In The
Botanic Garden, Erasmus Darwin drew on the Rosicrucian doctrine
of Gnomes, Sylphs Nymphs, and Salamanders to write a poem on
contemporary natural philosophy. In the text of the poem, he
combined Ancient philosophy and Enlightenment sensibilities,
all wrapped in deliciously and dangerously sensual and sexual
language. It is the subtext that we find Darwin’s poem
is a brilliant synthesis of the above with the new sciences:
In Gnomes,
Darwin writes:
“You! whose fine fingers fill the organic cells,
With virgin earth, of woods and bones and shells;
Mould with retractile glue their spongy beds,
And stretch and strengthen all their fibre threads.”
and explains
in a footnote that “Mould with retractile glue”
refers to the belief that the constituent parts of animal fibres
are made of earth and gluten, which are separated only by long
putrefaction or by fire. He refers his readers to Antoine Lavoisier’s
work on “the chemical composition of animal and vegetable
bodies.”
An example of how Erasmus Darwin and his generation
understood the “cycle of life” lies
in the stanza:
“Late
when the mass obeys its changeful doom,
and sinks to earth, cradle and its tomb,
Gnomes! with nice eye the flow solution watch,
With fostering hand the parting atoms catch,
Join in new forms, combine with life and sense,
And guide and guard the transmigrating Ens.”