Rare Science Book: d’Alembert, Jean le Rond; Trait de dynamique...1758

d’Alembert, Jean le Rond; Trait de dynamique, dans lequel les loix de l’equilibre & du Mouvement des Corps sont réduites au plus petit nombre possible, & démontrées d’une maniére nouvelle, & où l’on donne un Principe général pour trouver le Mouvement de plusieurs Corps qui agissent les uns sur les autres. d’une maniére quelconque.... Nouvelle édition revue et fort augmentee par l'auteur. Paris, 1758. Quarto, pp. 10, xl, errata, 272, xiii, 5 folded plates.

The work is complete and in a period full calf with gilt spine panels and titles. The binding is tight and clean, the text is clean with light toning at some page margins, owners book plate on paste down and original owner’s signature on title page in small pen. In very good condition.

d’Alembert (1717-1783) was a French mathematician, physicist and philosopher.
In 1743 he published his most famous work, Traité de Dynamique, in which he developed his own laws of motion a landmark in the history of mechanics.  We offer here the rare second edition of his Traité de Dynamique in which he expands some of his original thoughts.
d'Alembert's work reduces the laws of the motion of bodies to a law of equilibrium. That law’s statement that "the internal forces of inertia must be equal and opposite to the forces that produce the acceleration" is still known as "d'Alembert's Principle". This principle is applied to many phenomena and, in particular, to the theory of the motion of fluids.  The treatise on dynamics was d'Alembert's first major book and it is a landmark in the history of mechanics. D’Alembert, in addition to being a mathematician, physicist and philosopher was also co-editor with Denis Diderot of the “Encyclopédie”.