'46 



BOSCOVICH. 



Botcovich. resume -the labours of his mathematical professor- 



A dispute respecting the draining of a lake, which, 

 abput this time, originated between the Tuscan go- 

 vernment and the republic of Lucca, afforded a new 

 opportunity for the exercise of Boscovich's talents. 

 A number of mathematicians and commissioners had 

 been appointed to decide the controversy ; but the 

 commissioners having failed to appear, he repaired to 

 Vienna to obtain the decision of Francis I. whose 

 influence was paramount in Italy. At the Austrian 

 capital he employed his poetical talents in celebrating 

 the successes of Francis over Frederick the Great ; 

 but his attention was chiefly directed to his new- 

 theory of natural philosophy, which he is said to have 

 drawn up in the short space of thirty days, and 

 which he published at Vienna in 1758, under the 

 title of Theoria Philosophies Naturalis redacta ad 

 nnicam legem virium in natura existentium, a work 

 of distinguished merit, which we shall have occa- 

 sion to consider at great length in the subsequent 

 article. 



Having succeeded in settling the dispute in favour 

 of the republic of Lucca, he was handsomely re- 

 warded by the senate with a present of 1000 se- 

 quins. * 



The talents of Boscovich as a negociator, pointed 

 him out to the Senate of Ragusa, as the fittest per- 

 son for settling a misunderstanding that existed be- 

 tween that republic and the British government. It 

 was alleged by the latter, that the Ragusans had in- 

 fringed their neutrality by fitting out vessels for the 

 French service ; and as there had been no just ground 

 for this suspicion, so injurious to the commerce of 

 his native city, Boscovich repaired to London, and 

 succeeded in establishing the integrity of the republic 

 of Ragusa. 



On his way to London, Boscovich visited Paris, 

 where he remained for six months, enjoying the ex- 

 quisite society which then distinguished the French 

 metropolis. During his stay at London, he was 

 chosen a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1760; and 

 he published his work, De Solis ac Luna Dejectibus, 

 which he dedicated to that learned body. 



The approaching transit of Venus in 1761, had 

 at this time absorbed the attention of philosophers, 

 and numerous parties of astronomical observers were 

 sent to different parts of the world. Boscovich was 

 invited by the Royal Society to accompany the party 

 of its members that was going to America ; but as 

 such an expedition would have greatly retarded his 

 return to Italy, and interfered with some other plans, 

 he was obliged to decline the invitation, and return to 

 his native country. At Venice he met with his friend 

 Corner, who accompanied him to the Plain of Troy, 

 which they visited on their way to Constantinople. 

 During his residence in Constantinople, his happiness 

 was completely embittered by a continuance of ill 

 health, which rose to such a height that it frequently 

 threatened his existence. After he had begun to re- 

 cover his strength, he left Constantinople in the train 

 of the English ambassador, Sir James Porter, and tra- 

 velled through Bulgaria, Moldavia, and part of Po- 



land, with the intention of visiting the capital of BoeovicV.. 

 Russia ; but the death of Peter deterred him from ' >-' ' 

 the prosecution of his travels. An account of this 

 journey was afterwards published in French and 

 Italian, but it did not add much to the fame of its 

 author. 



The return of Boscovich to Rome was eagerly 

 welcomed by his countrymen, and his talents were 

 speedily called into exercise for the public good. In 

 the spring of 176-t, the Austrian governor of Milan 

 appointed him to the mathematical chair in the uni- 

 versity of Pavia, where the mean jealousy of his col- 

 leagues forced him to defend his reputation by the 

 publication of his Disscrtaiiones Dioptrical, which 

 related principally to the correction of the aberra- 

 tion of refrangibility in achromatic telescopes. The 

 fame which he derived from this ingenious work, si- 

 lenced, for a while, the calumnies of his rivals ; but 

 their malice having again broken out with increasing 

 violence, Boscovich sought for tranquillity in a jour- 

 ney to France and the Netherlands. When he re- 

 turned from this excursion, he was transferred from 

 the college of Pavia to the Palatine schools at Mi- 

 lan, where he received from the Empress queen the 

 professorship of astronomy and optics, and was also 

 appointed to superintend the observatory of the Royal 

 College of Brera, which was furnished with instru- 

 ments chiefly at his own expense. 



When Boscovich had repaired to the baths of 

 Albano to strengthen his constitution, he received 

 the mortifying intelligence, that several of the young 

 Jesuits whom he had employed as assistants, had 

 conspired against his favourite pupil, and had pre- 

 vented the government from appointing him to some 

 office of trust. He complained, in vain, to Prince 

 Kaunitz and to the governor of Milan, of this in- 

 sulting conduct ; but having received no redress, 

 he retired to Venice, where he continued for ten 

 months, and at last formed the resolution of spend- 

 ing the remainder of his days at Ragusa. When he 

 was upon the eve of carrying this resolution into ef- 

 fect, his plans were completely frustrated by the 

 suppression of the order of Jesuits in 1773. 



In consequence of this sudden revolution, so hos- 

 tile to his temporal interests, he went to Paris along 

 with La Bord, the chamberlain of Louis XV., and 

 sought in a foreign country those honourable rewards 

 of genius which had been so unjustly denied him in 

 his own. The influence of his friend La Bord procured 

 for him the patronage of the French king, who ap- 

 pointed him Director of Optics for the Marine, a new 

 office created on purpose, with two pensions, amount- 

 ing to 8000 livres.f Such' rapid promotion given to 

 a foreigner, naturally excited the jealousy of the 

 French philosophers. The piety of Boscovich, the 

 freedom of his conversation, and his personal vanity, 

 were by no means calculated for the meridian of 

 Paris. The generosity of the sovereign was not se- 

 conded by the kindness of his subjects ; and Bosco- 

 vich, after all his services to science, was doomed to 

 experience a neglect, which was the more mortify- 

 ing, when he reflected on the idolatry with which he 

 was formerly regarded at Rome. To a man of keen 



About foiir hundred and fifty pounds sterling. 



f About three hundred and thirty-three pounds sterling. 



