Wrote Letter L-320 of May 1697 to Victor van Beughem about how to distribute the enclosed copies of Continuatio Arcanorum Naturae
This letter is known only by reference in another letter.
With this letter to van Beughem, Leeuwenhoek enclosed four copies of one of his books and instructions on how to distribute them, sending one to the Elector Palatine and the other three to Antonio Magliabechi in Florence.
Letter 185 L-323 of 6 June 1697 to Antonio Magliabechi
Three weeks ago, I sent to The Hague four books, to be remitted to the excellent Mr N.A. Buegen, who at The Hague attends to the affairs of the very noble grand-master of the Teutonic Order, which books contain my recently printed letters translated into Latin, with the request that one volume of the collected letters be sent to the most serene Elector Palatine. Moreover, I charged him to send three collected volumes to Florence, to be presented to you.
This is the only known correspondence between Leeuwenhoek and Van Beughem, who at the time was involved in the negotiations to end the Nine Years’ War, which resulted in the Peace of Rijswijk later that year. He was on the staff of Frans Lodewijk von Pfalz-Neuburg (1664-1732), at the time grand-master of the Teutonic Order, who would in 1716 succeed his brother Johann Wilhelm as Elector Palatine. Elector Palatine Johann Wilhelm von Pfalz-Neuburg (1658-1716) visited in 1695.
The book that Leeuwenhoek sent is Continuatio Arcanorum Naturae Detectorum (Continuation of nature’s mysteries discovered), published in 1697, which contains two letters addressed to Johann Wilhelm. Letter 157 [95] L-271 of 18 September 1695 discusses the generation of mussels and oysters as a refutation of the theory of spontaneous generation. Letter 160 [96] L-279 of 3 November 1695 on protozoa and their great numbers, supported by excerpts from 1677 letters on the same topic to Henry Oldenburg and William Brouncker.
