u65COR. 1. By causing the point A or B to go off sometimes in infinitum, and sometimes to move towards other parts of the point C, will be obtained all those figures which Cartesius has exhibited in his Optics and Geometry relating to refractions. The invention of which Cartesius having thought fit to conceal, is here laid open in this Proposition.

COR. 2. If a body lighting on any superficies CD in the direction of a right line AD, drawn according to any law, should emerge in the direction of another right line DK; and from the point C there be drawn curve lines CP, CQ, always perpendicular to AD, DK; the increments of the lines PD, QD, and therefore the lines themselves PD, QD, generated by those increments, will be as the sines of incidence and emergence to each other, and è contra.

PROPOSITION XCVIII. PROBLEM XLVIII.

The same things supposed; if round the axis AB any attractive superficies be described as CD, regular or irregular, through which the bodies issuing from the given place A must pass; it is required to find[Pg 248] a second attractive superficies EF, which may make those bodies converge to a given place B.

Let a line joining AB cut the first superficies in C and the second in E, the point D being taken any how at pleasure. And supposing the sine of incidence on the first superficies to the sine of emergence from the same, and the sine of emergence from the second superficies to the sine of incidence on the same, to be as any given quantity M to another given quantity N; then produce AB to G, so that BG may be to CE as M - N to N; and AD to H, so that AH may be equal to AG; and DF to K, so that DK may be to DH as N to M. Join KB, and about the centre D with the interval DH describe a circle meeting KB produced in L, and draw BF parallel to DL; and the point F will touch the line EF, which, being turned round the axis AB, will describe the superficies sought. Q.E.F.

For conceive the lines CP, CQ to be every where perpendicular to AD, DF, and the lines ER, ES to FB, FD respectively, and therefore QS to be always equal to CE; and (by Cor. 2, Prop. XCVII) PD will be to QD as M to N, and therefore as DL to DK, or FB to FK; and by division as DL - FB or PH - PD - FB to FD or FQ - QD; and by composition as PH - FB to FQ, that is (because PH and CG, QS and CE, are equal), as CE + BG - FR to CE - FS. But (because BG is to CE as M - N to N) it comes to pass also that CE + BG is to CE as M to N; and therefore, by division, FR is to FS as M to N; and therefore (by Cor. 2, Prop. XCVII) the superficies EF compels a body, falling upon it in the direction DF, to go on in the line FR to the place B. Q.E.D.

SCHOLIUM.

[Pg 249]

In the same manner one may go on to three or more superficies. But of all figures the sphærical is the most proper for optical uses. If the object glasses of telescopes were made of two glasses of a sphærical figure, containing water between them, it is not unlikely that the errors of the refractions made in the extreme parts of the superficies of the glasses may be accurately enough corrected by the refractions of the water. Such object glasses are to be preferred before elliptic and hyperbolic glasses, not only because they may be formed with more ease and accuracy, but because the pencils of rays situate without the axis of the glass would be more accurately refracted by them. But the different refrangibility of different rays is the real obstacle that hinders optics from being made perfect by sphærical or any other figures. Unless the errors thence arising can be corrected, all the labour spent in correcting the others is quite thrown away.

[Pg 251]

OF THE MOTION OF BODIES.

Of the motion of bodies that are resisted in the ratio of the velocity.

PROPOSITION I. THEOREM I.

If a body is resisted in the ratio of its velocity, the motion lost by resistance is as the space gone over in its motion.

For since the motion lost in each equal particle of time is as the velocity, that is, as the particle of space gone over, then, by composition, the motion lost in the whole time will be as the whole space gone over. Q.E.D.

COR. Therefore if the body, destitute of all gravity, move by its innate force only in free spaces, and there be given both its whole motion at the beginning, and also the motion remaining after some part of the way is gone over, there will be given also the whole space which the body can describe in an infinite time. For that space will be to the space now described as the whole motion at the beginning is to the part lost of that motion.

LEMMA I.

Quantities proportional to their differences are continually proportional.

Let A be to A - B as B to B - C and C to C - D, &c., and, by conversion, A will be to B as B to C and C to D, &c. Q.E.D.

PROPOSITION II. THEOREM II.

If a body is resisted in the ratio of its velocity, and moves, by its vis insita only, through a similar medium, and the times be taken equal, the velocities in the beginning of each of the times are in a geometrical progression, and the spaces described in each of the times are as the velocities.

CASE 1. Let the time be divided into equal particles; and if at the very beginning of each particle we suppose the resistance to act with one single impulse which is as the velocity, the decrement of the velocity in each of[Pg 252] the particles of time will be as the same velocity. Therefore the velocities are proportional to their differences, and therefore (by Lem. 1, Book II) continually proportional. Therefore if out of an equal number of particles there be compounded any equal portions of time, the velocities at the beginning of those times will be as terms in a continued progression, which are taken by intervals, omitting every where an equal number of intermediate terms. But the ratios of these terms are compounded of the equal ratios of the intermediate terms equally repeated, and therefore are equal. Therefore the velocities, being proportional to those terms, are in geometrical progression. Let those equal particles of time be diminished, and their number increased in infinitum, so that the impulse of resistance may become continual; and the velocities at the beginnings of equal times, always continually proportional, will be also in this case continually proportional. Q.E.D.

CASE 2. And, by division, the differences of the velocities, that is, the parts of the velocities lost in each of the times, are as the wholes; but the spaces described in each of the times are as the lost parts of the velocities (by Prop. 1, Book I), and therefore are also as the wholes. Q.E.D.

COROL. Hence if to the rectangular asymptotes AC, CH, the hyperbola BG is described, and AB, DG be drawn perpendicular to the asymptote AC, and both the velocity of the body, and the resistance of the medium, at the very beginning of the motion, be expressed by any given line AC, and, after some time is elapsed, by the indefinite line DC; the time may be expressed by the area ABGD, and the space described in that time by the line AD. For if that area, by the motion of the point D, be uniformly increased in the same manner as the time, the right line DC will decrease in a geometrical ratio in the same manner as the velocity; and the parts of the right line AC, described in equal times, will decrease in the same ratio.

PROPOSITION III. PROBLEM I.

To define the motion of a body which, in a similar medium, ascends or descends in a right line, and is resisted in the ratio of its velocity, and acted upon by an uniform force of gravity.

The body ascending, let the gravity be expounded by any given rectangle BACH; and the resistance of the medium, at the beginning of the ascent, by the rectangle BADE, taken on the contrary side of the right line AB. Through the point B, with the rectangular asymptotes AC, CH, describe an hyperbola, cutting the perpendiculars DE, de, in[Pg 253] G, g; and the body ascending will in the time DGgd describe the space EGge; in the time DGBA, the space of the whole ascent EGB; in the time ABKI, the space of descent BFK; and in the time IKki the space of descent KFfk; and the velocities of the bodies (proportional to the resistance of the medium) in these periods of time will be ABED, ABed, O, ABFI, ABfi respectively; and the greatest velocity which the body can acquire by descending will be BACH.