In the year of its publication he became superintendent of Brunswick, and in effect the director of his church throughout Lower Saxony.
He returned to his native city in 1672 to become professor of anatomy, but, having become a Roman Catholic, he found it expedient to return to Florence, and was ultimately made apostolic vicar of Lower Saxony.
His family, not of Italian origin - as he himself was inclined to believe on the strength of family tradition - but established in Lower Saxony so early as the 16th century, was typical of the German upper middle classes, and this fact, together with the strongly religious atmosphere in which he was brought up and his early enthusiasm for nature, largely determined the bent of his mind.
