Conti, he exhibited perhaps only the petty feelings of a rival; but when he ventured to caluminate that great man in his correspondence with the Princess of Wales; when he dared to represent the philosophy of Newton as physically false, and as dangerous to religion; and when he founded these accusations on passages in the Principia and the Optics, glowing with all the fervour of genuine piety, he cast a blot upon his own name, which all his talents as a philosopher, and all his virtues as a man, will never be able to efface.

CHAPTER VI.

The privileges of the University attacked by James II. Newton chosen one of the delegates to resist this encroachment. Elected a member of the Convention Parliament. Burning of his manuscript. Supposed derangement of mind. Refutation of the statement. Friendship between Newton and Charles Montague. Newton appointed Master of the Mint. Newton elected Associate of the Academy of Sciences. Member for Cambridge. President of the Royal Society. Queen Anne confers upon him the honour of Knighthood.

AN event now occurred which drew Newton from his studies and placed him upon the theatre of public life. James II., desirous of re-establishing the Roman Catholic faith in its former supremacy, had begun to assail the rights and privileges of his Protestant subjects. Among other tyrannical acts, he sent his letter of mandamus to the University of Cambridge to order Father Francis, an illiterate Benedictine monk, to be received as Master of Arts, and to enjoy all the privileges of this degree, without taking the oaths of allegiance and supremacy. The University at once perceived the consequences which might arise from such a measure. Independent of the encroachment upon their vested rights which such an order involved, it was evident that the highest interests of the University were endangered, and that Roman Catholics might soon become a majority in the convocation. They, therefore, unanimously refused to pay the least attention to the royal mandate, and this they did with a firmness of purpose which greatly irritated the regal despot. He reiterated his commands, and accompanied them with the severest threatenings in case of disobedience. The Catholics were not idle in supporting the views of the sovereign. The ho

norary degree of M.A., which conveys no civil rights to its possessor, having been, upon one occasion given to the secretary of the ambassador from Morocco, it was triumphantly blazoned forth that the members of the University of Cambridge had a greater respect for an infidel than for a Roman Catholic, and were more obsequious to the Mohammedan ambassador than to their lawful sovereign. Though this reasoning might impose upon the ignorant, it produced but little effect upon the members of the University. A few weak-minded individuals, however, were disposed to yield a reluctant consent to the tyrant's wishes. They proposed to confer the degree, but at the same time to resolve that it should not be regarded as a precedent in future. To this it was replied, that the very act of submission in one case would be a stronger argument for continuing the practise than any such resolution would be against its repetition. The University, therefore, remained firm in their original decision. The Vice-Chancellor was summoned before the ecclesiastical commission to answer for this act of contempt. Newton was among the number of those who most strenuously resisted the command of the sovereign, and he was consequently chosen one of the nine delegates who were appointed to defend the independence of the University. These delegates appeared before the High Court. They maintained that not a single precedent could be found to justify so extraordinary a measure; and they showed that Charles II. had, under similar circumstances, been pleased to withdraw his mandamus. This representation had its full weight, and the king was compelled to abandon his design.

The part which Newton had taken in this affair, and the character which he now held in the scientific world, induced his friends to propose him as Member of Parliament for the university. He was accordingly elected in 1688, though by a majority of only five,

and he sat in the convention Parliament till its dissolution. In the years 1688 and 1689, Newton was for the greater portion of the time absent from Cambridge, owing to his attendance in parliament; but it appears from the books of the university that from 1690 to 1695, he was seldom absent, and must, therefore, we presume, have renounced his parliamentary duties.

During his residence in the metropolis he must have experienced the inadequacy of his finances to the new circumstances in which he was placed, and it is probable that this was the cause of his confining himself to Cambridge. His income was certainly limited, and but little suited to the generosity of his disposition. Demands were, no doubt, made upon it by some of his less wealthy relatives; and there is every reason to believe, that he himself, as well as his influential friends, had been looking forward to some act of liberality on the part of the government.

An event, however, occurred, which will ever form an epoch in the history of this distinguished philosopher; and it is a most singular fact that this incident was for more than a century unknown to his own countrymen, and was only accidentally brought to light by the examination of the various manuscripts belonging to Huygens. This event has been magnified into a temporary aberration of mind, which is said to have arisen from a cause scarcely adequate to its production.

One winter morning while he was attending divine service in the chapel of the university, he had left in his study a favourite little dog called Diamond. Upon returning from his devotions he found that this animal had overturned a lighted candle on his desk, which set fire to several papers on which he had recorded the results of some optical experiments. These papers are said to have contained the labours of many years, and it has been stated that when the philosopher discovered the magnitude of his loss, he exclaimed "Oh, Dia

mond, Diamond, little do you know the mischief you have done me!" It is a curious circumstance that Newton never refers to the experiments which he is said to have lost on this occasion, and Mr. Conduit, the husband of his favourite niece, makes no allusion to the accident itself. The distress, however, which it occasioned, is said to have been so deep as to affect even the mighty powers of his understanding.

This extraordinary effect was first communicated to the world in the life of Newton by M. Biot, who says he received the following account of it from the celebrated M. Van Swinden:—

"There is among the manuscripts of the celebrated Huygens, a small journal in folio, in which he used to note down different occurrences. The following extract is written by Huygens himself, with whose handwriting I am well acquainted, having had occasion to peruse several of his manuscripts and autograph letters. "On the 29th of May, 1694, M. Colin, a Scotsman, informed me that, 18 months ago, the illustrious geometer, Isaac Newton, had become insane, either in consequence of his too intense application to his studies, or from excessive grief at having lost, by fire, his chemical laboratory and several manuscripts. When he came to the Archbishop of Cambridge, he made some observations which indicated an alienation of mind. He was immediately taken care of by his friends, who confined him to his house and applied remedies, by means of which he had now so far recovered his health that he began to understand the Principia." Huygens mentioned this circumstance to Leibnitz in a letter, dated June 8th, 1694, to which Leibnitz replies on the 23rd, "I am very glad that I received information of the cure of Mr. Newton at the same time that I first heard of his illness, which doubtless must have been very alarming. It is to men like you and him, Sir, that I wish a long life.'

The first announcement of the preceeding statement