The Life of Dr. Robert Hooke.

watch, accommodated with a spring, applied to the arbor of the balance to regulate the motion thereof, while concealing the way I had for finding the longitude. This was so well approved of that Sir Robert Moray drew me up the form of a patent; the principal part—namely, the description of the watch so regulated—is in his own handwriting, which I still have. The discouragement I met with in the management of this affair made me desist for that time.

So far this paper. In confirmation of the above, I met with a draft of an agreement between Lord Brouncker, Mr. Boyle, and Sir Robert Moray with Robert Hooke, Master of Arts, to the effect that Robert Hooke should disclose to them the whole of his invention to measure the parts of time at sea as exactly and truly as they are at land by the pendulum clocks invented by Monsieur Huygens. Of the profits to be made thereby, not exceeding £6,000, Robert Hooke was to have three-quarters. Of whatever was made more than that, not exceeding £4,000, Robert Hooke was to have two-thirds. If more could be made of it, he was to have one-half, and Robert Hooke was to be publicly acknowledged as the author and inventor thereof. This is the sum of one draft; there are indeed some others which differ only in the division of the profits, which it is needless here to trouble the reader with. In pursuance of this design, there were several papers drawn up—namely, the draft of an Act of Parliament to oblige all masters of ships to pay a fee per ton for the use of this invention, as also a warrant to be granted by the King to Robert Hooke, M.A., etc., for a patent for the sole use of the said invention for fourteen years, signed by His Majesty’s command, William Morrice. I have some other papers which are unnecessary to be mentioned here.

Thus far the matter proceeded, and how it came to stop here may be justly wondered at. But to give the reader the best satisfaction I can in this matter, I shall transcribe a paragraph out of the postscript to Hooke’s Treatise of Helioscopes, printed in 1676.

Page 27.

"This treaty with me would have been finally concluded for several thousand pounds had not the inserting of one clause broken it off, which was: 'That if, after I had discovered my invention about finding the longitude by watches (though in themselves sufficient), they or any other person should find a way of improving my principles, he or they should have the benefit thereof during the term of the patent, and not I.' To which clause I could in no way agree, knowing it was easy to vary my principles a hundred ways. It was not improbable that there might be some addition of convenience to what I should first discover, it being facile inventis addere original: "facile inventis addere" — Latin for "it is easy to add to things already invented.". I judged it unreasonable to be deprived of the benefit of my inventions, which were in themselves sufficient, because others might vary them or improve them in some way—of which it was very probable they would have no thought if they had not the advantage of being instructed by my discovery, it having been hidden for some thousands of years already. As indeed the effect has made evident and certain, there having been nothing done by anybody else upon that matter ever since."

There is more in the same place worth perusal, which, for brevity, I omit.