TEXT-BOOKS OF MIDDLE OF CE N TUR Y 199 



a full treatise. But the treatise in question never 

 appeared. After a popular exposition of the ideas 

 of fluxion and fluent, and of Leibniz's infinitely little 

 quantities and their summation, showing how these 

 methodsyield importantresults in naturai philosophy, 

 he refers to Berkeley's attacks and the defence made 

 by Philalethes Cantabrigiensis, Walton, and Robins, 

 also Maclaurin, who ' * declined entering the Combat," 

 but endeavoured to treat the subject *'in a Manner 

 less exceptionable." *'But no Body, that I know 

 of," continues Rowning, '*has explained it in so 

 easy and familiar a VVay as I apprehend the Subject 

 capable of." Moreover, Jurin and Walton " carry 

 things ... no farther than Sir Isaac had done 

 before. They leave them, as to the Objections 

 made by the Analyst, exactly as they found them." 

 The diffìculties do not He in the idea of a first 

 fluxion — a velocity. *' In this there is Nothing 

 either infinitely great or infinitely little : Nothing 

 obscure. " As to higher fluxions, "these Things 

 indeed elude our Senses ; but they do not surpass 

 the Understanding " (p. 85). Berkeley's objection 

 to 'Mnfinitely small Quantities" is not fatai, 

 " because finite Measures might bave been made 

 use of." His other objection, that " such Quanti- 

 ties are in some Cases retained and made use of for 

 a while, and afterwards, to use his own Expression, 

 like Scaffolds to a Building, are rejected as of no 

 Significancy," may be met by the proof that those 

 quantities "are always such as ought by no means 

 to be retained." In further explanation of his 



