John Wilkins

author

John Wilkins

1614–1672

A seventeenth-century bishop, natural philosopher, and lively scientific thinker, he moved easily between religion, astronomy, language, and invention. He is often remembered as one of the founders of the Royal Society and as a writer who imagined everything from travel to the Moon to a universal language.

1 Audiobook

The discovery of a world in the moone : or, A discovrse tending to prove that 'tis probable there may be another habitable world in that planet

The discovery of a world in the moone : or, A discovrse tending to prove that 'tis probable there may be another habitable world in that planet

by John Wilkins

About the author

Born in 1614 in Northamptonshire, John Wilkins became an English Anglican clergyman whose curiosity reached far beyond church life. He studied at Oxford, later led both Wadham College, Oxford, and Trinity College, Cambridge, and eventually became Bishop of Chester.

Wilkins stood out for the breadth of his interests. He wrote about astronomy and the possibility of travel to the Moon, explored mechanical devices in Mathematical Magick, and produced An Essay towards a Real Character, and a Philosophical Language, an ambitious attempt to design a universal system of language and knowledge. His work shows the excitement of a period when science, philosophy, and theology were still closely connected.

He is also remembered as an important organizer of intellectual life in Restoration England. Wilkins helped bring together thinkers interested in experiment and natural philosophy, and he became one of the founders of the Royal Society. He died in 1672, leaving a reputation as a calm, practical, and unusually wide-ranging mind.