SCIENTIFIC A20) LITERARY PURSUITS OF AGE. 



211 



had once been his friend, but now 

 became his accuser; and in 1633, 

 Galileo was again summoned before 

 the Inquisition, and put upon his 

 trial for holding and teaching the 

 heretical opinion. He again abjured 

 the doctrine, kneeling before the 

 assembled cardinals, and clothed 

 in sackcloth of a penitent criminal. 

 Laying his hands upon the gospels, 

 he invoked the Divine aid in ab- 



juring and detesting, and vowing 

 never again to teach, the doctrine 

 of the earth's motion, and of the 

 sun's stability. When he rose from 

 his knees, he stamped on the ground 

 and said in a whisper to a friend, 

 " E pur si muove." " It does move, 

 though." Having signed his recan- 

 tation, he was, in conformity to 

 his sentence, confined in the prison 

 of the Inquisition. 



SCIENTIFIC AND LITEEAEY PURSUITS OF AGE, 



HUMEOLDT. 



a In my eightieth year " (writes 

 Baron Humboldt, in the Aspects of 

 Nature, 1849), " I am still enabled to 

 enjoy the satisfaction of completing 

 a third edition of my work, re- 

 moulding it entirely to meet the 

 requirements of the present time." 

 The Nestor of science is now (1854) 

 engaged in completing his Cosmos. 



AHNAULD AND SPELMAN. 



The great Arnauld retained the 

 vigour of his genius, and the com- 

 mand of his pen, to his last day. 

 He translated Josephus when eighty 

 years old, and at the age of eighty- 

 two was still the great Arnauld. 



Sir Henry Spelman neglected 

 the sciences in his youth, but culti- 

 vated them at fifty years of age, 

 and produced good fruit. His early 

 years were chiefly passed in farm- 

 ing, which greatly diverted him 

 from his studies : but a remarkable 

 disappointment respecting a con- 

 tested estate disgusted him with 

 these rustic occupations. Resolved 

 to attach himself to regular studies 

 and literary society, he sold his 

 farms, and became the most learned 

 antiquary and lawyer. 



JOHNSON, CHAUCER, CELLINI, AND 

 FRANKLIN. 



Dr. Johnson applied himself to 

 the Dutch language but a few years 



before his death. In one morning 

 of advanced life, he amused himself 

 by committing to memory 800 lines 

 of Virgil. At the age of seventy- 

 three, when staggering under an 

 immediate attack of paralysis 

 sufficiently severe to render him 

 speechless he composed a Latin 

 prayer, in order to test the loss or 

 retention of his mental faculties. 



Chaucer's Canterbury Tales vf ere 

 the composition of his latest years. 

 They were begun in his fifty-fourth 

 year, and finished in his sixty- 

 first. 



The most delightful of autobio- 

 graphers, for artists, is that of Ben- 

 venuto Cellini a work of great 

 originality, which was not begun 

 till "the clock of his age had struck 

 fifty-eight." 



Franklin's philosophical pursuits 

 began when he had nearly reached 

 his fiftieth year. 



DRYDEN, ANGELO, WREN, FRANKLIN, 

 AND ACCORSO. 



Dryden's complete works form 

 the largest body of poetry from the 

 pen of one writer in the English 

 language; yet he gave no public 

 testimony of poetical abilities till 

 his twenty-seventh year. In his 

 sixty-eighth year he proposed to 

 translate the whole Iliad; and the 

 most pleasing productions were 

 written in his old age. 



Michael Augelo preserved his 



