408 TLAWS OF MOTION. 



tree, however, been immersed in water, and 

 not in air, instead of the apples falling to the 

 ground, they would haVe risen to the surface of 

 the water, and, it is probable, that we should 

 not have had at this day to complain of the 

 universal principles which have been formed 

 from a partial solitary fact. After having en- 

 deavoured to prove, that gravitation is only a 

 relative, and not a positive term ; and that re- 

 action cannot be equal, or greater than action ; 

 but that it must be less ; I shall now proceed 

 to show, that the two remaining laws on which 

 the Newtonian philosophy is founded,, are 

 equally unnatural and erroneous, and that they 

 only require to be examined, in order to be 

 exposed. 



Lex: Corpus onme persevare, in statue suo 

 quiescendi vel movendi uniformiter in direct- 

 urn, nisi quatinus, a viribus impressis cogitur 

 statum ilium mutare ; or, in other words, that 

 " every body will persevere in its state of rest, or 

 of uniform motion, in a right line; unless it is 

 compelled, by some force, to change its state." 



1st. Although this pretended law is applica- 

 ble to solid matter only, whenever it is made to 

 undergo a change from rest to motion, and from 

 motion to rest, it will appear to be altogether 

 irrelevant, when it is applied to the government 

 of the essential property either of air, or of fire, 

 and more especially of the solar rays ; it is not 



