BERNOULLI, DANIEL. - CONSERVATION OF 'VIS VIVA'

Remarques sur le Principe de la Conservation des Forces Vives pris dans un sens General.

(Berlin, Haude et Spener, 1750). 4to. No wrappers, as issued in "Mémoires de l'Academie Royale des Sciences et Belles-Lettres", 1748, tome IV, Titlepage to the volume in red/black with engraved titlevignette a. pp. 356-364. A stamp on titlepage.c

First printing of this memoir. In various connections Bernoulli used the principle of the coservation of 'Vis Viva' within the main areas of mechanics. "Similarly, in an essay (1747) on the motion of a heavenly body and the three-body problem he worked out from the first integral of Newton’s second law, which related the square of its velocity to, in effect, its level of potential under attraction. In a sequel study (1750, the paper offered) on the generality of the principle he included the case where the body was acted upon by more than one centre of force. This was a most unusual way of working within celestial mechanics; Newton had rarely invoked energy equations or relationships, although he had also found results about external attraction and equipotential surfaces."(I. Grattan-Guiness).

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