The English works of Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury, Volume 07 (of 11)Hobbes, Thomas
Philosophy
The English works of Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury, Volume 07 (of 11)
Hobbes, Thomas
Philosophy, English -- 17th century
I shall in the first part confer with you about your _Arithmetica
Infinitorum_, and afterwards compare our manner of elocution; then your
politics; and last of all your grammar and critics. Your spiral line is
condemned by him whose authority you use to prove me a plagiary, (that
is, a man that stealeth other men’s inventions, and arrogates them to
himself), whether it be Roberval or not that writ that paper, I am not
certain. But I think I shall be shortly; but whosoever it be, his
authority will serve no less to show that your doctrine of the spiral
line, from the fifth to the eighteenth proposition of your _Arithmetica
Infinitorum_, is all false; and that the principal fault therein (if all
faults be not principal in geometry, when they proceed from ignorance of
the science) is the same that I objected to you in my _Lessons_. And for
the author of that paper, when I am certain who it is, it will be then
time enough to vindicate myself concerning that name of plagiary. And
whereas he challenges the invention of your method delivered in your
_Arithmetica Infinitorum_, to have been his before it was yours, I
shall, I think, by and by say that which shall make him ashamed to own
it; and those that writ those encomiastic epistles to you ashamed of the
honour they meant to you. I pass therefore to the nineteenth
proposition, which in Latin is this: your geometry!
“_Si proponatur series quantitatum in duplicata ratione arithmetice
proportionalium (sive juxta seriem numerorum quadraticorum) continue
crescentium, a puncto vel 0 inchoatarum, (puta ut 0. 1. 4. 9. 16. etc.),
propositum sit, inquirere quam habeat illa rationem ad seriem totidem
maximæ æqualium._
“_Fiat investigatio per modum inductionis ut_ (_in prop. 1_)
_Eritque_,
(0 + 1 = 1)/(1 + 1 = 2) = (1)/(3) + (1)/(6)
(0 + 1 + 4 = 5)/(4 + 4 + 4 = 12) = (1)/(3) + (1)/(12)
(0 + 1 + 4 + 9 = 14)/(9 + 9 + 9 + 9 = 36) = (1)/(3) + (1)/(18) _et sic
deinceps_.
“_Ratio proveniens est ubique major quam subtripla seu (1)/(3); excessus
autem perpetuo decrescit prout numerus terminorum augetur (puta (1)/(6)
(1)/(12) (1)/(18) (1)/(24) etc.) aucto nimirum fractionis denominatore
sive consequente rationis in singulis locis numero senario (ut patet) ut
sit rationis provenientis excessus supra subtriplam, ea quam habet
unitas ad sextuplum numeri terminorum post 0; adeoque._”
That is, if there be propounded a row of quantities in duplicate
proportion of the quantities arithmetically proportional (or proceeding
in the order of the square numbers) continually increasing; and
beginning at a point or 0; let it be propounded to find what proportion
the row hath; to as many quantities equal to the greatest;
Let it be sought by induction (as in the first proposition).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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