, who wrote his name sometimes Grubendol, reversing the letters, was
, who wrote his name sometimes Grubendol, reversing the letters, was a learned
German, and born in 1626, in the duchy of Bremen, in
the Lower Saxony, being descended from the counts of
Oldenburg, in Westphalia, whence his name. During the
long English parliament in Charles I.'s time, he was appointed consul for his countrymen, in which post he continued at London after the usurpation of Cromwell; but,
being discharged from that employment, he was made
tutor to the lord Henry Obrien, an Irish nobleman, whom
he attended to the university of Oxford, and in 1656 entered himself a student, chiefly for the sake of admission
to the Bodleian library. He was afterwards tutor to William lord Cavendish, and was acquainted with Milton,
among whose “Epistolae familiares,
” are four letters to
Oldenburg. During his residence at Oxford he became
also acquainted with the members of that little association
which gave birth to the royal society; and, upon the foundation of this latter, he was elected fellow; and, when the
society found it necessary to have two secretaries, he was
chosen assistant to Dr. Wilkins. He applied himself with
extraordinary diligence to the business of this office, and
began the publication of the “Philosophical Transactions;
”
with No. 1. in 1664. In order to discharge this task with
greater credit to himself and the society, he held a correspondence with more than seventy learned persons, and
others, upon a vast variety of subjects, in different parts
of the world. This fatigue would have been insupportable,
had he not, as he told Dr. Lister, answered every letter
the moment he received it, a rule which cannot be too
warmly recommended, whether in cases of business, literature, or pleasure. Among Oldenburg’s correspondents
may be mentioned the celebrated Robert Boyle, with
whom he had a very intimate friendship; and he translated
several of that gentleman’s works into Latin.