MACLAURIN. 



which was, the opening a passage from 

 Greenland to the South Sea by the north 

 pole- That such a passage might be 

 found, he was so fully persuaded, that he 

 used to say, if his situation could admit 

 of such adventures, he would undertake 

 the voyage, even at his own charge. But 

 when schemes for finding it were laid be- 

 fore the parliament in 1741, and he was 

 consulted by several persons of high rank 

 concerning them, and before he could 

 finish the memorial he proposed to send, 

 the premium was limited to the discovery 

 of a north-west passage ; and he used to 

 regret that the word west was inserted, 

 because he thought that passage, if at all 

 to be found, must lie not far from the 

 pole 



In 1745, having been very active in for- 

 tifying the city of Edinburgh against the 

 rebel army, he was obliged to fly from 

 thence into England,, where he was in- 

 vited by Dr. Herring, Archbishop of 

 York, to reside with him during his stay 

 in this country. In this expedition, how- 

 ever, being exposed to cold and hard- 

 ships, and naturally of a weak and ten- 

 dcr constitution, which had been much 

 more enfeebled by close application to 

 study, he laid the foundation of an ill- 

 ness which put an end to his life, in 

 June 1746, at forty -eight years of age, 

 leaving his widow with two sons and three 

 daughters. 



Mr. Maclaurin was a very good, as 

 well as a very great man, and worthy of 

 love as well as admiration. His peculiar 

 merit as a philosopher was, that all his 

 studies were accommodated to general 

 utility ; and we find, in many places of 

 his works, an application, even of the 

 most abstruse theories, to the perfecting 

 of mechanical arts. For the same pur- 

 pose he had resolved to compose a course 

 of practical mathematics, and to rescue 

 several useful branches of the science 

 from the ill treatment they often met with 

 in less skilful hands. These intentions 

 however were prevented by his death ; 

 unless we may reckon, as a part of his in- 

 tended work, the translation of Dr. David 

 Gregory's Practical Geometry, which he 

 revised, and published with additions, in 

 1745. 



In his life-time, however, he had fre- 

 quent opportunities of serving his friends 

 and his country by his great skill. What- 

 ever difficulty 'occurred concerning the 

 constructing or perfecting of machines, 

 the working of mines, the improving of 

 manufactures, the conveying of water, or 

 the execution of any public work, he was 



always ready to resolve it. He \vu* em- 

 ployed to terminate some disputes of con- 

 sequence that had arisen at Glasgow, con- 

 cerning the gauging of vessels ; and for 

 that purpose presented to the commis- 

 sioners of the excise two elaborate me- 

 morials, with their demonstrations, con- 

 taining rules by which the officers now 

 act. He made also calculations relating 

 to the provision, now established by law, 

 for the children and widows of the Scotch 

 clergy, and of the professors in the uni- 

 versities, entitling them to certain annui- 

 ties and sums, upon the voluntary an- 

 nual payment of a certain sum by the in- 

 cumbent. In contriving and adjusting 

 this Avise and useful scheme, he be- 

 stowed a great deal of labour, and con- 

 tributed not a little towards bringing it to 

 perfection. 



Of his works, we have mentioned his 

 " Geometrica Organica," in which he 

 treats of the description of curve lines by 

 continued motion; as also of his piece 

 which gained the prize of the Royal Ac- 

 ademy of Sciences in 1724. In 1740, he 

 likewise shared the prize of the same aca- 

 demy with the celebrated D.Bernoulli and 

 Euler, for resolving the problem relating 

 to the motion of the tides from the theory 

 of gravity, a question which had been 

 given out the former year without receiv- 

 ing any solution. He had only ten days 

 to draw this paper up in, and could not 

 find leisure to transcribe a fair copy ; so 

 that the Paris edition of it is incorrect. 

 He afterwards revised the whole, and in- 

 serted it in his treatise of fluxions ; as 

 he did also the substance of the former 

 piece. These, with the treatise of flux- 

 ions, and the pieces printed in the Medi- 

 cal Essays, and the Philos. Trans, a list of 

 which is given above, are all the writings 

 which our author lived to publish. 



Since his death, however, two more 

 volumes have appeared ; his algebra, and 

 his account of Sir Isaac Xewton's philoso- 

 phical discoveries. The algebra, though 

 not finished by himself, is yet allowed to 

 be excellent in its kind; containing, within 

 a moderate compass, a complete elementa- 

 ry treatise of that science, as far as it has 

 hitherto been carried ; besides some neat 

 analytical papers on curve lines. His ac- 

 count of Xewton's philosophy was occa- 

 sioned in the following manner. Sir 

 Isaac dying in the beginning of 1728, his 

 nephew, Mr. Conduitt, proposed to pub- 

 lish an account of >his life, and desired Mr. 

 Maclaurin's assistance. The latter, out 

 of gratitude to his great benefactor, cheer- 

 fully undertook, and soon finished, the 



