Not a misprint, the penny-a-page price reflects Liberty Fund's
desire to make accessible natural law and early modern writings,
such as this refutation of Hobbes by a future Bishop of
Peterborough (1691-1718, replacing a non-juror). Originally
published in Latin in 1672, the treatise was translated, prefaced,
and subjoined by John Maxwell in 1727, the edition republished
here. Among intellectually alert, progressive, Cambridge-educated
Anglican clergy, committed to both new scientific discoveries and
Christian theology, Cumberland (1632-1718) owed the opportunity for
his work to Sir Orlando Bridgeman's patronage and its occasion to
disputes over religious toleration. Preceding Locke, influencing
Pufendorf, Cumberland argued that a "natural duty of sociability"
supplements and supercedes Hobbesian self-preservation, with
individual interests best served by pursuit of the common good. To
that law of nature, God has attached sanctions and rewards, clues
in nature itself to the order he enjoins. Peace and plenty are the
reward of cooperation, a state of war the scourge of Hobbesian
self-interest.
Among the features of this edition, the play between 1672 and 1727,
Cumberland's time and Maxwell's, is especially instructive. Mr.
Parkin suggests that Maxwell's two introductory essays on heathen
errors relative to the deity and morality are intended to shore up
revelation, fending off deistic inroads permitted by Cumberland's
more generous account of the ancients. Describing pagan views of
divinity and the afterlife, from Homer through the Egyptians to the
Zoroastrians, with a running attack on Epicurus and a side-swipe at
"Heretical-Pagan-Gnosticks," Maxwell provides a fascinating account
of the doctrines themselves, the state of comparative knowledge in
his time, and the threat to orthodoxy proposed by enthusiasm for
alternate systems, including bishops who propose that all moral
essentials were known to the ancients.
For Maxwell, original sin is more closely allied to sexuality,
"concupiscence," than to violence, and he inveighs at length
against such nasty pagan practices as prostitutes of both sexes,
"genteel. . .Lovers of Boys," the community of women, and Spartan
spectacles of naked women. He does, however, correct Cumberland's
easy assertion that the husband has power over the wife because of
his natural superiority. "Greater Strength of either Body, or Mind,
is not universal in Men," he notes, so a woman superior in fortune
or sense might stipulate by contract the dominion ordinarily
accorded men.
"Intelligent design" appears, from Cicero through Cumberland to
Shaftesbury, cited at length in the appendix on the law of nature.
A popular essay might be written on how a doctrine originally
welcoming science turned into an attempt to deny science. Maxwell's
other appendix refutes Dodwell's argument that the soul is material
before baptism. Marking the new primacy of the body, Cumberland
argues about the brain and Maxwell shudders at Stoic principles
that discount the body, condemning its sympathy with the mind.
Rhetorically, the structure of Maxwell's book is peculiar: his
introductory essays revile the ancients' world souls and unified
world view, but the subjoined essay on the law of nature deploys
pre-Popean praise of such unity from Shaftesbury and others, so
that "natural law" ends beautifully, in spite of the neo-Calvinist
evil of pagan goodness advanced at the outset.
The edition is exemplary. It clearly explains a complex publishing
history, identifying important ancillary materials and
bibliography, amplifies Maxwell's and Cumberland's citations,
including when possible the editions they used. . . .A special
treat is the 791-member subscribers list, including twenty women
and Dr. Arbuthnot, Berkeley as Dean of Derry, Eustace Budgell of
the Middle Temple, Esq., and in large paper, the oft-cited Anthony
Collins and Sir Isaac Newton, as well as Ambrose Philips and Thomas
Tickell.
The Scriblerian
Spring 2007
. . . .The present edition includes the notes and comments on
Cumberland's text added by his translator in the 1727 edition.
Maxwell, no doubt inspired by the way Barbeyrac had translated and
annotated Grotius and Pufendorf, followed the example, made
supplementary remarks and occassionally registered disagreement
with his author. . . .As for the editing, the accuracy of the
transcription from the 1727 original, which preserves
capitalization, is truly impressive. . . .The editor has done
excellent work in supplying additional information, by giving
accurate references to works mentioned, and in other ways to assist
present-day readers. This also applies to editorial amendments to
Maxwell's text. On the whole, the editorial input is most
impressive. . . .
Thomas Mautner
Australian National University
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