Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 06.djvu/135

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Boyle
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Boyle

and correspondence, with a life of the author founded on materials collected with abortive biographical designs by Burnet and Wotton, and embracing Boyle's unfinished narrative of his early years entitled 'An Account of Philaretus during his Minority.' More or less complete Latin editions of his works were issued at Geneva in 1677, 1680, and 1714; at Cologne in 1680-95; and at Venice in 1695. A French collection, with the title 'Recueil d'Expériences,' appeared at Paris in 1679. Of his separate treatises the following, besides those already mentioned, deserve to be particularised: # 'Some Considerations touching the Usefulness of Experimental Natural Philosophy' (Oxford, 1663, 2nd part 1671). # 'Some Considerations touching the Style of the Holy Scriptures' (1663), extracted from an 'Essay on Scripture,' begun 1652, and published, after the writer's death, by Sir Peter Pett. # 'Occasional Reflections upon several Subjects' (1664, reprinted 1808), an early production satirised by Butler in his 'Occasional Reflection on Dr. Charlton's feeling a Dog's Pulse at Gresham College,' and by Swift in his 'Meditation on a Broom Stick,' who nevertheless was probably indebted for the first idea of 'Gulliver's Travels ' to one of the little pieces thus caricatured ('Upon the Eating of Oysters,' Works, ii. 219). # 'New Experiments and Observations touching Cold, or an Experimental History of Cold begun' (1665), containing a refutation of the vulgar doctrine of 'antiperistasis' (in full credit with Bacon) and of Hobbes's theory of cold. # 'A Continuation of New Experiments Physico-Mechanical touching the Spring and Weight of the Air and their Effects ' (1669, a third series appeared in 1682). # 'Tracts about the Cosmical Qualities of Things' (1670). # 'An Essay about the Origin and Virtues of Gems' (1672). # 'The Excellency of Theology compared with Natural Philosophy ' (1673). # 'Some Considerations about the Reconcilableness of Reason and Religion' (1675). # 'The Aerial Noctiluca ' (1680). # 'Memoirs for the Natural History of Human Blood' (1684). # 'Of the High Veneration Man's Intellect owes to God' (1685). # 'A Free Enquiry into the vulgarly received Notion of Nature' (1686). # 'The General History of the Air designed and begun' (1692). # 'Medicinal Experiments' (1692, 3rd vol. 1698), both posthumous.

Catalogues of Boyle's works were published at London in 1688 and subsequent years. He bequeathed his mineralogical collections to the Royal Society, and his portrait by Kerseboorn, the property of the same body, formed part of the National Portrait Exhibition in 1866.

[Life by Birch; Biog. Brit.; Wood's Fasti Oxon. (Bliss), ii. 286; Burnet's Funeral Sermon; Watt's Bibl. Brit.; Hoefer's Hist. de la Chimie, ii. 155; Poggendorff's Gesch. d. Physik, p. 466; Libes's Hist. Phil, des Progres de la Physique, ii. 134; A. Crum Brown's Development of the Idea of Chemical Composition, pp. 9-14.]

A. M. C.

BOYLE, ROGER, Baron Broghill, and first Earl of Orrery (1621–1679), statesman, soldier, and dramatist, the third son of Richard Boyle, first earl of Cork, and Catherine, daughter of Sir Geoffrey Fenton, was born at Lismore 25 April 1621. In recognition of his father's services he was on 28 Feb. 1627 created Baron Broghill. At the age of fifteen he entered Trinity College, Dublin (Budgell, Memoirs of the Boyles, p. 34), and according to Wood (Athenæ, ed. Bliss, iii. 1200) he also 'received some of his academical education in Oxon.' After concluding his university career he spent some years on the continent, chiefly in France and Italy, under a governor, Mr. Markham. Soon after his return to England, he was entrusted by the Earl of Northumberland with the command of his troop in the Scotch expedition. On his marriage to Lady Margaret Howard, third daughter of the Earl of Suffolk, he set out for Ireland, arriving 23 Oct. 1641, on the very day that the great rebellion broke out. When the Earl of Cork summoned his retainers, Lord Broghill was appointed to a troop of horse, with which he joined the Lord President St. Leger. It was only Broghill's acuteness that prevented St. Leger from believing the representations of Lord Muskerry, the leader of the Irish rebels, that he was acting on the authority of a commission from the king. Under the Earl of Cork he took part in the defence of Lismore, and he held a command at the battle of Liscarrol, 3 Sept. 1642. When the Marquis of Ormonde resigned his authority to the parliamentary commissioners in 1647, Lord Broghill, though a zealous royalist, continued to serve under them until the execution of the king. Immediately on receipt of the news he went over to England, where he lived for some time in strict retirement at Marston, Somersetshire. At last, however, he determined to make a strenuous attempt to retrieve his own fortunes and the royal cause, and, on the pretence of visiting a German spa for the sake of his health, resolved to seek an interview with Charles II on the continent, with a view to concoct measures to aid in his restoration. With this purpose he arrived in London, having meanwhile made application to the Earl of