'Medicine, Metals and Empire', British Journal for the History of Science, 48 (Dec. 2015), pp. 607-637. Pre-proof vers. 7 July 2015 This is a pre-proof version. The final version is available at http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=10052925&file Id=S000708741500059X 1 Medicine, Metals and Empire: The Survival of a Chymical Projector in Early Eighteenth-Century London Koji Yamamoto* ABSTRACT: It is well known that Newtonian philosophers such as Johan T. Desaguliers defined their authority in contradistinction to the 'projector', a promoter of allegedly impractical and fraudulent schemes. Partly due to the lack of evidence, however, we knew relatively little about these eighteenth- century projectors, especially those operating outside learned networks without claims to gentility, disinterest or theoretical sophistication. This paper begins to remedy this lacuna through a case of a 'chymical' projector, Moses Stringer (fl. 1693-1714). Instead of aspiring to respectability, this London chymist survived by vigorously promoting new projects, thereby accelerating, rather than attenuating, the course of action that rendered him dubious in the first place. The article follows his (often abortive) exploitation of medicine, metals and empire, and thereby illuminates the shady end of the enlightened world of public science. I am not very fond of lying under the Scandal of a bare Projector ... [but] I can easily give grains of allowance for your Suspicions, because I know very well what Miscarriages there have been by People Ignorant of what they pretend to. 1 Thus Thomas Savery, a Fellow of the Royal Society, complained of 'projectors' when promoting his engine for draining mines. Another natural philosopher, Johan T. Desaguliers, agreed. ‘Projectors contrive new Machines (new to them, tho’ perhaps describ’d in old Books, formerly practised and then difus’d and * CRASSH, University of Cambridge, Alison Richard Building, 7 West Road, Cambridge, CB3 9DT, UK. Email: ky273@cam.ac.uk An early version of this paper was presented at the EMPHASIS Seminar in London, for which I thank Stephen Clucas and Anthony Ossa-Richardson. I am also grateful to Larry Stewart for encouragement; to Colin Brain, Michelle DiMeo, David Dungworth, Anna Marie Roos, Lizzie Swann and Will Poole for kind suggestions; and to the editors Jon Agar and Charlotte Sleigh and anonymous referees for useful comments. While the article was completed as part of the ERC-funded project, 'Crossroads of Knowledge in Early Modern England', it began first as a conference paper for 'The New World of Project', the Huntington Library, 23-24 June 2012. I am grateful to Vera Keller and Ted McCormick for the invitation. Other conference papers will appear as a special issue of the journal Configurations. 1 Thomas Savery, The miners friend; or, an engine to raise water by fire, 1702, p. 2. The place of publication for pre-1800 materials is London unless otherwise stated.