8 DISSERTATION SECOND. [pabt i. 



marian and the critick were to precede, in a certain degree, 

 that of the geometrician or the astronomer. The obliga- 

 tions which we have to those who undertook this laborious 

 and irksome task, and who rescued the ancient books from 

 the prisons to which ignorance and barbarism had con- 

 demned them, and from the final destruction by which 

 they must soon have been overtaken, are such as we can 

 never sufficiently acknowledge ; and, indeed, we shall 

 never know even the names of many of the benefactors to 

 whom our thanks are due. In the midst of the wars, the 

 confusion, and bloodshed, which overwhelmed Europe 

 during the middle ages, the religious houses and monas- 

 teries afforded to the remains of ancient learning an asylum, 

 which a salutary prejudice forced even the most lawless to 

 respect ; and the authors who have given the best account 

 of the revival of letters, agree, that it is in a great measure 

 to those establishments, that we owe the safety of the books 

 which have kept alive the scientifick and literary attain- 

 ments of Greece and Rome. 



The study of the remains of antiquity gradually produc- 

 ed men of taste and intelligence, who were able to correct 

 the faults of the manuscripts they copied, and to explain 

 the difficulties of the authors they translated. Such were 

 Purbach, Regiomontanus, Commandine, Maurolycus, and 

 many others. By their means, the writings of Euclid, 

 Archimedes, Apollonius, Ptolemy, and, Pappus, became 

 known and accessible to men of science. Arabia contri- 

 buted its share towards this great renovation, and from the 

 language of that country was derived the knowledge of 

 many Greek books, of the originals of which, some were 

 not found till long afterwards, and others have never yet 

 been discovered. 



In nothing, perhaps, is the inventive and elegant genius 

 of the Greeks better exemplified than in their geometry. 



