Page:The Analyst; or, a Discourse Addressed to an Infidel Mathematician.djvu/37

Rh received Principles it is evident, that no Geometrical Quantity, can by any diviion or ubdiviion whatoever be exhauted, or reduced to nothing. Conidering the various Arts and Devices ued by the great Author of the Fluxionary Method: in how many Lights he placeth his Fluxions: and in what different ways he attempts to demontrate the ame Point: one would be inclined to think, he was himelf upicious of the jutnes of his own demontrations; and that he was not enough pleaed with any one notion teadily to adhere to it. Thus much at leat is plain, that he owned himelf atisfied concerning certain Points, which nevertheles he could not undertake to demontrate to others. Whether this atisfaction aroe from tentative Methods or Inductions; which have often been admitted by Mathematicians, (for inftance by Dr. Wallis in his Arithmetic of Infinites) is what I hall not pretend to determine. But, whatever the Cae might have been with repect to the Author, it appears that his Followers have hewn themelves more eager in  plying