Astronomy Explained upon Sir Isaac Newton's Principles, and made easy to those who have not studied Mathematics
Author: James Ferguson (1710-1776)
Year: 1757
Publisher: Printed for, and sold by the author
Place: London
Description:
[8]+283+[9] pages. Complete with frontispiece, 13 folding plates (as listed on final page), numerous tables, dedication, contents, errata, index, and directions to binder. Quarto (10 1/2" x 8 1/2") bound in full leather re-backed in calf with raised bands and gilt-stamped spine, with fresh endpapers and red speckled edges. (ESTC T18585) Second edition.
James Ferguson was a Scottish astronomer. He is known as the inventor and improver of astronomical and other scientific apparatus, as a striking instance of self education and as an itinerant lecturer.
In 1748, Ferguson began to give public lectures on experimental philosophy, which he repeated in most of the principal towns in England. During his time traveling in England, the well known London bookseller Andrew Millar arranged lectures for him in the spa towns of Royal Tunbridge Wells and Bath. Ferguson's deep interest in his subject, his clear explanations, his ingeniously constructed diagrams, and his mechanical apparatus rendered him one of the most successful of popular lecturers on scientific subjects.
Although not as well known nowadays, Ferguson was widely influential in his own time. Thomas Paine mentioned him in his publication The Age of Reason and William Herschel studied astronomy from his books. His international reputation was such that he was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 1770. The German experimental physicist Georg Christoph Lichtenberg admired Ferguson: "Everything was done by experiments – he had not even chalk and sponge."
Condition:
Boards scuffed with dry cracking to leather, darkening at edges, edgewear, and corners heavily rubbed, some chipping to leather with largest area on corner of lower board; spine with some residue, lightly rubbed, joints with mild creasing; a lovely interior with very mild toning, light staining from binder's glue at paste-down, expected offsetting, and occasional light foxing, small chip or tear, soiling, and damp staining at lower margin and corner; frontispiece and final leaf appear extended, minor writing on a couple of pages, plate VII with tiny pinhole, final (2) leaves attached at inner margin. An easily very good copy with most pages near pristine.