THIS is a remarkable book, about a remarkable man. Bruce Ritchie is a maths graduate, who subsequently studied theology under T. F. Torrance and went on to be ordained in the Church of Scotland, where he ministered for more than 20 years before teaching theology in Malawi and then back in Scotland. With that background, it is unsurprising that he has been able to craft a biography that explores not only the work of a man who, in 2000, was voted the third greatest physicist of all time (behind Newton and Einstein), but which also explores how his faith inspired his physics, and his physics his faith.
The book is arranged chronologically, charting the periods in Maxwell’s relatively short life: he died in 1879 at the age of 48. We learn about his early years in Edinburgh and at the family home at Glenlair House, near Corsock, in Dumfries and Galloway. We follow him to his further study at Cambridge and employment at Marischal College in Aberdeen and King’s College, London. When he left Aberdeen, Maxwell’s diaries hint at a life free from academic duties: “I shall do natural philosophy, whether in college or out of it, and I may perhaps publish more if I teach less.”
It is, therefore, no surprise that, after five years in London, Maxwell resigned and returned to the family home in Galloway, where: “I have now my time fully occupied with experiments and speculations of a physical kind, which I could not undertake as long as I had public duties.” After six years at Glenlair, however, he was persuaded by the University of Cambridge to accept a professorship and to set up what is now the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge.
AlamyA statue of James Clerk Maxwell by the sculptor Alexander Stoddart, in George Street, Edinburgh
Nevertheless, Ritchie’s work, drawing heavily on Maxwell’s diaries, along with a very wide set of other primary sources, doesn’t simply chart Maxwell’s astonishing set of scientific discoveries, which opened the way to the invention of television, radio, radar, and the communications technologies that we all take for granted today. It casts the net much wider to consider in detail Maxwell’s faith and involvement with theologians and religious thinkers of his day.
It is clear that Maxwell was an original thinker with an enormous appetite for ideas, whether scientific or theological, and he applied the same careful and thoughtful approach to all ideas. We hear about his interactions with Darwin, Huxley, and Galton over evolution, alongside the influence that William Hamilton, F. D. Maurice, and John Henry Newman (among many others) had on Maxwell and his ideas about the relationship between faith and science.
In this comprehensive treatment, Ritchie introduces us to many people: clergy, scientists, theologians, and others with whom he interacted and who influenced his thought as he developed both as a scientist and a person of faith. We hear of his involvement in churches, wherever he lived, of his ecumenical Evangelical faith and spirituality, and his care for those around him, whether family, friends, work colleagues, or fellow members of the Body of Christ.
William Garnett, who worked closely with him at the Cavendish. wrote: “Such complete unselfishness and tender consideration as he exhibited for those around him, and especially those under his control, are seldom to be met with.” All in all, Maxwell was clearly someone who would have made a fascinating subject for interview, and Ritchie opens up his life in a most engaging way.
The Revd Dr James Currall is an environmental scientist and Priest-in-Charge of the congregations of East Sutherland and Tain, in the diocese of Moray, Ross & Caithness.
James Clerk Maxwell: Faith, Church and physics
Bruce Ritchie
Handsel Press £15*
(978-1-912052-85-1)
*available from handselpress.org.uk