WILLIAM (ilLI'.KRT. 63 



Gilbert further laid the foundations of future scientific progress 

 by founding a sort of society, or college, which met monthly at his 

 house in Peter's Hill, Knightrider Street, for the discussion of 

 philosophical subjects, and which, though it fell into abeyance at his 

 death, was afterwards revived by Sir Christopher Wren and others, 

 and received the patronage of King Charles II., and was called the 

 Royal Society in honour of its pious founder. 



He did not live to add, as he purposed, an appendix of six or 

 eight sheets to " De Magnete "; no such addition appearing in either of 

 the German editions published at Stettin in 1628 and 1633 respect- 

 ively. He left behind him, however, the manuscript of another 

 work of lesser merit, which was posthumously published in 1651 by 

 the famous printing-house of Elzevir, entitled " De mundo nostro 

 sublunari Philosophia novo." It is chiefly a meteorological and cos- 

 mical treatise, remarkable indeed for one speculative point, namely, 

 a suggestion that the reason why the moon always presents the same 

 face towards the earth is because the moon, like the earth, is 

 magnetic. 



His fame as physician and physicist won him the favour of 

 Queen Elizabeth, by whom, in February, 1601, he was appointed 

 chief physician. He even received from her, as has been men- 

 tioned, an annual pension ; and was continued as chief physician to 

 James I., an honour which he only enjoyed for seven months, as he 

 died on November 30th, 1603. 



The partial oblivion into which Gilbert's fame has been allowed 

 to fall is due probably mainly to the loss of all personal relics of 

 him. With the exception of a single doubtful inscription, " ^.v dono 

 auctoris,'' in a single copy of " De Magnete," not a line of his hand- 

 writing is known to exist,- unless his hand wrote the signature " Yc 

 President and Societie " at the end of a petition, preserved amongst 

 the manuscripts in the British Museum, addressed by the Royal 

 College of Physicians in 1596 to the Lords of the Privy Council, 

 complaining of the exactions of the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of 

 London. It is pretty certain that the MS. copy of " De Mundo 

 Nostro," in Latin, in the British Museum, is not in the author's hand 

 writing ; for in the Elzevir print there is a note which states that the 

 author's original manuscript was partly in English. It is sad to 

 relate that the manuscripts, maps, letters, magnets and minerals, 



2 Two other specimens, believed to Ue in Gilbert's handwriting, have Ijeen recently unenrthed. 

 S.P.T., April, 1891. 



