At the height of his career, Isaac Newton possessed a mind so razor‑sharp that it reshaped physics, calculus, and our very grasp of gravity. Yet that same brilliance hid a shadowy side; the same genius who mapped the heavens also penned countless pages on alchemy, prophecy, and mysticism. In this roundup we dive into ten strange stories that reveal how the great scientist’s rational world gradually slipped into madness.
10 Strange Stories Unveiled
10 Isaac Newton Threatens To Burn His Mother Alive
Isaac Newton was a fervent believer, devouring the Bible with the same zeal he applied to optics and motion. At twenty, while his sanity was still largely intact, he drafted a list of fifty‑seven grievous sins as a plea for divine forgiveness. Some entries are trivial—like munching an apple during a service—but hidden among them are hints of a mind beginning to fracture.
Newton’s confession reveals a capacity for violence: he begged forgiveness for striking his sister and for beating a man named Arthur Storer. Later entries become vaguer, speaking of “striking many” and “wishing death and hoping it to some.”
The most alarming admission concerns his own parents. He confessed to “threatening my father and mother Smith to burne them and the house over them,” indicating a frightening rage directed at his mother and step‑father Barnabas Smith.
These early confessions foreshadow the darker chapters of Newton’s life, where personal turmoil mingled with his scholarly pursuits, hinting at the unraveling of his once‑steady mind.
9 Isaac Newton And The Philosopher’s Stone
In his later years, Newton plunged into the quest for the legendary philosopher’s stone—a substance believed to transmute base metals into gold and grant immortality. To him this was not superstition but a genuine scientific endeavor, and he immersed himself in every alchemical treatise he could locate.
His experiments centered on mercury, which he dubbed “sophick mercury.” Newton not only followed existing recipes but also concocted his own variants, spending countless hours inhaling the toxic vapors in a makeshift laboratory.
Evidence suggests he even tasted his own concoctions; a note in his papers complains about the “strong, sourish, ungrateful” flavor of mercury, implying he sampled the mixture himself.
Modern analysis of his hair in the 1970s revealed mercury levels forty times higher than normal, supporting the theory that his obsession with the stone—and the mercury it demanded—may have poisoned his brain, nudging him toward insanity.
8 2060: The Year Newton Said The World Would End
Newton once penned a treatise proclaiming that the world would meet its terminus in the year 2060. He envisioned an angel soaring across the sky, the fall of Babylon, and the return of Christ ushering an era of divine peace.
He insisted this was literal, not symbolic—an actual celestial messenger would appear, and he backed his claim with complex calculations drawn from the Books of Daniel and Revelation, which to most readers appear indecipherable.
His math led him to a specific timeline: 2060, or perhaps a few years later, but certainly not earlier. He framed his prophecy as a correction of earlier, “rash conjecture of fancifull men,” positioning himself as a rational arbiter of apocalypse timing.
The sheer confidence with which Newton presented this date underscores how his scientific mindset merged with biblical exegesis, producing a uniquely calculated doomsday forecast.
7 The Catholic Church And The Beast Of The Apocalypse
Newton argued that the apocalyptic beast described in Daniel had already risen, identifying the Catholic Church as the eleven‑horned monster that would speak blasphemies and compel world rulers to bow.
In his extensive paper he claimed the Church “gives laws to kings and nations as an Oracle; and pretends to Infallibility,” accusing it of endorsing the veneration of saints and the invocation of the dead—practices he deemed blasphemous.
According to Newton, the world was already in the “beginning of the end,” with the Beast in power and the final cataclysm only centuries away, a stark illustration of his intertwining of theology and eschatology.
6 The Magical Properties Of ‘Menstrual Blood’
Newton’s alchemical notebooks contain a startling recipe that calls for “the menstrual blood of the sordid whore.” While the phrasing sounds lurid, alchemists often encoded their ingredients, and scholars believe this cryptic term actually denotes metallic antimony.
Antimony, in the eyes of many contemporary mystics, possessed magical qualities and was thought to aid transmutation. Newton’s use of such coded language shows his willingness to blend occult belief with scientific inquiry.
Professor Bill Newman has argued that “menstrual blood” was Newton’s shorthand for antimony, a substance revered for its supposed mystical powers, underscoring the bizarre blend of chemistry and superstition in his later work.
This episode highlights how far Newton strayed from conventional science, embracing esoteric substances in his relentless pursuit of hidden knowledge.
5 Isaac Newton And The Mystery Of The Emerald Tablet
Among Newton’s posthumous papers was a handwritten translation of the Emerald Tablet, a legendary alchemical text said to contain the secret of life itself.
The Tablet, traditionally attributed to Hermes Trismegistus—a syncretic figure merging the Greek Hermes and Egyptian Thoth—describes the “prima materia,” the formless substance underlying all creation.
Newton treated the Tablet as a serious puzzle, believing it held a coded message that could unlock the ability to transform any element into any other, a notion that mirrors the ambitions of his alchemical experiments.
His deep dive into this obscure work illustrates the extent to which he merged mysticism with his scientific rigor, seeking a universal key hidden within ancient symbolism.
4 The Temple Of Solomon: God’s Miniaturized Version Of The Universe
Newton devoted countless hours to a painstaking study of King Solomon’s Temple, measuring every chamber and decoding its dimensions with obsessive precision.
He believed the temple encoded divine blueprints of the cosmos; by unlocking its architectural secrets, he thought he could unveil the very structure of God’s creation.
To accomplish this, Newton taught himself Hebrew and Latin, ensuring he could read the original biblical texts and Jewish commentaries without error.
While his contributions to gravity were groundbreaking, Newton saw the true key to universal understanding hidden in the sacred geometry of Solomon’s sanctuary.
3 The Seven Mystical Colors Of The Rainbow
Newton is credited with defining the seven colors of the rainbow—red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet—but his choice of indigo was not accidental.
He inserted indigo to achieve the mystically significant number seven, a number revered in biblical tradition for its spiritual completeness (seven days of creation, seven seals, etc.).
Thus, even a seemingly scientific classification was infused with theological symbolism, and centuries later students still recite the seven‑color sequence Newton devised.
2 Isaac Newton And The Fate Of Atlantis
Newton’s curiosity extended to the legendary island of Atlantis. He produced a treatise analyzing Plato and Homer, concluding that Atlantis was a real city‑state destroyed by a worldwide flood.
According to his calculations, the survivors included the mythic nymph Calypso, whom he identified as the last Atlantean princess. He claimed that when Odysseus landed on her island, he actually set foot on the remnants of Atlantis.
Newton dated the sinking of Atlantis to 1796 BC and Odysseus’s arrival to 896 BC, implying that Calypso would have been over nine hundred years old—a staggering chronology that showcases his willingness to blend myth with literal history.
These dates reveal how Newton’s scholarly rigor coexisted with an almost fantastical belief in a single, all‑encompassing flood that reshaped the world.
1 Isaac Newton’s Complete Mental Breakdown
Newton’s descent into madness manifested not only in his writings but also in his interactions with friends. During a twelve‑month stretch beginning in 1693, he survived on an hour of sleep at best, sometimes enduring five sleepless nights.
Paranoia set in: he believed acquaintances plotted against him, and his temper flared violently. When philosopher John Locke fell ill, Newton shouted, “Twere better if you were dead!”
Newton suspected Locke of trying to “embroil” him with women—essentially attempting to shatter his lifelong celibacy. Yet moments of lucidity persisted; in a later letter he confessed he could not recall his previous correspondence and begged Locke to inform him if it contained anything dreadful.
He told Samuel Pepys that he had lost his “former consistency of mind,” acknowledging he had become a danger to those around him.
In a final, harrowing missive, Newton wrote, “I am now sensible that I must withdraw from your acquaintance… I beg your pardon for saying I would see you again,” signaling his complete withdrawal from social ties.