List of Figures.- Preface.- Introduction: Natural Philosophy and Instrumentality.- 'What Was Worth Knowing' in 1500.- Humanism and Ancient Wisdom: How to Learn Things in the Sixteenth Century.- The Alchemist, the Craftsman and the Scholar.- Mathematics Challenges Philosophy: Galileo, Kepler, and the Mathematical Practitioners.- Mechanism and Corpuscles: Descartes Builds a Universe.

- Extra-Curricular Activities: New Homes for Natural Knowledge.- Experiment: How to Learn Things about Nature in the Seventeenth Century.- Cartesians and Newtonians.- Conclusion: What Was Worth Knowing by the Eighteenth Century?.- Notes and References.- Documentation and Further Reading.- Dramatis Personae.- Glossary of Major Terms.

- Index.