MECHANICS AND PHYSICS 183 



in his Quczstiones Naturales (Bk. I, Ch. vi., 5), says 

 that small letters looked at through a glass ball full 

 of water appear magnified. 



In the realm of mechanics the Ancients knew that 

 a movement can be transmitted by means of toothed 

 wheels and endless screws, and that it is possible to 

 produce great effects with a small force, by allowing 

 it time and by using a system of pulleys in sufficient 

 number ; they also knew that water is incompressible 

 and that this property can be utilized. 



Thus the technique of the Greeks was highly de- 

 veloped, and was well on the way towards the dis- 

 coveries which came to light during and after the 

 Renaissance. If its efforts failed to obtain greater 

 results, it was probably because the cheapness of slave 

 labour rendered the construction of machines unneces- 

 sary. 1 Leaving aside this important question, it 

 remains to be seen if and how the technical results 

 obtained were interpreted from a theoretical point of 

 view. With the exception of some passages from Plato, 

 it was Aristotle who first attempted to formulate in 

 order the general laws of physics and mechanics. 2 



2. ARISTOTELIAN DYNAMICS' 



Strictly speaking, Aristotle does not distinguish, as 

 do modern scientists, between statics and dynamics ; 

 he does not separate the theory of equilibrium from 



1 E. Meyerson, Bulletin de la Societe frangaise de Philosophie, 

 Feb. -March, 1914, p. 103. 



8 On the conceptions anterior to Aristotle, see Evolution- 

 nisme et platonisme, by R. Berthelot, p. 139, the chapter 

 entitled : L'idee de physique mathematique et l'idee de phy- 

 sique evolutionniste chez les philosophes grecs entre Pythagore 

 et Platon. 



8 For the general characters of Aristotelian physics, consult 

 A. Mansion, Introduction a la physique aristotelicienne , Louvain, 

 19 1 3 ; and H. Carteron, La notion de force dans le systdme 

 d'Aristote, 1924. 



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