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informed of, that by comparing the ſerveral true dates of the firſt edition of this Author's works with the books of others ſince printed, the priority of the experiments and conſiderations, reſpectively contained in them, may be truly ſtated.
II. Some very conſiderable additions are made in this edition, which were never before publiſhed; namely, fragments of an Appendix to the firſt Part of the Chriſtian Virtuoſo, and of the ſecond Part of that work, preſerved purſuant to the Author's own deſire; with a large collection of letters of Mr. Boyle and his friends upon various ſubjects, ſelected from about fifteen hundred written by moſt of the great men of the laſt age both at home and abroad, with whom he correſponded. Theſe additions in the public owes to the reverend and learned Mr. Henry Miles of Tooting in Surrey, and F. R. S. who is poſſeſſed of thoſe manuſcripts of Mr. Boyle, which were put into his hands, with leave to make uſe of them for the public good, by the late worthy Mr. Thomas Smith, apothecary in the Strand, who lived ſeventeen years with Mr. Boyle, and was with him at his death; and which have been lately increaſed by a part of the original collection, that had been communicated to Dr. William Wotton, author of the Reflections upon ancient and modern Learning, and were reſtored by his ſon-in-law the reverend Mr. William Clarke, canon reſidentiary of Chicheſter. Theſe manuſcripts are very numerous, but many of them written while the Author was very young, and few completed. However I ſhall ſubjoin to the Contents the liſt of them as drawn up by his own order, all of them being ſtill extant, except thoſe marked with an aſteriſk before them.
III. The copper-plates illuſtrating the ſeveral pieces are engraved with much greater exactneſs and elegance than thoſe in any former edition.
IV. There being only two original pictures of Mr. Boyle now known to be extant, it was thought proper to have them both engraved. One, which repreſents him in the 38th year of his age, is placed in the title-page of each volume, copied from a drawing of Mr. Faithorne, communicated by Sir Hans Sloane, from which likewiſe Mr. Faithorne himſelf engraved his print, with the inſtruments accompanying the head, according to the deſign of Dr. Robert Hooke, who thought the face very carefully and well done, and very like; as appears by his letters to Mr. Boyle of Auguſt 25, September 8, and December 15, 1664, printed in Vol. VI. p. 487, 488, and 501, of this edition. The other, which fronts the title-page of the firſt volume,