The great circulating mediums, who wrote to everybody, heard from
everybody, and sent extracts to everybody else, have been Father Mersenne,
John Collins, and the late Professor Schumacher: all "late" no doubt, but
only the last recent enough to be so styled. If M.C.S. should ever again
stand for "Member of the Corresponding Society," it should raise an
acrostic thought of the three. There is an allusion to Mersenne's
occupation in Hobbes's reply to him. He wanted to give Hobbes, who was very
ill at Paris, the Roman Eucharist: but Hobbes said, "I have settled all
that long ago; when did you hear from Gassendi?" We are reminded of
William's answer to Burnet. John Collins disseminated Newton, among others.
Schumacher ought to have been called the postmaster-general of astronomy,
as Collins was called the attorney-general of mathematics.[190]
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