COOPERATION IN SCIENCE 101 



nian lines) speaking in 1638 on the need of a collegi- 

 ate society for carrying on the educational work that 

 he himself had at heart. 



In 1641 Hartlib published a work of fiction in 

 the manner of the New Atlantis, and dedicated it 

 to the Long Parliament. In the same year he urged 

 Comenius to come to London, and published another 

 work, A Reformation of Schools. He had great in- 

 fluence and did not hesitate to use it in his adoptive 

 country. Everybody knew Hartlib, and he was ac- 

 quainted with all the strata of English society ; for 

 although his father had been a merchant, first in 

 Poland and later in Elbing, his mother was the 

 daughter of the Deputy of the English Company in 

 Dantzic and had relatives of rank in London, where 

 Hartlib spent most of his life. He gained the good- 

 will of the Puritan Government, and even after 

 Cromwell's death was working, in conjunction with 

 Boyle, for the establishment of a national council of 

 universal learning with Wilkins as president. 



When Comenius arrived in London he learned 

 that the invitation had been sent by order of Parlia- 

 ment. This body was very anxious to take up the 

 question of education, especially university educa- 

 tion. Bacon's criticisms of Oxford and Cambridge 

 were still borne in mind; the legislators considered 

 that the college curriculum was in need of reforma- 

 tion, that there ought to be more fraternity and cor- 

 respondence among the universities of Europe, and 

 they even contemplated the endowment by the State 

 of scientific experiment. They spoke of erecting a 

 university at London, where Gresham College had 

 been established in 1597 and Chelsea College in 



