Sir Isaac Newton is popularly known as having developed a theory of gravitation. Folks that have cracked a few books may view him as one of the father’s of modern science and one of the architects of the Mechanistic view of the universe’s function and meaning. Besides all that he was an avid occultist, later characterized as the “last of the magicians.” Here’s an excerpt from the Wikipedia article on that aspect of his work.
“English physicist and mathematician Isaac Newton produced many works that would now be classified as occult studies. These works explored chronology, alchemy, and Biblical interpretation (especially of the Apocalypse). Newton’s scientific work may have been of lesser personal importance to him, as he placed emphasis on rediscovering the occult wisdom of the ancients. In this sense, some historians, including economist John Maynard Keynes, believe that any reference to a “Newtonian Worldview” as being purely mechanical in nature is somewhat inaccurate.[1] Historical research on Newton’s occult studies in relation to his science have also been used to challenge the disenchantment narrative within critical theory.[2]
“After purchasing and studying Newton’s alchemical works, Keynes, for example, opined in 1942 at the tercentenary of his birth that “Newton was not the first of the age of reason, he was the last of the magicians.” In the Early Modern Period of Newton’s lifetime, the educated embraced a world view different from that of later centuries. Distinctions between science, superstition, and pseudoscience were still being formulated, and a devoutly Christian biblical perspective permeated Western culture.
“Newton believed that metals vegetate, that the whole cosmos/matter is alive and that gravity is caused by emissions of an alchemical principle he called salniter.[3]”
Read the entire posting
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Newton%27s_occult_studies.
thanks to Soror Amy for the tip!
