Robert Boyle, a natural philosopher, chemist, physicist, inventor, and gentleman scientist, had read in 1657 of Otto von Guericke's air-pump.

Setting himself up with the assistance of Robert Hooke to devise improvements in its construction, and with the result, the "machina Boyleana" or "Pneumatical Engine", finished in 1659, he began a series of experiments on the properties of air.

An account of Boyle's work with the air pump had been published in 1660 under the title New Experiments Physico-Mechanicall, Touching the Spring of the Air, and its Effects....

Among the critics of the views put forward in this book is a Jesuit, Franciscus Linus (1595–1675), and it was while answering his objections that Boyle made his first mention of the law that the volume of a gas varies inversely to the pressure of the gas, which among English-speaking people is usually called after his name.

However, the person that originally formulated the hypothesis was Henry Power in 1661.

Boyle included a reference to a paper written by Power, but mistakenly attributed it to Richard Townley.

Although his research and personal philosophy clearly has its roots in the alchemical tradition, he is largely regarded today as the first modern chemist, and therefore one of the founders of modern chemistry.

Among his works, The Sceptical Chymist, published in London in 1661 in the form of a dialogue, is seen as a cornerstone book in the field of chemistry.

The Sceptical Chymist presents Boyle's hypothesis that matter consists of atoms and clusters of atoms in motion and that every phenomenon is the result of collisions of particles in motion.

He appeals to chemists to experiment and asserts that experiments deny the limiting of chemical elements to only the classic four: earth, fire, air, and water.

He also pleads that chemistry should cease to be subservient to medicine or to alchemy, and rise to the status of a science.

Importantly, he advocates a rigorous approach to scientific experiment: he believes all theories must be proved experimentally before being regarded as true.