Page - 98 - in Maximilian Hell (1720–92) - And the Ends of Jesuit Science in Enlightenment Europe

Chapter 298 elaborated in the fifth point, working for and especially on the public implied an educational mission that pointed beyond the discipline of astronomy and was to engage and undermine the meanings traditionally associated with ce- lestial phenomena. The explicit injunction to level sound astronomical and other scientific knowledge against superstitious beliefs via the supervision of calendars—the practical guide of the common man for locating himself in time by an overview of the seasons, holidays, rendering or prescribing specific activities to them, marking ordinary or curious occurrences and proposing modes of relating to them—could well be understood as an attempt to enlist, perhaps even against his own inclination, the Jesuit scholar for the cause of Enlightenment. Given Van Swieten’s pervasive influence and his frontal offen- sive against every manner of superstition, this would not be implausible, ex- cept that there was nothing particularly unpalatable in it for a loyal member of the Society of Jesus. In fact, on Hell’s own testimony, the instruction for him was conceived by no other than Father Franz.28 Inasmuch as it was an Enlight- enment document, the Enlightenment in question is a Jesuit one. In any case, the first half of the 1750s was exactly the time when the issue of superstition was put into the limelight in the Habsburg monarchy by cases of alleged “vampirism” or magia posthuma—revenants harming the living—in Serbia, the Banat, and Moravia.29 While military surgeons active in the south- ern frontier regions inquired into the cases in the former two provinces, court physicians were sent to investigate those in Moravia, and their reports (togeth- er with Van Swieten’s advice pursuant to them) served as the basis for Maria Theresa’s decision to take legal measures to stamp out “superstition.” In March 1755, during the period immediately preceding the issuance of the instruction to Hell, a royal rescript forbade traditional measures against magia posthuma, which was followed by a circular letter to the parishes and courts of Hungary condemning a broader range of superstitious beliefs, including soothsaying, treasure-digging, divination, and the persecution of witches. In September, an- other decree prohibited the clergy from intervening in vampire cases without the approval of the secular authorities, and required consultation with medi- cal specialists. It also ordered the translation from the original French into 28 Hell to Delisle, Vienna, February 2, 1758 (Archives nationales, Paris, mar/2JJ/66). 29 On these cases and their impact, including Van Swieten’s involvement, see Gábor Klani- czay, “Decline of Witches and Rise of Vampires in 18th-Century Habsburg Monarchy,” Eth- nologia Europaea 17 (1987): 165–80; Ádám Mézes, “Insecure Boundaries: Medical Experts and the Returning Dead on the Southern Habsburg Borderland” (MA thesis, Central Eu- ropean University, 2013); www.etd.ceu.hu/2013/mezes_adam.pdf (accessed April 15, 2019). It is perhaps worth noting that this aspect of the instructions was missing from the sum- mary in Hell’s 1758 letter to Delisle mentioned above, n. 14.