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 have explained the phenomena of the heavens and of our sea by the force of gravity, but I have not yet assigned a cause to gravity.
Nature does nothing in vain when less will serve; for Nature is pleased with simplicity and affects not the pomp of superfluous causes.
Ax: 100 Every thing doth naturally persevere in yt state in wch it is unlesse it bee interrupted by some externall cause, hence... [a] body once moved will always keepe ye same celerity, quantity & determination of its motion.
Therefore, the causes assigned to natural effects of the same kind must be, so far as possible, the same.
Therefore to the same natural effects we must, as far as possible, assign the same causes.
The Synthesis consists in assuming the Causes discovered and established as Principles, and by them explaining the Phænomena proceeding from them, and proving the Explanations.
You sometimes speak of gravity as essential and inherent to matter. Pray do not ascribe that notion to me, for the cause of gravity is what I do not pretend to know, and therefore would take more time to consider of it.
We are to admit no more causes of natural things than such as are both true and sufficient to explain their appearances.
Gravity must be caused by an Agent acting constantly according to certain laws, but whether this Agent be material or immaterial I have left to the consideration of my readers.
The system of revealed truth which this Book contains is like that of the universe, concealed from common observation yet...the centuries have established its Divine origin.
Every body continues in its state of rest, or of uniform motion in a right line, unless it is compelled to change that state by forces impressed upon it.
If I saw further than other men, it was because I stood on the shoulders of giants.
The word 'God' usually signifies 'Lord', but every lord is not a God. It is the dominion of a spiritual being which constitutes a God: a true, supreme, or imaginary dominion makes a true, supreme, or imaginary God.
The smaller the planets are, they are, other things being equal, of so much the greater density; for so the powers of gravity on their several surfaces come nearer to equality. They are likewise, other things being equal, of the greater density, as they are nearer to the sun.