Poetry was a great communicator of natural philosophical ideas in 17th-century England, and the writing and reading of it substantially increased the numbers of the audience engaging with and contributing to scientific knowledge. This was especially the case with atomism, a philosophical theory with poetical roots in the work of Lucretius, which considered the existence of unfathomable particles that could only be described by what they were not – invisible indivisibles – or by what they could be likened to. Atomism captured the popular literary imagination. In this article, I address some of the many ways in which the ‘atom’ assumed greater philosophical, political and theological significance through its appearances in poetry from the Civil War to the Restoration, and I consider the shape of recent critical interest in atomism and imaginative literature, especially in the reception of Lucretius. While the negative connotations of atomic imagery have long been discussed by critics, I argue that the field should move forward by drawing out the equally diverse, yet largely untold, ways in which atomism assumed metaphysical and spiritual significance in 17th-century poetry.

中文翻译：

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内战与复兴中的诗歌与原子论

诗歌是17世纪英格兰自然哲学思想的伟大传播者，诗歌的写作和阅读大大增加了从事科学知识并为之做出贡献的观众人数。原子论尤为如此，原子论是卢克雷修斯作品中具有诗意根基的哲学理论，该理论认为，无法理解的粒子的存在只能用它们不是（看不见的，不可分割的）或可以被比喻的东西来描述。原子论吸引了流行的文学想象力。在本文中，我讨论了从内战到恢复时期，“原子”在诗歌中的表现形式，在许多方面使“原子”具有更大的哲学，政治和神学意义，我认为最近对原子论和富有想象力的文学特别是在接受卢克莱修斯（Lucretius）的批评中产生了兴趣。尽管批评家们早已讨论了原子意象的消极含义，但我认为，应该通过提出同样多样化但基本上不为人知的原子论在17世纪诗歌中具有形而上学和精神意义的方式，来推动原子图像领域的发展。