WILLIAM HOLMES CHAMBERS BARTLETT. 571 



lu 1829 he was married to Harriet Whitehouse, of Newport, Rhode 

 Island. Of eight children, three sons and two daughters survive him. 

 His eldest daughter was the wife of General J. M. Schofield, now in 

 command of the army, and his family has always been identified with 

 the army and navy. 



In 1837 the degree of A. M. was conferred on him by the College 

 of New Jersey, at Princeton, and in 1847 that of LL. D. by Geneva 

 College, New York. He has been a corporator of the National 

 Academy- since 1863, an Associate Fellow of the American Academy 

 since 1845, and a member of the Philosophical Society of Philadel- 

 phia since 1840, and also of other societies. 



He was the author of a Treatise on Optics, 1839 ; Synthetic Mechan- 

 ics, 1850-58; Acoustics and Optics, 1852-59; Analytical Mechanics, 

 1853-59 ; Special Astronomy, 1855-58 ; — all designed for the use of 

 the cadets of the United States Military Academy. He was also the 

 author of " Mortuary Experience" of the Mutual Life Insurance Com- 

 pany of New York from 1843 to 1874 ; and of official reports and 

 contributions to the publications of scientific societies. 



His Analytical Mechanics passed through nine editions, and was 

 used extensively throughout the country. In his Preface he says : 

 " The design of the author is to give to the classes committed to his 

 instruction in the Military Academy what has appeared to him a 

 proper elementary basis for a systematic study of the laws of nature. 

 The subject is the action of force upon bodies, — the source of all 

 physical phenomena, — and of which the sole and sufficient foundation 

 is the comprehensive fact, that all action is ever accompanied by an 

 equal, contrary, and simultaneous reaction. Neither can have prece- 

 dence of the other in point of time, and from this comes that character 

 of permanence in the midst of endless variety apparent in tlie order of 

 nature. A mathematical formula which shall express the laws of this 

 antagonism will contain the whole subject, and whatever of specialty 

 may mark our perceptions of a particular instance will be found to 

 have its origin in corresponding peculiarities of physical condition, 

 distance, place, and time, which are the elements of this formula. Its 

 discussion constitutes the study of Mechanics. All phenomena in 

 which bodies have a part are its legitimate subjects, and no form of 

 matter under extraneous influences is exempt from its scrutiny. As- 

 tronomy, terrestrial physics, and chemistry are but its specialties; it 

 classifies all of human knowledge thac relates to inert matter into 

 groups of phenomena, of which the rationale is in a common principle ; 

 and in the hands of those gifted with the priceless boon of a copious 



