Search
Random Quotation
Let no one say that I have said nothing new .... [T]he arrangement of the subject is new. When we play tennis, we both play with the same ball, but one of us places it better.
Pensees. 1670.
Loci: Convergence
show printer friendly
send to a friend
Mathematical Treasures
Rene Descartes' Treatise on Method
This is the title page to René Descartes' Treatise on Method, with its three famous essays on Dioptrics, Meteorology, and Geometry. The third essay contains Descartes' treatment of analytic geometry as well as his theory of equations and his rule for finding the normal to a given curve.
A complete translation of the Treatise with the essays is in René Descartes, Discourse on Method, Optics, Geometry, and Meteorology, trans by Paul Olscamp (Indianapolis, Bobbs-Merill Co., 1961).