"Doubts" and "desires": the New Science of 1725

Abstract

Documenting the places and themes of the passage from Universal Law to the Scienza nuova of 1725, this article aims to show the reasons for the novelty of the work, focusing on the new design of metaphysics that is the mens umana. The emphasis on the human, the way to access the new meaning of God as Providence, the mysterious “architect of the world”, allows Vico's philosophy to be presented as anthropology. The article insists, in fact, on the “necessity” of doing new science but also on the doubts and difficulties. Particular emphasis is placed on the incipit of the work dedicated to the “desire to live eternally”, a way of accessing religion, which, together with law, is the very mobile and very modern motor of Vico's new philosophy