Page:Philosophical Transactions - Volume 053.djvu/101

masterly performance, and a thing of the greatest merit and importance in navigation.

That there is a respect due to Edward Wright for his invention, that his principles are true, that Mr. West or his editor, and both (if both of the same opinion) are false, is most certain.

That the characters and abilities of Dr. Halley, Sir Jonas Moore, Mr. William Jones, Mr. James Hodgson, Mr. Haselden, and many others, for they are almost numberless, both of higher and lower mathematicians, who have wrote on the certainty and utility of Wright's chart, I say, that the characters and abilities of these able geometricians are attacked by Mr. West and his editor, and by the Critical Reviewers, is plain, and that this will have great weight with many not over well acquainted with geometry is no less plain. And what will an honest seaman say, who knows but just to make his calculations, when he reads the account given in this book, of Mercator's chart? And what must those gentlemen among the subscribers to Mr. West's book say or think, who, not being quite masters of geometry, are at liberty to believe or disbelieve Dr. Halley and many others, or Mr. West and his editor? Those who are masters of geometry must see the error.

But there are other circumstances; Edward Wright himself gives the very same construction by his words, as Mr. West doth, although his tables make out quite another thing, that is, both Wright and West say expressly, the sphere being inscribed in the hollow cylinder, and the equinoctial remaining fixed without swelling whilst the other parts swell towards the poles, the chart will be formed. But in this, Wright