"In mechanics, Descartes can hardly be said to have advanced beyond Galileo. The latter had overthrown the ideas of Aristotle on this subject and Descartes simply "threw himself upon the enemy" that had already been "put to the rout." His statement of the first and second laws of motion was an improvement in form, but his third law is false in substance. The motions of bodies in their direct impact was imperfectly understood by Galileo erroneously given by Descartes and first correctly stated by C. Wren, J. Wallis, and C. Huygens."