A discourse on the invention and improvements of the reflecting telescope. Delivered at the anniversary meeting of the Royal Society, November 30, 1777. / By Sir John Pringle, Baronet, President. Published at their request.

John Pringle

Date:: MDCCLXXVIII [1778]

Credit: A discourse on the invention and improvements of the reflecting telescope. Delivered at the anniversary meeting of the Royal Society, November 30, 1777. / By Sir John Pringle, Baronet, President. Published at their request. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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$I ‘ r ^ 1 « the perfpicilla, and propofirig fome proper improve¬ ments of them. Then came Snellius, Descartes, and • . * r , .4 •’ * ft r i » v •. ' • • 1 ^ jp 5 * \ other celebrated geometricians abroad, who applied themfelves to optics, and fuccefsfully cultivated that . . - '■ t • ; , fruitful branch of fcience. But whilft at that period, in ■ . . , ‘ ,-v r‘‘ * - ** r> ri 4 '' '* different parts of Europe, men of the fir ft rank in mathe¬ matical ftudies feemed to vie with each other in promo- ting not only the theory of vition, but the mechanical practice of the inftruments appertaining to it, and parti- cularly the telefcope ; how did it happen, that in this «.- '***/'/• X . . r * . < - r i T? **• A | • * T * * country., in the laft century, which had fo aufpicioufly begun with the lights derived from Lord Bacon and Dr. v \ ’• k — - . ^ *, • r r f . ~ - • f* * r ^ \ ^ ». ^ | ■ | ' t •'* j j ^ V Harvey, we fhould afterwards find few traces of any at¬ tempt in that way earlier than the eftablifhment of this Society? Of this paufe in the courfe of your philofophi- • X V1 ' cal difcoveries, the diftradted ftate of thefe kingdoms, under a long civil war, was indubitably the ocoafion. For no fooner had we fheathed the bloody fword and difplayed the peaceful olive, than arts and fciences again fprang forth, and with.fo much vigour, that the advancement made in thefe lands, fince that epoch, in optics alone, may be confidered as one of the nobleft exertions ¥ ^ r. y, * , . , 3 ^ ,r ' , — - ■ * • *1 • ^ of the human genius. Not to contend for a gene- ral fuperiority in the publications here on that fubjedt fince the time that Gregory entered firft into that grand (•; career,$