353 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[204 g. VI. 148., Oct. 30. '58. 



(Birch's Hist, vol. iii. p. 1.) : 1C7J, January 11, Mr. Isaac 

 Newton was elected." 



It is melancholy to find that the illustrious 

 author of the Principia, the great discoverer of 

 the hidden things of light, had the mortification 

 to find that honours were often profitless in a 

 worldly view ; for it is recorded in Birch's History 

 (vol. iii. p. 178.), under the date of January 28, 

 1675, that,— 



" At a meeting of the Council, Mr. Oldenburg having 

 mentioned that Mr. Newton having intimated his being 

 in such circumstances that he desired to be excused from 

 the weelil^' payments, it was agreed to by the Council 

 that he should be dispensed with." 



In April, 1676, the Society record his suc- 

 cessful experiments of the prism. In December, 

 1679, Sir Christopher Wren being in the chair, 

 an important communication from Mr. Newton, 

 dated November 28, 1679, explaining his opinions 

 of M. Mallemont's new hypothesis of the heavens, 

 was read and discussed. Wren suggesting experi- 

 ments to be made in proof of Newton's correct- 

 ness. {Ibid. p. 513.) 



The year 1685 I have already recorded as being 

 memorable for the publication of the Principia by 

 the Royal Society : and in IMay, 1714, the name 

 of Sir Isaac Newton was added to that of Wren, 

 for the first time, as one of his Majesty's Commis- 

 sioners, "for the carrying on, finishing, and adorn- 

 ing of this cathedral." (See Sir Henry Ellis's 

 Dugdale, p. 174.) 



It is not for me, nor, at the present day, for any 

 one, to eulogise the mighty mind of him whom our 

 great ethic poet sung, — 



" God said, let Newton be, and all was light." 



But the candour of the learned Professor must 

 e.\cuse my zeal in favour of that cyclopa;dian 

 genius, that prodigy of a boj', that miracle of a 

 man, that magician of science, whom he has un- 

 consciously underrated. As a mathematician, 

 Newton is nulli secundus; but "the visible diurnal 

 sphere " in which Wren " lived and moved and 

 had his being" for nearly a hundred years, de- 

 serves something more than the lukewarm praise 

 of being " a mathematician of no mean repu- 

 tation ! " In making Brutus poor, we enrich not 

 Cassius ! Let them both stand in the Temple of 

 Fame in their own circles, and let that of V/ren 

 be near to that of his distinguished contemporary 

 and yoke-fellow, the second Michelangiolo. Both 

 were celebrated for intellectual precocity; both 

 employed a long and useful life in the public wel- 

 fare ; both became acknowledged and admired 

 Nestorian sages ; and of both may be truly said — 



" sinqularis in singulis, in omnibus unicus." 



James Elmes. 

 20. Barney Street, Greenwich. 



LASCELLES' HISTORY OP IRELAND. 



(2""' S. vi. 287.) 



A correspondent asks, " what may be the merits 

 of this work, which he has not bad an opportunity 

 of consulting?" I presume he alludes to the Liber 

 Munerum Publicorum Hibernice, ab an 1152 uscpie 

 ad 1827, or Establishments of Ireland from the 

 \Qth of King Stephen to the 7th George I V.; being 

 the Report of Howley Lascelles, extracted from the 

 Records, ^-c. ^-c. If not to the entire work, the 

 Query probably points to the " Res Gestae An- 

 glorum in Hibernia," which forms a portion of it. 



This valuable compilation was commenced un- 

 der direction of the Irish Record Commission in 

 1812 from a collection of MS. books formed by 

 Mr. Lodge from the Patent and Close Rolls, and 

 afterwards purchased by the Crown. Mr. Las- 

 celles was entrusted with the preparation of the 

 documents for publication in 1813, and was em- 

 ployed on them to 1830, when it was taken out 

 of his hands in consequence of a Report of the 

 Record Commissioners in England ; in which they 

 represented the incompleteness, imperfections, and 

 the improper introduction of irrelevant matter 

 into the portion printed up to that date. The 

 cost of revising and remodelling it would have 

 been so formidable that the government, rather than 

 encounter it, deemed it more prudent to suspend 

 it altogether. For upwards of twenty years, 

 therefore, no farther progress was made, although 

 the printing had previously proceeded to the ex- 

 tent of two folio volumes of about 1000 pages 

 each. At length in 1852 it was resolved, in consi- 

 deration of the value of much of the material 

 embodied in it, and the great expense already 

 incurred, to issue the book incomplete as it is; and 

 even without expunging the objectionable por- 

 tions, such as the " Supplement to the History of 

 England, or Res Gestas Anglorum in Hibernia," 

 which Mr. Lascelles had introduced without au- 

 thority, and which has certainly no claim to appre- 

 ciation or retention. 



Accordingly, in February, 1852, it was issued to 

 the public with a preface by Mr. F. S. Thomas of 

 the Public Record Oflice, exposing the above 

 facts, and prefixing an analysis of its contents. 

 The work, as Mr. Thomas says, contains matter 

 of importance and interest, but in an imperfect 

 and immethodical form, utterly destitute of sys- 

 tem and arrangement. Hence its value for con- 

 sultation is, to a great extent, neutralised. 



To this notice I would append a Query : Mr. 

 Lascelles, about the year 1833, was in possession 

 of an elaborate index to the work, which I saw 

 with him in MS. (but whether complete or im- 

 perfect I am unable to say.) Such a key to the 

 " rudis indesquaque moles " of his compilation 

 would be of extreme value ; and it is desirable to 

 know whether the MS. I allude to is still in exist- 

 ence ; and whether it could be rendered available 



