NEWTON. 
Ever since 1684, Leibnitz had been artfully 
working the world into an opinion, that he 
first invented this method. Newton saw 
his design from the beginning, and had suf- 
ficiently obviated it in the first edition of 
the “Principia,” in 1687, (viz. in the Scho- 
lium to the 2nd lemma of the 2nd book) ; 
and with the same view, when he now pub- 
lished that method, he took occasion to ac- 
quaint the world that he invented it in the 
years 1665 and 1666. In the “ Acta Eru- 
ditorum” of Leipsic, where an account is 
given of this book, the author of that account 
ascribed the invention to Leibnitz, intimat- 
ing that Newton borrowed it from him. 
Dr. Keill, astronomical professor at Oxford, 
undertook Newton’s defence; and after 
several answers on both sides, Leibnitz 
complaining to the Royal Society, this body 
appointed a committee of their members to 
examine the merits of the case. These, 
after considering all the papers and letters 
relating to the point in controversy, decided 
in favour of Newton and Keill ; as is related 
at large in the life of the last-mentioned 
gentleman; and these papers themselves 
were published in 1712, under the title of 
“ Commercium Epistolicum Johannis Col- 
lins,” 8vo. 
In 1705, the honour of knighthood was 
conferred upon our author by Queen Anne, 
in consideration of his great merit. And in 
1714, he was applied to by the House of 
Commons, for his opinion upon a new me- 
thod of discovering the longitude at sea by 
signals, which had been laid before them by 
Ditton and Whiston, in order to procure 
their encouragement ; but the petition was 
thrown aside upon reading Neryton’s paper 
delivered to the committee. 
The following year, 1715, Leibnitz, with 
the view of bringing the world more easily 
into the belief that Newton had taken the 
Method of Fluxions from his Differential 
Method, attempted to foil his mathematical 
skill by the famous problem of the trajec- 
tories, which he, therefore, proposed to the 
English by way of challenge ; but the solu- 
tion of this, though the most difficult propo- 
sition he was able to devise, and what might 
pass for an arduous affair to any other, 
yet was hardly any more than an amuse- 
ment to Newton’s penetrating genius: he 
received the problem at 4 o’clock in the 
afternoon, as he was returning from the 
Mint ; and, though extremely fatigued with 
business, yet he finished the solution before 
he went to bed. 
As Leibnitz was Privy-Councellor of Jus- 
tice to the Elector of Hanover, so wteis 
that prince was raised to the British throne, 
Newton came more under the notice of the, 
court ; and it was for the immediate satis- 
faction of George the First, that he was 
prevailed on to put the last hand to the dis- 
pute about the invention of fluxions. In 
this court, Caroline, Princess of Wales, 
afterwards Queen consort to George the 
Second, happened to have a curiosity for 
philosophical inquiries; no sooner, there- 
fore, was she informed of our author’s at- 
tachment to the House of Hanover, than 
she engaged his conversation, which soon 
endeared him to her. Here she found, in 
every difficulty, that full satisfaction which 
she had in vain sought for elsewhere ; and 
she was often heard to declare, publicly, 
that she thought herself happy in coming 
into the world at a juncture of time which 
put it in her power to converse with him. 
It was at this Princess’s solicitations that 
he drew up an abstract of his Chronology ; 
a copy of which was at her request com- 
municated about 1718, to Signior Conti, a 
Venetian nobleman, then in England, upon 
a promise to keep it secret. Bat, notwith- 
standing this promise, the abb6, who while 
here had also affected to shew a particular 
friendship for Newton, though privately be- 
traying him, as much as lay in his power, to 
Leibnitz, was no sooner gof across the 
water, into France, than he dispersed copies 
of it, and procured an antiquary to trans- 
late it into French, as well as to write a 
confutation of it. This, being printed at 
Paris, in 1725, was delivered as a present, 
from the bookseller tliat printed it, to our 
author, that he might obtain, as was said, 
his consent to the publication ; but though 
he expressly refused such consent, yet the 
whole was published the same year. Here- 
upon Newjon found it necessary to publish 
a defence of himself, which was inserted in 
the Philos. Trans. Thus, he who had so 
much all his life long been studious to avoid 
disputes, was unavoidably all his lifetime, 
in a manner, involved in them ; nor did this 
last dispute even finish at his death, which 
happened the year following. Newton’s 
paper was republished in 1726, at Paris, in 
French, with a letter of the Abb6 Conti, in 
answer to it ; and the same year some dis- 
sertations were printed there by Father 
Souciet, against Newton’s Chronological 
Index ; an answer tq which was inserted, by 
Halley, in the Philos. Trans. No. 397. 
Some time before this business, in his 
80th year, our author was seized with an 
