John Bulwer and the Quest for a Universal Language, 1641–1644

Abstract

SummaryA pioneer of the language sciences, John Bulwer (1606–1656) published on universal language at the beginning of the English ‘scientific revolution’. The Comenians, centered in Bulwer’s own city of London and known for open communication, were interested in this subject area; yet Bulwer’s contact with them, if any, is unclear. This article argues that Bulwer’s Baconian research program on expression and gesture was the response of a non-puritan physician to the convergence of three factors: publication of John Wilkins’sMercury(1641); ongoing discussions about universal language during Comenius’s stay in England (September 1641–June 1642); and the religious-political crisis of the time.