” her affectionate name for Robert.82 Living together must have allowed them easier access to each other’s materials, and Ranelagh may have enjoyed using the improved laboratory equipment Hooke had developed for Boyle, though it would have been more common for a lay medical practitioner to prepare medical remedies in the kitchen or stillroom. The recipes the siblings shared with their family members could then be distributed among others or copied into a household recipe book, as seen with their sister-in-law, the Countess of Orrery, who included recipes from both Ranelagh and Boyle in her family collection.83 The medical practice that the siblings shared extended beyond their family as well, and continued until the end of their lives. Around 1687, when Anne, Duchess of Hamilton, was sick, Ranelagh wrote to her that “my brother . . . is very glad that any thing he advised has proved serviceable towards so usefull a health as god is pleased to make your Graces be,” typically deferring the credit to God for Hamilton’s recovery. Boyle had recommended the herb “Baume” infused in a posset drink as being

182

•

Chapter Seven

“very good against opressions about the hart.” Ranelagh then immediately followed her brother’s suggestion by adding her own, endorsing another remedy for the same purpose as well as a cordial she had already sent to Hamilton with some elderberries. Ranelagh said she personally found the latter to be the most effective and would be “very much rejoyced to heare it proved so to your Grace.” Ranelagh used the language of proving efficacy through trials— a practice commonly employed with recipe books and now in professional medicine thanks to the empirical trials of Sydenham and others. She was eager to hear how a remedy she had found to be beneficial for herself would work on other bodies. Likewise, she wanted to know if Boyle’s remedy worked because she thought it would be “a very acceptable peece of service to promote” it, noting that she would have sent it to the duchess except that she had none prepared.84 Like previous letters Ranelagh had written to patients decades earlier, this one shows that the siblings continued to collaboratively disseminate recipes, ingredients, and materials. They also shared an understanding that distributing effective cures was a spiritual obligation to God and society. Over the last decade of his life, Boyle began publishing a variety of medical texts. Some of these were manuscript drafts that he had originally composed in the 1660s and laid aside prior to seeing them through to publication; others were new works that articulated and developed theories and trials he had tested over the years. These works all had in common an endorsement of empirical medical trials and questioned the value of many traditional medical systems that prevailed in England in the 1680s. Boyle counted Dr. Thomas Sydenham and John Locke among his medical circle at this time, but the influence of Lady Ranelagh’s medical practice may also be seen in his works, particularly those that relate to recipes. Ranelagh and Boyle continued to endorse and distribute effective medical remedies via post or in person, but Boyle also returned to print in the 1680s to secure a wider audience for his medical views. Published in 1685, Of the Reconcileableness of Specifick Medicines to the Corpuscular Philosophy was a philosophical text meant to accompany his more practical medical recipe book, which he was revising for publication around the same time. This work posited a possible mechanical explanation for how and why remedies worked, suggesting that the shape and size of corpuscules in one

Robert Boyle Moves In

•

183

piece of matter may be “friendly” to another. Drawing on the latest discoveries in anatomy, Boyle also suggested that corpuscules could travel to the site of the problem by using digestion (for internal medicines) or via the circulation of blood (for external remedies, where some corpuscules were absorbed through the skin.) Specifick Medicines is both more narrative and theoretical than a recipe text, but the experiments and results described therein reveal that the content and procedures were usually simple remedies that were similar to those found in recipe books.85 When he privately circulated a copy of his printed book Some Receipts of Medicines in 1688 before embarking on a full publication run of the expanded version a few years later— this time entitled Medicinal Experiments— Boyle asked a select audience to read the recipes alongside the theories he had presented in Specifick Medicines. As he stated in the introduction to Some Receipts of Medicines: “I am willing that this short collection should furnish you with divers Instances to confirm the Paper, to which I desire you would subjoyn it, of the Usefulness of Simple Medicines.”86 The paper to which he refers is his “Invitation to the Use of Simple Medicines,” a book-length appendix sold together with Specifick Medicines. In this, Boyle implored the reader of his recipes to see them as empirically based evidence supporting the theories he postulated concerning medicine and the body. The note indicates that, nearing the end of his life, Boyle saw a direct connection between his practical remedies and theoretical works. In “Simple Medicines,” Boyle argued for the benefits of using remedies composed of just a few ingredients instead of complex compounds. Such simple medicines would allow practitioners to identify more easily which ingredients were effective, which would in turn reduce the possibility of accidental reactions when mixing multiple substances. Boyle dismissed “pompous” recipes with expansive and expensive lists of ingredients, seeing no value in them when a simple remedy would suffice. Above all, this piece shows that Boyle himself invested great value in the practical medical recipes for which his sister had become known.87 While most of the stories given in Specifick Medicines lack exact names for the sources and rarely provide enough details to trace them back to particular recipes, they do include references to using medical ingredients provided by one of his sisters, who was almost certainly Ranelagh. Boyle

184

•

Chapter Seven

remembers one summer when he was in a sister’s house and suffering from a nosebleed. He said he was able to easily obtain “some true Moss of a dead Mans scull, which had been sent her, by a great Person, for a present out of Ireland, in which Country, I found it less rare and more esteem’d than elsewhere.”88 Boyle’s reference to being in his sister’s house and her sharing medical ingredients sent from esteemed individuals in Ireland already suggests Ranelagh’s identity, and this assumption gains further support when we consider that the virtues of Irish moss from a dead man’s skull had also been a topic of discussion among the Hartlib circle.89 Boyle and Ranelagh must have exchanged stories and ideas on shared medical experiences; her practice would have informed Boyle’s own theory and practice, and vice versa. The theories in Specifick Medicines and the recipes in Boyle’s printed recipe collections, Some Receipts and Medicinal Experiments, probably incorporate more contributions from Lady Ranelagh than we will ever be able to confirm with certainty. Specifick Medicines is also an important text for acknowledging that Boyle treated recipes as experiments to test philosophical theories and principles. In so doing, he endorsed the kinds of practical chemistry done by his sister and others. While he apologized in Usefulness of Natural Philosophy for the inclusion of medical recipes in a book about natural philosophy, twenty years later Boyle solved this rhetorical challenge and published the medical recipes and the theories about them in two separate texts, for two distinct audiences.90 As such, Ranelagh’s own expertise in writing, trading, and testing medical recipes must be seen as a contribution to Boyle’s evolving thoughts on the subject. Ranelagh may also have been partly responsible for Boyle’s return to an uncharacteristically bold unpublished medical treatise that he began composing before he moved to London. In “Considerations and Doubts Touching the Vulgar Method of Physick,” Boyle attacked traditional Galenic physicians for using outdated, harsh remedies that did not work and for refusing to try new remedies that trials had proven were effective. He began that work during the 1660s when many attacks on orthodox medicine were circulating in pamphlet form, returning to it nearly twenty years later when he was working on several related medical texts.91 While Boyle was usually verbose and thoughtful in his works, often presenting both

Robert Boyle Moves In

•

185

sides of a debate and avoiding controversial statements that would invite criticism, the blunt attacks on Galenic physicians in “Considerations and Doubts” make it an exception. Moreover, a comparison of the rhetorical choices and reasoning in this document with similar statements made by Lady Ranelagh in her letters over the years suggests that she may have been one of the driving forces behind its composition. For example, “Considerations and Doubts” makes more explicit Boyle’s careful critiques of doctors found in earlier published works such as Usefulness of Natural Philosophy (which we have already established has Lady Ranelagh’s mark on it), but the tone here is more direct and sarcastic than what one commonly finds in Boyle’s works. In fact, it more closely mimics Ranelagh’s style than Boyle’s in its quick-witted oneliners and with its severity and sarcasm. Take, for example, the following comment in “Considerations”: “When in such Cases it is pleaded the Course which was taken was safe; it may be answer’d, that it was so indeed for the Physician, but not for the Patient: the former losing little or no reputation, whilst the latter looses his life.” This uncharacteristic sarcasm resurfaces again in a later comment: “When a poor Patient lyes sick of a dangerous Disease, his recourse to a Physician is, to be cur’d by him, or at lest [sic] to be reliev’d. But if he desir’d no more than that the Physician should , his course were not to send to a Physician at all; For then he need not fear to be killed by him.” This dark picture of physicians killing their patients echoes a letter Ranelagh wrote to Boyle in 1652. When providing Boyle with an update on Sir Fenton Parsons, a friend of the family who had done legal work for their father, Ranelagh lamented that he died due to poor treatment from a physician: “He was let bloud unseasonabley by one that is called a Dr. but sure their trade is rather to Cure men of their bodys Then to cure mens bodyes of diseases.”92 Neither Boyle nor Ranelagh was completely against bloodletting, as both endorsed carefully executed phlebotomy as a cure for some diseases;93 however, they both cautioned against casual use of this method because the consequences could be more extreme than with milder, empirically based remedies. Additionally, physicians’ unwillingness to try new remedies that deviated from traditional scholarship angered both Boyle and Ranelagh, who

186

•

Chapter Seven

felt that medical practitioners had an ethical responsibility to do what was best for the patient. Rhetorical and theoretical parallels concerning physicians who gave up on their patients prematurely can be found in Boyle’s statements in “Considerations” and in Ranelagh’s contemporary letters discussing her treatment of patients alongside ineffective doctors. Boyle commented in “Considerations” that “the chief difference the Patient finds, between Timid Physitian & a bold Empyric, seems to be this, that the latter ventures to kill him, & the former tamely lets him Dye”— a comment that equally critiques physicians who let down their patients as well as the boldness of some new experimental remedies. Boyle had written about timid physicians in more detail in Usefulness of Natural Philosophy, in which he offered an anecdote about a physician who, when questioned about why he was not giving his patient “more Generous Remedies” when the patient still suffered after trying the “more common Languid ones,” responded: “Let him die if he will, so he die secundum artem (according to the medical art).” Boyle disapproved, hoping “there were fewer learned Men that think a Physitian hath done enough, when he hath learnedly discoursed of the seat and nature of the Disease, foretold the event of it, and methodically imployed a company of safe, but languid Remedies.” He added, “I had much rather, that the Physitian of any Friend of mine, should keep his Patient by powerful Medicines from dying, then tell me punctually when he shall die, or shew me in the opened Carcase why it may be supposed he lived no longer.” Boyle concluded this section by explaining it was a tangent provoked by his “concern for Mankinde, and for the reputation of many excellent Physicistians, whose Profession suffers much by the want of either Industry or Charity.”94 Lady Ranelagh repeatedly expressed similar dissatisfaction with physicians who limited themselves to trying only what they learned in books, having noted in a letter from 1659 that she “would take Physick rather upon Experience than upon a fine resoning discourse.”95 She also offered critiques of ineffective and uncharitable doctors on two occasions we encountered in chapter 6: the illnesses of Lady Clarendon and of the baby Duke of Kendal. When Ranelagh witnessed the doctors prematurely giving up on their treatment of Lady Clarendon in 1667, determining that “her case [was] very hopeless” after none of their usual remedies worked,

Robert Boyle Moves In

•

187

Ranelagh explained, “Yet I act by the Proverbe that says as long as there is life there is hope.”96 She treated Clarendon by holding Spirit of Hartshorn (one of Boyle’s three preferred empirical remedies at this time) under her nose, which the doctors “confesed was as proper as any thing that could be used to her.”97 That same year, when she heard the physicians who were treating baby Kendal say “they had donn al they could” while the baby screamed in pain, her response was to write to her brother Burlington: “Such Phisitians of noe valew & myserable comforters are the greatest & most skilful of creatures in a dyeing houer.”98 This sarcastic one-liner is also typical of those that found their way into Boyle’s “Considerations,” which he was drafting around the same time. We can confirm that Ranelagh expressed bold critiques of physicians in the 1660s when Boyle was originally composing this tract. Moreover, we know from her biography that she was housing meetings for William Rand’s proposed Society of Chemical Physicians just prior to this. Nevertheless, it is unclear why Boyle returned to consider publishing this around 1680 or whether Ranelagh may have instigated that return. Many of the harshest critiques quoted above appear in a Royal Society manuscript composed within a year or two of 1680.99 Considering the reasons behind Boyle’s return to this manuscript around 1680, Michael Hunter has reflected on Boyle’s intellectual evolution over this decade and a half since Boyle composed the original manuscript. He notes that Boyle may have been influenced by recent work of Sydenham and others, and that he would have witnessed the revival of some of the College of Physicians’ regulatory practices.100 Indeed, while the college had become more intellectually diverse in recent years, sharing some fellows with the Royal Society, it was also becoming politically stronger in 1680. Over the first few years of the 1680s the college once again began trying unlicensed physicians, and by 1683 they would even vote to fine any member who consulted with an empiric.101 Like Boyle, Ranelagh too would have experienced intellectual growth and would have witnessed these changes to the medical landscape around the turn of 1680. Such changes may also have affected her more personally in 1681, when she was dealing with another medical situation that involved intense disagreement with the attending physicians. Ranelagh’s daughter-

188

•

Chapter Seven

in-law Elizabeth Jones was seriously sick with an illness described as “vapors from the spleene.”102 Ranelagh had an intimate relationship with her daughter-in-law, and Mary Rich’s diary includes several references to her sister repeatedly being called on to attend to her when ill. For example, over the course of one week in late August 1676, Rich noted that her sister was constantly attending to Elizabeth after she had suffered a miscarriage. She added that the “young Lady Ranelagh [Elizabeth]” was “in a very weake and dangereous condition” and that she was “troubled” to see her “poore Sisteres grief for her danger.”103 Thankfully, Elizabeth recovered from this episode, but when she fell dangerously ill again in 1681, it is no wonder why the young woman called in her mother-in-law in again. By this point, Elizabeth was so sick that she thought she was dying. Lady Ranelagh was distraught and spent several days almost perpetually by her daughter-in-law’s side. Unfortunately, the only description of this encounter exists in a letter from Ranelagh’s niece Elizabeth Tufton, 3rd Countess of Thanet, written to her mother.104 Thanet wrote that the doctors thought it “no unusuall thing” for Elizabeth to be acting like this and that they didn’t believe she was in any danger. However, her “poor Aunt Ranelaugh” was “so affected at the sight of it, as I never saw her more with any thing in my life.” As we know, Ranelagh was an established medical practitioner in her own right and no stranger to disagreeing with doctors. However, most testimonies of these disagreements are found in her own letters and are written with some emotional detachment from the situation, as seen with the Duke of Kendal. But in this situation in 1681, shortly after losing two of her own daughters, Ranelagh clearly feared the loss of her daughter-in-law. We can safely assume that she would not have easily dismissed her own opinions in favor of those given by the attending medical professionals, and that her brother Boyle would have heard about this as soon as Ranelagh returned to their shared home. This situation happened just as the College of Physicians was experiencing its resurgence and when Boyle was returning to his manuscripts on this topic. It could be that Ranelagh’s own recent medical encounters were factors pushing Boyle toward his return to this bold medical treatise at this time. If we look at Boyle’s medical practice as a partnership with Lady Ranelagh instead of an individual practice in isolation, his more radical

Robert Boyle Moves In

•

189

manuscripts no longer appear to be strange contradictions in a larger narrative of his “nonconfrontational demeanor,” to quote Barbara Kaplan.105 Instead, as evidenced throughout both Ranelagh’s letters and Boyle’s printed publications, we see a complex collaboration between the siblings where it is sometimes difficult to determine which was the originator of a particular medical remedy or theory. If they shared critical views on natural philosophy or medicine in the Restoration, they both would have known that such a statement would appear stronger if published by a man of Boyle’s intellectual stature than a lady of Ranelagh’s, despite her own esteemed reputation. Indeed, Michael Hunter has argued that Boyle himself probably knew that the attack would have great impact if he published it under his name, especially by this point around 1680, which is ultimately why he chose not to publish it. Furthermore, Ranelagh maintained her refusal to enter print throughout her life, instead leveraging manuscript circulation and shaping the works of her brother prior to their publication. By viewing these manuscript fragments as another work authored primarily by Boyle but perhaps promoted or edited by Ranelagh, it would fit into a much longer narrative in which both siblings were careful and able navigators of their rapidly changing sociopolitical climate, thoughtful of how natural philosophy and medicine fit into it. Beyond Ranelagh’s collaboration with her brother, her own medical practice continued into her final days, and her latest dated series of letters are those addressed to the Countess of Panmure. These epistles show Ranelagh distributing medical advice that began with a physician but which she, drawing from her own experience, supplemented with her own recommendations. By the 1690s, Ranelagh knew the surgeon and physician Sir Edmund King because he was now Robert Boyle’s physician, though he most famously served as the royal physician who attended to Charles II during his final illness.106 King is best remembered for his work on early blood transfusions, and he shared many associates with Lady Ranelagh, including Thomas Willis, Robert Boyle, Dr. Richard Lower, and Gilbert Sheldon, archbishop of Canterbury. When the Countess of Panmure was ill and had received some medication from Sir Edmund that was not helping, she wrote to Lady Ranelagh to ask for her advice and to see if Ranelagh would discuss this with him. Ranelagh replied with her characteristic

190

•

Chapter Seven

independence, beginning with proper deference to medical authorities, then adding her own advice on the frequency of the dose.107 In fact, her commitment to helping her ill friends and family members could not even be stopped by her own illness. Ranelagh’s last extant letter is addressed to the Countess of Panmure about the latter’s sickness, but it is not in Ranelagh’s hand. The letter begins with Ranelagh saying, “My abundantly increased decays both in sight & strength disable me from doing it with my own hand.”108 Through her dictation to an unknown amanuensis, Lady Ranelagh relayed Sir Edmund King’s advice to Panmure. In her final years of life, Ranelagh’s physical body began to fail her. In the summer of 1688, for example, she had fallen while walking in her home and afterward remained in bed with “a hurt forehead and a very black eye.”109 But her mind remained strong until the end. While medicine and religion remained lifelong passions, so was Ranelagh still dedicated to influencing the political landscape, particularly as it related to Irish settlements. The latter half of the 1680s brought frequent and significant changes to England’s monarchy, and in addition to her religious and medical associates Ranelagh maintained a diverse network of influential political figures who helped her negotiate this. When Charles II died in 1685, his Catholic brother James II took the throne. While James’s accession brought toleration for nonconformists, his open Catholicism also renewed national hysteria over the “popish threat.” Within Lady Ranelagh’s Anglo-Irish circle, James’s accession fed hopes of rebuilding Ireland, for the new king had known and supported Sir William Petty for some time. During the first two years of James’s reign, Petty circulated many manuscripts among his active coterie network, of which Lady Ranelagh was a part, soliciting comments prior to submitting them to the new king for consideration.110 Petty relied heavily on the safety of manuscript circulation as a means of getting politicians and other politically influential individuals to consider the practical implications of implementing his proposals. He passed at least one of these to Lady Ranelagh for comment, indicating her ongoing support for his projects and his continued value of her knowledge and influence. This document, known as “Speculum Hiberniae,” is a reply to G. F. D.’s Twelve Queries Relating to the Interest of Ireland (1685) and Nicholas French’s Narrative of the Settlement and Sales of Ireland (1668),

Robert Boyle Moves In

•

191

which Petty published in manuscript in 1686 toward the end of his life. It takes the form of a history of the Irish Rebellion and Catholic confederacy with the aim of defending the Protestant settlements in Ireland.111 The treatise begins with a list of twenty-two potential supporters, among which Lady Ranelagh is the only woman named; others include some of James II’s most loyal supporters in 1686, such as Edward Hyde’s two sons, Laurence Hyde, 1st Earl of Rochester, and Henry Hyde, 2nd Earl of Clarendon; Sir William Coventry; and Sir Edward Herbert. Lord Tyrconnell and Lord Ormond are also on this list, thus creating a diverse group of individuals who are connected perhaps only through their shared interest in the Irish settlement.112 When Petty was preparing this manuscript, he sent it to Lady Ranelagh and asked her to “shew them onely to the true friends of the King and Church of England & Emprovement of Ireland,” suggesting Ranelagh supported some of James II’s efforts.113 She replied to Petty with the promise that she would “make noe Ill use of it & if I can carry it on to a good accoumpt you shal heare it, & however it shal god wiling be faithfully returned to you.”114 Petty turned to his old friend because he knew of both her investment in the Irish settlement and the range of powerful contacts she held. Ranelagh managed to maintain her political network and influence with each change of the monarchy, which must have been a strategic act of patience and diplomacy when one considers her strong opinions on many political and religious topics. However, this period of collective optimism at the beginning of James’s reign was very brief, as in 1687 he began replacing Protestant officers with Catholics. Many of Lady Ranelagh’s friends were displaced, and Anglo-Irish Protestants began to fear that they might lose their Irish lands to Catholics.115 Robert Boyle lost the income generated by these lands for more than two years.116 Though it appears that Lady Ranelagh supported James at the beginning of his reign, this probably dissipated quickly as his actions began to disappoint her. After William and Mary secured the throne of England by overthrowing James II only three years into his reign, Lady Ranelagh must have welcomed the new climate of religious toleration for all Protestants. However, regardless of her personal political beliefs, she characteristically maintained friendships with significant Jacobites as well as Williamites. In fact, she was intimate with the three politicians who led the opposition to Wil-

192

•

Chapter Seven

liam of Orange taking the throne in January 1689: Henry Hyde, 2nd Earl of Clarendon; Laurence Hyde, 1st Earl of Rochester; and Daniel Finch, 2nd Earl of Nottingham. The Hyde brothers were relatives through marriage, as Laurence Hyde was married to her niece Henrietta, and the political divisions within her family must have reinforced her general inclination to maintain good personal relations with people of all parties. The 2nd Earl of Clarendon was arrested for treason in June 1690 and spent nearly two months in the Tower of London. During his imprisonment, Clarendon and Ranelagh’s mutual friend Gilbert Burnet suggested to Lady Ranelagh that he could benefit from a petition to the queen and council.117 Clarendon’s wife and his brother Lord Rochester prepared the petition and Lady Ranelagh agreed to deliver it to her old friend Lord Nottingham, who was now a secretary of state under the new administration; she “promised to recommend it effectually” to him.118 Though Nottingham did not deliver the petition as he had promised, Clarendon was eventually released on bail on August 15, 1690. Clarendon must have acknowledged that his release was due to Lady Ranelagh’s influence, as his first visit the following morning was to her house.119 Such workings behind the scenes show that Ranelagh continued to help change political outcomes, to adapt to governmental shifts, and to be persuasive without overstepping boundaries until the final year of her life. Among her Williamite acquaintances were William Cavendish, 1st Duke of Devonshire— a member of the Privy Council— and Lady Rachel Russell, an avid letter-writer and active Whig whose husband, William, Lord Russell, had been executed for treason under Charles II.120 The Duke of Devonshire was a friend of the now deceased William Russell and had been instrumental in engendering the revolution of 1688; as such, he was richly rewarded by the new government. In 1690, when Lady Russell was seeking a political position for Sir Francis Wingate, she wrote to Lady Ranelagh to see if she could convince their mutual friend, the Duke of Devonshire, to help Wingate. Lady Russell pleaded, “I can ask no more than when you see Lord Devonshire to mention the thing to him, and your wishes in it; and if you think fit, as a thing you know I offer’d to him, from my Lord Bedford, and my own account; tho’ I know there will not want that to enforce, when he knows your will in it, I know so well his respect

Robert Boyle Moves In

•

193

to your Ladyship.”121 Lady Russell then wrote directly to Lord Devonshire and told him, “My Lady Ranelagh will, I guess, let you see she is engaged in this matter, which I will say no more in; but if it is in your Lordship’s way to do him the courtesey I shall be glad.”122 While Lady Russell already knew Devonshire, she relied on his great respect for Lady Ranelagh to lend further support to her case for Wingate. This negotiation is another example of how early modern women may not have held political positions themselves but were responsible for analyzing situations and recommending individuals who could change the course of contemporary politics. Essentially, Ranelagh was a successful lobbyist, with her ability to influence contemporary politics resting on her esteemed reputation and solid sense of judgment. Lady Ranelagh remained active in politics until her final days. John Evelyn recorded that he visited “Mr. Boyle and Lady Ranelagh his sister” one day in June 1690, at which point she was seventy-five years old, and they discussed religion and foreign affairs.123 Evelyn accompanied William Lloyd, the bishop of St. Asaph, who delivered a millenarian reading of the scriptures to the three of them.124 The return to millenarianism was probably inspired by contemporary events. When William III was waging war on the Jacobite strongholds in Ireland in 1690, Lady Ranelagh firmly sided with the new king.125 Her letters written during the Siege of Limerick in August 1690 to Margaret Hamilton, Countess of Panmure, and to Margaret’s mother Anne, Duchess of Hamilton, are unequivocally supportive of William, saying, “We hope that god wil yet deliver & make him victorious there,” continuing her providential interpretation.126 Ranelagh may have come to know the countess and duchess through their shared friend Gilbert Burnet, and while the Countess of Panmure came from a politically divided family, Lady Ranelagh addressed her as a fellow Williamite. These letters written in support of William’s invasion expressed disgust at “the Irish cruelty”— seemingly in conflict with her recent sympathy for Irish Catholics through the vernacular Irish Bible translation project and her advocacy on behalf of Lady Clanmalier.127 When considering Ranelagh’s recent letter to Penn alongside this 1690 correspondence, it appears she separated individual cases from the Irish Catholic masses and that her sympathy for the Irish generally declined at times of war and violence.

194

•

Chapter Seven

Collectively, what these stories of her religious activism, medical experimentation, and political networks show us is that Lady Ranelagh maintained her “incomparable” reputation until the end of her life. Gender affected the way she interacted with her society in that she leveraged personal networks rather than professional societies and relied on manuscript circulation and her brother’s use of print instead of her own; however, this does not appear to have been an obvious inhibitor. Furthermore, living with her brother Boyle ensured that the intellectual elite in Restoration society continued to come to her. It was in 1681, more than a decade after Boyle had moved in with her, that the Duke of Ormond commented on Lady Ranelagh’s “great” influence on her family, noting that “she governs them very absolutely.”128 Lady Ranelagh’s biography offers a nuanced story, showing how one woman was able to intellectually engage with and influence others on a wide variety of topics and maintain an esteemed reputation, despite significant political and intellectual shifts. For three decades after the founding of the Royal Society, Ranelagh continued to use manuscript networks and the household as a site for conversation and experimentation, similar to what had been done in the first half of the seventeenth century. As we have seen in this and the previous chapter, Ranelagh maintained as active an intellectual life during the Restoration as she did beforehand. Extant evidence (although less bountiful in these last decades), shows the bond between brother and sister strengthened through the convenience of a shared space. These decades together in their old age also allowed Boyle and Ranelagh to support each other emotionally through the losses of their closest family members and friends, and to prepare for their own impending deaths and legacies.

Conclusion Death and Legacy

O

n December 23, 1691, Lady Katherine Ranelagh died, with her brother Robert Boyle following eight days later. The details of her death are mostly obscure, but we do know she was buried in the chancel in St. Martin-in-the-Fields three days later. If she left behind a will, it has not been located. Boyle’s will is another story. He first wrote it on July 18, 1691, then continued adding to and correcting it over his final months, leaving behind several subsequent versions and codicils with additions and corrections. He had originally named Lady Ranelagh as an executor, and she is the first person named in his list of beneficiaries. Boyle intended to bequeath to her a ring he had held “ever since my youth in great Esteeme” and had worn “for many yeares for a particular reason not Unknowne to my said Sister.” Unfortunately, this reason is unknown to us today; but we do know Boyle wanted her to wear it in remembrance of him, “a Brother that truly honor’d and most dearly Lov’d her.” He also intended to leave what remained of his estate to Lady Ranelagh, recommending that it be used to “the Advance or Propagation of the Christian Religion among Infidells.” Ranelagh was an obvious choice for this role, due to their shared vision for— and her established reputation and influence on— such projects: she had spent decades working with Boyle to reclaim and manage his Irish properties and had collaborated with him on his attempts to promote Christianity among an international assortment of people. The will and various codicils that followed over several

196

•

Conclusion

months also dispersed some gifts to various nephews and nieces, with one in particular allotted for Ranelagh’s grandchild Katherine Molster, whose mother Elizabeth had married a footman in 1677 and is thereafter absent from the archival record.1 Boyle also intended to give to Ranelagh “all my manuscripts and collections of receipts, whether of my own handwriting, or others . . . beseeching her to have a care, that they or any of them come not to the hands or perusal of any, to whom she thinks, that if I were alive, I should be unwilling to have them communicated.”2 Boyle’s “receipts” are his medical recipes; his minerals, chemical papers, and scientific instruments were bequeathed to associates in the Royal Society. By offering these recipes to her and saying she would know to whom she could disclose them, Boyle confirmed that their shared interest in collecting medical recipes and their tacit understanding of their overlapping medical networks continued until the end of their lives. This is particularly significant given the timing, as Boyle had been working over the last several years of his life to select and publish effective medical recipes that remained in manuscript. The first volume of these, Medicinal Experiments, was published posthumously in 1692, though Boyle was actively involved in its composition around the same time he was drafting and redrafting his will. As such, the above quote suggests that Ranelagh was knowledgeable about his intentions for a select publication derived from his “rich Treasury” of recipes; it may also confirm her knowledge of the auxiliary secret manuscript key he left behind to match the original recipe authors with the anonymous publication of their works.3 However, since Ranelagh had predeceased him, these papers went instead to his philosopher friend John Locke, who is partly responsible for what would become the second posthumous volume of Boyle’s Medicinal Experiments. (Locke’s editorial control can be seen through the employment of an alphabetical arrangement according to ailment being treated.) A third posthumous volume would be published in 1694. This haphazard collection may be the work of Boyle’s other literary executor, Edmund Dickinson.4 The rhetorical devices and genre conventions employed in these later two works lack Boyle’s thoughtful method of disguising authors and selecting recipes based on efficacy trials, as seen in the first.5 It is impossible to speculate how different those volumes would have looked if they

Death and Legacy

•

197

had been under Ranelagh’s intellectual control, or even if they would have been published at all. After Ranelagh’s death, one contemporary noted that Boyle “began evidently to droope apace.”6 He rewrote his last version of his will on December 29, two days before his death, sadly acknowledging the passing of his sister, who was principal executor of the will, and replacing her with his long-time colleague in the New England Company, Sir Henry Ashurst.7 Boyle died on December 31, and the fact that this date followed so closely after Ranelagh’s death came to symbolize to posterity the deep intimacy between the siblings— a closeness that could not even be shaken by death. In his final week, Boyle himself told Sir Charles Lyttleton that “his heart was broke when she died.”8 As well, John Evelyn suggested that Boyle may have lived much longer “had not his Beloved Sister the Lady Viscountesse Ranelagh, (with whom he lived) a person of extraordinary Talents, and suitable to his Religious and Philosophical temper, Dyed before him.”9 There was also an “odd report” circulating that “when Lady Ranelagh lay dying, there was a flame broke out of one of the chimneys, which being observed by the neighbours gave notice of it, and, the chimney being looked [into], there was no cause found for it in the inside, yet appeared to flame for som [sic] time to those without.”10 The same strange phenomenon was said to have occurred again when Robert Boyle died about one week later, perhaps indicating for contemporaries their elevated spiritual state and the union between their souls. As Boyle’s physician and Ranelagh’s trusted medical associate, Sir Edmund King, explained, “His lamp went out for want of oyle; soe did his sister’s too.”11 A separate funeral does not appear to have been held for Lady Ranelagh; she was honored at the funeral for her brother, on January 7, 1692, at which there was “a mighty crowd.” The siblings were buried next to each other in St. Martin-in-the-Fields, though the graves are no longer extant. The accomplished biographer and their longtime friend Gilbert Burnet, bishop of Salisbury, delivered a lengthy eulogy for Boyle that included a significant tribute to Ranelagh, the tone of which was characteristic of his flowery elocution. After celebrating the life of Robert Boyle, Burnet began talking about Lady Ranelagh with some modesty, saying that some of her friends tried to “restrain” him from remembering her, but he then deduced “since

198

•

Conclusion

I was not so [restrained] by her self, I must give a little vent.” Burnet’s remembrance of Lady Ranelagh is one of the most famous depictions of her and marks the beginning of her legacy and afterlife. He began with an appropriate description: “She lived the longest on the publickest Scene, she made the greatest Figure in all the Revolutions of these Kingdoms for above fifty Years, of any Woman of our Age.” He then tied her public reputation and ability to navigate Britain’s tumultuous political climate to her charity, noting that she did it “all for doing good to others.” Describing her as “indefatigable” and “dexterous,” and commenting on her “Zeal” and “success,” he declared that “her great Understanding, and the vast Esteem she was in, made all Persons in their several turns of Greatness, desire and value her Friendship.” In turn, she used their interest in her to benefit others, not herself. Burnet said that she never used her connections for personal gain because she was content with what she had, even though she was twice stripped of her wealth. Applauding her for attending to both “Persons of Merit, or in want,” Burnet noted that her actions were “more Christian and more effectual” because she did not limit herself to any particular party of individuals. He explained that while she held strong opinions on some subjects, “her Soul was never of a Party,” suggesting that her Protestantism was never affected by the politically inspired divisions that were rampant across the second half of the seventeenth century. Commenting specifically on her personality, Burnet described Ranelagh as having “had with a vast Reach both of Knowledge and Apprehensions, an universal Affability and Easiness of Access, a Humility that descended to the meanest Persons and Concerns, an obliging Kindness and Readiness to advise those who had no occasion for any further Assistance from her.” But in addition to these “excellent Qualities,” he recalled, “she had the deepest Sense of Religion, and the most constant turning of her Thoughts and Discourses that way,” perhaps more so than any other of their age. After this effusive celebration of her knowledge, charity, and religious devotion, Burnet concluded this digression in Boyle’s eulogy by acknowledging that it was Ranelagh who was responsible for cultivating these characteristics in Boyle: “Such a Sister became such a Brother.”12 Like the larger panegyric for Robert Boyle in which this tribute to Lady Ranelagh is situated, Burnet paints a laudatory portrait showcasing a

Death and Legacy

•

199

person of both great influence and exemplary piety. However, as Michael Hunter has already cautioned in relation to Robert Boyle, the modern biographer must read Burnet’s one-sided account of Ranelagh with some critical distance.13 While we must factor in the flattery inherent in any eulogy, Burnet was particularly known for this. Some of the references within his memorial for Ranelagh— such as the remark that she never used her contacts to help herself but only to benefit others— are exaggerations: for example, we know she exploited her political contacts for many years in her drawn-out quest to secure a settlement from her estranged husband. And while Burnet is careful to ground Boyle’s activities within his charitable work, there is an added apologetic layer in Ranelagh’s tribute that works hard to normalize the exceptionally public reputation of a woman. Burnet does so with a careful rhetorical framing device, beginning with a consideration as to whether such comments would even be appropriate and concluding by using her extraordinary life as a window into how Boyle developed similar charitable qualities. It may be here, immediately after her death, that her legacy began to be defined strictly in relationship to Boyle, not as a life that managed a balance of independence and support for her younger brother. While it may not be completely accurate, Burnet’s remembrance nevertheless offers insight into Lady Ranelagh’s exceptional reputation and helps to confirm the image of her presented by this book thus far. But writing about Ranelagh in the twenty-first century allows us to drop Burnet’s obligatory carefulness when publicly eulogizing her and to push our account of her life even further. Ranelagh was one of the most widely admired and influential women of the seventeenth century and had the rare ability to maintain a public profile under each successive ruler. She maintained politically diverse friendships and was either a member of or associated with each of the leading intellectual groups of her day. Her religious devotion led her to research subjects that were both charitable and intellectually rigorous, such as Hebrew and medicine. And it was her ability to maintain a pious and charitable reputation alongside her bold activism that allowed her to be taken seriously as a female intellectual. This necessary combination can be seen in the similar biography of Anne Conway, who balanced philosophy with piety, and can be confirmed by the opposite biography of

200

•

Conclusion

Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle, whose flamboyant disregard for modesty invited attacks on her intellect. When Boyle’s literary executors went to collect his books and manuscripts from the Pall Mall house, they would have found labeled boxes and folders with color-coded ribbons cluttering Boyle’s “Bed-Chamber” and “great Room.” There may have also been archival documents stored in other places, such as the “flat Chest of Drawers” in the laboratory that he had used to store “Manuscript Papers.” Boyle wrote several inventories over the years, the latest one dated 1691, which described the appearance and location of the various boxes and listed the contents within them. While the Boyle papers and letters acquired by the Royal Society in 1769 must have been comparable in size to the collection that Boyle left behind, the roughly fifteen thousand folios that the library received experienced some attrition and addition over the decades following Boyle’s death as they passed through multiple hands.14 Still, the fact that Boyle had a system for organizing his papers and had made provisions for his manuscripts after his death meant that the initial steps toward creating his legacy were already in place. The first serious attempt to recreate Boyle’s life was by the scholar William Wotton, a protégé of Gilbert Burnet who advertised in the 1699 London Gazette that his forthcoming “Life” would be accompanied by selections from Boyle’s unpublished manuscripts.15 Despite working with Boyle’s archive for many years, Wotton never finished the work. Instead, the most significant contribution to Boyle’s legacy emerged in the 1730s, when Thomas Birch worked with the nonconformist minster Henry Miles to publish a complete edition of Boyle’s writings with a full-length biography. Birch’s Life and Works of Boyle were first published in 1744, with a second edition in 1772; these served as the leading portrait of Boyle and the foundation for all future Boyle scholarship until the close of the twentieth century. At this point, essential modern scholarly editions of Boyle’s Correspondence (6 volumes, edited by Michael Hunter, Antonio Clericuzio, and Lawrence M. Principe) and Works (14 volumes, edited by Michael Hunter and Edward B. Davis) finally became available. These modern editions of Boyle’s writings have dramatically eased the study of Robert Boyle, improved the quality of Boyle scholarship, and allowed for the creation of

Death and Legacy

•

201

his most comprehensive biography to date. Still, Boyle’s textual afterlife demonstrates that his legacy commenced immediately after his death and continued to be improved upon by scholars throughout the centuries. Beginning with the generation directly following Boyle’s own, those interested in him could gain access to his writings in print, complete with a flattering biographical portrait. This was partly thanks to Boyle himself for appointing literary executors and for having devised a preliminary system for organizing his papers. Unlike Boyle, whose name was never obscured, Ranelagh’s life quickly became a shadow, and her writings went missing almost immediately after her death. While everyone knew Lady Ranelagh during her lifetime, no one knew anything about her once she died. This obscurity was not due to apathy on her admirers’ behalf. For example, while Thomas Birch was less concerned with Lady Ranelagh than Boyle when he wrote his Life, he did make several references to Boyle’s “beloved sister Chatharine [sic], vicountess Ranelagh, a lady remarkable for her uncommon genius and knowledge.”16 Birch also included several extracts from letters that passed between the siblings, some of which survive today only in these printed fragments. However, after Birch very little was written about Lady Ranelagh until the twentieth century. In the mid-1700s, when George Ballard was compiling his Memoirs of Several Ladies of Great Britain, Who Have Been Celebrated for Their Writings of Skill in the Learned Languages, Arts and Sciences, he included Lady Ranelagh in a list of seventeen other ladies and gentlewomen whom he knew were “persons of distinguished parts and learning,” but he regretted that he was able to “collect very little else relating to them.”17 Ballard commented on Ranelagh having learned Hebrew, a fact he may have gleaned from Robertson’s printed Hebrew dictionary or grammar— both of which included a dedication to her— but he seems to have lacked access to anything else.18 Such a legacy confirms the comments made by Ranelagh’s contemporary and fellow female scholar in the Republic of Letters, Anna Maria van Schurman, who complained that intellectual women were “soon enveloped by a useless obscurity” upon their deaths, and that “the memorials to women’s names are no more in evidence than the traces left by a ship crossing the ocean.”19 As we learned in the introduction to this book, the first brief biography of Lady Ranelagh, written by

202

•

Conclusion

Kathleen Lynch, did not appear until 1964. There is still no edited collection of Ranelagh’s letters or modern edition of her manuscript treatise on the plague, making it much harder for scholars to study her than Boyle.20 Recreating the life of this prolific, public female intellectual was possible only because of the preservation of personal papers belonging to her male family members and associates. The majority of Ranelagh’s letters can be found in collections of the Boyle family papers such as those from her father, the Earl of Cork, or her brothers Robert and Richard. Others survive thanks to the collecting practices of some of her male correspondents, such as Samuel Hartlib, William Penn, and Henry Oldenburg. The fragmentary archival record lends weight to Ruth Perry’s suggestion that “if historians want to study the philosophical contributions of women in the seventeenth century, they must not look for published papers, but to the archival records of learned men.”21 Perry is right, but starting with the archives of learned men, of course, presents its own challenges. As Elizabeth Yale has explained, “Historians, and other scholars who rely on archives, do well to understand the histories that have shaped them: these histories constrain the kinds of stories that can be written from any particular archive.”22 The history of each archive begins with the person whose records are being preserved, but that archival record continues to be shaped and reshaped as it passes between stewards over the years. Archivists are responsible for appraising, collecting, weeding, and describing collections, but these processes are imbued with judgments about intellectual value that tend to reflect the cultural norms of the time and place when the archivist is building the collection. Over the past decade, there has been a significant amount of reflection from both archivists and historians on how these collection practices enable the telling of some histories while suppressing the telling of others.23 Digitization and new online search tools can make the discovery of manuscripts much easier, and it is manuscripts that are proving more helpful than print for recovering writings by women. However, these search tools are effective in the case of women’s writing only if we intellectually value the letters, recipe books, and household notebooks of women enough to prioritize them for selection and inclusion in these time-consuming and expensive projects. There has been some work toward this larger goal, facilitated by projects such as Early Modern Let-

Death and Legacy

•

203

ters Online, Reception & Circulation of Early Modern Women’s Writing database, Early Modern Recipes Online Collective, and the Perdita Project, but there is still much to be done. While the story we can tell from Lady Ranelagh’s fragmentary record cannot be deemed complete, there are enough writings by her and references to her that we can begin to understand why contemporaries dubbed her “the Incomparable Lady Ranelagh.” We can hope that more documents will continue to be discovered to allow researchers to generate an even more comprehensive portrait. Based on the historical fragments we can piece together today, we see a respected Protestant gentlewoman who helped shape her political and intellectual landscape in meaningful and long-lasting ways. Despite the fact that her gender prohibited her from formally holding a political post, attending university, or joining the Royal Society, Ranelagh participated in controversial political cases, influenced decision makers, shaped the publications of male contemporaries, and wrote her own pieces that circulated widely in manuscript, across the seventeenth century. Her authority as a pious gentlewoman is what initially caught the attention of Hartlib and those in his circle, but her reputation quickly grew so that she engaged in medical recipe trials, interpretations of the scriptures, debates on laws governing the monarch’s power, plans for the “improvement” of Ireland, and testimonies concerning alchemical practice. Her firm grounding in the belief that natural philosophy could help people better understand God’s creation prompted her to encourage her younger brother’s pursuit of this subject, and she remained involved as his spiritual mentor, instigator, and intellectual collaborator until their deaths. Ranelagh’s wider community sometimes shifted with the rapid transitions in government, but she gracefully navigated these unpredictable terrains while maintaining her belief in liberty of conscience for all Protestants. Her esteemed reputation as a medical practitioner also demonstrates that diverse possibilities were available to women and could extend far beyond their immediate household, as Ranelagh was called upon to treat the wives and children of the royal family and of influential men of her time, including William Penn and the Earl of Clarendon. Lady Ranelagh was known in her own time for being “incomparable,” and this biography mostly confirms that assessment. While many

204

•

Conclusion

seventeenth-century women certainly found ways to engage with wider intellectual and political spheres, the impressive range of men who respected her judgment, asked for her help, or engaged in intellectual debates and exchanges with her suggest that Ranelagh’s authority reached beyond that of most gentlewomen. Among natural philosophers, independent from her relationship with Robert Boyle, she worked with Henry Oldenburg, John Evelyn, Robert Hooke, Sir Kenelm Digby, John Beale, Benjamin Worsley, and other fellows of the Royal Society. She engaged in medical discourses with, or practiced alongside, the doctors Thomas Willis, Daniel Coxe, William Quartermain, Thomas Sydenham, and Sir Edmund King, in addition to several foreign physicians. She was also able to leverage the power of those who held influential political positions both during the Commonwealth and after the Restoration, including Bulstrode Whitelocke, Lord John Berkeley, William Penn, and Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon. Prominent religious figures with whom she met included Gilbert Burnet, Richard Baxter, and William Kiffin, which helped her advocate for a more tolerant religious society. She even maintained relationships with some distinguished but rather different literary figures, including John Milton, Edmund Waller, and Andrew Marvell. This wide-ranging group reveals Lady Ranelagh’s eclectic interests and extraordinary intellect, while also demonstrating how women could leverage social status and piety to gain the respect of others and shape the public sphere. Despite the persistent trope on Ranelagh’s “incomparable” life, we should consider the possibility that there were more seventeenth-century women like her but whose lives have simply been lost. As explained above, what we know about Ranelagh is in many ways by chance: no one actively worked to preserve her story, and the fragmentary biography we are fortunate to be able to piece together today is the result of her “accidental archive.”24 While it is important to acknowledge her contemporaries’ admiration, many of the women in her wider network also enjoyed such esteem, such as Elizabeth Grey, Countess of Kent; Elizabeth, queen of Bohemia; and Anne Conway, to name but a few. This list of respected intellectual women would extend far further if we added women not personally known to Ranelagh. For example, the Hartlib Papers contain tantalizing references to other significant women, such as Lady Joan Barrington, with

Death and Legacy

•

205

whom Hartlib discussed “Chymical subjects,” and a “Mris Ogilby . . . A rare Cymical Gentlewoman,” about whom we know little today.25 The example of Lady Ranelagh and her contemporary women intellectuals should remind historians of the need to elevate the value we place on the circulation of writings in manuscript and on households as vibrant experimental spaces, both of which were clearly important options for early moderns who were either not interested in print publications or not included among Royal Society fellowship nominations. Gilbert Burnet remembered Lady Ranelagh as having “lived the longest on the publickest Scene . . . of any Woman of our Age,” but she did so without ever printing her works or visiting the Royal Society. Many historians, ranging from historians of science to feminist scholars, have treated the Royal Society as the focal point of natural philosophy in Restoration England, but Boyle’s own biography shows his inconsistent involvement with them and how his home, which he shared with Ranelagh, was itself a destination for reproducing experiments and engaging in philosophical debates. For men and women both, many experiments and formative conversations continued to take place outside of institutional societies and formal places of learning. These exchanges could happen in person within the household or by exchanging manuscript letters, recipes, or treatises. This was considered one way of being “publick” by seventeenth-century standards, and scholars today may find other women who were involved in natural philosophy if we remain open to this more inclusive scope. In 2015, the year of the four hundredth anniversary of Ranelagh’s death, the National Committee for Science and Engineering Commemorative Plaques in Ireland arranged for a plaque commemorating Lady Ranelagh to be placed on the gates of Lismore Castle, next to one honoring the birthplace of Robert Boyle. While Ranelagh was not born in Lismore Castle and in reality spent little time there, the location was chosen partly so that the siblings’ plaques could appear next to each other, much in the same way their graves once had done in St. Martin-in-the-Fields. With limited space available on a plaque, the organizing committee struggled to capture the full significance of her life within a few words.26 How can one articulate a life so rich and diverse within the constraints of the plaque’s size and design, and what short title for her would be most appropriate? As we see

206

•

Conclusion

Figure 10 This commemorative plaque for Lady Ranelagh was added next to the one honoring Robert Boyle on the gates of Lismore Castle in 2015, the four hundredth anniversary of her death. While acknowledging that Ranelagh rarely stayed at the castle, the committee preferred to mount it close to the memorial for her brother rather than in Youghal or Athlone. (Photo by Eoin Gill, Waterford Institute of Technology.)

in figure 10, the decision was to call her Katherine Jones, “The Incomparable Lady Ranelagh,” and to acknowledge her role as a “Member [of the] Hartlib Circle” and “Sister and Collaborator of Robert Boyle.” Defining Ranelagh by association with her brother and the intellectual correspondence network in which she was most active is a choice that in many ways reflects the archival fragments we have today, where she is defined in relation to the men she knew. But we should add, they are two relationships she was proud to be a part of and eager to support. Ranelagh’s biography can mean many things to many people: the older sister of the most significant natural philosopher of the seventeenth century, an independent Anglo-Irish woman who managed to separate herself from her contemptible husband, the lead female figure in the Hartlib circle, or a charitable medical practitioner and influential political writer. Yet what is more, this biography of Lady Ranelagh has offered numerous examples where her authority can stand on its own. Even within her relationships with others, she was often the strongest link between two parties as well as the most influential figure— of either sex— within a group suited to lobby on behalf of contemporaries. And while her identity as an authority figure on theology, medicine, and chemistry prevails throughout

Death and Legacy

•

207

her work within the Hartlib circle, she was simultaneously having conversations on these subjects with individuals who were outside of that correspondence network and she would continue to do so for decades after the circle dispersed. Words like intelligencer and polymath are increasingly used for men like Robert Hooke, Samuel Hartlib, or Athanasius Kircher, who were connected to and helped shape the formation of new knowledge in various subjects in the seventeenth century. And phrases like natural, mechanical, or experimental philosopher are those most often used now for Robert Boyle— more expansive terms that encompass not just his chemistry but all dimensions of his theoretical and practical work. By adopting the contemporary incomparable for Lady Ranelagh, we cover the wide influence she had and the great respect with which she was held. But we should not shy away from terms like natural philosopher, medical practitioner, political lobbyist, and religious authority. Ranelagh was all these things; but, due to gender conventions, the manner in which she participated in each role looks slightly different than it would for a male contemporary occupying the same role. Her ability to work within such constraints allowed her to maintain an esteemed public profile without attracting criticism during her lifetime or after her death, but ironically, it is also what has made it so challenging to recreate her life today.

Acknowledgments

This book has been in the making for more than a decade, so I’ve amassed considerable debt. My research on Lady Ranelagh grew out of work on the Perdita Project at the University of Warwick, when Elizabeth Clarke rightly noted that the recipe books of Boyle’s sister had great intellectual value. She and Bernard Capp, also at the University of Warwick, critically engaged with my work and helped me navigate the complex interdisciplinary terrain in which this project was situated. Financial assistance from the University of Warwick (Warwick Postgraduate Research Fellowship), Higher Education Funding Council for England (Overseas Research Scheme Award), and the Wellcome Trust (Medical Humanities Postgraduate Award) allowed me to write and travel to conduct archival research. Over time, it became clear that it would be best to expand Lady Ranelagh’s story, telling it chronologically as an intellectual life entwined with Robert Boyle’s. I am thankful to Michael Hunter for pushing me further here. I could never have asked for a more dedicated, conscientious, and generous source of mentorship. Even in his retirement, Michael has responded to my emails and happily shared resources. He read and commented on an earlier draft of this book, identifying many places for improvement. I hope I have addressed these issues to his satisfaction. A collaborative group of historians and literary scholars have assisted me by reading drafts of chapters, sharing notes, writing letters of support, or talking through challenging texts with me. They include Alice Eardley, Margaret Ezell, Vera Keller, Joel Klein, Rebecca Laroche, Elaine Leong, Larry Principe, Jeff Reznick, and Pamela Smith. Lady Ranelagh scholars

210

•

Acknowledgments

are also a supportive group, and I must thank Jayne Archer, Evan Bourke, Ruth Connolly, Lynette Hunter, Sarah Hutton, and Carol Pal for their Hartlib-esque sharing of knowledge and resources. Claire Sabel produced English translations of Ranelagh’s German letters. My dear friend and skilled editor, Julie Sutherland, read an earlier draft of the manuscript and improved the quality of my prose. My thanks to the Folger Shakespeare Library and the Science History Institute (then Chemical Heritage Foundation) for offering me shortterm fellowships to complete necessary research. In addition to financial support, both programs provided a stimulating research community and supportive administrative staff. I first met Carin Berkowitz during my fellowship at the Science History Institute, and she has since become a good friend and constant source of support and advice. At the Folger, Kathleen Lynch and Amanda Herbert made the fellowship program feel like home, as did other fellows in my cohort, particularly Megan Heffernan and Debapriya Sarkar. The librarians and archivists at both institutions were patient and knowledgeable, but I must extend particular thanks to Ashley Augustyniak, Hillary Kativa, and Victoria Orzechowski at the Science History Institute for their assistance. I have also been fortunate to be employed by research libraries that have allowed me sabbaticals to accept these visiting fellowships. Robert Hicks at the College of Physicians of Philadelphia and Ron Brashear at the Science History Institute were both supportive library directors who believed in the value of this project and helped me build writing and research time into my job description. Working at the Science History Institute was like living in Lady Ranelagh’s Pall Mall house: the intellectual community came to me. The Beckman Center allowed me to discuss my project with a wide and diverse community of early modernists, including Marieke Hendriksen, Bruce Moran, Bill Newman, and Simon Werrett. At Hagley Library, where I was subsequently employed for two years, Nicole Mahoney, Erik Rau, Yda Schreuder, and Amrys Williams all provided encouragement and support. It would be impossible to thank all the engaged audiences at various conferences I have attended over the years, but a significant few stick out in my mind. Eoin Gill and Sheila Donegal of the Robert Boyle Summer

Acknowledgments

•

211

School in Lismore, Ireland, helped me think about the power of biography in the history of science, and to see that Ranelagh’s story also appeals to a wider public audience. I am particularly grateful to Eoin, who helped orchestrate my unveiling of Lady Ranelagh’s memorial plaque at Lismore Castle and later returned to take photos of it for this book. Significant conversations at other conferences over the years include those with Nadine Akkerman, Elizabethanne Boran, Hal Cook, Marie-Louise Coolahan, James Daybell, Bill Eaton, Mary Fissell, Melissa Grafe, Jennifer Munroe, Alisha Rankin, Jole Shackelford, and Beth Yale. Thanks also to the scholars who have kindly answered questions by email and shared their unpublished works or manuscript transcriptions, including Tom Leng, Ted McCormick, Yelda Nasifoglu, and Ann-Maria Walsh. At the University of Chicago Press, editor Karen Darling has always been a source of wisdom, encouragement, and advocacy. I appreciate the excellent communication and support I’ve received from her, Tristan Bates, Christine Schwab, and the rest of the book team. Thanks also to the two anonymous readers, who provided shrewd feedback that significantly improved this book. I am lucky to have friends and family who continued encouraging me over the years. Mike and Lauren DiMeo, Corrie Glanville, Linda Lombardo, and Bill Winikates always knew what motivational thing to say. In addition to their support, my in-laws, Jill Nelson and Jeff Speroff, also provided abundant free childcare! My husband, Chad Nelson, and son, Theodore Nelson DiMeo, have been patient, kind, and enthusiastic over the last decade that I’ve chipped away at this book in addition to holding a full-time job and being a mother. I am truly thankful for everything they’ve done— particularly, entertaining themselves while I traveled to archives or worked on the weekends. The playful chants and home-cooked vegetarian meals were also a nice touch. This book is dedicated to the memory of my parents, Danny DiMeo and Judy Puleo Winikates, who died before they could see this completed. My father loved history and traveling, and my mother loved reading and writing. Without their love, support, and belief in me, I never would have embarked on such a project. I miss them every day.

Appendix Boyle Family Genealogy

Children of Richard Boyle, 1st Earl of Cork (1566– 1643), and his second wife, Catherine Fenton (ca. 1588– ca. 1630) Name

Titles

Married

Roger (Aug. 1, 1606– 1615)

N/A

Unmarried— died at age 9

Alice (Mar. 20, 1608– Mar. 23, 1666)

Countess of Barrymore (Feb. 1628)

July 21, 1621, to David Barry (d. 1642) Remarried to John Barry

Sarah (Mar. 29, 1609– July 14, 1633)

Lady Moore 1st Baroness Digby

1621 to Sir Thomas Moore Remarried to Robert Digby (d. 1642)

Lettice (Apr. 25, 1610– ca. Apr. 1643)

Baroness Goring

July 25, 1629, to George Goring (1608– 1657)

Joan ( June 14, 1611– 1656)

16th Countess of Kildare (1620)

Aug. 15, 1630, to George Fitzgerald (ca. 1612– 1660)

Richard (Oct. 20, 1612– Jan. 15, 1698)

Viscount Dungarvan (Oct. July 3, 1633 or 1634, to Elizabeth Clifford (1613– 1620) 1691) 2nd Earl of Cork (1643) Baron Clifford (Nov. 1644) 1st Earl of Burlington (1665)

214

•

Appendix

Katherine (Mar. 22, 1615– Dec. 23, 1691)

2nd Viscountess Ranelagh (1643)

Apr. 4, 1630, to Arthur Jones (d. 1670)

Geoffrey (Apr. 10, 1616– 1617)

N/A

Unmarried— died as an infant

Dorothy (Dec. 30, 1617– Mar. 26, 1668)

Lady Loftus Lady Talbot

1632 to Sir Arthur Loftus Remarried to Col. Gilbert Talbot

Lewis (May 23, 1619– Sep. 3, 1642)

Viscount Kinalmeaky (1628) 1639 to Elizabeth Fielding

Roger (Apr. 25, 1621– Oct. 16, 1679)

Baron Broghill (Feb. 1628) Jan. 27, 1641, to Margaret 1st Earl of Orrery (Sep. 1660) Howard (1623– 1689)

Francis ( June 25, 1623– Apr. 19, 1699)

1st Viscount of Shannon (1660)

1638 or 1639 to Elizabeth Killigrew (1622– 1681)

Mary (Nov. 11, 1625– Apr. 12, 1678)

4th Countess of Warwick (1659)

July 12, 1641, to Charles Rich (1616– 1673)

Robert ( Jan. 25, 1627– Dec. 31, 1691)

Known as “the Honourable Unmarried Robert Boyle”

Margaret (Apr. 30, 1629– 1637)

N/A

Unmarried— died at age 8

Notes

In citing works in the notes, short titles have generally been used. Some citations include the following abbreviations: BL

British Library

Boyle Correspondence

Michael Hunter, Antonio Clericuzio, and Lawrence M. Principe, eds. The Correspondence of Robert Boyle. 6 vols. London: Pickering & Chatto, 2001.

Boyle Works

Michael Hunter and Edward B. Davis, eds. The Works of Robert Boyle. 14 vols. London: Pickering & Chatto, 1999– 2000.

HP

Mark Greengrass, Michael Leslie, and Michael Hannon. The Hartlib Papers. University of Sheffield. https://www.dhi.ac.uk /hartlib/.

NLI

National Library of Ireland

RSL

Royal Society Library

Introduction 1. Burnet, A Sermon Preached, 32. For a more detailed discussion of this memorial, see the conclusion, below. 2. Chambers and Galbraith, Letterbooks of John Evelyn, 2:1084. 3. Pal, “Accidental Archive.” 4. Mendelson, Mental World of Stuart Women, 62– 115. Early biographical accounts of Mary Rich include C. F. Smith, Mary Rich, Countess of Warwick; Croker,

216

•

Notes to Pages 3–9

Autobiography of Lady Warwick; Palgrave, Mary Rich, Countess of Warwick; and Johnstone, Leading Women of the Restoration, 91– 119. 5. Fraser, Weaker Vessel, 132. 6. Shortland and Yeo, Telling Lives in Science, 37. 7. Des Jardins, Madame Curie Complex. See also Roos, Martin Lister. 8. Mommertz, “Invisible Economy of Science”; Fara, Pandora’s Breeches, esp. 107– 85. 9. Osler, “Nature of Gender”; S. Hutton, “Before Frankenstein.” Most ecofeminist proponents of the gendered nature theory build on foundational works of the 1980s, including Carolyn Merchant’s The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology, and the Scientific Revolution and Evelyn Fox Keller’s Reflections on Gender and Science. 10. For a concise history of the scientific revolution, see Principe, The Scientific Revolution. 11. Stagl, History of Curiosity, 147– 48. 12. See M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science. 13. M. Hunter, Robert Boyle Project. 14. Principe, Aspiring Adept, ch. 1. 15. See Principe, Secrets of Alchemy. 16. Newman and Principe, “Alchemy vs. Chemistry”; Principe, Aspiring Adept, 8– 10. 17. Principe, Aspiring Adept, 30– 31. 18. Rankin, Panaceia’s Daughters, esp. the introduction; Ray, Daughters of Alchemy, esp. ch. 2; Archer, “Women and Chymistry.” 19. Wilson, ‘Banquetting Stuffe’; Åkerman, “Queen Christina’s Metamorphosis”; Nummendal, “Alchemical Reproduction and Zieglerin”; Nummendal, Anna Zieglerin; Ray, Daughters of Alchemy. 20. For decades scholars tried to find the uncataloged letter that Ranelagh wrote to her father after escaping from Athlone Castle and which Lynch quoted and cited in her essay, but the letter remained lost until 2007, when Stephen Ball created the Lismore Castle Papers finding aid for the National Library of Ireland. 21. Taylor, “Writing Women, Honour, and Ireland”; Archer, “Women and Alchemy.” 22. See R. Connolly, “A Manuscript Treatise”; R. Connolly, “Politics of Honor”; R. Connolly, “Proselytising Protestant Commonwealth”; R. Connolly, “Viscountess Ranelagh and Women’s Knowledge”; R. Connolly, “‘Wise and Godly Sybilla.’ ” 23. See Pal, Republic of Women, ch. 5; Pal, “Accidental Archive.” 24. See DiMeo, “Lady Ranelagh’s Book”; DiMeo, “Authorship and Medical Networks”; DiMeo, “Rhetoric of Medical Authority.” 25. See DiMeo, “‘Such a sister.’ ” The issue was edited by Michael Hunter and Elizabethanne Boran. 26. DiMeo, “Lady Ranelagh’s Book.”

Notes to Pages 9–21

•

217

27. RECIRC, short for Reception and Circulation of Early Modern Women’s Writing, 1550– 1700, is being completed under the guidance of Principal Investigator Marie-Louise Coolahan. WEMLO, or Women’s Early Modern Letters Online, is codirected by James Daybell and Kim McLean-Fiander, and provides an extension of the Cultures of Knowledge project based at the University of Oxford, which is directed by Howard Hotson. See also Bourke, “Female Involvement.” 28. S. Hutton, Anne Conway, 6. 29. Pal, “Accidental Archive,” 121. 30. Sarasohn, Natural Philosophy of Cavendish, 2. 31. Fraser, Weaker Vessel, 132. 32. De Beer, Correspondence of John Locke, 2:761– 63. 33. Bertucci, “In/visible Woman,” 228. 34. Leong, Recipes and Everyday Knowledge, esp. ch. 4 and conclusion. Chapter 1 1. Canny, Making Ireland British, 308– 13; S. J. Connolly, Contested Island, 283, 307– 8. 2. Lyttleton, “‘A godly resolucon,’” 123– 30. 3. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 2:109– 10. 4. Canny, Upstart Earl; M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science. 5. Canny, Upstart Earl; M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science; Fenlon, “‘Acquiring Magnificence.’ ” 6. Lyttleton, “‘A godly resolucon,’” 130– 38. 7. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, vol. 1; Whittle and Griffiths, Consumption and Gender, esp. ch. 2. 8. Quoted in Canny, Upstart Earl, 114. 9. Canny, Upstart Earl, ch. 5; Chatsworth House, Cork MSS, Boyle Family Letters; Anon., Calendar of the Lismore Manuscripts. 10. Lettice Goring to the Earl of Cork, October 13, 1640, Chatsworth House, Cork MSS, box 21, fol. 59; Taylor, “Writing Women, Honour, and Ireland,” 2:281, n16. 11. See Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 2, vols. 1– 5; Canny, Upstart Earl. 12. Canny, Upstart Earl, 29. 13. Canny, Upstart Earl, ch. 5. 14. For new research on this topic, see the forthcoming book by Walsh, Daughters of the First Earl of Cork. 15. Canny, Upstart Earl, 86– 87; Mendelson, Mental World of Stuart Women, 65; MacCurtain, “Women, Education and Learning,” 170– 74. 16. Quoted in Canny, Upstart Earl, 85. 17. Mendelson, Mental World of Stuart Women, 65– 66. 18. Canny, Upstart Earl, 87; MacCurtain, “Women, Education and Learning.” 19. Walsh, Daughters of the First Earl of Cork. 20. Walsh, “Boyle Women,” 84– 85.

218

•

Notes to Pages 22–27

21. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 2:140, 4:130– 31. 22. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 2:140; Chamberlayne, “Maisemore Court,” 7– 12. 23. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 2:140; Whittle and Griffiths, Consumption and Gender, 77– 81, 195– 96. 24. A series of these articles composed between July 1622 and January 1623, complete with wax seals from witnesses, still remain among the Boyle family estate archives in the National Library of Ireland. “Articles of Agreement Made between Richard, 1st Earl of Cork, and Sir Thomas Beaumont, 1st Viscount Beaumont of Swords,” 4 items, NLI, Lismore Castle Papers, MS 43, 114/1– 2. 25. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 2:62, 284. 26. Haigh, “Troubles of Thomas Pestell,” 403– 28. 27. Carpenter, Verse in English, 154– 55. 28. R. Connolly, “‘Wise and Godly Sybilla,’” 285– 306. 29. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 2:242. 30. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 2:276– 77. 31. Quoted in Taylor, “Writing Women, Honour, and Ireland,” 2:282– 83. 32. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 3:155– 56, 204; Folger Shakespeare Library, “Attendants to the Funeral of Catherine Boyle, Countess of Cork [manuscript], ca. 1630,” formerly Add. MS 820. 33. Canny, Upstart Earl, ch. 5. 34. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 2:114, ser. 1, 3:18. 35. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 3:18; Folger Shakespeare Library, “Attendants to the Funeral of Catherine Boyle, Countess of Cork [manuscript], ca. 1630,” formerly Add. MS 820. 36. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 3:62. 37. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 21. 38. Harwood, Early Essays and Ethics of Boyle, 143– 68. 39. See Mary Rich, Countess of Warwick, diaries, 5 vols., BL, Add. MS 27351– 55. 40. James Butler, First Duke of Ormonde to Lord Arlington, August 24, 1681, in Anon., Calendar of Ormonde, 6:138. 41. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 3:24; S. Hutton, “Jones, Katherine.” 42. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 3:24– 26, 4:60– 61. 43. Quoted in Canny, Upstart Earl, 102. 44. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 3:224. 45. Murtagh, Athlone History and Settlement, 83– 87. 46. Murtagh, Athlone History and Settlement, 72– 77. 47. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 3:146. 48. Taylor, “Writing Women, Honour, and Ireland,” 2:285– 86. 49. Taylor, “Writing Women, Honour, and Ireland,” 2:285– 86; Mary Rich, diary, BL, Add. MS 27355.

Notes to Pages 27–33

•

219

50. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 2, 4:83. 51. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 5:169. 52. McGrath, “Jones, Richard.” 53. S. Hutton, “Jones, Katherine.” 54. Quoted in Verney, Memoirs, 1:206. 55. In 1640, Leeke wrote to Sir Edmund Verney to say he had received a letter from her, calling her his “owld mistress, the Lady Mary Wroth.” See Lamb, “Wroth, Lady Mary.” 56. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 4:52, 5:5, 59. 57. Quoted in Verney, Memoirs, 1:203– 4. 58. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, vol. 5; K. M. Lynch, “Incomparable Lady Ranelagh,” 26; Taylor, “Writing Women, Honour, and Ireland,” 1:288. 59. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 2I, 4:81– 84. 60. K. M. Lynch, “Incomparable Lady Ranelagh,” 27; Canny, Upstart Earl, 56– 57. 61. Hodgson-Wright, “Cary, Elizabeth.” 62. Trevor-Roper, Catholics, Anglicans and Puritans, 166– 230; Smith, “Cary, Lucius.” 63. Lady Katherine Jones to the Earl of Cork, October 13, 1640, Chatsworth House, Cork MSS, box 21, letter 61. 64. Memegalos, George Goring. 65. Jones to Cork, October 13, 1640, Chatsworth House, Cork MSS, box 21, letter 61. 66. Taylor, “Writing Women, Honour, and Ireland,” 2:285. 67. Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 1, 5:176. 68. Kishlansky, Monarchy Transformed, ch. 6. 69. Canny, Making Ireland British, ch. 8 70. Canny, Upstart Earl, 7. 71. Lyttleton, “‘A godly resolucon,’” 139– 43. 72. Canny, Making Ireland British, ch. 8; Murtagh, Athlone History and Settlement, 92– 94. 73. Murtagh, Athlone History and Settlement, 92– 94. 74. Piers, Chorographical Description, quoted in Murtagh, Athlone History and Settlement, 94. 75. Lady Ranelagh to the Earl of Cork, December 26, 1642, NLI, Lismore Castle Papers, MS 43, 266/20. 76. Murtagh, Athlone History and Settlement, 94– 95. 77. O’Dowd, “Women and War,” 91– 111. 78. Murtagh, Athlone History and Settlement, 94– 97. 79. Murtagh, Athlone History and Settlement, 97– 98; Lady Ranelagh, to the Earl of Cork, December 26, 1642, NLI, Lismore Castle Papers, MS 43, 266/20. 80. Lady Ranelagh to the Earl of Cork, December 26, 1642, NLI, Lismore Castle Papers, MS 43, 266/20.

220

•

Notes to Pages 34–40

81. Ranelagh to Cork, December 26, 1642, NLI, Lismore Castle Papers, MS 43, 266/20. Katherine’s letter has an endorsement in another hand (presumably that of the Earl of Cork) which reads, “26 Decemb: 1642 From my daughter Katherine Jones Rec: 10 Febr 1642.” 82. Ranelagh to Cork, December 26, 1642, NLI, Lismore Castle Papers, MS 43, 266/20. 83. Lord Falkland to Lady Dungarvan, August 20 [1642], BL, Add. MS 75356, unpaginated. 84. D. L. Smith, “Cary, Lucius”; D. L. Smith, Constitutional Royalism; TrevorRoper, Catholics, Anglicans and Puritans. 85. Barlow, Genuine Remains, 324– 32. 86. Ranelagh to Cork, December 26, 1642, NLI, Lismore Castle Papers, MS 43, 266/20. 87. Ranelagh to Cork, December 26, 1642, NLI, Lismore Castle Papers, MS 43, 266/20. 88. Ranelagh to Cork, December 26, 1642, NLI, Lismore Castle Papers, MS 43, 266/20. 89. Lady Ranelagh to the Earl of Burlington, April 13 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 57– 58. 90. Ranelagh to Burlington, April 13 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 57– 58. 91. Birch, Collection of State Papers of Thurloe, 7:395– 97, quoted in Zurcher, “Life Writing,” 107– 10. Chapter 2 1. Lady Kildare to Earl of Cork, February 8, 1642, Chatsworth House, box 22, letter 146; Grosart, Lismore Papers, ser. 2, 4:267– 69. 2. S. Hutton, “Jones, Katherine”; Kelsey, “Clotworthy, John.” 3. Morrill, Impact of the English Civil War, 8. 4. Kishlansky, Rise of the New Model Army; Gaunt, British Wars; Russell, Origins of the English Civil War. 5. Pal, Republic of Women, 6– 7. 6. For a good chronological overview of Hutchinson’s literary output, including her move between manuscript and print, see Norbrook’s chronology and introduction in Hutchinson, Order and Disorder, ix– xxi; Barbour and Norbrook, Works of Lucy Hutchinson, vol. 1, esp. xxxiii– xliii; Scott-Baumann, “Lucy Hutchinson.” 7. See Nevitt, Women and Pamphlet Culture; Mack, Visionary Women; L. Hunter, “Sister of the Royal Society.” 8. N. Smith, Literature and Revolution, 2. 9. The first anthology of early modern women writers was Greer et al., Kissing the Rod. This sparked wider interest and has since exploded into its own robust subdiscipline. See also Ezell, Writing Women’s Literary History.

Notes to Pages 40–44

•

221

10. Leong, Recipes and Everyday Knowledge, esp. chs. 1 and 6; Ezell, Patriarch’s Wife; Ezell, “Domestic Papers.” 11. Daybell and Gordon, “Living Letters,” 4– 6. 12. J. Harris and Scott-Baumann, Intellectual Culture of Puritan Women, esp. the introduction. 13. Richards and Thorpe, Women, Rhetoric and Politics, esp. the introduction. 14. Lady Ranelagh to Edward Hyde, March 3, 1644, Bodleian Library, Clarendon MSS, vol. 23, fols. 113– 15. 15. Ranelagh to Hyde, March 3, 1644, Bodleian Library, Clarendon MSS, vol. 23, fols. 113– 15. 16. Ranelagh to Hyde, March 3, 1644, Bodleian Library, Clarendon MSS, vol. 23, fols. 113– 15. 17. This is written in Hyde’s hand on Ranelagh’s letter. Ranelagh to Hyde, March 3, 1644, Bodleian Library, Clarendon MSS, vol. 23, fols. 113– 15. 18. Cited in R. Connolly, “Proselytising Protestant Commonwealth,” 248. 19. R. Connolly, “Proselytising Protestant Commonwealth,” 248. 20. Kishlansky, Monarchy Transformed, 170. 21. At the time of writing, Nadine Akkerman has edited the queen of Bohemia’s letters from 1603 to 1642, in two volumes. See Akkerman, Correspondence of Elizabeth Stuart. 22. Asch, “Elizabeth, Princess”; Pal, Republic of Women, ch. 1. 23. Lady Ranelagh to Elizabeth, queen of Bohemia, August 7 [1644], Victoria and Albert Museum, National Art Library, Forster MS 454, letter 74, 40/1, fols. 74– 75. 24. Gibson, “Significant Space,” 1– 9. 25. Ranelagh to Elizabeth, Victoria and Albert Museum, National Art Library, Forster MS 454, letter 74, 40/1, fols. 74– 75. 26. Ranelagh to Elizabeth, Victoria and Albert Museum, National Art Library, Forster MS 454, letter 74, 40/1, fols. 74– 75. 27. Ranelagh to Elizabeth, Victoria and Albert Museum, National Art Library, Forster MS 454, letter 74, 40/1, fols. 74– 75. 28. There is also an extant eighteenth- or nineteenth-century copy of this letter. Copy letter, Lady Ranelagh to Elizabeth, Queen of Bohemia, National Archives (England), TS 23/1/43, fols. 62– 63. Thanks to Nadine Akkerman for discussing these letters with me. 29. Asch, “Elizabeth, Princess.” 30. Lady Ranelagh to Edward Hyde, March 3, 1644, Bodleian Library, Clarendon State Papers MS, vol. 23, fols. 113– 15. 31. Ranelagh to Elizabeth, Victoria and Albert Museum, National Art Library, Forster MS 454, letter 74, 40/1, fols. 74– 75. 32. Ranelagh to Elizabeth, Victoria and Albert Museum, National Art Library, Forster MS 454, letter 74, 40/1, fols. 74– 75.

222

•

Notes to Pages 44–47

33. Greengrass, Leslie, and Raylor, Samuel Hartlib and Universal Reformation; Turnbull, Hartlib, Dury and Comenius; Pal, Republic of Women. 34. The pact is dated March 3/13, 1642, and can be found in Turnbull, Hartlib, Dury and Comenius, 460– 61. 35. The University of Sheffield now hosts on their website the manuscript scans and transcriptions that were formerly available only on the Hartlib Papers CD-ROM. See https://www.sheffield.ac.uk /cics/support/hri-online. 36. Carol Pal, Betsey Taylor Fitzsimon, and I each compiled our own database and each found nearly two hundred references to Lady Ranelagh. However, a more recent database compiled by the RECIRC project at the University Galway has nearly 250 mentions. Evan Bourke, pers. comm., email, August 11, 2017. The number varies between projects depending on various factors regarding how each compiler standardized their data, such as whether they included clear references to Lady Ranelagh that did not use her name, or if two mentions within the same letter should count as one or two references. 37. Bourke, “Female Involvement.” 38. Quoted from K. M. Lynch’s translation in “Incomparable Lady Ranelagh,” 30. There are four letters printed in Epistolarum Familiarium Liber Unus from Milton to Richard Boyle: September 21, 1656 (46– 47); undated (51– 52); Sextil. 1657 (57– 58); and December 20, 1659 (64). 39. Lynch, “Incomparable Lady Ranelagh,” 30. 40. Dorothy Moore’s letter to Hartlib, probably written in July 1645, states that it should be left “for mr Hartlib at his howse in Duckes place, or to be Left at the Lady Ranalaughs howse in Queens street to be sent him.” See HP 3/2/143A– 144B. The date is estimated by Lynette Hunter in Letters of Dorothy Moore, 79. 41. Ephemerides 1655, part 4, HP 29/5/58A. Cutler became an alderman in 1654 and would be named an honorary fellow of the Royal Society in 1664. Woodhead, Rulers of London, 55– 56; Hayton, “Cutler, Sir John.” 42. Robert Wood to Samuel Hartlib, June 24, 1656, HP 33/1/5A– 6B. 43. Born Dorothy King, when she married Arthur Moore, Dorothy Moore became Lady Ranelagh’s aunt. Arthur’s sister Frances was married to Roger Jones, 1st Viscount of Ranelagh. 44. Pal, Republic of Women, ch. 2. 45. Anon., Madam, Although My Former Freedom. The related manuscripts are copy letter, Dorothy Moore to [Lady Ranelagh], July 8, 1643, HP 21/7/1A– 2B; copy letter, Dorothy Moore to Lady Ranelagh, April 13, 1644, HP 8/52/1A– 2B; copy letter, Dorothy Moore to Lady Ranelagh, [ca. November 1644], HP 21/7/7A– 8B; copy letter, Dorothy Moore to Lady Ranelagh, December 2, 1644, HP 21/7/3A– 4B; Dorothy Moore to Lady Ranelagh, February 21, 1645, HP 3/2/95A; Dorothy Moore to Lady Ranelagh, May 5, 1645, HP 3/2/118A– 121B. See also L. Hunter, Letters of Dorothy Moore.

Notes to Pages 47–53

•

223

46. R. Connolly, “Viscountess Ranelagh and Women’s Knowledge,” 150– 61. 47. L. Hunter, Letters of Dorothy Moore, 80. 48. L. Hunter, Letters of Dorothy Moore, 80. 49. John Dury to Samuel Hartlib, September 8, 1646, HP 3/3/34A– B; John Dury to Samuel Hartlib, October 13, 1646, HP 3/3/40A– B. 50. Robert Boyle Papers, BL, Add. MS 4229, fol. 68; M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 57. 51. Robert Boyle Papers, BL, Add. MS 4229, reprinted in M. Hunter, Robert Boyle by Himself, 25. 52. Lyttleton, “‘A godly resolucon,’” 139– 40; Barnard, “Boyle, Richard.” 53. Boyle Correspondence, 1:80; DiMeo, “‘Such a sister.’ ” 54. Boyle Correspondence, 1:34. 55. On Boyle’s lost letters, see Boyle Correspondence, 1:xxv– xxxi; and M. Hunter, “Robert Boyle and the Dilemma.” 56. Harwood, Early Essays and Ethics of Boyle, 157– 59, 164. 57. Harwood, Early Essays and Ethics of Boyle, 179. 58. Boyle Correspondence, 1:68. 59. Harwood, Early Essays and Ethics of Boyle, 203n1. 60. See Mary Rich, Countess of Warwick, diaries, 5 vols., BL, Add. MSS 27351– 55. 61. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 60. 62. Boyle Correspondence, 1:76. 63. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 65– 66, 292– 97. 64. Boyle Correspondence, 1:36– 42. 65. Boyle Correspondence, 1:45– 47. 66. Boyle Correspondence, 1:58– 61. 67. The first to do so was Charles Webster, and all further scholarship cites him instead of original sources. Webster, Great Instauration, 57– 67; Webster, “New Light on the Invisible College,” 17– 42. 68. Charles Webster’s attribution of this undated letter to 1647 has since been convincingly refuted in Boyle Correspondence, 1:215, note b. 69. Ranelagh to [?], November 3, 1657, HP 39/2/56A. Thanks to Joel Klein for confirming my translation. 70. Pal, Republic of Women, 161– 63; Ranelagh to [?], November 3, 1657, HP 39/2/56A. Thanks to Claire Sabel for translating this letter for me and talking through some of the difficult content. 71. The most accurate and concise summary of the evidence is M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 66– 67. 72. Boyle Correspondence, 1:35. 73. Boyle Correspondence, 1:79– 81. 74. Boyle Correspondence, 1:26– 27. 75. Boyle Correspondence, 1:215– 16.

224

•

Notes to Pages 53–59

76. Boyle Correspondence, 1:50. 77. Boyle Correspondence, 1:43, quoted in Leng, Benjamin Worsley, 20. 78. Leng, Benjamin Worsley, 20– 21; Cressy, Saltpeter, chs. 5 and 6; Webster, “Benjamin Worsley,” 213– 35. For more on the history of “projectors,” see Yamamoto, Taming Capitalism. 79. Ranelagh’s letter is no longer extant, but Boyle mentions it in his letter to Worsley. Boyle Correspondence, 1:42– 44. 80. Boyle Correspondence, 1:42– 44. 81. Leng, Benjamin Worsley, 25. 82. Webster, “Benjamin Worsley,” 213– 35; McCormick, William Petty, 57– 58. 83. Webster, Samuel Hartlib; Webster, Great Instauration; Greengrass, Leslie, and Raylor, introduction to Samuel Hartlib and Universal Reformation, 1– 25. 84. Dailey, “Visitation of Sarah Wight,” 438– 55; Fissell, Vernacular Bodies, ch. 4. 85. Jessey, Exceeding Riches. 86. Jessey, Exceeding Riches, 9, 56, 85– 88. The name in question is spelled “the Lady Renula.” 87. For an example of scholarship treating medical practitioners and spiritual companions as opposites, see Scott-Luckens, “Propaganda or Marks of Grace?” 88. M. Hunter, “Magic, Science and Reputation.” 89. Maxwell-Stuart, Occult, 1– 10; Moran, Alchemical World, 25, 87– 92. 90. Jessey, “A Postscript to the Reader,” in Exceeding Riches, sig. R. 91. Kishlansky, Rise of the New Model, ch. 7. 92. Capp, Fifth Monarchy Men, ch. 2. 93. John Beale to Samuel Hartlib?, letter fragment, August 14 [no year], HP 31/1/27A– 34B. 94. Kishlansky, Rise of the New Model, ch. 8. 95. Sir Cheney Culpeper and Lady Ranelagh, copy questions, and Lady Ranelagh to Hartlib, letter, undated, HP 26/13/1A– 2B. While the document containing Lady Ranelagh’s questions is undated, it must have been written in 1648 because of contextual clues within the letter and because one letter of Culpeper’s, dated September 1648, makes reference to her recent questions. See also Yeo, Notebooks, English Virtuosi, 221. 96. Clucas, “Correspondence of a ‘Chymicall Gentleman,’” 147– 70; Greengrass, “Culpeper, Sir Cheney.” 97. Lady Ranelagh to Hartlib, copy questions and letter, undated, HP 26/13/1A– 2B. 98. R. Connolly, “Proselytising Protestant Commonwealth,” 253. 99. Lady Ranelagh to Hartlib, copy questions and letter, undated, HP 26/13/1A– 2B. 100. Sir Cheney Culpeper to Samuel Hartlib, “Copy Extracts on Power of Commons to Levy Money,” [undated], HP 26/12/1A– 6B.

Notes to Pages 59–66

•

225

101. R. Connolly, “Proselytising Protestant Commonwealth,” 254. 102. Sir Cheney Culpeper to Samuel Hartlib, August 30, 1648, HP 13/241A– 242B. 103. William Waller to Samuel Hartlib, March 26, 1648, HP 32/2/26A. Chapter 3 1. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, ch. 5; M. Hunter, “Boyle’s Early Intellectual Evolution”; M. Hunter, “How Boyle Became a Scientist”; Principe, “Virtuous Romance.” 2. Greengrass, “Archive Refractions,” 44; M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 65– 66. 3. Webster, “Benjamin Worsley,” 218. 4. W. T. Lynch, “Society of Baconians?,” 178– 81; Webster, Great Instauration. 5. Greengrass, Leslie, and Raylor, introduction to Samuel Hartlib and Universal Reformation, 9– 12; Webster, Great Instauration. 6. This summation is based on my dataset of references to Lady Ranelagh in the Hartlib Papers. It included variant spellings of her name and many references that are obviously to her where she not called by her name (such as “my lady”). 7. Ephemerides April– August 1649, part 2, HP 28/1/24B. 8. Boyle Correspondence, 1:79– 82; M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 70– 73. 9. Boyle Correspondence, 1:82– 83. 10. References in Boyle’s letters to Lady Ranelagh from August 1649, as well as others, suggest they were written in response to her letters that are no longer extant. 11. Boyle Correspondence, 1:82– 83. 12. Boyle Works, 1:1– 12; Harwood, Early Essays and Ethics of Boyle, xx; M. Hunter, “Reluctant Philanthropist,” 202– 22. 13. Principe, Aspiring Adept, 149. 14. Boyle Correspondence, 1:80. 15. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 61. 16. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 66. 17. Boyle Correspondence, 1:82– 83; Principe, “Virtuous Romance,” 389– 97. 18. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 73– 75. 19. Boyle Correspondence, 1:36– 42. 20. Principe, “Virtuous Romance,” 392– 94. 21. Principe, “Virtuous Romance,” 392– 94. 22. Boyle, Occasional Reflections, sigs. A4v– A5r. See also ch. 6, below. 23. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 75; Newman, Gehennical Fire, 53 and ch. 2; Newman and Principe, Alchemy Tried in the Fire, ch. 5; Principe, “Virtuous Romance”; M. Hunter, Boyle Studies, 33– 52. 24. The series of letters and proposals related to Le Pruvost can be found in HP 12/5– 191. See also Webster, “Benjamin Worsley.”

226

•

Notes to Pages 66–72

25. Sir Cheney Culpeper to Samuel Hartlib, November 10, 1647, HP 13/202A– 203B; Webster, Great Instauration, 372. 26. John Dury to Samuel Hartlib, copy letter, November 30, 1645, HP 12/66A– 68B; Webster, Great Instauration, 371– 72. 27. Leng, Benjamin Worsley, 35– 37. 28. John Dury to Sir Cheney Culpeper, copy letter, September 25, 1648, HP 12/23A– B. 29. Sir Cheney Culpeper to John Dury, copy letter, September 26, 1648, HP 12/24A. 30. Yeo, Notebooks, English Virtuosi, 221. See also ch. 2, above. 31. John Dury to Samuel Hartlib, ca. May 1646, HP 3/3/19A; Leng, Benjamin Worsley, 35– 36. 32. Schreuder, Amsterdam’s Sephardic Merchants, 160. 33. Ephemerides 1650, part 4, HP 28/1/83A; Bushnell, Green Desire, 25– 31. 34. Bushnell, Green Desire, esp. ch. 1; Schiebinger, Plants and Empire, 5– 12. 35. Tigner, Literature and the Renaissance Garden, 211– 22. 36. Ephemerides 1652, part 1, HP 28/2/29A; Yeo, Notebooks, English Virtuosi, 88, 221. 37. Hartlib, The Reformed Virginian Silk-Worm, title page. 38. Correspondence of Oldenberg, 1:35, 73– 74; Avramov, “Apprenticeship in Scientific Communication,” 190, 196, 199– 200. 39. Avramov, “Apprenticeship in Scientific Communication,” 190, 196, 199– 200; A. R. Hall and Hall, Correspondence of Oldenburg, 1:74. 40. Avramov, “Apprenticeship in Scientific Communication,” 190, 196, 199– 200; A. R. Hall and Hall, Correspondence of Oldenburg, 1:73– 74, 130– 32, 148– 49, 336; Henry Oldenburg to Samuel Hartlib, February 16, 1658, HP 39/3/6A– B; “Ex. Litt. M[adam] Ra[nelagh],” RSL, MS/1, fols. 190– 94. 41. A. R. Hall and Hall, Correspondence of Oldenburg, 1:305. 42. A. R. Hall and Hall, Correspondence of Oldenburg, 1:227, 231, 242. 43. A. R. Hall and Hall, Correspondence of Oldenburg, 1:303. 44. Rankin, Panaceia’s Daughters. 45. Boyle Correspondence, 1:169– 79; Dobbs, Foundations of Newton’s Alchemy, 75– 78. 46. Webster, “English Medical Reformers,” 33. 47. Webster, “English Medical Reformers”; H. J. Cook, “Society of Chemical Physicians”; H. J. Cook, Decline of the Old Medicine Regime, 128– 29. 48. William Rand to Samuel Hartlib, August 15, 1656, HP 42/10/1A– 4B. 49. Rand to Hartlib, August 15, 1656, HP 42/10/1A– 4B. 50. Leong, “Making Medicines”; Stobart, Household Medicine, ch. 6 and conclusion; Fissell, “Introduction: Women, Health and Healing”; Nagy, Popular Medicine, ch. 5.

Notes to Pages 72–76

•

227

51. Markham, English Housewife, 8. 52. Stobart, Household Medicine, ch. 5; L. Hunter, “Sisters of the Royal Society”; Wall, Recipes for Thought; Pennell, Birth of the English Kitchen, 81, 129– 33. 53. Herbert, Female Alliances, ch. 3; Pennell, Birth of the English Kitchen. 54. Pollock, With Faith and Physick, 97– 98; Cavallo and Storey, Healthy Living; Gowing, Common Bodies; Moody, Private Life. 55. Boyle Correspondence, 1:136. 56. Boyle Correspondence, 1:80. 57. Boyle Correspondence, 1:136. 58. Boyle Correspondence, 1:136. 59. Boyle Correspondence, 1:136. 60. Boyle Correspondence, 1:136; Searle, “‘A kind of agonie.’ ” 61. Boyle Correspondence, 1:137. 62. Boyle Correspondence, 1:137. 63. Pal, Republic of Women, 207– 8; Fitzmaurice, “Cavendish, Margaret”; Hannan, Women of Letters. 64. Hannan, Women of Letters, 64. 65. Leong, Recipes and Everyday Knowledge, chs. 3– 4; Ezell, “Domestic Papers”; Herbert, Female Alliances, ch. 3. 66. For more on patients’ options in London, see Leong and Pennell, “Recipe Collections and Medical Knowledge”; Lindemann, Medicine and Society; Porter, “The Patient’s View.” 67. Eamon, Science and the Secrets of Nature; P. Smith “What is a Secret?” 68. Muldrew, Economy of Obligation; Swan, “Making Sense.” 69. Pennell, “Perfecting Practice?”; Leong and Pennell, “Recipe Collections and Medical Knowledge.” 70. Yeo, Notebooks, English Virtuosi, 102– 13; Hartlib’s Ephemerides, part 1, HP 28/1/74A. 71. Yeo, Notebooks, English Virtuosi, 108; Blair, Too Much to Know, 91, 101. 72. Werrett, Thrifty Science, 37– 40; Shapin and Schaffer, Leviathan and the AirPump. 73. Leong, Recipes and Everyday Knowledge; Leong and Pennell, “Recipe Collections and Medical Knowledge”; Leong, “Making Medicines”; Pennell, “‘Perfecting Practice?” 74. On Hartlib’s organizational method, see Yeo, Notebooks, English Virtuosi, esp. ch. 4. 75. Ephemerides 1650, part 2, HP 28/1/59A. 76. Ephemerides 1650, part 2, HP 28/1/59A. 77. Ephemerides 1655, part 4, HP 29/5/46B; Ephemerides 1648, part 3, HP 31/22/35A. 78. Ephemerides 1654, part 2, HP 29/4/14B.

228

•

Notes to Pages 76–82

79. Ephemerides 1655, part 2, HP 29/5/19A– B; Ephemerides 1654, HP 29/4/6B. 80. Ephemerides 1653, HP 28/2/82A. 81. Extract from Lady Ranelagh’s letter from Lismore, March 13, 1658, and “Recipes for the Stone, Mr Maltus & Lady Ranelagh in Hartlib’s Hand,” HP 60/4/20B. See also Oxford English Dictionary. 82. See esp. chs. 5 and 7, below. 83. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 105. 84. Lady Ranelagh and Kenelm Digby, “Extracts and Recipes,” HP 66/8/1A– B. 85. Leong, “Making Medicines,” 153– 56; DiMeo, “Rhetoric of Medical Authority.” 86. Considine, “Grey, Elizabeth”; Spiller, Seventeenth-Century English Recipe Books, xxxi– xxxiv; Knoppers, Politicizing Domesticity, 105. 87. Ephemerides 1649, HP 28/1/32B. 88. Ephemerides 1649, part 3, July/August– December 1649, HP 28/1/32B– 33A; Ephemerides 1650, part 4, October– December 1650, HP 28/1/83A– B. 89. Ephemerides 1650, part 2, HP 28/1/50B. 90. Ephemerides 1650, HP 28/1/83A– B. 91. “Recipes for the Stone,” HP 60/4/13A– 14b. 92. “Recipes for the Stone,” HP 60/4/13A– 14b. 93. Ephemerides 1653, part 4, HP 28/2/76A– B. 94. Ephemerides 1653, part 4, HP 28/2/76A– B. Dr Theodore Turquet de Mayerne (1573– 1655) appears frequently throughout the Hartlib Papers, and Hartlib also collected his recipes in his Ephemerides. For example, see Ephemerides 1650, part 2, HP 28/1/55A. 95. Ephemerides 1653, part 4, HP 28/2/76A– B. 96. “My Lady Rennelagh’s Choice Receipts,” BL, Sloane MS 1367, fol. 1r. 97. “My Lady Rennelagh’s Choice Receipts,” BL, Sloane MS 1367, fol. 32v begins with the subheading “Capt ^Dr^ Willis receipts.” 98. “My Lady Rennelagh’s Choice Receipts,” BL, Sloane MS 1367, fols. 32v, 38v. 99. “My Lady Rennelagh’s Choice Receipts,” BL, Sloane MS 1367, fol. 38v. 100. For more on this manuscript, see DiMeo, “Authorship and Medical Networks.” 101. For an overview of chemical ingredients in early modern recipes, see Leong and Pennell, “Recipe Collections and Medical Knowledge.” 102. “My Lady Rennelagh’s Choice Receipts,” BL, Sloane MS 1367, fols. 6r, 13v. 103. “My Lady Rennelagh’s Choice Receipts,” BL, Sloane MS 1367, fols. 8r, 15r, 16v, 17r, 18r. 104. M. Hunter, “Reluctant Philanthropist”; DiMeo, “Communicating Medical Recipes.” 105. DiMeo, “Openness vs. Secrecy,” 116– 17; DiMeo, “Such a sister.” 106. “Boyle Family Receipt Book,” Wellcome Library, Western MS 1340.

Notes to Pages 82–86

•

229

107. For some of those who previously attributed it to Lady Ranelagh, see L. Hunter, “Sisters of the Royal Society”; Whaley, Women and Medical Care, 159, 253; and Wall, Recipes for Thought, 221, 224, 278n24. On the reattribution of the manuscript, see DiMeo, “Lady Ranelagh’s Book.” 108. DiMeo, “Lady Ranelagh’s Book.” 109. M. Hunter, “Reluctant Philanthropist”; DiMeo, “Communicating Medical Recipes.” 110. “Recipe Book of Lady Catherine Fitzgerald,” Wellcome MS 2367, 118, 119, 121. My thanks to Katherine Foxhall for sharing this reference with me. There are references to other Boyle women in the manuscript, including Lady Warwick on p. 96. 111. BL, Sloane MS 1289, fols. 65– 75. 112. “Medical Commonplace Book Used by Boyle and Lady Ranelagh,” RSL, RB/2/8 (previously RS MS/41); M. Hunter, Boyle Papers, 516; M. Hunter, Letters and Papers of Boyle, 73. The reattribution of authorship based on paleography is from my own extensive comparisons. 113. Dorothy Moore, “Of the Education of Girles,” BL, Sloane MS 649, fols. 203– 5; L. Hunter, The Letters of Dorothy Moore; S. Hutton, “Jones, Katherine”; Pal, Republic of Women, 128– 29. 114. L. Hunter, Letters of Dorothy Moore, 87. 115. Pal, Republic of Women, 212. 116. Pal, Republic of Women, 213– 14; M. B. Hall, Henry Oldenburg, 277– 92 and appendix, 312– 17. 117. Pal, Republic of Women, 157– 58. 118. Katz, “Menasseh ben Israel’s Mission,” 62. 119. S. Hutton, Anne Conway, ch. 8. 120. Popkin, “Hartlib, Dury and the Jews”; Young, Faith, Medical Alchemy, 41– 48. 121. Robertson, A Gate or Door, sigs. A2r– A3r. The book was reprinted with a different title, The First Gate, or The Outward Door to the Holy Tongue Opened in English in the following year, and included the same dedication to Lady Ranelagh. 122. Robertson, A Gate or Door, sig. A2v. 123. Robertson, A Gate or Door, sig. A3r. 124. Pal, Republic of Women, 158. 125. Robertson, Second Gate, sigs. §3r– v (§3r). 126. Robertson, Second Gate, sigs. §3r– v (§3v). 127. Life, “Robertson, William.” 128. For more on the importance of Hebrew to millenarian prophecies, see Schreuder, “Menasseh ben Israel’s Messianic Prophecies.” 129. Boyle Correspondence, 1:138. 130. Boyle Correspondence, 1:135– 38. See also Lady Ranelagh to Henry Oldenburg, copy extracts, 1656– 57, RSL, MS/1, fols. 190– 92.

230

•

Notes to Pages 86–92

131. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 86; Jacob, “Boyle’s Circle”; Oster, “Millenarianism and the New Science”; Taylor, “Writing Women, Honour, and Ireland,” 2:331– 38. 132. Popkin, “Hartlib, Dury and the Jews,” 118– 36. 133. Schreuder, Amsterdam’s Sephardic Merchants, 170; Schreuder, “Menasseh ben Israel’s Messianic Prophecies.” 134. Schreuder, “Menasseh ben Israel’s Messianic Prophecies.” 135. Malcolm, “Moses Wall,” 25– 53; Popkin, “Note on Moses Wall,” 165– 70. 136. Roth, Life of Menasseh, 248– 61; Katz, Philo-semitism, ch. 6. 137. A letter from Oldenburg to ben Israel in 1657 reminds the latter that “I was in your company several times, both at Mr. Boreel’s and at the house of that very noble and pious Lady Ranelagh.” See Henry Oldenburg to Menasseh ben Israel, July 25, 1657, in A. R. Hall and Hall, Correspondence of Oldenburg, 1:123– 27. 138. Schreuder, Amsterdam’s Sephardic Merchants, 171; Schreuder, “Menasseh ben Israel’s Messianic Prophecies.” 139. Katz, “Menasseh ben Israel’s Mission,” 62; Åkerman, “Queen Christina’s Metamorphosis,” 23; Pal, Republic of Women, 250. 140. Chapman, “From Alchemy to Airpumps,” 17– 51. 141. Boyle Correspondence, 1:193. 142. Cavallo and Storey, Healthy Living, 71– 76. 143. Boyle Correspondence, 1:193. Angle brackets are reproduced as in this edition. 144. Chapman, “From Alchemy to Airpumps,” 24. 145. Shapin, “House of Experiment,” 380. 146. Quoted in M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 90. Chapter 4 1. John Milton to Richard Boyle, September 21, 1656, in Milton, Epistolarum Familiarium, 46– 47. In a letter that William Petty wrote from Dublin to Samuel Hartlib on November 5, 1656, he says that Lady Ranelagh had arrived safely in Ireland. Yale University, Beinecke Library, Osborn Collection, document 29, transcribed and cataloged in Hartlib Papers as Yale/29. 2. Barnard, Cromwellian Ireland, esp. ch. 1; Collingham, Taste of Empire, ch. 2. 3. On Cork’s Irish estates, see Edwards and Rynne, Colonial World of Richard Boyle, particularly essays by Heffernan, “Theory and Practice”; and Lyttleton, “A godly resolucon.” 4. Collingham, Taste of Empire, 39. 5. Little, Lord Broghill, ch. 7; M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, ch. 6. 6. In a letter dated June 3, 1657, from Lady Ranelagh to Robert Boyle, she mentioned that she had received his “list of your Connaught lands.” She noted she would process them and then write to him again when she had more information. Boyle Correspondence, 1:215– 16. See also M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, ch. 6.

Notes to Pages 93–98

•

231

7. Little, Lord Broghill; Barnard, “Boyle, Roger.” 8. Ash, Draining of the Fens, 281– 90. 9. Milton, Epistolarum Familiarium, 47. I quote from the translation from the Latin in K. M. Lynch, “Incomparable Lady Ranelagh,” 29. 10. Burke, Peerage, 850. Sir William Parsons died shortly after their marriage on December 31, 1658. NLI, Genealogical Office MS 64-79, Funeral Entries, 14:24– 25. 11. William Petty to Samuel Hartlib, November 5, 1656, Yale University, Beinecke Library, Osborn Collection, document 29, transcribed and cataloged in Hartlib Papers as Yale/29; Taylor, “Writing Women, Honour, and Ireland,” 2:294. 12. Quoted in Little, Lord Broghill, 202– 3 and ch. 2. 13. Broghill to Cromwell, June 27, 1656, Bodleian Library, MS Rawl. A. 39, 170– 73, quoted in Little, Lord Broghill, 204. 14. Eliza Kempston to her brother, General Ludlow, October 20, 1658, Calendar of State Papers Ireland 1647– 60. 15. Malay, Case of Mistress Mary Hampson, ch. 1; Taylor, “Writing Women, Honour, and Ireland,” 2:292; Stone, Road to Divorce, 149– 51, 305– 13; Chatsworth House, Lismore Papers, vol. 31. 16. Boyle Correspondence, 1:166; M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 87– 92. 17. Coughlan, “Natural History and Historical Nature,” 302. 18. Barnard, “Hartlib Circle,” 281– 97; Coughlan, “Natural History and Historical Nature”; Mendyk, “Gerard Boate.” 19. Carlyle, “Wood, Robert.” 20. [Lady Ranelagh to Lady Broghill], letter fragment, undated, West Sussex Record Office, Petworth House Archives, Orrery MS 13219, letter 18. The letter is addressed to Lady Broghill and so must date prior to 1660, when Lady Broghill became the Countess of Orrery. 21. Barnard, “Hartlib Circle,” 284– 85; Coughlan, “Natural History and Historical Nature,” 306– 8. 22. Boate, Naturall History of Ireland, title page; Barnard, “Hartlib Circle,” 284– 85. 23. Barnard, “Miles Symner and the New Learning,” 129– 42. 24. Barnard, “Miles Symner and the New Learning”; Barnard, Cromwellian Ireland; Webster, Great Instauration. 25. Robert Wood to Samuel Hartlib, May 26, 1658, HP 15/4/5A– B; Robert Wood to Samuel Hartlib, June 16, 1658, HP 15/4/6– 7. 26. Barnard, Cromwellian Ireland, ch. 8. 27. Ash, Draining of the Fens, 281– 90. 28. Carlyle, “Wood, Robert.” 29. Robert Wood to Samuel Hartlib, May 13, 1656, HP 33/1/1– 2; Robert Wood to Samuel Hartlib, June 24, 1656, HP 33/1/5– 6. 30. Robert Wood to Samuel Hartlib, March 3, 1657, HP 33/1/11– 12.

232

•

Notes to Pages 98–103

31. William Petty to Samuel Hartlib, November 5, 1656, Yale University, Beinecke Library, Osborn Collection, document 29 (transcribed and cataloged in Hartlib Papers as Yale/29) is the first, and Robert Wood to Samuel Hartlib, March 2, 1659, HP 33/1/45– 46, is the last. Between these dates, I counted forty-one references to Lady Ranelagh in the Hartlib Papers letters and Hartlib’s Ephemerides. 32. Robert Wood to Samuel Hartlib, March 3, 1657, HP 33/1/11– 12. 33. Robert Wood to Samuel Hartlib, July 1, 1657, HP 33/1/19A– B; Robert Wood to Samuel Hartlib, June 16, 1658, HP 15/4/6/6– 7. 34. Robert Wood to Samuel Hartlib, July 27, [1657?], HP 31/1/21A– 22B. 35. Webster, “Decimilization,” 463. 36. Quoted in Webster, “Decimilization,” 463. 37. Robert Wood, “Treatise on Decimal Coinage,” HP 27/20/3A– 6B. 38. Robert Wood to Samuel Hartlib, April 8, 1657, HP 33/1/13A– 14B. 39. Robert Wood to Samuel Hartlib, August 1, 1657, HP 33/1/23– 24. 40. John Beale to Samuel Hartlib, May 28, 1657, HP 25/5/1A– 12B. The only letter written between them that includes a formal disclaimer and generally reads as though it were written at the beginning of their friendship is John Beale to Lady Ranelagh, copy letter, undated, HP 27/16/1A– 14B. 41. Stubbs, “John Beale,” 463– 89; Woodland, “Beale, John.” 42. Quoted in Hunt, “Hortulan Affairs,” 334. 43. Collingham, Taste of Empire, 39– 40. 44. Leslie, “Spiritual Husbandry,” 170n3. 45. John Beale to [Samuel Hartlib], undated, HP 25/6/1A– 4B. I have dated this as a late 1650s document because of similar proposals Beale made to Hartlib, which are all dated between 1657 and 1659. See also Hunt, “Hortulan Affairs.” 46. Beale to [Hartlib], undated, HP 25/6/1A– 4B. 47. Beale to [Hartlib], undated, HP 25/6/1A– 4B. 48. Drayton, Nature’s Government, 9. 49. Cunningham, “Culture of Gardens.” 50. Wilson, “Growing Aromatic Herbs,” 86– 99. 51. Beale to [Hartlib], undated, HP 25/6/1A– 4B. 52. Beale to [Hartlib], undated, HP 25/6/1A– 4B. 53. [ John Beale] to [Samuel Hartlib], May 28, 1657, HP 25/5/1A– 12B; Newman, “George Starkey,” 196– 200; [ John Beale] to [Samuel Hartlib], HP 25/5/7B. 54. [ John Beale] to [Samuel Hartlib], June 8, 1657, HP 25/5/13A. 55. John Beale to Samuel Hartlib, August 14 [no year], HP 31/1/28B. 56. See copy letter written to “the Rt. Honbl. Vic:tesse Ranalaugh by J.B. concerning Apostles Creede,” September 5, 1660, RSL, MS, RB/3/1/24. See also ch. 5, below. 57. Copy letters from Lady Ranelagh, in German, October 1656– January 1657, HP 35/2/56A– 59B. My thanks to Claire Sabel for providing me with English translations of the German letters.

Notes to Pages 104–110

•

233

58. Pal, Republic of Women, 162, n. 64; Peter Figulus to Samuel Hartlib, November 29, 1658, HP 9/17/51A– 52. 59. William Petty to Samuel Hartlib, October 23, 1652, Yale University, Beinecke Library, Osborn Collection, document 23, transcribed and cataloged in Hartlib Papers as Yale/23; William Petty to Samuel Hartlib, undated, Yale University, Beinecke Library, Osborn Collection, document 32, transcribed and cataloged in Hartlib Papers as Yale/32; McCormick, William Petty, 42. 60. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 90– 94. 61. McCormick, William Petty; Barnard, “Petty, Sir William.” 62. Lady Ranelagh and Kenelm Digby, “Extract & Recipes in Scribal Hands,” September 11, 1658, HP 66/8/1A– B. 63. “My Lady Rennelagh’s Choice Receipts,” BL, Sloane MS 1367, fols. 19v– 20r, 54v; DiMeo, “Authorship and Medical Networks,” 28– 34. See also ch. 3, above. 64. Ranelagh and Digby, “Extract & Recipes in Scribal Hands,” HP 66/8/1A– B. 65. [Lady Ranelagh] to [Samuel Hartlib], extract in scribal hand, April 3, 1658, available in HP as RSL, Boyle Letters 6, 4A– B. 66. Boyle Correspondence, 1:263– 69; M. Hunter, “Magic, Science and Reputation,” 226– 27. 67. “Recipes for the Stone,” Hartlib and Scribe A, February 14– 20, 1657, HP 60/4/13A. For Frances’s letter to Oldenburg, see Henry Oldenburg to Frances Jones, August 1659, in A. R. Hall and Hall, Correspondence of Oldenburg, 1:305. 68. Boyle Correspondence, 1:165– 68; M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 90. 69. For a diversity of this range, search for “peony” in the Recipes Project blog and note its multitude of uses: https://recipes.hypotheses.org (accessed April 7, 2017). 70. For example, see Robert Wood to Samuel Hartlib, June 17, 1657, HP 33/1/17A– 18B; and Robert Wood to Samuel Hartlib, July 1, 1657, HP 33/1/19. 71. Henry Oldenburg to Samuel Hartlib, June 12, 1658, HP 39/3/9– 10; Henry Oldenburg to Samuel Hartlib, June 15, 1658, HP 39/3/11; A. R. Hall and Hall, Correspondence of Oldenburg, 1:161– 63, 179– 81. 72. Henry Oldenburg to Samuel Hartlib, September 12, 1658, HP 39/3/18– 19. 73. Birch, Collection of State Papers of John Thurloe, 7:395– 97. 74. Birch, Collection of State Papers of John Thurloe, 7:395– 97. 75. Birch, Collection of State Papers of John Thurloe, 7:395– 97. 76. Quoted in Little, Lord Broghill, 170. 77. R. Connolly, “‘Wise and Godly Sybilla.’ ” See also ch. 1, above. 78. R. Connolly, “‘Wise and Godly Sybilla’”; Ranelagh to unknown correspondent, February 19, 1657, HP 39/2/60A. 79. Peter Figulus to Samuel Hartlib, November 29, 1658, HP 9/17/51A– 52B. 80. Figulus to Hartlib, November 29, 1658, HP 9/17/51A– 52B.

234

•

Notes to Pages 110–119

81. Comenius, School of Infancy, 65. 82. For more on Ranelagh as a prophet, see Bourke, “Katherine Jones’s Reputation.” 83. Birch, Collection of State Papers of John Thurloe, 7:395– 97. 84. Canny, Upstart Earl, ch. 7. 85. Elizabeth Clifford, Countess of Cork and Burlington, journal, Chatsworth House, Cork MSS, Misc. Box 5, fols. 3v– 4r; Lady Ranelagh to the Earl of Cork and Burlington, undated, Chatsworth House, Cork MSS, Box 30, letter 95. 86. See ch. 7, below. 87. Samuel Hartlib to John Winthrop the Younger, copy letter, Hartlib Papers 7/7/1A– 8B. 88. See ch. 7, below. Chapter 5 1. John Beale to Samuel Hartlib, March 26, 1659, HP 51/102A– 106B. Though the woman is unnamed, the reference must be to Lady Ranelagh because she is the only woman who is mentioned consistently in the correspondence between Beale and Hartlib with respect to theological and scientific matters. 2. Boyle Correspondence, 1:357– 59. 3. Within the Hartlib Papers archive, there is a reference to Dr. Butler in a letter dated one month earlier than Lady Ranelagh’s narrative. See Robert Wood to Samuel Hartlib, March 21, 1659, HP 33/1/48A– 49B. 4. I am quoting from the 1662 English translation: van Helmont, Oriatrike, 585– 96. 5. Newman and Principe, Alchemy Tried in the Fire, 221– 22. 6. Webster, “Water as the Ultimate Principle,” 96– 107; Boyle Works, 3:347– 48, 392– 93. 7. Henry Oldenburg to Freiherr von Friesen, April 26, 1649, mentions a man near Montpellier who was trying to prepare “Butler’s stone.” A. R. Hall and Hall, Correspondence of Oldenburg, 1:233– 38. See also Henry Oldenburg to Robert Boyle, May 7, 1659, in A. R. Hall and Hall, Correspondence of Oldenburg, 1:252– 54. 8. Lady Katherine Ranelagh to Samuel Hartlib, April 5, 1659, Yale University, Beinecke Library, Osborn MS 16789. Also transcribed and cataloged in Hartlib Papers as Yale/32. 9. Newman, Gehennical Fire, 5. 10. Woodward, Prospero’s America, ch. 1. 11. Samuel Hartlib to John Winthrop the Younger, March 16, 1660, copy letter, HP 7/7/1A– 8B. 12. For more on this, see DiMeo, “‘Such a sister.’ ” 13. Boyle Works, 3:348. 14. Boyle Works, 3:348. 15. From here on in this paragraph, I quote from Hall and Hall’s English transla-

Notes to Pages 119–125

•

235

tion of the Latin. See Correspondence of Oldenburg, 1:268– 77. Also see Henry Oldenburg to Hartlib, with enclosure, July 5, 1659, HP 39/3/25A– 27B. 16. A. R. Hall and Hall, Correspondence of Oldenburg, 1:272, 275. 17. A. R. Hall and Hall, Correspondence of Oldenburg, 1:276. 18. Avramov, “Apprenticeship in Scientific Communication,” 190, 193– 94. 19. A. R. Hall and Hall, Correspondence of Oldenburg, 1:270. On communicating secrets, see Eamon, Science and the Secrets of Nature, esp. ch. 10. 20. John Beale to Lady Ranelagh, September 5, 1660, RSL, RB/3/1/23. 21. Rankin, Panaceia’s Daughters, 70– 74; Harkness, “Managing an Experimental Household,” 249. 22. Quoted in Principe, Aspiring Adept, 32. 23. Quoted in Principe, Aspiring Adept, 33. 24. John Beale to Samuel Hartlib, March 26, 1659, HP 51/102A– 106B. 25. Boyle Correspondence, 1:357. 26. Pal, Republic of Women, 218. 27. Ranelagh’s letter is quoted in Samuel Hartlib to John Worthington, January 30, 1660, in Crossley, Diary and Correspondence of Dr. John Worthington, 13:162– 77. 28. Crossley, Diary and Correspondence of Dr. John Worthington, 13:162– 77. 29. Webster, Samuel Hartlib and the Advancement, 62. 30. L. Hunter, Letters of Dorothy Moore. 31. Crossley, Diary and Correspondence of Dr. John Worthington, 13:162– 77. 32. Keeble, Restoration, 32– 33. 33. John Beale to Lady Ranelagh, September 5 and 6, 1660, RSL, RB/3/1/23– 24; Benjamin Worsley to Samuel Hartlib, September 10, 1660, HP 33/2/15A– B. 34. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 123. 35. Principe, Scientific Revolution, 122– 29; Stagl, History of Curiosity, 143, 147– 48. 36. Principe, Scientific Revolution, 122– 29; Eamon, Science and the Secrets of Nature, 345– 50. 37. M. Hunter, Royal Society and Its Fellows, esp. ch. 1; M. Hunter, “Founder Members of the Royal Society.” 38. Shapin and Schaffer, Leviathan and the Air-Pump, ch. 2; Sarasohn, Natural Philosophy of Cavendish, ch. 7. 39. M. Hunter, Royal Society and Its Fellows, 120, 160, 176; Webster, Great Instauration, esp. ch. 2. 40. McGrath, “Jones, Richard.” 41. Londa Schiebinger, The Mind Has No Sex? Women in the Origins of Modern Science. See also Sarah Hutton’s helpful historiography of scholarship since then that concerns early modern women and science: S. Hutton, “Before Frankenstein,” 17– 28. 42. Hayden, New Science and Women’s Literary Discourse; Zinsser, Men, Women, and the Birthing of Modern Science; Shapin, “House of Experiment.” Some exceptional early modern women who pursued education in universities are discussed in Schiebinger, Mind Has No Sex?

236

•

Notes to Pages 125–130

43. For “big picture” models, see Jordanova, “Gender and the Historiography of Science.” See also Rose, “Foreword: From Household to Public Knowledge.” 44. Eamon, Science and the Secrets of Nature, esp. ch. 10. 45. Sprat, History of the Royal Society, esp. part 3. For enthusiasm and the emerging identity of the natural philosopher, see Gaukroger, Emergence of Scientific Culture, 220– 27. 46. Greengrass, “Hartlib, Samuel.” For more on projectors, see also Yamamoto, “Reformation.” 47. Young, “Durie [Dury], John”; Batten, John Dury, ch. 9. 48. Webster, “Worsley, Benjamin”; Leng, Benjamin Worsley, chs. 5, 7; Newman and Principe, Alchemy Tried in the Fire, ch. 5. 49. Webster, “Benjamin Worsley,” 213– 35. 50. Dorothy Moore to Samuel Hartlib, October 13 [1661], HP 4/4/37A– B. 51. Boyle Correspondence, 4:454– 55. 52. John Dury to John Pell, May 28/June 7, 1678, BL, Add. MS 4365, fol. 7. 53. Boyle Correspondence, 4:454– 55. 54. Schiebinger, Mind Has No Sex?; Rose, “Foreword: From Household to Public Knowledge.” 55. Elizabeth Clifford, Lady Burlington and Cork, journal, 1650s– 1688, Chatsworth House, Cork MSS, Misc. Box 5, fol. 10r. The quotation is from the original pamphlet describing the act, reprinted in Gould, Documents Relating to the Settlement of the Church, 477. 56. Yale University, Cushing and Whitney Medical Library, uncataloged letter, Lady Ranelagh to the Earl of Clarendon, undated. 57. Yale University, Cushing and Whitney Medical Library, uncataloged letter, Lady Ranelagh to the Earl of Clarendon, undated; Haykin, “Kiffin, William.” 58. A similar argument is made in M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 166. 59. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 121. 60. For a more thorough discussion of gender, science, and print, see ch. 6, below. 61. See ch. 6 and ch. 7, below. 62. Boyle Correspondence, 1:82– 83. 63. Boyle Works, 3:xix– xxv, 195. 64. Boyle Works, 3:416, 431. 65. Boyle Works, vols. 2, 4. 66. McGrath, “Jones, Richard.” 67. See “My Lady Rennelagh’s Choice Receipts,” BL, Sloane MS 1367. See also ch. 3, above. 68. Boyle Works, 3:346, 368, 538. 69. Lenox-Conyngham, Diaries of Ireland, 9– 15. Cork even noted in his diary when Raleigh was beheaded in 1618. 70. Boyle Works, 3:384.

Notes to Pages 130–138

•

237

71. Boyle Works, 3:385. 72. Boyle Works, 3:430– 31. 73. M. Hunter, Robert Boyle by Himself, 55. 74. H. J. Cook, Decline of the Old Medical Regime, 108– 9; Glisson, De rachitide. 75. Newman and Principe, Alchemy Tried in the Fire, esp. 221– 22. 76. Boyle Works, 3:393. 77. Boyle Works, 3:416. 78. Boyle Works, 3:538. 79. Quoted in S. Hutton, Anne Conway, 123. 80. S. Hutton, Anne Conway, 123. 81. See, for example, the letter from Ralph Austen and Robert Sharrock addressed to Boyle at Lady Ranelagh’s house on Pall Mall, dated January 1665, in Boyle Correspondence, 2:448– 51. 82. H. J. Cook, Decline of the Old Medical Regime, esp. chs. 3 and 4; Wear, “Medical Practice”; Wear, Knowledge and Practice, ch. 10. See also ch. 6, below. 83. Boyle Correspondence, 2:498– 500, 504– 6. 84. Boyle Correspondence, 2:498. 85. Boyle Correspondence, 2:499. 86. Boyle Correspondence, 2:503– 4. 87. See, for example, Cavendish, Philosophical and Physical Opinions; and Cavendish, Observations upon Experimental Philosophy. 88. Sarasohn, Natural Philosophy of Cavendish, 25– 33. 89. “The Diary of Samuel Pepys, 26 April 1667,” http://www.pepysdiary.com /diary/1667/04/26/ (accessed April 15, 2014). 90. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, April 13, [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 57– 58. 91. Braddick, State Formation in Early Modern England, 155– 56; Gowing, Domestic Dangers, ch. 3. Chapter 6 1. Mary Rich, Countess of Warwick, diaries, 5 vols, BL, Add. MSS 27351– 55. 2. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, September 2, [1665], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 50– 51. 3. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, January 19 [1666], BL, Add. MS 75354, fol. 52v. 4. The dates are based on the following letters: Boyle Correspondence, 2:498– 500; Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, multiple letters, January [1666], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 52– 54. 5. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, January 11 [1666], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 52– 53. 6. Boyle Correspondence, 2:583.

238

•

Notes to Pages 138–142

7. Boyle Correspondence, 2:583. 8. Keeble, Restoration, 138– 48. 9. Lady Ranelagh to the Earl of Clarendon, uncataloged letter, undated. Yale University, Cushing and Whitney Medical Library. See also ch. 5, above. 10. In a letter from John Dury to Samuel Hartlib written around 1661, he mentions “my Ld John Berclay who is a gentelman of a free & Generous disposition & one with whom the Lady Ranalaugh is intimat.” See John Dury to [Samuel Hartlib], undated [ca. June 1661], HP 4/4/43A– B. 11. Barnard, “Boyle, Richard.” 12. Barnard, “Boyle, Roger.” 13. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 128– 29. 14. Lady Ranelagh to Countess of Orrery, undated, West Sussex Record Office, Petworth House, Orrery MS 13219. The letter must be dated after 1665 because Ranelagh refers to her “bro[ther] Burl[ington],” who received the title of Burlington in 1665. 15. Lady Ranelagh to Countess of Orrery, undated, West Sussex Record Office, Petworth House, Orrery MS 13219. 16. Robert Boyle Papers, BL, Add. MS 4229, fol. 68; reprinted in M. Hunter, Robert Boyle by Himself. 17. Lady Ranelagh, “Discourse Concerning the Plague of 1665,” RSL, RB/1/14/4, fol. 42v. 18. Lady Ranelagh, “Discourse Concerning the Plague of 1665,” RSL, RB/1/14/4, fol. 31r. 19. R. Connolly, “Manuscript Treatise,” 170– 72. 20. R. Connolly, “‘Wise and Godly Sybilla,’” 285– 306. 21. R. Connolly, “Manuscript Treatise,” 170– 72. 22. Some of these letters from the previous decade emphasized the need for Protestant unity in order to withstand the threat from Catholics in Ireland and continental Europe. For example, see Copy extracts, Lady Ranelagh in German, HP 39/2/56– 59 and HP 39/2/60– 61. See also the select translation by Little, “New English in Europe,” 154– 66, esp. 163. 23. Lady Ranelagh to Edward Hyde, March 3, 1644, Bodleian Library, Clarendon State Papers MSS, 23, fols. 113– 15. 24. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 123. 25. Boyle Correspondence, 3:327. 26. Boyle Correspondence, 3:327. 27. R. Connolly, “‘Wise and Godly Sybilla’”; Zurcher, “Life Writing.” 28. See ch. 2, above. 29. Boyle Correspondence, 2:499– 500. 30. Boyle Works, 5:xi– xv, 5– 7, 63; Harwood, Early Essays and Ethics of Boyle, lviii, note 78.

Notes to Pages 142–149

•

239

31. Boyle Correspondence, 2:499. 32. Boyle Works, 5:xii. 33. Boyle, Occasional Reflections, sigs. A4v– A5r. See also ch. 3, above. 34. Hobby, introduction to Virtue of Necessity; Ezell, Writing Women’s Literary History, ch. 2; Wall, Imprint of Gender, ch. 5 and afterword; Terrall, “Uses of Anonymity,” 91– 92, 94– 97; Bertucci, “In/Visible Woman.” 35. On the opportunities and challenges of print and natural philosophy, see Johns, Nature of the Book, esp. Chs. 2 and 7. 36. Yale, “Playing Archival Politics”; Moxham, “Fit for Print”; Fyfe and Moxham, “Making Public.” 37. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, September 2 [1665], BL, Add. MS 75354, fol. 50. 38. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, January 11 [1666], BL, Add. MS 75354, fol. 53. 39. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, January 11 [1666], BL, Add. MS 75354, fol. 53. 40. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, January 11 [1666], BL, Add. MS 75354, fol. 53. 41. Wallis, “Plagues, Morality,” 4. 42. “My Lady Rennelagh’s Choice Receipts,” BL, Sloane MS 1367, fol. 3v. See also ch. 3, above. 43. Wallis, “Plagues, Morality,” 12– 21; Wear, English Medical Practitioners, ch. 6. 44. Wallis, “Plagues, Morality,” 12– 21; M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 161– 62; Newman, Gehennical Fire, 203– 8. 45. H. J. Cook, Decline of the Old Medical Regime, 156– 60. See also ch. 5, above. 46. Elmer, Miraculous Conformist, esp. ch. 4. 47. See ch. 5, above, and S. Hutton, Anne Conway, 123– 26. 48. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 151; Elmer, Miraculous Conformist, 79. 49. Boyle Correspondence, 3:85– 86. 50. Boyle Correspondence, 3:85– 86. 51. “Workdiary 26 (Editorial Transcript),” Workdiaries of Robert Boyle, http:// www.livesandletters.ac.uk /wd/view/text_ed/WD26_ed.html (accessed January 8, 2014). 52. “Workdiary 26 (Editorial Transcript),” Workdiaries of Robert Boyle, http:// www.livesandletters.ac.uk /wd/view/text_ed/WD26_ed.html (accessed January 8, 2014). 53. Boyle Correspondence, 3:234– 36. 54. Boyle Correspondence, 3:234– 36; Birch, History of the Royal Society, 2:113– 14. 55. Boyle Correspondence, 3:269. For Oldenburg’s report to the Royal Society, see Birch, History of the Royal Society, 2:121.

240

•

Notes to Pages 150–155

56. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, April 20 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 59– 60. 57. Elizabeth (Clifford), Lady Burlington, journal, fol. 10, Chatsworth House, Cork MSS, Misc. Box 5. 58. Seaward, “Hyde, Edward.” 59. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, July 30 [1667], BL, MS Add. 75354, fols. 97– 98; Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, August 8 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 99– 100. 60. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, January 11 [1666], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 53– 54. 61. Chatsworth House, Cork MSS, Misc. Box 1, fols. 8v, 10r. For Lady Ranelagh reclaiming her estate, see ch. 7, below. 62. Pelling, “Medical Practice,” 116– 18. 63. H. J. Cook, Decline of the Old Medical Regime, 180– 82. 64. Strocchia, “Introduction: Women and Healthcare”; Fissell, “Introduction: Women, Health, and Healing.” 65. Lindemann, Medicine and Society; Leong and Pennell, “Recipe Collections and Medical Knowledge.” 66. Boyle Works, 5:63. 67. Chatsworth House, Cork MSS, Misc. Box 5, Journal of Elizabeth (Clifford), Lady Burlington, fol. 13r. 68. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, [ca. April 27, 1667] and May 4, [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 61– 65. All definitions are taken from the glossaries in Boyle Works, vol. 14, and Boyle Correspondence, vol. 6, unless noted. 69. The letters to Boyle appear in Boyle Correspondence, vols. 2 and 3. Boyle’s letters to Coxe are no longer extant. 70. Munk, Munk’s Roll, 1:304. 71. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, [ca. April 27, 1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 61– 62. 72. Ranelagh to Burlington, [ca. April 27, 1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 61– 62. 73. Boyle, Of the Reconcileableness of Specifick Medicines, 14. 74. Boyle, Of the Reconcileableness of Specifick Medicines, 14. 75. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, May 4 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fol. 65. 76. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, May 4 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fol. 65. 77. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, May 4 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fol. 65. 78. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, May 11 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fol. 68. 79. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, May 11 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fol. 68. 80. Lindemann, Medicine and Society, 241. 81. Charles, Lord Clifford, to Lord Burlington, May 25 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75355, unpaginated.

Notes to Pages 155–161

•

241

82. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, May 25 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 70– 73. 83. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington May 25 [1667]. 84. See M. Hunter, “Boyle versus the Galenists.” 85. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, May 25 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 70– 73. 86. DiMeo “Authorship and Medical Networks,” 28– 34. See also “My Lady Rennelagh’s Choice Receipts,” BL, Sloane MS 1367. 87. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, May 25 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 70– 73. 88. “Cookbook of Grace Blome,” 1697, Folger MS V.b. 301, fol. 104r. 89. For her account of the French woman’s autopsy, see Boyle Correspondence, 1:396. 90. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, May 25 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 70– 73. 91. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, June 1 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 74– 77. 92. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, June 1 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 74– 77. 93. Lord Clifford to Lord Burlington, May 25 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75355, Bundle 1, unpaginated. 94. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, June 15 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 79– 82; Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, June 22 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 83– 84. 95. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, July 30 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 97– 98. 96. R. Hutton, “Digby, George”; G. E. C.’s Complete Peerage, 2:321– 22. George and Rachel Bristol had at least two sons in 1667: John Digby (ca. 1635– 1698) and Francis Digby (d. 1672). We also know that Lady Ranelagh was associated with the Bristol family through a letter written June 3 [1657], in which she asks her brother Robert to “present [her] humble Service to my two lady Bristols.” The editorial note in the Boyle Correspondence explains, “The reference to ‘two lady Bristols’ suggests that it was written in the widowhood of Beatrice Digby, Countess of Bristol, whose husband John Digby, 1st Earl of Bristol, died on 21 Jan. 1653. As the heir was already married there were two Lady Bristols until Beatrice’s death on 12 Sept. 1658.” This suggests that Lady Ranelagh is referring to Lady Beatrice Bristol (d. 1658) and Lady Anne Bristol (1620– 97). See Boyle Correspondence, 1:215– 16, esp. 215, note c. 97. M. Hunter, “Coxe, Daniel.” 98. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, June 22 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 99– 100.

242

•

Notes to Pages 161–166

99. Allestree, Art of Contentment, 30. See also search results for this phrase in Early English Books Online Text Creation Partnership (EEBO-TCP). 100. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, June 22 [1667], BL Add. MS 75354, fols. 99– 100. 101. For more on household experiments while Boyle resided at Pall Mall, see Shapin, “House of Experiment.” Chapter 7 1. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 294– 97. 2. Beauclerk, Nell Gywn, 183– 84. 3. “Nos. 83– 84 Pall Mall,” in Sheppard, Survey of London, vol. 29– 30; M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 164; Nasifoglu, “Robert Hooke’s Praxes,” 2:312– 15, 3:152. 4. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 164. 5. Dewhurst, Dr. Thomas Sydenham, 34, 74; Meynell, Materials for a Biography, 79. 6. Boyle Correspondence, 3:234– 35. 7. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 166. 8. Boyle Correspondence, 2:503– 4. 9. Boyle Correspondence, 3:235. 10. Diaries of Lord Burlington, Chatsworth House, Cork MSS, Misc. Box 1, fols. 8v, 10r. See also ch. 6, above. 11. See ch. 6, above. 12. Boyle Correspondence, 3:213. 13. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 166; Jardine, Curious Life, 87, 91. 14. Cooper, “Homes and Households,” 225– 29; Shapin, “House of Experiment.” 15. P. H. Smith, “Laboratories,” 302– 4; Shapin and Schaffer, Leviathan and the Air-Pump. 16. Boyle Correspondence, 3:270. 17. M Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 168– 69; Shapin “House of Experiment.” 18. Both quoted in Shapin, “House of Experiment,” 386. 19. M. Hunter, Workdiaries of Robert Boyle; M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 167– 68; Shapin, “House of Experiment,” 394– 95. 20. Lisa Jardine suggested that Hooke lived at Lady Ranelagh’s Pall Mall home until he moved into Gresham College in August 1664, but the dating for this seems unlikely when compared with Ranelagh’s biography. Hooke’s letter to Robert Boyle written “from Pall-Mall” is dated [ July 3, 1663], prior to her move there, and does not mention her by name. Jardine, Curious Life, 348, n. 46; Boyle Correspondence, 2:96– 99. 21. Shapin, “House of Experiment,” 382. 22. Robinson and Adams, Diary of Robert Hooke, 184; Jardine, Curious Life, 91.

Notes to Pages 167–173

•

243

23. Robinson and Adams, Diary of Robert Hooke, 184, 341. 24. See entries for April 2, 3, 10, and 20, and May 5, 1677, in Robinson and Adams, Diary of Robert Hooke, 283– 88. 25. Nasifoglu, “Robert Hooke’s Praxes,” 315– 17. 26. Jardine, Curious Life, 247– 58. 27. Robinson and Adams, Diary of Robert Hooke, 81; Shapin, Never Pure, 191. 28. Boyle Works, 10:42. 29. Shapin, Social History of Truth, 371. 30. Shapin, Social History of Truth, 371. 31. Boyle Correspondence, 3:239. 32. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 175. 33. See chs. 2 and 3, above. 34. Boyle Correspondence, 2:498– 500, 583. See also chs. 5 and 6, above. 35. See chs. 2 and 5, above. 36. See ch. 6, above. 37. Lord Ranelagh was buried in St. Patrick’s Cathedral on January 14, 1670, and must have died “about the last day of December 1669.” Lodge, Peerage of Ireland, 4:303. Two letters addressed to Lady Ranelagh when in Dublin are dated May 17, 1670, and June 27, 1670. By at least April 22, 1671, she and Frances were back in London. MacLysaght, Calendar of the Orrery Papers, 73, 75, 84. 38. Lodge, Peerage of Ireland, 4:303. 39. Elizabeth Clifford, Lady Burlington, journal, Chatsworth House, Cork MSS, Misc. Box 5, fol. 16r; Brogan, “Marvell’s Epitaph on ———,” 197– 99. 40. N. Smith, Poems of Andrew Marvell, 200. 41. N. Smith, Poems of Andrew Marvell, 200; N. Smith, Andrew Marvell: The Chameleon, 238, 247– 48. 42. Mary Rich, diary entry, October 16, 1675, BL, Add. MS 27354. 43. Boyle Correspondence, 4:454. 44. Boyle Correspondence, 4:454. 45. Clarke, “‘A heart terrifying Sorrow.’ ” 46. M. B. Hall, Henry Oldenburg, ch. 11 and appendix. 47. Walker, Virtuous Woman Found, sig. A4. 48. Lady Ranelagh, “Ex. Litt. M. Ra,” Liber Epistolaris, [1657?], RSL, MS/1, fols. 190– 94. See also R. Connolly, “Proselytising Protestant Commonwealth.” 49. R. Connolly, “‘Wise and Godly Sybilla,’” 293. 50. Spalding, Diary of Bulstrode Whitelocke, 750– 51. 51. Haykin, “Kiffin, William.” 52. Notes of Conventicles &c. in Westminster &c., July 1676, BL, Egerton MS 3330, fols. 14– 18 (16r), quoted in R. Connolly, “‘Wise and Godly Sybilla,’” 293. For a summary of Baxter’s religious views before and after the Restoration, see Keeble, “Baxter, Richard.”

244

•

Notes to Pages 174–179

53. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, July 3, [1675], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 115– 17 (fol. 115v). 54. Lady Ranelagh to Lord Burlington, July 3 [1675], BL Add. MS 75354, fols. 115– 17. 55. R. Connolly, “‘Wise and Godly Sybilla,’” 296. 56. Fausz, “Eliot, John.” 57. Lepore, Name of War, 139. 58. These letters are no longer extant, but Lady Ranelagh’s letter of August 13, 1676, mentions at least two previous letters by Eliot: one to Boyle and one to her. See Lady Ranelagh to John Eliot, August 13, 1676, RSL, RB/3/5/9, fols. 17– 18. 59. Ranelagh to Eliot, August 13, 1676, RSL, RB/3/5/9, fols. 17– 18; Lepore, Name of War, 139. 60. M. Hunter, “Robert Boyle, Narcissus Marsh,” 51– 75; M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 131 and ch. 12. 61. Fitzsimon, “Conversion”; Barnard, “Protestants and the Irish Language.” 62. Fitzsimon, “Conversion,” 170. 63. Fitzsimon, “Conversion,” 173– 75. Wolley refers to the “Act of Conformity,” but he must be referring to the Act of Uniformity (1662). 64. Murphy, William Penn, 14, 18– 21. 65. Letters of William Penn, 472– 73; Boyle Correspondence, 5:422– 23. 66. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 226– 27. 67. Lady Ranelagh to William Penn, copy letters, Society of Friends Library, MS Box 7.1.(14,15,16). 68. Lady Ranelagh to William Penn, copy letter, undated, Society of Friends Library, MS Box 7.1.(15). 69. Lady Ranelagh to William Penn, copy letter, August 4, 1688, Society of Friends Library, MS Box 7.1.(16). 70. Ranelagh to Penn, copy letter, August 4, 1688, Society of Friends Library, MS Box 7.1.(16). 71. Ranelagh to Penn, copy letter, August 4, 1688, Society of Friends Library, MS Box 7.1.(16). 72. Mathews, Account of the O’Dempseys, 174– 75. 73. Ranelagh to Penn, copy letter, August 4, 1688, Society of Friends Library, MS Box 7.1.(16). 74. Ranelagh to Penn, copy letter, August 4, 1688, Society of Friends Library, MS Box 7.1.(16). 75. Ranelagh to Penn, copy letter, August 4, 1688, Society of Friends Library, MS Box 7.1.(16). 76. Ranelagh to Penn, copy letter, August 4, 1688, Society of Friends Library, MS Box 7.1.(16). 77. R. Connolly, “‘Wise and Godly Sybilla,’” 291; Zurcher, “Life Writing,”112.

Notes to Pages 180–187

•

245

78. R. Connolly, “‘Wise and Godly Sybilla,’” 296. 79. H. J. Cook, Decline of the Old Medical Regime, 195; Meli, Mechanism, Experiment, Disease. 80. Lady Ranelagh to William Penn, February 12 [no year], Society of Friends Library, MS Box 7.1.(14). 81. Lady Ranelagh to Lady Orerry, letter fragment, undated, West Sussex Record Office, Petworth House, Orrery MS 13219, unpaginated. While the letter is undated, it must have been written after Elizabeth Boyle married Folliott Wingfield, later Viscount Powerscourt, which probably happened in 1662. See K. M. Lynch, Roger Boyle, 113. 82. Lady Ranelagh to the Earl of Burlington, April 27, 1667, BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 61r– 62v. 83. DiMeo, “Lady Ranelagh’s Book.” See also “Boyle Family Receipt Book,” Wellcome MS 1340. 84. Lady Ranelagh to Anne Hamilton, April 5 [1687], National Archives of Scotland, GD 406/1/10720. Thanks to Evan Bourke for bringing this letter to my attention. 85. DiMeo, “Communicating Medical Recipes.” 86. Boyle Works, 11:176. This passage was eliminated from the preface when it was revised for Medicinal Experiments, but it is not clear whether Boyle or his publisher was responsible for this decision. 87. For a broader history of medical specifics at the end of the seventeenth century, see H. J. Cook, “Markets and Cultures.” 88. Boyle Works, 10:400. 89. Robert Child to [Hartlib], February 2, 1652, HP 15/5/18A– 19B. 90. DiMeo, “Communicating Medical Recipes”; M. Hunter, “Reluctant Philanthropist.” 91. See chs. 5 and 6, above. 92. Quotes from Boyle’s “Considerations” are taken from the modern edition in M. Hunter, “Boyle vs. the Galenists,” esp. 356– 57. Boyle Correspondence, 1:135– 38. 93. See, for example, Lady Ranelagh to the Earl of Burlington, BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 105r– 106v; Lady Ranelagh to John Eliot, August 13, 1676, RSL, RB/3/5/9; and Boyle Works, 3:437. 94. Quoted in M. Hunter, “Boyle vs. the Galenists,” 357; Boyle Works, 3:364– 65. 95. Letter, Lady Ranelagh to the Earl of Cork, April 5, 1659, Chatsworth House, Corke MSS, box 31. 96. Ranelagh to Burlington, May 25 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 70– 73. 97. Ranelagh to Burlington, May 25 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 70– 73. 98. Ranelagh to Burlington, May 25 [1667], BL, Add. MS 75354, fols. 70– 73. 99. Robert Boyle, “Considerations and Doubts Touching the Vulgar Method of Physick,” fragments, RSL, MS 199, fols. 120– 114v. Thanks to Michael Hunter for discussing the dating of this manuscript with me. See also M. Hunter, “Boyle vs. the Galenists,” 335– 37, 343, and appendix 3; and Principe, Aspiring Adept, 224– 30.

246

•

Notes to Pages 187–193

100. M. Hunter, “Boyle vs. the Galenists,” 344– 45. 101. H. J. Cook, Decline of the Old Medical Regime, 193– 99. 102. Lady Elizabeth Boyle to her mother Elizabeth, Countess of Cork and Burlington, May 9 [1681], BL, Add. MS 75355. Elizabeth Jones was formerly Elizabeth Willoughby. 103. Mary Rich, Countess of Warwick, diaries, Add. MSS 27355, fol. 4. 104. Lady Elizabeth Boyle to her mother Elizabeth, Countess of Cork, and Burlington, May 9 [1681], BL, Add. MS 75355. This is Elizabeth Tufton, 3rd Countess of Thanet, written to her mother and Lady Ranelagh’s sister-in-law Elizabeth, Countess of Burlington. See also the family genealogy in Coolahan, Women, Writing, and Language, 203n72. 105. Kaplan, “Divulging of Useful Truths,” 172. 106. Lady Ranelagh to the Countess of Hamilton, August 6, 1690, National Archives of Scotland, GD/406/1/3797; Lady Ranelagh to Countess of Panmure, 1690– 91, National Archives of Scotland, GD 45/14/237/1– 5. For more on King as Boyle’s physician, see M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 228. 107. Lady Ranelagh to Countess of Panmure, July 31, 1690, and undated, National Archives of Scotland, GD 45/14/237/1– 2. 108. Lady Ranelagh to Countess of Panmure, June 7, [1691], National Archives of Scotland, GD 45/14/237/5. 109. MacLysaght, Calendar of Orrery Papers, 361. 110. Barnard, “Petty, Sir William”; McCormick, William Petty, chs. 6, 7. 111. “Speculum Hiberniae” is BL, Add. MS 72884, fols. 1– 54, is one of many such papers in BL, Add. MSs 72883– 84, that defend the Restoration land settlement. Thanks to Ted McCormick for discussing these with me. Pers. comm., email, July 1, 2009. 112. “Speculum Hiberniae,” BL, Add. MS 72884, fol. 3v. 113. William Petty to Lady Ranelagh, undated, BL, Add. MS 72884, fol. 4. 114. Lady Ranelagh to William Petty, undated, BL, Add. MS 72884, fol. 5. 115. Speck, James II, esp. 101– 16. 116. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 226. 117. Singer, Correspondence of Hyde, 2:324– 25. 118. Singer, Correspondence of Hyde, 2:325. 119. Singer, Correspondence of Hyde, 2:327– 39. 120. Hosford, “Cavendish, William”; Schwoerer, “Russell, William.” 121. Russell, Letters, 507– 9. 122. Russell, Letters, 509– 10. 123. De Beer, Diary of John Evelyn, 5:26. 124. M. Hunter, Boyle Studies, 11– 12. 125. For more on William’s invasion of Ireland, see Doherty, Williamite War.

Notes to Pages 193–202

•

247

126. Lady Ranelagh to the Countess of Hamilton, August 6, 1690, National Archives of Scotland, GD/406/1/3797; letters to the Countess of Panmure; Handley, National Archives of Scotland, GD 45/14/237/1– 5. See also Handley, “Maule, James.” 127. Lady Ranelagh to the Countess of Panmure, August 9, 1690, National Archives of Scotland, GD 45/14/237/1– 5, fol. 3. 128. Duke of Ormonde to Lord Arlington, August 24, 1681, in Anon., Calendar of Ormonde, 4:138. Conclusion 1. Birch, Works of the Honourable Robert Boyle, 1:clix; Maddison, Life of the Honorable Boyle, 257– 82; M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 239– 40. None of the wills currently discoverable at the National Archives in London are Ranelagh’s, including PROB 11/409/105, the closest dated “Will of Katherin Jones,” from February 26, 1692. 2. Birch, Works of the Honourable Robert Boyle, 1:clix. 3. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 233. 4. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 246. 5. DiMeo, “Communicating Medical Recipes,” 209– 28; M. Hunter, “Reluctant Philanthropist.” 6. John Evelyn to William Wotton, March 30, 1696, in Chambers and Galbraith, Letterbooks of John Evelyn, 2:1084. 7. M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 240. 8. Quoted in M. Hunter, Boyle: Between God and Science, 242. 9. Thompson, Correspondence of the Family of Hatton, 2:168; Chambers and Galbraith, Letterbooks of John Evelyn, 2:1084. 10. Thompson, Correspondence of the Family of Hatton, 2:168. 11. Thompson, Correspondence of the Family of Hatton, 2:166. 12. Burnet, A Sermon Preached, 32– 34. For “a mighty crowd,” see Thompson, Correspondence of the Family of Hatton, 2:168. 13. M. Hunter, “Robert Boyle and the Dilemma of Biography,” 251– 68. 14. M. Hunter, “Mapping the Mind,” 121– 36; Yeo, Notebooks, English Virtuosi. 15. M. Hunter, “Robert Boyle and the Dilemma of Biography,” 124. 16. Birch, Works of the Honourable Robert Boyle, 1:15. 17. Ballard, Memoirs of Several Ladies, vii, 321. 18. See ch. 3, above. 19. Quoted in Pal, “Accidental Archive,” 121. 20. However, at the time of this writing, Evan Bourke of Maynooth Univeristy is completing a modern edition of Lady Ranelagh’s correspondence. Pers. comm., Twitter direct messages, September 2019. 21. Perry, “Radical Doubt,” 482.

248

•

Notes to Pages 202–205

22. Yale, “The History of Archives,” 333. See also Burton, “Introduction: Archive Fever.” 23. Jimerson, Archives Power, 267– 77. Thanks also to the archivist Sarah Newhouse for discussing this with me. 24. In her essay “Accidental Archive,” Carol Pal explicitly (and accurately) connects this term with Lady Ranelagh. However, Pal was not the first to use it. For example, Joseph Heathcott used it in 2007 to describe the Aufderheide family’s archive, and the film scholar Harvey Deneroff used it as early as 1966. Thanks to Eileen Clancy and Nadine Akkerman for the vibrant Twitter conversation on this topic, August 23– 25, 2019. 25. Samuel Hartlib to Lady Barrington, copy letter, August 21, 1640, HP 7/29/1A; Ephemerides 1655, part 3, HP 29/5/42B. 26. I wasn’t on the organizing committee, but I commented on an early draft of the language. The plaque was commissioned after schoolgirl Alicia Premkumar, a student of Norman D. Macmillan, won a national Irish history competition with her biography of Lady Ranelagh. Eoin Gill invited me to unveil the plaque as part of the third annual Robert Boyle Summer School.

Bibliography

Manuscript Sources Armagh Public Library, Northern Ireland Collection of State Papers Connected with Meath, 3 vols., Lady Ranelagh to Bishop Anthony Dopping, letters 10, 17, 20, 21, MS 26544. Beinecke Library, Yale University Osborn MS Collection, letters from the Hartlib circle. Bodleian Library, Oxford University. Carte MS 30, fols. 484– 86, Edward Hyde to Marquis of Ormonde. October 25, 1659. Carte MS 217, fols. 452– 59, 66, letters of Lady Ranelagh. Clarendon State Papers, vol. 23, fols. 113– 15, Lady Ranelagh to Edward Hyde, March 3, 1644. Clarendon State Papers, vol. 78, fols. 230– 31, Lady Ranelagh to Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon. Clarendon State Papers, vol. 79, fols. 73– 74, 269– 72, Lady Ranelagh to Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon. MSS Add, A. 191, fol. 113, Lady Ranelagh to Bishop Gilbert Burnet. MS Rawl. A. 39, 170– 73, Broghill to Cromwell, June 27, 1656. British Library, London Add. MS 4106, fols. 224– 25, Benjamin Worsley to Lady Ranelagh. July 29, 1653. Add. MS 4229, Robert Boyle Papers. Add. MS 4292, fols. 278– 79, Lady Ranelagh to Robert Boyle. September 11, 1677. Add. MS 4293, Robert Boyle, workdiary, 1666. Add. MS 4365, fol. 7. John Dury to John Pell, May 28/June 7, 1678. Add. MS 15948, John Evelyn Manuscripts. Add. MS 17017, Lady Ranelagh to Laurence Hyde, November 23, [1676]. Add. MSS 27351– 55, Mary Rich, Countess of Warwick, diaries, 5 vols. Add. MS 27356, “Occasional Meditations of Mary Rich, Countess of Warwick.”

250

•

Bibliography

Add. MS 27357, “Autobiographical Reflections of Mary Rich, Countess of Warwick.” Add. MS 46932, Lady Ranelagh to Lord Broghill, copy letter, February 9, 1650. Add. MS 72883– 84, “Papers of William Petty.” Add. MS 75354, fols. 50– 119, letters from Lady Ranelagh to the Earl of Cork and Burlington. Add. MS 75355, letters to the Earl and Countess of Cork and Burlington. Add. MS 75356, unpaginated, Lord Falkland to Lady Dungarvan, August 20, [1642]. Egerton MS 3330, fols. 14– 18, “Notes of Conventicles &c. in Westminster &c.,” July 1676. Sloane MS 417, fol. 213, Samuel Hartlib to Adolf Tassius, August 10, 1638. Sloane MS 548, fol. 18, copy of John Beale, “Perspective Tubes and Telescopes.” Sloane MS 649, fols. 203– 5, Dorothy Moore to [Lady Ranelagh?], “Of the Education of Girles.” Sloane MS 1289, fols. 65– 75, “Severall [Medical] receipts copied out of the booke of Mad. Jones, 1681.” Sloane MS 1367, “My Lady Rennelagh’s Choice Receipts.” Stowe MS 206, fols. 1, 15, 61, 107– 8, 117– 18, Lady Orrey to Arthur Capel, Earl of Essex, 1674. Stowe MS 207, fols. 297– 98, 318– 19, letters from Lady Orrery to Arthur Capel, Earl of Essex, 1675. Chatsworth House, Derbyshire Cork MSS, boxes 21, 30, 31, and 33, “Boyle Family Letters.” Cork MSS, Misc. Box 1, Lord Burlington, diaries, 3 vols. Cork MSS, Misc. Box 5, Elizabeth (Clifford), Lady Burlington, journals, 1650s– 1688. Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library, Yale University Lady Ranelagh to Earl of Clarendon, uncataloged letter. Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington, DC “Attendants to the Funeral of Catherine Boyle, Countess of Cork [manuscript],” ca. 1630, formerly Add. MS 820. Folger MS V.b. 301, “Cookbook of Grace Blome,” 1697. Library of the Religious Society of Friends, London MS Box 7.1.(14– 16), Lady Ranelagh to William Penn, copy letters. National Archives (formerly Public Record Office), London E 192/14/5, Lady Ranelagh to Robert Thornhill. E 192/14/11, Lady Ranelagh to Robert Thornhill. SP 3/30, Lady Ranelagh to Daniel Finch, Earl of Nottingham. SP 29/197, Lady Ranelagh to Joseph Williamson. SP 29/230, Lady Ranelagh to Joseph Williamson. SP 29/251B, Lady Ranelagh to Joseph Williamson.

Bibliography

•

251

TS 23/1/43, fols. 62– 63, Lady Ranelagh to Elizabeth, queen of Bohemia, copy letter. National Archives of Ireland, Dublin Ormonde MS 2383 f 299 (4952), Lady Ranelagh to R. Fitzgerald, March 4, 1679. National Archives of Scotland, Edinburgh GD 45/14/237/1– 5, letters from Lady Ranelagh to the Countess of Panmure. GD 406/1/3797, Lady Ranelagh to the Duchess of Hamilton, August 6, 1690. GD 406/1/10719– 20, letters from Lady Ranelagh to the Duchess of Hamilton. National Art Library, Victoria and Albert Museum, London Forster MS 454, letter 74, 40/1, fols. 74– 75, Lady Ranelagh to Elizabeth, queen of Bohemia. National Library of Ireland, Dublin Genealogical Office MS 64-79, Funeral Entries. Lismore Castle Papers, MS 43, 114/1– 2, “Articles of Agreement Made between Richard, 1st Earl of Cork, and Sir Thomas Beaumont, 1st Viscount Beaumont of Swords.” Lismore Castle Papers, MS 43, 266/20, Lady Katherine Ranelagh to Richard Boyle, Earl of Cork, 1642. MSS 2557, 3137 Survey of Ireland by Thomas Phillips, 1685 [with plan of Athlone and prospect of Athlone Castle]. Royal Society Library, London MS/1, fols. 190– 94, Oldenburg Liber Epistolari, “Ex. Litt. M. Ra.” MS 199, fols. 120– 114v, Robert Boyle “Considerations and Doubts Touching the Vulgar Method of Physick,” fragments. RB/1/14/4, fols. 27– 42, Katherine Ranelagh, “Discourse Concerning the Plague of 1665.” RB/2/8, “Medical Commonplace Book” [used by Boyle and Lady Ranelagh]. RB/3/1/23– 24, letters from John Beale to Lady Ranelagh, September 5 and 6, 1660. RB/3/5/6– 15, letters from Lady Ranelagh to Robert Boyle and John Eliot. RB/3/6/3, [Lady Ranelagh?] to [Samuel Hartlib?], April 3, 1658. University of Sheffield Library, Hartlib Papers Archive Wellcome Library, London Western MS 1340, “Boyle Family Receipt Book.” Western MS 2367, “Recipe Book of Lady Catherine Fitzgerald.” West Sussex Record Office, Chichester Petworth House, Orrery MS 13219, letters from Lady Ranelagh to Margaret Boyle, Countess of Orrery. Primary Sources Akkerman, Nadine, ed. The Correspondence of Elizabeth Stuart, Queen of Bohemia. 2 vols. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011, 2015.

252

•

Bibliography

Allestree, Richard. The Art of Contentment by the Author of “The Whole Duty of Man,” &c. Oxford, 1675. Anon. Calendar of the Lismore Manuscripts with Index of Matters A.D. 1396– 1774. Private publication, n.d. ———. Calendar of the Manuscripts of the Marquess of Ormonde. K.P. 8 vols. London: His Majesty’s Stationary Office, 1895– 1920. ———. Madam, Although My Former Freedom. London, 1645. Ballard, George. Memoirs of Several Ladies of Great Britain. Oxford: W. Jackson, 1752. Barbour, Reid, and David Norbrook, eds. The Works of Lucy Hutchinson, Vol. 1: The Translation of “Lucretius”. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012. Barlow, Thomas. The Genuine Remains of that Learned Prelate Dr. Thomas Barlow. London: Dunton, 1693. Birch, Thomas, ed. A Collection of the State Papers of John Thurloe, Esq. 7 vols. London, 1752. ———. History of the Royal Society of London. 4 vols. London: A. Millar, 1756– 57. ———, ed. The Works of the Honourable Robert Boyle. 5 vols. London: A. Millar, 1744. Boate, Gerard. Naturall History of Ireland. London, 1652. Boyle, Robert. Medicinal Experiments or a Collection of Choice Remedies for the Most Part Simple and Easily Prepared. 3 vols. London, 1692– 94. ———. Occasional Reflections upon Several Subjects. London: W. Wilson, 1665. ———. Of the Reconcileableness of Specifick Medicines to the Corpuscular Philosophy. London: Sam. Smith, 1685. Braddick, M. J., and M. Greengrass, eds. “The Letters of Sir Cheney Culpeper (1641– 1657).” In Seventeenth-Century Political and Financial Papers, Camden Miscellany XXXIII, 5th ser., vol. 7 (London: Royal Historical Society, 1996), 105– 402. Burnet, Gilbert. A Sermon Preached at the Funeral of the Honorable Robert Boyle. London: Ric. Chiswell and John Taylor, 1692. Cavendish, Margaret. Observations upon Experimental Philosophy. London: A. Maxwell, 1666. ———. The Philosophical and Physical Opinions. London: J. Martin and J. Allestrye, 1655. Chambers, Douglas D. C., and David Galbraith, eds. The Letterbooks of John Evelyn. 2 vols. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2014. Cockayne, G. E. The Complete Peerage. 13 vols. London: St. Catherine Press, 1910– 40. Cody, Lisa Forman, ed. Writings on Medicine. The Early Modern Englishwoman, ser. 2, vol. 4. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2002. Comenius, John Amos. The School of Infancy: An Essay on the Education of Youth, during Their First Six Years, to Which Is Prefixed a Sketch of the Life of the Author. London: W. Mallalieu, 1858. Croker, T. Crofton, ed. Autobiography of Lady Warwick. London: Percy Society, 1848.

Bibliography

•

253

Crossley, James, ed. The Diary and Correspondence of Dr. John Worthington. 3 vols. Manchester: Chetham Society, 1847– 86. De Beer, E. S., ed. The Correspondence of John Locke. 8 vols. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1976– 89. ———, ed. The Diary of John Evelyn. 6 vols. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1955; repr. 2000. Evelyn, John. Elysium Britannicum, or The Royal Gardens. Edited by John E. Ingram. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001. Glisson, Francis. De rachitide: Sive, morbo puerili. 2nd ed. London, 1660. Gould, George, ed. Documents Relating to the Settlement of the Church of England by the Act of Uniformity of 1662. London: Kent, 1862. Greengrass, Mark, Michael Leslie, and Michael Hannon. “The Hartlib Papers.” University of Sheffield. https://www.dhi.ac.uk /hartlib/. Grosart, Alexander Balloch, ed. The Lismore Papers of Sir Richard Boyle, First and “Great Earl of Cork.” 2 ser., 10 vols. London: Chiswick Press, 1886– 88. Hall, A. Rupert, and Marie Boas Hall, eds. The Correspondence of Henry Oldenburg. 13 vols. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1965– 88. Hartlib, Samuel. The Reformed Virginian Silk-Worm. London, 1655. Harwood, John T., ed. The Early Essays and Ethics of Robert Boyle. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1991. Hunter, Lynette, ed. The Letters of Dorothy Moore, 1612– 64: The Friendships, Marriage, and Intellectual Life of a Seventeenth-Century Woman. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2004. Hunter, Michael. The Boyle Papers: Understanding the Manuscripts of Robert Boyle. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2007. ———. Letters and Papers of Robert Boyle: A Guide to the Manuscripts and Microfilm. Bethesda, MD: University Publications of America, 1992. ———, ed. The Workdiaries of Robert Boyle. Center for Lives and Letters. http:// www.livesandletters.ac.uk /wd/. Hunter, Michael, Antonio Clericuzio, and Lawrence M. Principe, eds. The Correspondence of Robert Boyle. 6 vols. London: Pickering & Chatto, 2001. Hunter, Michael, and Edward B. Davis, eds. The Works of Robert Boyle. 14 vols. London: Pickering & Chatto, 1999– 2000. Hutchinson, Lucy. Order and Disorder. Edited by David Norbrook. Oxford: Blackwell, 2001. Jessey, Henry. The Exceeding Riches of Grace Advanced. London, 1647. Johnstone, Grace. Leading Women of the Restoration. London: Digby, 1891. Lenox-Conyngham, Melosina, ed. Diaries of Ireland: An Anthology, 1590– 1987. Dublin: Lilliput Press, 1998. Lodge, John. The Peerage of Ireland. Rev. by Mervyn Archdall. 7 vols. Dublin: James Moore, 1789. MacLysaght, Edward, ed. Calendar of the Orrery Papers. Dublin: Stationery Office, 1941.

254

•

Bibliography

Mahaffy, Robert Pentland, ed. Calendar of State Papers, Ireland, 1647– 60. London: Mackie, 1903. Markham, Gervase. The English Housewife. London, 1615. Milton, John. Epistolarum Familiarium Liber Unus. London, 1674. Moody, Joanna, ed. The Private Life of an Elizabethan Lady: The Diary of Lady Margaret Hoby, 1599– 1605. Stroud, UK: Sutton, 1998. Munk, William. Munk’s Roll. Accessed April 1, 2014, via “Lives of Fellows,” Royal College of Physicians, http://munksroll.rcplondon.ac.uk /Biography/Details /3671. Nicolson, Marjorie Hope. The Conway Letters. Revised by Sarah Hutton. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992. Palgrave, Mary E. Mary Rich, Countess of Warwick (1625– 1678). London: Dent, 1901. Pepys, Samuel. The Diary of Samuel Pepys. https://www.pepysdiary.com. Accessed April 14, 2014. Piers, Sir Henry. A Chorographical Description of the County of Westmeath. Dublin: Thomas Ewing, 1682. Robertson, William. The First Gate, or The Outward Door to the Holy Tongue Opened in English. London, 1654. ———. A Gate or Door to the Holy Tongue, Opened in English. London, 1653. ———. The Second Gate, or The Inner Door to the Holy Tongue. London, 1655. Robinson, H. W., and W. Adams, eds. The Diary of Robert Hooke 1672– 1680. London: Wykeham, 1968. First published 1935. Russell, Rachel. The Letters of Lady Rachel Russell: From the Manuscript in the Library at Wooburn [sic] Abbey. London: Dilly, 1792. Sheppard, F. H. W., ed. Survey of London. Vols. 29– 30. London: English Heritage, 1960. Singer, Samuel Weller, ed. The Correspondence of Henry Hyde, Earl of Clarendon, and of his Brother, Laurence Hyde, Earl of Rochester; with the Diary of Lord Clarendon from 1687– 1690. 2 vols. London: Colburn, 1828. Smith, Charlotte Fell. Mary Rich, Countess of Warwick (1625– 1678): Her Family and Friends. London: Longmans, Green, 1901. Smith, Nigel, ed. The Poems of Andrew Marvell. London: Pearson Longman, 2003. Spalding, Ruth, ed. The Diary of Bulstrode Whitelocke, 1605– 1675. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990. Spiller, Elizabeth, ed. Seventeenth-Century English Recipe Books: Cooking, Physic, and Chirurgery in the Works of Elizabeth Talbot Grey and Aletheia Talbot Howard. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2008. Sprat, Thomas. History of the Royal Society. London, 1667. Thompson, Edward Maunde, ed. Correspondence of the Family of Hatton. 2 vols. Westminster: Camden Society, 1878. Trye, Mary. Medicatrix, Or The Woman-Physician. London, 1675.

Bibliography

•

255

Van Helmont, Jan Baptist. Oriatrike, Or Physick Refined. London, 1662. Verney, Frances Parthenope, ed. Memoirs of the Verney Family. 4 vols. London: Longmans, 1892. Walker, Anthony. The Virtuous Woman Found. London, 1678. Secondary Sources Åkerman, Susanna. “Queen Christina’s Metamorphosis— Her Alchemical World Soul and Fictional Gender Transformation.” In Zinsser, Men, Women, and the Birthing of Modern Science, 13– 33. Archer, Jayne E. E. “Women and Alchemy in Early Modern England.” PhD diss., Cambridge University, 2000. ———. “Women and Chymistry in Early Modern England: The Manuscript Receipt Book (c. 1616) of Sarah Wigges.” In Gender and Scientific Discourse in Early Modern Culture, edited by Kathleen P. Long, 191– 216. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2010. Asch, Robert G. “Elizabeth, Princess [Elizabeth Stuart] (1596– 1662).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., May 2016. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/8638. Ash, Eric H. The Draining of the Fens: Projectors, Popular Politics, and State Building in Early Modern England. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2017. Avramov, Iordan. “An Apprenticeship in Scientific Communication: The Early Correspondence of Henry Oldenburg (1656– 63).” Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London 53 (1999): 187– 201. Barnard, T. C. “Boyle, Richard, First Earl of Cork (1566– 1643).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., May 2008. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/3133. ———. “Boyle, Roger, First Earl of Orrery (1621– 1679).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., May 2012. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/3138. ———. Cromwellian Ireland: English Government and Reform in Ireland 1649– 1660. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1975. ———. “The Hartlib Circle and the Cult and Culture of Improvement in Ireland.” In Greengrass, Leslie, and Raylor, Samuel Hartlib and Universal Reformation, 281– 97. ———. “Miles Symner and the New Learning in Seventeenth-Century Ireland.” Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 102 (1972): 129– 42. ———. “Petty, Sir William (1623– 1687).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., October 2013. https://doi.org/10 .1093/ref:odnb/22069. ———. “Protestants and the Irish Language, c. 1675– 1725.” Journal of Ecclesiastical History 44 (1993): 243– 72.

256

•

Bibliography

Batten, J. Minton. John Dury: Advocate of Christian Reunion. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1944. Beauclerk, Charles. Nell Gywn: A Biography. London: Macmillan, 2005. Bertucci, Paola. “The In/visible Woman: Mariangela Ardinghelli and the Circulation of Knowledge between Paris and Naples in the Eighteenth Century.” Isis 104, no. 2 (2013): 226– 49. Blair, Ann M. Too Much to Know: Managing Scholarly Information before the Modern Age. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2010. Bourke, Evan. “Female Involvement, Membership, and Centrality: A Social Network Analysis of the Hartlib Circle.” Literature Compass 14, no. 4 (2017): https:// doi.org/10.1111/lic3.123888. ———. “Katherine Jones’s Reputation within Hartlib’s Correspondence Network.” History Hub, 2016. https://soundcloud.com/history-hub/evan-bourke-lady -ranelagh-katherine-jones-samuel-hartlibs-correspondence-network. Braddick, Michael J. State Formation in Early Modern England, c. 1550– 1700. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. Brogan, Hugh. “Marvell’s Epitaph on ———.” Renaissance Quarterly 32 (1979): 197– 99. Burton, Antoinette, ed. Archive Stories: Facts, Fictions and the Writing of History. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2005. Bushnell, Rebecca. Green Desire: Imagining Early Modern English Gardens. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2003. Canny, Nicholas. Making Ireland British, 1580– 1650. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001. ———. The Upstart Earl: A Study of the Social and Mental World of Richard Boyle, First Earl of Cork, 1566– 1643. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982. Capp, B. S. The Fifth Monarchy Men: A Study in Seventeenth-Century English Millenarianism. London: Faber and Faber, 1972. Carlyle, E. I. “Wood, Robert (1621/2– 1685).” Revised by Michael Bevan. In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., May 2006. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/29890. Carpenter, Andrew. Verse in English from Tudor and Stuart Ireland. Cork: Cork University Press, 2003. Cavallo, Sandra, and Tessa Storey. Healthy Living in Late Renaissance Italy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. Chamberlayne, Betty. “Maisemore Court and the Families Who Lived There, Part I.” Gloucestershire History 12 (1998): 7– 12. Chapman, Allan. “From Alchemy to Airpumps: The Foundations of Oxford Chemistry to 1700.” In Chemistry at Oxford: A History from 1600 to 2005, edited by Robert J. P. Williams, Allan Chapman, and John S. Rowlinson, 17– 51. Cambridge: Royal Society of Chemistry Publishing, 2009.

Bibliography

•

257

Christianson, David. Timepieces: Masterpieces of Chronometry. Newton Abbot, UK: David & Charles, 2002. Clarke, Elizabeth. “‘A heart terrifying Sorrow’: The Deaths of Children in Seventeenth-Century Women’s Manuscript Journals.” In Representations of Childhood Death, edited by Gillian Avery and Kimberley Reynolds, 65– 86. Basingstoke: Macmillan, 2000. Clucas, Stephen. “The Correspondence of a Seventeenth-Century ‘Chymicall Gentleman’: Sir Cheney Culpeper and the Chemical Interests of the Hartlib Circle.” Ambix 40 (1993): 147– 70. Collingham, Lizzie. The Taste of Empire: How Britain’s Quest for Food Shaped the Modern World. New York: Basic Books, 2017. Connolly, Ruth. “A Manuscript Treatise by Viscountess Ranelagh (1614– 1691).” Notes and Queries, 53 (2006): 170– 72. ———. “The Politics of Honor in Lady Ranelagh’s Ireland.” In Eckerle and McAreavey, Women’s Life Writing and Early Modern Ireland, 137– 58. ———. “A Proselytising Protestant Commonwealth: The Religious and Political Ideas of Katherine Jones, Viscountess Ranelagh (1614– 1691).” Seventeenth Century 23 (2008): 244– 64. ———. “Viscountess Ranelagh and the Authorisation of Women’s Knowledge in the Hartlib Circle.” In Harris and Scott-Baumann, Intellectual Culture of Puritan Women, 150– 61. ———. “‘A Wise and Godly Sybilla’: Viscountess Ranelagh and the Politics of International Protestantism.” In Women, Gender and Radical Religion in Early Modern Europe, edited by Sylvia Brown, 285– 306. Leiden: Brill, 2007. Connolly, S. J. Contested Island: Ireland 1460– 1630. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007. Considine, John. “Grey, Elizabeth, Countess of Kent (1582– 1651).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., September 2006. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/11530. Cook, Alan. “Ladies in the Scientific Revolution.” Notes and Records of the Royal Society 51, no. 1 (1997): 1– 12. Cook, Harold J. The Decline of the Old Medical Regime in Stuart London. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1986. ———. “Markets and Cultures: Medical Specifics and the Reconfiguration of the Body in Early Modern Europe.” Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 21 (2011): 123– 45. ———. “The Society of Chemical Physicians, the New Philosophy, and the Restoration Court.” Bulletin of the History of Medicine 61, no. 1 (1987): 61– 77. Coolahan, Marie-Louise. “Irish Women’s Letters, 1641– 1653.” In Daybell and Gordon, Women and Epistolary Agency, 167– 81.

258

•

Bibliography

———. Women, Writing, and Language in Early Modern Ireland. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010. Cooper, Alix. “Homes and Households.” In Park and Daston, Cambridge History of Science, 3:224– 37. Coughlan, Patricia. “Natural History and Historical Nature: The Project for a Natural History of Ireland.” In Greengrass, Leslie, and Raylor, Samuel Hartlib and Universal Reformation, 298– 317. Cressy, David. Saltpeter: The Mother of Gunpowder. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. Cunningham, Andrew. “The Culture of Gardens.” In Cultures of Natural History, edited by N. Jardine, J. A. Secord, and E. C. Spary, 38– 56. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. Dailey, Barbara Ritter. “The Visitation of Sarah Wight: Holy Carnival and the Revolution of the Saints in Civil War London.” Church History 55, no. 4 (1986): 438– 55. Daybell, James, ed. Women and Politics in Early Modern England, 1450– 1700. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2004. Daybell, James, and Andrew Gordon. “Living Letters: Re-reading Correspondence and Women’s Letters.” In Daybell and Gordon, Women and Epistolary Agency, 1– 19. ———, eds. Women and Epistolary Agency in Early Modern Culture, 1450– 1690. New York: Routledge, 2016. Dear, Peter. “A Philosophical Duchess: Understanding Margaret Cavendish and the Royal Society.” In Science, Literature and Rhetoric in Early Modern England, edited by Juliet Cummins and David Burchell, 125– 43. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2007. Debus, A. G. The English Paracelsians. London: Oldbourne, 1965. Des Jardins, Julie. The Marie Curie Complex: The Hidden History of Women in Science. New York: Feminist Press, 2010. Dewhurst, Kenneth. Dr. Thomas Sydenham (1624– 1689): His Life and Original Writings. London: Wellcome Historical Medical Library, 1966. DiMeo, Michelle. “Authorship and Medical Networks: Reading Attributions in Early Modern Manuscript Recipe Books.” In Reading and Writing Recipe Books 1550– 1800, edited by Michelle DiMeo and Sara Pennell, 25– 46. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2013. ———. “Communicating Medical Recipes: Robert Boyle’s Genre and Rhetorical Strategies for Print.” The Palgrave Handbook of Early Modern Literature and Science, edited by Howard Marchitello and Evelyn Tribble, 209– 28. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017. ———. “Lady Ranelagh’s Book of Kitchen-Physick? Reattributing Authorship for Wellcome Library MS 1340.” Huntington Library Quarterly 77, no. 3 (2014): 331– 46.

Bibliography

•

259

———. “Openness vs. Secrecy in the Hartlib Circle: Revisiting ‘Democratic Baconianism’ in Interregnum England.” In Leong and Rankin, Secrets and Knowledge in Medicine and Science, 105– 21. ———. “The Rhetoric of Medical Authority in Lady Katherine Ranelagh’s Letters.” In Daybell and Gordon, Women and Epistolary Agency, 96– 109. ———. “‘Such a sister became such a brother’: Lady Ranelagh’s Influence on Robert Boyle.” Intellectual History Review 21, no. 1 (2015): 21– 36. Dobbs, Betty Jo Teeter. The Foundations of Newton’s Alchemy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975. Doherty, Richard. The Williamite War in Ireland 1688– 1691. Dublin: Four Courts Press, 1998. Drayton, Richard. Nature’s Government: Science, Imperial Britain, and the ‘Improvement’ of the World. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2000. Eamon, William. Science and the Secrets of Nature: Books of Secrets in Medieval and Early Modern Culture. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994. Eckerle, Julie A., and Naomi McAreavey, eds. Women’s Life Writing and Early Modern Ireland. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2019. Edwards, David, and Colin Rynne, eds. The Colonial World of Richard Boyle, First Earl of Cork. Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2017. Elmer, Peter. The Miraculous Conformist: Valentine Greatrakes, the Body Politic, and the Politics of Healing in Restoration Britain. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. Engineer, Amanda. “The 17th-Century ‘Lady Doctor.’ ” Friends of the Wellcome Library and Centre Newsletter 31 (2003): 2– 5. Ezell, Margaret J. M. “Domestic Papers: Manuscript Culture and Early Modern Women’s Life Writing.” In Genre and Women’s Life Writing in Early Modern England, edited by Michelle M. Dowd and Julie A. Eckerle, 33– 48. Burlington, VT: Routledge, 2007. ———. The Patriarch’s Wife: Literary Evidence and the History of the Family. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1987. ———. Writing Women’s Literary History. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996. Fara, Patricia. Pandora’s Breeches: Women, Science, and Power in the Enlightenment. London: Pimlico, 2004. Fausz, J. Frederick. “Eliot, John (1604– 1690).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., January 2011. https://doi .org/10.1093/ref:odnb/8631. Fenlon, Jane. “‘Acquiring Magnificence’: Luxury Goods in the Material Word of Richard Boyle, First Earl of Cork.” In Edwards and Rynne, Colonial World of Richard Boyle, 149– 65. Findlen, Paula. “The Scientist’s Body: The Nature of a Woman Philosopher in Enlightenment Italy.” In The Faces of Nature in Enlightenment Europe,

260

•

Bibliography

edited by Lorraine Daston and Gianna Pomata, 211– 36. Berlin: BWVBerliner Wissenschafts-Verlag, 2003. Fissell, Mary. “Introduction: Women, Health and Healing in Early Modern Europe.” Bulletin of the History of Medicine 82, no. 1 (2008): 1– 17. ———. Vernacular Bodies: The Politics of Reproduction in Early Modern England. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004. Fitzmaurice, James. “Cavendish, Margaret, Duchess of Newcastle upon Tyne (1623?– 1673).” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/4940. Fitzsimon, Betsey Taylor. “Conversion, the Bible and the Irish Language: The Correspondence of Lady Ranelagh and Bishop Dopping.” In Converts and Conversion in Ireland, 1650– 1850, edited by M. Brown, C. I. McGrath, and T. P. Power, 157– 82. Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2005. Fraser, Antonia. The Weaker Vessel. New York: Knopf, 1984. Fyfe, Aileen, and Noah Moxham. “Making Public Ahead of Print: Meetings and Publications at the Royal Society, 1752– 1892.” Notes and Records 70 (2016): 361– 79. Gaukroger, Stephen. The Emergence of Scientific Culture: Science and the Shaping of Modernity, 1210– 1685. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006. Gaunt, Peter. The British Wars, 1637– 1651. London: Routledge, 1997. Gibson, Jonathan. “Significant Space in Manuscript Letters.” Seventeenth Century 12 (1997): 1– 9. Gowing, Laura. Common Bodies: Women, Touch and Power in Seventeenth-Century England. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2003. ———. Domestic Dangers: Women, Words and Sex in Early Modern London. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996. Greengrass, Mark. “Archive Refractions: Hartlib’s Papers and the Workings of an Intelligencer.” In M. Hunter, Archives of the Scientific Revolution, 35– 47. ———. “Culpeper, Sir Cheney (bap. 1601, d. 1663).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., January 2008. https:// doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/50336. ———. “Hartlib, Samuel (c.1600– 1662).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., October 2007. https://doi.org/10 .1093/ref:odnb/12500. Greengrass, Mark, Michael Leslie, and Timothy Raylor, eds. Samuel Hartlib and Universal Reformation: Studies in Intellectual Communication. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Greer, Germaine, Jeslyn Medoff, Melinda Sansone, and Susan Hastings, eds. Kissing the Rod: An Anthology of Seventeenth-Century Women’s Verse. London: Virago Press, 1988. Haigh, Christopher. “The Troubles of Thomas Pestell: Parish Squabbles and Ecclesiastical Politics in Caroline England.” Journal of British Studies, 41 (2002): 403– 28.

Bibliography

•

261

Hall, Maria Boas. Henry Oldenburg: Shaping the Royal Society. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002. Handley, Stuart. “Maule, James, Fourth Earl of Panmure (1658/9– 1723).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., September 2006. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/18367. Hannan, Leonie. Women of Letters: Gender, Writing and the Life of the Mind in Early Modern England. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2016. Harkness, Deborah E. “Managing an Experimental Household: The Dees of Mortlake and the Practice of Natural Philosophy.” Isis 88 (1997): 247– 62. Harris, Frances. “Living in the Neighbourhood of Science: Mary Evelyn, Margaret Cavendish and the Greshamites.” In L. Hunter and Hutton, Women, Science and Medicine, 198– 217. Harris, Johanna, and Elizabeth Scott-Baumann, eds. The Intellectual Culture of Puritan Women, 1558– 1680. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011. Hayden, Judy, ed. The New Science and Women’s Literary Discourse: Prefiguring Frankenstein. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011. Haykin, Michael A. G. “Kiffin, William (1616– 1701).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., May 2008. https://doi .org/10.1093/ref:odnb/15521. Hayton, D. W. “Cutler, Sir John (1607/8– 1693).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., January 2008. https:// doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/6980. Heffernan, David. “Theory and Practice in the Munster Plantation: The Estates of Richard Boyle, First Earl of Cork, 1602– 43.” In Edwards and Rynne, Colonial World of Richard Boyle, 43– 63. Herbert, Amanda E. Female Alliances: Gender, Identity, and Friendship in Early Modern Britain. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2014. Hobby, Elaine. Virtue of Necessity: English Women’s Writing, 1649– 88. London: Virago Press, 1988. Hodgson-Wright, Stephanie. “Cary [née Tanfield], Elizabeth, Viscountess Falkland (1585– 1639).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., May 2014. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/4835. Hosford, David. “Cavendish, William, first Duke of Devonshire.” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., September 2004. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/4948. Hunt, John Dixon. “Hortulan Affairs.” In Greengrass, Leslie, and Raylor, Samuel Hartlib and Universal Reformation, 321– 42. Hunter, Lynette. “Sisters of the Royal Society: The Circle of Katherine Jones, Lady Ranelagh.” In L. Hunter and Hutton, Women, Science and Medicine, 178– 97. Hunter, Lynette, and Sarah Hutton, eds. Women, Science and Medicine, 1500– 1700. Stroud: Sutton, 1997.

262

•

Bibliography

Hunter, Michael, ed. Archives of the Scientific Revolution: The Formation and Exchange of Ideas in Seventeenth-Century Europe. Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 1998. ———. Boyle: Between God and Science. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2009. ———. Boyle Studies: Aspects of the Life and Thought of Robert Boyle (1627– 91). New York: Ashgate, 2015. ———. “Boyle versus the Galenists: A Suppressed Critique of Seventeenth-Century Medical Practice and Its Significance,” Medical History 41, no. 3 (1997): 322– 61. ———. “Coxe, Daniel (1640– 1730).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., September 2004. https://doi.org /10.1093/ref:odnb/37319. ———. “Founder Members of the Royal Society (act. 1660– 1663).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., May 2006. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/59221. ———. “How Boyle Became a Scientist.” In Robert Boyle: Scrupulosity and Science, 15– 57. ———. “Magic, Science and Reputation: Robert Boyle, the Royal Society and the Occult in the Late Seventeenth Century.” In Robert Boyle: Scrupulosity and Science, by Michael Hunter, 223– 50. ———. “Mapping the Mind of Robert Boyle: The Evidence of the Boyle Papers.” In M. Hunter, Archives of the Scientific Revolution, 121– 36. ———. “The Reluctant Philanthropist: Robert Boyle and the ‘Communication of Secrets and Receits in Physick.’ ” In Robert Boyle: Scrupulosity and Science, by Michael Hunter, 202– 22. ———. “Robert Boyle and the Dilemma of Biography in the Age of the Scientific Revolution.” In Shortland and Yeo, Telling Lives in Science: Essays on Scientific Biography, 115– 37. ———. Robert Boyle by Himself and His Friends. London: Pickering & Chatto, 1994. ———. “Robert Boyle, Narcissus Marsh and the Anglo-Irish Intellectual Scene in the Late-Seventeenth Century.” In The Making of Marsh’s Library: Learning, Politics and Religion in Ireland, 1650– 1750, edited by Muriel McCarthy and Ann Simmons, 51– 75. Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2004. ———. The Robert Boyle Project. Birkbeck, University of London, http://www.bbk .ac.uk /boyle. ———, ed. Robert Boyle Reconsidered. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994. ———. “Robert Boyle’s Early Intellectual Evolution.” Intellectual History Review 25, no. 1 (2015): 5– 19. ———. Robert Boyle (1627– 91): Scrupulosity and Science. Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2000.

Bibliography

•

263

———. The Royal Society and Its Fellows, 1660– 1700: The Morphology of an Early Scientific Institution. 2nd ed. Oxford: British Society for the History of Science, 1994. ———. Science and Society in Restoration England. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981. Hutton, Ronald. “Digby, George, Second Earl of Bristol (1612– 1677).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., May 2009. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/7627. Hutton, Sarah. Anne Conway: A Woman Philosopher. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004. ———. “Before Frankenstein.” In Hayden, The New Science and Women’s Literary Discourse, 17– 28. ———. “Jones, Katherine, Viscountess Ranelagh (1615– 1691).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., January 2008. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/66365. Jacob, James. “Boyle’s Circle in the Protectorate: Revelation, Politics and the Millennium.” Journal of the History of Ideas 38 (1977): 118– 32. Jardine, Lisa. The Curious Life of Robert Hooke: The Man Who Measured London. London: Harper Perennial, 2003. Jimerson, Randall C. Archives Power: Memory, Accountability and Social Justice. Chicago: Society of American Archivists, 2009. Johns, Adrian. The Nature of the Book: Print and Knowledge in the Making. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998. Jordanova, Ludamilla. “Gender and the Historiography of Science.” British Journal for the History of Science 26 (1993): 469– 83. Justice, George L., and Nathan Tinker, eds. Women’s Writing and the Circulation of Ideas: Manuscript Publication in England, 1550– 1800. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Kaplan, Barbara. “Divulging of Useful Truths in Physick”: The Medical Agenda of Robert Boyle. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993. Katz, David. “Menasseh ben Israel’s Mission to Queen Christina of Sweden, 1651– 1655.” Jewish Social Studies 45 (1983): 57– 72. ———. Philo-semitism and the Readmission of the Jews to England, 1603– 1655. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1982. Keeble, N. H. “Baxter, Richard (1615– 1691).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., October 2009. https://doi .org/10.1093/ref:odnb/1734. ———. The Restoration: England in the 1660s. Oxford: Blackwell, 2002. Keller, Evelyn Fox. Reflections on Gender and Science. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1985. Keller, Vera, Anna Marie Roos, and Elizabeth Yale. Archival Afterlives: Life, Death, and

264

•

Bibliography

Knowledge-Making in Early Modern British Scientific and Medical Archives. Leiden: Brill, 2018. Kelsey, Sean. “Clotworthy, John, First Viscount Massereene (d. 1665).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., September 2014. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/5709. Kishlansky, Mark A. A Monarchy Transformed: Britain, 1603– 1714. London: Penguin, 1996. ———. The Rise of the New Model Army. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979. Knoppers, Laura Lunger. Politicizing Domesticity from Henrietta Maria to Milton’s Eve. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Lamb, Mary Ellen. “Wroth, Lady Mary (1587?– 1651/1653).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., January 2008. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/30082. Leng, Thomas. Benjamin Worsley (1618– 1677): Trade, Interest and the Spirit in Revolutionary England. Woodbridge, UK: Boydell Press, 2008. Leong, Elaine. “Making Medicines in the Early Modern Household.” Bulletin of the History of Medicine 81, no. 1 (2008): 145– 68. ———. Recipes and Everyday Knowledge: Medicine, Science, and the Household in Early Modern England. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2018. Leong, Elaine, and Sara Pennell. “Recipe Collections and the Currency of Medical Knowledge in the Early Modern ‘Medical Marketplace.’ ” In Medicine and the Marketplace in England and Its Colonies c. 1450– c. 1850, edited by Mark S. Jenner and Patrick Wallis, 133– 52. New York: Palgrave Macmillian, 2007. Leong, Elaine, and Alisha Rankin, eds. Secrets and Knowledge in Medicine and Science, 1500– 1800. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2011. Lepore, Jill. The Name of War: King Philip’s War and the Origins of American Identity. New York: Knopf, 1998. Leslie, Michael. “The Spiritual Husbandry of John Beale.” In Culture and Cultivation in Early Modern England: Writing and the Land, edited by Michael Leslie and Timothy Raylor, 151– 72. Leicester: Leicester University Press, 1992. Life, Page. “Robertson, William ( fl. 1651– 1685).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., September 2004. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/23815. Lindemann, Mary. Medicine and Society in Early Modern Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010. Little, Patrick. “The Earl of Cork and the Fall of Strafford, 1638– 41.” Historical Journal 39 (1996): 619– 35. ———. Lord Broghill and the Cromwellian Union with Ireland and Scotland. Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2004. ———. “The New English in Europe, 1625– 60.” In Community in Early Modern

Bibliography

•

265

Ireland, edited by Robert Armstrong and Tadhg Ó hAnnracháin, 154– 66. Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2006. Love, Harold. Scribal Publication in Seventeenth-Century England. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998. Lynch, Kathleen M. “The Incomparable Lady Ranelagh.” In Of Books and Humankind: Essays and Poems Presented to Bonamy Dobrée, edited by John Butt, 25– 33. London: Routledge, 1964. ———. Roger Boyle: First Earl of Orrery. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1965. Lynch, William T. “A Society of Baconians? The Collective Development of Bacon’s Method in the Royal Society of London.” In Francis Bacon and the Refiguring of Early Modern Thought: Essays to Commemorate “The Advancement of Learning” (1605– 2005), edited by Julie Robin Solomon and Catherine Gimelli Martin, 173– 202. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2005. Lyttleton, James. “‘A godly resolucon to rebwilde’: Richard Boyle’s Patronage of Elite Architecture.” In Edwards and Rynne, Colonial World of Richard Boyle, 121– 48. MacCurtain, Margaret. “Women, Education and Learning in Early Modern Ireland.” In MacCurtain and O’Dowd, Women in Early Modern Ireland, 160– 87. MacCurtain, Margaret, and Mary O’Dowd, eds. Women in Early Modern Ireland. Dublin: Wolfhound Press, 1991. Mack, Phyllis. Visionary Women: Ecstatic Prophecy in Seventeenth-Century England. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992. Maddison, R. E. W. The Life of the Honourable Robert Boyle FRS. London: Taylor & Francis, 1969. Malay, Jessica L. The Case of Mistress Mary Hampson: Her Story of Marital Abuse and Defiance in Seventeenth-Century England. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2014. Malcolm, Noel. “Moses Wall: Millenarian, Tolerationist and Friend of Milton.” Seventeenth Century 27, no. 1 (Spring 2012): 25– 53. Mathews, Thomas. An Account of the O’Dempseys, Chiefs of Clan Maliere. Dublin: Hodges, Figgis, 1903. Maxwell, Felicity. “Calling for Collaboration: Women and Public Service in Dorothy Moore’s Transnational Protestant Correspondence.” Literature Compass 14, no. 4 (April 2017). https://doi.org/10.1111/lic3.12386. Maxwell-Stuart, P. G. The Occult in Early Modern Europe: A Documentary History. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999. McCormick, Ted. William Petty and the Ambitions of Political Arithmetic. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009. McGrath, C. I. “Jones, Richard, Earl of Ranelagh (1641– 1712).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., January 2008. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/15072.

266

•

Bibliography

Meli, Domenico Bertoloni. Mechanism, Experiment, Disease: Marcello Malpighi and Seventeenth-Century Anatomy. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2011. Memegalos, Florence S. George Goring (1608– 1657): Caroline Courtier and Royalist General. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2007. Mendelson, Sara Heller. The Mental World of Stuart Women: Three Studies. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1987. Mendyk, S. “Gerard Boate and Irelands Naturall History.” Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 115 (1985): 5– 12. Merchant, Carolyn. The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology, and the Scientific Revolution. New York: Harper and Row, 1983. Meynell, G. C. Materials for a Biography of Dr. Thomas Sydenham (1624– 1689). Folkstone, UK: Winterdown Books, 1988. Miller, Jane A. “Women in Chemistry.” In Women of Science: Righting the Record, edited by G. Kass-Simon and Patricia Farnes, 300– 334. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1990. Mommertz, Monika. “The Invisible Economy of Science— a New Approach to the History of Gender and Astronomy at the Eighteenth-Century Berlin Academy of Sciences.” In Zinsser, Men, Women, and the Birthing of Modern Science, 159– 78. Moran, Bruce T. The Alchemical World of the German Court: Occult Philosophy and Chemical Medicine in the Circle of Moritz of Hessen (1572– 1632). Stuttgart: Steiner, 1991. Morrill, John, ed. The Impact of the English Civil War. London: Collins & Brown, 1991. Moxham, Noah. “Fit for Print: Developing an Institutional Model of Scientific Periodical Publishing in England, 1665– c. 1714.” Notes and Records 69 (2015): 241– 60. Muldrew, Craig. The Economy of Obligation: The Culture of Credit and Social Relations in Early Modern England. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 1998. Murphy, Andrew R. William Penn: A Life. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019. Murtagh, Harman. Athlone History and Settlement to 1800. Athlone: Old Athlone Society, 2000. Nagy, Doreen E. Popular Medicine in Seventeenth-Century England. Bowling Green, OH: Bowling Green State University Popular Press, 1988. Nasifoglu, Yelda. “Robert Hooke’s Praxes: Reading, Drawing, Building.” 3 vols. PhD diss., McGill University, 2018. Nevitt, Marcus. Women and Pamphlet Culture of Revolutionary England, 1640– 1660. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2006. Newman, William R. Gehennical Fire: The Lives of George Starkey. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1994. ———. “George Starkey and the Selling of Secrets.” In Greengrass, Leslie, and Raylor, Samuel Hartlib and Universal Reformation, 193– 210.

Bibliography

•

267

Newman, William R., and Anthony Grafton, eds. Secrets of Nature: Astrology and Alchemy in Early Modern Europe. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2001. Newman, William R., and Lawrence M. Principe. Alchemy Tried in the Fire: Starkey, Boyle and the Fate of Helmontian Chymistry. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002. ———. “Alchemy vs. Chemistry: The Etymological Origins of a Historiographic Mistake.” Early Science and Medicine 3, no. 1 (1998): 32– 65. Nummendal, Tara. “Alchemical Reproduction and the Career of Anna Maria Zieglerin.” Ambix 48 (2001): 56– 68. ———. Anna Zieglerin and the Lion’s Blood: Alchemy and End Times in Reformation Germany. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2019. O’Dowd, Mary. “Women and War in Ireland in the 1640s.” In MacCurtain and O’Dowd, Women in Early Modern Ireland, 91– 111. Osler, Margaret J. “The Gender of Nature and the Nature of Gender in Early Modern Natural Philosophy.” In Zinsser, Men, Women, and the Birthing of Modern Science, 71– 85. Oster, Malcolm. “Millenarianism and the New Science: The Case of Robert Boyle.” In Greengrass, Leslie, and Raylor, Samuel Hartlib and Universal Reformation, 137– 48. ———. “Virtue, Providence and Political Neutralism: Boyle and Interregnum Politics.” In M. Hunter, Robert Boyle Reconsidered, 19– 36. Pal, Carol. “Accidental Archive: Samuel Hartlib and the Afterlife of Female Scholars.” In V. Keller, Roos, and Yale, Archival Afterlives, 120– 49. ———. Republic of Women: Rethinking the Republic of Letters in the Seventeenth Century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012. Park, Katharine, and Lorraine Daston, eds. The Cambridge History of Science: Volume 3: Early Modern Science. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008. Pelling, Margaret. “Medical Practice in Early Modern England: Trade or Profession?” In The Professions in Early Modern England, edited by Wilfrid Prest, 90– 128. New York: Croom Helm, 1987. Pelling, Margaret, and Scott Mandelbrote, eds. The Practice of Reform in Health, Medicine and Science, 1500– 2000. New York: Routledge, 2005. Penman, Leigh. “Omnium Exposita Rapinae: The Afterlives of the Papers of Samuel Hartlib.” Book History 19 (2016): 1– 65. Pennell, Sara. The Birth of the English Kitchen, 1600– 1850. London: Bloomsbury, 2016. ———. “Introduction.” In Women in Medicine: Remedy Books, 1533– 1865, edited by Sara Pennell. Woodbridge, CT: Primary Source Microfilm, 2004. ———. “Perfecting Practice? Women, Manuscript Recipes, and Knowledge in Early Modern England.” In Early Modern Women’s Manuscript Writing: Selected Papers from the Trinity/Trent Colloquium, edited by Victoria E. Burke and Jonathan Gibson, 237– 58. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2004.

268

•

Bibliography

Perceval-Maxwell, Michael. The Outbreak of the Irish Rebellion of 1641. Dublin: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1994. Perry, Ruth. “Radical Doubt and the Liberation of Women.” Eighteenth-Century Studies 18 (1985): 472– 93. Pollock, Linda. With Faith and Physick: The Life of a Tudor Gentlewoman, Lady Grace Mildmay, 1552– 1620. London: Collins & Brown, 1993. Popkin, Richard H. “Hartlib, Dury and the Jews.” In Greengrass, Leslie, and Raylor, Samuel Hartlib and Universal Reformation, 118– 36. ———. “A Note on Moses Wall.” In Menasseh ben Israel, “The Hope of Israel”: The English Translation by Moses Wall, 1652, edited by Henry Méchoulan and Gérard Nahon, 165– 70. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987. Porter, Roy. “The Patient’s View: Doing Medical History from Below.” Theory and Society 14, no. 2 (1985): 175– 98. Principe, Lawrence M. Aspiring Adept: Robert Boyle and His Alchemical Quest. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1998. ———. The Scientific Revolution: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. ———. The Secrets of Alchemy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2013. ———. “Virtuous Romance and Romantic Virtuoso: The Shaping of Robert Boyle’s Literary Style.” Journal of the History of Ideas 56, no. 3 (1995): 377– 97. Rankin, Alisha. Panaceia’s Daughters: Noblewomen as Healers in Early Modern Germany. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2013. Ray, Meredith K. Daughters of Alchemy: Women and Scientific Culture in Early Modern Italy. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2015. Richards, Jennifer, and Alison Thorpe, eds. Women, Rhetoric and Politics in Early Modern England. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007. Roos, Anna Marie. Martin Lister and His Remarkable Daughters: The Art of Science in the Seventeenth Century. Oxford: Bodleian Library, University of Oxford, 2019. Rose, Hillary. “Foreword: From Household to Public Knowledge, to a New Production System of Knowledge.” In L. Hunter and Hutton, Women, Science and Medicine, xi– xx. Roth, Cecil. A Life of Menasseh ben Israel: Rabbi, Printer, and Diplomat. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of American, 1934. Russell, Conrad, ed. The Origins of the English Civil War. London: Macmillan, 1973. Sarasohn, Lisa T. The Natural Philosophy of Margaret Cavendish. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010. Schiebinger, Londa. The Mind Has No Sex? Women in the Origins of Modern Science. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989. ———. Plants and Empire: Colonial Bioprospecting in the Atlantic World. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007.

Bibliography

•

269

Schreuder, Yda. Amsterdam’s Sephardic Merchants and the Atlantic Sugar Trade in the Seventeenth Century. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan for Springer Nature Switzerland, 2019. ———. “Menasseh ben Israel’s Messianic Prophecies and Cromwell’s Western Design.” Unpublished paper. Schwoerer, Lois G. “Russell, William, Lord Russell [Called the Patriot, the Martyr] (1639– 1683).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., October 2009. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb /24344. Scott-Baumann, Elizabeth. “Lucy Hutchinson, the Bible and Order and Disorder.” In J. Harris and Scott-Baumann, Intellectual Culture of Puritan Women, 176– 89. Scott-Luckens, Carola. “Propaganda or Marks of Grace? The Impact of the Reported Ordeals of Sarah Wight in Revolutionary London, 1647– 52.” Women’s Writing 9, no. 2 (2002): 215– 32. Searle, Alison. “‘A kind of agonie in my thoughts’: Writing Puritan and Nonconformist Women’s Pain in Seventeenth-Century England.” Medical Humanities 44, no. 2 (2018): 125– 36. Seaward, Paul. “Hyde, Edward, First Earl of Clarendon (1609– 1674).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., October 2008. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/14328. Shapin, Steven. “The House of Experiment in Seventeenth-Century England.” Isis 79 (1988): 373– 404. ———. Never Pure: Historical Studies of Science . . . Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010. ———. A Social History of Truth: Civility and Science in Seventeenth-Century England. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994. Shapin, Steven, and Simon Schaffer. Leviathan and the Air-Pump: Hobbes, Boyle, and the Experimental Life. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1985. Shortland, Michael, and Richard Yeo, eds. Telling Lives in Science: Essays on Scientific Biography. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. Smith, David L. “Cary, Lucius, Second Viscount Falkland (1609/10– 1643).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., May 2014. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/4841. ———. Constitutional Royalism and the Search for Settlement, c.1640– 1649. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Smith, Hilda L. “Margaret Cavendish and the Microscope as Play.” In Zinsser, Men, Women and the Birthing of Modern Science, 34– 47. Smith, Nigel. Andrew Marvell: The Chameleon. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2010. ———. Literature and Revolution in England, 1640– 1660. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1994.

270

•

Bibliography

Smith, Pamela H. “Laboratories.” In Park and Daston, Cambridge History of Science, 3:290– 305. ———. “What Is a Secret? Secrets and Craft Knowledge in Early Modern Europe.” In Leong and Rankin, Secrets and Knowledge in Medicine and Science, 47– 66. Smith, Pamela H., and Benjamin Schmidt, eds. Making Knowledge in Early Modern Europe: Practices, Objects, and Texts, 1400– 1800. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007. Speck, W. A. James II. London: Longman, 2002. Stagl, Justin. A History of Curiosity: The Theory of Travel, 1550– 1800. Chur, UK: Harwood, 1995. Stobart, Anne. Household Medicine in Seventeenth-Century England. London: Bloomsbury, 2016. Stone, Lawrence. Road to Divorce: England 1530– 1987. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990. Strocchia, Sharon T. “Introduction: Women and Healthcare in Early Modern Europe.” Renaissance Studies 28, no. 4 (2014): 496– 514. Stubbs, Mayling. “John Beale, Philosophical Gardener of Herefordshire: Part I: Prelude to the Royal Society (1608– 1663).” Annals of Science 39 (1982): 463– 89. Swan, Claudia. “Making Sense of Medical Collections in Early Modern Holland: The Uses of Wonder.” In Smith and Schmidt, Making Knowledge in Early Modern Europe, 199– 213. Taylor, Elizabeth Anne. “Writing Women, Honour, and Ireland: 1640– 1715.” 3 vols. PhD diss., University College Dublin, 1999. Terrall, Mary. “The Uses of Anonymity in the Age of Reason.” In Scientific Authorship: Credit and Intellectual Property in Science, edited by Mario Biagioli and Peter Galison, 91– 112. New York: Routledge, 2003. Tigner, Amy L. Literature and the Renaissance Garden from Elizabeth I to Charles II: England’s Paradise. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2012. Trevor-Roper, Hugh. Catholics, Anglicans and Puritans: Seventeenth Century Essays. London: Secker & Warburg, 1987. Turnbull, G. H. Hartlib, Dury and Comenius: Gleanings from Hartlib’s Papers. Liverpool: University Press of Liverpool, 1947. Wall, Wendy. The Imprint of Gender: Authorship and Publication in the English Renaissance. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1993. ———. Recipes for Thought: Knowledge and Taste in the Early Modern English Kitchen. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015. Wallis, Patrick. “Plagues, Morality and the Place of Medicine in Early Modern Europe.” English Historical Review 121, no. 490 (2006): 1– 24. Walsh, Ann-Maria. “The Boyle Women and Familial Life Writing.” In Eckerle and McAreavey, Women’s Life Writing and Early Modern Ireland, 79– 98.

Bibliography

•

271

———. The Daughters of the First Earl of Cork: Writing Faith, Family, Politics, and Place. Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2020. Watts, Ruth. Women in Science: Social and Cultural History. Abingdon, UK: Routledge, 2007. Wear, Andrew. Knowledge and Practice in English Medicine, 1550– 1680. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. ———. “Medical Practice in Late Seventeenth- and Early Eighteenth-Century England: Continuity and Union.” In The Medical Revolution of the Seventeenth Century, edited by Roger French and Andrew Wear, 294– 320. Cambridge: Cambridge Universtity Press, 1989. Webster, Charles. “Benjamin Worsley: Engineering for Universal Reform from the Invisible College to the Navigation Act.” In Greengrass, Leslie, and Raylor, Samuel Hartlib and Universal Reformation, 213– 35. ———. “English Medical Reformers of the Puritan Revolution: A Background to the ‘Society of Chymical Physitians.’ ” Ambix 14 (1967): 16– 41. ———. The Great Instauration: Science, Medicine and Reform 1626– 1660. London: Duckworth, 1975. ———. “New Light on the Invisible College.” Transactions of the Royal Historical Society. 5th ser. 24 (1974): 17– 42. ———. Samuel Hartlib and the Advancement of Learning. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970. ———. “Water as the Ultimate Principle of Nature: The Background to Boyle’s Sceptical Chymist.” Ambix 13 (1965– 66): 96– 107. ———. “Worsley, Benjamin (1617/18– 1677).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., January 2008. https://doi .org/10.1093/ref:odnb/38153. Werrett, Simon. Thrifty Science: Making the Most of Materials in the History of Experiment. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2019. Whaley, Leigh. Women and the Practice of Medical Care in Early Modern Europe, 1400– 1800. New York: Palgrave, 2011. Whittle, Jane, and Elizabeth Griffiths. Consumption and Gender in the Early Seventeenth-Century Household: The World of Alice Le Strange. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012. Wilson, C. Anne. ‘Banquetting Stuffe’: The Fare and Social Background of the Tudor and Stuart Banquet. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1991. ———. “Growing Aromatic Herbs and Flowers for Food and Physic.” In The Country House Kitchen Garden, 1600– 1950, edited by C. Anne Wilson, 86– 99. Stroud, Gloucestershire: Sutton, 1998. Woodhead, J. R. The Rulers of London, 1660– 1689: A Biographical Record of the Aldermen and Common Councilmen of the City of London. London: London & Middlesex Archaeological Society, 1965.

272

•

Bibliography

Woodland, Patrick. “Beale, John (bap. 1608, d. 1683).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., January 2008. https:// doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/1802. Woodward, Walter. Prospero’s America: John Winthrop, Jr., Alchemy, and the Creation of New England Culture, 1606– 1676. Chapel Hill: University of North Caroline Press, 2010. Yale, Elizabeth. “The History of Archives: The State of the Discipline.” Book History 18 (2015): 332– 56. ———. “Playing Archival Politics with Hans Sloane, Edward Lhuyd, and John Woodward.” In V. Keller, Roos, and Yale, Archival Afterlives, 173– 94. Yamamoto, Koji. “Reformation and the Distrust of the Projector.” Historical Journal 55 (2012): 375– 397. ———. Taming Capitalism before Its Triumph: Public Service, Distrust, and “Projecting” in Early Modern England. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018. Yeo, Richard. Notebooks, English Virtuosi and Early Modern Science. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2014. Young, John T. “Durie [Dury], John (1596– 1680).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004; online ed., January 2008. https:// doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/8323. ———. Faith, Medical Alchemy and Natural Philosophy: Johann Moriaen, Reformed Intelligencer, and the Hartlib Circle. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 1998. Zinsser, Judith P., ed. Men, Women, and the Birthing of Modern Science. DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2005. Zurcher, Amelia. “Life Writing in the Boyle Family Network.” In Eckerle and McAreavey, Women’s Life Writing and Early Modern Ireland, 99– 136.

Index

Page references in italics refer to illustrations. Académie des Sciences, Paris, 5 Accademia del Cimento, Florence, 5 Act of Uniformity, 139, 177 agriculture: Bacon on role of, in natural philosophy, 100; Cromwell’s initiatives in Ireland, 92; proposals to improve, by Hartlib members, 66– 68, 126; religio-economic prestige of, in English Commonwealth, 100. See also gardens and gardening Akkerman, Nadine, 221n9 alchemy, 6– 7, 12, 116– 19, 118 Allestree, Richard, 161 Anglo– Dutch War, First, 13, 86 Anglo– Dutch War, Second, 149– 50 archival practices: “accidental” (“unintentional” or “fragmented”) archive, 14, 202, 204, 248n24; Boyle’s system for organizing papers and provisions for manuscripts after his death, 200, 201 Ardinghelli, Mariangela, 15 Aristotle: early modern challenges to his view of universe, 5, 14, 64, 133– 34, 146; scholastic natural philosophy, 133 Athlone Bridge and Castle, 28– 33, 32

Bacon, Francis: and Great Instauration, 62; Novum organum, 55; on role of agriculture in natural philosophy, 100 Badnedge, Salisbury, 22 Badnedge, Thomas, 22 Ball, Stephen, and Lismore Castle Papers finding aid, 216n20 Ballard, George, Memoirs of Several Ladies of Great Britain, 201 Barlow, Thomas, 123 Barry, John, 213 Barrymore, Alice Barry (née Boyle), Countess of (sister), 20, 21, 37 Barrymore, David Barry, 1st Earl of, 213 Battle of Lowestoft, 149 Battle of Newbury, First, 35 Baxter, Richard, 173– 74, 204 Beale, John: correspondence with Ranelagh about legal issues and dreams, 12, 99– 103, 110, 111, 120– 22, 204; and discussions of religion in response to religiopolitical shift under Charles II, 123; “Dreames,” 102; encouragement of Ranelagh’s experimentation with telescope, 115, 121; as fellow of Royal Society,

274

Beale, John (continued) 99, 124; and Hartlib circle, 45, 57, 99; Herefordshire Orchards, a Pattern for All England, 100; proposed dedication of “A Physique Guarden” to Ranelagh, 100– 101, 232n45; reference to Lady-Chymistry, 121 Beaumont, Lord Sapcott, 22 Beaumont, Sir Thomas, Viscount of Swords, 22– 23, 218n24 ben Israel, Menasseh: efforts to lift ban on Jews in England and promotion of Jewish messianism, 86– 87; Humble Address for Cromwell, 87 Berkeley, Lord John, 139, 204, 238n10 Bertucci, Paola, 15 Bible translation projects, 113, 175, 177, 193 Birch, Thomas, 200 Bishops’ War, 38 Blome, Grace, 157 Blome, Richard, map of St. James’s Square, 1685, 164 bloodletting, 185 Boate, Gerald, Irelands Naturall History, 12 Boate, Gerard and Arnold: deaths in 1650, 97; and Dorothy Moore, 46; and Irelands Naturall History, 12, 96– 97 Bohemia, Elizabeth Stuart, Queen of: involvement in contemporary political thought, 38, 204; Ranelagh’s letter to her, 42– 44, 59 Bolton, Sir Richard (godfather), 17 Bourke, Evan, 9, 45, 46 Boyle, Alice (sister). See Barrymore, Alice Barry (née Boyle), Countess of (sister) Boyle, Catherine (mother). See Cork, Catherine Boyle (née Fenton), Countess of (mother) Boyle, Dorothy (sister). See Talbot, Lady Dorothy (née Boyle) (sister)

•

Index

Boyle, Francis (brother). See Shannon, Francis Boyle, 1st Viscount of (brother) Boyle, Geoffrey (brother), 214 Boyle, Joan (sister). See Kildare, Joan Boyle, 16th Countess of (sister) Boyle, Katherine. See Ranelagh, Katherine Jones (née Boyle), 2nd Viscountess of Boyle, Lettice (sister). See Goring, Lady Lettice (née Boyle) (sister) Boyle, Lewis (brother). See Kinalmeaky, Lewis Boyle, Viscount of (brother) Boyle, Margaret (sister), 21, 23, 24 Boyle, Mary (sister). See Warwick, Mary Rich (née Boyle), 4th Countess of (sister) Boyle, Richard (brother). See Burlington, Richard Boyle, 1st Earl of (brother) Boyle, Richard (cousin of father), 22 Boyle, Richard (father). See Cork, Richard Boyle, 1st Earl of (father) Boyle, Robert (brother): and alchemy, 6; anatomical lessons with William Petty, 104; anti-Aristotelian thought, 64, 133; appointment to Council for Foreign Plantations, 139– 40; bequeath of chemical papers and scientific instruments to Royal Society, 196, 200; Bible translations, 113, 175, 177, 193; and bloodletting, 185; Boyle’s Law, 6, 20; and Butler’s philosophers’ stone, 119; and Cavendish, Margaret, 135; chemical experimentation, 3, 5– 6, 11, 61, 64– 65; chemical recipe exchanges, 119– 20; “Considerations and Doubts,” style of, 184– 87; death and burial next to Ranelagh, 197; dedication of work to Richard Jones, 129– 30; and Digby, Sir Kenelm, 77; and educational reform, 122; as “English

Index

philosopher,” 6, 20, 112; ens veneris treatment, 116, 131– 32; evangelism and reconciling of religion with experimentation, 177; on Galenic physicians, 156, 184– 85; and Grand Tour, 11, 48; and Hartlib circle, 44, 51, 96; illnesses, 73, 93; and the “Invisible College,” 51– 52; Irish lands, loss of, 191; laboratory at Stalbridge, 53, 62; laboratory in Pall Mall as gathering place, 166; and liberty of conscience, 141; manuscript key to recipe authors, 196; on mechanical versus scholastic philosophy, 133– 34; “medical commonplace book,” 83; medical texts, 182; millenarian thought, 85– 86; and modern scientific method, 6; New England Company, governor of, 175, 178; and occult sciences, 56, 105; and Office of Address project, 55; and Oldenburg, 172– 73; and Oxford circle, 65, 88– 89, 128; physicians, criticism of, 185– 86; and religiopolitical shift under Charles II, 123; reputation as natural philosopher, 128– 29, 168; rickets, treatment of, 131– 32; Royal Society, founding fellow of, 20, 124; Shannon Portrait of the Hon. Robert Boyle F.R.S. (Kerseboom), 169; “Spirit of Hartshorn,” use of, 153– 54, 162; “Spirit of Roses” recipe, 8– 9, 82; at Stalbridge, 49; stay in Ireland, 89, 92, 95– 96, 107; strange phenomenon reported at death of, 197; support for Worsley’s saltpeter project, 54; and sympathetic medicine, 130– 31; system for organizing papers and provisions for manuscripts after his death, 200, 201; technicians as notetakers for experiments, 166; and telescopes, 115– 16; and Valentine Greatrakes, 146– 47; will

•

275

and numerous codicils, 195– 96, 197; witnesses to experiments, 167– 68. See also Ranelagh, Katherine Jones (née Boyle), 2nd Viscountess of, influence on and relationship with robert boyle Boyle, Robert (brother), works: Aretology, 49; Certain Physiological Essays, 130; The Christian Virtuoso, 174; Colours, 130; “Considerations and Doubts Touching the Vulgar Method of Physick,” 184– 85, 186, 187; “The Dayly Reflection,” 50– 51; Discourse of Things above Reason, 174; discourse on “PublickeSpiritednesse” (not extant), 63; “An Epistolical Discourse . . . Inviting All True Lovers of Vertue and Mankind, to Free and Generous Communication of Their Secrets and Receits in Physick,” 63– 65, 128; “An Invitation to the Use of Simple Medicines,” 183– 84; Medicinal Experiments, three posthumous volumes, 183– 84, 196– 97; Memoirs for the Natural History of Humane Blood, 167– 68; New Experiments Physico-Mechanical, 129; Occasional Reflections upon Several Subjects, 51, 65, 142, 145, 153; “Of Sin,” 25, 49– 50; Of the Reconcileableness of Specifick Medicines to the Corpuscular Philosophy, 154, 182– 83; “Of the Study of the Book of Nature,” 129; The Origine of Forms and Qualities, 13, 133– 34, 146, 170; The Skeptical Chemist, 6, 116, 120– 21; Some Considerations Touching the Usefulnesse of Experimental Naturall Philosophy, 13, 64, 65, 116, 129– 32, 133, 156, 184, 186; Some Motives or Incentives to the Love of God (Seraphic Love), 128– 29; Some Receipts of Medicines, 183– 84; untitled essay on piety, 50

276

Boyle, Roger (brother). See Orrery, Roger Boyle, 1st Earl of (brother) Boyle, Sarah (sister). See Digby, Sarah Moore (née Boyle), 1st Baroness of (sister) Boyle, Thomas (uncle), 22 Boyle family genealogy, 213– 14 Boyle Papers, Royal Society Library, 140 Boyle’s law, 6, 20 Bristol, George Digby, 2nd Earl of, 160, 241n96 Bristol, John Digby, 1st Earl of, 241n96 Bristol, Lady Anne (née Russell), 160, 241n96 Bristol, Lady Beatrice, 241n96 Broghill, Lord Roger (brother). See Orrery, Roger Boyle, 1st Earl of (brother) Burlington, Elizabeth Clifford, Countess of (sister-in-law), 35, 111, 213; Ranelagh as medical advisor and facilitator, 153– 55, 181 Burlington, Richard Boyle, 1st Earl of (brother), 20, 52, 137; appointment as lord treasurer in Ireland, 139, 151; assistance to Ranelagh in obtaining settlement with her husband, 151– 52, 153, 165; Ranelagh’s arrangement for Burlington’s daughter’s marriage, 150; Ranelagh’s influence on, 25; Ranelagh’s letters to, 36, 150, 202; and settlement of family estates, 92 Burnet, Bishop Gilbert, 131, 192, 193, 204; eulogy for Robert Boyle and tribute to Ranelagh, 1, 197– 200, 205 Butler, Dr., 12, 116– 19 Butler, James. See Ormond, James Butler, 1st Duke of Calvinism, 57 Cambridge, James Stuart, Duke of, illness and death, 157– 58, 160 Canny, Nicholas, 111

•

Index

Cary, Elizabeth. See Falkland, Elizabeth Cary, 1st Viscountess of Cary, Lucius. See Falkland, Lucius, 2nd Viscount Cary, Sir Henry, 29 Castlemaine, Barbara Palmer, Countess of, 139 Catherine of Braganza, Infanta of Portugal, 139 Cavendish, Margaret, Duchess of Newcastle, 14, 124; disregard for conventional social norms, 135, 200; first woman to visit Royal Society, 134– 35 Cecil, Lady Margaret, 27 Charles I, 31, 35, 38, 42, 58– 59, 91, 140 Charles II, 122– 23, 133, 138– 39 Chelsea Hospital, London, 27 chemical medicine, 69– 70, 72, 131– 33, 184 chemistry: and alchemy, 6– 7; Boyle and, 5– 6, 11, 53, 62, 64– 65, 95– 96; efforts of male experimental chemists to distance work from that of women’s, 120– 21; Hartlib circle and, 53– 54, 58, 62, 69– 70, 100– 101, 117– 18; and natural philosophy, 5; as part of women’s household duties, 7, 71– 72; Ranelagh and, 6– 7, 11– 12, 16, 53, 59, 62– 63, 71, 119– 21, 206 Chesterfield, Lady, 36 Child, Robert, 97 Chillingworth, William, 30 Christina, Queen of Sweden, 7, 85; and ben Israel, 88 chrysopoeia, 6 chymistry. See alchemy; chemistry Clanmalier, Anne O’Dempsey, 3rd Viscountess of, 179, 193 Clarendon, Edward Hyde, Earl of, and lord chancellor under Charles II, 43, 127– 28, 140– 41, 150, 159; and Great Tew circle, 30; Ranelagh’s letters to, concerning political situation,

Index

40– 42, 59, 141, 204; rumor of his disapproval of Ranelagh’s involvement in state affairs, 158– 59, 162 Clarendon, Henry Hyde, 2nd Earl of, 191, 192 Clarendon, Lady, Ranelagh’s treatment of, 13, 160– 62, 186– 87 Clarendon Code, 127– 28 Clericuzio, Antonio, 200 Cleyton, Sir Randall and Lady, foster parents of Boyle girls, 21 Clifford, Elizabeth (sister-in-law). See Burlington, Elizabeth Clifford, Countess of (sister-in-law) Clodius, Frederick, 70, 95– 96, 107 Clotworthy, Sir John, 38, 49 Clotworthy, Lady Margaret, 37– 38, 49, 56 Cole, Sir John, 171 Cole, Sir Michael, 178 College of Physicians, 11, 55, 70– 71, 132– 33, 187, 188 Comenius, John Amos, 44, 45, 110, 122 Connolly, Ruth, 7– 8, 58, 173, 179 Conventicle Act, 127– 28, 139, 141 Conway, Lady Anne, 10, 14, 85, 199, 204; and Boyle’s ens veneris, 132, 146; and Valentine Greatrakes, 146 Coolahan, Marie-Louise, 217n27 Cork, Catherine Boyle (née Fenton), Countess of (mother), 17, 22– 24, 24 Cork, Richard Boyle, 1st Earl of (father), 10, 17– 19, 27; death of, 49; dowry arrangements for Katherine, 22– 23, 25– 26; entry to Irish peerage, 18; final will, 92; influence of religious beliefs on children, 19; plea to Viscount Ranelagh for Katherine to remain in England, 28– 29; Ranelagh’s letters to, 202; retreat to Yougal during Irish Rebellion and subsequent death, 31; and Sir Walter Raleigh, 18, 130, 236n69; strict control over domestic affairs and upbringing of children,

•

277

18– 20; “True Remembrances” (autobiography), 19 Correspondence of Robert Boyle, The (Hunter, Clericuzio, and Principe), 200 Coughlan, Patricia, 96 Coventry, Sir William, 191 Coxe, Dr. Daniel, 83, 147, 153, 165; fellow of Royal Society, 160; working partnership with Ranelagh, 160, 204 Craven, Lord William, 158 Cromwell, Henry, 92 Cromwell, Oliver, 12, 86– 88, 91– 92, 108– 9, 122 Cromwell, Richard, 113, 121 Crosse, John, 88– 89 Cudworth, Dr. Ralph, 87 Culme, Benjamin, Dean of St. Patrick’s, Ireland, 25 Culpeper, Sir Cheney, 55, 66– 67, 104, 121; response to Ranelagh’s proposal for limited constitutional monarchy, 58– 59, 121, 224n95 Cultures of Knowledge project, University of Oxford, 9, 217n27 Cutler, John, 45, 222n41 Davis, Edward B., 200 Daybell, James, 217n27 De Geer, Lawrence, 110 Deneroff, Harvey, 248n24 Denham, Benjamin, 141 Desmond, Gerald Fitzgerald, 15th Earl of, 18 Devonshire, William Cavendish, 1st Duke of, 192– 93 Dickinson, Edmund, 196 Digby, Robert, 213 Digby, Sarah Moore (née Boyle), 1st Baroness of (sister), 213 Digby, Sir Kenelm, 23, 70, 77, 81, 124; sharing of medical recipes with Ranelagh, 105, 204

278

Dillon, Sir James, 33 DiMeo, Michelle, 222n36, 225n6 Dopping, Bishop Anthony, 177 Dungarvan, Charles Boyle, Viscount of (nephew): 158– 59 Dury, John: assistance to ben Israel in visiting London, 86; belief in education and social change, 122; discharge from librarianship under Charles II and departure from England, 126; and Hartlib circle, 44, 45, 75; interest in Judaism, 84; interest in natural philosophy linked to socioreligious reform, 126; and issue of liberty of conscience, 123, 141; and Office of Address project, 55; and proposals to improve agricultural husbandry, 66– 67; Ranelagh as confidant for spiritual, ethical, and intellectual matters, 47– 48; Ranelagh’s guidance of, concerning marriage to Dorothy Moore, 11, 46– 47 Dutch invasion of London, 159– 60 Early Modern Letters Online (EMLO), 46, 202– 3 Early Modern Recipes Online Collective (EMROC), 203 Eliot, John, 175– 76 Embassy of the Dutch Republic, London, 87– 88 English Civil Wars (War of Three Kingdoms), 10, 35, 37– 38, 58 English Commonwealth: establishment of, 91; and loosening of regulations and abolishment of judicial structures, 70, 95; religio-economic prestige of agricultural projects, 100; and 1651 Navigation Acts, 70 ens veneris, or “essence of copper,” 7, 13, 116, 131– 32

•

Index

Evelyn, John, 1, 204; “Elysium Britannicum,” 100 Evelyn, Mary, 14 Fairclough, Dr., 147 Falkland, Elizabeth Cary, 1st Viscountess of, 30 Falkland, Lucius, 2nd Viscount, 29– 30, 35, 40– 41 Fenton, Catherine. See Cork, Catherine Boyle (née Fenton), Countess of (mother) Fenton, Margaret (godmother and aunt), 17 Fenton, Sir Geoffrey (grandfather), 17 Fielding, Elizabeth, 214 Figulus, Peter, 103– 4, 109– 10 Fitzgerald, George, 213 Fitzgerald, Lady Catherine (niece), 82 Fitzsimon, Betsey Taylor, 7, 222n36 Fountaine, Monsieur, 106 Franco– Dutch War, 174 Fraser, Antonia, 3, 14 Frederick V, Elector Palatine of the Rhine, 42 Frederick William, elector of Brandenburg, 174– 75 French, Nicholas, Narrative of the Settlement and Sales of Ireland, 190 Galenic medicine, 72, 81, 131, 145; Boyle’s attack on, 156, 184– 85 gardens and gardening: and common plants used for medicinal purposes, 82; physic, or “botanic” gardens, 12, 100– 101 gender: and ability of seventeenthcentury women to effect change, 3, 121, 125, 194, 203, 207; and increasing importance of print, 142– 44; and science in seventeenth century, 4, 14– 16,

Index

216n9. See also manuscripts; women, early modern G. F. D. (pseud.), Twelve Queries Relating to the Interest of Ireland, 190 Gill, Eoin, 248n26 Glorious Revolution of 1688, 192 Goring, George, 30, 213 Goring, Lady Lettice (née Boyle) (sister), 19, 21 Great Fire of London, 13, 148– 49 “Great Instauration” of knowledge, 62 Greatrakes, Valentine, 57, 146– 48, 172 Great Tew circle, 30 Greenville, Sir Richard, 33 Grey, Elizabeth. See Kent, Elizabeth Grey, Countess of, authority on medical recipes Gwynn, Nell, 163 Haak, Theodore, 75, 124 Hamilton, Anne Hamilton, 3rd Duchess of, 181, 193 Hamilton, Lady Catherine (née Catherine Montgomery) (granddaughter), 26 Hamilton, Sir Francis, 3rd Baronet of Castle Hamilton, 26 Hammond, Henry, 30 Harley, Lady Brilliana, 40 Harris, Lady (godmother), 17 Hartlib, Samuel, 82, 98, 122, 125– 26; and Beale’s discourse on dreams, 102– 3; and chemical recipe exchange between Oldenburg, Ranelagh, and Robert Boyle, 119– 20; circulation of Ranelagh’s history of Butler’s philosophers’ stone, 117– 19, 118; collection and distribution of chemical recipes, 74– 78; collection and distribution of Ranelagh’s letters from Ireland, 107– 8; combined distribution of books and letters to Wood and

•

279

Ranelagh, 82, 102– 3; decimalization of currency project, 99; discussions in response to religiopolitical shift under Charles II, 123; Ephemerides, 51, 61, 68, 74– 75; formation and goals of Hartlib circle, 44– 45; illness and impoverishment and death, 12, 126; interest in Judaism, 84; interest in natural philosophy linked to socioreligious reform, 126; and Irelands Naturall History project, 12, 96– 97; letters discussing spiritual and magical matters with Boyle and Ranelagh, 105– 6; letters sent to Ranelagh’s house for distribution to members, 45, 222n40; Office of Address project, 55, 63; printing and circulation of Moore’s and Dury’s letters to Ranelagh as Madam, Although My Former Freedom, 47; printing of Beale’s Herefordshire Orchards, 100; printing of Boyle’s essay on secrecy in Chymical, Medicinal, and Chyrurgical Addresses, 63; proposals to improve agricultural husbandry and fishing, 66– 68; quest to learn about “Maid’s Physick,” 75– 76; and Rand’s proposal for a chemical college, 70– 71; recipient of medical secrets gleaned by Ranelagh, 106– 7, 111; references to women who studied chemistry, 204– 5; The Reformed Virginian Silk-Worm, 68 Hartlib circle: and ben Israel’s trip to London, 86– 87; collection of recipes and “secrets,” 74– 79, 184; dissolution of, with rise of Royal Society, 12, 123– 27; interest in occult, mystical, and supernatural forces, 56; international correspondence network, 44– 45, 71; Irelands Naturall History, 96– 97; members’ use

280

Hartlib circle (continued) of religious beliefs to effect social reform, 126– 27; millenarian projects, 85– 88, 115; Office of Address proposal, 54– 55; projects in Ireland, 93, 96– 98; proposal for improved techniques of husbandry and fishing in England, 66– 68; Ranelagh’s role within, 8, 45– 46; and reunification of Protestant churches, 57, 108– 9; setbacks to projects as result of government transition, 108– 9, 115; and systematic organizing, testing, and understanding new knowledge, 75; turn toward natural philosophy and chemistry, 62, 69– 70; use of query genre, 58– 59, 67 Hartlib Papers, University of Sheffield, 2, 129, 234n3; earliest reference to Ranelagh in, 11, 46; references to Ranelagh in, 45– 46, 62, 222n36, 225n6; references to significant women other than Ranelagh, 204– 5; reference to Ranelagh’s daughter, 106 Heathcott, Joseph, 248n24 Hebrew, study of, 11, 84– 85, 199 Henrietta Maria, Queen, 29 Herbert, Sir Edward, 191 Herschel, Caroline, 4 Higgins, Dr. Daniel, 117, 119 Highmore, Nathaniel, 65 Hobbes, Thomas, 30, 124 Hooke, Robert, 13, 89, 166; assistance with Ranelagh’s architectural renovations, 166– 67; development of laboratory equipment for Boyle, 181; remarks about Ranelagh, 167 Hotson, Howard, 217n27 Howard, Margaret. See Orrery, Margaret Boyle (née Howard), Countess of (sister-in-law) Hunter, Lynette, 8

•

Index

Hunter, Michael, 6, 169, 187, 189, 199, 200 Hutchinson, Lucy, 14, 39, 220n6 Hutton, Sarah, 4, 7, 10, 46 Hyde, Edward. See Clarendon, Edward Hyde, Earl of, and lord chancellor under Charles II Hyde, Thomas, 177 iatrochemistry. See chemical medicine Inchiquin, Murrough O’Brien, Earl of, 94 indigenous peoples: converting through Bible translations, 175– 77; Massachusetts Council atrocities against Christian converts, 175– 76 Intellectual History Review, special issue dedicated to Boyle, 8 Invisible College, 51– 52 Irish Rebellion, 10, 31– 33, 107; Boyle estates lost during, 31, 92; Ranelagh’s experiences during, 10, 33– 35; subsequent confiscation of Irish Catholic land, 91 James II, 30, 155, 189– 90 Jardine, Lisa, 242n20 Jarvis, William, A Choice Manual, or Rare Secrets in Physick and Chirurgery Collected and Practised by the Right Honourable the Countess of Kent, Late Decreased, 77 Jerome, Stephen, 22, 109 Jessey, Henry, The Exceeding Riches of Grace Advanced, 55– 56, 57 Jewish reentry to England, debate over, 86– 88 Jones, Arthur (husband). See Ranelagh, Arthur Jones, 2nd Viscount of (husband) Jones, Catherine (daughter). See MountAlexander, Catherine Montgomery (née Jones), Countess of (daughter) Jones, Catherine (granddaughter), 27 Jones, Elizabeth (daughter), 27, 171

Index

Jones, Elizabeth (granddaughter), 27 Jones, Frances (daughter), 27, 73, 106, 147; death, 171; epitaph for tomb by Andrew Marvell, 171– 72 Jones, Frances (granddaughter), 27 Jones, Richard (son). See Ranelagh, Richard Jones, 2nd Earl of (son) Jones family, coat of arms for, as viscounts of Ranelagh, 112 Jonson, Ben, 28 Kendal, Charles Stuart, Duke of, illness and death of, 13, 155– 57, 187, 188 Kent, Elizabeth Grey, Countess of, authority on medical recipes, 77– 78, 204 Kerseboom, Johann, The Shannon Portrait of the Hon. Robert Boyle F.R.S., 169 Kiffin, William, 13, 128, 173, 204 Kildare, Joan Boyle, 16th Countess of (sister), 20, 21, 37, 82 Killigrew, Elizabeth, 28– 29, 214 Kinalmeaky, Lewis Boyle, Viscount of (brother), 20, 31, 34, 214 King, Sir Edmund, 189– 90, 197, 204 King Philip’s War of 1675, 175 Kissing the Rod (Greer et al.), 220n9 Kneeling Daughters and Infant Son, Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin, 24 Kominski, Jan Amos. See Comenius, John Amos laudanum, 76, 130 Leeke, Sir John, 27– 28, 219n55 Leng, Thomas, 54 Lepore, Jill, 176 Le Pruvost, Peter, 66– 67 liberty of conscience, advocacy of Ranelagh and Boyle for, 3, 13, 57, 93, 127– 28, 136, 139, 140– 41, 150, 179– 80, 203 Limerick, Siege of, 193

•

281

Lismore Castle, 18, 23, 31; commemorative plaques for Boyle and Ranelagh on gates of, 205, 206, 248n26 Lismore Castle Papers finding aid, National Library of Ireland, 216n20 Lloyd, William, bishop of St. Asaph, 193 Locke, John, 14, 89, 165, 182, 192 Lodge, John, Peerage of Ireland, 112 Loftus, Sir Arthur, 214 Louis XIV, 174– 75 Lower, Dr. Richard, 165, 189 Lynch, Kathleen M., 7, 8, 216n20 Makin, Bathsua, 38 Malpighi, Marcello, 180 Manning, Mrs. Margaret, 147 manuscripts: as method of publication, 40, 129, 143– 44; preference for, over print, by seventeenth-century women, 40, 47, 142– 44, 202 Marcombes, Isaac, 65 Markham, Gervase, 72 Marsh, Narcissus, 177 Marshall, Thomas, 177 Marsham, Lady Damaris, 14 Marvel, Andrew, 171– 72, 204 Mary II, 191 Massachusetts Council, 175– 76 McLean-Fiander, Kim, 217n27 medical practice: integration of household medicine with professional options, 152– 53; and kitchen physick, 72; “medical promiscuity” of early modern Europe, 155; pamphlet war between proponents of new and old medical system, 133, 146, 152; and the plague, 145– 46. See also recipes Menasseh ben Israel. See ben Israel, Menasseh microscope, development of, 116 Middlesex, Lionel Cranfield, Earl of, visitation by ghost, 105 Miles, Henry, 200

282

millenarianism, 57, 85– 86, 193 Milton, John, 27, 86, 93; and Hartlib circle, 44, 45; relationship with Ranelagh, 45, 69, 204 Montgomery, Catherine (granddaughter). See Hamilton, Lady Catherine (née Catherine Montgomery) (granddaughter) Moore, Arthur, 222n43 Moore, Doro-Katherina (later Oldenburg), 84 Moore, Dorothy (aunt), 14, 38, 222n40; lifelong friendship with Ranelagh, 84; and “Maid’s Physick,” 76; marriage to Arthur Moore, 222n43; “Of the Education of Girles,” 83– 84; Ranelagh’s moral guidance of, regarding union with John Dury, 11, 46– 47, 172; reaction to Hartlib’s pamphlet comprising her and Dury’s letters, 47; study of Hebrew, 85 Moore, Sir Thomas, 213 More, Henry: discussions of Jewish kabbalah, 85; On the Immortality of the Soul, 69 Moriaen, Johann: assistance to ben Israel in visiting London, 86; and Hartlib circle, 45, 75; interest in Judaism, 84 Mount-Alexander, Catherine Montgomery (née Jones), Countess of (daughter), 26, 93, 111, 171, 172 Mount-Alexander, Hugh Montgomery, 1st Earl of (son-in-law), 26, 171 National Committee for Science and Engineering Commemorative Plaques in Ireland, 205– 6 National Library of Ireland, 218n24 natural philosophy, 5, 100, 124– 25, 136; and Hartlib circle, 62, 69– 70, 126; interests in linked to socioreligious reform, 9, 39, 62, 126

•

Index

Navigation Acts of 1651, 68 New College House, Youghal, 17 New England Company, 175 Newman, William, 6 Newton, Isaac, 5, 20 nonconformists: division among in late 1640s, 57; imprisonment of under Charles II, 13, 140– 41. See also liberty of conscience, advocacy of Ranelagh and Boyle for Nottingham, Daniel Finch, 2nd Earl of, 192 occult sciences, 56– 57 Office of Address project, 54, 55, 63, 71 Oldenburg, Henry, 133; attempt to recreate philosophers’ stone, 116; and chemical recipe exchange with Hartlib, Robert Boyle, and Ranelagh, 119– 20; death of, 127, 172– 73; editor of Philosophical Transactions, 144; first secretary of Royal Society, 68– 69, 124; and Hartlib circle, 44, 69; lifelong friendship and correspondence with Ranelagh, 1, 69, 82, 87, 202, 204; meeting with ben Israel at Ranelagh’s house, 87, 230n137; report on body of bishop found in St. Paul’s, 149; residence in London, 165; as tutor for Ranelagh’s son, 27, 69, 93, 120 optical instruments, 115– 16 Ormond, James Butler, 1st Duke of, 25, 33, 191, 194; on Ranelagh’s strong influence on her siblings, 25, 194 Orrery, Margaret Boyle (née Howard), Countess of (sister-in-law), 37– 38, 49, 56, 140, 214; inclusion of recipes from Ranelagh and Boyle in her family collection, 181 Orrery, Roger Boyle, 1st Earl of (brother), 108, 111, 214; and Andrew Marvell, 172; and Charles II, 139;

Index

•

283

death of, 173; politician and playwright, 20, 35; prominent positions in Ireland in 1650s, 92– 93; requests for Ranelagh to intervene in Irish politics on his behalf, 93– 94; and settlement of Boyle estates, 92 Osler, Margaret, 4 Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, first entry for Lady Ranelagh by Sarah Hutton, 7 Oxford experimentalists, 65, 89, 98, 165

Principe, Lawrence, 6, 65, 200 print dissemination, 129, 143– 44 Ptolemy, geocentric system, 5 Puritanism, 85; conversion narratives, 55; and crafting of godly society, 44– 45; doctrines for grieving, 172; “enthusiasm” of interregnum natural philosophy, 125; relation to natural philosophy, 62, 73; and Richard Boyle, 1st Earl of Cork, 19; and women’s writings, 40

Pal, Carol, 7– 8, 14, 38– 39, 222n36, 248n24 Panmure, Margaret Hamilton, Countess of, 189– 90, 193 Paracelsus, 120 Parsons, Sir Fenton, 185 Parsons, Sir William, 26, 171 Penn, Admiral Sir William, 178 Penn, William: correspondence with Boyle and Ranelagh, 178, 202; recipe from Ranelagh of medicines for sick child, 180– 81, 203 Pepys, Samuel, 135 Percivalle, Sir Philip, 94 Perdita Project, University of Warwick, 203 Pestell, Thomas, 22 Pett, Sir Peter, 35, 141 Petty, Sir William, 97, 99, 124; anatomical lessons for Robert Boyle, 104; and Andrew Marvell, 172; and Ireland, 93, 104, 113, 190– 91, 230n1; and Office of Address project, 55 philosophers’ stone, 6, 7, 12, 116– 19 Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, 144 plague of London, 1665: medical practice and, 145– 46; Ranelagh and, 13, 137– 38, 140– 41, 144– 45 Potter, William, 122 Premkumar, Alicia, 248n26

Quartermain, Dr. William, 153, 154, 156, 204 query genre, 58– 59 Raleigh, Sir Walter: and Cork, Richard Boyle, 1st Earl of, 18, 130, 236n69; “Sir Walter Raleigh’s Cordial,” 130 Rand, William, and Society of Chemical Physicians, 11, 70– 71, 146, 187 Ranelagh, Arthur Jones, 2nd Viscount of (husband), 25, 27– 28, 37, 213; death and will divesting Lady Ranelagh of responsibility for unmarried daughters, 171, 243n37 Ranelagh, Elizabeth, Countess of (daughter-in-law), 187– 88 Ranelagh, Frances Moore, 1st Viscountess of, 222n43 Ranelagh, Katherine Jones (née Boyle), 2nd Viscountess of, early years, personal life, death, and legacy, 37– 59; arrangement for marriage of Burlington’s daughter, 150; attempts to negotiate settlement from estranged husband, 10, 12, 35– 37, 94– 95, 110– 11; attempts to reclaim Boyle family estates, 12, 96, 110– 11; birth in Youghal, Ireland, 9– 10, 17; birth of children, 26– 27; commemorative plaque placed on gates of Lismore Castle,

284

Ranelagh, Katherine Jones, early years, personal life, death, and legacy (continued) 205, 206, 248n26; contemporary references to as “the Incomparable Lady Ranelagh,” 1, 14, 98, 99, 111, 117, 194, 203– 4, 206– 7; death of, 1, 10, 195; deaths of family members and friends, 171– 72; divorce settlement, 151– 52, 153, 165, 199; early contract into marriage, 21– 23; effects of her choice of manuscripts over print, 2, 14, 134, 142– 44, 189, 194, 203; exertion of great influence on family, 25, 194; house on Pall Mall, 163, 164; imprisonment in Athlone Castle during Irish Rebellion, 10, 33– 35, 216n20; and Irish heritage, 111– 13; marriage to Arthur Jones, 25– 31; portrait of, 41; scarcity of personal records from 1668 to 1690, 169– 70; strange phenomenon reported at death of, 197; as surrogate mother to Boyle children, 10, 23– 25; title of Viscountess, 37; tribute to by Bishop Burnet at Boyle’s funeral, 197– 200 Ranelagh, Katherine Jones (née Boyle), 2nd Viscountess of, hartlib circle and religiopolitical agenda, 1, 11; and agricultural husbandry, 66– 68; and ben Israel, 11, 87– 88, 102, 230n137; blending of evangelical Protestantism with experimental philosophy, 14; centrality to Hartlib circle, 8, 9– 11, 44– 47, 62, 222n36, 225n6; chemical recipe exchanges with Hartlib members, 119– 20; and conversion of Sarah Wight, 55– 57, 87, 102, 110, 149; correspondence and collaboration with members of Hartlib circle, 12, 96– 108, 110– 11, 113, 115, 121– 23; criti-

•

Index

cal view of those in political power, 40– 42, 149– 50; efforts for advancement of learning, 68, 122; and Eliot, 175– 76; epistolary discourse as preferred form of expression and means of disseminating information, 39, 142– 44; friendships across political lines, 139, 191– 92, 199; Hebrew studies, 11, 84– 85, 199; and liberty of conscience, 3, 13, 57, 93, 127– 28, 136, 139, 140– 41, 150, 170, 173– 74, 179– 82, 194, 203; lifelong friendships, 30, 69, 126– 27; millenarianism, 85– 86, 142; and Milton, 45, 69, 204; moral and religious reputation, 1, 11, 46– 47, 87, 172; and Office of Address project, 55, 71; and Parliamentarian cause, 37– 38, 43– 44, 58– 59; and Petty’s “Speculum Hiberniae,” 190– 91; and plague, 13, 137– 38, 145; as political lobbyist, 1, 11, 37– 38, 40– 44, 58– 59, 66, 71– 72, 93– 94, 136, 151, 162, 170– 71, 175, 192– 94; and prophecy and providential beliefs, 19, 102– 4, 108– 10, 141– 42, 144– 45, 148, 157, 159– 60; and religious tolerance, 170, 173, 174, 180– 82, 194; as source of international news to family, 150, 174– 75; and unification of Protestant churches, 109, 141, 174, 238n22; use of query genre as discussion tool, 58– 59, 224n95; and Valentine Greatrakes, 146– 48, 149; and William Penn, 178– 79, 193 Ranelagh, Katherine Jones (née Boyle), 2nd Viscountess of, influence on and relationship with robert boyle: Boyle’s dedication of works to Ranelagh, 50– 51, 142, 143, 165; and Boyle’s move to Oxford, 88– 89; Boyle’s provision of collateral for Ranelagh’s loans, 165; Boyle’s receipt of mail

Index

at Ranelagh’s home, 132, 237n81; Boyle’s residence with Ranelagh, 1, 13, 162, 163– 64, 168; Ranelagh’s assistance in building laboratory at Stalbridge, 53; Ranelagh’s construction of laboratory for Boyle’s use, 13, 165– 66; Ranelagh’s emotional support, 23– 25, 52– 53; Ranelagh’s encouragement of Boyle’s use of print, 134, 142; Ranelagh’s endorsement of Boyle’s Origine of Forms and Qualities, 13, 133– 34, 146, 170; Ranelagh’s intellectual collaboration with, 3, 11, 13, 49– 51, 63– 65, 133– 34, 142, 145– 46, 168, 170, 177, 193; Ranelagh’s religious and political influence, 48– 49; Ranelagh’s shared theory and practice of medicine with Boyle, 13, 129, 130– 33, 136, 180– 89 Ranelagh, Katherine Jones (née Boyle), 2nd Viscountess of, natural philosophy and medicine, 4, 156; on Aristotelian versus mechanical philosophy, 133– 34, 146, 156; and bloodletting, 176, 185; and chemical recipe exchanges, 119– 20; criticism of physicians, 156– 57, 185– 88; crossing of traditional gender boundaries, 121; ethics of medical practice informed by religious beliefs, 161– 62; incorporation of chemical ingredients into domestic medical practice, 7, 11; interest in alchemy and transmutation history, 6– 7, 12, 81, 116– 19, 118; interest in body of bishop found in St. Paul’s, 149; knowledge of, and household simples and “specifics,” 76, 154; and Margaret Cavendish, 135; medical recipes and trials, 74– 83, 80, 153– 54, 161– 62, 203; provision of healthcare for family and far-reaching patient

•

285

network, 13, 72– 74, 153– 62, 180– 81, 186– 87, 189– 90; shared theory and practice of medicine with Boyle, 13, 62, 129, 130– 33, 136, 153– 54, 180– 82; support for centralized chemical initiatives, 11, 55, 71– 72; synergies between natural philosophy and reformist ideas, 3, 9, 12– 13, 14, 39, 61– 62, 63; and testing of scientific instruments, 115– 16; treatment of rickets in children, 13, 131– 32. See also Ranelagh, Katherine Jones (née Boyle), 2nd Viscountess of, influence on and relationship with robert boyle Ranelagh, Katherine Jones (née Boyle), 2nd Viscountess of, written works: “Discourse Concerning the Plague,” 13, 140– 41; letters of in collections of Boyle family papers and those of her male correspondents, 2– 3, 202; “My Lady Rennelagh’s Choice Receipts,” 79– 83, 80; references in Hartlib Papers, 45– 46, 62, 222n36, 225n6; transmutation history of alchemist Dr. Butler, 7, 12, 116– 19, 118. See also recipe books (manuscript) Ranelagh, Richard Jones, 2nd Earl of (son), 111; member of Parliament in Ireland, 130; member of Royal Society, 124, 127; tutoring by Henry Oldenburg, 27, 69, 93, 120; tutoring by John Milton, 45 Ranelagh, Roger Jones, 1st Viscount of (father-in-law), 28– 29, 32– 33; entrusting of Katherine with family financial responsibilities, 26 Ranelagh Gardens, Chelsea, London, 27 Reception & Circulation of Early Modern Women’s Writing (RECIRC) database, NUI Galway, 9, 46, 203, 217n27

286

recipe books (manuscript): Boyle’s “medical commonplace book,” 83; collections of, and public presence, 74– 75, 77; “My Lady Rennelagh’s Choice Receipts,” 79– 81, 80; and Ranelagh’s recipes in family members’ collections, 82; Wellcome Library compilations of medical recipes associated with Boyle family, 82– 83 recipes: “Countess of Kent’s Powder,” 77; Hartlib circle’s recipes and “secrets,” 74– 79; “Lucatella’s Balsam,” 77– 78; “Maid’s Physick,” 75– 76; medical recipes and trials by network of women experts, 74, 76– 78, 182; medical recipes of Dr. Willis, 69, 79, 80; as reflection of domestic role in prevention and treatment of disease, 145; Robert Boyle’s recipes, 8– 9, 81– 83 (see also Boyle, Robert [brother], works); “Sir Walter Raleigh’s Cordial,” 130; “Spirit of Hartshorn,” 153– 54, 161– 62 Renaudot, Théophraste, Bureau d’adresse, 55 Republic of Letters, 15, 144 Restoration society: creation of medical dynasties, 152; emphasis on religious conformity, 12, 122– 23. See also Charles II Robertson, William: A Gate or Door to the Holy Tongue, Opened in English, dedication to Ranelagh, 84– 85, 201; The Second Gate, or the Inner Door to the Holy Tongue, dedication to Ranelagh and John Sadler, 85 Rochester, Henrietta Hyde (née Boyle), Countess of, 150, 192 Rochester, Laurence Hyde, 1st Earl of, 150, 191, 192 Royal Charles, English flagship, 159

•

Index

Royal Society, London, 5, 14, 55, 67– 69, 75, 123– 26, 148– 49, 166; Ranelagh’s exclusion from, 125, 149, 205 Rump Parliament, 121 Russell, Lady Rachel, 192– 93 Russell, Lord William, 192 Sadler, John, 75, 85 sal ammoniac, 153– 54, 181 Sall, Andrew, 177 saltpeter (potassium nitrate), demand for, during English Civil Wars, 53– 54 Sarasohn, Lisa, 14 Scarborough waters, 156 science: discovery and advancement in early modern period, 5; and gender, 4, 15– 16; institutionalization of and decrease in diversity of field, 124– 25. See also chemistry; natural philosophy; Royal Society, London Scientific Revolution, 4– 5 scientific societies, birth of, 5. See also Royal Society, London secrets, 63– 65, 106– 7, 111, 128. See also recipes Shannon, Francis Boyle, 1st Viscount of (brother), 20, 29, 69, 214 Shannon Portrait of the Hon. Robert Boyle F.R.S. (Kerseboom), 169 Shapin, Steven, 8, 168 Sheldon, Gilbert, archbishop of Canterbury, 30, 189 Shortland, Michael, 3– 4 Sidney, Sir Philip, Arcadia, 21 Siege of Limerick, 193 Smith, Nigel, 39 Society of Chemical Physicians, 70, 71, 146, 187 Society of Friends Library, London, copies of Ranelagh’s correspondence with William Penn, 178 spagyria, 6, 120

Index

“specific” medicines, 76, 154, 182– 83 “Spirit of Hartshorn,” 153– 54, 161– 62, 187 Sprat, Thomas, 125– 26 Stalbridge: Boyle family estate at, 11, 26– 29; Robert Boyle residence at, 49, 53, 62, 88, 92, 165 Starkey, George, 65, 70, 116; use of plague to champion chemical medicine, 146 Steno, Nicolas, 180 St. James’s Square, detail of, showing approximate location of Ranelagh’s Pall Mall house, 164 St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin, Kneeling Daughters and Infant Son on tomb of Catherine, Countess of Cork, 24 St. Paul’s Cathedral, destruction of, in Great Fire, 149 Stuart, Elizabeth. See Bohemia, Elizabeth Stuart, Queen of Stubbe, Henry, 146– 47 Sydenham, Dr. Thomas, 163, 182, 204; dedication of Methodus curandi febris to Robert Boyle, 163– 64; Observationes medicae, 180 Symner, Miles, 12, 97, 99 sympathetic medicine, 130– 31 Talbot, Col. Gilbert, 214 Talbot, Lady Dorothy (née Boyle) (sister), 11, 20, 21, 37 Taylor, Elizabeth Anne. See Fitzsimon, Betsey Taylor telescope: development of, 116; and heliocentric models of cosmos, 5 Telling Lives in Science (Shortland and Yeo), 3– 4 Thanet, Elizabeth Tufton, 3rd Countess of (niece), 188, 245n81, 246n104 Thirty Years’ War, 42 transmutation history, 6– 7; Ranelagh’s history of alchemist Dr. Butler, 12, 116– 19, 118

•

287

Tufton, Elizabeth (niece). See Thanet, Elizabeth Tufton, 3rd Countess of (niece) Turquet de Mayerne, Dr. Theodore, 79 Tyrconnell, Lord, 191 Ussher, Archbishop James, 109, 110 Van Helmont, Francis Mercury, 84 Van Helmont, Jan Baptist: “Butler” story, 116, 119; ens veneris, 7, 116, 131; Ortus Medicinae, 116 Van Schurman, Anna Maria, 38– 39, 201 Vere, Lady Mary, 40 Verney, Sir Edmund, 27– 28, 219n55 Verney, Sir Ralph, 21 Walker, Anthony, 173 Wall, Moses, translation of ben Israel’s The Hope of Israel, 86 Waller, William, 59 Wallis, John, 124 Walsh, Ann-Maria, 21 Warwick, Charles Rich, Earl of (brotherin-law), 73, 147, 163, 214 Warwick, Mary Rich (née Boyle), 4th Countess of (sister), 19– 21, 23– 25; death of, 173; diaries, 50; participation in medical and spiritual activities with Ranelagh, 137, 154– 56; preserved and annotated body of manuscripts, 2; Ranelagh’s medical care for, 73; Ranelagh’s shelter with, during plague, 13, 137– 38; references to Ranelagh treating Elizabeth Jones, 188 Webster, Charles, 8, 9, 223n67 Wellcome Library, London, recipe book associated with Boyle family, 82– 83 Wentworth, Thomas, Earl of Strafford, 31, 35, 38 Whichcote, Dr., 147

288

Whitelocke, Bulstrode, 13, 173, 204 Wight, Sarah, conversion of, 11, 55– 57, 87, 149 Wilkins, John, 88, 89, 124 William III (William of Orange), 191– 92, 193 Willis, Dr. Thomas, 89, 156– 57, 165, 189, 204; medical recipes, 69, 79, 80 Willoughby, Elizabeth, 27 Wilmot, Charles, 1st Viscount of, 26 Wingate, Sir Francis, 192– 93 Wingfield, Folliott (later Viscount Powerscourt), 245n81 Winkelmann-Kirch family, astronomical observations of Maria Margaretha and daughters, 4 Winthrop, John, Jr., 26, 117– 19, 124 Wolley, Edward, bishop of Clonfert, 177 women, early modern: ability to change course of contemporary politics through lobbying, 192– 93; chemistry as part of household duties, 7; choices of those interested in natural philosophy in late seventeenth century, 136; dissemination of writings through manuscript coteries and networks, 40, 47, 202; English vernacular healthcare books by, 153; exclusion from field of science with institutionalization, 124– 25; exclusion from intellectual conversations after increased print dissemination, 144; first anthology of writers, 220n9; household as place of scientific and medical experimentation, 125; international epistolary networks of intellectual women, 15; provision of medical care for families, 72– 74; in seventeenth-century intellectual

•

Index

discourse, 38– 39; support for male family members who published scientific books and essays or held academic posts, 38– 39 Women’s Early Modern Letters Online (WEMLO), 9, 217n27 Wood, Robert, 12, 96– 99, 122 Woodroffe, Thomas, 2 Works of Robert Boyle, The (Hunter and Davis), 200 Worsley, Benjamin, 204; and chemistry, 121; and conversion of Sarah Wight, 55– 56; death of, 127, 172; and discussions of religion in response to religiopolitical shift under Charles II, 123; interest in natural philosophy linked to socioreligious reform, 126; involvement in Cromwellian projects in Ireland, 93, 104; lack of association with Royal Society or Royal College of Physicians, 126; and Office of Address project, 55; proposals for saltpeter production workhouse during civil wars, 53– 54; and proposals to improve agricultural husbandry, 66– 67, 126 Wotton, William, 200 Wren, Christopher, 89 Wroth, Lady Mary, 28, 219n55 Wroth, Sir Robert, 28 Yale, Elizabeth, 202 Yeo, Richard, 3– 4 York, Anne Hyde, Duchess of, 155 York, James Stuart, Duke of. See James II Youghal, County Cork, Ireland, 17 Zieglerin, Anna Maria, 7 Zurcher, Amelia, 179