|
Thomas Hariot
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
[Redactor's note: Very little is known of Thomas Hariot; his only
published works are the 'Briefe and true report' (PG#4247) and the
posthumous 'Praxis', a handbook of algebra. He anticipated the law of
refraction, corresponded with Kepler, observed comets, and may have been
the first to recognize that the straight line paths of comets might be
segments of elongated ellipses. The lost 'ephemera' referred to in the
text have since been found (since 1876) and a conference was held in
1970 at the University of Delaware on the current state of Hariot
research, the proceedings of which have been published by the Oxford
University Press, where one may find a fairly current view of the
historical record. Due to the large number of quotations and early
english typography, the casual reader may find the 'html' version easier
to follow than the text version.]
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
THOMAS HARIOT
THE MATHEMATICIAN
THE PHILOSOPHER AND
THE SCHOLAR
DEVELOPED
CHIEFLY
FROM
DORMANT MATERIALS
WITH NOTICES OF HIS ASSOCIATES
INCLUDING BIOGRAPHICAL AND
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL DISQUISITIONS
UPON THE MATERIALS OF THE
HISTORY OF 'OULD
VIRGINIA'
BY HENRY STEVENS OF VERMONT
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
PREMONITION
WHEN I YEARS AGO undertook among other enterprises to compile a sketch
of the life of THOMAS HARIOT the first historian of the new found land
of Virginia; and to trace the gradual geographical development of that
country out of the unlimited 'Terra Florida' of Juan Ponce de Leon,
through the French planting and the Spanish rooting out of the Huguenot
colony down to the successful foothold of the English in Wingandacoa
under Raleigh's patent, I little suspected either the extent of the
research I was drifting into, or the success that awaited my
investigations.
The results however are contained in this little volume, which has
expanded day by day from the original limit of fifty to above two
hundred pages. From a concise bibliographical essay the work has grown
into a biography of a philosopher and man of science with extraordinary
surroundings, wherein the patient reader may trace the gradual
development of Virginia from the earliest time to 1585 ; I especially,'
says Strachey, I that which hath bene published by that true lover of
vertue and great learned professor of all arts and knowledges, Mr
Hariots, who lyved there in the tyme of the first colony, spake the
Indian language, searcht the country,' etc ; Hariot's nearly forty
years' intimate connection with Sir Walter Raleigh; his long close
companionship with Henry Percy ; his correspondence with Kepler; his
participation in Raleigh's `History of the World;' his invention of the
telescope and his consequent astronomical discoveries ; his scientific
disciples ; his many friendships and no foeships ; his blameless life ;
his beautiful epitaph in St Christopher's church, and his long slumber
in the 'garden' of the Bank of England.
The little book is now submitted with considerable diffidence, for in
endeavouring to extricate Hariot from the confusion of historical
'facts' into which he had fallen, and to place him in the position to
which he is entitled by his great merits, it is desirable to be clear,
explicit and logical. A decision of mankind of two centuries' standing,
|
|
