Analysis of a course of lectures on natural and experimental philosophy. Viz. 1. Magnetism, 2. Mechanics, 3. Chemistry, 4 & 5. Pneumatics, 6. Hydrostatics, 7. Electricity, 8. Fortification, 9. Optics, 10. Use of the globes, & c. 11 and 12. Astronomy / by A. Walker.

  • Walker, A. (Adam), 1730 or 1731-1821.
Date:
[1790]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Analysis of a course of lectures on natural and experimental philosophy. Viz. 1. Magnetism, 2. Mechanics, 3. Chemistry, 4 & 5. Pneumatics, 6. Hydrostatics, 7. Electricity, 8. Fortification, 9. Optics, 10. Use of the globes, & c. 11 and 12. Astronomy / by A. Walker. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    5/88 (page 5)
    air failing on the plate of an air-pump will give a re¬ port as loud as a gun. Nay, elementary fire, fubtil as it Is, firikes the bones, in the eledtric (hock, like a foiled body $ and lightning penetrates the hardefi fubfiances. ■. « r .. * gdly. Matter is inert, z. e, can neither move, nor flop, of itfelf. A ball on the whirling-table, neither begins to move when the table moves, nor ftops when the motion of the table is flopped. Give a hidden pufh to a bowl of water, and the fluid will fly over the bowl in a contrary direction; but if you turn fwiftly round with the bowl in your hand, and ftc-p fuddenly, the water will fly over the bowl the way it was going. The inertia increafes as the quantity of matter. A man lying with a large anvil on his bread, will not be hurt when a blackfmith flnkes upon it with a large hammer, with all his Arength 3 but if he had an anvil only a pound weight upon his breafi, the firfi firoke of the blackfmith would kill him. The vis inertia of the large anvil makes its refifiance equal to the Aroke of the hammer, fo that the anvil may be/aid to Anke the hammer as forcibly as the hammer Arikes it; and hence the difficulty of putting large bodies-in motion, Thefe are but fmall infiances of thofe three laws of nature which Sir Ifaac Newton found univerfal, viz. That matter is perfectly indifferent to either reji or motion. 2dly. That bodies move in proportion to the force that adis on them. And gdly. That aftion and re-action are equal, and contrary. 4thly. Matter attracts, - and is attracted; i. e. All parts of matter have a tendency towards each other. A plumb line on the fide of a mountain is drawn out of its perpendicular by the attraction of the mountain. Two cork balls, fwimining on water, run together with an accelerated motion, and flick together. Water riles above Its