SOME OF THE EARLY LEADERS l<> 



another distinguished mathematician, who ranked as one of the 

 leaders of science in his day ; Robert Hooke, brilliant, original, 

 and versatile as a physicist, with an inexhaustible fertility in 

 devising experimental proofs of physical deductions, a gift which 

 he employed unweariedly in the service of the Society, thus 

 largely contributing to the interest and success of the meetings : 

 John Evelyn, a true and typical virtuoso of the noblest kind, 

 scholar, and gentleman with the keenest interest in natural history 

 and a warm supporter of the experimental philosophy ; Francis 

 Glisson, Regius Professor of Physic at Cambridge, afterwards 

 President of the Royal College of Physicians, a pioneer in physio- 

 logy ; Francis Willughby, eminent as a zoologist and author of a 

 valuable work on Ornithology and also a History of Fishes, both of 

 which treatises were published by the Royal Society ; Jonathan 

 Goddard, Gresham Professor of Physic, Warden of Merton, 

 Oxford, whose laboratory and personal service were constantly at 

 the call of the Society ; Sir William Petty, singularly versatile 

 and ingenious, who, after his mathematical and anatomical studies, 

 surveyed the whole of Ireland, producing the most exact map of 

 the kind that had ever been constructed, who turned his 

 mechanical genius to the invention of various contrivances such 

 as a double-keeled vessel that should be steady on the water and 

 4 a wheel to ride upon ', and who is perhaps most widely known as 

 one of the early founders and exponents of political economy ; 

 Walter Pope, Gresham Professor of Astronomy, "and John 

 Graunt, who even in his own lifetime was recognized and hon- 

 oured as the first to break ground in the scientific treatment 

 of vital statistics. In this gallery of worthies a place of special 

 distinction is due to Sir Christopher Wren, commonly thought of 

 only as an eminent architect, but who was undoubtedly the most 

 widely accomplished man of his time. An able mathematician. 

 Wren early turned his attention to the applications of mathe- 

 matics, so as to become a pioneer in dynamical science. He 

 was astronomical professor first at Gresham College and there- 

 after at Oxford. He was likewise a meteorologist before the 



1 His f Micrographia ', published in 1665 by the Royal Society, was one of the earliest 

 works in which the value of the microscope as an instrument of scientific research was 

 developed, and was illustrated with excellent plates. 



c 2 



