2'2 OX IMPROVING NATURAL KNOWLEDGE i 



provemeut of telescopes and grinding of glasses 

 for that purpose, the weight of air, the possibility 

 or impossibility of vacuities and nature's abhor- 

 rence thereof, the Torricellian experiment in 

 quicksilver, the descent of heavy bodies and the 

 degree of acceleration therein, with divers other 

 things of like nature, some of which were then 

 but new discoveries, and others not so generally 

 known and embraced as now they are ; with other 

 things appertaining to what hath been called 

 the New Philosophy, which from the times of 

 Galileo at Florence, and Sir Francis Bacon (Lord 

 Verulam) in England, hath been much cultivated 

 in Italy, France, Germany, and other parts abroad, 

 as well as with us in England." 



The learned Dr. Wallis, writing in 1090, 

 narrates in these words, what happened half a 

 century before, or about 1645. The associates 

 met at Oxford, in the rooms of Dr. Wilkins, 

 who was destined to become a bishop; and sub- 

 sequently coming together in London, they at- 

 tracted the notice of the king. And it is a 

 strange evidence of the taste for knowledge which 

 the most obviously worthless of the Stuarts 

 shared with his father and grandfather, that 

 ( 'harles the Second was not content with saying 

 witty things about his philosophers, but did wiso 

 things with regard to them. For he not only be- 

 stowed upon them such attention as he could 

 spare from his poodles and his mistresses, but, 



