"In the middle of the 1660s, Borelli, Newton, Huygens and Hooke were wrestling with various parts of the same planetary problems, some of them treading on one another's heels in the study of the nature of light... in England, experiments with the pendulum clock had started independently, and Christopher Wren, , William Balle and Laurence Rooke appear to have unaugurated the enquiry into laws of motion, Robert Hooke performing most of the experiments. The 1670s must represent one of the greatest decades in the scientific revolution, if not the climax... and in both London and Paris... achievements... were of a remarkable nature. So far as the gravitational theory... our attention ought to be directed not merely to Newton... but to the combined operations of the English group. The Royal Society... following Baconian principles, sought to collect... the data necessary for the establishment of the Copernican hypothesis... ideally... "freely communicating their methods and pooling their gains." Here the names... in the forefront are... Isaac Newton, Robert Hooke, Edmond Halley and Christopher Wren."