Page - 143 - in Maximilian Hell (1720–92) - And the Ends of Jesuit Science in Enlightenment Europe

143The 1761 Transit of Venus and Hell’s Transition to Fame Possibly, he will receive assistance in this endeavor from Father Bosco- vich, whose arrival among us is awaited any day soon. If this turns out to be the case, then our court—along with the rest of our adversaries—will surely be confirmed in their opinion, which we hear uttered every day, that the Jesuits of this [i.e., the Austrian] province are ignorant of the sci- ences. Surely, in case I had been in Father Liesganig’s shoes, I would ei- ther have refused to accept help from a foreign province, or refused to take upon my shoulders such a burden, barely sustainable even for the greatest of men. That Liesganig succeeded, and without the help of Boscovich at that, is an- other story altogether.17 What is of interest is that Hell’s care for the prestige of Jesuit astronomy—with geodesy as a related field—did not restrict itself to the Austrian province alone. Further on in the same letter, the honor of the Habsburg capital is defended, exactly like Hell had been ordered in his instruc- tion when appointed several years earlier: Monsieur Chappe [d’Auteroche] stayed here for a few days until he left us on January 9 to go to St. Petersburg, from where he will proceed to To- bolsk. He was astonished to see how well equipped we are, both at the observatory of the [Jesuit] collegium and at my own. He asked me wheth- er there were any lay practitioners of this science around. When I con- firmed this, he retorted that astronomy in this city of ours was held in no esteem whatsoever among foreigners. Overall, during the few days that he stayed in this city he had experienced that, apart from the Jesuits and Prince Liechtenstein, all other persons he had met were fairly ignorant of the hard sciences. […] This extremely friendly gentleman intends, on his return from Muscovy, to pay a visit to the mines of Hungary, in case this is allowed him by the academy [i.e., the Académie des Sciences], and I will gladly join him. Thus, in his personal encounter with a Venus transit expeditionist commis- sioned by the Académie des Sciences, Hell’s “cultural capital” as the scion of a family of mining engineers is brought to the fore, alongside his role as a “nodal astronomer,” inspiring laymen to engage in the noble art of astronomy. His care for the reputation of the Society’s Austrian province and the Habsburg capital go hand in hand. 17 See above, 123–25.