Sciences et des Arts. A
Paris: de
l’Imprimerie de la République, An
viii
. Et se trouve chez le C.
cn
[
sic
--
Ed.
]
Bernard. [1800.]
QA804 .P96
First Edition. 4to. 245 leaves.
See no. 3744 above.
[3746]
30
Newton’s Optics.
8
vo.
1815 Catalogue, page 114, no. 21, as above.
NEWTON,
Sir Isaac.
Opticks: or, A treatise of the Reflections, Refractions, Inflections and Colours of Light. The
Fourth Edition, corrected. By Sir Isaac Newton, Knt.
London: printed for
William Innys,
mdccxxx
. [1730.]
QC353 .N56
8vo. 196 leaves, 12 folded plates, publisher’s advertisement on the last leaf.
Jefferson referred to this work in a letter to the Rev. James Madison, President of William and Mary College, dated from Paris,
July 19, 1788: “
. . . an Abbé here has shaken, if not destroyed, the theory of de Dominis, Descartes & Newton for explaining the phoenomenon
of the rainbow. according to that theory, you know, a cone of rays issuing from the sun and falling on a cloud in the opposite
part of the heavens, is reflected back in the form of a smaller cone, the apex of which is the eye of the observer: thus .
. . so that . . . the eye of the observer must be in the axis of both cones, and equally distant from every part of the bow.
but he observes that he has repeatedly seen bows the one end of which has been very near to him, & the other at a great distance.
I have often seen the same thing myself. I recollect well to have seen the end of a rainbow between myself & a house, or between
myself & a bank not twenty yards distant, & this repeatedly. but I never saw, what he sais he has seen, different rainbows
at the same time intersecting each other. I never saw coexistent bows which were not concentric also.--again, according to
the theory, if the sun is in the horizon, the horizon intercepts the lower half of the bow . . . if above the horizon, that
intercepts more than the half, in proportion. so that generally the bow is less than a semicircle & never more. he says he
has seen it more than a semicircle. I have often seen a leg of the bow below my level. my situation at Monticello admitted
this, because there is a mountain there in the opposite direction of the afternoon’s sun, the valley between which & Monticello
is 500 feet deep. I have seen a leg of a rainbow plunge down on the river running through that valley. but I do not recollect
to have remarked at any time that the bow was of more than half a circle. it appears to me that these facts demolish the Newtonian
hypothesis but they do not support that erected in it’s stead by the abbé . . .
”
For a note on Sir Isaac Newton and Jefferson’s opinion of him, see no. 3720 above.
[3747]
31
Adams’s Essay on vision.
8
vo.
1815 Catalogue, page 113, no. 22, as above.
ADAMS,
George.
An Essay on Vision, briefly explaining the Fabric of the Eye, and the Nature of Vision: intended for the Service of those
whose Eyes are weak or impaired: enabling them to form an accurate Idea of the true State of their Sight, the means of Preserving
it, together with Proper Rules for ascertaining when Spectacles are Necessary, and how to choose them without injuring the
Sight. By George Adams, mathematical instrument maker to his Majesty, and optician to his Royal Highness
