lists. The necessary inference is that his stay at the university was short, and that only the groundwork of his education was laid there. Although there is no direct evidence of the fact, there can be no doubt that he left St Andrews to complete his education on the Continent, and that he probably studied at the university of Paris, and visited Italy and Germany. He did not, however, as has been supposed, spend the best years of his manhood abroad, for he was certainly at home in 1571, when, being just of age, the preliminaries of his marriage were arranged at Merchiston; and for many years after that event he took an earnest interest in the affairs of the church, the most engrossing element in the politics of the time.
In 1572 John Napier married Elizabeth, daughter of Sir James Stirling of Keir, mentioned above. This marriage took place almost immediately after his father’s second marriage. About the end of the year 1579 John Napier’s wife died, leaving him one son, Archibald, the first Lord Napier, and one daughter, Jane. A few years afterwards he married again, the name of his second wife being Agnes Chisholme, and by her he had ten children, five sons and five daughters.
On the 17th of October 1593 a convention of delegates was held at Edinburgh at which a committee was appointed to follow the king and lay before him in a personal interview certain instructions relating to the punishment of the rebellious Popish earls and the safety of the church. This committee consisted of six members, two barons, two ministers, and two burgesses—the two barons selected being John Napier of Merchiston and James Maxwell of Calderwood. The delegates found the king at Jedburgh, and the mission, which was a dangerous one, was success fully accomplished. Shortly afterwards another convention was held at Edinburgh, and it was resolved that the delegates sent to Jedburgh should again meet the king at Linlithgow and repeat their former instructions. This was done accordingly, the number of members of the committee being, however, doubled. These interviews took place in October 1593, and on the 29th of the following January Napier wrote to the king the letter which forms the dedication of the Plaine Discovery.
The full title of this first work of Napier s is given be low.[1] It was written in English instead of Latin in order that “hereby the simple of this Hand may be instructed”; and the author states that he “was constrained of compassion, leaving the Latine, to haste out in English this present worke.” He apologizes also for the language and his own mode of expression in the following sentences:—
Whatsoever therfore through hast, is here rudely and in base language set downe, I doubt not to be pardoned thereof by all good men, who, considering the necessitie of this time, will esteem it more meete to make hast to prevent the rising againe of Anti-christian darknes within this Hand, then to prolong the time in painting of language&rdquot; and “I graunt indeede, and am sure, that in the style of wordes and utterance of language, we shall greatlie differ, for therein I do judge my selfe inferiour to all men: so that scarcely in these high matters could I with long deliberation finde wordes to expresse my minde.”[2]
It is not to be supposed that Napier’s Plaine Discovery was in any respect due to a visionary cloud passing over his mind, or to any temporary infatuation; on the contrary, it is a serious and laborious work, to which he had devoted years of care and thought, and which is closely connected with the history of the times. In one sense it may be said to stand to theological literature in Scotland in something of the same position as that occupied by the Canon Mirificus with respect to the scientific literature, for it is the first published original work relating to theological interpretation, and is quite without a predecessor in its own field. In judging of the book, the circumstances of the time and the state of the country have to be taken into account. Napier lived in the very midst of fiercely contending religious factions, and his home was situated in a district which was the scene of constant wars and disturbances; there was but little theological teaching of any kind, and the work related to what were then the leading political and religious questions of the day.
After the publication of the Plaine Discovery, Napier seems to have occupied himself with the invention of secret instruments of war, for in the Bacon collection at Lambeth Palace there is a document, dated June 7, 1596, and signed by Napier, giving a list of his inventions for the defence of the country against the anticipated invasion by Philip of Spain. The document is entitled “Secrett Inventionis, proffitabill and necessary in theis dayes for defence of this Hand, and withstanding of strangers, enemies of God’s truth and religion,”[3] and the inventions consist of (1) a mirror for burning the enemies’ ships at any distance, (2) a piece of artillery destroying everything round an arc of a circle, and (3) a round metal chariot, so constructed that its occupants could move it rapidly and easily, while firing out through small holes in it. It has been asserted (by Sir Thomas Urquhart) that the piece of artillery was actually tried upon a plain in Scotland with complete success, a number of sheep and cattle being destroyed.
In 1614 appeared the work which in the history of British science can be placed as second only to Newton’s Principia. The full title is as follows: Mirifici Logarithmorum Canonis descriptio, Ejusque usus, in utraque Trigonometria; ut etiam in omni Logistica Mathematica, Amplissimi, Facillimi, & expeditissimi explicatio. Authore ac Inventor e Ioanne Nepero, Barone Merckistonii, &c. Scoto. Edinburgi, ex officinâ Andreæ, Hart Bibliopolæ, CIƆ. DC. XIV. This is printed on an ornamental title-page. The work is a small-sized quarto, containing fifty-seven pages of explanatory matter and ninety pages of tables.
The nature of logarithms is explained by reference to the motion of points in a straight line, and the principle upon which they are based is that of the correspondence of a geometrical and an arithmetical series of numbers. The table gives the logarithms of sines for every minute to seven figures; it is arranged semi-quadrantally, so that the differentiæ, which are the differences of the two logarithms in the same line, are the logarithms of the tangents. Napier’s logarithms are not the logarithms now termed
- ↑ A plaine discovery of the whole Revelation of Saint Iohn: set downe in two treatises: The one searching and proving the true interpretation thereof: The other applying the same paraphrastically and Historically to the text. Set foorth by John Napeir L. of Marchistoun younger. Whereunto are annexed certaine Oracles of Sibylla, agreeing with the Revelation and other places of Scripture. Edinburgh, printed by Robert Walde-grave, printer to the King’s Majestie, 1593. Cum privilegio Regali.
- ↑ The work was translated into French by George Thomson, a naturalized Scotsman residing in La Rochelle, and published by him at that town in 1602, under the title Ouverture de tons les secrets de l’Apocalypse, &c. Par Jean Napier (c. a. d.) Nonpareil, Sieur de Merchiston, reveue par lui-meme, et mise en Francois par Georges Thomson, Escossois. There was a second edition of the translation in 1605, and a third edition in 1607. There was also a German translation published at Frankfort, which reached its third edition in 1627. The second English edition appeared in 1611, and in the preface to it Napier states he intended to have published an edition in Latin soon after the original publication in 1593, but that, as the work had now been made public by the French and German translations, and as he was “advertised that our papistical adversaries wer to write larglie against the said editions that are alreadie set out,” he defers the Latin edition “till having first seene the adversaries objections, I may insert in the Latin edition an apologie of that which is rightly done, and an amends of whatsoever is amisse.” No criticism on the work was ever published, and there was no Latin edition. A third edition appeared in 1645.
- ↑ A facsimile of this document is given by Mr Mark Napier in his Memoirs of John Napier.
