488 Dr. Moll on the Invention of Telescopes. 



Fuccarins distinctly says, that one Dutch telescope was brought 

 to Venice, and that Galileo saw it*. But such is our respect 

 both for the genius and the character of Galileo, that his mere 

 assertion that he never saw a telescope when he set about 

 making one ; that he did not know its construction, that his 

 friend Jacob Badorere, by whom he got intelligence of the 

 invention from France, did not give him any information of 

 the manner in which it was made his simple assertion of all 

 this is taken by us as conclusive against any presumption. 



Nelli, in his Life of Galileo, says, that the Florentine phi- 

 losopher first heard of the invention in June, 1809. Galileo 

 himself informs us, in a letter written in March, 1610, that he 

 heard of the invention about ten months ago, which would fix 

 the time of his first attempt to the month of May, 1609, the 

 time when, we know from Sirturus, that a Frenchman brought 

 the telescope to Milan. 



Even after the very able manner in which the history of 

 Galileo's discoveries have been recently given by an English 

 author, it will not be superfluous to give Galileo's own account 

 of the transaction. 



In March, 1610 f, he wrote in the following manner: ' It 

 is about ten months ago that it came to our ears, that a glass J 

 had been worked by a Belgian, by the help of which, visible 

 objects, though at a great distance from the eye of the ob- 

 server, may be seen distinctly. (In the Italian of the Sag- 

 giatore it is added, ne piu aggiunto, no more was added, or 

 this was all.) And some experiments were related of the 

 admirable effects of this instrument, which some believed, 

 and others not. A few days afterwards the same was con- 

 firmed by letters of a noble Frenchman, Jacob de Badorere, 

 from Paris ; all which occasioned me to apply myself wholly 

 to inquire into the cause of this, and to think on the means by 

 which the invention of a similar instrument might be brought 

 about ; in which I succeeded in a short time, assisted by the 

 doctrine of refraction : and I first procured a leaden tube, at 

 the end of which I adapted spectacle glasses , both plane on 

 one side, the one convex on the other side, the second con- 



* Kepleri epistolae, No. 309, p. 493. f Epist. 4. Td. Martii, 1610. 



J Un occhiale, perspicillum. Vitrea perspicilla. 



