ABSTRACT
The Church of Rome might arrest the body of Galilei, but his spirit went marching on. Not only his disciples, Viviani and Torricelli, but many others were infected with his enthusiasm for experimental science; and within a comparatively short time influential institutions were organized for the express purpose of advancing experimental science by the co-operative work of their members. The Academy of Experiments was founded in Florence in 1657. Its moving spirits were two of Galilei’s most distinguished disciples, Viviani and Torricelli. The Royal Society appears to have developed from an informal association of adherents of Francis Bacon’s experimental philosophy. These men began to meet weekly in London about 1645 to discuss natural problems. The French Academie des Sciences had its origin in certain informal gatherings of a group of philosophers and mathematicians in Paris towards the middle of the seventeenth century.
