approaching diifolution, but which he concealed as much-as pof-
fible from his friends. He was reduced however to fo low a flate
as to be affedted with the molt trifling circumflances, which he
confidered as prodigies, and would frequently interrupt his fellies
of wit with fudden reflections on death.
The immediate caufe of his deceafe was a ilrangury, which
being attended with the moil excruciating torments, brought on
a violent fever,, and a temporary delirium j in the midfl of which
he was heard repeatedly to cry out, “ Ne fruitra vixifle videar mm
His delirium at length fubfiding he became calm and eompofed,
and perfectly fenfible. Being extremely debilitated by the violence
of his diibrder, he perceived that he had not many hours to
live. Accordingly he gave orders with the utmofl coolnefs and
refignation j- even amufed himfelf with compofing an extempore
copy of verfes; fung various hymns j offered up prayers and Applications
to the Supreme Being j recommended to his family and
friends piety and. refignation to the divine will. ; exhorted his
pupils to perfevere in their fludies; and converfed with Kepler on
the moil abflrufe parts of ailronomy. Thus, amidil prayers, exhortations,
and literary converfation, he expired fo peaceably, that
he was. neither heard nor feen -f-, by any of thofe who were pre-
fent, to breathe his. lail. He. died in Odtober 1.601, in the fifty-
fifth year of his age.
It is remarkable, that fo fenfible a man, and fo accurate an ob-
* T h a t I may n o t feem to have lived in vain,
| T am tranquille ut nec deficere nec vifus fit nec audit us,
O ratio FunebriSj p. 27 .
ferver
ferver as Tycho Brahe, fhould be fo infedted with the
rage of fyflem-making as to rejecft the limpie and beautiful
fyflem of Copernicus, eflablifhed by the moil incontrovertible
proofs,, and to endeavour to reconcile the abfurdities of the Ptolemaic
fyflem. He was, indeed, too well acquainted with the
motions of the heavenly bodies, not to be fenfible that the fun was
the centre of the fyflem j and though he was flruck with the
fimplicity and harmony of the Pythagorean fyflem, which Copernicus
had lately revived, yet out of refpedt, it is faid, for fe-
veral pafiages in fcripture, he abfurdly endeavoured to reconcile
(what were never intended to be reconciled) his learning with
his faith: he rejedted the diurnal rotation of the earth on its own
axis ¡ fuppofed that the earth was quiefcent; that the fun, witH
all the planets, was carried about the earth in the fpace of a year;
and that the planets, by their proper motions, revolved round the
fun in their feveral periods ; thus retaining the moil abfurd part
of the Ptolemaic hypothefis, which makes the whole planetary
fyflem revolve round the earth, in the fpace of every twenty-four
hours.
Tycho, indeed, was fo higotted to his own hypothefis, and
fhewed, even in his lail moments, fuch an attachment to his own
fyflem, as to defire his favourite fcholar, the great Kepler, to
follow his fyflem rather than that of Copernicus.
I f we .were tp efljmate the merits of Tycho Brahe as an aflro-
nomer, we fhould compare the fcience as he left it with the flate
ia which lie found it. His great merit confilled in his inventions,'