The Third Force in Seventeenth-Century Thought: Skepticism, Science and Millenarianism

Abstract

The philosophical battle of the seventeenth century is usually presented as a contest between two philosophies — Cartesian rationalism and British empiricism — each of which was set forth in order to justify “the new science.” Thinkers who do not fit in these categories are usually ignored or treated as strange, unrelated figures, as one finds in the discussion of Herbert of Cherbury, Gassendi, Hobbes, the Cambridge Platonists, Kenelm Digby, John Seargant, and Comenius, among others.