VOL. v.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 553 



the stupendous mutability of the air, as to rarity and density, whereby the 

 same quantity of air, being sometimes compressed, sometimes dilated, may 

 change its dimensions to a degree that seems almost to transcend the power 

 of nature and art, and might be thought incredible, if it were abruptly pro- 

 posed, or by a person of only common skill in these matters. 



It will then appear, by the experiments and calculation made by our noble 

 author, that according to the least estimate of any recited in them, the exten- 

 sion of the same quantity of air, is as 1 to 2744 : and if, instead of the least 

 there be taken the greatest expansion of the air, being as about 13000 to 1, 

 when the uncompressed air was highly rarefied, that number being multiplied by 

 40, because of the greatest compression of the air effected by cold, will amount 

 to 520000, for the number of times by which the air at one time exceeds the 

 same portion of air at another time. 



II. Elementa Geometrias Planae. Authore T^gidio Francisco de Gottig- 

 nies Bruxellensi, Soc. Jesu in CoUegio Romano Matheseos Professore. Romae, 

 1669, in 12mo. 



One of the numerous deviations that have been made from the method of 

 Euclid, in the form of the principles of geometry. 



III. Synopsis Geometrica ; cum Tribus Opusculis, De Linea Sinuum et 

 Cycloide ; De Maximis et Minimis, Centuria ; Et Synopsis Geometriae Planae. 

 Auth. Honor. Fabry,* S. Jesu. Lugduni Galliarum, 1 669, in 12mo. 



The author, in this Geometrical Synopsis, has endeavoured to render 

 geometry clearer and easier, by delivering such demonstrations as prove the 

 thing in hand by direct and intrinsic principles, not such as are indirect, and 

 leading ad ahsurdum et impossihile, whereby it is only concluded, that the thing 

 cannot be false, but not shown why it is and must be true. 



IV. Dialogi Physici ; quorum Primus de Lumine ; Secundus et Tertius De 

 Vi Percussionis et Motu ; Quartus de Humoris Elevatione per Canaliculum ; 

 Quintus et Sextus de Variis Selectis. Auth. Honor. Fabry. S. Jesu. Lugduni 

 Galliarum, 1669, in 8vo. 



This learned Jesuit in those dialogues writes against Grimaldi, Borelli, and 

 Montanari, who in several things differ from what he has written : Against 

 the first, concerning light, and that great controverted point. Whether it be a 

 body? And whether reflection and refraction prove it to be such ? &c. Against 

 the second, about motion and percussion ; where many things are discussed ; 

 as. Whether motion be produced, or traduced ? Whether the impetus of the 



* Honore Fabri, a learned Jesuit, was bom at Bellay, near Lyons, in 1607. He wrote many 

 elaborate works on theology and philosophy, beside the above article. It has even been said that he 

 discovered the circulation of the blood before Harvey j but there are proofs to the contrary. 



VOL. 1. 4 A 



