Seite - 346 - in Maximilian Hell (1720–92) - And the Ends of Jesuit Science in Enlightenment Europe

Chapter 8346 “ historical-philosophical” one. The academy, von Hess argued, ought to be fi- nanced either by issuing calendars, or by imposing a nationwide tax on the book trade. Hell’s proposal7 was more modest in scientific terms but seeming- ly  more detailed with regard to financial planning. He argued that the Vien- nese academy, like its older sisters in London and Paris, ought to focus on “ physikalisch-mathematische” disciplines—astronomy, geometry, mechanics, physics, botany, anatomy, and chemistry—only. Hell established this proposi- tion on epistemological and methodological grounds. The goal of a learned society is “the elevation of the sciences on a higher level; and the society achieves this goal by new findings and discoveries, which do not yet exist, in the sciences” by the application of the spirit of observation and invention that imbues men of science.8 Fields of learning that, in the strict sense, are not suit- able for making such new discoveries—like theology and metaphysics (Hell is emphatic about the need for a sharp distinction between knowledge and faith), as well as the arts and antiquarian studies—should not be mingled in the academy, and if they are to be organized in a learned society at all, it ought to be a separate one. Hell asked rhetorically: Should the refined mind, that possesses no knowledge in mathematics, physics, astronomy, mechanics etc., follow lectures and profound demon- strations, watch subtle experiments, formulate judgments on these, of which he understands nothing and grasps nothing, and which have no influence on his field, nor any use for it; and similarly, should the pro- found astronomer, mathematician, geometer, physicist admire and ap- preciate the fine essays on the improvement of the German language, orthography, poetry, and theater?9 Besides the thematic focus, Hell also pressed for following the London and Paris models in the ethos of sociability as the basis of the convening and the operation of the academy as a “friendly association of a few men of superior learning” who “assemble voluntarily as friends thanks to their harmony of tem- per.” At first sight, this closely resembles the enlightened values cherished 7 The full text of Maximilian Hell, “Patriotischer Plan einer Kayserlich-Königlichen zu Wienn errichtenden gelehrten Gesellschaft, oder Academie der Wissenschaften” is available in Hans Schlitter, Gründung der kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der vormärzlichen Österreich (Vienna: Hölder, 1921), 66–112. Excerpts (the substantive parts, without the lengthy sections on organization and procedure) have been published in Lengyel and Tüskés, Learned Societies, 67–75. 8 Lengyel and Tüskés, Learned Societies, 68. 9 Lengyel and Tüskés, Learned Societies, 69–70.