The last twenty years of Newton's life were spent almost wholly in London. In 1722, and the following years, he suffered from several attacks of illness, and in 1725, from gout. But in the intervals his mind reverted occasionally to philosophical topics; and we have on record a remarkable conversation held with his nephew, Mr. Conduit, after his recovery from the last-mentioned attack, in which he developed several ideas respecting the nature of comets. But his time was chiefly occupied with the study of the Scriptures. On the 28th of February, 1727, he imprudently attended a meeting of the Royal Society; the fatigue brought on a renewal of his former attacks, which were pronounced to be from calculus. After several returns of pain, with intervals of ease, he became insensible on the 18th of March, and died on the 20th, in the 85th year of his age.

His body lay in state, and a public funeral took place in Westminster Abbey; where a handsome monument was afterwards erected to his memory.

Newton's Philosophical Character.

The remarks which we have made, as occasion required, in the course of the review of Newton's discoveries, will have sufficed to point out the leading peculiarities of his character, and the distinguishing features of his method of philosophising. In the former, we have had abundant opportunity of observing those singular combinations which were unquestionably connected, in the closest manner, with the powers of that pre-eminent genius with which he was endowed. Many of these have, till of late years, been little known or remarked; and it is not surprising that they should have been misconceived, especially where a theory was concerned in the view taken of them. The extreme repugnance of Newton's mind to the publication of his researches, the weariness and disgust which he, more than once, speaks of feeling towards scientific subjects, and the strong revulsion of his mind towards those

re

mystical fancies," as he himself calls them, in which he delighted to lose himself; the "refreshment" he found in the driest details of ancient chronology; his excessive sensibility to the annoyances of controversy; his preference of tranquillity to every other consideration; his positive determination, on more than one occasion, to give up all scientific labours; his constant refusal, during the later years of his life, to answer enquiries put to him on mathematical subjects, which he always met by referring the enquirer to other mathematicians, especially to M. de Moivre, who, he observed, "understands those subjects better than I do ;" and lastly, what we must call his unreasonable disparagement of his own discoveries, in the remarkable declaration, "I know not what the world may think of my labours, but to myself it seems that I have been but as a child playing on the sea-shore; now finding some prettier pebble or more beautiful shell than my companions, while the unbounded ocean of truth lay undiscovered before me:"such were the instances in which some of the marked peculiarities of his character were developed ; and these circumstances put together cannot but strongly impress us with the belief, that such peculiarities were, by some of those unknown links and mysterious sympathies which connect the phenomena of man's moral and intellectual nature, intimately wound up with the operations of Newton's mighty genius, and connected with the exercise of those surprising faculties which enabled him to comprehend in a single grasp the most extensive theories, and to bring together in the closest union the most widely separated elements of truth. In the facility with which he seems to have surmounted difficulties, almost unconscious of their magnitude, we may, perhaps, perceive some explanation of the little value he was led to set upon what he had done. Celebrity attended him unsought; and, had he cared for it, his morbid reserve more than counterbalanced the desire for fame, and induced him to keep his discoveries private.

It is characteristic, perhaps, of a genius of the highest

order to be insensible to its own superiority. It pursues its lofty excursions, and attains its highest conclusions, by a method which seems to itself no more than assiduous investigation, but which to others appears intuition. It follows a train of reflections obvious to its own apprehension, and, therefore, supposes it is only following a train of obvious reflections. What to genius itself seems mere ordinary thinking, appears to ordinary thinkers the inspiration of genius.

Of this class was the mind of Newton: he accomplished his great discoveries almost unconscious of their greatness, and ascribed them all to mere patient thought. But his patient thoughts were the highest flights of genius. What to him was a mere ordinary deduction, would have seemed to an inferior mind a gigantic effort; to the successful issue of which it would have attached · proportionate importance. Newton "waited till light was shed upon his subject:" other men might wait without the light appearing.

"To his important inventions in pure mathematics," says professor Playfair, "Newton added the greatest discoveries in the philosophy of nature; and, in passing through his hands, mechanics, optics, and astronomy were not merely improved but renovated. No one ever left knowledge in a state so different from that in which he found it. Men were instructed not only in new truths, but in new methods of discovering truth: they were made acquainted with the great principle which connects together the most distant regions of space, as well as the most remote periods of duration; and which was to lead to future discoveries, far beyond what the wisest or most sanguine could anticipate." *

In fact, in whatever light we view him Newton appears equally remarkable. In the department of pure experimental enquiry alone, as in his optical researches, he evinced a degree of skill and accuracy, of patience and sagacity, which place him at the head of experimentalists. Considered merely in respect to scientific * Dissertation, p. 444.

manipulation, he has had few equals even down to modern times; and in regard to extent and importance of results, his experimental discoveries alone may challenge preference over those of almost any other philosopher. In abstract mathematics, again, distinct from all the physical branches, he had confessedly no rival but Leibnitz; and he, individually, can hardly be said to have done more for the calculus than Newton did. And while the latter certainly displayed his powers equally in the geometrical and analytical styles, the former almost wholly confined himself to the analytical.

In the applied departments of mathematical science, Newton's lofty superiority above all other philosophers (except his modern rival Laplace) is universally admitted. The whole range of physico-mathematical dynamics is a science nearly of his own creation; and its application to the actual phenomena of the planetary system, which observation had classified by inductive laws, is due to the sole and unaided powers of Newton's master-mind.

Pre-eminent, then, in each department taken singly he would have shone brightly conspicuous had he done nothing in any other. But when we contemplate him as alike unrivalled in all at once, we feel at a loss how to express adequately the wonder and admiration with which these transcendent powers impress us; and are convinced that the well-known poetical eulogies which have been bestowed on him are scarcely overstrained. Nor is this a vain and idolatrous homage paid at the mere shrine of a fellow-creature, but will rather, by the thoughtful and discriminating, be turned to the purposes of higher and more important reflections. Newton himself stands as a phenomenon in the intellectual creation; and the consideration of such phenomena may lead us into an unbounded train of contemplation on the great moral designs to which they are destined to contribute.

SECTION II.

THE DISCOVERIES OF NEWTON'S SUCCESSORS

In laying out our plan in our introductory remarks, we professedly designed to carry down the history of the progress of discovery to our own times; but so numerous have been the topics which, from their importance, we could not omit, and, from their high interest, we could not mention without at least allowing ourselves some small latitude for remark and illustration, and this especially in reference to those grand discoveries which have occupied us in the foregoing section, that we have now the mortification of finding ourselves trenching upon the extreme limits which the nature of this treatise absolutely imposes upon us without having accomplished by any means the whole of our design: and in consequence, though with deep regret, we are compelled to conclude with a most brief and imperfect outline, a bare enumeration of the principal names and discoveries which have adorned the age since Newton, and which stand recorded mainly as forwarding and completing the investigations which he began.

Progress of Mathematics.

We have seen enough of the controversy respecting fluxions, to admit that the spirit in which it was carried on was not less disgraceful to science, than unaccountably at variance with that dispassionate tranquillity of investigation which is usually supposed to be its distinguishing characteristic. But highly to be deprecated as was the temper of this dispute at the time, it was, perhaps, yet more to be regretted in its consequences: for thus, from the era of Newton's discoveries, we have to date a period in the history of the science, distinguished by a remarkable and wide alienation between the English and foreign mathematicians,