Page:Newton's Principia (1846).djvu/382

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376
the mathematical principles
[Book II.

tion on one side retards it just as much as its attrition on the other side accelerates it.

Cor. 9. Therefore if the vessel be quiescent, and the motion of the globe be given, the motion of the fluid will be given. For conceive a plane to pass through the axis of the globe, and to revolve with a contrary motion; and suppose the sum of the time of this revolution and of the revolution of the globe to be to the time of the revolution of the globe as the square of the semi-diameter of the vessel to the square of the semi-diameter of the globe; and the periodic times of the parts of the fluid in respect of this plane will be as the squares of their distances from the centre of the globe.

Cor. 10. Therefore if the vessel move about the same axis with the globe, or with a given velocity about a different one, the motion of the fluid will be given. For if from the whole system we take away the angular motion of the vessel, all the motions will remain the same among themselves as before, by Cor. 8, and those motions will be given by Cor. 9.

Cor. 11. If the vessel and the fluid are quiescent, and the globe revolves with an uniform motion, that motion will be propagated by degrees through the whole fluid to the vessel, and the vessel will be carried round by it, unless violently detained; and the fluid and the vessel will be continually accelerated till their periodic times become equal to the periodic times of the globe. If the vessel be either withheld by some force, or revolve with any constant and uniform motion, the medium will come by little and little to the state of motion defined in Cor. 8, 9, 10, nor will it ever persevere in any other state. But if then the forces, by which the globe and vessel revolve with certain motions, should cease, and the whole system be left to act according to the mechanical laws, the vessel and globe, by means of the intervening fluid, will act upon each other, and will continue to propagate their motions through the fluid to each other, till their periodic times become equal among themselves, and the whole system revolves together like one solid body.


SCHOLIUM.

In all these reasonings I suppose the fluid to consist of matter of uniform density and fluidity; I mean, that the fluid is such, that a globe placed any where therein may propagate with the same motion of its own, at distances from itself continually equal, similar and equal motions in the fluid in the same interval of time. The matter by its circular motion endeavours to recede from the axis of the vortex, and therefore presses all the matter that lies beyond. This pressure makes the attrition greater, and the separation of the parts more difficult; and by consequence diminishes the fluidity of the matter. Again; if the parts of the fluid are in any one place denser or larger than in the others, the fluidity will be less in that place, because there are fewer superficies where the parts can be separated