Husbanding creation and the technology of amelioration in the works of Gabriel Plattes

HUSBANDING CREATION AND THE TECHNOLOGY OF AMELIORATION IN THE WORKS OF GABRIEL PLATTES

Oana MATEI

Abstract. In this paper I will try to investigate some of the ways in which husbandry, a recurrent topic in Gabriel Plattes’ works, was considered to be the recipe for bringing salvation in religious and economic manner. I will argue that proper methods of husbandry advocated by Gabriel Plattes, accompanied by a technological vision of amelioration, have been able to provide the foundation for healing the land and the human soul. Technological innovation, good measures of husbandry of the land and of the soul are able to ameliorate the economic estate of the nation and also to restore the human condition held prior to Fall. Experimental husbandry of the land and of the soul includes: agricultural innovation which could restore the plenty of the Garden of Eden, medicine which could solve the problems of disease, education reformation which could cultivate the young, and general economic reform which could bring undreamed of prosperity. Inspired from the Baconian tradition, Plattes reformulates the view on husbandry, promoting a new type of ‘integrated science’ able to cultivate the land and the human soul as well. Plattes contribution lies in providing a number of ‘technologies of amelioration’ for the material of Creation (soil, plants, human beings), technologies of salvation in an economic and religious manner.

Keywords: husbandry, Gabriel Plattes, Hartlib Circle, technologies of amelioration, technologies of salvation

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