La Geometrie Francoise, ou la Pratique aisee.... La quadracture du
cercle. Par le Sieur de Beaulieu, Ingenieur, Geographe du Roi ...
Paris, 1676, 8vo. [not Pontault de Beaulieu, the celebrated
topographer; he died in 1674].[232]
If this book had been a fair specimen, I might have pointed to it in
connection with contemporary English works, and made a scornful comparison.
But it is not a fair specimen. Beaulieu was attached to the Royal
Household, and throughout the century it may be suspected that the
household forced a royal road to geometry. Fifty years before, Beaugrand,
the king's secretary, made a fool of himself, and [so?] contrived to pass
for a geometer. He had interest enough to get Desargues, the most powerful
geometer of his time,[233] the teacher and friend of Pascal, prohibited
from {120} lecturing. See some letters on the History of Perspective, which
I wrote in the _Athenaeum_, in October and November, 1861. Montucla, who
does not seem to know the true secret of Beaugrand's greatness, describes
him as "un certain M. de Beaugrand, mathematicien, fort mal traite par
Descartes, et a ce qu'il paroit avec justice."[234]
Beaulieu's quadrature amounts to a geometrical construction[235] which
gives [pi] = [root]10. His depth may be ascertained from the following
extracts. First on Copernicus:
"Copernic, Allemand, ne s'est pas moins rendu illustre par ses doctes
ecrits; et nous pourrions dire de luy, qu'il seroit le seul et unique en la
force de ses Problemes, si sa trop grande presomption ne l'avoit porte a
avancer en cette Science une proposition aussi absurde, qu'elle est contre
la Foy et raison, en faisant la circonference d'un Cercle fixe, immobile,
et le centre mobile, sur lequel principe Geometrique, il a avance en son
Traitte Astrologique le Soleil fixe, et la Terre mobile."[236]
I digress here to point out that though our quadrators, etc., very often,
and our historians sometimes, assert that men of the character of
Copernicus, etc., were treated with contempt and abuse until their day of
ascendancy came, nothing can be more incorrect. From Tycho Brahe[237] to
Beaulieu, there is but one expression of admiration for the genius of
Copernicus. There is an exception, which, I {121} believe, has been quite
misunderstood. Maurolycus,[238] in his _De Sphaera_, written many years
before its posthumous publication in 1575, and which it is not certain he
would have published, speaking of the safety with which various authors may
be read after his cautions, says, "Toleratur et Nicolaus Copernicus qui
Solem fixum et Terram _in girum circumverti_ posuit: et scutica potius, aut
flagello, quam reprehensione dignus est."[239] Maurolycus was a mild and
somewhat contemptuous satirist, when expressing disapproval: as we should
now say, he pooh-poohed his opponents; but, unless the above be an
instance, he was never savage nor impetuous. I am fully satisfied that the
meaning of the sentence is, that Copernicus, who turned the earth like a
boy's top, ought rather to have a whip given him wherewith to keep up his
plaything than a serious refutation. To speak of _tolerating_ a person _as
being_ more worthy of a flogging than an argument, is almost a
contradiction.