BERKELEY'S ANALYST (1734) 65 



presumed to be of ali inen the greatest masters of 

 reason. (3) Of error and false reasoning in their 

 own science. " 



87. The early part of Jurin's reply is given to a 

 discussion of the religious side. If there is no 

 more certainty -in modem analysis, argues Jurin, 

 than in the Christian religion, this comparison brings 

 no honour to Christianity ; it is not true that 

 mathematicians are infidels, leading others to 

 infidehty. If it were true, this fact ought not in 

 prudence to be published. Even if it be shown 

 that the method of fluxions is built upon false 

 principles, will. it follow that ali other parts of 

 mathematics rest on inaccurate and false reasoning ? 

 Your attack, I surmise, is really, not so much in 

 the interest of Christianity, as to demonstrate your 

 superiority as a reasoner, by showing Newton and 

 Barrow, two of the greatest mathematicians, less 

 clear and just than you are. But because a mathe- 

 matician " is thought to reason well in Geometry, " 

 his '' decisions against the Christian Religion " will 

 not "pass even upon weak and vulgar minds. " 

 " Sir Isaac Newton was a greater Mathematician 

 than any of his contemporaries in France, . . . yet 

 I bave not heard that the French Mathematicians 

 are converted to the Protestant Religion by his 

 authority." Your objections against Newton's 

 Fluxions may be " reduced under three heads : 

 (i) Obscurity of this doctrine ; (2) False reasoning 

 in it by Sir Isaac Newton, and implicitly received 

 by his followers ; (3) Artifices and fallacies used by 



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