The autobiography of John Wallis, F. R. S

Abstract

Abstract In old age John Wallis (1616-1703) wrote an autobiography in response to the repeated requests of his friend Thomas Smith (1638-1710). Apart from the purely biographical interest, it is a valuable historical source for the origins of the Royal Society and for the Assembly of Divines at Westminster in the 1640s. Besides the final version, excerpts of which have often been quoted, there still exists Wallis’s first draft of this autobiography—though unfortunately incomplete and, to the best of my knowledge, hitherto unpublished. Both texts, transcribed from the manuscripts, are printed in this article side by side. This shows how Wallis greatly altered and extended his first draft before he had a copy made for Smith. The notes subjoined to this article contain additional information about persons and places mentioned by Wallis.

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