Project of the Company of Sciences & Arts

The design of this Company is to work towards the perfection of the Sciences and the Arts, and generally to research all that may prove useful or beneficial to Humankind and particularly to France.

In order to accomplish this design we will work to create experiments and to discover the utmost innovations that one can find under the Sky and on the Earth by Astronomical and Geographic observations with great Telescopes, microscopes, and all other necessary instruments.

We will work in order to learn more specifically the construction and the movements of the human Body by means of chemistry, Anatomy, and Medicine in order to be able to conserve or re-establish health which is the most precious thing in life.

We will apply ourselves to the invention of new Machines, and to the facilitation of the older ones for convenience or for diversion in life, as well as the invention of new secrets as much for manufacture in the Arts as for curiosity.

We will attempt to learn all the secrets that can be well proven, recompensing the Inventors or those who have hidden them: And if we can not learn them, we will try to find them in order to publish them, so that everyone profits from these individuals' beautiful inventions, and that the interests of some do not deprive the public of the benefits of the few good secrets that we have until now found in proportion to what the public wished to know, particularly as concerns health issues since it is a kind of cruelty to let men perish from the fault of not teaching them certain means of saving their lives.

We will also test the Secrets of consequence, for which we have the description, when there is some suggestion that they will be successful, to approve them and to make use of them if they prove to be good, or to unveil the truth to those who believe them on the faith of others, if they are not true. Finally, we will study in order to disentangle the World of all Vulgar Errors that have passed for such a long time as truths, the fault of not having conducted a single experiment necessary to discover the falsities.

We will make an effort to learn all the practices of the Arts, as much as those who use them in France and in other Countries and to obtain the design of all the Machines, and of all the instruments that prove useful, and to know all that the Workers remark in the materials that they employ, all of the difficulties they encounter in their Works, all they research or even that they wish for in perfecting their arts, and of all the things from which one makes a List or a Table, so that the learned can think on it, and they can try by Mechanics or Chemistry or by the discussion of diverse arts to apply to certain ones, by Analogy, that which applies to others.

We will also attempt to learn all of the secrets of the Artisans and the Merchants and their Sophisticated ways with the Means to discover them, that we will publish to dissuade the public from being fooled by them and to oblige the workers to work more faithfully.

We will apply ourselves to the research of ways to facilitate navigation in order to augment Commerce and in order to have occasion to discover the wonders we can meet in unknown countries, where all is new and different than what We see in our country, from which there will come a great profit to the State by the discovery of Mines, precious stones, [animals?] and excellent Remedies with which these countries abound. And to this end, we will research all that concerns the construction of vessels and their equipment, and all the means of remedying the inconveniences that we have remarked in voyages of great Duration.

In all occasions where curious persons will travel or reside in foreign countries, we will give them the 'Memoirs' and ask them to examine in the Place where they are, that which may be judged remarkable as much in Nature as in the arts, and even in great navigations we will attempt to send intelligent people speedily to remark on all there is that is curious in the new Lands, as much in metals, animals, plants, as in the Inventions of the arts. And for this we will carry into these civilized countries models or designs of Machines which we make use of ourselves, here, so that if they do not have their own machines, we can instruct them in their use and exchange others for those that We do not have, or for the secrets of their arts that we do not know, that we could perhaps gain, but only through difficult means, such as money or by other paths. We will also send all the curiosities of optics, of the Dioptrics, etc. of magnets etc. in order to introduce ourselves by this means, and to have ourselves esteemed, since we know that it was by similar paths that one has gained entry into powerful Kingdoms in the past.

We will apply ourselves particularly to the study of all that pertains to agriculture, in order to make fertile uncultivated Lands, to dry the Wetlands etc., examples of things that can most augment the happiness of a State, and render it as good and also as fertile as Our own.

We will research the means to make communication possible between the Provinces, in order that provisions can be shared and transported to Places where they are lacking, thus rendering the Rivers navigable, or joining them to those that are already navigable.

We will also search all possible means of remedying the floods of the Seine that inconvenience Paris, for several years now, And for all of these things, we will work to establish precise Geographic Maps, which is one of the things most lacking in this State.

If the Company is consulted on some new inventions, on some Machines or on some great designs public or private, It will send Those from its Body who will be the most well-versed in such matters in order to examine them, and even to go to these Places if deemed necessary, which will establish their relationship to the Company of what they will have found. In turn, the Company will examine the information very carefully in order to judge the possibility or the utility of the design, and to speak its opinion which, preceding from intelligent and disinterested people, will rarely miss the truth. So that without such a test, the Prince or Individuals do not engage themselves where unhonorable enterprises result, as we see only too often. By these means, the King will have in his great designs and in all the new propositions a Council capable of giving him sincere and veritable advice if he gives the honor of consulting them.

The Company will hold commerce with all other Academies, and with all the learned in all Countries to introduce itself reciprocally to what there is of particular note in Nature and in the arts, and in what is currently done as regards Books and sciences, And to observe by this means in all Places, the Seasons, the winds, the most hot, the most cold, the declination of the magnet, the flux and the re-flux of the Seas [tides),] the Eclipses, Comets, meteors and the other phenomena of the Sky and the Earth by means of the mercury Thermometers, the pendulums, and of all other necessary instruments to be able, then, to make a history of the most universal Nature possible, on which, as on solid foundations, one can work to build a Physics, and, on a parallel level, to make a history of the arts, and of inventions of men which are currently in use, and in the Places where there are curious things: And where not a single person capable of examining them is to be found, as at the baths, and at the fountains over the high Mountains, at the depth of the Mines, etc. we will speedily send intelligent persons with good Memoirs to make all of the notes, and the necessary experiments.

We will entreat those persons, particularly, to apply themselves to a certain science or a certain art, or who have the curiosity to apply themselves to work on all sorts of paths to perfect them and to give a communication to the Company of all they know. And thus everyone will delight in such works. And one becomes mutually excited to contribute from all sorts of matters to the improvement of life. A goal to which it is wished that everyone should aspire in the future more seriously than in the past.

We will also make a List or a Table of all Inventions that are lost, in order to set about rediscovering them. And another of all the wishes that men have ever had or can have on whatever subject; and of all the subjects that one researches for such a long time, without finding answers, so that we can examine if they are possible or impossible, and so that we can interest the skillful to research the questions.

We will never speak in the Assemblies of the mysteries of Religion nor of the affairs of State: And if we sometimes speak of Metaphysics, Morals, History or of Grammar, etc. This will only be in passing, and only with regard to Physics or the commerce of men.

The Company will be composed of the most learned people in all the true Sciences that one can find, As in Geometry, Mechanics, Optics, Astronomy, Geography &c. in Physics, Medicine, Chemistry, Anatomy, &c. or in the practice of the Arts, As in Architecture, fortifications, Sculpture, painting, design, Conduits [Conduite] and the elevation of the Waters, Metallurgy, Agriculture, navigation, &c. Or of those who will make known to the Company some secret, or some considerable Invention that they have found, in order to inspire everyone to invent something of whatever nature it might be, since there is nothing new from which, with time, one does not find some considerable usefulness: Or from those who have traveled extensively; And from some of whom listen to vernacular Languages in order to translate all of our good books that treat the sciences and the Arts, that we do not have in our language, in order to print them, should the Company judge them useful to the public, and in order to read all those printed in these Languages, that to verify from all that is written and found to be new: And from some others who write well in Latin, in order to translate into this Language the Works that the Company would permit to be printed, and that they may be composed in French.

And we will receive no one who does not excel in at least one of these above-mentioned areas, and that we do not judge capable of contributing to the advancement of the designs of the Company.

We will elect, from time to time, depending on what is resolved, people of the Company in order to take care of its conservation and advancement.

There will be one person to conduct the assemblies, and to ensure good manners [biensance] and silence, to whom one defers without opposition, and without the permission of whom one will not be allowed to speak on any matter.

There will be another to collect that which is remarkable of what is said or done in the Assemblies, of which he will hold an exact Register that will remain in the Academy, where all Members of the Company can see it, or can copy it, in the case of an absence, but which they can never make public nor print without the consent of the Company. And in order to engage Commerce with other Academies and the learned.

There will be others who will take their place in their absence and who will assist. 

There will be one person or two dependents of the Company who will be in charge of preparing and of executing all that concerns experiments, and the Instruments [Machines] for conducting them, and to have the workers operate them, and generally to do all that will be ordered following the deliberations of the Company.

We will elect six or eight of the most enthusiastic to apply themselves particularly to the advancement of the Company, and in order to remedy inconveniences that may arise, who could assemble when they deemed appropriate, And if they resolved something, we would hear the report at the next assembly in order to deliberate on it. And the Results will be put in a special Register together with the Statutes and the laws of the Company.