Sir Isaac Newton, Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica (London, 1687).

The first edition of Sir Isaac Newton's most famous work, which contains the summation of his theories on the laws of motion and universal gravitation, which now bear his name. The quote "all matter attracts all other matter with a force proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them" sums up his theory and has stood the test of time. It was probably his rivalry with Robert Hooke which inspired and drove him to complete the work, which still stands today as the greatest contribution to theoretical physics, mathematics and mechanics. In 1705 he became the first British scientist ever to be knighted for his researches.

Donated by John Brill.