Instruments of the Antients. 1 79 



cellence of his own. For, if a man of his scrupulous, phi- 

 losophical turn of mind, could believe, as he certainly ap- 

 pears to have done, that any optical contrivance could be 

 useful at such a distance as even the smallest breadth of the 

 British channel, he must have had sufficient reason for such 

 belief; and this reason, one would think, could only be the 

 performance of his own instruments. Mere speculation 

 could never have produced such a belief in such a mind. 

 Thus it was exactly, when the happy performance of Buf- 

 Jbn's burning, apparatus constrained the most fastidious 

 sceptics to believe in the similar exploit of Archimedes. 



5. But 1 have now cited this passage chiefly to prove, as 

 I think it does satisfactorily, that Bacon did not claim the 

 invention of the telescope, or equivalent instrument, but 

 referred it to an age much anterior to his own. This leaves 

 us at liberty to carry our inquiries on this subject into times 

 much more remote. And this I shall do by submitting, 

 though not implicitly, to the able guidance of Abat. I 

 shall, however, take the liberty to retrench his French ver- 

 bosity when it becomes tiresome; to support and illustrate 

 his valuable text with occasional notes; and to express freely 

 my dissent when I think him in the wrong. 



6. (< On a mirror placed by Vtolemy Euergetes upon the 

 tower called the Pharos of Alexandria. 



" We read in several authors that Ptolemy Euergetes 

 caused to be placed on the tower of. the Pharos, at Alex- 

 andria, a mirror which represented accurately every thing 

 which was transacted throughout all Egypt, both on water 

 and land. Some authors relate, that with this mirror an 

 enemy's fleet was seen at the distance of 600,000 paces ; 

 others say 500 parasangs, or more than 100 leagues. 



7. " Most persons whom I have heard mention this fact, 

 treated it as a random story, and as a thing impossible. 

 There are even celebrated opticians who think that, if the 

 fact was real, it could only be the effect of magic, or a de- 

 lusion of the devil. Such, among others, is the opinion of 

 father Kircher, who, when speaking of several effects of 

 superstition, includes this in the number. The following 

 are his words: (Ars magna Lucis et Umbrce, lib. x. c. l. 

 at the end) " Verum cum hcec omnia, &c. But as all these 

 things are owing to the delusions of the devil, we shun 

 them with all our might; and, after the example of holy 

 mother church, we condemn and execrate them *. Of this 



kind, 

 * It is probable that many of the Scottish peasantry stiii follow, with- 



