Editing Jean Sylvain Bailly (section)

==Scientific career==
Born in Paris, Bailly was the son of Jacques Bailly, an artist and supervisor of the [[Musée du Louvre|Louvre]], and the grandson of Nicholas Bailly, also an artist and court painter. As a child he originally intended to follow in his family's footsteps and pursue a career in the arts. He became deeply attracted to science, however, particularly [[astronomy]], by the influence of [[Nicolas de Lacaille]]. An excellent student with a "particularly retentive memory and inexhaustible patience",<ref name=Stephens51>Stephens, p. 51.</ref> he calculated an orbit for the next appearance of [[Halley's Comet]] (in 1759), and correctly reduced Lacaille's observations of 515 stars.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Smith |first=Edwin Burrows |date=September 1954 |title=Jean-Sylvain Bailly: Astronomer, Mystic, Revolutionary 1736–1793 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/1005705 |journal=Transactions of the American Philosophical Society |volume=44 |issue=4 |page=430 |doi=10.2307/1005705 |jstor=1005705 }}</ref> He participated in the construction of an observatory at the [[Louvre]].  These achievements along with others got him elected to the [[French Academy of Sciences]] in 1763.<ref name=Stephens51/> In the years prior to the [[French Revolution]], Bailly's distinctive reputation as a French astronomer led to his recognition and admiration by the European scientific community.<ref name="Brucker">{{Cite book|title=Jean-Sylvain Bailly: Revolutionary Mayor of Paris|last=Brucker|first=Gene A|publisher=[[University of Illinois Press]]|year=1950|location=Illinois}}</ref>{{rp|1}} Due to his popularity amongst the scientific groups, in 1777, Bailly received [[Benjamin Franklin]] as a guest in his house in Chaillot.<ref name = "Brucker" />{{rp|2}}

===Scientific and other writing===
Bailly published his ''Essay on The Theory of the Satellites of Jupiter'' in 1766.{{Ref|fn_a|a}} The essay was an expansion of a presentation he had made to the academy in 1763. He later released the noteworthy dissertation O''n the Inequalities of Light of the Satellites of Jupiter''{{Ref|fn_b|b}} in 1771. In 1778, he was elected a foreign member of the [[Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences]].
[[File:Lettres sur l'origine des sciences - et sur celle des peuples de l'Asie.jpg|thumb|Front page of the 1777 copy of "''Discourse on the Origin of the Sciences and the Peoples of Asia''"]]
Bailly gained a high literary reputation thanks to his ''[[Eulogy|Eulogies]]'' for King [[Charles V of France]], [[Nicolas Louis de Lacaille|Lacaille]], [[Molière]], [[Pierre Corneille]] and [[Gottfried Leibniz]], which were issued in collected form in 1770 and 1790. He was admitted to the [[Académie française]] on 26 February 1784 and to the [[Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres|Académie des Inscriptions]] in 1785. From then on, Bailly devoted himself to the [[history of science]]. He published ''A History of Ancient Astronomy'' {{Ref|fn_c|c}} in 1775, followed by ''A History of Modern Astronomy'' (3 vols., 1782).{{Ref|fn_d|d}} Other works include ''Discourse on the Origin of the Sciences and the Peoples of Asia'' (1777),{{Ref|fn_e|e}} ''Discourse on [[Plato]]'s [[Atlantis#Plato.27s account|'Atlantide']]'' (1779),{{Ref|fn_f|f}} and ''A Treatise on Indian and Oriental Astronomy'' (1787).{{Ref|fn_g|g}} Though his works were "universally admired" by contemporaries,<ref name=Stephens51/> later commentators have remarked that "their erudition was... marred by speculative extravagances."{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}