HEEOES OP INVENTION AND DISCOVEEY. 



ROBERT BOYLE. 



)ERHAPS the best example we can adduce of the manner 

 ^- in which wealth may be made subservient by its pos- 

 sessor, not only to the acquisition of knowledge, but also to its 

 diffusion and improvement, is that of our celebrated countryman 

 The Honourable Robert Boyle. Boyle was borne at Lismore, 

 in Ireland, in 1627, and was the seventh and youngest son of 

 Richard, the first Earl of Cork, commonly called the Great 

 Earl. The first advantage which he derived from the wealth and 

 station of his father was an excellent education. After having 

 enjoyed the instructions of a domestic tutor, he was sent, at an 

 early age, to Eton. But his inclination, from the first, seems to 

 have led him to the study of things, rather than of words. He 

 remained at Eton only four years, "in the last of which," 

 according to his own statement, in an account which he has 

 given us of his early life, " he forgot much of that Latin he had 

 got, for he was so addicted to more solid parts of knowledge, that 

 he hated the study of bare words naturally, as something that 

 relished too much of pedantry, to consort with his disposition and 

 designs." In reference to what is here insinuated, in disparage- 



