670 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



eminent for the invention of mechanical agencies by which the exter- 

 nal conditions of human life have been revolutionized than the seven- 

 teenth for the production of those momentous " aids to sense " * the 

 telescope, microscope, barometer, and thermometer by which an in- 

 definite series of new worlds have been annexed to the domain of 

 human intelligence. In the abstract region of mathematics, the per- 

 formances of the epoch under consideration are equally remarkable. 

 By the invention of logarithms, calculation was hardly less expedited 

 than communication has been in our time by the discovery of the elee 

 trie telegraph ; while the differential and integral calculus, through 

 the enormous increase of power conferred by it, might not inappropri- 

 ately be termed the steam-engine of the intellect. Yet, notwithstand- 

 ing the utilitarian character of the prevalent philosophy, inventions of 

 practical utility remained comparatively rare ; and no advance, corre- 

 sponding in any degree with that accomplished in science, was made 

 in the comforts and conveniences of every-day life. Thus, by a singu- 

 lar irony, a generation which sought in its experiments " fruit," found 

 "light" ; while our own age, which, with the dying Goethe, demands 

 " more light," has received, instead, " fruit " not always sweet to the 

 taste. 



To Englishmen the seventeenth century is rendered of peculiar in- 

 terest by the circumstance that, during its course, the center of scien- 

 tific progress was shifted, through the overwhelming force of genius, 

 from the Continent to this island. When it opened, our countrymen 

 were in the position of disciples ; when it closed, they were recognized 

 as the teachers of Europe. The advance made in the interval was 

 enormous. In 1600 Tycho Brahe was still inculcating at Prague 

 the geocentric theory of the universe ; Galileo was expounding the 

 " sphere " on Ptolemaic principles ; Harvey was listening at Padua 

 the '' Quartier Latin of Venice," as M. Renan has called it to the 

 cloudy conjectures of Fabricius as to the purpose served by the valves 

 in the veins. In 1700 the " Principia " had been for thirteen years the 

 common property of mankind ; Newton was acknowledged as the 

 arbiter of science by the greater part of the civilized world ; the prin- 

 ciples of mechanics were settled on the same footing on which they 

 stand to-day ; and the last cavil against the innovation of the Folke- 

 stone physician had long ago been forgotten. We propose, in the 

 following pages, to sketch in its broader outlines the movement of 

 thought which led to such great results, and to devote some brief atten- 

 tion to a man whose career was the most conspicuous failure of the 

 century, and who, aspiring to play the part of the Octavius, was con- 

 demned to that of the Antony of science. 



Dr. Robert Hooke not only was unable to " command success," but 

 we doubt whether he could have conscientiously asserted that he de- 

 served it. He was original, diligent, and ingenious ; but he wanted 

 * "Novum Organum," lib. ii., Aph. xxxix. 



