with other thoughts, that he was quite incompetent to the task. He therefore entered Trinity College, Cambridge, and gave himself entirely up to the mathematical and mechanical studies he loved so well. Having obtained a professorship in his university, he turned his attention to optics, making discoveries in reference to light that entirely changed the aspects of science, and led to the most important results. He became ultimately president of the Royal Society. He made from reflection on a simple circumstance—the fall of an apple from a tree-a discovery of the great law of gravitation, "which he showed to affect the vast orbs that revolve around the sun not less than the smallest objects in our own globe." This theory he explained in his "Principia,” or The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy. A telescope, which he executed entirely himself, is now in the library of the Royal Society of London, and bears the inscription,

INVENTED BY SIR ISAAC NEWTON, AND MADE WITH HIS OWN HANDS, 1671.

Great as Newton was as a philosopher, he was equally great as a man and a Christian. When James II. sought to introduce Popery into the land, and wished the university to admit Father Francis, "an ignorant monk of the Benedictine order,” to the rank and privilege of a Master of Arts,

no one was more firm in resisting this encroachment than Sir Isaac Newton; and when the vice-chancellor of the university was summoned before the ecclesiastical court, Newton was appointed a delegate to defend the privileges of the university. He was the parliamentary representative of Cambridge, and discharged his duties with wisdom and integrity.

He wrote much on theological subjects, being a humble, sincere believer in the truths of Christianity. He was eminently a Bible student, and always loved to depict the harmony of science. with revealed religion. His modesty, peacefulness, and candour were all the product of the genuine piety that lived in his every action. When complimented on his discoveries, his reply is well known:

"I do not know what I appear to the world, but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore, and diverting myself now and then in finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me."

His tranquil character is shown in the fact, that some quibbling philosophers made it a practice to contest, controvert, and undervalue his discoveries, vexing him with irritating questions and other annoyances. This caused him to desire to withhold some of his discoveries for a time, saying, "To publish a new discovery was as bad

as entering on a lawsuit." The readiness with which he owned himself in the wrong, as soon as convinced of the fact, is proved in the following beautiful letter he wrote to John Locke.

66 Sir,

Being of opinion that you endeavoured to embroil me with women, and by other means, I was so much affected with it, as when one told me you were sickly, and would not live, I answered, "Twere better if you were dead.' I desire you to forgive me this uncharitableness, for I am now satisfied that what you have done is just, and I beg your pardon for my having had hard thoughts of you for it, and for representing that you struck at the root of morality in a principle you laid down in your book of ideas, and designed to pursue in another book; and that I took you for a Hobbist.* I beg your pardon also for saying or thinking that there was a design to sell me an office, or to embroil me. I am your most humble and unfortunate servant,

"I have been ever since I first knew you so entirely your friend, and thought you so much mine, that I could not have believed what you tell me of yourself had I had it from anybody else. And though I cannot but be mightily troubled that you should have had so many wrong and unjust thoughts of me, yet, next to the return of good offices, such as from a sincere good will I have ever done you, I

* Thomas Hobbes was a celebrated metaphysical and infidel writer, born 1588, died 1679.

receive your acknowledgment of the contrary as the kindest thing you could have done me, since it gives me hopes that I have not lost a friend I so valued." *

*

**

These letters let the reader into the very hearts of two of England's worthiest sons. How sensitive must Newton's conscience have been to induce him to disclose to the person he had injured in thought only, what, but for his own frankness, would never have been suspected! How beautiful in both was the union of the profoundest intellect with fervent piety, and with manners that illustrated the primitive simplicity of the Gospel! Of the value of Newton's discoveries to his age and posterity, the appropriate couplet of the poet gives the best estimate:

"Nature, and Nature's laws, lay hid in night:

God said, 'Let Newton be,' and all was light."

CHAP. XIV.

ASPECTS OF THE LITERATURE OF THE EIGHTEENTH
CENTURY.-ITS LEADING MINDS.

THE distinguishing characteristic of the literature of the last century was its diffusiveness, as we have attempted to show in our remarks on periodical literature. The standard literature of the time partook of the graceful manner and brilliant sarcasm that the essayists had introduced. There was an excess of external smoothness and polish, less depth and intrinsic value.

Following in the path that Dryden had trod, and his avowed disciple, Pope became the most popular poet of his time, and exerted an influence not only over his own age, but over all that have followed. He was born in London, 1688. His father, a Roman Catholic by religion, and a linendraper by trade, made a fortune, and retired to Binfield, in Windsor Forest. Pope's well known lines,

"As yet a child, and all unknown to fame,

I lisp'd in numbers, for the numbers came,"

have made all readers familiar with his remarkable precocity. "The child was" decidedly "the father to the man" in Pope's case; for, after having re