Medical Science and the Anatomia Animata in Milton's Paradise Lost

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discourses that can describe the same ultimate referent. Thus the final question is whether or not the poem manages to make these models coherent in the natural philosophy of the body and the created world, and if it does, how precisely does it do so? 43
Chapter 2 Aristotelian Soul and some problems of monism We have touched upon the problems of heresy that monism evoked in the seventeenth century and concede with John Rogers and Christopher Hill that the proliferation of monist models of natural philosophy were part of the ‘Vitalist Moment’ that issued an uncomfortable challenge to authoritarian structures of power, whether monarchic political models or determinist theologies. Having located Milton’s monism of body and soul within a framework of natural philosophy, we have noted that it bears the hallmarks of Aristotelian organisation of knowledge in the system of causes, the notions of vital, sensitive and rational faculties, their actions and affections, and the impelling power of ‘spirit’ in body and world. There are, however, several areas of Aristotelian orthodoxy that Milton himself modifies or even reverses. Most fundamental of these is the thesis of the non-activity of matter and the corresponding form/matter dualism. In his representation of generation we find a careful modification of the theory of eduction of forms, and in the Christian Doctrine a revision of the tradition of God as Actus Purus (and an associated attribution of divine origin to matter) which undoes the corresponding Christian elaboration of form/matter dualism. Milton counters and reorganises these problems in the philosophical mode of the Art of Logic and in the poetic mode of Paradise Lost in the same ways that Glisson and Harvey do, providing less detail, but also giving a theological framework that both supports and demands such a system of natural philosophy. In fact what we will see is that in the medical context Aristotelian thought offers monism a wide, flexible inheritance of thought – specifically a system of four causal modes rather than just the binary of form and matter. There is, moreover, a corpus of observational natural history and philosophy identified by Newman and Pagel within this tradition, which seems to contribute more to the burgeoning ‘scientific revolution’ of the seventeenth century than has been noted by Milton criticism. 44
Page 1 and 2: “Your bodies may at last turn all
Page 3 and 4: This work is dedicated to my parent
Page 5 and 6: Contents Introduction: Milton and t
Page 7 and 8: Tentative diagnoses of amaurosis or
Page 9 and 10: fenugreek, and of tragagant are to
Page 11 and 12: it. 16 Here the treatments in quest
Page 13 and 14: included a study of the lacteals, w
Page 15 and 16: indeed they do not, nor yet Aristot
Page 17 and 18: alternative views as traditional an
Page 19 and 20: themselves capable of actions and r
Page 21 and 22: and head) were separate and humours
Page 23 and 24: Goutish pain.” 55 Of course the p
Page 25 and 26: all” speech. Finally I turn from
Page 27 and 28: each other, thus validating both th
Page 29 and 30: ubiquitous and fertile nature of th
Page 31 and 32: The idea that the spirit of man is
Page 33 and 34: Aristotelian form, Platonic ideas o
Page 35 and 36: Milton’s reference to the “spir
Page 37 and 38: lood, flesh, or nerve. And activity
Page 39 and 40: tripartite structure in Walker’s
Page 41 and 42: iii. Material and immaterial spirit
Page 43 and 44: published in Latin in 1672. Althoug
Page 45 and 46: In his teaching notes from Cambridg
Page 47: The different discourses of theolog
Page 51 and 52: insists on the creative agency of d
Page 53 and 54: the body by enabling it to step out
Page 55 and 56: how the definition of form “combi
Page 57 and 58: and, of course, fiscal economy were
Page 59 and 60: unknown to the ancients. There is n
Page 61 and 62: iii. Milton’s Aristotle: the prob
Page 63 and 64: father”. 142 In the Art of Logic,
Page 65 and 66: properties and virtues Adam has asc
Page 67 and 68: efuses to give a definitive answer
Page 69 and 70: modified so that bodily fluids and
Page 71 and 72: Ambrose Paré had also categorised
Page 73 and 74: central importance to this schema a
Page 75 and 76: and sole cause of all things, he un
Page 77 and 78: which renovates the traditionally m
Page 79 and 80: of the divine voice which went fort
Page 81 and 82: its tendency to ascribe to things t
Page 83 and 84: extensively, nevertheless dismisses
Page 85 and 86: Harvey’s experimental work with a
Page 87 and 88: manuscripts of Glisson’s, in part
Page 89 and 90: superseded Aristotelian theory) to
Page 91 and 92: Glisson notes as biousia. Its eleme
Page 93 and 94: degree to such an elevated fastigiu
Page 95 and 96: evolutionary potential at the expen
Page 97 and 98: attraction is based on the famous p
Page 99 and 100:
the animation of substance involves
Page 101 and 102:
“intimately intermingled with the
Page 103 and 104:
show the 4 elements, they did not s
Page 105 and 106:
eturn to Presocratic chaos. 262 Thu
Page 107 and 108:
of incoherent, unformed matter; in
Page 109 and 110:
continue to play out in journals of
Page 111 and 112:
Yet this is precisely the process t
Page 113 and 114:
the ‘warm, prolific humour’ of
Page 115 and 116:
gradually heats the vital fluid in
Page 117 and 118:
There are two possible problems wit
Page 119 and 120:
“overshadowing spirit” ride int
Page 121 and 122:
characterised by a self-active mate
Page 123 and 124:
This is the process through which t
Page 125 and 126:
are being excluded, since Milton is
Page 127 and 128:
“offspring of Heav’n firstborn
Page 129 and 130:
investment of power and dignity cor
Page 131 and 132:
God has withdrawn himself from the
Page 133 and 134:
the optic nerve. Giglioni explores
Page 135 and 136:
Which of us who beholds the bright
Page 137 and 138:
Chapter 5 Body into spirit i. Model
Page 139 and 140:
spirit. This was an unusual solutio
Page 141 and 142:
statements in the Christian Doctrin
Page 143 and 144:
(spirit, light, matter) to be respo
Page 145 and 146:
Raphael’s addition given to this
Page 147 and 148:
Willis too notes that artificially
Page 149 and 150:
from diseases, to delay old age, an
Page 151 and 152:
Raymond has recently proposed that
Page 153 and 154:
meat scarse chawed, and the drinke
Page 155 and 156:
While Glisson was extremely heretic
Page 157 and 158:
can be ingested and acted upon by s
Page 159 and 160:
whence at length are made diversiti
Page 161 and 162:
otanical contexts for ‘balm’. 3
Page 163 and 164:
its angelic guest; the sunlight and
Page 165 and 166:
unfeigned shows a slight discomfort
Page 167 and 168:
If we adde to Vegetation and Sensat
Page 169 and 170:
degrees up through the intellectual
Page 171 and 172:
so that in the transition they beco
Page 173 and 174:
subversive radicals.” 420 The not
Page 175 and 176:
This is a transition from multiple
Page 177 and 178:
[B]y his infinite wisdom and power,
Page 179 and 180:
i. Discordance in the vitae chorea
Page 181 and 182:
Among unequals what society Can sor
Page 183 and 184:
espond to the ordering influence of
Page 185 and 186:
natural motion of the spirit and ma
Page 187 and 188:
man’s component parts. In the tox
Page 189 and 190:
differentiated approach is thus clo
Page 191 and 192:
As with new wine intoxicated both T
Page 193 and 194:
A thing not undesirable, sometime S
Page 195 and 196:
close to replicating. He describes
Page 197 and 198:
till dewy sleep Oppressed them, wea
Page 199 and 200:
iv. Sulphur and nitre in Paradise L
Page 201 and 202:
appeared in hue, as when the force
Page 203 and 204:
Unlike heaven and earth, the ground
Page 205 and 206:
first behold The effects which thy
Page 207 and 208:
Despite the actual discordance that
Page 209 and 210:
alm of paradise if it functions as
Page 211 and 212:
Chaos is once again subject to forc
Page 213 and 214:
are “not substances; they are ‘
Page 215 and 216:
vii. Regeneration and mercy The des
Page 217 and 218:
(PL 11. 22-36) 491 The physiology o
Page 219 and 220:
This calm, gentle process mirrors t
Page 221 and 222:
perfecting motion of spirit-matter
Page 223 and 224:
they, like the free human beings th
Page 225 and 226:
---. Natural History of the Passion
Page 227 and 228:
Secondary Sources ABRAHAM, LYNDY.
Page 229 and 230:
FALLON, STEPHEN. Milton Among the P
Page 231 and 232:
Seventeenth-Century England. Ed. O.
Page 233 and 234:
NORTON, MARY F. ‘“The Rising Wo
Page 235 and 236:
SCHOENFELDT, MICHAEL. Bodies and Se
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Medical Science and the Anatomia Animata in Milton's Paradise Lost

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