were attracted by a force issuing from a single corpuscle in the centre of the first sphere; and is therefore proportional to the distance between the centres of the spheres. Q.E.D.
Case 4. Let the spheres attract each other mutually, and the force will be doubled, but the proportion will remain. Q.E.D.
Case 5. Let the corpuscle p be placed within the sphere AEBF; and because the force of the plane ef upon the corpuscle is as the solid contained under that plane and the distance pg; and the contrary force of the plane EP as the solid contained under that plane and the distance pG; the force compounded of both will be as the difference of the solids, that is, as the sum of the equal planes drawn into half the difference of the distances; that is, as that sum drawn into pS, the distance of the corpuscle from the centre of the sphere. And, by a like reasoning, the attraction of all the planes EF, ef, throughout the whole sphere, that is, the attraction of the whole sphere, is conjunctly as the sum of all the planes, or as the whole sphere, and as pS, the distance of the corpuscle from the centre of the sphere. Q.E.D.
Case 6. And if there be composed a new sphere out of innumerable corpuscles such as p, situate within the first sphere AEBF, it may be proved, as before, that the attraction, whether single of one sphere towards the other, or mutual of both towards each other, will be as the distance pS of the centres. Q.E.D.
PROPOSITION LXXVIII. THEOREM XXXVIII.
- If spheres is the progress from the centre to the circumference be however dissimilar and unequable, but similar on every side round about at all given distances from the centre; and the attractive force of every point be as the distance of the attracted body; I say, that the entire force with which two spheres of this kind attract each other mutually is proportional to the distance between the centres of the spheres.
This is demonstrated from the foregoing Proposition, in the same manner as Proposition LXXVI was demonstrated from Proposition LXXV.
Cor. Those things that were above demonstrated in Prop. X and LXIV, of the motion of bodies round the centres of conic sections, take place when all the attractions are made by the force of sphærical bodies of the condition above described, and the attracted bodies are spheres of the same kind.
SCHOLIUM.
I have now explained the two principal cases of attractions; to wit, when the centripetal forces decrease in a duplicate ratio of the distances, or increase in a simple ratio of the distances, causing the bodies in both
