RUTHERFORD (Thomas, D. D.)

, an ingenious English philosopher, was the son of the Rev. Thomas Rutherford, rector of Papworth Everard in the county of Cambridge, who had made large collections for the history of that county.

Our author was born the 13th of October 1712. He studied at Cambridge, and became fellow of St. John's college, and regius professor of divinity, in that university; afterwards rector of Shenfield in Essex, and of Barley in Hertfordshire, and archdeacon of Essex. He died the 5th of October 1771, at 59 years of age.

Dr. Rutherford, besides a number of theological writings, published, at Cambridge,

1. Ordo Institutionum Physicarum, 1743, in 4to.

2. A System of Natural Philosophy, in 2 vols, 4to, 1748. A work which has been much esteemed.

3. He communicated also to the Gentleman's Society at Spalding, a curious correction of Plutarch's description of the instrument used to renew the Vestal fire, as relating to the triangle with which the instrument was formed. It was nothing else, it seems, but a concave speculum, whose principal focus, which collected the rays, is not in the centre of concavity, but at the distance of half a diameter from its surface. But some of the Ancients thought otherwise, as appears from prop. 31 of Euclid's Catoptrics.

The writer of his epitaph says, “He was eminent no less for his piety and integrity, than his extensive learning; and filled every public station in which he was placed with general approbation. In private life, his behaviour was truly amiable. He was esteemed, beloved, and honoured by his family and friends; and his death was sincerely lamented by all who had ever heard of his well deserved character.” |