he remarks, "But, because my private lectures and domestic pupils are a great hinderance and interruption of my studies, I wish to live entirely exempt from the former, and in great measure from the latter."—Life of Galileo, p. 18. And, in another letter to Kepler, he speaks with gratitude of Cosmo, the Grand Duke of Tuscany, who "has now invited me to attach myself to him with the annual salary of 1000 florins, and with the title of Philosopher and principal Mathematician to his Highness, without the duties of any office to perform, but with most complete leisure; so that I can complete my treatise on Mechanics, &c."—P. 31.[1]
Surely, if knowledge is valuable, it can never be good policy in a country far wealthier than Tuscany, to allow a genius like Mr. Dalton's, to be employed in the drudgery of elementary intruction.[2] Where would have been the military renown of England, if, with an equally improvi-
- ↑ Life of Galileo, published by the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge.
- ↑ I utter these sentiments from no feelings of private friendship to that estimable philosopher, to whom it is my regret to be almost unknown, and whose modest and retiring merit, I may, perhaps, have the misfortune to offend by these remarks. But Mr. Dalton was of no party; had he ever moved in that vortex which has brought discredit, and almost
