344 On the Force, Construction, 8fc, 



founded on principles which cost the intellect of Newton one of 

 its happiest efforts to discover, are so very simple and uniform, 

 that the merest schoolboy may perform them with ease; and 

 hence it may not be unlikely, that persons may avail themselves 

 of the very plain rules for calculating the contents of areas atid 

 solids, lately published, without the slightest knowledge beyond 

 that of being able to perform the simplest operations in de- 

 cimal arithmetic. Such may be able to put forth the displace- 

 ment, &c. of a ship ; but we must warn them, that without ah 

 intimate acquaintance with mathematical science, both pure 

 and mixed, it is in vain for them to endeavour to advance'iA: 

 the path of improvement. The very data they may have col- 

 lected are most likely to turn out useless, because, ignorant of 

 their specific connections with the various qualities of a ship, 

 and their mutual relations, they know not how to institute 

 comparisons between them, much less to derive maxims, which 

 are the very primary objects of analysis and inquiry. They 

 may, in a small degree, tell us what a ship w, but cannot inform 

 us what it ought to 6e, or depart a step out of the beaten track 

 without floundering amongst the pitfalls that beset the foot- 

 steps of ignorance, and which the light of science alone can 

 discover, and teach them to avoid. In no branch of the arts is 

 a little learning, in the hands of an over-confident and pre- 

 sumptuous man, more likely to produce irreparable mischief 

 than in that of which we are treating. '' 



The next important property of a ship of the line, which is 

 affected by the force, is the stability, or the hydrostatic effort 

 by which the inclining power of the wind on the sails is coun- 

 terbalanced. If a ship of the line, of two or three decks, do 

 not possess this property in a sufficient degree, it is liable to 

 lose the service of its lower tier of cannon, although the 

 ports may be sufficiently high when it is upright ; and even if 

 fighting to windward (as a depression of not more than 7° can 

 be obtained with a long gun) it would waste, in close action, 

 nearly the whole of its force on that side, excepting what might 

 be expended against the enemy's masts and rigging. . jo[i 



It has been already mentioned, that the construction (jO^ 

 ships, with three or more batteries, becomes a task of no snaall 

 difficulty ; and this principally arises from a complication of 



