ENGLISH

Solomon's Secret Arts: The Occult in the Age of Enlightenment

By Paul Kleber Monod

Book information

Publisher
Yale University Press
Year
2013
ISBN
0300123582, 9780300123586
LCC
BF1611.M65 2013
Google Books ID
dmFQGRfpvm8C
Language
english
Format
PDF
Filesize
22 MB (23522738 bytes)
Pages
440\457
Scanned
no
Time added
2013-08-22 17:13:32

Description

The late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries are known as the Age of Enlightenment, a time of science and reason. But in this illuminating book, Paul Monod reveals the surprising extent to which Newton, Boyle, Locke, and other giants of rational thought and empiricism also embraced the spiritual, the magical, and the occult. Although public acceptance of occult and magical practices waxed and waned during this period they survived underground, experiencing a considerable revival in the mid-eighteenth century with the rise of new antiestablishment religious denominations. The occult spilled over into politics with the radicalism of the French Revolution and into literature in early Romanticism. Even when official disapproval was at its strongest, the evidence points to a growing audience for occult publications as well as to subversive popular enthusiasm. Ultimately, finds Monod, the occult was not discarded in favor of “reason” but was incorporated into new forms of learning. In that sense, the occult is part of the modern world, not simply a relic of an unenlightened past, and is still with us today.

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