Patrons of the Nation

Abstract

This chapter illustrates the eighteenth century as an age of improvement in which letters of scholars criss-crossed Europe and North America, even India or China, in an active pursuit and sharing of knowledge. It talks about the scholar's letters that transcended all political and social barriers and confirmed to a specific agenda set by Francis Bacon, an English politician and philosopher of the early seventeenth century. It also discusses the “Baconian programme,” which was aimed to accumulate and rigorously test knowledge. The chapter highlights the Baconian obsession with collection and cataloguing that was applied beyond natural philosophy, to history, archaeology, and ancient languages. It also mentions the founding of the “Royal Society of London for the Improvement of Natural Knowledge” in 1660, as well as the establishment of the “Académie des Sciences” in France.