432 THE INTELLECTUAL RISE IN ELECTRICITY. 



of those strange characteristics which often drive the in- 

 ventor to hiding his work from the world, as a bird hides 

 her eggs from the serpent. 



u He was in the beginning of his being made known to 

 the learned," says Waller, "very communicative of his 

 philosophical discoveries and inventions, till some acci- 

 dents made him, to a crime, close and reserved. He laid 

 the cause upon some persons challenging his discoveries 

 for their own, taking occasion from his hints to perfect 

 what he had not; which made him say he would suggest 

 nothing till he had time to perfect it himself, which had 

 been the reason that many things are lost which he af- 

 firmed he knew." 



The Royal Society was not the first of the institutions 

 for the promotion of experimental science, the organiza- 

 tion of which followed as a consequence of the renewed 

 interest in physical discovery which, in the last half of the 

 century, spread throughout Europe. In 1657 the Floren- 

 tine Academy del Cimento was established under the im- 

 mediate patronage of Prince Leopold, of Tuscany, (a 

 potentate whose interest in natural science rivaled that of 

 Charles), and attracted to itself many of the most eminent 

 Italian philosophers. Its transactions were not published, 

 however, until 1667, when it went out of existence; so that 

 the exact dates when the experiments recorded were 

 made, cannot be assigned. Although the researches in- 

 cluded the first demonstration of the incompressibility of 

 water, and mainly related to air pressure, physical condi- 

 tions in vacuo and effects of high and low temperatures, 

 those on electricity and magnetism which are interspersed 

 show notable insight and skill. 



In magnetism, many attempts were made to find a sub- 

 stance which would cut off the influence of the lodestone, 

 but without avail; and the Academy records that the vir- 

 tue is neither barred nor impaired by any interposed body, 



