GILBERT, or GILBER D, WILLIAM, an eminent philoso pher and physician, was born at Colchester, in the year 1540, and was the son of the recorder of that town. After having attended the two English universities, lie set out upon his travels, and graduated at some of the foreign uni versities. Upon his return to England he settled in London in 1573, was admitted a member of the College of Physicians, and practised medicine with great success and reputation. His fame became so great, that he was appointed first phy sician to Queen Elizabeth, who generously allowed him a pension for the purpose of carrying on his philosophical experiments. He retained his pension and his office after the accession of James I. but he did not long enjoy the pa tronage of the new sovereign. Ile died on the 20th Novem ber 1603, in the 63d year of his age, and was interred at Colchester, where a handsome monument was erected to his memory by his brothers. His library, minerals, globes, and mathematical instruments, were left to the College of Physicians. His picture is placed in the gallery over the schools at Oxford. He appears to have been a man of tall stature, and cheerful disposition.
The reputation of Gilbert is founded on his work enti tled, De Magnete, magneticisyue corporibus, et de Magno Magnete Tellure, Physiologia novo, plurimis et argumentie et experimentis demonstrate. It appeared in London in 1600, in folio, and was afterwards reprinted in Germany. The following analysis of this admirable work has been given by our countryman, Dr Robison, and is too valuable to admit of abridgment.
" In the introduction he recounts all the knowledge of the ancients on the subject, and their supine inattention to what was so entirely in their hands, and the impossibility of ever adding to the stock of useful knowledge, so long as men imagined themselves to be philosophising, while they were only repeating a few cant words, and the unmeaning phrases of the Aristotelian school. It is curious to remark the almost perfect sameness of Dr Gilbert's sentiments and language with those of Lord Bacon. They both charge, in a peremptory manner, all those who pretend to inform others, to give over their dialectic labours, which are no thing but ringing changes on a few trite truths, and many unfounded conjectures, and immediately to betake them selves to experiment. We has pursued this method on the subject of magnetism with wonderful ardour, and with , equal genius and success ; for Dr Gilbert was possessed both of ingenuity, and a mind fitted for general views of things. l'he Nvork contains a prodigious number and variety of observations and experiments, collected with sa the writings of others, and instituted by him self with considerable expence and labour. It would in deed be a miracle, if all Dr Gilbert's general inferences were just, or all his experiments accurate. It was untrodden ground. But, on the whole, this performance contains more real information, than any writing of the age in which he lived, and is scarcely exceeded by any that has appeared since. We may hold it with justice as the first fruits of
the Baconian or experimental philosophy.
This work of Dr Gilbert's relates chiefly to the load stone, and what we call magnets ; that is, pieces of steel which have acquired properties similar to those of the loadstonc. But he extends the term magnetism, and the epithet magnetic, to all bodies which are affected by load stones and magnets, in a manner similar to that in which they affect each other. In the course of his investigation, indeed, he finds that these bodies are only such as contain iron in some state or other ; and in proving this limitation, he mentions a great variety of phenomena which have a considerable resemblance to those which he allows to he inagnetical, namely, those which he called electrical, be cause they were produced in the same way that amber is made to attract and repel light bodies. lle marks, with care, the distinctions between these and the characteristic phenomena of magnets. He seems to have that all bodies maybe rendered electrical, while lerrugineous substances alone can he made magnetical. It is not saying too much of this work of Dr Gilbert's, to affirm, that it contains almost every thing that we know about magnetism. His unwearied diligence in searching every writing on the subject, and in getting information from navigators, and his incessant occupation in experiments, have left very few facts unknown to him. We meet with many things in the writings of posterior enquirers, some of them of high re putation, and of the present day, which are published and received as notable discoveries, but arc contained in the rich collection of Dr Gilbert. We by no means ascribe all this to mean plagiarism, although we know traders in experi mental knowledge who are not free from this charge. \Ve ascribe it to the general indolence of mankind, who do not take the trouble of consulting originals, where things are mixed with others which they do not want, or treated in a way, and with a painful minuteness, which arc no lon ger in fashion.
Dr Gilbert's hook, although one of those which does the highest honour to our country, is less known in Britain than on the continent. Indeed, we know but of two Bri tish editions of it, which are both in Latin ; and we have seen five editions published in Germany and Holland be fore 1628.
\Ve earnestly recommend it to the perusal of the curious reader. He will, (besides the philosophy), find more facts in it than in the two large folios of Scareda."•• Besides this work, there appeared a posthumous publica tion of Gilbert's, entitled, De Mundo nostro sublunari Phi losolihia nova, Amst. 1651, 4to. It was printed from two MSS. in the library of Sir William Boswell, and consists of an attempt to establish a new system of natural philoso phy upon the ruins of the Aristotelian system. It was edited by the learned Gruter. Dr Gilbert invented two very ingenious instruments for ascertaining the latitudes of places without the aid celestial observations. See