But in this case the discoverer lived to see his theory accepted by practically all the great minds of his time.
Delambre is authority for the following estimate of Newton by Lagrange.
"The celebrated Lagrange," he says, "who frequently asserted that Newton was the greatest genius that ever existed, used to add--'and the most fortunate, for we cannot find MORE THAN ONCE a system of the world to establish.'" With pardonable exaggeration the admiring followers of the great generalizer pronounced this epitaph: "Nature and Nature's laws lay hid in night; God said 'Let Newton be!' and all was light." XIII.

INSTRUMENTS OF PRECISION IN THE AGE OF NEWTON During the Newtonian epoch there were numerous important inventions of scientific instruments, as well as many improvements made upon the older ones.

Some of these discoveries have been referred to briefly in other places, but their importance in promoting scientific investigation warrants a fuller treatment of some of the more significant.
Many of the errors that had arisen in various scientific calculations before the seventeenth century may be ascribed to the crudeness and inaccuracy in the construction of most scientific instruments.
Scientists had not as yet learned that an approach to absolute accuracy was necessary in every investigation in the field of science, and that such accuracy must be extended to the construction of the instruments used in these investigations and observations.

In astronomy it is obvious that instruments of delicate exactness are most essential; yet Tycho Brahe, who lived in the sixteenth century, is credited with being the first astronomer whose instruments show extreme care in construction.
It seems practically settled that the first telescope was invented in Holland in 1608; but three men, Hans Lippershey, James Metius, and Zacharias Jansen, have been given the credit of the invention at different times.

It would seem from certain papers, now in the library of the University of Leyden, and included in Huygens's papers, that Lippershey was probably the first to invent a telescope and to describe his invention.