e time of the Commonwealth.

He derived his love of architecture from his father, Dr. Christopher
Wren, a mathematician, a musician, a draughtsman, who liked to employ
his leisure in repairing and decorating the churches under his charge.
Dr. Wren had much mechanical skill, and devised some new methods of
supporting the roofs of large buildings. He was the ideal churchman,
bland, dignified, scholarly, and ingenious.

His son Christopher, born in 1631 (the year after Boston was founded),
inherited his father's propensities, with more than his father's
talents. Like many other children destined to enjoy ninety years of
happy life, he was of such delicate health as to require constant
attention from all his family to prolong his existence. As the years
went on, he became sufficiently robust, and passed through Westminster
school to Oxford, where he was regarded as a prodigy of learning and
ability.

John Evelyn, who visited Oxford when Wren was a student there, speaks of
visiting "that miracle of a youth, Mr. Christopher Wren, nephew of the
Bishop of Ely." He also mentions calling upon one of the professors, at
whose house "that prodigious young scholar, Mr. Christopher Wren,"
showed him a thermometer, "a monstrous magnet," some dials, and a piece
of white marble stained red, and many other curiosities, some of which
were the young scholar's own work.

There never had been such an interest before in science and invention.
The work of Lord Bacon in which he explained to the scholars of Europe
the best way of discovering truth (by experiment, comparison, and
observation) was beginning to bear fruit. A number of gentlemen at
Oxford were accustomed to meet once a week at one another's houses for
the purpose of making and reporting experiments, and thus accumulating
the facts leading to the discovery of principles. This little social
club, of which Christopher Wren was a most active and zealous member,
grew afterwards into the famous Royal Society, of which Sir Isaac Newton
was president, and to which he first communicated his most important
discoveries.

All subjects seem to have been discussed by the Oxford club except
theology and politics, which were becoming a little too exciting for
philosophic treatment. Wren was in the fullest sympathy with the new
scientific spirit, and during all the contention between king and
Parliament he and his friends were quietly developing the science which
was to change the face of the