Three decades before Newton’s prism experiments, Robert Boyle set about colour the Royal Society way: by experiment. Experiments and Considerations Touching Colours (1664) reports his trials on whiteness and blackness, the colours of bodies and their changes under chemistry — offered modestly as ‘the beginning of an experimental history of colours’ for others to build upon.
Newton read it closely, and did exactly that. Download the free EPUB and watch the experimental method feel its way toward one of its greatest triumphs.