MACLAURIN'S TREATISE, 1742 189 



fluxions it is difficult to say. Later we shall see 

 what James Wilson states on this point. Certain 

 it is that Maclaurin's views agree much more closely 

 with those of Robins than those of Jurin. Maclaurin 

 stood for the narrower view of limits — limits none 

 of which are reached by the variable. However, 

 the conception of Hmits does not receive as great a 

 degree of emphasis with Maclaurin as it does in the 

 Discoursc of Robins. 



Of Maclaurin's Fluxions^ Professor Kelland has 

 remarked : "The Analyst did good service to 

 science, if in no other way, at least by giving 

 occasion to this last work. The principles of the 

 method had been previously exhibited in a concise 

 and obscure manner ; Maclaurin developed them 

 after the manner of ancient geometers." 



In 1749, Maclaurin's Treatisc of Fluxions was 

 translated into French by Esprit Pezenas, director 

 of the observatory at Avignon. 



As we look back, we see that the eight years ìm- 

 mediately foUowing Berkeley's A^talyst were eight 

 great years, during which Jurin, and especially 

 Robins and Maclaurin, made wonderful progress in 

 the banishment of infinitely small quantities and the 

 development of the concept of a limit. Both before 

 and after that eight-year period there were published 

 books in Great Britain containing a mixture of Con- 

 tinental and British conceptions of the new calculus, 

 a superposition of British symbols and phraseology 

 upon the older Continental concepts. 



