Sometime between the middle of 1671 and his departure for Paris in March 1672, Leibniz took notes on a book written by the English philosopher, John Wilkins. The book, entitled Essay towards a Real Character and a Philosophical Language, is a hodgepodge of various topics concerning language, with a final section on the universal characteristic. As the title page announces, the author is Dean of Ripon and a member of the Royal Society; in his book, he intends to give a “general Scheme of things.” The notes that Leibniz took on the book and that the Academy editors have entitled Studies on the universal characteristic bear little resemblance to anything in Wilkins' text. Although Leibniz accepts the classification scheme used in the first chapter of the Essay, his proposals have nothing else in common with those of its author. Whereas Wilkins begins by defining ‘Genus’ and ‘Species,’ Leibniz begins with ‘Something (Aliquid)’ and ‘Nothing (Nihil).’ Whereas the former offers lists of synonyms and only the briefest of explications, the latter gives relatively carefully wrought definitions. Nor do the proposals in the remainder of Wilkins' book bear any similarity to those of Leibniz. The claims in Leibniz's notes are entirely his own and owe nothing to Wilkins.