[X] My Assistant

[djellison]

Not every day you get to do this - I'm posting from an outhouse of Newton's birthplace - Woolsthorpe Manor in Lincolnshire. Yes - it has an apple orchard, and yes, it has his bedroom where he used a south facing window to split light into its spectrum. Sadly, you can't take pictures in the house, but I've got some nice ones from outside that I'll post when we get home in a few hours!


Doug

[djellison]

Superstition and things of that nature were HUGE during Newtons time - for instance people would draw a 5 fingered hand on the wall - because anyone who HAD 5 fingers was declared a witch and a witch could just knock on your door and demand accomodation...just inside the door at Woolesthorpe is scratching on the wall of a 5 fingered hand so if such an event were to transpire they could say "sorry - already got one staying here, look - that's her hand"

To have dismissed superstition and even the belief that God was all powerfull and all controlling in the late 1600's would have been considered very very strange indeed. The plague would have played a major part in life in Britain during the pivotal period of Newtons life and superstition, alchemy, witchcraft etc were rife in that period.

Lest we forget, Galileo (who's life story is of course highly exagerated w.r.t. house arrests and torture and the like) died just lest than a year before the birth of Newton, and I have no doubt that Newton would have felt a need to 'coform' to the 'system' for fear of being silenced, arrested or worse.

It's a common symptom of intellectual brilliance - strangeness.

Just because he wasn't a model citizen, hit achievments are not to be underestimated - and his heavy mercury doses because of his alchemy work could well explain much of his behaviour.

Doug