"CCIII. [W]e may arrive at the knowledge of the figures (magnitude), and motions of the insensible particles of bodies. ...[S]ince I assign determinate figures, magnitudes, and motions to the insensible particles... how... have [I] come by my knowledge of them. ...I ...considered in general all the clear and distinct notions of material things ...in our understanding, and that, finding no others except ...figures, magnitudes, and motions, and ...rules according to which these three ...can be diversified by each other, which rules are ...of geometry and mechanics ...I judged that all the knowledge ...of nature must ...be drawn from this ...I considered the chief differences ...between the magnitudes, and figures, and situations of bodies insensible ... and what sensible effects could be produced by their ...modes of ...contact ...[W]hen I found like effects in the bodies that we perceive ...I judged ...they could have been thus produced ...[A]ll the rules of mechanics belong also to physics, of which it is a part ...for it is not less natural for a clock ...to mark the hours, than for a tree ...to produce ...fruit ...[S]o from considering the sensible effects and parts of natural bodies, I have essayed to determine the character of their causes and insensible parts."
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Principles of Philosophy
Principles of Philosophy (Latin: Principia philosophiae) is a book by René Descartes. It is basically a synthesis of the Discourse on the Method and Meditations on First Philosophy. The book sets forth the principles of nature—the Laws of Physics—as Descartes viewed them. It set forth the principle that in the absence of external forces, an object's motion will be uniform and in a straight line. Newton borrowed this principle from Descartes and included it in his own Philosophiæ Naturalis Princi
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