BARROW (ISAAC,) a very eminent mathematician and divine, was born at London in October, 1630, being the son of Thomas Barrow, then a linen-draper of that city, but descended from an ancient family in Suffolk. He was at first placed at the Charter-house school for two or three years, where his behaviour afford ed but little hopes of success in the pro fession of a scholar. Being removed to Felsted in Essex, his disposition took a different turn ; and having soon made great progress in learning, he was first admitted a pensioner of Peter-House in Cambridge; but when he came to join the university, in February, 1645, he was en tered at Trinity College. He now applied himself with great diligence to the study of all parts of literature, especially natu ral philosophy. He afterwards turned his attention to the profession of physic. and made a considerable progress in anatomy, botany, and chemistry : he next studied divinity, then chronology, astronomy, geometry, and the other branches of the mathematics ; with what success, his writings afterwards most eminently sheaved.
When Dr. Duport resigned the chair of Greek professor, he recommended his pupil, Mr. Barrow, for his successor, who, in his probation exercise, sheaved himself equal to the character that had been gi ven him by this gentleman ; but being suspected of favouring Arminianism, he was not preferred This disappointment determined him to quit the college, and visit foreign countries ; but his finances were so low, that he was obliged to dis pose of his books, to enable him to exe cute that design, He left England in June, 1655, and vi sited France, Italy, Turkey, &c. At seve ral places, in the course of this tour, he met with kindness and liberal assistance from the English Ambassadors, &c. which enabled him to benefit the more, by protracting his stay and prolonging his journey. He spent more than a year in Turkey, and returned to England by way of Venice, Germany, and Holland, in 1659. At Constantinople he react over the works of St. Chrysostom, whom he pre ferred to all the other fathers.
On his return, Barrow was ordained by Bishop 13rownrig ; and in 1660, he was chosen to the Greek professorship at Cambridge. In July, 1662, he was elected professor of geometry in Gresham Col lege : in this station he not only dis charged his own duty, but supplied like wise the absence of Dr. Pope, the astro nomy professor. Among his lectures, some were upon the projection of the sphere and perspective, which are lost ; but his Latin oration, introductory to his lectures, is still extant. About this time Mr. Barrow was offered a good living; but the condition annexed, of teaching the patron's son, made him refuse it, as thinking it too like a simoniacal contract.
Upon the 20th of May, 1663, he was elect ed a fellow of the Royal Society, in the first choice made by the council after their charter. The same year the exe cutors of Mr. Lucas having, according to his appointment, founded a mathematical lecture at Cambridge, they selected Mr. Barrow for the first professor ; and though his two professorships were not incom patible with each other, he chose to re sign that of Gresham College, which he did May the 20th, 1664. In 1669, he re signed the mathematical chair to his learned friend Mr. Isaac Newton, being now determined to quit the study of ma thematics for that of divinity. On quit ting his professorship, he had only his fellowship of Trinity College, till his un cle gave him a small sinecure in Wales, and Dr. Seth Ward, Bishop of Salisbury, conferred upon him a prebend in his church. In the year 1670 he was created" doctor in divinity by mandate; and, upon the promotion of Dr. Pearson, master of Trinity College, to the See of Chester, he was appointed to succeed him by the king's patent,bearing date the 13th of Feb. 1672; upon which occasion the king was pleased to say, " he had given it to the best scholar in England." In this, his majesty did not speak from report, but from his own knowledge ; the doctor being then his chaplain, he used often to converse with him, and, in his humorous way, to call him an " unfair preacher," because he exhausted every subject, and left no room for others to come after him. In 1675, he was chosen Vice-Chancellor of the University ; and he omitted no en deavours for the good of that society, nor in the line of his profession, as a divine, for the promotion of piety and virtue ; but his useful labours were abruptly ter minated by a fever on the 4th of May, 1677, in the 47th year of his age. He was interred in Westminster Abbey, where• a monument, adorned with his bust, was soon after erected, by the con tribution of his friends.
Dr. Barrow's works are very nume rous, and indeed various, mathematical, theological, poetical, &c. and such as do honour to the English nation. They are principally as follow : 1. Euchdis Elementa. Cantab. 1655, in 8vo 2. Euclidis data Cantab. 1657, in 8vo.
3. Lectiones Opticx xviii. Lond. 1669, 4to.
4. Lectiones Geometricx xiii. Lond. 1670, 4to.
5. Archimedis Opera, Apollonii Coni corum, libri iv. Theodosii Sphericorum, lib. iii ; novo methodo illustrata, et suc cincte demonstrata. Loud. 1675, in 4to.