390 HISTORY OF PHYSICAL ASTRONOMY. 



for his opinions with great bigotry and fury by a Dutch divine, Voet ; 

 the favorite and teacher of two distinguished princesses, and, it 

 is said, the lover of one of them. This was Elizabeth, the daughter 

 of the Elector Frederick, and consequently grand-daughter of our 

 James the First. His other royal disciple, the celebrated Christiana 

 of Sweden, showed her zeal for his instructions by appointing the hour 

 of five in the morning for their interviews. This, in the climate of 

 Sweden, and in the winter, was too severe a trial for the constitution 

 of the philosopher, born in the sunny valley of the Loire ; and, after a 

 short residence at Stockholm, he died of an inflammation of the chest 

 in 1650. He always kept up an active correspondence with his friend 

 Mersenne, who was called, by some of the Parisians, " the Resident of 

 Descartes at Paris ;" and who informed him of all that was done in 

 the world of science. It is said that he at first sent to Mersenne an 

 account of a system of the universe which he had devised, which went 

 on the assumption of a vacuum ; Merseune informed him that the 

 vacuum was no longer the fashion at Paris ; upon which he proceeded 

 to remodel his system, and to re-establish it on the principle of a ple- 

 num. Undoubtedly fee tried to avoid promulgating, opinions which 

 might bring hiln into trouble. He, on all occasions, endeavored to ex- 

 plain away the doctrine of the motion of the earth, so as to evade the 

 scruples to which the decrees of the pope had given rise ; and, in stat- 

 ing the theory of vortices, he says, 8 " There is no doubt that the world 

 was created at first with all its perfection ; nevertheless, it is well to 

 consider how it might have arisen from certain principles, although 

 we know that it did not." Indeed, in the whole of his philosophy, he 

 appears to deserve the character of being both rash and cowardly, 

 " pusillanimus simul et audax? far more than Aristotle, to whose phy- 

 sical speculations Bacon applies this description. 9 



"Whatever the causes might be, his system was well received and 

 rapidly adopted. Gassendi, indeed, says that he found nobody who 

 had the courage to read the Principia through ;' but the system was 

 soon embraced by the younger professors, who were eager to dispute 

 in its favor. It is said" that the University of Paris was on the point 

 of publishing an edict against these new doctrines, and was only pre- 

 vented from doing so by a pasquinade which is worth mentioning. It 

 was composed by the poet Boileau (about 1684), and professed to be a 

 Request in favor of Aristotle, and an Edict issued from Mount Parnas- 



8 Prin. p. 56. 9 Bacon, Descrlptlo Gloll Intellectuals 



Del. A. M. ii. 193. u Enc. Brit. art. Cartetlaniam. 



