The Theater of Nature: Jean Bodin and Renaissance Science.

Ann Blair. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997. 382 pp. $45. ISBN: 0-691-005675-7.

"How is it possible to understand the whole universe?" asked the author of a 1643 geography, Theatre de l'univers, "[W]hat could we read that would treat absolutely everything? Thus he despaired of satisfying the encyclopedic ambitions announced by the popular literary form of "theater" (175). In her "histoire totale" of Jean Bodin's Universae Naturae Theatrum (1596), Ann Blair explains how Bodin thought it was possible to understand and treat absolutely everything (at least everything in natural philosophy), and why he thought he should.

The importance of Bodin's other writings justify a comprehensive and modern study of his last work. But Blair has additional reasons for an in-depth investigation: because the Theatrum combines "a traditional practice of natural philosophy" and "irenicist agenda . . . shared with other late humanists," it "opens a new window onto the methods, motivations and difficulties of a kind of natural philosophy not often studied by historians of science" (3). And the natural philosophy of Bodin's era, which was both ubiquitous and popular, constitute the proper context for appreciating the revolutionary achievements of the major seventeenth-century figures who followed.

Thus Bodin's Theatrum promises a glimpse into a pre-Baconian, pre-Cartesian world of "science," and Blair admirably fulfills that promise with a densely packed, extremely well-informed study. Through her analysis, we enter a world where "demonstration," "experience," and "evidence" had significantly different meanings and applications; where qualitative, not quantitative, description prevailed; and where sheer quantity - more examples, more complexity, more authorities - carried demonstrative force (while also proving the author's erudition and God's plenitude). Here a lawyer need not fear to tread out of respect for the kind of disciplinary divides that bound our intellectual endeavors, and the reader, his faith perchance shaken by the religious wars, could find reassurance of divine providence.

Blair deserves praise for grappling with the Theatrum's totality, thoroughly explicating the traditions that shaped everything from Bodin's rhetorical strategies to his principles of selection. She rightly rejects the typical scholarly approach to a late Renaissance polymath like Bodin - "parceling out his contributions to different disciplines and evaluating them separately" (12). She shows how Bodin's arguments were shaped by a "bookish" intellectual culture, medieval assumptions, a shallow anti-Aristotelianism, and a corrosive lawyerly dialectic. Behind the Theatrum she finds the commonplace book, which by liberating "facts" from their original contexts made for great flexibility, but also cognitive dissonance and credulity. Bodin's belief in the chain of being was commonplace, but Blair reveals its idiosyncratic transformation into a web of being in the Theatrum. She shows how Bodin exploited the popular dialogue form to create a seamless presentation, mirroring his vision of an intricately interconnected and harmonious natural world. She explores Bodin's "natural theology," one intended to bring Christians together in wonderment and to warn them against intellectual arrogance, while Bodin's own (probable) unorthodox beliefs remained unexpressed. Finally, she describes the Theatrum's reception by tracing the production of subsequent Latin editions and vernacular translations and adaptations, and by analyzing readers' annotations.

The weaknesses in Blair's study are minor and probably difficult to avoid given her worthy ambition of writing "total history": striking the right balance between context and her main subject, and between Bodin's typicality and idiosyncracy. The most appealing chapters are those where we hear Bodin's own voice the most - indeed, I wanted to hear more examples of what delighted Bodin's readers and more of his biblical allegories, which led to accusations of "judaizing." Her illuminating analysis of the names Bodin gave the participants in his dialogue would have had greater force if it had appeared with her treatment of the contemporary metaphorical significance of "theater," which should have appeared earlier than chapter 5. But such quibbles do not detract from an impressive achievement that also satisfies the Theatrum's acknowledged goals: Delectare et docere.

APRIL G. SHELFORD Society of Fellows, Columbia University