44 HEROES OF SCIENCE. 



placed Ki ng William on. the throne. An honest 

 'TEngh'shman, however retired in his habits and 

 pursuits, could not have withheld this tribute at 

 such a time, nor was any loyalty ever more per- 

 sonally disinterested than that of Ray." The year 

 1690 was the date of the first pubJicationlQflhls. 

 noble work on "The Wisdom of God in_Creatioi3," 

 *bf 'which we have already spoken, and whose sale 

 through many editions was very extensive. In 

 1700 he printed a book more exclusively within 

 the sphere of his sacred profession, called " A Per- 

 suasive to a Holy Life," a rare performance oTTHe 

 kind at that day, being devoid of enOiusiasm, 

 mysticism, or cant, as well as of religious bigotry 

 or party spirit, " and employing the plain and solid 

 arguments of reason for the best of purposes." His 

 ITiree "Physico-Theological Discourses concerning 

 the Chaos, Deluge, and Dissolution of the World," 

 of which the original materials had been collected 

 and prepared formerly at Cambridge, came out in 

 1692, and were reprinted the following year. A 

 third edition, superintended by Derham, was pub- 

 lished in 17 1 3. This able editor took up the same 

 subject himself, in a similar performance, the 

 materials of which, like Ray's, were first delivered 

 in sermons at Bow church, he having been ap- 

 pointed reader of Mr. Boyle's lectures. 

 Sp Ray studied animals as carefully as he did 

 / plants, and his influence on zoology will be noticed 

 further on in this book, and he revised a translation 

 of Rauwolfif's travels, and gave a catalogue of 



