Born in Scotland, Dr William Hunter (1718-83) pursued an extensive medical education in Glasgow, Edinburgh, London and Paris. He settled in London where he made his name as an anatomist and obstetrician before being elected to the Royal Society in 1767. This book presents all of his known correspondence, drawing upon archives around the world.

Mysteries and Secrets Revealed uncovers the reality behind mysteries of nature and secrets of frauds that eluded common understanding. The journey begins in the ancient Greek city of Delphi, where priests claimed the gift of a priceless gold lion was an acknowledgement of their clairvoyant powers. But their concocted story concealed an embarrassing blunder. Those sufficiently savvy to catch the lie became aware of even deeper problems. Author Loren Pankratz then guides us through the conflicts of Renaissance scholars, including Galileo who explained things in ways that enraged philosophers and infuriated priests. Galileo's methods of investigation were perpetuated by the meticulous work of the Academy of Experiment, and Bernard Fontenelle's enthralling dialogue enabled common people to accept life in the rearranged sun-centered universe. Clairvoyants in a mesmeric trance claimed they could visit distant planets and endure brutal surgical procedures. If any of this was real, how was it possible? One nineteenth century mesmeric savant, Alexis Didier, was so convincing that someone claimed no case of clairvoyance could be made for anyone if his accomplishments were not real. This unchallenged declaration is now unraveled here for the first time through information gleaned from uncommon documents and rare antiquarian pamphlets. The surprising manifestations of modern spiritualism quickly escalated into a psychic arms race that included mysterious tipping and turning of tables. Scientist Michael Faraday devised ingenious experiments to show how subtle muscle reactions outside of awareness created these manifestations. On the other hand, explanations for table levitations and mysterious writing on slates could only be solved by individuals with acute observational skills and acquainted with the methods of trickery. Each story in Mysteries and SecretsRevealed captures the tension of conflict, the thrill of discovery, and the strategies of science that unmasked frauds, fakes, false belief, and the enigmas of our natural world.

Three distinguished authorities offer informed reflections on the history of books, on literary commerce, and on the reading public in eighteenth-century England, France, and Germany. Concerned with an area of study that has gone largely unexplored—the social function of the book trade and the various agencies of distribution—Robert Darnton. Roy M. Wiles, and Bernhard Fabian lay the groundwork for the intellectual, social, and literary historian as well as the student of political revolutions. Robert Darnton's rich account of a clandestine book dealer expands our knowledge of the actual habits of eighteenth-century Frenchmen. We learn about the livres philosophiques, as they were known in the trade—obscene. irreligious. or seditious works; about the intricate circuit of agents linking publisher and bookdealer; and about a confidence game often surviving on sheer bravura. Darnton not only gives us a general sense of the literary tastes in a small provincial city in France on the eve of the Revolution but also opens the way toward an understanding of the country's entire literary underground. The late Roy M. Wiles investigates the principal readership in eighteenth-century England and demonstrates that intellectual activities were not confined to polite society in London. Employing new, often untouched materials—newspaper circulation and delivery figures, book lists and advertisements in London and local papers, subscription books in provincial towns and cities—Wiles helps dispel some of the uncertainty surrounding the question of literacy and shows that, in fact, what the provincial readers chose to read more accurately registers the eighteenth century's relish for reading than those books considered by Londoners as "required" reading. Bernhard Fabian explores the sources that permit us to assess the circulation of English letters in Germany during the second half of the eighteenth century. By considering the kind of information obtained from subscription lists, by studying the relation of English literature to the general reader of the period, and by examining the emergence of a reading public that actually read English, Fabian helps delineate a broad view of the contemporary reading scene in eighteenth-century Germany.