[879]Mr. Thomas Digges:—he wrote a booke in 4to, entituled—
'Stratioticos, compendiously teaching the science of nombres as well in fractions as integers, and so much of the rules and aequations algebraicall and art of nombers cossicall as are requisite for the profession of a soldier; together with the modern militarie discipline, offices, lawes and orders in every well-governed camp and armie inviolably to be observed.'
First published by him, 1579, and dedicated 'unto the right honourable Robert, earle of Leicester.' The second edition, 1590.
He was muster-master generall of all her majestie's forces in the Low Countries, as appeares in page237.
At the end of this booke (the last paragraph) speaking of 'engins and inventions not usual to be thought on and had in readinesse.'—
'Of these and many mo important mattars militare, I shall have occasion at large to dilate in my treatise of great artillerie and pyrotechnie, ☞ whose publication I have for divers due respects hitherto differred.'
He was the onely sonne of the learned Leonard Digges, esqr, of whom he speakes in the preface to hisStratioticos.
Pliny, Nat. Hist. lib. vii. cap. 51;—'Una familia Curionum in qua tres continua serie Oratores extiterunt.' Inthisfamily have been four learned men in an uninterrupted descent—scilicet, two eminent mathematicians (Leonard and Thomas), Sir Dudley Digges, Master of the Rolles, and his sonne Dudley, fellow of Allsoules College, Oxon.
[880]Alae seu scalae mathematicae, quibus visibilium remotissima coelorum theatra conscendi et planetarumomnium itinera novis et inauditis methodis explorari, tum hujus portentosi syderis (in Cassiopea) in mundi boreali plaga insolito fulgore coruscantis distantia et magnitudo immensa situsque protinus tremendus indagari Deique stupendum ostentum terricolis expositum cognosci liquidissime possit.
Thoma Diggesio, Cantiensi, stemmatis generosi, autore, Lond. 1573.
Dedicated
'Ad Guliel. Cecilium, praeclariss. ordinis equitem auratum, baronem Burghleium, summumque Angliae Thesaurarium,' etc.
—luce clarius deprehendi longè supra lunam ipsam esse. Tum demum antiquorum et recentiorum omnium astronomorum modos cometarum et corporum coelestium distantias et magnitudines metiendi quos unquam legeram in animum sevocare coeperam, nec quenquam reperire poteram qui viam huic subtilissimae parallaxi examinandae convenientem demonstravit. Solus igitur, omnium astronomorum antiquorum et recentiorum ope orbatus, (in fluctuanti dubitationum plurimarum pelago jactatus) ad meipsum redii: brevissimoque spatio (foelicibus mathematicis spirantibus auris) portum optatum assequendi varios cursus expeditissimos hactenus a nemine exploratos atque ab omni erroris scopulo tutissimos inveni. Quos in exigui libelli formam redactos honori tuo exhibere decrevi, mei officii testimonium (nisi me fallit Philautia) haud vulgari genio conscriptum, neque brevi temporum curriculo periturum—
[881]Praefatio Authoris.
Sed plura de hujus stellae historia scribere non decrevi quia eximius vir Johannes Dee (quum in reliqua philosophia admirandus, tum harum scientiarum peritissimus, quem tanquam mihi parentem alterum mathematicum veneror, quippe qui in tenerrimâ meâ aetate plurima harum suavissimarum scientiarum semina menti meae inseruerit, alia a patre meo prius sata amicissime fidelissimequenutriverit atque auxerit) hanc sibi tractandam assumpserit materiam quam.... Conatus igitur sum et assequutus variis problematibus demonstrative et practice exactissime parallaxin hujus phaenomeni et cujusvis etiam alterius concludere, licet Saturni Jovis et Martis parallaxeis adeo sint exiguae ut sensuum imbecillitate vix discerni possint. Si tamen ulla arte vere animadverti queant (hoc ausim dicere) aut his nostris sequentibus problematibus aut nullis penitus praeceptis geometricis inveniri posse—Si aequi bonique consuleris, majora (annuenti potentissimo) in posterum promitto, quibus (non probabilibus solummodo argumentis sed firmissimis apodixibus) demonstrabitur verissimam esse Copernici hactenus explosum de terrae motu paradoxum—1573.
To theseAlae seu ScalaeMr. Digges hath annexed
Parallaticae commentationis praxeos nucleus quidam, Jo. Day—
writ by John Dee, a small treatise, Lond. 1573; and hath writ thus
Lectori Benevolo.
—Me autem isti meo opusculo annectere et in lucem simul emittere variae impulere causae—Imane charissimus mihi illius author debita suae inventionis privaretur laude: cum nonnulli fortassis si postea ederetur suspicari possint a meis methodis derivatum fuisse. Fateor equidem adeo late mea sese extendere fundamina ut tum istiusmodi tum plurimi etiam alii nuclei inde excerpi possint, etc.
[882]Pantometria, containing longimetria, planimetria, stereometria—was writ by Leonard Digges, esq., but published by his sonne Thomas Digges esqr. and dedicated to Sir Nicholas Bacon, knight, Lord Keeper, lately reviewed and augmented by the author, printed at London, 1591.
In the preface, thus:—
'But to leave things doone of antiquity long ago, my father, by his continuall painfull practises, assisted withdemonstrations mathematicall, was able, and sundry times hath, by proportionall glasses duely situate in convenient angles, not onely discovered things farre off, read letters, numbred peeces of money with the very coyne and superscription thereof cast by some of his freends on purpose upon downes in open fields but also seven miles off declared what hath been doone at that instant in private places; he hath also at sundry times by the sunne fired powder and discharged ordinance halfe a mile and more distant—which things I am the bolder to report for that there are yet living diverse of these his doeingsoculati testes, and many other matters far more strange and rare which I omit as impertinent to this place. But for invention of these conclusions I have heard him say nothing ever helped him so much as the exquisite knowledge he had, by continuall practise, attained in geometricall mensurations.'