Althanasius Kircher and his followers. Kircher wrote on an astonishingly wide range of scientific subjects, including medicine, acoustics, geology, astronomy and mathematics. Although Kircher's philosophy--a blend of science and superstition combining empirical observation with magical and religious elements--seems strange to modern eyes, it was seriously noted and discussed by many eminent scientists of the time, including Descartes, Boyle and Leibniz. Although not in the mainstream of seventeenth-century scientific thought, the works of Kircher and his Jesuit contemporaries typify the complexity and diversity of scientific writing of the period.
Athanasius Kircher, 1602-1680
Iter exstaticum coeleste, quo mundi opificium, id est, coelestis expansi, siderumque tam errantium, quám fixorum natura, vires, proprietates, singulorumque composito et structura, ab infimo telluris globo, usque ad ultima mundi confinia, per ficti raptus integumentum explorata, novâ hypothesi exponitur ad veritatem, interlocutoribus Cosmiele et Theodidacto... (Würzburg, 1660)
In this work Kircher uses the narrative device of a fantastic voyage through space to discuss his theories of the solar system. Accompanied by the "music of the spheres," the two protagonists (Theodidactus and Cosmiel) travel through the void to other worlds, and converse with the intelligent life forms they find there.
Athanasii Kircheri è Soc. Jesu Scrutinum physico-medicum contagiosae luis, quae dicitur pestis... (Leipzig, 1659)
An investigation into the nature of bubonic plague, prompted by an outbreak of the disease in Naples during 1656. After examining the blood and urine of plague victims under a primitive microscope, Kircher hazarded a guess that a living organism (contagium animatum) might play a role in plague infection, but he stopped short of propounding an actual germ theory of disease