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which may be considered as a great problem of dynamics, wherein it is required to deduce all the phenomena of the solar system from the abstract laws of motion, and to confirm the truth of those laws, by comparing theory with observation.

Tables of the motions of the planets, by which their places may be determined at any instant for thousands of years, are computed from the analytical formulæ of La Place. In a research so profound and complicated, the most abstruse analysis is required, the higher branches of mathematical science are employed from the first, and approximations are made to the most intricate series. Easier methods, and more convergent series, may probably be discovered in process of time, which will supersede those now in use; but the work of La Place, regarded as embodying the results of not only his own researches, but those of so many of his illustrious predecessors and contemporaries, must ever remain, as he himself expressed it to the writer of these pages, a monument to the genius of the age in which it appeared.

Although physical astronomy is now the most perfect of sciences, a wide range is still left for the industry of future astronomers. The whole system of comets is a subject involved in mystery; they obey, indeed, the general law of gravitation, but many generations must be swept from the earth before their paths can be traced through the regions of space, or the periods of their return can be determined. A new and extensive field of investigation has lately been opened in the discovery of thousands of double stars, or, to speak more strictly, of systems of double stars, since many of them revolve round centres in various and long periods. Who can venture to predict when their theories shall be known, or what laws may be revealed by the knowledge of their motions ?-but, perhaps, Veniet tempus, in quo ista quæ nunc latent, in lucem dies extrahat et longioris ævi diligentia: ad inquisitionem tantorum ætas una non sufficit. Veniet tempus, quo posteri nostri tam aperta nos nescisse mirentur.

It must, however, be acknowledged that many circumstances seem to be placed beyond our reach. The planets are so remote, that observation discloses but little of their structure; and although their similarity to the earth, in the appearance of their surfaces, and in their annual and diurnal revolutions producing the vicissitudes of

seasons, and of day and night, may lead us to fancy that they are peopled with inhabitants like ourselves; yet, were it even permitted to form an analogy from the single instance of the earth, the only one known to us, certain it is that the physical nature of the inhabitants of the planets, if such there be, must differ essentially from ours, to enable them to endure every gradation of temperature, from the intensity of heat in Mercury, to the extreme cold that probably reigns in Uranus. Of the use of Comets in the economy of nature it is impossible to form an idea; still less of the Nebula, or cloudy appearances that are scattered through the immensity of space; but instead of being surprised that much is unknown, we have reason to be astonished that the successful daring of man has developed so much.

In the following pages it is not intended to limit the account of the Mécanique Céleste to a detail of results, but rather to endeavour to explain the methods by which these results are deduced from one general equation of the motion of matter. To accomplish this, without having recourse to the higher branches of mathematics, is impossible; many subjects, indeed, admit of geometrical demonstration; but as the object of this work is rather to give the spirit of La Place's method than to pursue a regular system of demonstration, it would be a deviation from the unity of his plan to adopt it in the present case.

Diagrams are not employed in La Place's works, being unnecessary to those versed in analysis; some, however, will be occasionally introduced for the convenience of the reader.

BOOK I.

CHAPTER I.

DEFINITIONS, AXIOMS, &c.

1. THE activity of matter seems to be a law of the universe, as we know of no particle that is at rest. Were a body absolutely at rest, we could not prove it to be so, because there are no fixed points to which it could be referred; consequently, if only one particle of matter were in existence, it would be impossible to ascertain whether it were at rest or in motion. Thus, being totally ignorant of absolute motion, relative motion alone forms the subject of investigation: a body is, therefore, said to be in motion, when it changes its position with regard to other bodies which are assumed to be at rest.

2. The cause of motion is unknown, force being only a name given to a certain set of phenomena preceding the motion of a body, known by the experience of its effects alone. Even after experience, we cannot prove that the same consequents will invariably follow certain antecedents; we only believe that they will, and experience tends to confirm this belief.

3. No idea of force can be formed independent of matter; all the forces of which we have any experience are exerted by matter; as gravity, muscular force, electricity, chemical attractions and repulsions, &c. &c., in all which cases, one portion of matter acts upon another.

4. When bodies in a state of motion or rest are not acted upon by matter under any of these circumstances, we know by experience that they will remain in that state: hence a body will continue to move uniformly in the direction of the force which caused its motion, unless in some of the cases enumerated, in which we have ascertained by experience that a change of motion will take place, then a force is said to act.

5. Force is proportional to the differential of the velocity, divided

dv

by the differential of the time, or analytically F= which is dt' all we know about it.

6. The direction of a force is the straight line in which it causes a body to move. This is known by experience only.

7. In dynamics, force is proportional to the indefinitely small space caused to be moved over in a given indefinitely small time. 8. Velocity is the space moved over in a given time, how small soever the parts may be into which the interval is divided.

9. The velocity of a body moving uniformly, is the straight line or space over which it moves in a given interval of time; hence if the velocity v be the space moved over in one second or unit of time, vt is the space moved over in t seconds or units of time; or representing the space by s, s = vt.

10. Thus it is proved that the space described with a uniform motion is proportional to the product of the time and the velocity..

11. Conversely, v, the space moved over in one second of time, is equal to s, the space moved over in t seconds of time, multiplied 1"

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1"

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12. Hence the velocity varies directly as the space, and inversely

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13. The time varies directly as the space, and inversely as the velocity.

14. Forces are proportional to the velocities they generate in equal times.

The intensity of forces can only be known by comparing their effects under precisely similar circumstances. Thus two forces are equal, which in a given time will generate equal velocities in bodies of the same magnitude; and one force is said to be double of another which, in a given time, will generate double the velocity in one body that it will do in another body of the same magnitude.

15. The intensity of a force may therefore be expressed by the ratios of numbers, or both its intensity and direction by the ratios of lines, since the direction of a force is the straight line in which it causes the body to move.

16. In general, a line expressing the intensity of a force is taken in the direction of the force, beginning from the point of application.

17. Since motion is the change of rectilinear distance between two points, it appears that force, velocity, and motion are expressed by the ratios of spaces; we are acquainted with the ratios of quantities only.

Uniform Motion.

18. A body is said to move uniformly, when, in equal successive intervals of time, how short soever, it moves over equal intervals of space.

19. Hence in uniform motion the space is proportional to the time. 20. The only uniform motion that comes under our observation is the rotation of the earth upon its axis; all other motions in nature are accelerated or retarded. The rotation of the earth forms the only standard of time to which all recurring periods are referred. To be certain of the uniformity of its rotation is, therefore, of the greatest importance. The descent of materials from a higher to a lower level at its surface, or a change of internal temperature, would alter the length of the radius, and consequently the time of rotation: such causes of disturbance do take place; but it will be shown that their effects are so minute as to be insensible, and that the earth's rotation has suffered no sensible change from the earliest times recorded.

21. The equality of successive intervals of time may be measured by the recurrence of an event under circumstances as precisely similar as possible: for example, from the oscillations of a pendulum. When dissimilarity of circumstances takes place, we rectify our conclusions respecting the presumed equality of the intervals, by introducing an equation, which is a quantity to be added or taken away, in order to obtain the equality.

Composition and Resolution of Forces.

fig. 1.

m

A

22. Let m be a particle of mat.C ter which is free to move in every direction; if two forces, repre

sented both in intensity and direction by the lines mA and mB, be applied to it, and urge it towards C, the particle will move by the combined action of these two forces, and it will require a force equal

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