Richard Baxter (1615-1691) was born at Eaton Constantyne, in Shropshire, on the 12th of November 1615. He received-and all through his life he regretted this

Richard Baxter

fact-no regular education. About 1638 he became a Nonconformist, and in 1639 settled as a preacher at Bridgnorth. In 1641 he was invited over to take charge of the Dissenting body in Kidderminster, where, with various interruptions, he was engaged until the Restoration. He was offered the bishopric of Hereford if he would conform to the Church of England, but he declined, nor was he allowed to return to Kidderminster. He was persecuted both by Charles II. and James II., and his treatment by Judge Jeffreys, though the details of it may have been exaggerated, was grossly insulting. He was

not released until the close of 1686. His last years, it is pleasant to relate, were peaceful; and when he died in London, on the 8th of December 1691, he was buried

with greater show of popular respect than had ever been displayed at a private funeral. The writings of Baxter are so numerous as to baffle the bibliographer, but nearly 170 distinct publications have been traced to his pen.

Samuel Pepys (1633-1703) was born at Brampton, in Northamptonshire, on the 23rd of February 1633. He was the son of John Pepys, a London tailor. The future dia.ist was educated at Huntingdon and then at St. Paul's School; in 1650 he was entered a sizar at Trinity Hall, Cambridge, but removed early in 1651 to Magdalene College. He took his degree in 1653, and married Elizabeth St. Michel, whose looks were all her fortune, in 1655. In 1660 he entered the Civil Service, as Clerk of the Acts, and on January 1st of that year he made the first entry in his famous Diary. Pepys was then living in Axe Yard, Westminster. His fortunes now rapidly developed; he became Clerk of Privy Seal, Justice of the Peace, Younger Brother of the Trinity, and one of the Tangiers Commissioners, all within a few months. In 1664 his eyesight began to fail, and this defect grew more and more serious until, on the 31st of May 1669, he was most unfortunately obliged to desist from keeping his confidential Diary.

Later in the same year Mrs. Pepys died of a fever. In 1673 Pepys became M.P. for Castle Rising, and was given the highly responsible post of Secretary to the Admiralty; in 1679 and 1680 he was very unjustly persecuted for his supposed connection with the Popish Plot, in which he was really not in any way engaged. He was released from the Tower, and was sent, in the winter of 1683-4, to Tangiers to report on the value of the fortress to England. On his return Pepys was elected President of the Royal Society, and in June 1686 he again became Secretary to the Admiralty, but he was subjected to great annoyances, and in 1690 was imprisoned once more on a charge

of treason.

He completed his Memoirs of the Royal Navy, which he published in 1690. He returned no more to public life, although he was active as treasurer to Christ's Hospital. He died at Clapham, after a long and painful illness, on the 26th of May 1703, and Evelyn noted in his diary, "This day died Mr. Sam Pepys, a very worthy, industrious, and curious person, none in England exceeding him in knowledge of the Navy." Among Pepys' effects were a collection of books and papers bequeathed to Magdalene College, Cambridge; the famous Diary was in this library, and about half of it was first given to the world in 1825 by Lord Braybrooke.

FROM PEPYS' "DIARY."

7th [November 1667].-Up, and at the office hard all the morning, and at noon resolved with Sir W. Penn to go see "The Tempest," an old play of Shakespeare's, acted, I hear, the first day; and so my wife, and girl, and W. Flewer by themselves, and Sir W. Penn and I afterwards by ourselves; and forced to sit in the side balcone over against the musique-room at the Duke's house, close by my Lady Dorset and a great many great

ones.

The house mighty full; the King and Court there; and the most innocent play that ever I saw ; and a curious piece of musique in an echo of half sentences, the echo repeating the former half, while the man goes on to the latter; which is mighty pretty.

The play [has] no great wit, but yet good, above ordinary plays. Thence home with [Sir] W. Penn, and there all mightily pleased with the play; and so to supper and to bed, after having done at the office.

8th.-Called up betimes by Sir H. Cholmly, and he and I to good purpose most of the morning-I in my dressing-gown with him, on our Tangier accounts, and stated them well; and here he tells me that he believes it will go hard with my Lord Chancellor. Thence I to the office, where met on some special business; and here I hear that the Duke of York is very ill; and by and by word brought us that we shall not need to attend to-day the Duke of York, for he is not well, which is bad news. They being gone, I to my work

Science

men, who this day come to

alter my office, by beating

down the wall, and making me a fayre window both there, and increasing the window of my closet, which do give me some present trouble; but will be mighty pleasant. So all the whole day among them to very late, and so home weary, to supper, and to bed, troubled for the Duke of York his being sick.

An interesting feature of this period was formed by the work of the new men of science, "experimental philosophers" as they were called, who continued the work of Bacon in the close investigation of physical principles. Of some of these men an account has already been given, but of those who originally met "at the lodgings of Dr. Wilkins" and there formed the nucleus of the future Royal Society, the leading spirit, ROBERT BOYLE (1627-1691), remains to be mentioned. His voluminous writings, many of which first saw the light in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, were ridiculed by Swift in his Pious Meditation on a Broomstick for their miscellaneous and unselected character. It is true that the scientific and philosophical curiosity of the age, which Robert Boyle, as its most prominent savant, represented, lacked the sense of proportion, and was easily led aside into purely vapid disquisition. Not he only, but Sir Isaac Newton himself, toyed with themes,

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