Excerpt from The Principles of Mechanics: Explaining and Demonstrating the General Laws of Motion, the Laws of Gravity, Motion of Descending Bodies, Projectiles, Mechanic Powers, Pendulums, Centers of Gravity, &C., Strength and Stress of Timber, Hydrostatics, and Construction of Machines T H E art of mechanics being the jirji that men had occa/ion to make ufi: o'f, it is reafon'able to jnppofe that it tobh 'it: be ginning with man and was ftudied in the earlie/t tiger of the world. For no foonerfi did nteinkind begin to 'pe'o'ple the earth than they wanted hon/e: to dwell in, cloaths to wear, and ntenfilr to till the ground, to get then: bread, with othei' necefl'arier' of life and being thus defiit'ute proper habitationt, and other conveniences of lining, their want: mtg/t immediately put' them upon the [lady of niecha nier.' At theirfitj/t' fitting out, they would be cbntent with very little theory eitdeazteuring tn get that. More by ebeperienee' than ren-j jbning, aitd being unacguatnted with numbers, or any fort of calw culation; and having neither rule nor co/npafi to work by, nor ia firument: to work witc, but fad? As t-cey nzujt invent 1cyl of all; nor any Method: of working: witc all thde aah/advantage}, w'e' may judgb wh'at flirt of work they were likely 'te make All thot'i contribancet mil/t b'e otte're guefiing, and\ they contd but {ill eiecnte' what'thty had'f badly wontrz'vedf and inn/lc be continually niending' About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.