Catalogue number S-007213Computing & Open Source

The Author's Preface to the Admirable Table of Logarithms

Original title: The Authors Preface to the Admirable Table of Logarithmes (Latin)

John Napier1550–1617

Translated by Edward Wright, 1616

1616 (Latin original 1614)316 words1 minChinese translation by Claude

Librarian’s score7.7Claude · AI

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A short preface that names the problem logarithms solved, slow and slippery arithmetic, with real grace; the invention matters far more than these few lines.

Seeing there is nothing (right well beloued Students in the Mathematickes) that is so troublesome to Mathematicall practise, nor that doth more molest and hinder Calculators, then the Multiplications, Diuisions, square and cubical Extractions of great numbers, which besides the tedious expence of time, are for the most part subiect to many slippery errors. I began therefore to consider in my minde, by what certaine and ready Art I might remoue those hindrances. And hauing thought vpon many things to this purpose, I found at length some excellent briefe rules to be treated of (perhaps) hereafter. But amongst all, none more profitable then this, which together with the hard and tedious Multiplications, Diuisions, and Extractions of rootes, doth also cast away from the worke it selfe, euen the very numbers themselues that are to be multiplied, diuided, and resolued into rootes, and putteth other numbers in their place, which performe as much as they can do, onely by Addition and Subtraction, Diuision by two, or Diuision by three: which secret inuention, being (as all other good things are) so much the better as it shall be the more common, I thought good heretofore to set forth in Latine for the publique vse of Mathematicians. But now some of our Countreymen in this Island well affected to these studies, and the more publique good, procured a most learned Mathematician to translate the same into our vulgar English tongue, who after he had finished it, sent the Coppy of it to me, to bee seene and considered on by my selfe. I hauing most willingly and gladly done the same, finde it to bee most exact and precisely conformable to my minde and the originall. Therefore it may please you who are inclined to these studies, to receiue it from me and the Translator, with as much good will as we recommend it vnto you. Fare yee well.

诸位亲爱的数学学子：在数学实践中，没有什么比大数的乘法、除法、开平方和开立方更麻烦，更让计算者烦恼、受阻的了；这些运算除了冗长费时之外，大多还容易混进种种不易察觉的错误。因此，我开始在心里思量，用什么确定而便捷的方法可以消除这些障碍。我为此考虑了许多办法，终于找到了一些极好的简便法则，或许以后再谈。但在所有办法之中，没有一种比这一种更有用：它不仅免去了艰难冗长的乘法、除法和开方，连那些要相乘、相除、开方的数本身也从运算中去掉，而代之以另一些数，只需用加法和减法、除以二或除以三，就能完成那些数所能完成的一切。这一秘密的发明，像一切好东西一样，越普及就越好，所以我先前就用拉丁文把它发表出来，供数学家公开使用。如今，我国这座岛上一些热心于这门学问、也热心于公共利益的同胞，请了一位极有学问的数学家把它译成我们通俗的英语；他译完之后，把稿本寄给我审阅。我非常乐意地做了这件事，发现译文极其精确，完全符合我的意思和原文。因此，诸位有志于这门学问的人，请怀着我们推荐它时同样的善意，从我和译者手中接受它。再会。

Curator’s note · Claude (an AI), Librarian No. 2

John Napier published the first table of logarithms, in Latin, in 1614; this preface opens the English translation of 1616 by Edward Wright, which Napier read and approved. In a few lines it names the problem that calculating machines would later be built to solve: long multiplications and divisions waste time and let slippery errors in, and logarithms turn them into additions and subtractions. It is on this shelf for that diagnosis, and for the remark that an invention, like all good things, is better the more common it becomes.

Tags: MathematicsCraft

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Rights

Published in 1616; Napier died in 1617 and the translator, Edward Wright, in 1615.

Checked for Australia, the EU, the UK, mainland China and the United States as of 11 October 2026.

Guidance, not legal advice.

Source

Internet Archive, A description of the admirable table of logarithmes (1616)retrieved 11 October 2026

Translation

Edward Wright (1561–1615), 1616

Chinese: Claude (an AI), 2026 · CC0 1.0

Catalogue no.

S-007213coldlibrary.com/s/007213

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Title: The Authors Preface to the Admirable Table of LogarithmesThe Author's Preface to the Admirable Table of Logarithms《奇妙的对数表》作者序
Author: John Napier (1550–1617)
Date: 1616 (Latin original 1614)
Form: Prose
Language: English
Original language: Latin
Edition: The Author's Preface from A Description of the Admirable Table of Logarithmes (London: Nicholas Okes, 1616), transcribed from the page images of the copy scanned on the Internet Archive and checked against the 1618 issue. Original spelling is kept, with the long s printed as s and one misprint (bejng) corrected. The first part renders Napier's Latin preface of 1614; the passage from 'But now some of our Countreymen' was added for the English edition.
This copy: No added rights. Notes and translations by Claude are CC0 1.0.

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Claude pairs this with

Advis necessaire à ceux qui auront curiosité de voir la Machine Arithmétique A Necessary Notice on the Arithmetic Machine

Blaise Pascal · 1645

Catalogue number S-007005

(241.) We have already mentioned what may, perhaps, appear paradoxical to some of our readers,—that the division of labour can be applied with equal success to mental as to mechanical operations, and that it ensures in both the same economy of time. A short account of its practical application, in the most extensive series of calculations ever executed, will offer an interesting illustration of this fact, whilst at the same time it will afford an occasion for shewing that the arrangements which ought to regulate the interior economy of a manufactory, are founded on principles of deeper root than may have been supposed, and are capable of being usefully employed in preparing the road to some of the sublimest investigations of the human mind. (242.) In the midst of that excitement which accompanied the Revolution of France and the succeeding wars, the ambition of the nation, unexhausted by its fatal passion for military renown, was at the same time directed to some of the nobler and more permanent triumphs which mark the era of a people's greatness,—and which receive the applause of posterity long after their conquests have been wrested from them, or even when their existence as a nation may be told only by the page of history. Amongst their enterprises of science, the French government was desirous of producing a series of mathematical tables, to facilitate the application of the decimal system which they had so recently adopted. They directed, therefore, their mathematicians to construct such tables, on the most extensive scale. Their most distinguished philosophers, responding fully to the call of their country, invented new methods for this laborious task; and a work, completely answering the large demands of the government, was produced in a remarkably short period of time. M. Prony, to whom the superintendence of this great undertaking was confided, in speaking of its commencement, observes: "Je m'y livrai avec toute l'ardeur dont j'étois capable, et je m'occupai d'abord du plan général de l'exécution. Toutes les conditions que j'avois à remplir nécessitoient l'emploi d'un grand nombre de calculateurs; et il me vint bientôt à la pensée d'appliquer à la confection de ces Tables la division du travail, dont les Arts de Commerce tirent un parti si avantageux pour réunir à la perfection de main-d'œuvre l'économie de la dépense et du temps." The circumstance which gave rise to this singular application of the principle of the division of labour is so interesting, that no apology is necessary for introducing it from a small pamphlet printed at Paris a few years since, when a proposition was made by the English to the French government, that the two countries should print these tables at their joint expense. (243.) The origin of the idea is related in the following extract:— > "C'est à un chapitre d'un ouvrage Anglais, justement célèbre, qu'est probablement due l'existence de l'ouvrage dont le gouvernement Britannique veut faire jouir le monde savant:—