THE BARLOWE AND RIDLEY CONTROVERSY. 339 



ing the supposed magnetic attractions of earth., it appears 

 that Ridley was also one of the illustrious men who 

 Gruter says had access to the manuscript of Gilbert's post- 

 humous Philosophia Nova, of course before Bacon sup- 

 pressed it. 



It is but just to Barlowe to state that he claims to have 

 written the work which appeared in 1618 in reply to 

 Ridley, some seven years earlier, and that the manuscript, 

 having been delivered to his chosen patron, Sir Thomas 

 Challoner, was, as he says, "either mislaied or embeseled." 

 The book, as published, was dedicated to another poli- 

 tician, Sir Dudley Digges. Barlowe compares him to the 

 magnet, because he thinks Digges maintains "so pleasing 

 a carriage toward everie man, as causeth all good men 

 which know you to love you by force of a natural sympa- 

 thy," which was a new use of the old metaphor in its ap- 

 plication to a politician, and confers upon the astute Am- 

 bassador of Elizabeth the honor of being the first of modern 

 "magnetic statesmen." 



I shall not pause to examine the magnetic experiments 

 which Barlowe records, for they augment but little the facts 

 already known. Nor does his brief reference to electric 

 phenomena add anything, except the word "electrical," 

 to^the language. In fact, he translates Gilbert's "elec- 

 trica," as "electricall bodies," and not "electrics;" and 

 speaks of "electricall attraction," which he says is in "in- 

 finite other things both naturale and compound" besides 

 those noted by Gilbert. But he gives no additional names 

 of electrics, nor, despite his alleged extension of Gilbert's 

 observations, has he the slightest notion of electrical re- 

 pulsion or conduction. 



Barlowe' s assertion that his thunder had been stolen, 

 provoked from Ridley a prompt and caustic reply under 

 the title of Magneticall Animadversions, 1 in which Ridley 

 avers that there is not a fact in Barlowe's treatise that was 

 not well known long before his first manuscript was given 



1 Cit. sup. 



