THE ENGLISH PRECURSORS OF NEWTON. 779 



accusing Oldenburg of "trafficking in intelligence," and Oldenburg 

 retaliating with the better-founded assertion that Hooke's " pendulum- 

 watches " could never be got to go ; while Huygens, who might well 

 disdain to wrangle over so small a prize, stood aloof, and let the con- 

 troversy rage. Hooke's priority, as regards the principle, is unques- 

 tionable ; but it is equally unquestionable that the modification intro- 

 duced by Huygens first brought the improved timepieces into general 

 use. That modification was nothing more than the coiling into a spi- 

 ral of a spring which, in Hooke's design, had remained straight. So 

 fine is the line drawn between failure and success. 



The history of this invention is, in brief, the history of Hooke's 

 life. He was a man whose brilliant qualities were neutralized one by 

 the other. His extraordinary ingenuity was marred by his equally 

 extraordinary versatility. His thoughts pursued each other in a rapid 

 succession of vivid and original suggestions ; but they found no halt- 

 ing-place on the way. He received them with rapture, but they wea- 

 ried him if they staid too long. He welcomed all, but made none his 

 friend. He wanted that laborious passion of perfection, apart from 

 which the progeny of invention is but a sterile brood. His mind was 

 like a telescope without clock-work, which shows the moving host of 

 heaven, but can not fix or observe any individual star. Thus, his dis- 

 coveries and investigations were usually abandoned or postponed when 

 on the point of completion. It was not until some other inquirer, less 

 discursive or more discreet, added the finishing touches still wanting, 

 that he became sensible of the full value of what he had neglected, 

 and, with loud vociferations, stood on the highway of learning, crying 

 " Stop thief ! " to the whole scientific world. Nor was his manner of 

 conducting these controversies happier than his choice of occasions for 

 them. His tone in argument was at all times dictatorial, and under 

 excitement it was apt to become shrill. By his arrogance, he exasper- 

 ated his adversaries ; by his irritability, he prejudiced his cause. Thus, 

 when (as not unfrequently happened) he was in the right, he roused 

 animosity ; when he was in the wrong, he incurred discredit. 



But we anticipate our narrative. The foundation of the Royal 

 Society opened to him the road to fortune and fame. Having raised 

 his reputation by an able paper on " Capillary Attraction," his name was 

 placed on the first list of Fellows, and on November 12, 1662, he was 

 unanimously elected Curator of Experiments, " with the thanks of the 

 Society ordered to Mr. Boyle for dispensing with him for their use." 

 He had at this time entered on his twenty-ninth year, and had within 

 him a spirit of fire, not indeed "grossly," but most inadequately " clad" 

 in the corporeal " dimension " of his species. Pepys, who knew him 

 well and rated him high, notes in his " Diary " that " Mr. Hooke is the 

 most, and promises the least, of any man in the world that ever I saw." 

 His personal appearance, indeed, was to the last degree deplorable. 

 His figure was crooked, his limbs shrunken and emaciated, his aspect 



