Mathematical and Philosophical Works

After King Charles II’s Restoration, he was ejected from there and became preacher to the Honourable Society of Gray's Inn and Minister of St. Lawrence Jewry, London, in the place of Dr. Ward. About this time, he became a member of the Royal Society, was chosen one of their council, and proved one of their most eminent members and chief benefactors. Soon after this, he was made Dean of Ripon, and through the interest of the late Duke of Buckingham, he was created Bishop of Chester and consecrated in the chapel of Ely House in Holborn on the 15th of November, 1668, by Dr. Cosin, Bishop of Durham; Dr. Laney, Bishop of Ely; and Dr. Ward, Bishop of Salisbury. On this occasion, Dr. Tillotson—afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury—preached an excellent sermon.

He was a person of great natural endowments and, through his indefatigable study, attained an universal insight into all, or at least most, parts of useful learning. He was a great mathematician and very much advanced the study of astronomy, both while he was Warden of Wadham College in Oxford and in London, when he was a member of the Royal Society. He was as well-versed in mechanics and experimental philosophy as any man in his time and was a great promoter of them. In divinity, which was his main business, he excelled and was a very able critic. His talent for preaching was admirable and more suited to profit than to please his hearers; he favored an apt and plain way of speech and expressed his conceptions in a natural style. In his writings, he was judicious and plain, and did not value circumstances so much as the substance. This appeared evident in whatever subject he undertook, which he always made easier for those who came after him.

He treated sometimes on matters that did not properly belong to his profession, but always with a design to make men wiser and better; which was his chief end in promoting universal knowledge and one of the main reasons for his entering into the Royal Society. His virtues and graces were very uncommon; at least as to that degree of