Isaac Newton
Isaac Newton
Sir Isaac Newton PRSwas an English physicist and mathematicianwho is widely recognised as one of the most influential scientists of all time and a key figure in the scientific revolution. His book Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica, first published in 1687, laid the foundations for classical mechanics. Newton made seminal contributions to optics, and he shares credit with Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz for the development of calculus...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionScientist
Date of Birth4 January 1643
CityWoolsthorpe, England
I was like a boy playing on the sea-shore, and diverting myself now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me.
One [method] is by a Watch to keep time exactly. But, by reason of the motion of the Ship, the Variation of Heat and Cold, Wet and Dry, and the Difference of Gravity in different Latitudes, such a watch hath not yet been made.
If the ancient churches, in debating and deciding the greatest mysteries of religion, knew nothing of these two texts, I understand not why we should be so fond of them now the debate is over.
Pictures, propagated by motion along the fibers of the optic nerves in the brain, are the cause of vision.
I know not how I seem to others, but to myself I am but a small child wandering upon the vast shores of knowledge, every now and then finding a small bright pebble to content myself with while the vast ocean of undiscovered truth lay before me.
As a blind man has no idea of colors, so we have no idea of the manner by which the all-wise God perceives and understands all things.
I shall not mingle conjectures with certainties.
Nature is very consonant and conformable with herself.
My principal method for defeating error and heresy is by establishing the truth. One purposes to fill a bushel with tares, but if I can fill it first with wheat, I may defy his attempts.
Centripetal force is the force by which bodies are drawn from all sides, are impelled, or in any way tend, toward some point as to a center.
I have presented principles of philosophy that are not, however, philosophical but strictly mathematical-that is, those on which the study of philosophy can be based. These principles are the laws and conditions of motions and of forces, which especially relate to philosophy.
Did blind chance know that there was light and what was its refraction, and fit the eyes of all creatures after the most curious manner to make use of it? These and other suchlike considerations, always have, and always will prevail with mankind, to believe that there is a Being who made all things, who has all things in his power, and who is therefore to be feared.
1. Fidelity & Allegiance sworn to ye King is only such a fidelity and obedience as is due to him by ye law of ye land; for were that faith and allegiance more than what the law requires, we would swear ourselves slaves, and ye King absolute; whereas, by the law, we are free men, notwithstanding those Oaths. 2. When, therefore, the obligation by the law to fidelity and allegiance ceases, that by the Oath also ceases...
A good watch may serve to keep a recconing at Sea for some days and to know the time of a Celestial Observ[at]ion: and for this end a good Jewel watch may suffice till a better sort of Watch can be found out. But when the Longitude at sea is once lost, it cannot be found again by any watch.