Optique

1755 · 50315 — Altenburg Richterischen Buchhandlung 1755. 4to. Contemp. boards. Handwritten titlelabel on spine. Engraved titlevignette. 205315 pp. and 22 folded engraved plates. A few scattered brownspots but in general clean. <br/><br/><em>Scarce first German edition of this hugely influential textbook in optics."Smith wrote on optics and harmonics. In 1738 he published A Compleat System of Optics in Four Books viz. A Popular at Mathematical a Mechanical and a Philosophical Treatise. Both comprehensive and reliable the work became probably the most influential optical textbook of the eighteenth century. It was also published in Dutch in 1753 in German in 1755 and in two different French translations in 1767 In 1778 an abridged version was published in English. In turn its popularity helped to establish the eighteenth-century conviction that light is particulate." DSB. </em> hardcover