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Doc. 43.] SWEDENBORG TO ERICUS BENZELIUS. 219
a
:
by cross-lines only for the minutes; every sixth second is shown
by some divisions in a brass ruler, which is like a member of a
pair of scissors, and cuts off every circle [?]. Upon the whole it
is uniform with Tycho’s method, only it is more compendious in
the division, for the marks on the above -mentioned brass ruler
are in the place of a circle upon the instrument. In his observa
tory he had also other quadrants, all with tubes and micro
meters, which were set in a horizontal position by means of a
plumb -line. This is my respectful answer to Prof. Elfvius 54
letter. *
I have also been asked about Flamsteed’s56 publications;
they are as follows: The Posthumous Works of Horroxius,together
with a little about the eclipses of the sun, how they may be
marked down, so that they may be computed in full; he has
also published in folio his Observations during fifteen years,
but they cannot be obtained. He told me also that he had in
the press the Heavenly Constellations as they are found in
Hipparchus, but corrected and emended; for he shows that
the one among the ancients who first put them on record mistook
right for left, upper for lower, and was especially wrong in
the .constellation of the ship, because he did not sufficiently
understand the Greek language. He prefers to take the stars
in the order in which they reach the meridian .
When the plates for the globes arrive in Sweden , Prof.
Elfvius54 will perhaps take care to have them printed and
made up ; I shall send a specimen very soon ; but no impression
is to be sold.
P. S. Prof. Elfvius asks what is the opinion of Englishmen
with regard to Newton’s Principia ; but in this matter no
Englishman ought to be consulted, quia cæcutit in suis, i. e.
because he is blind about his own ; yet it would be crimina!
to doubt them. The lunar tables that are most sold here,
are, Horroxii tabulæ Britannicæ, Strechii [ ? ] Carolinae,
Greenwood’s Anglicanæ. Flamsteed informed me that he had
made unerring lunar tables. No other writings are in use
here, nor do the English employ any other writings in mathe
matics except those of their own countrymen.
* Compare Document 42.
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