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Artificers had, and still have, that they are able with a small force
to move and raise great weights; (in a certain manner with their
Machines cozening nature, whose Instinct, yea most positive con
stitution it is, that no Resistance can be overcome, but by a Force
more potent then it:) which conjecture how false it is, I hope by
the ensuing true and necessary Demonstrations to evince.

In the mean time, since I have hinted, that the benefit and help
derived from Machines is not, to be able with lesse Force, by help
of the Machine to move those weights, which, without it, could
not be moved by the same Force: it would not be besides the
purpose to declare what the Commodities be which are derived to
us from such like faculties, for if no profit were to be hoped for,
all endeavours employed in the acquist thereof will be but lost
labour.

Proceeding therefore according to the nature of these Studies,
let us first propose four things to be considered. First, the weight
to be transferred from place to place; and secondly, the Force
and Power which should move it; thirdly, the Distance between
the one and the other Term of the Motion; Fourthly, the Time
in which that mutation is to be made: which Time becometh the
same thing with the Dexterity, and Velocity of the Motion; we
determining that Motion to be more swift then another, which in
lesse Time passeth an equal Distance.

Now, any determinate Resistance and limited Force whatsoever
being assigned, and any Distance given, there is no doubt to be
made, but that the given Force may carry the given Weight to the
determinate Distance; for, although the Force were extream
small, yet, by dividing the Weight into many small parts, none
of which remain superiour to the Force, and by transferring them
one by one, it shall at last have carried the whole Weight to the
assigned Term: and yet one cannot at the end of the Work with
Reason say, that that great Weight hath been moved, and trans
ported by a Force lesse then it self, howbeit indeed it was done
by a Force, that many times reiterated that Motion, and that
Space, which shall have been measured but only once by the whole
Weight. From whence it appears, that the Velocity of the Force
hath been as many times Superiour to the Resistance of the weight,
as the said Weight was superiour to the Force; for that in the
same Time that the moving Force hath many times measured the
intervall between the Terms of the Motion, the said Moveable
happens to have past it onely once: nor therefore ought we to
affirm a great Resistance to have been overcome by a small Force,
contrary to the constitution of Nature. Then onely may we say
the Natural Constitution is overcome, when the lesser Force trans
fers the greater Resistance, with a Velocity of Motion like to that