SOURCE: Cohen, I. Bernard. “Science and the Constitution.” In Science and the Founding Fathers: Science in the Political Thought of Jefferson, Franklin, Adams, and Madison, pp. 262-72. New York: W. W. Norton, 1995.

In the following excerpt, Cohen discusses Madison's education in the scientific disciplines and his scientific references in The Federalist papers.

James Madison's Scientific Education

James Madison's early education included the study of Latin and Greek, history, rhetoric, and some mathematics: arithmetic, algebra, and geometry.¹ At the age of eighteen he entered the College of New Jersey at Princeton, now grown into Princeton University, rather than following the traditional path of young Virginians to William and Mary. The college had been founded in 1746, twenty-three years before Madison's arrival as a freshman. In 1768, a year before Madison entered as a student, John Witherspoon came from Scotland to take over the presidency of the college. Witherspoon had been greatly...