162 ’ 
‘The first meeting took place on the 15th of October, 1683, 
when papers were read by Mr. William Molyneaux, Dr. 
Narcissus Marsh, afterwards Archbishop of Dublin, Mr. Foley, 
and Mr. St. George Ashe. It is remarkable, that although 
Ware, Birch, and Whitelaw have agreed in dating the origin 
of this society in 1683, Mr. Halliwell has, in a * Collection 
of Notes on the early History of Science in Ireland,” pub- 
lished in the Proceedings of this Academy for 1841, stated 
that its first meeting took place on the 28th of January, 1684. 
In the winter of 1683, writes Archbishop Marsh in his Diary, 
‘was set up the Philosophical Meeting in Dublin, that met 
and formed itself into a society, in the Provost’s lodgings. 
There, at the first opening of it, asa prelude to what we were 
to do, I in three or four days’ time, composed An Introductory 
Discourse to the Doctrine of Sounds, which was sent to the 
Society in Oxford, and then printed in the Philosophical 
Transactions.’* 
‘* Not having facilities for publishing their proceedings in 
Ireland, it appears that they determined upon offering them 
to the Royal Society ; accordingly, on the 18th of December, 
1683, the Provost, Dr. Robert Huntingdon, wrote a letter to 
Dr. Plot, of the Royal Society, giving an account of ‘a 
weekly meeting of several ingenious men about philosophical 
subjects in Dublin.’ This notice, which is recorded in the 
letter book of the Royal Society (vol. ix, p- 103), informs us 
that W. Molyneaux, then residing near Ormond’s Gate (now 
Wormwood Gate), and who was at that period engaged in 
writing an ‘ Atlas for this Country,’ was Secretary :—*‘ And 
since,’ he writes, ‘you so generously, as well as charitably, 
offer your assistance, I think this will be the best method of 
conveyance, to transmit our notices to the Secretary of the 
">> + i i LPs. aera ana Oe es 
* The Diary of Archbishop Marsh, from a transcript in Marsh’s Li- 
brary, Dublin, published by the Rey. Dr. Todd in the British Magazine 
for July and August, 1845. 
