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10 - Last years

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 September 2009

Sarah Hutton
Affiliation:
Middlesex University, London
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Summary

‘though her Pains encreas'd, yet her Understanding diminish'd not’

The last four years of Anne Conway's life were years of intense intellectual activity, crucial in the genesis of her philosophical system. From what we have seen of her investigations into kabbalism and Quakerism, she was at the centre of a lively interchange of ideas among the little group in contact with her at Ragley. Here her immediate circle of Henry More and Van Helmont had been enlarged by the entry of the Quaker leader George Keith. As we have seen, her correspondence of these last years documents an intense interchange between members of this group. The debates are also registered in what might be described as a penumbra of texts produced by Keith, More and Van Helmont, which supplement the epistolary record of her intellectual pursuits. The writings of Keith, the scholia assiduously added by More to his published writings, as well as the publications of Van Helmont, reverberate with these dialogues at Ragley. Far from being the passive spectator of the intellectual drama going on around her, Anne Conway was centrally involved as director of and participant in their debates. From these writings, we can gather more about the main issues under discussion, enabling us to register the impact that she made and providing us with some means of assessing her debt to her interlocutors.

Type
Chapter
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Anne Conway
A Woman Philosopher
, pp. 203 - 219
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2004

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  • Last years
  • Sarah Hutton, Middlesex University, London
  • Book: Anne Conway
  • Online publication: 22 September 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511487217.011
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  • Last years
  • Sarah Hutton, Middlesex University, London
  • Book: Anne Conway
  • Online publication: 22 September 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511487217.011
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Last years
  • Sarah Hutton, Middlesex University, London
  • Book: Anne Conway
  • Online publication: 22 September 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511487217.011
Available formats
×