172 Memoir of John Napier, 



ingenious geometrician, attempted, a short time before, to 

 write decimals. In fact, Pitiscus substituted actual notation 

 in 1612, in the second edition of his trigonometry ; and the 

 "Canon Mirificus" where Napier employs this notation, did 

 not appear till 1614 ; so that Pitiscus deserves the credit 

 of priority in publication. But, that Napier, who employs 

 it constantly in his tables, has contrived it independently 

 of Pitiscus, appears incontestible, when we consider the 

 number of years which the calculation of those tables must 

 have required ; and, thus is proved their prior use probably 

 long before Pitiscus, who did not employ them in his 

 former edition, in 1599. 



The system of logarithms adopted by Napier was the 

 the most simple, and most convenient which could then 

 be conceived, for forming the successive terms of the geo- 

 metrical progression. The tables which he had constructed 

 presented immense advantages in regard to simplicity, as 

 has been already explained for multiplication and division. 

 Kepler adopted them, and published a copy in his Rudol- 

 phine tables, of which, as has been stated, he changed the 

 plan in order to adapt them to the use of the logarithms. 



But, when the invention is considered, we can readily 

 see that the logarithmic system of Napier was not that 

 which was best fitted for our decimal mode of numeration. 

 Briggs, Professor at Oxford, a contemporary of Napier, 

 proposed another which offered this advantage, and which 

 is that used at present ; he appears to have received the 

 notion from Napier himself, whom he visited several times 

 in Scotland. At the end of the posthumous work of Napier 

 there is an appendix, in which the method employed by 

 Briggs is pointed out. However it may be, Briggs con- 

 structed, with ability, on this new system, excellent tables, 

 the most accurate, and the most extensive which had then 

 been published. It is a work characterized by great patience 

 of calculation, and even claims ingenuity from its numerical 

 approximation. But some consider themselves authorized 

 to attribute, on this account, to Briggs a share in the inven- 

 tion. This is, however, to confound merits totally dissimilar, 

 viz. genius and labour. But the lively passion for discovery 

 is not a vulgar faculty, and it is too often re-placed by one 

 less honourable, viz. the secret desire of second rate minds 

 to pull down that which is elevated. 



