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Locating John Toland Introduction . Locating John Toland T was desperately ill. He had recurring ‘pains in my thighs, reins and stomach’ accompanied by ‘a total loss of appetite, hourly retchings, and very high colour’d water’. His hopes that this suffering was the symptom of ‘gravel’ that would pass with the stones were dashed. Confined to his chamber for weeks, he could keep down nothing but weak broth, and was scarcely able to walk. Reduced to relying on the kindnesses of others by disastrous investments in the fashionable speculations of South Sea Company
This book offers a full account of the role played by seventeenth- and eighteenth-century English Republican ideas in eighteenth-century France. Challenging some of the dominant accounts of the Republican tradition, it revises conventional understandings of what Republicanism meant in both Britain and France during the eighteenth century, offering a distinctive trajectory as regards ancient and modern constructions and highlighting variety rather than homogeneity within the tradition. The book thus offers a new perspective on both the legacy of the English Republican tradition and the origins and thought of the French Revolution. It centres around a series of case studies that focus on a number of colourful and influential characters including John Toland, Viscount Bolingbroke, John Wilkes, and the Comte de Mirabeau.
This book explores the life, thought and political commitments of the free-thinker John Toland (1670–1722). Studying both his private archive and published works, it illustrates how he moved in both subversive and elite political circles in England and abroad. The book explores the connections between Toland's republican political thought and his irreligious belief about Christian doctrine, the ecclesiastical establishment and divine revelation, arguing that far from being a marginal and insignificant figure, he counted queens, princes and government ministers as his friends and political associates. In particular, Toland's intimate relationship with the Electress Sophia of Hanover saw him act as a court philosopher, but also as a powerful publicist for the Hanoverian succession. The book argues that he shaped the republican tradition after the Glorious Revolution into a practical and politically viable programme, focused not on destroying the monarchy but on reforming public religion and the Church of England. It also examines how Toland used his social intimacy with a wide circle of men and women (ranging from Prince Eugene of Savoy to Robert Harley) to distribute his ideas in private. The book explores the connections between his erudition and print culture, arguing that his intellectual project was aimed at compromising the authority of Christian ‘knowledge’ as much as the political power of the Church. Overall, it illustrates how Toland's ideas and influence impacted upon English political life between the 1690s and the 1720s.
consequences of noting the difference of form and audience has sometimes obscured and fragmented the integrity of intentions articulated in his writings. For some historians the ‘real’ John Toland is only present in the clandestine, secret, shadowy Masonic coteries, while the public Toland was little more than a hypocritical gad-fly irritating the orthodox establishment. This understanding not only devalues the sophistication of Toland’s public writing, but mis-characterises his similarly creative exploitation of manuscript publication. Manuscripts were not simply a
articulated political theory in defence of these liberties. NOTES 1 A. Boyer The political state of Great Britain XXIII (1722) p. 342. 2 BL Add Ms 5853 fo. 385. 3 Collections 2 pp. 301–304. 4 Ibid. pp. 309–313. 5 See Correspondence V No 29. 6 See J. A. I. Champion ‘John Toland: the politics of Pantheism’ Revue de Synthèse 116 86 MUP/Champion_04_Ch3 86 27/2/03, 10:18 am Reading scripture (1995) pp. 259–280. A more detailed account of the prosecution of Christianity not mysterious can be found in J. A. I. Champion ‘Making authority: belief, conviction and reason in the
allegiance to William and Mary, claiming that while James lived the oaths given to him could not be abrogated.1 These nonjurors, though relatively small in number, will appear frequently in this history of deism. Indeed, we will see that the popular view of deism is mostly a characterisation created by them. The fear of High Churchmen that too much religious tolerance posed both political and religious threats to England was seemingly confirmed in 1693 when a young John Toland sailed for England. It was against this backdrop of religious uncertainty that our deists wrote
Communities of readers 2 . Publishing reason: John Toland and print and scribal communities T OLAND did more than simply read and write books: he was a key agent in disseminating ideas around the elite salons of early eighteenth-century Europe. In the last chapter Toland’s involvement in a world of learning and the library was explored. One of the intentions was to underscore the social dimensions of this world of learning: gaining entrance to the inner sanctum of a man’s library was a means of getting inside his head. In locating Toland in this milieu we
and soul. To bolster his arguments, Strutt referred readers to ‘what has been already so successfully offer’d on that Head’ by ‘the learn’d’ John Toland in Letters to Serena. Toland was also the author of Christianity not Mysterious, the book which is seen as initiating the entire deist controversy in England, from about 1696 to 1742. Strutt further suggested, using arguments provided by another deist, Anthony Collins as support, that because natural philosophers did not know the precise make-up of matter, no one could conclude exactly what properties it did possess
Rewriting the commonwealth 4 . Editing the republic: Milton, Harrington and the Williamite monarchy, 1698–1714 A T some point in 1694, John Toland frequented Jack’s Coffee House in King’s Street, London. Recently arrived from Oxford, he struck up conversation with two persons ‘wholly unknown to him’. Boldly he opened the discussion with a powerful statement of political identity: ‘I am a commonwealth’s Man, tho’ I live at Whitehall, and that is a Mistery’. Continuing in this vein he challenged his auditors, ‘if any man will give me Ten guineas, I will go to
therefore fundamental blasphemy. NOTES 1 F. H. Heinemann ‘John Toland, France, Holland, and Dr Williams’ Review of English Studies 25 (1949) pp. 346–349 at 346. 2 Tolandiana pp. 241, 244, 246. 3 Sullivan Toland esp. pp. 46–47. 4 See F. Schmidt ‘John Toland, critique Deiste de la littérature Apocryphe’ Apocrypha 1 (1990) pp. 119–145; B. E. Schwarzbach ‘The sacred genealogy of a Voltairean polemic: the development of critical hypotheses regarding the composition of the canonical gospels’ Studies in Voltaire and the eighteenth century 245 (1986) pp. 303–349. 5 See Nazarenus