Welcome to the Best of the West, compliments of the Foundations Forum. Start your day with a 'who's who' of the Western tradition, a sampling of sublime verse, and an idea or two to mull over. Take a break from modernity to reflect on the good, the true, and the beautiful with us.
Today's reading time is 5 minutes.
Spotlight: Sir Isaac Newton
Sir Isaac Newton by Sir Godfrey Kneller, oil on canvas, c. 1689
Born in 1643 in Woolsthorpe, England, Newton entered Trinity College, Cambridge, during a time of political and scientific upheaval. When the university temporarily closed due to the plague in 1665–1666, he returned home and began developing ideas that would later revolutionize science.
Few people realize that Sir Isaac Newton was an amateur theologian before he became a famous scientist. Although history remembers him primarily for his groundbreaking work in mathematics and physics, Newton devoted much of his intellectual energy to religious study, writing extensively on biblical prophecy and church history. (Apparently, Newton was secretly an Arian; a belief his contemporary John Milton, may have shared.)
In 1687, Newton published Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica, commonly known as the Principia. In this monumental work, he articulated the three laws of motion and the law of universal gravitation, demonstrating that the same force governing a falling apple also controlled the motion of the moon and planets. His achievement unified terrestrial and celestial mechanics under a single mathematical framework, fundamentally transforming humanity’s understanding of the universe.
Newton’s work in optics was equally influential. He demonstrated that white light is composed of a spectrum of colours and built the first practical reflecting telescope, now known as the Newtonian telescope. These contributions established him as one of the leading scientific minds of his era.
Beyond academia, Newton’s lifetime spanned the turbulence of the English Civil War and the Glorious Revolution; he lived through the Long Parliament, and would have witnessed the end of the Stuart dynasty when William III (William of Orange) was invited to take the British throne. (Newton also lived amongst famous thinkers like John Milton and John Locke, who were reshaping political thought during his lifetime.)
Later in his career, Newton served as Warden and then Master of the Royal Mint, where he reformed England’s coinage and pursued counterfeiters with an avid determination. He was Knighted in 1705 by Queen Anne.
Newton’s enduring legacy lies not only in specific scientific laws but in his synthesis of empirical rigour with metaphysical inquiry, which stands out from the work of some of the rigid empiricists who would follow him. For Newton, the study of motion, gravity, and light did not exclude metaphysical or theological reflection; rather, it complemented it.
Verse: 'Ulysses' by Alfred Lord Tennyson
There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail:
There gloom the dark, broad seas. My mariners,
Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought with me—
That ever with a frolic welcome took
The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed
Free hearts, free foreheads—you and I are old;
Old age hath yet his honour and his toil;
Death closes all: but something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:
The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,
'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho'
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
‘Ulysses’ was written by Tennyson in blank verse in 1833. Its narrator is Ulysses (Odysseus), the famous hero from the Trojan War. The poet has him contemplating another voyage with his men; despite their age, they may yet achieve great deeds. Above is just the final stanza of this exquisite poem; read it in its entirety here.
Pensées
Wisdom’s Rebuke (From the book of Proverbs 1: 20-23)
‘Wisdom crieth without; she uttereth her voice in the streets:
She crieth in the chief place of concourse, in the openings of the gates: in the city she uttereth her words, saying,
“How long, ye simple ones, will ye love simplicity? and the scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge?
Turn you at my reproof: behold, I will pour out my spirit unto you, I will make known my words unto you.”’
Q: As the proverb says, ‘fools hate knowledge’, yet we live in a society where traditional wisdom is spurned. How can we revive a love of wisdom in our fellow citizens?
Diversions
Watch: An honest conversation about colonialism with Lord Nigel Biggar and the MacDonald-Laurier Institute.
Listen to the choir of Merton College, Oxford sing the Te Deum.
Peter Copeland explains in Without Diminishment why conservatives need to be intentional about technology (partial paywall).
141 years after it was painted, Monet’s La Seine près de Giverny continues to inspire.
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