View source for Isaac Newton

{{Short description|English polymath (1642–1727)}}
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{{Infobox scientist
| honorific_prefix  = [[Sir]]
| name              = Isaac Newton
| honorific_suffix  = {{post-nominals|country=GBR|size=100%|FRS}}
| image             = Portrait of Sir Isaac Newton, 1689 (brightened).jpg
| alt               = Portrait of Newton, a white man with white hair and a brown robe, sitting with his hands folded
| caption           = [[Portrait of Isaac Newton|''Portrait of Isaac Newton'']] by [[Godfrey Kneller]], 1689
| birth_date        = {{Birth date|df=y|1643|01|04}}
| birth_place       = {{nowrap|[[Woolsthorpe-by-Colsterworth]],}} Lincolnshire, England
| death_date        = {{Death date and age|df=y|1727|03|31|1643|01|04}}
| death_place       = [[Kensington]], Middlesex, England
| resting_place     = [[Westminster Abbey]]
| fields            = {{hlist|[[Physics]]|[[natural philosophy]]|[[alchemy]]|[[theology]]|[[mathematics]]|[[astronomy]]|[[economics]]}}
| workplaces        = {{hlist|[[University of Cambridge]]|[[Royal Society]]|[[Royal Mint]]}}
| education         = [[Trinity College, Cambridge]] ([[Bachelor of Arts|BA]], 1665; [[Master of Arts|MA]], 1668)<ref>Kevin C. Knox, Richard Noakes (eds.), ''From Newton to Hawking: A History of Cambridge University's Lucasian Professors of Mathematics'', Cambridge University Press, 2003, p.&nbsp;61.</ref>
| academic_advisors = {{unbulleted list | [[Isaac Barrow]]<ref>Feingold, Mordechai. [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/1541 Barrow, Isaac (1630–1677)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130129154554/http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/1541 |date=29 January 2013 }}, ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', [[Oxford University Press]], September 2004; online edn, May 2007. Retrieved 24 February 2009; explained further in {{cite journal |last=Feingold |first=Mordechai |date=1993 |title=Newton, Leibniz, and Barrow Too: An Attempt at a Reinterpretation |journal=Isis |volume=84 |issue=2 |pages=310–338 |bibcode=1993Isis...84..310F |doi=10.1086/356464 |jstor=236236 |s2cid=144019197 |issn=0021-1753}}</ref> | [[Benjamin Pulleyn]]<ref>{{cite web |title=Dictionary of Scientific Biography |url=http://www.chlt.org/sandbox/lhl/dsb/page.50.a.php |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050225223812/http://www.chlt.org/sandbox/lhl/dsb/page.50.a.php |archive-date=25 February 2005 |at=Notes, No. 4}}</ref>}}
| notable_students  = {{unbulleted list| [[Roger Cotes]]|[[William Whiston]]}}
| awards            = {{unbulleted list | [[Fellow of the Royal Society|FRS]]&nbsp;(1672)<ref name="frs">{{cite web |title=Fellows of the Royal Society |url=https://royalsociety.org/about-us/fellowship/fellows |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150316060617/https://royalsociety.org/about-us/fellowship/fellows |archive-date=16 March 2015 |publisher=Royal Society |location=London}}</ref> | [[Knight Bachelor]]&nbsp;(1705)}}
| known_for         = {{collapsible list|[[Classical mechanics|Newtonian mechanics]]| [[universal gravitation]]| [[calculus]]| [[Newton's laws of motion]]| [[optics]]| [[binomial series]]| ''[[Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica|Principia]]''| [[Newton's method]] | [[Newton's law of cooling]]| [[Newton's identities]]| [[Newton's metal]]| [[Newton line]]| [[Newton–Gauss line]]| [[Newtonian fluid]]| [[Newton's rings]]|''[[Standing on the shoulders of giants]]'' |[[List of things named after Isaac Newton|List of all other works and concepts]]|}}
| signature         = Isaac Newton signature ws.svg
| signature_alt     = Signature written in ink in a flowing script
| party             = [[Whigs (British political party)|Whig]]
| module            = {{Infobox officeholder| embed = yes
| office            = [[Parliament of England|Member of Parliament]]<br />for [[Cambridge University (UK Parliament constituency)|the University of Cambridge]]
| term_start        = 1689
| term_end          = 1690
| alongside         = [[Henry Boyle, 1st Baron Carleton|Henry Boyle]]
| predecessor       = [[Robert Brady (writer)|Robert Brady]]
| successor         = [[Edward Finch (composer)|Edward Finch]]
| term_start1       = 1701
| term_end1         = 1702
| alongside1        = Henry Boyle
| predecessor1      = [[Anthony Hammond (politician)|Anthony Hammond]]
| successor1        = [[Arthur Annesley, 5th Earl of Anglesey]]
| office2           = President of the Royal Society
| order2            = 12th
| term_start2       = 1703
| term_end2         = 1727
| predecessor2      = [[John Somers, 1st Baron Somers|John Somers]]
| successor2        = [[Hans Sloane]]
| office3           = [[Master of the Mint]]
| term_start3       = 1699
| term_end3         = 1727
| predecessor3      = [[Thomas Neale]]
| successor3        = [[John Conduitt]]
| suboffice3        = [[Warden of the Mint]]
| subterm3          = 1696–1699
| office4           = Lucasian Professor of Mathematics
| order4            = 2nd
| term_start4       = 1669
| term_end4         = 1702
| predecessor4      = [[Isaac Barrow]]
| successor4        = [[William Whiston]]
}}
}}

'''Sir Isaac Newton''' ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|nj|uː|t|ən|audio=LL-Q1860 (eng)-Naomi Persephone Amethyst (NaomiAmethyst)-Newton.wav}}; {{OldStyleDate|4 January|1643|25 December}}{{snd}}{{OldStyleDate|31 March|1727|20 March}}){{efn|name=OSNS|During Newton's lifetime, two calendars were in use in Europe: the [[Julian Calendar|Julian]] ("[[Old Style and New Style dates|Old Style]]" calendar in [[Protestant]] and [[Eastern Orthodox Church|Orthodox]] regions, including Britain; and the [[Gregorian Calendar|Gregorian]] ("[[Old Style and New Style dates|New Style]]") calendar in Roman Catholic Europe. At Newton's birth, Gregorian dates were ten days ahead of Julian dates; thus, his birth is recorded as taking place on 25 December 1642 Old Style, but it can be converted to a New Style (modern) date of 4 January 1643. By the time of his death, the difference between the calendars had increased to eleven days. Moreover the civil or legal year in England began on 25 March, therefore the Newton's death on 20 March was still dated as 1726 O.S. there.}} was an English [[polymath]] who was a [[mathematician]], [[physicist]], [[astronomer]], [[alchemist]], [[theologian]], author and inventor.<ref name=":1">{{cite web |last=Alex |first=Berezow |date=4 February 2022 |title=Who was the smartest person in the world? |url=https://bigthink.com/the-past/smartest-person-world-isaac-newton/ |access-date=28 September 2023 |website=Big Think |archive-date=28 September 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230928161012/https://bigthink.com/the-past/smartest-person-world-isaac-newton/ |url-status=live }}</ref> He was a key figure in the [[Scientific Revolution]] and the [[Age of Enlightenment|Enlightenment]] that followed.<ref name=":9">{{cite book |last=Matthews |first=Michael R. |author-link=Michael R. Matthews |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JrcqBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA181 |title=Time for Science Education: How Teaching the History and Philosophy of Pendulum Motion Can Contribute to Science Literacy |date=2000 |publisher=Springer Science+Business Media, LLC |isbn=978-0-306-45880-4 |series= |location=New York |page=181 }}</ref> His book {{lang|la|[[Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica]]}} (''Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy''), first published in 1687, [[Unification of theories in physics#Unification of gravity on Earth with astronomical behaviors|achieved the first great unification in physics]] and established [[classical mechanics]].<ref name=":32">{{cite journal |last=Rynasiewicz |first=Robert A. |title=Newton's Views on Space, Time, and Motion |date=22 August 2011 |journal=[[Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy]] |pages= |url=https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/newton-stm/ |access-date=15 November 2024 |publisher=Stanford University |author-link=Robert Rynasiewicz}}</ref><ref name=":15">{{cite book |author=Klaus Mainzer |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QekhAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA8 |title=Symmetries of Nature: A Handbook for Philosophy of Nature and Science |date=2 December 2013 |publisher=Walter de Gruyter |isbn=978-3-11-088693-1 |page=8 }}</ref> Newton also made seminal contributions to [[optics]], and [[Leibniz–Newton calculus controversy|shares credit]] with the German mathematician [[Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz]] for formulating [[calculus|infinitesimal calculus]], although he developed calculus years before Leibniz. Newton contributed to and refined the [[scientific method]], and his work is considered the most influential in bringing forth modern science.

In the {{lang|la|Principia}}, Newton formulated the [[Newton's laws of motion|laws of motion]] and [[Newton's law of universal gravitation|universal gravitation]] that formed the dominant scientific viewpoint for centuries until it was superseded by the [[theory of relativity]]. While this is the case, his laws still serve as excellent approximations for the vast majority of physical phenomena involving low speeds (much less than the [[speed of light]]) and weak [[Gravitational field|gravitational fields]]. He used his mathematical description of [[gravity]] to derive [[Kepler's laws of planetary motion]], account for [[tide]]s, the [[Trajectory|trajectories]] of [[comet]]s, the [[Axial precession|precession of the equinoxes]] and other phenomena, eradicating doubt about the [[Solar System]]'s [[heliocentrism|heliocentricity]].<ref>{{cite book |last=More |first=Louis Trenchard |url=https://archive.org/details/isaacnewtonbiogr0000loui/page/327 |title=Isaac Newton: A Biography |publisher=Dover Publications |year=1934 |page=327}}</ref> Newton solved the [[two-body problem]] and introduced the [[three-body problem]]. He demonstrated that the [[Dynamics (mechanics)|motion of objects]] on Earth and [[Astronomical object|celestial bodies]] could be accounted for by the same principles. Newton's inference that the Earth is an [[Spheroid#Oblate spheroids|oblate spheroid]] was later confirmed by the geodetic measurements of [[Alexis Clairaut]], [[Charles Marie de La Condamine]], and others, convincing most European scientists of the superiority of Newtonian mechanics over earlier systems. He was also the first to calculate the [[age of Earth]] by experiment, and described a precursor to the modern [[wind tunnel]]. Further, he was the first to provide a quantitative estimate of the [[solar mass]].

Newton built the [[Newtonian telescope|first reflecting telescope]] and developed a sophisticated [[Color theory|theory of colour]] based on the observation that a [[Dispersive prism|prism]] separates [[Electromagnetic spectrum#Visible radiation (light)|white light]] into the colours of the [[visible spectrum]]. His work on light was collected in his book ''[[Opticks]]'', published in 1704. He originated prisms as [[beam expander]]s and [[Multiple-prism dispersion theory|multiple-prism arrays]], which would later become integral to the development of [[tunable laser]]s.<ref name="OPN1" /> He also anticipated [[wave–particle duality]] and was the first to theorise the [[Goos–Hänchen effect]]. He further formulated an [[Newton's law of cooling|empirical law of cooling]], which was the first heat transfer formulation and serves as the formal basis of [[Convection (heat transfer)|convective heat transfer]],<ref name=":13">{{cite journal |last1=Cheng |first1=K. C. |last2=Fujii |first2=T. |date=1998 |title=Isaac Newton and Heat Transfer |url=http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01457639808939932 |journal=Heat Transfer Engineering |volume=19 |issue=4 |pages=9–21 |doi=10.1080/01457639808939932 |issn=0145-7632|url-access=subscription }}</ref> made the first theoretical calculation of the [[speed of sound]], and introduced the notions of a [[Newtonian fluid]] and a [[black body]]. He was also the first to explain the [[Magnus effect]]. Moreover, he was the first to analyze [[Couette flow]]. In addition to his creation of calculus, Newton's work on mathematics was extensive. He generalised the [[binomial theorem]] to any real number, introduced the [[Puiseux series]], was the first to state [[Bézout's theorem]], classified most of the [[cubic plane curve]]s, contributed to the study of [[Cremona transformation]]s, developed [[Newton's method|a method]] for approximating the [[Zero of a function|roots of a function]], originated the [[Newton–Cotes formulas]] used for [[numerical integration]], and further produced the earliest explicit enunciation of the general [[Taylor series]]. Additionally, Newton initiated the field of [[calculus of variations]], formulated and solved the earliest problem in [[geometric probability]], devised the earliest form of [[linear regression]], and was a pioneer of [[Vector calculus|vector analysis]].

Newton was a fellow of [[Trinity College, Cambridge|Trinity College]] and the second [[Lucasian Professor of Mathematics]] at the [[University of Cambridge]]; he was appointed at the age of 26. He was a devout but unorthodox Christian who privately rejected the doctrine of the [[Trinity]]. He refused to take [[holy orders]] in the [[Church of England]], unlike most members of the Cambridge faculty of the day. Beyond his work on the [[mathematical sciences]], Newton dedicated much of his time to the study of [[alchemy]] and [[Chronology of the Bible|biblical chronology]], but most of his work in those areas remained unpublished until long after his death. Politically and personally tied to the [[Whigs (British political party)|Whigs]], Newton served two brief terms as [[Cambridge University (UK Parliament constituency)|Member of Parliament for the University of Cambridge]], in 1689–1690 and 1701–1702. He was [[knight]]ed by [[Anne, Queen of Great Britain|Queen Anne]] in 1705 and spent the last three decades of his life in London, serving as [[Warden of the Mint|Warden]] (1696–1699) and [[Master of the Mint|Master]] (1699–1727) of the [[Royal Mint]], in which he increased the accuracy and security of British coinage. He was also the president of the [[Royal Society]] (1703–1727).

== Early life ==
{{Main|Early life of Isaac Newton}}

Isaac Newton was born (according to the [[Julian calendar]] in use in England at the time) on Christmas Day, 25 December 1642 ([[Old Style and New Style dates|NS]] 4 January 1643{{efn|name=OSNS}}) at [[Woolsthorpe Manor]] in [[Woolsthorpe-by-Colsterworth]], a hamlet in [[Lincolnshire]].<ref>{{cite web |last=Hatch |first=Robert&nbsp;A. |date=1988 |title=Sir Isaac Newton |url=http://users.clas.ufl.edu//ufhatch/pages/01-courses/current-courses/08sr-newton.htm |access-date=13 June 2023 |archive-date=5 November 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221105011958/http://users.clas.ufl.edu/ufhatch/pages/01-Courses/current-courses/08sr-newton.htm |url-status=live }}</ref> His father, also named Isaac Newton, had died three months before. Born prematurely, Newton was a small child; his mother, Hannah Ayscough, reportedly said that he could have fit inside a [[quart]] mug.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Storr |first=Anthony |author-link=Anthony Storr |date=December 1985 |title=Isaac Newton |journal=British Medical Journal (Clinical Research Edition) |volume=291 |issue=6511 |pages=1779–84 |doi=10.1136/bmj.291.6511.1779 |jstor=29521701 |pmc=1419183 |pmid=3936583}}</ref> When Newton was three, his mother remarried and went to live with her new husband, the Reverend Barnabas Smith, leaving her son in the care of his maternal grandmother, Margery Ayscough (née Blythe). Newton disliked his stepfather and maintained some enmity towards his mother for marrying him, as revealed by this entry in a list of sins committed up to the age of 19: "Threatening my father and mother Smith to burn them and the house over them."<ref>{{cite journal |last=Keynes |first=Milo |date=20 September 2008 |title=Balancing Newton's Mind: His Singular Behaviour and His Madness of 1692–93 |journal=Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London |volume=62 |issue=3 |pages=289–300 |doi=10.1098/rsnr.2007.0025 |jstor=20462679 |pmid=19244857 |doi-access=free}}</ref> Newton's mother had three children (Mary, Benjamin, and Hannah) from her second marriage.{{sfn|Westfall|1980|p=55}}

=== The King's School ===
From the age of about twelve until he was seventeen, Newton was educated at [[The King's School, Grantham|The King's School]] in [[Grantham]], which taught [[Latin]] and [[Ancient Greek]] and probably imparted a significant foundation of mathematics.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Whiteside |first=D. T. |author-link=Tom Whiteside |title=Contemporary Newtonian Research |date=1982 |publisher=Springer |isbn=978-94-009-7717-4 |editor-last=Bechler |editor-first=Zev |series=Studies in the History of Modern Science |location=Dordrecht |pages=110–111 |chapter=Newton the Mathematician |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LP3nCAAAQBAJ&pg=110}}</ref> He was removed from school by his mother and returned to Woolsthorpe-by-Colsterworth by October 1659. His mother, widowed for the second time, attempted to make him a farmer, an occupation he hated.{{sfn|Westfall|1994|pp=16–19}} Henry Stokes, master at The King's School, and Reverend William Ayscough (Newton's Uncle) persuaded his mother to send him back to school.{{sfn|Westfall|1994|p=64}} Motivated by a desire for revenge against a schoolyard bully, whom Newton beat in a fight and humiliated, he became the top-ranked student,{{sfn|White|1997|p=22}} distinguishing himself mainly by building [[sundial]]s and models of windmills.{{sfn|Westfall|1980|pp=60–62}}

=== University of Cambridge ===
In June 1661, Newton was admitted to [[Trinity College, Cambridge|Trinity College]] at the [[University of Cambridge]]. His uncle the Reverend William Ayscough, who had studied at Cambridge, recommended him to the university. At Cambridge, Newton started as a [[subsizar]], paying his way by performing [[valet]] duties until he was awarded a scholarship in 1664, which covered his university costs for four more years until the completion of his [[Master of Arts (Oxbridge and Dublin)|MA]].{{sfn|Westfall|1980|pp=71, 103}} At the time, Cambridge's teachings were based on those of [[Aristotle]], whom Newton read along with then more modern philosophers, including [[René Descartes]] and [[astronomer]]s such as [[Galileo Galilei]] and [[Thomas Street (astronomer)|Thomas Street]]. He set down in his notebook a series of "[[Quaestiones quaedam philosophicae|''Quaestiones'']]" about [[mechanical philosophy]] as he found it.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Westfall |first=Richard S. |author-link=Richard S. Westfall |date=1962 |title=The Foundations of Newton's Philosophy of Nature |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/4025131 |journal=The British Journal for the History of Science |volume=1 |issue=2 |pages=171–182 |doi=10.1017/S0007087400001345 |jstor=4025131 |issn=0007-0874 |via=JSTOR}}</ref> In 1665, he discovered the generalised [[binomial theorem]] and began to develop a mathematical theory that later became [[calculus]]. Soon after Newton obtained his BA degree at Cambridge in August 1665, the university temporarily closed as a precaution against the [[Great Plague of London|Great Plague]].<ref>{{cite EB1911 |wstitle=Newton, Sir Isaac |volume=19 |page=583 |first=Henry Martyn |last=Taylor}}</ref>

Although he had been undistinguished as a Cambridge student, his private studies and the years following his bachelor's degree have been described as "the richest and most productive ever experienced by a scientist".<ref>{{cite journal |last=Connor |first=Elizabeth |date=1 January 1942 |title=Sir Isaac Newton, the Pioneer of Astrophysics |url=https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1942ASPL....4...55C/abstract |journal=Leaflet of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific |volume=4 |issue=158 |page=55 |bibcode=1942ASPL....4...55C |issn=0004-6272}}</ref> The next two years alone saw the development of theories on calculus,<ref>{{cite web |last=Newton |first=Isaac |title=Waste Book |url=http://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-ADD-04004 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120108205159/http://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-ADD-04004/ |archive-date=8 January 2012 |access-date=10 January 2012 |publisher=Cambridge University Digital Library}}</ref> [[optics]], and the [[law of gravitation]], at his home in Woolsthorpe. The physicist Louis Trenchard More suggesting that "There are no other examples of achievement in the history of science to compare with that of Newton during those two golden years."<ref>{{cite book |last=More |first=Louis Trenchard |url=https://archive.org/details/b29977800/page/41 |title=Isaac Newton: A Biography |publisher=[[Charles Scribner's Sons]] |year=1934 |page=41}}</ref>

Newton has been described as an "exceptionally organized" person when it came to note-taking, further [[Dog ears|dog-earing]] pages he saw as important. Furthermore, Newton's "indexes look like present-day indexes: They are alphabetical, by topic." His books showed his interests to be wide-ranging, with Newton himself described as a "Janusian thinker, someone who could mix and combine seemingly disparate fields to stimulate creative breakthroughs."<ref>{{cite news |last=Mochari |first=Ilan |date=19 October 2015 |title=Here's How Isaac Newton Remembered Everything He Read: The scientific genius had very specific habits when he pored over books in his favorite library. |url=https://www.inc.com/ilan-mochari/how-isaac-newton-remembered-everything-he-read.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20251004085538/https://www.inc.com/ilan-mochari/how-isaac-newton-remembered-everything-he-read.html |archive-date=4 October 2025 |access-date=22 January 2025 |work=[[Inc. (magazine)|Inc.]]}}</ref> [[William Stukeley]] wrote that Newton "was not only very expert with his mechanical tools, but he was equally so with his pen", and further illustrated how Newton's lodging room wall at Grantham was covered in drawings of "birds, beasts, men, ships & mathematical schemes. & very well designed". He also noted his "uncommon skill & industry in mechanical works".<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Keynes |first=Milo |date=2008-09-20 |title=Balancing Newton's mind: his singular behaviour and his madness of 1692–93 |url=https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsnr.2007.0025 |journal=Notes and Records of the Royal Society |language=en |volume=62 |issue=3 |pages=289–300 |doi=10.1098/rsnr.2007.0025 |pmid=19244857 |issn=0035-9149|url-access=subscription }}</ref>

In April 1667, Newton returned to the University of Cambridge, and in October he was elected as a fellow of Trinity.<ref>{{acad|id=NWTN661I|name=Newton, Isaac}}</ref>{{sfn|Westfall|1980|p=178}} Fellows were required to take [[holy orders]] and be ordained as [[Anglicanism|Anglican]] priests, although this was not enforced in the [[Stuart Restoration|Restoration]] years, and an assertion of conformity to the [[Church of England]] was sufficient. He made the commitment that "I will either set Theology as the object of my studies and will take holy orders when the time prescribed by these statutes [7&nbsp;years] arrives, or I will resign from the college."{{sfn|Westfall|1980|p=179}} Up until this point he had not thought much about religion and had twice signed his agreement to the [[Thirty-nine Articles]], the basis of Church of England doctrine. By 1675 the issue could not be avoided, and his unconventional views stood in the way.{{sfn|Westfall|1980|pp=330–331}}

His academic work impressed the [[Lucasian Professor of Mathematics|Lucasian Professor]] [[Isaac Barrow]], who was anxious to develop his own religious and administrative potential (he became master of Trinity College two years later); in 1669, Newton succeeded him, only one year after receiving his MA. Newton argued that this should exempt him from the ordination requirement, and King [[Charles II of England|Charles II]], whose permission was needed, accepted this argument; thus, a conflict between Newton's religious views and Anglican orthodoxy was averted.{{sfn|White|1997|p=151}} He was appointed at the age of 26.<ref>{{cite book |last=Ackroyd |first=Peter |url=https://archive.org/details/isaacnewton0000ackr/page/39 |title=Isaac Newton |date=2007 |publisher=Vintage Books |isbn=978-0-09-928738-4 |series=Brief Lives |location=London |pages=39–40 }}</ref>

As accomplished as Newton was as a theoretician, he was less effective as a teacher; his classes were almost always empty. Humphrey Newton, his [[sizar]] (assistant), noted that Newton would arrive on time and, if the room was empty, he would reduce his lecture time in half from 30 to 15 minutes, talk to the walls, then retreat to his experiments, thus fulfilling his contractual obligations. For his part Newton enjoyed neither teaching nor students. Over his career he was only assigned three students to tutor and none were noteworthy.{{sfn|White|1997|pp=164–165}}

Newton was elected a [[List of fellows of the Royal Society elected in 1672|Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 1672]].<ref name="frs" />

=== Revision of ''Geographia Generalis'' ===
[[File:Geographia Generalis 1733 Figures 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, and 49.jpg|thumb|Some of the figures added by Isaac Newton in his 1672 and 1681 editions of the ''[[Geographia Generalis]]''. These figures appeared in subsequent editions as well.<ref name="Warntz1989" />]]
The Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge position included the responsibility of instructing [[geography]].<ref name="Warntz1989">{{cite journal |last1=Warntz |first1=William |title=Newton, the Newtonians, and the Geographia Generalis Varenii |journal=Annals of the Association of American Geographers |date=1989 |volume=79 |issue=2 |pages=165–191 |doi=10.2307/621272 |jstor=621272 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2563251 |access-date=9 June 2024|url-access=subscription }}</ref> In 1672, and again in 1681, Newton published a revised, corrected, and amended edition of the ''[[Geographia Generalis]]'', a geography textbook first published in 1650 by the then-deceased [[Bernhardus Varenius]].{{sfn|Westfall|1994|p=252}}<ref name="Baker1955">{{cite journal |last1=Baker |first1=J. N. L. |title=The Geography of Bernhard Varenius |journal=Transactions and Papers (Institute of British Geographers) |date=1955 |volume=21 |issue=21 |pages=51–60 |doi=10.2307/621272|jstor=621272 }}</ref> In the ''Geographia Generalis,'' Varenius attempted to create a theoretical foundation linking scientific principles to classical concepts in geography, and considered geography to be a mix between science and pure mathematics applied to quantifying features of the Earth.<ref name="Warntz1989" /><ref name="Schuchard2008">{{cite book |last1=Schuchard |first1=Margret |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CTewCQAAQBAJ&pg=228 |title=Bernhard Varenius (1622–1650) |date=2008 |publisher=Brill |isbn=978-90-04-16363-8 |editor1-last=Schuchard |editor1-first=Margret |pages=227–237 |chapter=Notes On Geographia Generalis And Its Introduction To England And North America |access-date=9 June 2024}}</ref> While it is unclear if Newton ever lectured in geography, the 1733 Dugdale and Shaw English translation of the book stated Newton published the book to be read by students while he lectured on the subject.<ref name="Warntz1989" /> The ''Geographia Generalis'' is viewed by some as the dividing line between ancient and modern traditions in the [[history of geography]], and Newton's involvement in the subsequent editions is thought to be a large part of the reason for this enduring legacy.<ref name="Mayhew2011">{{cite book |last1=Mayhew |first1=Robert J. |editor1-last=Agnew |editor1-first=John A. |editor2-last=Livingstone |editor2-first=David N. |title=The SAGE Handbook of Geographical Knowledge |date=2011 |publisher=SAGE Publications Inc. |isbn=978-1-4129-1081-1 |chapter=Geography's Genealogies}}</ref>

== Scientific studies ==
=== Mathematics ===
Newton's work has been said "to distinctly advance every branch of mathematics then studied".{{sfn|Ball|1908|p=319}} His work on [[calculus]], usually referred to as fluxions, began in 1664, and by 20 May 1665 as seen in a manuscript, Newton "had already developed the calculus to the point where he could compute the tangent and the curvature at any point of a continuous curve".<ref>{{cite book |last1=Press |first1=S. James |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aAJYCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA88 |title=The Subjectivity of Scientists and the Bayesian Approach |last2=Tanur |first2=Judith M. |date=2016 |publisher=Dover Publications, Inc |isbn=978-0-486-80284-8 |edition= |location= |page=88}}</ref> Another manuscript of October 1666, is now published among Newton's mathematical papers.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Newton |first1=Isaac |editor1-last=Whiteside |editor1-first=Derek Thomas |title=The Mathematical Papers of Isaac Newton Volume 1 from 1664 to 1666 |date=1967 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-05817-9 |page=400 |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/MathematicsIsaacNewtonVol1_1664-66Whiteside1967/MathematicsIsaacNewtonVol1_1664-66Whiteside1967_144x75/page/400/mode/1up |chapter=The October 1666 tract on fluxions}}</ref> He recorded a definitive tract of calculus in what is called his "Waste Book". Newton was self-taught in mathematics and did his research without help, as according to scholar [[Richard S. Westfall]], "By every indication we have, Newton carried out his education in mathematics and his program of research entirely on his own."<ref name=":25" /> His work ''[[De analysi per aequationes numero terminorum infinitas]]'', sent by [[Isaac Barrow]] to [[John Collins (mathematician)|John Collins]] in June 1669, was identified by Barrow in a letter sent to Collins that August as the work "of an extraordinary genius and proficiency in these things".{{sfn|Gjertsen|1986|p=149}} 

Newton later [[Leibniz–Newton calculus controversy|became involved in a dispute]] with the German polymath [[Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz]] over priority in the development of calculus. Both are now credited with independently developing calculus, though with very different [[mathematical notation]]s. However, it is established that Newton came to develop calculus much earlier than Leibniz.<ref name=":2">{{cite book |last=Newman |first=James Roy |url=https://archive.org/details/world1ofmathemati00newm/page/58 |title=The World of Mathematics: A Small Library of the Literature of Mathematics from Aʻh-mosé the Scribe to Albert Einstein |publisher=Simon and Schuster |year=1956 |page=58}}</ref><ref name=":28">{{Cite journal |last=Whitrow |first=G. J. |date=1989 |title=Newton's Role in the History of Mathematics |journal=Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London |volume=43 |issue=1 |pages=71–92 |doi=10.1098/rsnr.1989.0006 |jstor=531719 |issn=0035-9149}}</ref>{{sfn|Hall|1980|pp=1, 15, 21}} Despite this, the notation of Leibniz is recognised as the more convenient notation, being adopted by continental European mathematicians, and after 1820, by British mathematicians.<ref>{{cite book |author1=H. Jerome Keisler |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8NTCAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA903 |title=Elementary Calculus: An Infinitesimal Approach |publisher=Dover Publications |year=2013 |isbn=978-0-486-31046-6 |edition=3rd |page=903}}</ref>

The historian of science [[A. Rupert Hall]] notes that while Leibniz deserves credit for his independent formulation of calculus, Newton was undoubtedly the first to develop it, stating:{{sfn|Hall|1980|pp=15, 21}}{{blockquote|But all these matters are of little weight in comparison with the central truth, which has indeed long been universally recognized, that Newton was master of the essential techniques of the calculus by the end of 1666, almost exactly nine years before Leibniz . . . Newton's claim to have mastered the new infinitesimal calculus long before Leibniz, and even to have written — or at least made a good start upon — a publishable exposition of it as early as 1671, is certainly borne out by copious evidence, and though Leibniz and some of his friends sought to belittle Newton's case, the truth has not been seriously in doubt for the last 250 years.}}Hall further notes that in ''Principia'', Newton was able to "formulate and resolve problems by the integration of differential equations" and "in fact, he anticipated in his book many results that later exponents of the calculus regarded as their own novel achievements."{{sfn|Hall|1980|p=30}} Hall notes Newton's rapid development of calculus in comparison to his contemporaries, stating that Newton "well before 1690 . . . had reached roughly the point in the development of the calculus that Leibniz, the two Bernoullis, L'Hospital, Hermann and others had by joint efforts reached in print by the early 1700s".{{sfn|Hall|1980|p=136}}

Despite the convenience of Leibniz's notation, it has been noted that Newton's notation could also have developed multivariate techniques, with his dot notation still widely used in [[physics]]. Some academics have noted the richness and depth of Newton's work, such as the physicist [[Roger Penrose]], stating "in most cases Newton's geometrical methods are not only more concise and elegant, they reveal deeper principles than would become evident by the use of those formal methods of calculus that nowadays would seem more direct." The mathematician [[Vladimir Arnold]] stated that "Comparing the texts of Newton with the comments of his successors, it is striking how Newton's original presentation is more modern, more understandable and richer in ideas than the translation due to commentators of his geometrical ideas into the formal language of the calculus of Leibniz."<ref>{{cite book |last=Rowlands |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=u0NBDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA48 |title=Newton – Innovation And Controversy |publisher=[[World Scientific Publishing]] |year=2017 |isbn=978-1-78634-404-5 |pages=48–49}}</ref>

His work extensively uses calculus in geometric form based on limiting values of the ratios of vanishingly small quantities: in the ''Principia'' itself, Newton gave demonstration of this under the name of "the method of first and last ratios"<ref>Newton, ''Principia'', 1729 English translation, [https://books.google.com/books?id=Tm0FAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA41 p.&nbsp;41] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151003114205/https://books.google.com/books?id=Tm0FAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA41 |date=3 October 2015 }}.</ref> and explained why he put his expositions in this form,<ref>Newton, ''Principia'', 1729 English translation, [https://books.google.com/books?id=Tm0FAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA54 p.&nbsp;54] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160503022921/https://books.google.com/books?id=Tm0FAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA54 |date=3 May 2016 }}.</ref> remarking also that "hereby the same thing is performed as by the method of indivisibles."<ref name="Newton 1850">{{cite book |last=Newton |first=Sir Isaac |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=N-hHAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA506 |title=Newton's Principia: The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy |date=1850 |publisher=Geo. P. Putnam |pages=506–507 }}</ref> Because of this, the ''Principia'' has been called "a book dense with the theory and application of the infinitesimal calculus" in modern times<ref>{{cite book |last=Truesdell |first=Clifford |author-link=Clifford Truesdell |url=https://archive.org/details/essaysinhistoryo0000true/page/99 |title=Essays in the History of Mechanics |publisher=[[Springer-Verlag]] |year=1968 |page=99}}</ref> and in Newton's time "nearly all of it is of this calculus."<ref>In the preface to the Marquis de L'Hospital's ''Analyse des Infiniment Petits'' (Paris, 1696).</ref> His use of methods involving "one or more orders of the infinitesimally small" is present in his ''De motu corporum in gyrum'' of 1684<ref>Starting with [[De motu corporum in gyrum#Contents|De motu corporum in gyrum]], see also [https://books.google.com/books?id=uvMGAAAAcAAJ&pg=RA1-PA2 (Latin) Theorem 1] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160512135306/https://books.google.com/books?id=uvMGAAAAcAAJ&pg=RA1-PA2 |date=12 May 2016 }}.</ref> and in his papers on motion "during the two decades preceding 1684".<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Whiteside |first=D. T. |date=1970-08-01 |title=The Mathematical Principles Underlying Newton's Principia Mathematica |journal=Journal for the History of Astronomy |language=EN |volume=1 |issue=2 |pages=116–138 |doi=10.1177/002182867000100203 |bibcode=1970JHA.....1..116W |issn=0021-8286}}</ref>

It has been argued that Newton had an imprecise or limited understanding of [[Limit (mathematics)|limits]]. However, the mathematician Bruce Pourciau contends that in his ''Principia'', Newton actually demonstrated a more sophisticated understanding of limits than he is generally credited with, including being the first to present an epsilon argument.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Pourciau |first=Bruce |date=2001-02-01 |title=Newton and the Notion of Limit |url=https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0315086000923012 |journal=Historia Mathematica |volume=28 |issue=1 |pages=18–30 |doi=10.1006/hmat.2000.2301 |issn=0315-0860}}</ref>

[[File:Sir Isaac Newton by Sir Godfrey Kneller, Bt.jpg|thumb|upright=0.75|Newton in 1702 by [[Godfrey Kneller]]]]

Newton had been reluctant to publish his calculus because he feared controversy and criticism.{{sfn|Stewart|2009|p=107}} He was close to the Swiss mathematician [[Nicolas Fatio de Duillier]]. In 1691, Duillier started to write a new version of Newton's ''Principia'', and corresponded with Leibniz.{{sfn|Westfall|1980|pp=538–539}} In 1693, the relationship between Duillier and Newton deteriorated and the book was never completed.{{sfn|Westfall|1994|p=108}} Starting in 1699, Duillier accused Leibniz of plagiarism.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Palomo |first=Miguel |date=2 January 2021 |title=New insight into the origins of the calculus war |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00033790.2020.1794038 |journal=Annals of Science |volume=78 |issue=1 |pages=22–40 |doi=10.1080/00033790.2020.1794038 |pmid=32684104 |issn=0003-3790|url-access=subscription }}</ref> The mathematician [[John Keill]] accused Leibniz of plagiarism in 1708 in the [[Royal Society]] journal, thereby deteriorating the situation even more.{{sfn|Iliffe|Smith|2016|pp=|p=414}} The dispute then broke out in full force in 1711 when the Royal Society proclaimed in a study that it was Newton who was the true discoverer and labelled Leibniz a fraud; it was later found that Newton wrote the study's concluding remarks on Leibniz. Thus began the bitter controversy which marred the lives of both men until Leibniz's death in 1716.{{sfn|Ball|1908|p=356}}

Newton's first major mathematical discovery was the [[Binomial theorem#Newton's generalized binomial theorem|generalised binomial theorem]], valid for any exponent, in 1664-5,{{sfn|Iliffe|Smith|2016|pp=389–390}} which has been called "one of the most powerful and significant in the whole of mathematics."<ref name=":175">{{cite book |last=Rowlands |first=Peter |url= |title=Newton and the Great World System |date=2017 |publisher=[[World Scientific Publishing]] |isbn=978-1-78634-372-7 |pages=39–40 |doi=10.1142/q0108}}</ref> He discovered [[Newton's identities]] (probably without knowing of earlier work by [[Albert Girard]] in 1629), [[Newton's method]], the [[Newton polygon]], and classified [[cubic plane curve]]s ([[polynomials]] of degree three in two [[variable (mathematics)|variables]]). Newton is also a founder of the theory of [[Cremona transformation]]s,<ref name=":20">{{cite journal |last1=Bloye |first1=Nicole |last2=Huggett |first2=Stephen |year=2011 |title=Newton, the geometer |url=https://stephenhuggett.com/Newton.pdf |journal=Newsletter of the European Mathematical Society |issue=82 |pages=19–27 |mr=2896438 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230308041757/http://stephenhuggett.com/Newton.pdf |archive-date=8 March 2023 |access-date=19 February 2023}}</ref> and he made substantial contributions to the theory of [[finite differences]], with Newton regarded as "the single most significant contributor to finite difference [[interpolation]]", with many formulas created by Newton.<ref>{{cite book |last=Roy |first=Ranjan |author-link=Ranjan Roy |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KyYhEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA190 |title=Series and Products in the Development of Mathematics |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |year=2021 |isbn=978-1-108-70945-3 |edition=2nd |volume=I |location=Cambridge |pages=190–191 }}</ref> He was the first to state [[Bézout's theorem]], and was also the first to use fractional indices and to employ [[coordinate geometry]] to derive solutions to [[Diophantine equations]]. He approximated [[series (mathematics)|partial]] sums of the [[harmonic series (mathematics)|harmonic series]] by [[logarithms]] (a precursor to [[Euler's summation formula]]) and was the first to use [[power series]] with confidence and to revert power series.<ref name=":174">{{cite book |last=Rowlands |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ipA4DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA40 |title=Newton and the Great World System |date=2017 |publisher=[[World Scientific Publishing]] |isbn=978-1-78634-372-7 |pages=40–42 |doi=10.1142/q0108}}</ref> He introduced the [[Puiseux series|Puisseux series]].<ref name=":172">{{cite book |last=Rowlands |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ipA4DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA45 |title=Newton and the Great World System |year=2017 |publisher=[[World Scientific Publishing]] |isbn=978-1-78634-372-7 |page=45 |doi=10.1142/q0108}}</ref> He also provided the earliest explicit formulation of the general [[Taylor series]], which appeared in a 1691-1692 draft of his ''De Quadratura Curvarum''.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Edwards |first=C. Henry |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ilrlBwAAQBAJ&pg=PA289 |title=The Historical Development of the Calculus |date=1994 |publisher=Springer |isbn=978-0-387-94313-8 |series=Springer study edition |location= |page=289}}</ref><ref name=":1722">{{cite book |last=Rowlands |first=Peter |url= |title=Newton and the Great World System |publisher=[[World Scientific Publishing]] |year=2017 |isbn=978-1-78634-372-7 |page=40 |doi=10.1142/q0108}}</ref> He originated the [[Newton–Cotes formulas|Newton-Cotes formulas]] for [[numerical integration]].{{sfn|Iliffe|Smith|2016|pp=382–394, 411}} Newton's work on infinite series was inspired by [[Simon Stevin]]'s decimals.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Błaszczyk |first1=P. |last2=Katz |first2=M.&nbsp;G. |author-link2=Mikhail Katz |last3=Sherry |first3=D. |display-authors=1 |date=March 2013 |title=Ten misconceptions from the history of analysis and their debunking |journal=[[Foundations of Science]] |volume=18 |issue=1 |pages=43–74 |arxiv=1202.4153 |doi=10.1007/s10699-012-9285-8 |s2cid=119134151}}</ref> He also initiated the field of [[calculus of variations]], being the first to formulate and solve a problem in the field, that being [[Newton's minimal resistance problem]], which he posed and solved in 1685, later publishing it in ''Principia'' in 1687.<ref>{{cite book |last=Goldstine |first=Herman H. |author-link=Herman Goldstine |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_iTnBwAAQBAJ&pg=PA7 |title=A History of the Calculus of Variations from the 17th Through the 19th Century |date=1980 |publisher=Springer New York |isbn=978-1-4613-8106-8 |series= |location= |pages=7–21}}</ref><ref name=":31">{{Cite journal |last1=Barsuk |first1=Alexandr A. |last2=Paladi |first2=Florentin |date=2023 |title=On parametric representation of the Newton's aerodynamic problem |journal=Heliyon |language=en |volume=9 |issue=6 |article-number=e16721 |doi=10.1016/j.heliyon.2023.e16721 |doi-access=free |pmc=10248267 |pmid=37303526 |bibcode=2023Heliy...916721B }}</ref> It is regarded as one of the most difficult problems tackled by variational methods prior to the twentieth century.<ref name=":02">{{cite arXiv |last=Ferguson |first=James |title=A Brief Survey of the History of the Calculus of Variations and its Applications |date=2004 |eprint=math/0402357 }}</ref> He then used calculus of variations in his solving of the [[brachistochrone curve]] problem in 1697, which was posed by [[Johann Bernoulli]] in 1696, and which he famously solved in a night, thus pioneering the field with his work on the two problems.<ref name=":17">{{cite book |last=Rowlands |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ipA4DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA36 |title=Newton and the Great World System |date=2017 |publisher=[[World Scientific Publishing]] |isbn=978-1-78634-372-7 |pages=36–39 |doi=10.1142/q0108}}</ref> He was also a pioneer of [[vector calculus|vector analysis]], as he demonstrated how to apply the parallelogram law for adding various physical quantities and realised that these quantities could be broken down into components in any direction.<ref name=":173">{{cite book |last=Rowlands |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ipA4DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA26 |title=Newton and the Great World System |publisher=[[World Scientific Publishing]] |year=2017 |isbn=978-1-78634-372-7 |page=26, 82–83 |doi=10.1142/q0108}}</ref> He is credited with introducing the notion of the [[Vector (mathematics and physics)|vector]] in his ''Principia'', by proposing that physical quantities like velocity, acceleration, momentum, and force be treated as directed quantities, thereby making Newton the "true originator of this mathematical object".<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Bochner |first=Salomon |date=1963 |title=The Significance of Some Basic Mathematical Conceptions for Physics |journal=Isis |volume=54 |issue=2 |pages=179–205 |doi=10.1086/349700 |jstor=228537 |issn=0021-1753}}</ref> 

Newton was probably first to develop a system of [[Polar coordinate system|polar coordinates]] in a strictly analytic sense, with his work in relation to the topic being superior, in both generality and flexibility, to any other during his lifetime. His 1671 ''[[Method of Fluxions]]'' work preceded the earliest publication on the subject by [[Jacob Bernoulli]] in 1691. He is also credited as the originator of [[bipolar coordinates]] in a strict sense.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Boyer |first=C. B. |date=1949 |title=Newton as an Originator of Polar Coördinates |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2306162 |journal=The American Mathematical Monthly |volume=56 |issue=2 |pages=73–78 |doi=10.2307/2306162 |jstor=2306162 |issn=0002-9890|url-access=subscription }}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Boyer |first=Carl B. |author-link=Carl Benjamin Boyer |url=https://archive.org/details/historyofanalyti0000boye/page/142 |title=History of Analytic Geometry |publisher=[[Scripta Mathematica]] |year=1956 |pages=142–146}}</ref> 

A private manuscript of Newton's which dates to 1664–66 contains what is the earliest known problem in the field of [[geometric probability]]. The problem dealt with the likelihood of a negligible ball landing in one of two unequal sectors of a circle. In analysing this problem, he proposed substituting the enumeration of occurrences with their quantitative assessment, and replacing the estimation of an area's proportion with a tally of points, which has led to him being credited as founding [[stereology]].<ref>{{Cite conference |last1=Hykšová |first1=Magdalena |year= |title=GEOMETRIC PROBABILITY APPLICATIONS THROUGH HISTORICAL EXCURSION |url=https://bibnum.publimath.fr/ACF/ACF11021.pdf |conference=ESU-6}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Hykšová |first1=Magdalena |last2=Kalousová |first2=Anna |last3=Saxl |first3=Ivan |date=2012-03-15 |title=Early History of Geometric Probability and Stereology |url=https://www.ias-iss.org/ojs/IAS/article/view/901 |journal=Image Analysis & Stereology |volume=31 |issue=1 |page=1 |doi=10.5566/ias.v31.p1-16 |issn=1854-5165|doi-access=free }}</ref> 

Newton was responsible for the modern origin of [[Gaussian elimination]] in Europe. In 1669 to 1670, Newton wrote that all the algebra books known to him lacked a lesson for solving simultaneous equations, which he then supplied. His notes lay unpublished for decades, but once released, his textbook became the most influential of its kind, establishing the method of substitution and the key terminology of 'extermination' (now known as elimination).<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Grcar |first=Joseph F. |date=2011-05-01 |title=How ordinary elimination became Gaussian elimination |url=https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0315086010000376 |journal=Historia Mathematica |volume=38 |issue=2 |pages=163–218 |doi=10.1016/j.hm.2010.06.003 |arxiv=0907.2397 |issn=0315-0860}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Grcar |first=Joseph F. |date=2011 |title=Mathematicians of Gaussian Elimination |url=https://www.ams.org/notices/201106/rtx110600782p.pdf |journal=Notices of the American Mathematical Society |volume=58 |issue=6 |pages=782–792}}</ref>

In the 1660s and 1670s, Newton found 72 of the 78 "species" of cubic curves and categorised them into four types, systemising his results in later publications. However, a 1690s manuscript later analysed showed that Newton had identified all 78 cubic curves, but chose not to publish the remaining six for unknown reasons.<ref name=":28" /><ref name=":20" />{{sfn|Iliffe|Smith|2016|pp=382–394, 411}} In 1717, and probably with Newton's help, [[James Stirling (mathematician)|James Stirling]] proved that every cubic was one of these four types. He claimed that the four types could be obtained by [[Projective plane|plane projection]] from one of them, and this was proved in 1731, four years after his death.<ref>{{cite book |last=Bix |first=Robert |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nlsyqix3FWcC&pg=129 |title=Conics and Cubics: A Concrete Introduction to Algebraic Curves |date=2006 |publisher=Springer |isbn=978-0-387-31802-8 |edition=2nd |series= |location= |page=129}}</ref>

Newton briefly dabbled in [[probability]]. In letters with [[Samuel Pepys]] in 1693, they corresponded over the [[Newton–Pepys problem]], which was a problem about the probability of throwing sixes from a certain number of dice. For it, outcome A was that six dice are tossed with at least one six appearing, outcome B that twelve dice are tossed with at least two sixes appearing, and outcome C in which eighteen dice are tossed with at least three sixes appearing. Newton solved it correctly, choosing outcome A, Pepys incorrectly chose the wrong outcome of C. However, Newton's intuitive explanation for the problem was flawed.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Stigler |first=Stephen M. |author-link=Stephen Stigler |date=2006-08-01 |title=Isaac Newton as a Probabilist |url=https://projecteuclid.org/journals/statistical-science/volume-21/issue-3/Isaac-Newton-as-a-Probabilist/10.1214/088342306000000312.full |journal=Statistical Science |volume=21 |issue=3 |doi=10.1214/088342306000000312 |issn=0883-4237|arxiv=math/0701089 }}</ref>

=== Optics ===
[[File:Newton telescope replica 1668.jpg|thumb|A replica of the reflecting telescope Newton presented to the [[Royal Society]] in 1672 (the first one he made in 1668 was loaned to an instrument maker but there is no further record of what happened to it).<ref>{{cite book |last=King |first=Henry |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KAWwzHlDVksC&pg=PA74 |title=The History of the Telescope |publisher=Charles Griffin & Co. |year=1955|page=74}} Reprinted, Dover Publications, 1979 & 2003, {{isbn|978-0-486-43265-6}}</ref>]]

In 1666, Newton observed that the spectrum of colours exiting a [[Triangular prism (optics)|prism]] in the position of [[minimum deviation]] is oblong, even when the light ray entering the prism is circular, which is to say, the prism refracts different colours by different angles.<ref>{{cite book |last=Whittaker |first=E. T. |author-link=E. T. Whittaker |url=https://archive.org/details/historyoftheorie00whitrich/page/15 |title=A History of the Theories of Aether and Electricity: From the Age of Descartes to the Close of the Nineteenth Century |publisher=Longmans, Green, and Co. |year=1910 |pages=15–16}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Darrigol |first=Olivier |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Ye_1AAAAQBAJ&pg=PAPA81 |title=A History of Optics from Greek Antiquity to the Nineteenth Century |date=2012 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-964437-7 |page=81 }}</ref> This led him to conclude that colour is a property intrinsic to light – a point which had, until then, been a matter of debate.

From 1670 to 1672, Newton lectured on optics.<ref>{{cite web |last=Newton |first=Isaac |title=Hydrostatics, Optics, Sound and Heat |url=http://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-ADD-03970/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120108215515/http://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-ADD-03970/ |archive-date=8 January 2012 |access-date=10 January 2012 |publisher=Cambridge University Digital Library}}</ref> During this period he investigated the [[refraction]] of light, demonstrating that the multicoloured image produced by a prism, which he named a [[spectrum]], could be recomposed into white light by a [[lens (optics)|lens]] and a second prism.{{sfn|Ball|1908|p=324}} Modern scholarship has revealed that Newton's analysis and resynthesis of white light owes a debt to [[Corpuscularianism|corpuscular]] alchemy.<ref>[[William R. Newman]], "Newton's Early Optical Theory and its Debt to Chymistry", in Danielle Jacquart and Michel Hochmann, eds., ''Lumière et vision dans les sciences et dans les arts'' (Geneva: Droz, 2010), pp.&nbsp;283–307. {{cite web |url=https://webapp1.dlib.indiana.edu/newton/html/Newton_optics-alchemy_Jacquart_paper.pdf |title=Archived copy - Newton's Early Optical Theory and its Debt to Chymistry |access-date=1 June 2012 |archive-date=28 May 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160528020600/http://webapp1.dlib.indiana.edu/newton/html/Newton_optics-alchemy_Jacquart_paper.pdf |url-status=live }} (PDF)</ref>

In his work on [[Newton's rings]] in 1671, he used a method that was unprecedented in the 17th century, as "he ''averaged'' all of the differences, and he then calculated the difference between the average and the value for the first ring", in effect introducing a now [[Least squares#Founding|standard method]] for reducing noise in measurements, and which does not appear elsewhere at the time.<ref>{{cite web |last=Drum |first=Kevin |date=10 May 2013 |title=The Groundbreaking Isaac Newton Invention You've Never Heard Of |url=https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2013/05/groundbreaking-isaac-newton-invention-youve-never-heard/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20250123213256/https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2013/05/groundbreaking-isaac-newton-invention-youve-never-heard/ |archive-date=2025-01-23 |access-date=21 December 2024 |website=Mother Jones}}</ref> He extended his "error-slaying method" to studies of equinoxes in 1700, which was described as an "altogether unprecedented method" but differed in that here "Newton required good values for each of the original equinoctial times, and so he devised a method that allowed them to, as it were, self-correct."<ref name=":11">{{cite book |last1=Buchwald |first1=Jed Z. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QdT7xGlZvPUC&pg=PA103 |title=Newton and the Origin of Civilization |last2=Feingold |first2=Mordechai |date=2013 |publisher=[[Princeton University Press]] |isbn=978-0-691-15478-7 |location= |pages=90–93, 101–103}}</ref> Newton "invented a certain technique known today as ''[[linear regression]] analysis''",<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Belenkiy |first=Ari |last2=Vila Echagüe |first2=Eduardo |date=2005-09-22 |title=History of one defeat: reform of the Julian calendar as envisaged by Isaac Newton |url=https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsnr.2005.0096 |journal=Notes and Records of the Royal Society |language=en |volume=59 |issue=3 |pages=223–254 |doi=10.1098/rsnr.2005.0096 |issn=0035-9149}}</ref> as he wrote the first of the two 'normal equations' known from [[ordinary least squares]], averaged a set of data, 50 years before [[Tobias Mayer]], the person originally thought to be the oldest to do so, and he also summed the residuals to zero, forcing the regression line through the average point. He differentiated between two uneven sets of data and may have considered an optimal solution regarding bias, although not in terms of effectiveness.<ref name=":18">{{cite journal |last1=Belenkiy |first1=A. |last2=Echague |first2=E. V. |date=1 February 2016 |title=Groping toward linear regression analysis: Newton's analysis of Hipparchus' equinox observations |url=https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2016Obs...136....1B/abstract |journal=The Observatory |volume=136 |pages=1–22 |bibcode=2016Obs...136....1B |issn=0029-7704}}</ref>

He showed that coloured light does not change its properties by separating out a coloured beam and shining it on various objects, and that regardless of whether reflected, scattered, or transmitted, the light remains the same colour. Thus, he observed that colour is the result of objects interacting with already-coloured light rather than objects generating the colour themselves. This is known as [[Early life of Isaac Newton#Newton's theory of colour|Newton's theory of colour]].{{sfn|Ball|1908|p=325}} His 1672 paper on the nature of white light and colours forms the basis for all work that followed on colour and colour vision.<ref>{{cite book |last=Marriott |first=F.H.C. |chapter=Colour Vision: Introduction |year=1962 |title=The Visual Process |pages=219–229  |publisher=Academic Press |doi=10.1016/b978-1-4832-3089-4.50021-2}}</ref>

[[File:Dispersive Prism Illustration.jpg|thumb|Illustration of a [[dispersive prism]] separating white light into the colours of the spectrum, as discovered by Newton]]

From this work, he concluded that the lens of any [[refracting telescope]] would suffer from the [[dispersion (optics)|dispersion]] of light into colours ([[chromatic aberration]]). As a proof of the concept, he constructed a telescope using reflective mirrors instead of lenses as the [[objective (optics)|objective]] to bypass that problem. Building the design, the first known functional reflecting telescope, today known as a [[Newtonian telescope]], involved solving the problem of a suitable mirror material and shaping technique.<ref name="White 1997, p170" /> Previous designs for the reflecting telescope were never put into practice or ended in failure, thereby making Newton's telescope the first one truly created.<ref name=":03">{{cite book |last=King |first=Henry C. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KAWwzHlDVksC&pg=PA71 |title=The History of the Telescope |publisher=Richard Griffin & Co |year=1955 |pages=68–72}} {{ isbn|978-0-486-43265-6 }}.</ref> Newton grounded his own mirrors out of a custom composition of highly reflective [[speculum metal]], using Newton's rings to judge the [[quality (philosophy)|quality]] of the optics for his telescopes. In late 1668, he was able to produce this first reflecting telescope.<ref>{{cite book |last=Hall |first=Alfred Rupert |author-link=Alfred Rupert Hall |url=https://archive.org/details/isaacnewtonadven0000hall/page/67 |title=Isaac Newton: Adventurer in thought |date=1996 |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |isbn=978-0-521-56221-8 |series= |location= |page=67}}</ref> It was about eight inches long and it gave a clearer and larger image. In 1671, he was asked for a demonstration of his reflecting telescope by the Royal Society.{{sfn|White|1997|p=168}} Their interest encouraged him to publish his notes, ''Of Colours'',<ref>{{cite web |last=Newton |first=Isaac |title=Of Colours |url=http://www.newtonproject.sussex.ac.uk/view/texts/normalized/NATP00004 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141009051407/http://www.newtonproject.sussex.ac.uk/view/texts/normalized/NATP00004 |archive-date=9 October 2014 |access-date=6 October 2014 |website=The [[Newton Project]]}}</ref> which he later expanded into the work ''[[Opticks]]''. When [[Robert Hooke]] criticised some of Newton's ideas, Newton was so offended that he withdrew from public debate. However, the two had brief exchanges in 1679–80, when Hooke, who had been appointed Secretary of the Royal Society,<ref>{{cite book |last=Inwood |first=Stephen |url=https://archive.org/details/forgottengeniusb00inwo/page/246 |title=The Forgotten Genius |publisher=MacAdam/Cage Pub. |year=2003 |isbn=978-1-931561-56-3 |location=San Francisco |pages=246–247 |oclc=53006741}}</ref> opened a correspondence intended to elicit contributions from Newton to Royal Society transactions,<ref name="hooke1679nov24" /> which had the effect of stimulating Newton to work out a proof that the elliptical form of planetary orbits would result from a centripetal force inversely proportional to the square of the radius vector.<ref>{{cite web |date=5 March 2025 |title=Isaac Newton |url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Isaac-Newton/The-Principia |access-date=15 March 2025 |website=www.britannica.com }}</ref>

In astronomy, Newton is further credited with the realization that [[List of highest astronomical observatories#History of high altitude astronomical observatories|high-altitude sites]] are superior for observation because they provide the "most serene and quiet Air" above the dense, turbulent atmosphere ("grosser Clouds"), thereby reducing star [[twinkling]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=McLean |first=Ian S. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LXH2UavpcakC&pg=PA41 |title=Electronic Imaging in Astronomy: Detectors and Instrumentation |date=2008 |publisher=Springer |isbn=978-3-540-76582-0 |edition=2nd |location= |page=41}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Smith |first=Graeme H. |date=2021-06-10 |title=The Distribution of Ground-based Reflecting Telescopes with Respect to Altitude |journal=Research Notes of the AAS |volume=5 |issue=6 |page=140 |doi=10.3847/2515-5172/ac097e |bibcode=2021RNAAS...5..140S |doi-access=free |issn=2515-5172}}</ref>

[[File:Newton-letter-to-briggs 03.jpg|thumb|upright|Facsimile of a 1682 letter from Newton to [[William Briggs (physician)|William Briggs]], commenting on Briggs' ''A New Theory of Vision'']]

Newton argued that light is composed of particles or corpuscles, which were refracted by accelerating into a denser medium. He verged on soundlike waves to explain the repeated pattern of reflection and transmission by thin films (''Opticks'' Bk. II, Props. 12), but still retained his theory of 'fits' that disposed corpuscles to be reflected or transmitted (Props.13). Physicists later favoured a purely wavelike explanation of light to account for the [[interference (wave propagation)|interference]] patterns and the general phenomenon of [[diffraction]]. Despite his known preference of a particle theory, Newton in fact noted that light had both particle-like and wave-like properties in ''Opticks'', and was the first to attempt to reconcile the two theories, thereby anticipating later developments of [[Wave–particle duality|wave-particle duality]], which is the modern understanding of light.<ref name=":22">{{cite book |last=Finkelstein |first=David Ritz |author-link=David Finkelstein |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OvjsCAAAQBAJ&pg=PA156 |title=Quantum Relativity |date=1996 |publisher=Springer Berlin Heidelberg |isbn=978-3-642-64612-6 |location= |pages=156, 169–170 |doi=10.1007/978-3-642-60936-7}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Bacciagaluppi |first1=Guido |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EAPX3JfQAgIC&pg=PA31 |title=Quantum Theory at the Crossroads: Reconsidering the 1927 Solvay Conference |last2=Valentini |first2=Antony |author-link2=Antony Valentini |date=2009 |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |isbn=978-0-521-81421-8 |location= |pages=31–32 |oclc=227191829}}</ref> The physicist [[David Finkelstein]] called him "the first quantum physicist" as a result.<ref name=":22" />

In his ''Hypothesis of Light'' of 1675, Newton posited the existence of the [[luminiferous aether|ether]] to transmit forces between particles. The contact with the [[Cambridge Platonists|Cambridge Platonist]] philosopher [[Henry More]] revived his interest in alchemy.<ref name="More" /> He replaced the ether with occult forces based on [[Hermeticism|Hermetic]] ideas of attraction and repulsion between particles. His contributions to science cannot be isolated from his interest in alchemy.<ref name="More" /> This was at a time when there was no clear distinction between alchemy and science.<ref>{{cite book |author1=Allison B. Kaufman |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZLT4DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA9 |title=Pseudoscience: The Conspiracy Against Science |author2=James C. Kaufman |publisher=MIT Press |year=2019 |isbn=978-0-262-53704-9 |edition= |page=9}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author1=Márcia Lemos |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6xNUDgAAQBAJ&pg=PA83 |title=Exchanges between Literature and Science from the 1800s to the 2000s: Converging Realms |publisher=Cambridge Scholars Publishing |year=2017 |isbn=978-1-4438-7605-6 |edition= |page=83}}</ref>

Newton contributed to the study of [[Astigmatism (optical systems)|astigmatism]] by helping to erect its mathematical foundation through his discovery that when oblique pencils of light undergo refraction, two distinct image points are created.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Shapiro |first=Alan E. |title=Before Newton: The Life and Times of Isaac Barrow |date=1990 |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |isbn=978-0-521-30694-2 |editor-last=Feingold |editor-first=Mordechai |location= |page=136 |chapter=The ''Optical Lectures'' and the foundations of the theory of optical imagery |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jR1rxaob2PUC&pg=PA136}}</ref> This would later stimulate the work of [[Thomas Young (scientist)|Thomas Young]].<ref name=":1742">{{cite book |last=Rowlands |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ipA4DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA34 |title=Newton and the Great World System |date=2017 |publisher=[[World Scientific Publishing]] |isbn=978-1-78634-372-7 |page=34 |doi=10.1142/q0108}}</ref>

In 1704, Newton published ''Opticks'', in which he expounded his corpuscular theory of light, and included a set of queries at the end, which were posed as unanswered questions and positive assertions. In line with his corpuscle theory, he thought that normal matter was made of grosser corpuscles and speculated that through a kind of alchemical transmutation, with query 30 stating "Are not gross Bodies and Light convertible into one another, and may not Bodies receive much of their Activity from the Particles of Light which enter their Composition?"<ref name="Newton's Alchemy and His Theory of Matter" /> Query 6 introduced the concept of a [[black body]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Bochner |first=Salomon |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=naH_AwAAQBAJ&pg=PA221 |title=Role of Mathematics in the Rise of Science |date=1981 |publisher=[[Princeton University Press]] |isbn=978-0-691-08028-4 |edition= |location= |pages=221, 347 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Rowlands |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=u0NBDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA69 |title=Newton – Innovation And Controversy |publisher=[[World Scientific Publishing]] |year=2017 |isbn=978-1-78634-404-5 |page=69}}</ref>

In 1699, Newton presented an improved version of his [[Octant (instrument)#Newton's reflecting quadrant|reflecting quadrant]], or octant, that he had previously designed to the Royal Society.<ref name="egrtaylor">{{cite book |last=Taylor |first=E. G. R. |author-link=Eva Germaine Rimington Taylor |url=https://collections.mun.ca/digital/collection/cns/id/177818 |title=The Haven-finding Art: A History of Navigation from Odysseus to Captain Cook |date=1971 |publisher=Hollis & Carter |isbn=0-370-01347-6 |location=London |pages=252, 257}}</ref> His design was probably built as early as 1677.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Williams |first=J. E. D. |url=https://archive.org/details/fromsailstosatel0000will_l9t2/page/97 |title=From Sails to Satellites: The Origin and Development of Navigational Science |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=1994 |isbn=0-19-856387-6 |page=97}}</ref> It is notable for being the first quadrant to use two mirrors, which greatly improved the accuracy of measurements since it provided a stable view of both the horizon and the celestial body at the same time. His quadrant was built but appears to have not survived to the present. [[John Hadley]] would later construct his own double-reflecting quadrant that was nearly identical to the one invented by Newton. However, Hadley likely did not know of Newton's original invention, causing confusion regarding originality.<ref name=":04">{{Cite book |last=Mörzer Bruyns |first=W. F. J. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LNgVDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA23 |title=Sextants at Greenwich: A Catalogue of the Mariner's Quadrants, Mariner's Astrolabes, Cross-staffs, Backstaffs, Octants, Sextants, Quintants, Reflecting Circles and Artificial Horizons in the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich |date=2009 |publisher=Oxford University Press; National Maritime Museum |isbn=978-0-19-953254-4 |location= |pages=23–25}}</ref>

In 1704, Newton constructed and presented a [[Burning glass|burning mirror]] to the Royal Society. It consisted of seven concave glass mirrors, each about one foot in diameter. It is estimated that it reached a maximum possible radiant energy of 460 W cm⁻², which has been described as "certainly brighter thermally than a thousand Suns (1,000 × 0.065 W cm⁻²)" based on estimating that the intensity of the [[Sun]]'s radiation in London in May of 1704 was 0.065 W cm⁻².<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Simms |first1=D. L. |last2=Hinkley |first2=P. L. |date=1989 |title=Brighter than How Many Suns? Sir Isaac Newton's Burning Mirror |journal=Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London |volume=43 |issue=1 |pages=31–51 |doi=10.1098/rsnr.1989.0003 |jstor=531716 |issn=0035-9149}}</ref> As a result of the maximum radiant intensity possibly achieved with his mirror he "may have produced the greatest intensity of radiation brought about by human agency before the arrival of [[nuclear weapon]]s in 1945."<ref>{{cite book |last=Rowlands |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=u0NBDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA57 |title=Newton – Innovation And Controversy |publisher=[[World Scientific Publishing]] |year=2017 |isbn=978-1-78634-404-5 |page=57}}</ref> [[David Gregory (mathematician)|David Gregory]] reported that it caused metals to smoke, boiled [[gold]] and brought about the [[vitrification]] of [[slate]]. [[William Derham]] thought it be to the most powerful burning mirror in Europe at the time.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Simms |first1=D. L. |last2=Hinkley |first2=P. L. |date=2001 |title=David Gregory on Newton's Burning Mirror |journal=Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London |volume=55 |issue=2 |pages=185–190 |doi=10.1098/rsnr.2001.0137 |jstor=532094 |issn=0035-9149}}</ref>

Newton also made early studies into electricity, as he constructed a primitive form of a frictional [[electrostatic generator]] using a [[glass]] globe,<ref>Opticks, 2nd Ed 1706. Query 8.</ref> the first to do so with glass instead of [[sulfur]], which had previously been used by scientists such as [[Otto von Guericke]] to construct their globes.<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=H-ZRGUWrF7oC&pg=PA141 |title=Encyclopaedia Britannica: A New Survey of Universal Knowledge |year=1929 |edition=14th |volume=VIII |page=141}}</ref> He detailed an experiment in 1675 that showed when one side of a glass sheet is rubbed to create an electric charge, it attracts "light bodies" to the opposite side. He interpreted this as evidence that electric forces could pass through glass.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Sanford |first=Fernando |year=1921 |title=Some Early Theories Regarding Electrical Forces – The Electric Emanation Theory |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/6312 |journal=The Scientific Monthly |volume=12 |issue=6 |pages=544–550 |bibcode=1921SciMo..12..544S |issn=0096-3771}}</ref> Newton also reported to the Royal Society that glass was effective for generating static electricity, classifying it as a "good electric" decades before this property was widely known.<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hKXaDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA172 |title=The Oxford Handbook of History and Material Culture |date=2020 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-934176-4 |editor-last=Gaskell |editor-first=Ivan |location=New York, NY |page=172 |editor-last2=Carter |editor-first2=Sarah Anne}}</ref> His idea in ''Opticks'' that optical [[Reflection (physics)|reflection]] and [[refraction]] arise from interactions across the entire surface is seen as a precursor to the field theory of the electric force.<ref name=":16" /> He also recognised the crucial role of electricity in nature, believing it to be responsible for various phenomena, including the emission, reflection, refraction, inflection, and heating effects of light. He proposed that electricity was involved in the sensations experienced by the human body, affecting everything from muscle movement to brain function.<ref>{{cite book |last=Home |first=R. W. |title=Contemporary Newtonian Research |date=1982 |publisher=Springer Netherlands |isbn=978-94-009-7715-0 |editor-last=Bechler |editor-first=Zev |series= |location= |page=191 |chapter=Newton on Electricity and the Aether}}</ref> His theory of nervous transmission had an immense influence on the work of [[Luigi Galvani]], as Newton's theory focused on electricity as a possible mediator of nervous transmission, which went against the prevailing Cartesian hydraulic theory of the time. He was also the first to present a clear and balanced theory for how both electrical and chemical mechanisms could work together in the nervous system.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Wallace |first=Wes |date=2003 |title=The vibrating nerve impulse in Newton, Willis and Gassendi: First steps in a mechanical theory of communication |url=https://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0278262602005134 |journal=Brain and Cognition |volume=51 |issue=1 |pages=66–94 |doi=10.1016/S0278-2626(02)00513-4|pmid=12633590 |url-access=subscription }}</ref> Newton's mass-dispersion model, ancestral to the successful use of the [[Action principles|least action principle]], provided a credible framework for understanding refraction, particularly in its approach to refraction in terms of momentum.<ref name=":16">{{cite book |last=Rowlands |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=u0NBDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA109 |title=Newton – Innovation And Controversy |publisher=[[World Scientific Publishing]] |year=2017 |isbn=978-1-78634-404-5 |page=109}}</ref>

In ''Opticks'', he was the first to show a diagram using a prism as a beam expander, and also the use of multiple-prism arrays. Some 278 years after Newton's discussion, [[beam expander#Multiple-prism beam expanders|multiple-prism beam expanders]] became central to the development of [[laser linewidth|narrow-linewidth]] [[tunable laser]]s. The use of these prismatic beam expanders led to the [[multiple-prism dispersion theory]].<ref name=OPN1 />

Newton was also the first to propose the [[Goos–Hänchen effect]], an [[optical phenomenon]] in which [[Linear polarization|linearly polarised]] light undergoes a small lateral shift when [[Total internal reflection|totally internally reflected]]. He provided both experimental and theoretical explanations for the effect using a mechanical model.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Ul Haq |first1=Iqra Zia |last2=Syed |first2=Aqeel A. |last3=Naqvi |first3=Qaisar Abbas |date=2020 |title=Observing the Goos–Hänchen shift in non-integer dimensional medium |url=https://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0030402619319709 |journal=Optik |volume=206 |article-number=164071 |doi=10.1016/j.ijleo.2019.164071|bibcode=2020Optik.20664071U |url-access=subscription }}</ref>

Science came to realise the difference between perception of colour and mathematisable optics. The German poet and scientist [[Johann Wolfgang von Goethe]] could not shake the Newtonian foundation but "one hole Goethe did find in Newton's armour,&nbsp;... Newton had committed himself to the doctrine that refraction without colour was impossible. He, therefore, thought that the object-glasses of telescopes must forever remain imperfect, achromatism and refraction being incompatible. This inference was proved by [[John Dollond|Dollond]] to be wrong."<ref>Tyndall, John. (1880). ''Popular Science Monthly'' Volume 17, July. [[s:Popular Science Monthly/Volume 17/July 1880/Goethe's Farbenlehre: Theory of Colors II]]</ref>
[[File:Portrait of Sir Isaac Newton (4670220).jpg|thumb|upright|Engraving of ''Portrait of Newton'' by [[John Vanderbank]]]]

=== ''Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica'' ===
[[File:NewtonsPrincipia.jpg|thumb|upright=1.25|Newton's own copy of ''[[Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica|Principia]]'' with Newton's hand-written corrections for the second edition, now housed in the [[Wren Library]] at [[Trinity College, Cambridge]]]]

Newton had been developing his theory of gravitation as far back as 1665.<ref name=":4">{{cite book |last=Struik |first=Dirk J. |author-link=Dirk Jan Struik |url=https://archive.org/details/concisehistoryof02stru/page/151 |title=A Concise History of Mathematics |publisher=Dover Publications |year=1948 |pages=151, 154}}</ref> In 1679, he returned to his work on [[celestial mechanics]] by considering gravitation and its effect on the orbits of [[planet]]s with reference to [[Kepler's laws]] of planetary motion. Newton's reawakening interest in astronomical matters received further stimulus by the appearance of a comet in the winter of 1680–1681, on which he corresponded with [[John Flamsteed]].{{sfn|Westfall|1980|pp=391–392}} After the exchanges with Hooke, Newton worked out a proof that the elliptical form of planetary orbits would result from a centripetal force inversely proportional to the square of the radius vector. He shared his results with [[Edmond Halley]] and the Royal Society in {{lang|la|[[De motu corporum in gyrum]]}}, a tract written on about nine sheets which was copied into the Royal Society's Register Book in December 1684.<ref>Whiteside, D. T., ed. (1974). ''Mathematical Papers of Isaac Newton, 1684–1691''. '''6'''. Cambridge University Press. p.&nbsp;30.</ref> As part of this work, Newton also coined the term [[centripetal force]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Brackenridge |first=John Bruce |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ovOTK7X_mMkC&pg=PA74 |title=The Key to Newton's Dynamics: The Kepler Problem and the Principia |date=1996 |publisher=University of California Press |isbn=978-0-520-91685-2 |location= |page=74}}</ref> This tract contained the nucleus that Newton developed and expanded to form the ''Principia''.

The {{lang|la|[[Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica|Principia]]}} was published on 5 July 1687 with encouragement and financial help from Halley. In this work, Newton stated the [[Newton's laws of motion|three universal laws of motion]]. Together, these laws describe the relationship between any object, the forces acting upon it and the resulting motion, laying the foundation for [[classical mechanics]].<ref name=":32" /> They contributed to numerous advances during the [[Industrial Revolution]] and were not improved upon for more than 200 years. Many of these advances still underpin non-relativistic technologies today. Newton used the Latin word ''gravitas'' (weight) for the effect that would become known as [[gravity]], and defined the law of [[Newton's law of universal gravitation|universal gravitation]].<ref name="Schmitz2018">{{cite book |last=Schmitz |first=Kenneth&nbsp;S. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4WGdBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA251 |title=Physical Chemistry: Multidisciplinary Applications in Society |publisher=Elsevier |year=2018 |isbn=978-0-12-800599-6 |location=Amsterdam |page=251 |access-date=1 March 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200310132426/https://books.google.com/books?id=4WGdBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA251 |archive-date=10 March 2020 |url-status=live}}</ref> His work achieved the [[Unification of theories in physics#Unification of gravity on Earth with astronomical behaviors|first great unification in physics]].<ref name=":15" /> He solved the [[two-body problem]], and introduced the [[three-body problem]].<ref name=":14">{{cite book |last1=Musielak |first1=Zdzislaw |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=D90tDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA3 |title=Three Body Dynamics and Its Applications to Exoplanets |last2=Quarles |first2=Billy |date=2017 |publisher=Springer International Publishing |isbn=978-3-319-58225-2 |series= |location= |page=3 |bibcode=2017tbdi.book.....M |doi=10.1007/978-3-319-58226-9}}</ref>

In the same work, Newton presented a calculus-like method of geometrical analysis using 'first and last ratios', gave the first analytical determination (based on [[Boyle's law]]) of the speed of sound in air, inferred the oblateness of Earth's spheroidal figure, accounted for the precession of the equinoxes as a result of the Moon's gravitational attraction on the Earth's oblateness, initiated the gravitational study of the [[Lunar theory#Newton|irregularities in the motion of the Moon]], provided a theory for the determination of the orbits of comets, and much more.<ref name="Schmitz2018" /> Newton's biographer [[David Brewster]] reported that the complexity of applying his theory of gravity to the motion of the moon was so great it affected Newton's health: "[H]e was deprived of his appetite and sleep" during his work on the problem in 1692–93, and told the astronomer [[John Machin]] that "his head never ached but when he was studying the subject". According to Brewster, Halley also told [[John Conduitt]] that when pressed to complete his analysis Newton "always replied that it made his head ache, and ''kept him awake so often, that he would think of it no more''". [Emphasis in original]<ref>{{cite book |last=Brewster |first=David |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=acBV7QHgMIAC&pg=108 |title=Memoirs of the Life, Writings, and Discoveries of Sir Isaac Newton |publisher=Edmonston and Douglas |year=1860 |page=108}}</ref> He provided the first calculation of the [[age of Earth]] by experiment,<ref name=":19">{{cite journal |last=Simms |first=D. L. |date=2004 |title=Newton's Contribution to the Science of Heat |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00033790210123810 |journal=Annals of Science |volume=61 |issue=1 |pages=33–77 |doi=10.1080/00033790210123810 |issn=0003-3790|url-access=subscription }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Pask |first=Colin |author-link=Colin Pask |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lRhnAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA457 |title=Magnificent Principia: Exploring Isaac Newton's Masterpiece |publisher=Prometheus Books |year=2013 |isbn=978-1-61614-745-7 |page=457}}</ref> and also described a precursor to the modern [[wind tunnel]].<ref name=":21">{{cite book |last=Rowlands |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=u0NBDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA152 |title=Newton – Innovation And Controversy |publisher=[[World Scientific Publishing]] |year=2017 |isbn=978-1-78634-404-5 |pages=152–153}}</ref>

Through Book II of the ''Principia'', Newton was an important pioneer of [[fluid mechanics]], and later analysis has shown that of its 53 propositions almost all are correct, with only two or three open to question.<ref name=":30">{{cite book |last=Rowlands |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=u0NBDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA48 |title=Newton – Innovation And Controversy |publisher=[[World Scientific Publishing]] |year=2017 |isbn=978-1-78634-404-5 |pages=140–159}}</ref> Propositions 1–18 of the book are the first comprehensive treatment of motion under resistance proportional to velocity or its square, leading scholar [[Richard S. Westfall]] to remark that 'almost without precedent, Newton created the scientific treatment of motion under conditions of resistance, that is, of motion as it is found in the world'.<ref name=":30" /> Proposition 15 showed that under an atmosphere whose density falls inversely with distance, a circular-orbiting body subject to drag will trace an equiangular spiral—a result later independently derived by Morduchow and Volpe (1973).<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=King-Hele |first1=D.G. |last2=Walker |first2=D.M.C. |date=1987 |title=The effect of air drag on satellite orbits: Advances in 1687 and 1987 |url=https://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/0083665687900067 |journal=Vistas in Astronomy |language=en |volume=30 |issue=3 |pages=269–289 |doi=10.1016/0083-6656(87)90006-7 |bibcode=1987VA.....30..269K }}</ref> In Section IX of Book II, he  formulated the [[Newtonian fluid#Newton's law of viscosity|linear relation]] between viscous resistance and velocity gradient that now defines a [[Newtonian fluid]], despite his experiments giving little direct insight into viscosity.<ref name=":162" /><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Hamilton |first1=George |last2=Disharoon |first2=Zachary |last3=Sanabria |first3=Hugo |date=July–December 2018 |title=Revisiting viscosity from the macroscopic to nanoscale regimes |url=https://www.scielo.org.mx/scielo.php?pid=S1870-35422018000200222&script=sci_arttext&tlng=en |journal=Revista mexicana de física E |volume=64 |issue=2 |pages=222–231 |arxiv=1804.04028 |doi=10.31349/RevMexFisE.64.222}}</ref> Newton also discussed the circular motion of fluids and was the first to analyze [[Couette flow]], initially in Proposition 51 for a single rotating cylinder and extended in Corollary 2 to the flow between two concentric cylinders.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Donnelly |first=Russell J. |date=1 November 1991 |title=Taylor-Couette Flow: The Early Days |url=https://pubs.aip.org/physicstoday/article/44/11/32/406407/Taylor-Couette-Flow-The-Early-DaysFluid-caught |journal=Physics Today |volume=44 |issue=11 |pages=32–39 |bibcode=1991PhT....44k..32D |doi=10.1063/1.881296 |issn=0031-9228 |url-access=subscription}}</ref><ref name=":162">{{cite book |last=Rowlands |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=u0NBDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA162 |title=Newton – Innovation And Controversy |publisher=[[World Scientific Publishing]] |year=2017 |isbn=978-1-78634-404-5 |pages=161–162}}</ref> Further, he was the first to analyze the resistance of axisymmetric bodies moving through a [[Rarefaction|rarefied]] medium.<ref name=":31" /> 

In ''Principia'', Newton provided the first quantitative estimate of the [[solar mass]], with later editions incorporating more accurate measurements, bringing his Sun-to-Earth mass ratio calculation close to the modern value.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Solar Physics Historical Timeline (1600 - 1799) {{!}} High Altitude Observatory |url=https://www2.hao.ucar.edu/education/solar-physics-timeline/1600-1799 |access-date=2025-11-19 |website=www2.hao.ucar.edu}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last1=Tassoul |first1=Jean Louis |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PS7aBAAAQBAJ&pg=PA40 |title=A Concise History of Solar and Stellar Physics |last2=Tassoul |first2=Monique |date=2014 |publisher=Princeton University Press |isbn=978-1-4008-6539-0 |location= |page=40}}</ref> He further determined the masses and densities of [[Jupiter]] and [[Saturn]], putting all four celestial bodies (Sun, Earth, Jupiter, and Saturn) on the same comparative scale.<ref name=":29">{{Cite journal |last=Cohen |first=I. Bernard |date=1998 |title=Newton's Determination of the Masses and Densities of the Sun, Jupiter, Saturn, and the Earth |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/41134054 |journal=Archive for History of Exact Sciences |volume=53 |issue=1 |pages=83–95 |doi=10.1007/s004070050022 |jstor=41134054 |issn=0003-9519}}</ref> This achievement by Newton has been called "a supreme expression of the doctrine that one set of physical concepts and principles applies to all bodies on earth, the earth itself, and bodies anywhere throughout the universe".<ref name=":29" />

Newton made clear his [[heliocentric]] view of the Solar System—developed in a somewhat modern way because already in the mid-1680s he recognised the "deviation of the Sun" from the centre of gravity of the Solar System.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Taton |first1=R. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rkQKU-wfPYMC&pg=PA233 |title=Planetary Astronomy from the Renaissance to the Rise of Astrophysics, Part A, Tycho Brahe to Newton |last2=Wilson |first2=C. |last3=Hoskin |first3=Michael |date=18 September 2003 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-54205-0 |page=233 }}</ref> For Newton, it was not precisely the centre of the Sun or any other body that could be considered at rest, but rather "the common centre of gravity of the Earth, the Sun and all the Planets is to be esteem'd the Centre of the World", and this centre of gravity "either is at rest or moves uniformly forward in a right line". (Newton adopted the "at rest" alternative in view of common consent that the centre, wherever it was, was at rest.)<ref>Text quotations are from 1729 translation of Newton's ''Principia'', Book 3 (1729 vol.2) [https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_6EqxPav3vIsC/page/n257 at pp.&nbsp;232–33 &#91;233&#93;].</ref>

Newton was criticised for introducing "[[occult]] agencies" into science because of his postulate of an invisible [[action at a distance (physics)|force able to act over vast distances]].<ref>Edelglass et al., ''Matter and Mind'', {{isbn|0-940262-45-2}}. p.&nbsp;54</ref> Later, in the second edition of the ''Principia'' (1713), Newton firmly rejected such criticisms in a concluding [[General Scholium]], writing that it was enough that the phenomenon implied a gravitational attraction, as they did; but they did not so far indicate its cause, and it was both unnecessary and improper to frame hypotheses of things that were not implied by the phenomenon. (Here he used what became his famous expression {{lang|la|"[[Hypotheses non fingo]]"}}.<ref>On the meaning and origins of this expression, see Kirsten Walsh, [https://blogs.otago.ac.nz/emxphi/2010/10/does-newton-feign-an-hypothesis/ Does Newton feign an hypothesis?] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140714120054/https://blogs.otago.ac.nz/emxphi/2010/10/does-newton-feign-an-hypothesis/ |date=14 July 2014 }}, [https://blogs.otago.ac.nz/emxphi/ Early Modern Experimental Philosophy] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110721051523/https://blogs.otago.ac.nz/emxphi/ |date=21 July 2011 }}, 18 October 2010.</ref>)

With the {{lang|la|Principia}}, Newton became internationally recognised.{{sfn|Westfall|1980|loc=Chapter 11}} He acquired a circle of admirers, including the Swiss-born mathematician [[Nicolas Fatio de Duillier]].<ref name="Hatch">{{cite web |last=Hatch |first=Robert&nbsp;A. |title=Newton Timeline |url=http://web.clas.ufl.edu/users/ufhatch/pages/13-NDFE/newton/05-newton-timeline-m.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120802071026/http://web.clas.ufl.edu/users/ufhatch/pages/13-NDFE/newton/05-newton-timeline-m.htm |archive-date=2 August 2012 |access-date=13 August 2012 |website=The Scientific Revolution}}</ref>

=== Other significant work ===
Newton studied heat and energy flow, formulating an [[Newton's law of cooling|empirical law of cooling]] which states that the rate at which an object cools is proportional to the temperature difference between the object and its surrounding environment. It was first formulated in 1701, being the first heat transfer formulation and serves as the formal basis of [[Convection (heat transfer)|convective heat transfer]], later being incorporated by [[Joseph Fourier]] into his work.<ref name=":13" />

Newton was the first to observe and qualitatively describe what would much later be formalised as the [[Magnus effect]], nearly two centuries before [[Heinrich Gustav Magnus|Heinrich Magnus]]'s experimental studies. In a 1672 text, Newton recounted watching [[Real tennis|tennis]] players at Cambridge college and noted how a tennis ball struck obliquely with a spinning motion curved in flight. He explained that the ball's combination of circular and progressive motion caused one side to "press and beat the contiguous air more violently" than the other, thereby producing "a reluctancy and reaction of the air proportionably greater", an astute observation of the pressure differential responsible for lateral deflection.<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7wzkEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA198 |title=Proceedings of the 2nd International Seminar on Aeronautics and Energy: ISAE 2022 |date=2024 |publisher=Springer |isbn=978-981-99-6874-9 |editor-last=Nik Mohd |editor-first=Nik Ahmad Ridhwan |series= |location= |page=198 |editor-last2=Mat |editor-first2=Shabudin}}</ref><ref>Newton I. 40. Newton to Oldenburg, 6 February 1671/2. In: Turnball HW, ed. The Correspondence of Isaac Newton. Cambridge University Press; 1959:92–107.</ref>

=== Philosophy of science ===

Newton's role as a philosopher was deeply influential, and understanding the philosophical landscape of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries requires recognising his central contributions. Historically, Newton was widely regarded as a core figure in modern philosophy. For example, [[Johann Jakob Brucker]]'s ''Historia Critica Philosophiae'' (1744), considered the first comprehensive modern history of philosophy, prominently positioned Newton as a central philosophical figure. This portrayal notably shaped the perception of modern philosophy among leading Enlightenment intellectuals, including figures such as [[Denis Diderot]], [[Jean le Rond d'Alembert]], and [[Immanuel Kant]].<ref>Andrew Janiak, "Newton's Philosophy," Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2023). https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/newton-philosophy/</ref>

Starting with the second edition of his ''Principia'', Newton included a final section on science philosophy or method. It was here that he wrote his famous line, in Latin, "hypotheses non fingo", which can be translated as "I don't make hypotheses," (the direct translation of "fingo" is "frame", but in context he was advocating against the use of hypotheses in science). 
Newton's rejection of hypotheses ("hypotheses non fingo") emphasised that he refused to speculate on causes not directly supported by phenomena. Harper explains that Newton's experimental philosophy involves clearly distinguishing hypotheses-unverified conjectures-from propositions established through phenomena and generalised by induction. According to Newton, true scientific inquiry requires grounding explanations strictly on observable data rather than speculative reasoning. Thus, for Newton, proposing hypotheses without empirical backing undermines the integrity of experimental philosophy, as hypotheses should serve merely as tentative suggestions subordinate to observational evidence.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Harper |first=William L. |url=https://archive.org/details/isaacnewtonsscie0000harp/page/342 |title=Isaac Newton's Scientific Method: Turning Data into Evidence about Gravity and Cosmology |date=2012 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-957040-9 |location= |pages=342–349}}</ref>

In Latin, he wrote: 
{{blockquote | text = Rationem vero harum gravitatis proprietatum ex phaenomenis nondum potui deducere,& '''hypotheses non fingo'''. Quicquid enim ex phaenomenis non deducitur, ''hypothesis'' vocanda est;& hypotheses, seu metaphysicae, seu physicae, seu qualitatum occultarum, seu mechanicae, in ''philosophia experimentali''  locum non habent. In hac philosophia propositiones deducuntur ex phaenomenis, et redduntur generales per inductionem.<ref>Alexandre Koyré, I. Bernard Cohen,''[https://books.google.de/books/about/Philosophiae%20naturalis%20principia%20mathema.html?id=yQKxAQAACAAJ&redir%20esc=y Isaac Newton's Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica: Volume 2: The Third Edition]''. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1972, pp.764.</ref>}}

This is translated as:

{{blockquote 
| text = "Hitherto I have not been able to discover the cause of those properties of gravity from phenomena, and I frame no hypotheses, for whatever is not deduced from the phenomena is to be called an hypothesis; and hypotheses, whether metaphysical or physical, whether of occult qualities or mechanical, have no place in experimental philosophy. In this philosophy particular propositions are inferred from the phenomena, and afterwards rendered general by induction".<ref name="Newton 1850"/>}}

Newton contributed to and refined the [[scientific method]]. In his work on the properties of light in the 1670s, he showed his rigorous method, which was conducting experiments, taking detailed notes, making measurements, conducting more experiments that grew out of the initial ones, he formulated a theory, created more experiments to test it, and finally described the entire process so other scientists could replicate every step.<ref name=":5">{{cite web |last=Tyson |first=Peter |date=15 November 2005 |title=Newton's Legacy |url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/newton-legacy/ |access-date=14 November 2024 |website=www.pbs.org}}</ref>

In his 1687 ''Principia'', he outlined four rules: the first is, 'Admit no more causes of natural things than are both true and sufficient to explain their appearances'; the second is, 'To the same natural effect, assign the same causes'; the third is, 'Qualities of bodies, which are found to belong to all bodies within experiments, are to be esteemed universal'; and lastly, 'Propositions collected from observation of phenomena should be viewed as accurate or very nearly true until contradicted by other phenomena'. These rules have become the basis of the modern approaches to science.<ref name=":12">{{cite book |last1=Carpi |first1=Anthony |url=https://archive.org/details/processofscience0000carp/page/91 |title=The Process of Science |last2=Egger |first2=Anne E. |publisher=Visionlearning |year=2011 |isbn=978-1-257-96132-0 |edition=Revised |pages=91–92}}</ref>

Newton's scientific method went beyond simple prediction in three critical ways, thereby enriching the basic [[hypothetico-deductive model]]. First, it established a richer ideal of empirical success, requiring phenomena to accurately measure theoretical parameters. Second, it transformed theoretical questions into ones empirically solvable by measurement. Third, it used provisionally accepted propositions to guide research, enabling the method of successive approximations where deviations drive the creation of more accurate models. This robust method of theory-mediated measurements was adopted by his successors for extensions of his theory to [[astronomy]] and remains a foundational element in modern physics.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Harper |first=William L. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pDUfqo-q0fkC&pg=PA2 |title=Isaac Newton's Scientific Method: Turning Data into Evidence about Gravity and Cosmology |date=2012 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-957040-9 |location= |pages=2–3}}</ref>

== Later life ==
{{Main|Later life of Isaac Newton}}

=== Royal Mint ===
[[File:Newton 25.jpg|thumb|upright|Newton in old age in 1712, portrait by [[Sir James Thornhill]]]]
In the 1690s, Newton wrote a number of [[religious tracts]] dealing with the literal and symbolic interpretation of the Bible. A manuscript Newton sent to [[John Locke]] in which he disputed the fidelity of [[1 John 5:7]]—the [[Johannine Comma]]—and its fidelity to the original manuscripts of the New Testament, remained unpublished until 1785.<ref>{{cite web |title=John Locke Manuscripts&nbsp;– Chronological Listing: 1690 |url=http://www.libraries.psu.edu/tas/locke/mss/c1690.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170709035722/https://www.libraries.psu.edu/tas/locke/mss/c1690.html |archive-date=9 July 2017 |access-date=20 January 2013 |website=psu.edu}}; and John C. Attig, [http://www.libraries.psu.edu/tas/locke/bib/ch5c.html#01160 John Locke Bibliography&nbsp;— Chapter 5, Religion, 1751–1900] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121112070820/http://www.libraries.psu.edu/tas/locke/bib/ch5c.html#01160 |date=12 November 2012 }}</ref>

Newton was also a member of the [[Parliament of England]] for [[Cambridge University (UK Parliament constituency)|Cambridge University]] in 1689 and 1701, but according to some accounts his only comments were to complain about a cold draught in the chamber and request that the window be closed.{{sfn|White|1997|p=232}} He was, however, noted by the Cambridge diarist [[Abraham de la Pryme]] to have rebuked students who were frightening locals by claiming that a house was haunted.<ref>{{cite news |last=Sawer |first=Patrick |date=6 September 2016 |title=What students should avoid during fresher's week (100&nbsp;years ago and now) |work=The Daily Telegraph |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/06/what-students-should-avoid-during-freshers-week-100-years-ago-an/ |url-status=live |url-access=subscription |access-date=7 September 2016 |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220110/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/06/what-students-should-avoid-during-freshers-week-100-years-ago-an/ |archive-date=10 January 2022}}{{cbignore}}</ref>

Newton moved to London to take up the post of warden of the [[Royal Mint]] during the reign of [[William III of England|King William III]] in 1696, a position that he had obtained through the patronage of [[Charles Montagu, 1st Earl of Halifax]], then [[Chancellor of the Exchequer]]. He took charge of England's great recoining, fought Lord Lucas, Governor of the Tower, and secured the job of deputy [[comptroller]] of the temporary Chester branch for Edmond Halley. Newton became perhaps the best-known [[Master of the Mint]] upon the death of [[Thomas Neale]] in 1699, a position he held for the last 30&nbsp;years of his life.<ref name="Mint">{{cite episode |title=Isaac Newton: Physicist And&nbsp;... Crime Fighter? |url=https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=105012144 |access-date=1 August 2014 |series=Science Friday |network=NPR |transcript=Transcript |transcript-url=https://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?storyId=105012144 |air-date=5 June 2009 |archive-date=1 November 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141101074330/http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=105012144 |url-status=live}}</ref>{{sfn|Levenson|2009|p=238–239}} These appointments were intended as [[sinecure]]s, but Newton took them seriously. He retired from his Cambridge duties in 1701, and exercised his authority to reform the currency and punish [[Methods of coin debasement|clippers]] and counterfeiters.

As Warden, and afterwards as Master, of the Royal Mint, Newton estimated that 20&nbsp;per cent of the coins taken in during the [[Great Recoinage of 1696]] were [[Counterfeit money|counterfeit]]. Counterfeiting was [[High treason in the United Kingdom|high treason]], punishable by the felon being [[hanged, drawn and quartered]]. Despite this, convicting even the most flagrant criminals could be extremely difficult, but Newton proved equal to the task.{{sfn|White|1997|p=259}}

Disguised as a [[:wikt:habitué|habitué]] of bars and taverns, he gathered much of that evidence himself.{{sfn|White|1997|p=267}} For all the barriers placed to prosecution, and separating the branches of government, [[English law]] still had ancient and formidable customs of authority. Newton had himself made a [[justice of the peace]] in all the [[home counties]]. A draft letter regarding the matter is included in Newton's personal first edition of ''Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica'', which he must have been amending at the time.<ref>{{cite web |last=Newton |first=Isaac |title=Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica |url=http://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/PR-ADV-B-00039-00001/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120108031556/http://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/PR-ADV-B-00039-00001/ |archive-date=8 January 2012 |access-date=10 January 2012 |publisher=Cambridge University Digital Library |pages=265–66}}</ref> Then he conducted more than 100&nbsp;cross-examinations of witnesses, informers, and suspects between June 1698 and Christmas 1699. He successfully prosecuted 28&nbsp;coiners, including the serial counterfeiter [[William Chaloner]], who was hanged.{{sfn|Westfall|2007|p=73}}

Beyond prosecuting counterfeiters, he improved minting technology and reduced the standard deviation of the weight of guineas from 1.3 grams to 0.75 grams. Starting in 1707, Newton introduced the practice of testing a small sample of coins, a pound in weight, in the [[Trial of the Pyx|trial of the pyx]], which helped to reduce the size of admissible error. He ultimately saved the Treasury a then £41,510, roughly £3 million in 2012,<ref>{{cite web |last=Aron |first=Jacob |date=29 May 2012 |title=Newton saved the UK economy £10&nbsp;million |url=https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn21856-newton-saved-the-uk-economy-10-million/ |access-date=25 January 2025 |website=New Scientist}}</ref> with his improvements lasting until the 1770s, thereby increasing the accuracy of British coinage.<ref name=":3">{{cite journal |last=Belenkiy |first=Ari |date=1 February 2013 |title=The Master of the Royal Mint: How Much Money did Isaac Newton Save Britain? |url=https://academic.oup.com/jrsssa/article/176/2/481/7077810 |journal=Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A: Statistics in Society |volume=176 |issue=2 |pages=481–498 |doi=10.1111/j.1467-985X.2012.01037.x |issn=0964-1998 |hdl-access=free |hdl=10.1111/j.1467-985X.2012.01037.x|url-access=subscription }}</ref> He greatly increased the productivity of the Mint, as he raised the weekly output of coin from 15,000 pounds to 100,000 pounds.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Wennerlind |first=Carl |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ixHtSkjqEMcC&pg=PA153 |title=Casualties of Credit: The English Financial Revolution, 1620-1720 |date=2011 |publisher=Harvard University Press |isbn=978-0-674-06266-5 |location=Cambridge |page=153}}</ref> Newton has also been credited with pioneering [[Time and motion study|time and motion studies]],{{sfn|Iliffe|Smith|2016|p=25}} although his work was a theoretical calculation of physical capability rather than a standardised industrial productivity model.<ref name=":24" />

Newton's activities at the Mint influenced rising scientific and commercial interests in fields such as [[numismatics]], [[geology]], [[mining]], [[metallurgy]], and [[metrology]] in the early 18th century.<ref name=":24">{{cite journal |last=Marples |first=Alice |date=20 September 2022 |title=The science of money: Isaac Newton's mastering of the Mint |url=https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsnr.2021.0033 |journal=Notes and Records: The Royal Society Journal of the History of Science |volume=76 |issue=3 |pages=507–525 |doi=10.1098/rsnr.2021.0033 |issn=0035-9149|url-access=subscription }}</ref>

Newton held a surprisingly modern view on [[economics]], believing that paper credit, such as government debt, was a practical and wise solution to the limitations of a currency based solely on metal. He argued that increasing the supply of this paper credit could lower interest rates, which would in turn stimulate trade and create employment. Newton also held a radical minority opinion that the value of both metal and paper currency was set by public opinion and trust.{{sfn|Levenson|2009|p=242}}

[[File:ENG COA Newton.svg|thumb|upright|[[Coat of arms]] of the Newton family of [[Great Gonerby]], Lincolnshire, afterwards used by Sir Isaac<ref>{{cite book |last=Wagner |first=Anthony |url=https://archive.org/details/historicheraldry0000wagn/page/85 |title=Historic Heraldry of Britain |publisher=Phillimore |year=1972 |isbn=978-0-85033-022-9 |edition=2nd |location=London and Chichester |page=[https://archive.org/details/historicheraldry0000wagn/page/85 85] |author-link=Anthony Wagner}}; and {{cite book|title=Genealogical Memoranda Relating to the Family of Newton|place=London|publisher=Taylor and Co.|year=1871|url=https://archive.org/details/genealogicalmemo00inlond }}</ref>]]

Newton was made president of the [[Royal Society]] in 1703 and an associate of the French [[French Academy of Sciences|Académie des Sciences]]. In his position at the Royal Society, Newton made an enemy of [[John Flamsteed]], the [[Astronomer Royal]], by prematurely publishing Flamsteed's ''Historia Coelestis Britannica'', which Newton had used in his studies.{{sfn|White|1997|p=317}}

=== Knighthood ===
In April 1705, Newton was [[Knight Bachelor|knighted]] by [[Anne, Queen of Great Britain|Queen Anne]] during a royal visit to Trinity College, Cambridge. The knighthood is likely to have been motivated by political considerations connected with the [[1705 English general election|parliamentary election in May 1705]], rather than any recognition of Newton's scientific work or services as Master of the Mint.<ref>"The Queen's 'great Assistance' to Newton's election was his knighting, an honor bestowed not for his contributions to science, nor for his service at the Mint, but for the greater glory of party politics in the election of 1705." {{harvnb|Westfall|1994|p=245}}</ref> Newton was the second scientist to be knighted, after [[Francis Bacon]].<ref>{{cite web |title=This Month in Physics History |url=https://www.aps.org/archives/publications/apsnews/201103/physicshistory.cfm |access-date=6 March 2025 |website=www.aps.org }}</ref>

As a result of a report written by Newton on 21 September 1717 to the Lords Commissioners of His Majesty's Treasury, the bimetallic relationship between gold coins and silver coins was changed by royal proclamation on 22 December 1717, forbidding the exchange of gold guineas for more than 21&nbsp;silver shillings.<ref>[http://www.pierre-marteau.com/editions/1701-25-mint-reports/report-1717-09-25.html ''On the Value of Gold and Silver in European Currencies and the Consequences on the Worldwide Gold- and Silver-Trade''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170406191205/http://www.pierre-marteau.com/editions/1701-25-mint-reports/report-1717-09-25.html |date=6 April 2017 }}, Sir Isaac Newton, 21 September 1717; [https://archive.org/details/numismaticser1v05royauoft "By The King, A Proclamation Declaring the Rates at which Gold shall be current in Payments"]. ''Royal Numismatic Society''. '''V'''. April 1842&nbsp;– January 1843.</ref> This inadvertently resulted in a silver shortage as silver coins were used to pay for imports, while exports were paid for in gold, effectively moving Britain from the [[silver standard]] to its first [[gold standard]]. It is a matter of debate as to whether he intended to do this or not.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Fay |first=C.&nbsp;R. |date=1 January 1935 |title=Newton and the Gold Standard |journal=Cambridge Historical Journal |volume=5 |issue=1 |pages=109–17 |doi=10.1017/S1474691300001256 |jstor=3020836}}</ref> It has been argued that Newton viewed his work at the Mint as a continuation of his alchemical work.<ref>{{cite news |date=12 September 2006 |title=Sir Isaac Newton's Unpublished Manuscripts Explain Connections He Made Between Alchemy and Economics |publisher=Georgia Tech Research News |url=http://gtresearchnews.gatech.edu/newsrelease/newton.htm |access-date=30 July 2014 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20130217100410/http://gtresearchnews.gatech.edu/newsrelease/newton.htm |archive-date=17 February 2013}}</ref>

Newton was invested in the [[South Sea Company]] and lost at least £10,000, and plausibly more than £20,000 (£4.4&nbsp;million in 2020<ref>Eric W. Nye, [https://www.uwyo.edu/numimage/currency.htm Pounds Sterling to Dollars: Historical Conversion of Currency] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210815124946/https://www.uwyo.edu/numimage/Currency.htm |date=15 August 2021 }}. Retrieved: 5 October 2020</ref>) when it collapsed in around 1720. Since he was already rich before the bubble, he still died rich, at estate value around £30,000.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Odlyzko |first=Andrew |date=20 March 2019 |title=Newton's financial misadventures in the South Sea Bubble |url=https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsnr.2018.0018 |journal=Notes and Records: The Royal Society Journal of the History of Science |volume=73 |issue=1 |pages=29–59 |doi=10.1098/rsnr.2018.0018 |issn=0035-9149|url-access=subscription }}</ref>

Toward the end of his life, Newton spent some time at [[Cranbury Park]], near [[Winchester]], the country residence of his niece and her husband, though he primarily lived in London.<ref name="Yonge6">{{cite web |last=Yonge |first=Charlotte&nbsp;M. |author-link=Charlotte M. Yonge |year=1898 |title=Cranbury and Brambridge |url=http://www.online-literature.com/charlotte-yonge/john-keble/6/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081208223436/http://www.online-literature.com/charlotte-yonge/john-keble/6/ |archive-date=8 December 2008 |access-date=23 September 2009 |website=[[John Keble]]'s Parishes&nbsp;– Chapter 6 |publisher=online-literature.com}}</ref>{{sfn|Westfall|1980|pp=848-49}} His half-niece, [[Catherine Barton]],{{sfn|Westfall|1980|p=44}} served as his hostess in social affairs at his house on [[Jermyn Street]] in London. In a surviving letter written in 1700 while she was recovering from smallpox, Newton closed with the phrase "your very loving uncle", expressing familial concern in a manner typical of seventeenth-century epistolary style.{{sfn|Westfall|1980|p=595}} Historian Patricia Fara notes that the letter's tone is warm and paternal, including medical advice and attention to her appearance during convalescence, rather than conveying any romantic implication.<ref>{{cite book
 |last=Fara|first=Patricia|title=Life After Gravity: Isaac Newton's London Career|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=2021|isbn=978-0-19-884102-9|pages=47–48|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=D-AeEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA47}}</ref>

=== Death ===
[[File:PSM V69 D480 Death mask of isaac newton.png|alt=Isaac Newton's death mask|thumb|upright|Death mask of Newton, photographed {{circa|1906}}]]
Newton died in his sleep in London on 20 March 1727 ([[Old Style and New Style dates|NS]] 31 March 1727).{{efn|name=OSNS}} He was given a ceremonial funeral, attended by nobles, scientists, and philosophers, and was buried in [[Westminster Abbey]] among kings and queens. He was the first scientist to be buried in the abbey.<ref>{{London Gazette |issue=6569 |date=1 April 1727 |page=7 }}</ref> [[Voltaire]] may have been present at his funeral.<ref>Dobre and Nyden suggest that there is no clear evidence that Voltaire was present; see p.&nbsp;89 of {{cite book |last1=Dobre |first1=Mihnea |title=Cartesian Empiricism |last2=Nyden |first2=Tammy |publisher=Springer |year=2013 |isbn=978-94-007-7690-6}}</ref> A bachelor, he had divested much of his estate to relatives during his last years, and died [[intestacy|intestate]].<ref name="Newton, Isaac (1642–1727)" /> His papers went to [[John Conduitt]] and [[Catherine Barton]].<ref name="Mann">{{cite magazine |last=Mann |first=Adam |date=14 May 2014 |title=The Strange, Secret History of Isaac Newton's Papers |url=https://www.wired.com/2014/05/newton-papers-q-and-a/ |url-access=limited |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170911221912/https://www.wired.com/2014/05/newton-papers-q-and-a/ |archive-date=11 September 2017 |access-date=25 April 2016 |magazine=Wired}}</ref>

Shortly after his death, a plaster [[death mask]] was moulded of Newton. It was used by the [[Flemings|Flemish]] sculptor [[John Michael Rysbrack]] in making a sculpture of Newton.<ref>{{cite web |title=Newton's Death Mask |url=https://huntington.org/verso/newtons-death-mask |access-date=7 August 2023 |website=The Huntington |date=2 August 2011 |first1=John |last1=Vining |archive-date=7 August 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230807122527/https://huntington.org/verso/newtons-death-mask |url-status=live }}</ref> It is now held by the [[Royal Society]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Death mask of Isaac Newton |url=https://pictures.royalsociety.org/image-rs-8492 |access-date=7 August 2023 |website=Royal Society Picture Library |archive-date=7 August 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230807122526/https://pictures.royalsociety.org/image-rs-8492 |url-status=live }}</ref>

Newton's hair was posthumously examined and found to contain [[mercury (element)|mercury]], probably resulting from his alchemical pursuits. [[Mercury poisoning]] could explain Newton's eccentricity in late life.<ref name="Newton, Isaac (1642–1727)" />

== Personality ==
Newton has been described as an incredibly driven and disciplined man who dedicated his life to his work. He is known for having a prodigious appetite for work, which he prioritised above his personal health. Newton also maintained strict control over his physical appetites, being sparing with food and drink and becoming a [[Vegetarianism|vegetarian]] later in life. While Newton was a secretive and [[Neuroticism|neurotic]] individual, he is not considered to have been [[Psychosis|psychotic]] or [[Bipolar disorder|bipolar]]. He has been described as an "incredible polymath" who was "immensely versatile", with some of his earliest investigations involving a phonetic alphabet and a [[universal language]].<ref name=":23" /> 

Newton's diverse range of interests is seen in his library, which contained 1,752 books that could be identified. A large portion consisted of works on theology (27.2%, or 477 books), followed by alchemy (9.6%, 169 books), mathematics (7.2%, 126 books), physics (3.0%, 52 books), and finally astronomy (1.9%, 33 books). Ultimately, books related to his famous scientific work made up slightly less than 12% of the total collection.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=van Gent |first=Robert H. |date=1993 |title=Isaac Newton and Astrology: Witness for the Defence or for the Prosecution? |url=https://webspace.science.uu.nl/~gent0113/astrology/newton.htm |journal=Correlation: J. Research Astrology |volume=12}}</ref>

Although it was claimed that he was once engaged,{{efn|name=claim|This claim was made by William Stukeley in 1727, in a letter about Newton written to [[Richard Mead]]. [[Charles Hutton]], who in the late eighteenth century collected oral traditions about earlier scientists, declared that there "do not appear to be any sufficient reason for his never marrying, if he had an inclination so to do. It is much more likely that he had a constitutional indifference to the state, and even to the sex in general."<ref>Hutton, Charles (1795/6). ''A Mathematical and Philosophical Dictionary''. vol.&nbsp;2. p.&nbsp;100.</ref>}} Newton never married. Voltaire, who was in London at the time of Newton's funeral, said that he "was never sensible to any passion, was not subject to the common frailties of mankind, nor had any commerce with women—a circumstance which was assured me by the physician and surgeon who attended him in his last moments."<ref>{{cite book |last=Voltaire |title=Letters on England |date=1894 |publisher=Cassell |page=100 |chapter=14 |chapter-url=https://archive.org/stream/lettersonenglan00voltgoog#page/n102}}</ref>

Newton had a close friendship with the Swiss mathematician [[Nicolas Fatio de Duillier]], whom he met in London around 1689;<ref name="Hatch" /> some of their correspondence has survived.<ref>{{cite web |title=Duillier, Nicholas Fatio de (1664–1753) mathematician and natural philosopher |url=http://janus.lib.cam.ac.uk/db/node.xsp?id=CV%2FPers%2FDuillier%2C%20Nicholas%20Fatio%20de%20%281664-1753%29%20mathematician%20and%20natural%20philosopher |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130701114749/http://janus.lib.cam.ac.uk/db/node.xsp?id=CV%2FPers%2FDuillier%2C%20Nicholas%20Fatio%20de%20%281664-1753%29%20mathematician%20and%20natural%20philosopher |archive-date=1 July 2013 |access-date=22 March 2013 |publisher=Janus database}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Collection Guide: Fatio de Duillier, Nicolas [Letters to Isaac Newton] |url=http://www.oac.cdlib.org/search?style=oac4;Institution=UCLA::Clark%20%28William%20Andrews%29%20Memorial%20Library;idT=4859632 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130531055908/http://www.oac.cdlib.org/search?style=oac4;Institution=UCLA::Clark%20%28William%20Andrews%29%20Memorial%20Library;idT=4859632 |archive-date=31 May 2013 |access-date=22 March 2013 |publisher=Online Archive of California}}</ref> Their relationship came to an abrupt and unexplained end in 1693, and at the same time Newton suffered a [[nervous breakdown]],<ref>{{harvnb|Westfall| 1980|pp= 493–497}} on the friendship with Fatio, pp.&nbsp;531–540 on Newton's breakdown.</ref> which included sending wild accusatory letters to his friends [[Samuel Pepys]] and [[John Locke]]. His note to the latter included the charge that Locke had endeavoured to "embroil" him with "woemen & by other means".{{sfn|Manuel|1968|p=219}}

Newton appeared to be relatively modest about his achievements, writing in a later memoir, "I do not know what I may appear to the world, but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the sea-shore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me."<ref>''Memoirs of the Life, Writings, and Discoveries of Sir Isaac Newton'' (1855) by Sir David Brewster (Volume II. Ch. 27)</ref> Nonetheless, he could be fiercely competitive and did on occasion hold grudges against his intellectual rivals, not abstaining from personal attacks when it suited him—a common trait found in many of his contemporaries.<ref name=":23">{{cite book |last=Rowlands |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CRM0DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA50 |title=Newton And Modern Physics |publisher=[[World Scientific Publishing]] |year=2017 |isbn=978-1-78634-332-1 |pages=50–55}}</ref> In a letter to [[Robert Hooke]] in February 1675, for instance, he confessed "If I have seen further it is by [[standing on the shoulders of giants]]."<ref>{{cite web |last1=Newton |first1=Isaac |title=Letter from Sir Isaac Newton to Robert Hooke |url=https://discover.hsp.org/Record/dc-9792/Description#tabnav |access-date=7 June 2018 |website=Historical Society of Pennsylvania |archive-date=4 August 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200804215356/https://discover.hsp.org/Record/dc-9792/Description#tabnav }}</ref> Some historians argued that this, written at a time when Newton and Hooke were disputing over optical discoveries, was an oblique attack on Hooke who was presumably short and hunchbacked, rather than (or in addition to) a statement of modesty.<ref>{{cite book |last=Gribbin |first=John |url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780713997316/page/164 |title=Science: A History; 1543–2001 |year=2002 |publisher=Allen Lane |isbn=978-0-7139-9503-9 |edition= |location=London |page=241}}</ref> On the other hand, the widely known proverb about standing on the shoulders of giants, found in the 17th-century poet [[George Herbert]]'s {{lang|la|Jacula Prudentum}} (1651) among others, had as its main point that "a dwarf on a giant's shoulders sees farther of the two", and so in effect place Newton himself rather than Hooke as the 'dwarf' who saw farther.{{sfn|White|1997|p=187}}

== Theology ==
=== Religious views ===
{{Main|Religious views of Isaac Newton|Isaac Newton's occult studies}}

Although born into an [[Anglicanism|Anglican]] family, by his thirties Newton had developed unorthodox beliefs,<ref name="Newton – 1">[[Richard S. Westfall]]&nbsp;– [[Indiana University]] {{cite book |url=http://galileo.rice.edu/Catalog/NewFiles/newton.html |title=The Galileo Project |publisher=([[Rice University]]) |access-date=5 July 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200929133323/http://galileo.rice.edu/Catalog/NewFiles/newton.html |archive-date=29 September 2020 |url-status=live}}</ref> with historian [[Stephen Snobelen]] labelling him a [[heresy|heretic]].<ref name="heretic">{{cite journal |last=Snobelen |first=Stephen&nbsp;D. |date=December 1999 |title=Isaac Newton, heretic: the strategies of a Nicodemite |journal=The British Journal for the History of Science |volume=32 |issue=4 |pages=381–419 |doi=10.1017/S0007087499003751 |jstor=4027945 |s2cid=145208136}}</ref> Despite this, Newton in his time was considered a knowledgeable and insightful [[Theology|theologian]] who was respected by his contemporaries, with [[Thomas Tenison]], the then [[Archbishop of Canterbury]], telling him "You know more divinity than all of us put together",<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Austin |first=William H. |date=1970 |title=Isaac Newton on Science and Religion |journal=Journal of the History of Ideas |volume=31 |issue=4 |pages=521–542 |doi=10.2307/2708258 |issn=0022-5037 |jstor=2708258 }}</ref> and the philosopher [[John Locke]] describing him as "a very valuable man not onely for his wonderful skill in Mathematicks but in divinity too and his great knowledg in the Scriptures where in I know few his equals".<ref name="heretic" /> By 1680, his reputation in biblical scholarship was established. [[John Mill (theologian)|John Mill]] sought his advice on a critical [[New Testament]] edition, and the two had a short correspondence on interpreting the early chapters of [[Book of Genesis|Genesis]] as well. [[Thomas Burnet (theologian)|Thomas Burnet]] consulted Newton on drafts of ''Telluris theoria sacra'', and with [[Henry More]] he discussed the interpretation of the [[Apocalypse]] at Cambridge.<ref name="heretic" />

[[William Stukeley]] wrote of Newton’s diligence in reading and studying the Bible:<ref name="heretic" />{{blockquote|No man in England read the Bible more carefully than he did, none study’d it more, as appears by his printed works, by many pieces he left which are not printed, and even by the Bible which he commonly used, thumbd over, as they call it, in an extraordinary degree, with frequency of use.}}By 1672, he had started to record his theological researches in notebooks which he showed to no one and which have only been available for public examination since 1972.{{sfn|Katz|1992|p=63}} Over half of what Newton wrote concerned theology and alchemy, and most has never been printed.{{sfn|Katz|1992|p=63}} His writings show extensive knowledge of [[Early Christianity|early Church]] texts and reveal that he sided with [[Arius]], who rejected the conventional view of the [[Trinity]] and was the losing party in the conflict with [[Athanasius of Alexandria|Athanasius]] over the [[Nicene Creed|Creed]]. Newton "recognized Christ as a divine mediator between God and man, who was subordinate to the Father who created him."{{sfn|Westfall|1980|p=315}} He was especially interested in prophecy, but for him, "the [[great apostasy]] was trinitarianism."{{sfn|Westfall|1980|p=321}}

Newton tried unsuccessfully to obtain one of the two fellowships that exempted the holder from the ordination requirement. At the last moment in 1675, he received a government dispensation that excused him and all future holders of the [[Lucasian Professor of Mathematics|Lucasian chair]].{{sfn|Westfall|1980|pp=331–34}}

Worshipping [[Jesus|Jesus Christ]] as [[God in Christianity|God]] was, in Newton's eyes, [[idolatry]], an act he believed to be the fundamental [[sin]].{{sfn|Westfall|1994|p=124}} In 1999, Snobelen wrote, that "Isaac Newton was a heretic. But&nbsp;... he never made a public declaration of his private faith—which the orthodox would have deemed extremely radical. He hid his faith so well that scholars are still unraveling his personal beliefs." Snobelen concludes that Newton was at least a [[Socinian]] sympathiser (he owned and had thoroughly read at least eight Socinian books), possibly an [[Arianism|Arian]] and almost certainly an [[anti-trinitarian]].<ref name="heretic" />

[[File:Newton-WilliamBlake crop.jpg|thumb|''[[Newton (Blake)|Newton]]'' (1795, detail) by [[William Blake]]. Newton is depicted critically as a "divine geometer".<ref>{{cite web |date=25 September 2013 |title=Newton, object 1 (Butlin 306) "Newton" |url=http://www.blakearchive.org/exist/blake/archive/copyinfo.xq?copyid=but306.1 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130927214741/http://www.blakearchive.org/exist/blake/archive/copyinfo.xq?copyid=but306.1 |archive-date=27 September 2013 |access-date=25 September 2013 |publisher=[[William Blake Archive]]}}</ref>]]

Although the laws of motion and universal gravitation became Newton's best-known discoveries, he warned against using them to view the Universe as a mere machine, as if akin to a great clock. He said, "So then gravity may put the planets into motion, but without the Divine Power it could never put them into such a circulating motion, as they have about the sun".<ref>{{cite book |last=Newton |first=Isaac |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Dz2FzJqaJMUC&pg=PA436 |title=Isaaci Newtoni Opera quae exstant omnia |date=1782 |publisher=Joannes Nichols |location=London |pages=436–37 |access-date=18 October 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210414055022/https://books.google.com/books?id=Dz2FzJqaJMUC&q=%22gravity%20may%20put%20the%20planets%20into%20motion%22&pg=PA436 |archive-date=14 April 2021 |url-status=live}}</ref>

Along with his scientific fame, Newton's studies of the Bible and of the early [[Church Fathers]] were also noteworthy. Newton wrote works on [[textual criticism]], most notably ''[[An Historical Account of Two Notable Corruptions of Scripture]]'' and ''[[s:Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel|Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel, and the Apocalypse of St. John]]''.<ref>[http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/16878 ''Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel, and the Apocalypse of St. John''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170120113904/http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/16878 |date=20 January 2017 }} 1733</ref> He placed the crucifixion of Jesus Christ at 3 April, AD 33, which agrees with one traditionally accepted date.<ref>John P. Meier, ''[[John P. Meier#A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus|A Marginal Jew]]'', I, pp.&nbsp;382–402, Yale University Press, 1991. After narrowing the years to 30 or 33, provisionally judges 30 most likely.</ref>

He believed in a rationally [[immanent]] world, but he rejected the [[hylozoism]] implicit in [[Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz]] and [[Baruch Spinoza]]. The ordered and dynamically informed Universe could be understood, and must be understood, by an active reason. In his correspondence, he claimed that in writing the ''Principia'' "I had an eye upon such Principles as might work with considering men for the belief of a Deity".<ref>Newton to [[Richard Bentley]] 10 December 1692, in Turnbull et al. (1959–77), vol&nbsp;3, p.&nbsp;233.</ref> He saw evidence of design in the system of the world: "Such a wonderful uniformity in the planetary system must be allowed the effect of choice". But Newton insisted that divine intervention would eventually be required to reform the system, due to the slow growth of instabilities.<ref>Opticks, 2nd Ed 1706. Query 31.</ref> For this, Leibniz lampooned him: "God Almighty wants to wind up his watch from time to time: otherwise it would cease to move. He had not, it seems, sufficient foresight to make it a perpetual motion."<ref>{{cite book |last=Alexander |first=H. G. |url=https://archive.org/details/leibnizclarkecor00clar/page/11 |title=The Leibniz-Clarke Correspondence |publisher=Manchester University Press |year=1956 |page=11}}</ref>

Newton's position was defended by his follower [[Samuel Clarke]] in a [[Leibniz-Clarke correspondence|famous correspondence]]. A century later, [[Pierre-Simon Laplace]]'s work [[Traité de mécanique céleste|''Celestial Mechanics'']] had a natural explanation for why the planet orbits do not require periodic divine intervention.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Tyson |first=Neil Degrasse |author-link=Neil deGrasse Tyson |date=1 November 2005 |title=The Perimeter of Ignorance |url=http://www.haydenplanetarium.org/tyson/read/2005/11/01/the-perimeter-of-ignorance |journal=Natural History Magazine |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180906154623/http://www.haydenplanetarium.org/tyson/read/2005/11/01/the-perimeter-of-ignorance |archive-date=6 September 2018 |access-date=7 January 2016}}</ref> The contrast between Laplace's mechanistic worldview and Newton's one is the most strident considering the famous answer which the French scientist gave [[Napoleon]], who had criticised him for the absence of the Creator in the ''Mécanique céleste'': "Sire, j'ai pu me passer de cette hypothèse" ("Sir, I can do without this hypothesis").<ref>Dijksterhuis, E. J. ''The Mechanization of the World Picture'', IV 329–330, Oxford University Press, 1961. The author's final comment on this episode is: "The mechanization of the world picture led with irresistible coherence to the conception of God as a sort of 'retired engineer', and from here to God's complete elimination it took just one more step".</ref>

Scholars long debated whether Newton disputed the doctrine of the Trinity. His first biographer, [[David Brewster]], who compiled his manuscripts, interpreted Newton as questioning the veracity of some passages used to support the Trinity, but never denying the doctrine of the Trinity as such.<ref>Brewster states that Newton was never known as an [[Arianism|Arian]] during his lifetime, it was [[William Whiston]], an Arian, who first argued that "Sir Isaac Newton was so hearty for the Baptists, as well as for the Eusebians or Arians, that he sometimes suspected these two were the two witnesses in the Revelations," while others like [[Hopton Haynes]] (a Mint employee and Humanitarian), "mentioned to [[Richard Baron (dissenting minister)|Richard Baron]], that Newton held the same doctrine as himself". David Brewster. ''Memoirs of the Life, Writings, and Discoveries of Sir Isaac Newton''. p.&nbsp;268.</ref> In the twentieth century, encrypted manuscripts written by Newton and bought by [[John Maynard Keynes]] (among others) were deciphered<ref name="The Collected Writings of John Maynard Keynes Volume X" /> and it became known that Newton did indeed reject Trinitarianism.<ref name="heretic" />

=== Religious thought ===

Newton and [[Robert Boyle]]'s approach to [[mechanical philosophy]] was promoted by [[rationalist]] pamphleteers as a viable alternative to [[pantheism]] and [[enthusiasm]]. It was accepted hesitantly by orthodox preachers as well as dissident preachers like the [[latitudinarian]]s.<ref name="The Newtonians and the English Revolution: 1689–1720" /> The clarity and simplicity of science was seen as a way to combat the emotional and [[metaphysics|metaphysical]] superlatives of both [[superstition|superstitious]] enthusiasm and the threat of [[atheism]],<ref name="Science and Religion in Seventeenth-Century England" /> and at the same time, the second wave of English [[deism|deists]] used Newton's discoveries to demonstrate the possibility of a "Natural Religion".<ref>{{Cite book |last=Hurlbutt III |first=Robert H. |url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_0803223374/page/49 |title=Hume, Newton, and the Design Argument |date=1985 |publisher=University of Nebraska Press |isbn=978-0-8032-2337-0 |edition=Revised |location=Lincoln |pages=49}}</ref>

The attacks made against pre-[[Age of Enlightenment|Enlightenment]] "[[magical thinking]]", and the [[Christian mysticism|mystical elements of Christianity]], were given their foundation with Boyle's mechanical conception of the universe. Newton gave Boyle's ideas their completion through [[mathematical proof]]s and, perhaps more importantly, was very successful in popularising them.<ref name="Enlightenment and Religion: Rational Dissent in eighteenth-century Britain" />

== Alchemy ==
{{Quote box
 | quote  = Newton was not the first of the age of reason. He was the last of the magicians, the last of the Babylonians and Sumerians, the last great mind which looked out on the visible and intellectual world with the same eyes as those who began to build our intellectual inheritance rather less than 10,000 years ago. Isaac Newton, a posthumous child born with no father on Christmas Day, 1642, was the last wonderchild to whom the Magi could do sincere and appropriate homage.
 | source = –[[John Maynard Keynes]], "Newton, the Man"<ref>{{cite web |title=John Maynard Keynes: Newton, the Man |url=https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Extras/Keynes_Newton/ |access-date=6 May 2023 |website=Maths History |archive-date=17 June 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190617095839/http://www-history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/Extras/Keynes_Newton.html |url-status=live }}</ref>
 | width  = 30%
 | align  = right
}}

Of an estimated ten million words of writing in Newton's papers, about one million deal with [[alchemy]]. Many of Newton's writings on alchemy are copies of other manuscripts, with his own annotations.<ref name="Mann" /> Alchemical texts mix artisanal knowledge with philosophical speculation, often hidden behind layers of wordplay, allegory, and imagery to protect craft secrets.<ref name="Meyer">{{cite journal |last=Meyer |first=Michal |year=2014 |title=Gold, secrecy and prestige |url=https://www.sciencehistory.org/distillations/magazine/gold-secrecy-and-prestige |url-status=live |journal=Chemical Heritage Magazine |volume=32 |issue=1 |pages=42–43 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180320230826/https://www.sciencehistory.org/distillations/magazine/gold-secrecy-and-prestige |archive-date=20 March 2018 |access-date=20 March 2018}}</ref> Some of the content contained in Newton's papers could have been considered heretical by the church.<ref name="Mann" />

In 1888, after spending sixteen years cataloguing Newton's papers, Cambridge University kept a small number and returned the rest to the Earl of Portsmouth. In 1936, a descendant offered the papers for sale at Sotheby's.<ref name="Kean" /> The collection was broken up and sold for a total of about £9,000.<ref name="Greshko">{{cite journal |last=Greshko |first=Michael |date=4 April 2016 |title=Isaac Newton's Lost Alchemy Recipe Rediscovered |url=http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/04/160404-isaac-newton-alchemy-mercury-recipe-chemistry-science/ |journal=National Geographic |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160426031049/http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/04/160404-isaac-newton-alchemy-mercury-recipe-chemistry-science/ |archive-date=26 April 2016 |access-date=25 April 2016}}</ref> [[John Maynard Keynes]] was one of about three dozen bidders who obtained part of the collection at auction. Keynes went on to reassemble an estimated half of Newton's collection of papers on alchemy before donating his collection to Cambridge University in 1946.<ref name="Kean">{{cite journal |last=Kean |first=Sam |year=2011 |title=Newton, The Last Magician |url=http://www.neh.gov/humanities/2011/januaryfebruary/feature/newton-the-last-magician |url-status=live |journal=Humanities |volume=32 |issue=1 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160413235352/http://www.neh.gov/humanities/2011/januaryfebruary/feature/newton-the-last-magician |archive-date=13 April 2016 |access-date=25 April 2016}}</ref>

All of Newton's known writings on alchemy are currently being put online in a project undertaken by [[Indiana University]]: "The Chymistry of Isaac Newton"<ref name="Indiana">{{cite web |title=The Chymistry of Isaac Newton |url=https://webapp1.dlib.indiana.edu/newton/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160426013127/http://webapp1.dlib.indiana.edu/newton/ |archive-date=26 April 2016 |access-date=25 April 2016 |website=Indiana University, Bloomington}}</ref> and has been summarised in a book.<ref>{{cite book |last=Newman |first=William&nbsp;R. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NT9hDwAAQBAJ |title=Newton the Alchemist Science, Enigma, and the Quest for Nature's "Secret Fire" |date=2018 |publisher=Princeton University Press |isbn=978-0-691-17487-7}}</ref>

{{blockquote|Newton's fundamental contributions to science include the quantification of gravitational attraction, the discovery that white light is actually a mixture of immutable spectral colors, and the formulation of the calculus. Yet there is another, more mysterious side to Newton that is imperfectly known, a realm of activity that spanned some thirty years of his life, although he kept it largely hidden from his contemporaries and colleagues. We refer to Newton's involvement in the discipline of alchemy, or as it was often called in seventeenth-century England, "chymistry."<ref name="Indiana" />}}

In June 2020, two unpublished pages of Newton's notes on [[Jan Baptist van Helmont]]'s book on plague, ''De Peste'', were being auctioned online by [[Bonhams]]. Newton's analysis of this book, which he made in Cambridge while protecting himself from [[Great Plague of London|London's 1665–66 epidemic]] of the bubonic plague, is the most substantial written statement he is known to have made about the plague, according to Bonhams. As far as the therapy is concerned, Newton writes that "the best is a toad suspended by the legs in a chimney for three days, which at last vomited up earth with various insects in it, on to a dish of yellow wax, and shortly after died. Combining powdered toad with the excretions and serum made into lozenges and worn about the affected area drove away the contagion and drew out the poison".<ref>{{cite news |last=Flood |first=Alison |date=2 June 2020 |title=Isaac Newton proposed curing plague with toad vomit, unseen papers show |work=The Guardian |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/jun/02/isaac-newton-plague-cure-toad-vomit |url-status=live |access-date=6 June 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200606192933/https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/jun/02/isaac-newton-plague-cure-toad-vomit |archive-date=6 June 2020}}</ref>

== Legacy ==
{{See also|Isaac Newton in popular culture}}

=== Recognition ===
[[File:Tumba de Isaac Newton - panoramio (cropped).jpg|thumb|upright=1.2|Newton's tomb monument in [[Westminster Abbey]] by [[John Michael Rysbrack]]]]

The mathematician and astronomer [[Joseph Louis Lagrange|Joseph-Louis Lagrange]] frequently asserted that Newton was the greatest [[genius]] who ever lived,<ref>{{cite book |last=Andrade |first=Edward |author-link=Edward Andrade |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UQqLHyd8K0IC&pg=PA275 |title=The World of Mathematics: Volume 1 |publisher=[[Dover Publications]] |year=2000 |isbn=978-0-486-41153-8 |editor-last=Newman |editor-first=James R. |editor-link=James R. Newman |edition=Reprint |page=275 |chapter=Isaac Newton}}</ref> and once added that Newton was also "the most fortunate, for we cannot find more than once a system of the world to establish."<ref>Fred L. Wilson, ''History of Science: Newton'' citing: Delambre, M. "Notice sur la vie et les ouvrages de M. le comte J.L. Lagrange", ''Oeuvres de Lagrange'' I. Paris, 1867, p.&nbsp;xx.</ref> English poet [[Alexander Pope]] wrote the famous [[epitaph]]:

{{blockquote|Nature, and Nature's laws lay hid in night.<br />
God said, ''Let Newton be!'' and all was light.}}

But this was not allowed to be inscribed in Newton's monument at Westminster. The epitaph added is as follows:<ref name="westminster_newton">{{cite news |last=Westminster Abbey |title=Sir Isaac Newton Scientist, Mathematician and Astronomer |url=https://www.westminster-abbey.org/ko/abbey-commemorations/commemorations/sir-isaac-newton |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220809191135/https://www.westminster-abbey.org/ko/abbey-commemorations/commemorations/sir-isaac-newton |archive-date=9 August 2022 |access-date=19 January 2022 |newspaper=Westminster Abbey}}</ref>

{{blockquote|{{lang|la|H. S. E. ISAACUS NEWTON Eques Auratus, / Qui, animi vi prope divinâ, / Planetarum Motus, Figuras, / Cometarum semitas, Oceanique Aestus. Suâ Mathesi facem praeferente / Primus demonstravit: / Radiorum Lucis dissimilitudines, / Colorumque inde nascentium proprietates, / Quas nemo antea vel suspicatus erat, pervestigavit. / Naturae, Antiquitatis, S. Scripturae, / Sedulus, sagax, fidus Interpres / Dei O. M. Majestatem Philosophiâ asseruit, / Evangelij Simplicitatem Moribus expressit. / Sibi gratulentur Mortales, / Tale tantumque exstitisse / HUMANI GENERIS DECUS. / NAT. XXV DEC. A.D. MDCXLII. OBIIT. XX. MAR. MDCCXXVI,}}}}

which can be translated as follows:<ref name="westminster_newton" />

{{blockquote|Here is buried Isaac Newton, Knight, who by a strength of mind almost divine, and mathematical principles peculiarly his own, explored the course and figures of the planets, the paths of comets, the tides of the sea, the dissimilarities in rays of light, and, what no other scholar has previously imagined, the properties of the colours thus produced. Diligent, sagacious and faithful, in his expositions of nature, antiquity and the holy Scriptures, he vindicated by his philosophy the majesty of God mighty and good, and expressed the simplicity of the Gospel in his manners. Mortals rejoice that there has existed such and so great an ornament of the human race! He was born on 25th December 1642, and died on 20th March 1726.}}

Newton has been called "the most influential figure in the history of Western science",<ref>{{cite book |last=Simmons |first=John G. |url=https://archive.org/details/scientific100ran0000simm/page/3 |title=The Scientific 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Scientists, Past and Present |publisher=Citadel Press |year=1996 |isbn=978-0-8065-1749-0 |location=Secaucus, New Jersey |page=3}}</ref> and has been regarded as "the central figure in the history of science", who "more than anyone else is the source of our great confidence in the power of science."<ref name=":7">{{cite book |last=Rowlands |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CRM0DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA20 |title=Newton and Modern Physics |publisher=[[World Scientific Publishing]] |year=2017 |isbn=978-1-78634-332-1 |location= |page=20}}</ref> ''[[New Scientist]]'' called Newton "the supreme genius and most enigmatic character in the history of science".<ref name=":0">{{cite web |title=Isaac Newton |url=https://www.newscientist.com/people/isaac-newton/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230928162212/https://www.newscientist.com/people/isaac-newton/ |archive-date=28 September 2023 |access-date=28 September 2023 |website=New Scientist}}</ref> The philosopher and historian [[David Hume]] also declared that Newton was "the greatest and rarest genius that ever arose for the ornament and instruction of the species".<ref>{{cite book |last=Schmidt |first=Claudia M. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZSXlNY6xIMoC&pg=PA101 |title=David Hume: Reason in History |date=2003 |publisher=Pennsylvania State University Press |isbn=978-0-271-02264-2 |location= |pages=101–102}}</ref> In his home of [[Monticello]], [[Thomas Jefferson]], a [[Founding Fathers of the United States|Founding Father]] and [[President of the United States]], kept portraits of [[John Locke]], [[Francis Bacon|Sir Francis Bacon]], and Newton, whom he described as "the three greatest men that have ever lived, without any exception", and who he credited with laying "the foundation of those superstructures which have been raised in the Physical and Moral sciences".<ref>{{cite book |last=Hayes |first=Kevin J. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9eDQCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA370 |title=The Road to Monticello: The Life and Mind of Thomas Jefferson |date=2012 |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |others=Thomas Jefferson |isbn=978-0-19-989583-0 |edition= |location= |page=370 }}</ref> The writer and philosopher [[Voltaire]] wrote of Newton that "If all the geniuses of the universe were assembled, Newton should lead the band".<ref name=":27" /> The neurologist and psychoanalyst [[Ernest Jones]] wrote of Newton as "the greatest genius of all times".<ref>{{cite journal |last=Jones |first=Ernest |author-link=Ernest Jones |date=4 August 1956 |title=The Nature of Genius |journal=BMJ |volume=2 |issue=4987 |pages=257–262 |doi=10.1136/bmj.2.4987.257 |issn=0959-8138 |pmc=2035007 |pmid=13342465}}</ref> The mathematician [[Guillaume de l'Hôpital]] had a mythical reverence for Newton, which he expressed with a profound question and statement: "Does Mr. Newton eat, or drink, or sleep like other men? I represent him to myself as a celestial genius, entirely disengaged from matter."<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0SgAAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA297 |title=The National Quarterly Review |editor-last=Sears |editor-first=Edward I. |volume=XIII |publication-date=1866 |page=297}}</ref>

Newton has further been called "the towering figure of the [[Scientific Revolution]]" and that "In a period rich with outstanding thinkers, Newton was simply the most outstanding." The polymath [[Johann Wolfgang von Goethe]] labelled the year in which [[Galileo Galilei]] died and Newton was born, 1642, as the "[[Christmas]] of the modern age".<ref name=":9" /> In the polymath [[Vilfredo Pareto]]'s estimation, Newton was the greatest human being who ever lived.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Turner |first1=Jonathan H. |url=https://archive.org/details/emergenceofsocio0000turn_f1q7/page/366 |title=The Emergence of Sociological Theory |last2=Beeghley |first2=Leonard |last3=Powers |first3=Charles H. |year=1989 |publisher=Dorsey Press |isbn=978-0-256-06208-3 |edition=2nd |series= |location= |page=366 }}</ref> On the bicentennial of Newton's death in 1927, the astronomer [[James Jeans]] stated that he "was certainly the greatest man of science, and perhaps the greatest intellect, the human race has seen".<ref name=":27">{{cite journal |last=Jeans |first=J. H. |author-link=James Jeans |date=26 March 1927 |title=Isaac Newton |url=https://www.nature.com/doifinder/10.1038/119028a0x |journal=Nature |volume=119 |issue=2995supp |pages=28–30 |doi=10.1038/119028a0x |issn=0028-0836}}</ref> The physicist Peter Rowlands also notes that Newton was "possibly possessed of the most powerful intellect in the whole of human history".<ref name=":23" /> Newton conceived four revolutions—in optics, mathematics, mechanics, and gravity—but also foresaw a fifth in electricity, though he lacked the time and energy in old age to fully accomplish it.<ref name=":10">{{cite magazine |last=Morrow |first=Lance |author-link=Lance Morrow |date=31 December 1999 |title=17th Century: Isaac Newton (1642–1727) |url=https://time.com/archive/6737426/17th-century-isaac-newton-1642-1727/ |access-date=19 December 2024 |magazine=[[Time (magazine)|Time]]}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Rowlands |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CRM0DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA24 |title=Newton And Modern Physics |publisher=World Scientific |year=2017 |isbn=978-1-78634-332-1 |pages=24–25}}</ref> Newton's work is considered the most influential in bringing forth modern science.<ref name=":25">{{cite journal |last=Westfall |first=Richard S. |author-link=Richard S. Westfall |date=1981 |title=The Career of Isaac Newton: A Scientific Life in the Seventeenth Century |journal=The American Scholar |volume=50 |issue=3 |pages=341–353 |issn=0003-0937 |jstor=41210741}}</ref>{{sfn|Iliffe|Smith|2016|pp=1, 4, 12–16}}<ref>{{Cite book |last=Simmons |first=George Finlay |author-link=George F. Simmons |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=orbXDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA328 |title=Calculus Gems: Brief Lives and Memorable Mathematics |date=2019 |publisher=American Mathematical Society |isbn=978-1-4704-5128-8 |series=Spectrum Ser |location= |page=328}}</ref><ref name=":26">{{cite book |last=Snobelen |first=Stephen D. |contribution=Isaac Newton |date=24 February 2021 |title=Renaissance and Reformation |url=https://oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780195399301/obo-9780195399301-0462.xml |access-date=15 November 2024 |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |doi=10.1093/obo/9780195399301-0462 |isbn=978-0-19-539930-1 |author-link=Stephen Snobelen}}</ref>

The physicist [[Ludwig Boltzmann]] called Newton's ''Principia'' "the first and greatest work ever written about [[theoretical physics]]".<ref>{{cite book |last=Boltzmann |first=Ludwig |author-link=Ludwig Boltzmann |url=https://archive.org/details/theoretical-physics-and-philosophical-problems-selected-writings/page/157 |title=Theoretical Physics and Philosophical Problems: Selected Writings |date=1974 |publisher=Springer Netherlands |isbn=978-90-277-0250-0 |editor-last=McGuinness |editor-first=Brian |location= |page=157}}</ref> The physicist [[Stephen Hawking]] similarly called ''Principia'' "probably the most important single work ever published in the [[Outline of physical science|physical sciences]]".<ref name=":62">{{cite book |last=Pask |first=Colin |author-link=Colin Pask |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lRhnAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA11 |title=Magnificent Principia: Exploring Isaac Newton's Masterpiece |date=2013 |publisher=Prometheus Books |isbn=978-1-61614-746-4 |location= |page=11}}</ref> Lagrange called ''Principia'' "the greatest production of the human mind", and noted that "he felt dazed at such an illustration of what man's intellect might be capable".<ref name=":8">{{cite book |last=Ball |first=W. W. Rouse |author-link=W. W. Rouse Ball |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kIxsAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA352 |title=A Short Account of the History of Mathematics |publisher=Macmillan & Co. |year=1915 |edition=6th |page=352}}</ref>

The physicist [[Edward Andrade]] stated that Newton "was capable of greater sustained mental effort than any man, before or since". He also noted the place of Newton in history, stating:<ref>{{cite book |last=Andrade |first=Edward |author-link=Edward Andrade |title=The World of Mathematics: Volume 1 |publisher=[[Dover Publications]] |year=2000 |isbn=978-0-486-41153-8 |editor-last=Newman |editor-first=James R. |editor-link=James R. Newman |edition=Reprint |pages=255, 275 |chapter=Isaac Newton |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UQqLHyd8K0IC&pg=PA255}}</ref>{{blockquote|From time to time in the history of mankind a man arises who is of universal significance, whose work changes the current of human thought or of human experience, so that all that comes after him bears evidence of his spirit. Such a man was [[Shakespeare]], such a man was [[Beethoven]], such a man was Newton, and, of the three, his kingdom is the most widespread.}}The French physicist and mathematician [[Jean-Baptiste Biot]] praised Newton's genius, stating that:<ref>{{cite book |last=King |first=Edmund Fillingham |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5O49AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA97 |title=A Biographical Sketch of Sir Isaac Newton |publisher=S. Ridge & Son |year=1858 |edition=2nd |page=97}}</ref>
{{blockquote|Never was the supremacy of intellect so justly established and so fully confessed . . . In mathematical and in experimental science without an equal and without an example; combining the genius for both in its highest degree.}}Despite his rivalry with [[Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz|Gottfried Wilhem Leibniz]], Leibniz still praised the work of Newton, with him responding to a question at a dinner in 1701 from [[Sophia Charlotte of Hanover|Sophia Charlotte]], the Queen of Prussia, about his view of Newton with:<ref>{{cite book |last1=Schorling |first1=Raleigh |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qMZXAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA418 |title=General Mathematics |last2=Reeve |first2=William David |publisher=Ginn & Company |year=1919 |page=418 }}</ref>{{sfn|Westfall|1994|p=282}}{{blockquote|Taking mathematics from the beginning of the world to the time of when Newton lived, what he had done was much the better half.}}
The mathematician [[Eric Temple Bell|E.T. Bell]] ranked Newton alongside [[Carl Friedrich Gauss]] and [[Archimedes]] as the three greatest mathematicians of all time,<ref>{{cite book |last=Bell |first=Eric Temple |author-link=Eric Temple Bell |title=The World of Mathematics: Volume 1 |publisher=[[Dover Publications]] |year=2000 |isbn=978-0-486-41153-8 |editor-last=Newman |editor-first=James R. |editor-link=James R. Newman |edition=Reprint |page=295 |chapter=Gauss, the Prince of Mathematicians |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UQqLHyd8K0IC&pg=PA295}}</ref> with the mathematician [[Donald M. Davis (mathematician)|Donald M. Davis]] also noting that Newton is generally ranked with the other two as the greatest mathematicians ever.<ref name=":33">{{cite book |last=Davis |first=Donald M. |author-link=Donald M. Davis (mathematician) |url=https://archive.org/details/naturepowerofmat0000davi/page/15 |title=The Nature and Power of Mathematics |year=1993 |publisher=[[Princeton University Press]] |isbn=0-691-08783-0 |edition= |series= |location= |pages=15, 92, 366 }}</ref> In his 1962 paper from the journal ''The Mathematics Teacher'', the mathematician Walter Crosby Eells sought to objectively create a list that classified the most eminent mathematicians of all time; Newton was ranked first out of a list of the top 100, a position that was statistically confirmed even after taking probable error into account in the study.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Eells |first=Walter Crosby |date=1962 |title=One hundred eminent mathematicians |journal=The Mathematics Teacher |volume=55 |issue=7 |pages=582–588 |doi=10.5951/MT.55.7.0582 |jstor=27956690 |issn=0025-5769}}</ref> In his book ''Wonders of Numbers'' in 2001, the science editor and author [[Clifford A. Pickover]] ranked his top ten most influential mathematicians that ever lived, placing Newton first in the list.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Pickover |first=Clifford A. |author-link=Clifford A. Pickover |url=https://archive.org/details/wondersofnumbers0000pick_g6a7/page/78 |title=Wonders of Numbers: Adventures in Mathematics, Mind, and Meaning |date=2001 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-513342-4 |location= |page=78}}</ref> In ''The Cambridge Companion to Isaac Newton'' (2016), he is described as being "from a very young age, an extraordinary problem-solver, as good, it would appear, as humanity has ever produced".{{sfn|Iliffe|Smith|2016|p=30}} He is ultimately ranked among the top two or three greatest theoretical scientists ever, alongside [[James Clerk Maxwell]] and [[Albert Einstein]], the greatest mathematician ever alongside Carl F. Gauss, and in the first rank of experimentalists, thereby putting "Newton in a class by himself among empirical scientists, for one has trouble in thinking of any other candidate who was in the first rank of even two of these categories." Also noted is "At least in comparison to subsequent scientists, Newton was also exceptional in his ability to put his scientific effort in much wider perspective".{{sfn|Iliffe|Smith|2016|pp=15–16}} Gauss himself had Archimedes and Newton as his heroes,<ref>{{cite book |last=Goldman |first=Jay R. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=A0FZDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA88 |title=The Queen of Mathematics: A Historically Motivated Guide to Number Theory |date=1998 |publisher=A.K. Peters |isbn=978-1-56881-006-5 |location= |page=88}}</ref> and used terms such as [[wiktionary:clarissimus|''clarissimus'']] or [[wiktionary:magnus|''magnus'']] to describe other intellectuals such as great mathematicians and philosophers, but reserved [[wiktionary:summus|''summus'']] for Newton only, and once realising the immense influence of Newton's work on scientists such as Lagrange and [[Pierre-Simon Laplace]], Gauss then exclaimed that "Newton remains forever the master of all masters!"<ref name=":8" /><ref>{{cite book |last=Dunnington |first=Guy Waldo |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MMH2DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA57 |title=Carl Friedrich Gauss: Titan of Science |year=2004 |publisher=Mathematical Association of America |isbn=978-0-88385-547-8 |series= |pages=57, 232}}</ref>

In his book ''Great Physicists'', the chemist William H. Cropper highlighted the unparalleled genius of Newton, stating:<ref>{{cite book |last=Cropper |first=William H. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UqbxZpELwHYC&pg=PA39 |title=Great Physicists: The Life and Times of Leading Physicists from Galileo to Hawking |date=2004 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-517324-6 |edition= |location= |page=39}}</ref>

{{blockquote|On one assessment there should be no doubt: Newton was the greatest creative genius physics has ever seen. None of the other candidates for the superlative (Einstein, Maxwell, Boltzmann, [[Josiah Willard Gibbs|Gibbs]], and [[Richard Feynman|Feynman]]) has matched Newton's combined achievements as theoretician, experimentalist, ''and'' mathematician.}}Albert Einstein kept a picture of Newton on his study wall alongside ones of [[Michael Faraday]] and of James Clerk Maxwell.<ref>{{cite news |last=Gleeson-White |first=Jane |date=10 November 2003 |title=Einstein's Heroes |url=https://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/books/einsteins-heroes-20031110-gdhr3v.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191128115406/https://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/books/einsteins-heroes-20031110-gdhr3v.html |archive-date=28 November 2019 |access-date=29 September 2021 |work=The Sydney Morning Herald}}</ref> Einstein stated that Newton's creation of calculus in relation to his laws of motion was "perhaps the greatest advance in thought that a single individual was ever privileged to make."<ref>{{cite book |last=Capra |first=Fritjof |author-link=Fritjof Capra |title=The Tao of Physics: An Exploration of the Parallels Between Modern Physics and Eastern Mysticism |year=1975 |publisher=Shambhala |isbn=978-0-87773-078-1 |location=Berkeley |page=56 }}</ref> He also noted the influence of Newton, stating that:<ref name=":6">{{cite book |last=Pask |first=Colin |author-link=Colin Pask |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lRhnAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA11 |title=Magnificent Principia: Exploring Isaac Newton's Masterpiece |date=2013 |publisher=Prometheus Books |isbn=978-1-61614-746-4 |location=Amherst, New York |page=11}}</ref>{{blockquote|The whole evolution of our ideas about the processes of nature, with which we have been concerned so far, might be regarded as an organic development of Newton's ideas.}}In 1999, an opinion poll of 100 of the day's leading physicists voted Einstein the "greatest physicist ever," with Newton the runner-up, while a parallel survey of rank-and-file physicists ranked Newton as the greatest.<ref>{{cite news |date=29 November 1999 |title=Opinion poll. Einstein voted 'greatest physicist ever' by leading physicists; Newton runner-up |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/541840.stm |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170812011359/http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/541840.stm |archive-date=12 August 2017 |access-date=17 January 2012 |work=BBC News}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last= |first= |date=29 November 1999 |title=Newton tops PhysicsWeb poll |url=https://physicsworld.com/a/newton-tops-physicsweb-poll/ |access-date=19 November 2024 |website=Physics World }}</ref> In 2005, a dual survey of the public and members of Britain's [[Royal Society]] asked two questions: who made the bigger overall contributions to science and who made the bigger positive contributions to humankind, with the candidates being Newton or Einstein. In both groups, and for both questions, the consensus was that Newton had made the greater overall contributions.<ref>{{cite web |date=23 November 2005 |title=Newton beats Einstein in polls of scientists and the public |url=https://royalsociety.org/news/2012/newton-einstein/ |access-date=19 June 2024 |website=[[Royal Society]]}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last= |first= |date=24 November 2005 |title=Newton beats Einstein in new poll |url=https://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2005/11/24/1515693.htm |access-date=11 September 2024 |website=www.abc.net.au }}</ref>

In 1999 [[Time (magazine)|''Time'']] magazine named Newton the [[Time Person of the Year#Special editions|Person of the Century]] for the 17th century.<ref name=":10" /> Newton placed sixth in the ''[[100 Greatest Britons]]'' poll conducted by [[BBC]] in 2002. However, in 2003, he was voted as the greatest Briton in a poll conducted by [[BBC News (international TV channel)|BBC World]], with [[Winston Churchill]] second.<ref>{{cite news |date=13 August 2003 |title=Newton voted greatest Briton |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/3151333.stm |access-date=22 November 2024 |work=[[BBC News]]}}</ref> He was voted as the greatest [[Cantabrigian]] by University of Cambridge students in 2009.<ref>{{cite news |date=20 November 2009 |title=Newton voted Greatest Cantabrigian |url=https://www.varsity.co.uk/news/1609 |access-date=30 November 2024 |work=[[Varsity (Cambridge)|Varsity]]}}</ref>

The physicist [[Lev Landau]] [[Lev Landau#Landau's ranking of physicists|ranked physicists on a logarithmic scale]] of productivity and genius ranging from 0 to 5. The highest ranking, 0, was assigned to Newton. Einstein was ranked 0.5. A rank of 1 was awarded to the fathers of [[quantum mechanics]], such as [[Werner Heisenberg]] and [[Paul Dirac]]. Landau, a Nobel prize winner and the discoverer of [[superfluidity]], ranked himself as 2.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Mitra |first=Asoke |author-link=Asoke Nath Mitra |date=1 November 2006 |title=New Einsteins need positive environment, independent spirit |url=https://pubs.aip.org/physicstoday/article/59/11/12/395831/New-Einsteins-need-positive-environment |journal=Physics Today |volume=59 |issue=11 |page=12 |doi=10.1063/1.4797321 |bibcode=2006PhT....59k..12M |issn=0031-9228|url-access=subscription }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Goldberg |first=Elkhonon |author-link=Elkhonon Goldberg |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Rr9EDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA166 |title=Creativity: The Human Brain in the Age of Innovation |date=2018 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-046649-7 |location=New York, NY |page=166 }}</ref>

The [[SI derived unit]] of [[force]] is named the [[Newton (unit)|newton]] in his honour.

Most of Newton's surviving scientific and technical papers are kept at [[Cambridge University]]. [[Cambridge University Library]] has the largest collection and there are also papers in [[Kings College, Cambridge|Kings College]], [[Trinity College, Cambridge|Trinity College]], and the [[Fitzwilliam Museum]]. There is an archive of theological and alchemical papers in the [[National Library of Israel]], and smaller collections at the [[Smithsonian Institution]], [[Stanford University Library]], and the [[Huntington Library]]. The [[Royal Society]] in London also has some manuscripts.<ref>{{cite web |title=PROPOSAL TO ADD AN EXEMPLAR/DOCUMENT TO AN EXISTING INSCRIPTION |url=https://media.unesco.org/sites/default/files/webform/mow001/israel_uk_newton_en.pdf |access-date=1 September 2025 |website=UNESCO}}</ref> The Israel collection was inscribed by [[UNESCO]] on its [[Memory of the World International Register]] in 2015, recognising the global significance of the documents. The Cambridge and Royal Society collections were added to this inscription in 2017.<ref>{{cite web |title=The Scientific and Mathematical Papers of Sir Isaac Newton |url=https://www.unesco.org/en/memory-world/scientific-and-mathematical-papers-sir-isaac-newton |publisher=UNESCO Memory of the World Programme |access-date=1 September 2025}}</ref>

=== Apple incident ===
{{Multiple image|direction=vertical|align=right|image1=Sapling of newton apple tree (cropped).jpg|image2=Newton's tree, Botanic Gardens, Cambridge (sign).jpg|image3=Newtons apple.jpg|width=220|caption3=Reputed descendants of Newton's apple tree at (from top to bottom): [[Trinity College, Cambridge]], the [[Cambridge University Botanic Garden]], and the [[Instituto Balseiro]] library garden in Argentina}}
Newton often told the story that he was inspired to formulate his theory of gravitation by watching the fall of an apple from a tree.{{sfn|White|1997|p=86}}{{sfn|Numbers|2015|pp=48–56}} The story is believed to have passed into popular knowledge after being related by [[Catherine Barton]], Newton's niece, to [[Voltaire]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Malament |first=David B. |url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780812695076/page/118 |title=Reading Natural Philosophy: Essays in the History and Philosophy of Science and Mathematics |date=2002 |publisher=Open Court Publishing |isbn=978-0-8126-9507-6 |pages=118–119}}</ref> Voltaire then wrote in his ''Essay on Epic Poetry'' (1727), "Sir Isaac Newton walking in his gardens, had the first thought of his system of gravitation, upon seeing an apple falling from a tree."<ref>{{cite book |last=Voltaire |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0o5bAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA104 |title=An Essay upon the Civil Wars of France, extracted from curious Manuscripts and also upon the Epick Poetry of the European Nations, from Homer down to Milton |date=1727 |publisher=Samuel Jallasson |location=London, England |page=104}} From p.&nbsp;104: 'In the like Manner ''Pythagoras'' ow'd the Invention of Musik to the noise of the Hammer of a Blacksmith. And thus in our Days Sir ''Isaak Newton'' walking in his Garden had the first Thought of his System of Gravitation, upon seeing an apple falling from a Tree.'</ref><ref>Voltaire (1786) heard the story of Newton and the apple tree from Newton's niece, Catherine Conduit (née Barton) (1679–1740): {{cite book |last=Voltaire |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NKWTGHiZSm4C&pg=PA175 |title=Oeuvres completes de Voltaire |date=1786 |publisher=Jean-Jacques Tourneisen |volume=31 |location=Basel, Switzerland |page=175 |language=French |trans-title=The complete works of Voltaire |access-date=15 June 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210709192112/https://books.google.com/books?id=NKWTGHiZSm4C&pg=PA175 |archive-date=9 July 2021 |url-status=live}} From p.&nbsp;175: ''"Un jour en l'année 1666, ''Newton'' retiré à la campagne, et voyant tomber des fruits d'un arbre, à ce que m'a conté sa nièce, (Mme ''Conduit'') se laissa aller à une méditation profonde sur la cause qui entraine ainsi tous les corps dans une ligne, qui, si elle était prolongée, passerait à peu près par le centre de la terre."'' (One day in the year 1666 ''Newton'' withdrew to the country, and seeing the fruits of a tree fall, according to what his niece (Madame ''Conduit'') told me, he entered into a deep meditation on the cause that draws all bodies in a [straight] line, which, if it were extended, would pass very near to the centre of the Earth.)</ref>

Although some question the veracity of the apple story,<ref name="Berkun2010" />{{sfnp|Gribbin|Gribbin|2017|pages=165{{ndash}}175}} acquaintances of Newton attribute the story to Newton himself, though not the apocryphal version that the apple actually hit Newton's head.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=McKie |first1=Douglas |last2=De Beer |first2=Gavin Rylands |date=January 1997 |title=Newton's apple |url=https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsnr.1951.0003 |journal=Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London |volume=9 |issue=1 |pages=46–54 |doi=10.1098/rsnr.1951.0003|url-access=subscription }}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last1=McKie |first1=D. |last2=de Beer |first2=G. R. |date=1952 |title=Newton's Apple: An Addendum |journal=Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London |volume=9 |issue=2 |pages=333–335 |doi=10.1098/rsnr.1952.0020 |jstor=3087221 |s2cid=144544715 |issn=0035-9149 |doi-access=free }}</ref> [[William Stukeley]], whose manuscript account of 1752 has been made available by the Royal Society, recorded a conversation with Newton in Kensington on 15 April 1726:<ref name="Newton's apple: The real story" /><ref name="NP">{{cite web |title=Revised Memoir of Newton (Normalized Version) |url=http://www.newtonproject.ox.ac.uk/view/texts/normalized/OTHE00001 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170314064817/http://www.newtonproject.ox.ac.uk/view/texts/normalized/OTHE00001 |archive-date=14 March 2017 |access-date=13 March 2017 |website=The Newton Project}}</ref>

{{Blockquote|we went into the garden, & drank thea under the shade of some appletrees, only he, & myself. amidst other discourse, he told me, he was just in the same situation, as when formerly, the notion of gravitation came into his mind. "why should that apple always descend perpendicularly to the ground," thought he to him self: occasion'd by the fall of an apple, as he sat in a comtemplative mood: "why should it not go sideways, or upwards? but constantly to the earths centre? assuredly, the reason is, that the earth draws it. there must be a drawing power in matter. & the sum of the drawing power in the matter of the earth must be in the earths center, not in any side of the earth. therefore dos this apple fall perpendicularly, or toward the center. if matter thus draws matter; it must be in proportion of its quantity. therefore the apple draws the earth, as well as the earth draws the apple."<!-- Please do not correct the spelling in this quotation, which is as per the cited source. -->}}

[[John Conduitt]], Newton's assistant at the Royal Mint and husband of Newton's niece, also described the event when he wrote about Newton's life:<ref name="Keynes Ms. 130.4:Conduitt's account of Newton's life at Cambridge" />

{{Blockquote|In the year 1666 he retired again from Cambridge to his mother in Lincolnshire. Whilst he was pensively meandering in a garden it came into his thought that the power of gravity (which brought an apple from a tree to the ground) was not limited to a certain distance from earth, but that this power must extend much further than was usually thought. Why not as high as the Moon said he to himself & if so, that must influence her motion & perhaps retain her in her orbit, whereupon he fell a calculating what would be the effect of that supposition.}}
It is known from his notebooks that Newton was grappling in the late 1660s with the idea that terrestrial gravity extends, in an inverse-square proportion, to the Moon,<ref>I. Bernard Cohen and George E. Smith, eds. ''The Cambridge Companion to Newton'' (2002) p.&nbsp;6</ref> as [[Newton–Hooke priority controversy for the inverse square law|other scientists]] had already conjectured. Around 1665, Newton made quantitative analysis, considering the period and distance of the Moon's orbit and considering the timing of objects falling on Earth. Newton did not publish these results at the time because he could not prove that the [[Shell theorem|Earth's gravity acts as if all its mass were concentrated at its center]]. That proof took him twenty years.<ref name="Weinberg-1972">{{cite book |last=Weinberg |first=Steven |author-link=Steven Weinberg |url=https://archive.org/details/gravitationcosmo00stev_0/page/13 |title=Gravitation and cosmology |date=1972 |publisher=John Wiley & Sons |isbn=978-0-471-92567-5 |url-access=registration}}</ref>{{rp|13}}

Detailed analysis of historical accounts backed up by [[dendrochronology]] and DNA analysis indicate that the sole apple tree in a garden at [[Woolsthorpe Manor]] was the tree Newton described.<ref name="Keesing-1998">{{Cite journal |last=Keesing |first=R. G. |date=1998-05-01 |title=The history of Newton's apple tree |url=https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1998ConPh..39..377K |journal=Contemporary Physics |volume=39 |issue=5 |pages=377–391 |bibcode=1998ConPh..39..377K |doi=10.1080/001075198181874 |issn=0010-7514 |access-date=2023-06-07 |archive-date=2023-07-08 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230708151817/https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1998ConPh..39..377K |url-status=live}}</ref> The tree blew over in at storm sometime around 1816, regrew from is roots,<ref>{{cite web |last=Moore |first=Keith |date=February 2012 |title=newtons-apple-tree |url=https://royalsociety.org/blog/2012/02/newtons-apple-tree/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211003133759/https://royalsociety.org/blog/2012/02/newtons-apple-tree/ |archive-date=3 October 2021 |access-date=3 October 2021 |website=Royal Society}}</ref> and continues as a tourist attraction under the care of the [[National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty|National Trust]].<ref>{{Cite news |last=Staff |first=Times |date=2023-06-27 |title=Gravity of damage facing Newton's tree prompts action |newspaper=[[The Times]] |language=en |url=https://www.thetimes.com/life-style/wildlife-nature/article/gravity-of-damage-facing-newtons-tree-prompts-action-xz5gmtv53gj |access-date=2023-06-27 |issn=0140-0460 |archive-date=2023-06-27 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230627125359/https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/gravity-of-damage-facing-newtons-tree-prompts-action-xz5gmtv53gj |url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="National Trust">{{Cite web |title=Woolsthorpe Manor {{!}} Lincolnshire |url=https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/visit/nottinghamshire-lincolnshire/woolsthorpe-manor/things-to-do-at-woolsthorpe-manor#rt-the-apple-tree |access-date=2025-09-17 |website=National Trust |archive-date=3 October 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211003130446/https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/woolsthorpe-manor/features/the-most-famous-apple-tree-in-the-world|language=en}}</ref>

A descendant of the original tree<ref>{{cite book |last=Mart́ínez |first=Alberto A. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BOTTBAAAQBAJ&pg=PA69 |title=Science Secrets: The Truth about Darwin's Finches, Einstein's Wife, and Other Myths |date=2011 |publisher=University of Pittsburgh Press |isbn=978-0-8229-4407-2 |location= |page=69 |oclc=682895134}}</ref> can be seen growing outside the main gate of Trinity College, Cambridge, below the room Newton lived in when he studied there. The [[National Fruit Collection]] at [[Brogdale]] in Kent can supply grafts from their tree, which appears identical to [[Flower of Kent]], a coarse-fleshed cooking variety.<ref name="From the National Fruit Collection: Isaac Newton's Tree" />

=== Commemorations ===
[[File:Isaac Newton statue.jpg|thumb|upright|Newton statue on display at the [[Oxford University Museum of Natural History]] portrays him contemplating the fallen apple.]]
Newton's monument (1731) can be seen in [[Westminster Abbey]], at the north of the entrance to the choir against the choir screen, near his tomb. It was executed by the sculptor [[Michael Rysbrack]] (1694–1770) in white and grey marble with design by the architect [[William Kent]].<ref>'The Abbey Scientists' Hall, A.R. p13: London; Roger & Robert Nicholson; 1966</ref> The monument features a figure of Newton reclining on top of a [[sarcophagus]], his right elbow resting on several of his great books and his left hand pointing to a scroll with a mathematical design. Above him is a pyramid and a celestial globe showing the signs of the Zodiac and the path of the comet of 1680. A relief panel depicts [[putti]] using instruments such as a telescope and prism.<ref name="wmabbey" />

From 1978 until 1988, an image of Newton designed by Harry Ecclestone appeared on Series D £1 banknotes issued by the [[Bank of England]] (the last £1 notes to be issued by the Bank of England). Newton was shown on the reverse of the notes holding a book and accompanied by a telescope, a prism and a map of the [[Solar System]].<ref name="bankofengland" />

A statue of Isaac Newton, looking at an apple at his feet, can be seen at the [[Oxford University Museum of Natural History]]. A large bronze statue, ''[[Newton, after William Blake]]'', by [[Eduardo Paolozzi]], dated 1995 and inspired by [[William Blake]]'s [[Newton (Blake)|etching]], dominates the piazza of the [[British Library]] in London. A bronze statue of Newton was erected in 1858 in the centre of [[Grantham]] where he went to school, prominently standing in front of [[Grantham Guildhall]].

The still-surviving farmhouse at Woolsthorpe By Colsterworth is a Grade I [[listed building]] by [[Historic England]] through being his birthplace and "where he discovered gravity and developed his theories regarding the refraction of light".<ref name="ReferenceA">{{NHLE|num=1062362|desc=Woolsthorpe Manor House, Colsterworth|access-date=5 October 2021}}</ref>

The [[Institute of Physics]], or IOP, has its highest and most prestigious award, the [[Isaac Newton Medal]], named after Newton, which is given for world-leading contributions to physics.<ref>{{cite web |date=12 July 2018 |title=Canadian Association of Physicists Canadian physicist Paul Corkum is recipient of the highest medal awarded by the UK Institute of Physics |url=https://cap.ca/publications/cap-news/canadian-physicist-paul-corkum-recipient-highest-medal-awarded-uk-institute-physics/ |access-date=22 August 2025 |website=cap.ca }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=2024 Isaac Newton Medal and Lecture |url=https://www.iop.org/about/awards/2024-isaac-newton-medal-and-prize |access-date=22 August 2025 |website=www.iop.org }}</ref> It was first awarded in 2008.
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== The Enlightenment ==
It is held by European philosophers of the [[Age of Enlightenment|Enlightenment]] and by historians of the Enlightenment that Newton's publication of the [[Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica|''Principia'']] was a turning point in the [[Scientific Revolution]] and started the Enlightenment. It was Newton's conception of the universe based upon natural and rationally understandable laws that became one of the seeds for Enlightenment ideology.<ref>{{cite book |last=Gribbin |first=John |url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780713997316/page/241 |title=Science: A History; 1543–2001 |date=2002 |publisher=Allen Lane |isbn=978-0-7139-9503-9 |edition= |location=London |page=241}}</ref> [[John Locke]] and [[Voltaire]] applied concepts of natural law to political systems advocating intrinsic rights; the [[physiocrat]]s and [[Adam Smith]] applied natural conceptions of [[psychology]] and self-interest to economic systems; and [[sociology|sociologists]] criticised the current [[social order]] for trying to fit history into natural models of [[progress (history)|progress]].{{citation needed|date=April 2025}} [[James Burnett, Lord Monboddo]] and [[Samuel Clarke]] resisted elements of Newton's work, but eventually rationalised it to conform with their strong religious views of nature.<ref>{{cite book |last=Wilson |first=David B. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=53w2gMknsMYC&pg=PA213 |title=Seeking Nature's Logic: Natural Philosophy in the Scottish Enlightenment |date=2009 |publisher=Pennsylvania State University Press |isbn=978-0-271-03525-3 |location= |pages=213–215 |oclc=276712924}}</ref>

== Works ==

=== Published in his lifetime ===
* ''[[De analysi per aequationes numero terminorum infinitas]]'' (1669, published 1711)<ref>Anders Hald 2003 – ''A history of probability and statistics and their applications before 1750'' – 586&nbsp;pages ''Volume&nbsp;501 of Wiley series in probability and statistics'' [https://books.google.com/books?id=pOQy6-qnVx8C&q=de%20analysi%20per%20aequationes%20numero%20terminorum%20infinitas&pg=PA563 Wiley-IEEE, 2003] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220602024647/https://books.google.com/books?id=pOQy6-qnVx8C&pg=PA563&q=de%20analysi%20per%20aequationes%20numero%20terminorum%20infinitas |date=2 June 2022 }} Retrieved 27 January 2012 {{ISBN|0-471-47129-1}}</ref>
* ''Of Natures Obvious Laws & Processes in Vegetation'' (unpublished, {{circa|1671}}–75)<ref>{{cite web |title=Natures obvious laws & processes in vegetation – Introduction |url=http://webapp1.dlib.indiana.edu/newton/mss/intro/ALCH00081/query/field1=text&text1=Of%20Natures%20obvious%20laws%20&%20processes%20in%20vegetation |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210117172142/http://webapp1.dlib.indiana.edu/newton/mss/intro/ALCH00081/query/ |archive-date=17 January 2021 |access-date=17 January 2021 |website=The Chymistry of Isaac Newton}} Transcribed and online at [[Indiana University (Bloomington)|Indiana University]].</ref>
* ''[[De motu corporum in gyrum]]'' (1684)<ref>Whiteside, D.T., ed. (1974). ''Mathematical Papers of Isaac Newton, 1684–1691''. '''6'''. Cambridge University Press. [https://books.google.com/books?id=lIZ0v23iqRgC&pg=PA30 pp.&nbsp;30–91.] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160610163025/https://books.google.com/books?id=lIZ0v23iqRgC&pg=PA30 |date=10 June 2016 }}</ref>
* ''[[Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica]]'' (1687)<ref>{{cite web |title=Museum of London exhibit including facsimile of title page from John Flamsteed's copy of 1687 edition of Newton's ''Principia'' |url=http://www.museumoflondon.org.uk/archive/exhibits/pepys/pages/largeImage.asp?id=101&size=3&nav=none |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120331192529/http://www.museumoflondon.org.uk/archive/exhibits/pepys/pages/largeImage.asp?id=101&size=3&nav=none |archive-date=31 March 2012 |access-date=16 March 2012 |publisher=Museumoflondon.org.uk}}</ref>
* ''[[Newton scale|Scala graduum Caloris. Calorum Descriptiones & signa]]'' (1701)<ref>Published anonymously as "Scala graduum Caloris. Calorum Descriptiones & signa." in ''Philosophical Transactions'', 1701, [https://books.google.com/books?id=x8NeAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA824 824] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200121085937/https://books.google.com/books?id=x8NeAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA824 |date=21 January 2020 }}–829;
ed. Joannes Nichols, ''Isaaci Newtoni Opera quae exstant omnia'', vol.&nbsp;4 (1782), [https://books.google.com/books?id=Dz2FzJqaJMUC&pg=PA403 403] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160617115723/https://books.google.com/books?id=Dz2FzJqaJMUC&pg=PA403 |date=17 June 2016 }}–407.
Mark P. Silverman, ''A Universe of Atoms, An Atom in the Universe'', Springer, 2002, [https://books.google.com/books?id=-Er5pIsYe_AC&pg=PA49 p.&nbsp;49.] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160624011536/https://books.google.com/books?id=-Er5pIsYe_AC&pg=PA49 |date=24 June 2016 }}</ref>
* ''[[Opticks]]'' (1704)<ref>{{cite book |last=Newton |first=Isaac |url=http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k3362k |title=Opticks or, a Treatise of the reflexions, refractions, inflexions and colours of light. Also two treatises of the species and magnitude of curvilinear figures |publisher=Sam. Smith. and Benj. Walford |year=1704 |access-date=17 March 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210224021530/http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k3362k |archive-date=24 February 2021 |url-status=live}}</ref>
* ''Reports as Master of the Mint'' (1701–1725)<ref name="Pickover2008">{{cite book |last=Pickover |first=Clifford |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SQXcpvjcJBUC&pg=PA117 |title=Archimedes to Hawking: Laws of Science and the Great Minds Behind Them |date=2008 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-979268-9 |pages=117–18 |access-date=17 March 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240226145626/https://books.google.com/books?id=SQXcpvjcJBUC&pg=PAPA117#v=onepage&q&f=false |archive-date=26 February 2024 |url-status=live}}</ref>
* ''[[Arithmetica Universalis]]'' (1707)<ref name="Pickover2008" />

=== Published posthumously ===
* ''De mundi systemate'' (''The System of the World'') (1728)<ref name="Pickover2008" />
* ''Optical Lectures'' (1728)<ref name="Pickover2008" />
* ''[[The Chronology of Ancient Kingdoms Amended]]'' (1728)<ref name="Pickover2008" />
* ''Observations on Daniel and The Apocalypse of St. John'' (1733)<ref name="Pickover2008" />
* ''[[Method of Fluxions]]'' (1671, published 1736)<ref>{{cite magazine |last=Swetz |first=Frank&nbsp;J. |title=Mathematical Treasure: Newton's Method of Fluxions |url=https://www.maa.org/press/periodicals/convergence/mathematical-treasure-newtons-method-of-fluxions |url-status=live |magazine=Convergence |publisher=Mathematical Association of America |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170628213844/http://www.maa.org/press/periodicals/convergence/mathematical-treasure-newtons-method-of-fluxions |archive-date=28 June 2017 |access-date=17 March 2018}}</ref>
* ''[[An Historical Account of Two Notable Corruptions of Scripture]]'' (1754)<ref name="Pickover2008" />

== See also ==
* ''[[Elements of the Philosophy of Newton]]'', a book by Voltaire
* [[List of multiple discoveries#17th century|List of multiple discoveries: seventeenth century]]
* [[List of presidents of the Royal Society]]
* [[List of things named after Isaac Newton]]

== References ==
=== Notes ===
{{Notelist}}

=== Citations ===
{{Reflist|refs=
<ref name="Berkun2010">{{cite book |last=Berkun |first=Scott |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kPCgnc70MSgC&pg=PAPA4 |title=The Myths of Innovation |date=2010 |publisher=O'Reilly Media, Inc. |isbn=978-1-4493-8962-8 |page=4 |author-link=Scott Berkun |access-date=1 December 2018 |archive-date=17 March 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200317084422/https://books.google.com/books?id=kPCgnc70MSgC&pg=PAPA4 |url-status=live }}</ref>

<ref name="Enlightenment and Religion: Rational Dissent in eighteenth-century Britain">{{cite book |last=Haakonssen |first=Knud |title=Enlightenment and Religion: Rational Dissent in Eighteenth-century Britain |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hszsutQ5xrcC&pg=PA64 |date=1996 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-56060-3 |editor-last=Martin Fitzpatrick |location=Cambridge |page=64 |chapter=The Enlightenment, politics and providence: some Scottish and English comparisons}}</ref>

<ref name="From the National Fruit Collection: Isaac Newton's Tree">{{cite web |url=http://www.nationalfruitcollection.org.uk/full2.php?varid=2946&&acc=1948729 |title=From the National Fruit Collection: Isaac Newton's Tree |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220705225956/http://www.nationalfruitcollection.org.uk/full2.php?varid=2946&&acc=1948729 |archive-date=5 July 2022|access-date= 5 July 2022}}.</ref>

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<ref name="Hamblyn (2011)">{{cite book|last=Hamblyn|first=Richard|date=2011|title=The Art of Science|publisher=[[Pan Macmillan]]|isbn=978-1-4472-0415-2|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1xKFSqsDj0MC&pg=PAPT57|chapter=Newtonian Apples: William Stukeley|access-date=1 December 2018|archive-date=9 March 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200309013441/https://books.google.com/books?id=1xKFSqsDj0MC&pg=PAPT57|url-status=live}}</ref>
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<ref name="Keynes Ms. 130.4:Conduitt's account of Newton's life at Cambridge">{{cite web|url=http://www.newtonproject.sussex.ac.uk/view/texts/normalized/THEM00167|last=Conduitt|first=John|title=Keynes Ms. 130.4:Conduitt's account of Newton's life at Cambridge|website=Newtonproject|publisher=Imperial College London|access-date=30 August 2006|archive-date=7 November 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091107101632/http://www.newtonproject.sussex.ac.uk/view/texts/normalized/THEM00167|url-status=live}}</ref>

<ref name="More">{{cite book|last=Westfall|first=Richard&nbsp;S.|orig-date=1980|date=1983|title=Never at Rest: A Biography of Isaac Newton|publisher=Cambridge University Press|location=Cambridge|isbn=978-0-521-27435-7|pages= 530–531|url=https://archive.org/details/neveratrestbiogr00west/page/530}}</ref>

<ref name="Newton's Alchemy and His Theory of Matter">{{cite journal|last=Dobbs|first=J.&nbsp;T.|date=December 1982|title=Newton's Alchemy and His Theory of Matter|journal=Isis|volume=73|issue=4|page=523|doi=10.1086/353114|s2cid=170669199}} quoting ''Opticks''</ref>

<ref name="Newton's apple: The real story">{{cite journal|journal=New Scientist|url=https://www.newscientist.com/blogs/culturelab/2010/01/newtons-apple-the-real-story.php|archive-url=https://archive.today/20100121073908/http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/culturelab/2010/01/newtons-apple-the-real-story.php|archive-date=21 January 2010|title=Newton's apple: The real story|date=18 January 2010|access-date=10 May 2010}}</ref>

<ref name="Newton, Isaac (1642–1727)">{{cite web|url=http://scienceworld.wolfram.com/biography/Newton.html|title=Newton, Isaac (1642–1727)|website=Eric Weisstein's World of Biography|access-date=30 August 2006|publisher=Eric W. Weisstein|archive-date=28 April 2006|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060428081045/http://scienceworld.wolfram.com/biography/Newton.html|url-status=live}}</ref>

<ref name="OPN1">{{cite journal|last=Duarte|first=F.&nbsp;J.|author-link=F. J. Duarte|year=2000|title=Newton, prisms, and the 'opticks' of tunable lasers|journal=Optics and Photonics News|volume=11|issue=5|pages=24–25|doi=10.1364/OPN.11.5.000024|bibcode=2000OptPN..11...24D|url=http://www.tunablelasers.com/F.J.DuarteOPN%282000%29.pdf|access-date=17 February 2015|archive-date=17 February 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150217223512/http://www.tunablelasers.com/F.J.DuarteOPN%282000%29.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref>

<ref name="Science and Religion in Seventeenth-Century England">{{cite book|last=Westfall |first=Richard&nbsp;S. |date=1970 |title=Science and Religion in Seventeenth-Century England |url=https://archive.org/details/sciencereligioni0000west/page/200|publisher=Yale University Press |location=New Haven |page=200 |isbn=978-0-208-00843-5}}</ref>

<!--ref name="Singular scientists">{{cite journal|last=James|first=Ioan|date=January 2003|journal=Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine|volume=96|issue=1|pages=36–39|pmc=539373|doi=10.1258/jrsm.96.1.36|pmid=12519805|title=Singular scientists}}</ref-->

<ref name="The Collected Writings of John Maynard Keynes Volume X">{{cite book|last=Keynes |first=John Maynard |date=1972 |chapter=Newton, The Man |title=The Collected Writings of John Maynard Keynes Volume X |publisher=MacMillan St. Martin's Press |pages=363–66}}</ref>

<!-- <ref name="The Early Period (1608–1672)">{{cite web|url=http://etoile.berkeley.edu/~jrg/TelescopeHistory/Early_Period.html |title=The Early Period (1608–1672) |access-date=3 February 2009 |publisher=James R. Graham's Home Page }}{{dead link|date=June 2017 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref> -->

<ref name="The Newtonians and the English Revolution: 1689–1720">{{cite book|last=Jacob|first=Margaret&nbsp;C.|date=1976|title=The Newtonians and the English Revolution: 1689–1720|url=https://archive.org/details/newtoniansenglis00jaco|url-access=registration|publisher=Cornell University Press|pages=[https://archive.org/details/newtoniansenglis00jaco/page/37 37], 44|isbn=978-0-85527-066-7}}</ref>

<ref name="White 1997, p170">{{harvnb|White|1997|p=170}}</ref>

<ref name="bankofengland">{{cite web|url=http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/banknotes/denom_guide/nonflash/1-SeriesD-Revised.htm|title=Withdrawn banknotes reference guide|publisher=Bank of England|access-date=27 August 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100505053927/http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/banknotes/denom_guide/nonflash/1-SeriesD-Revised.htm|archive-date=5 May 2010}}</ref>

<!-- <ref name="dulles">Avery Cardinal Dulles. [https://www.firstthings.com/article/2005/01/the-deist-minimum The Deist Minimum] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131006023220/http://www.firstthings.com/print.php?type=article&year=2008&month=08&title_link=the-deist-minimum--28 |date=6 October 2013 }} (January 2005).</ref> unused -->

<ref name="hooke1679nov24">See 'Correspondence of Isaac Newton, vol.&nbsp;2, 1676–1687' ed. H.W. Turnbull, Cambridge University Press 1960; at p.&nbsp;297, document No. 235, letter from Hooke to Newton dated 24 November 1679.</ref>

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<ref name="royalsoc.ac.uk">{{cite web |title=Newton beats Einstein in polls of Royal Society scientists and the public |website=The Royal Society |url=http://royalsociety.org/News.aspx?id=1324&terms=Newton+beats+Einstein+in+polls+of+scientists+and+the+public |access-date=24 August 2010 |archive-date=13 July 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170713073814/https://royalsociety.org/News.aspx?id=1324&terms=Newton+beats+Einstein+in+polls+of+scientists+and+the+public |url-status=live }}</ref>
-->

<ref name="wmabbey">{{cite web|url=http://www.westminster-abbey.org/our-history/people/sir-isaac-newton|title=Famous People & the Abbey: Sir Isaac Newton|publisher=Westminster Abbey|access-date=13 November 2009|archive-date=16 October 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091016081238/http://www.westminster-abbey.org/our-history/people/sir-isaac-newton|url-status=live}}</ref>}}

=== Bibliography ===
{{refbegin|30em}}
* {{cite book |last=Ball |first=W.&nbsp;W. Rouse |title=A Short Account of the History of Mathematics |edition=4th |location=London |publisher=Macmillan & Co. |date=1908 |url=https://archive.org/details/ashortaccounthi01ballgoog/page/n9}} Reprinted, Dover Publications, 1960, {{isbn|978-0-486-20630-1}}, and [https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/31246 Project Gutenberg], 2010.
* {{cite book |last=Gjertsen |first=Derek |title=The Newton Handbook |publisher=Routledge & Kegan Paul |location=London |date=1986 |isbn=0-7102-0279-2}}
* {{Cite book |title=Out of the shadow of a giant: Hooke, Halley and the birth of British science |last1=Gribbin |last2=Gribbin |first1= John |first2=Mary |isbn=978-0-00-822059-4 |location=London |oclc=966239842 |year=2017 |publisher=William Collins |author-link=John Gribbin}}
* {{cite book |last=Hall |first=Alfred Rupert |author-link=A. Rupert Hall |url=https://archive.org/details/a.-rupert-hall-philosophers-at-war-the-quarrel-between-newton-and-leibniz |title=Philosophers at War: The Quarrel Between Newton and Leibniz |date=1980 |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |isbn=978-0-521-22732-2}}
* {{cite book |url= |title=The Cambridge Companion to Newton |date=2016 |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |isbn=978-1-139-05856-8 |editor-last=Iliffe |editor-first=Rob |edition=2nd |doi=10.1017/cco9781139058568 |editor-last2=Smith |editor-first2=George E.}}
* {{cite book |last1=Katz |first1=David S. |editor1-last=Kushner |editor1-first=Tony |title=The Marginalization of Early Modern Jewish History |date=1992 |publisher=Frank Cass |isbn=0-7146-3464-6 |pages=42–59 |chapter=Englishness and Medieval Anglo-Jewry}}
* {{cite book |last=Levenson |first=Thomas |title=Newton and the Counterfeiter: The Unknown Detective Career of the World's Greatest Scientist |publisher=Mariner Books |date=2009 |isbn=978-0-547-33604-6}}
* {{cite book |last=Manuel |first=Frank&nbsp;E. |title=A Portrait of Isaac Newton |url=https://archive.org/details/portraitofisaacn00manu |url-access=registration |date=1968 |publisher=Belknap Press of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA}}
* {{cite book |last=Numbers |first=R.&nbsp;L. |year=2015 |title=Newton's Apple and Other Myths about Science |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pWouCwAAQBAJ |publisher=Harvard University Press |isbn=978-0-674-91547-3 |access-date=7 December 2018 |archive-date=8 July 2023 |oclc=906121832 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230708151321/https://books.google.com/books?id=pWouCwAAQBAJ |url-status=live}}
* {{cite book |last=Stewart |first=James |title=Calculus: Concepts and Contexts |publisher=Cengage Learning |date=2009 |isbn=978-0-495-55742-5}}
* {{cite book |author-link=Richard S. Westfall |last=Westfall |first=Richard&nbsp;S. |title=Never at Rest |publisher=Cambridge University Press |date=1980 |isbn=978-0-521-27435-7 |url=https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%28westfall%29%20newton}}
* {{cite book |last=Westfall |first=Richard&nbsp;S. |title=Isaac Newton |publisher=Cambridge University Press |date=2007 |isbn=978-0-19-921355-9}}
* {{cite book |last=Westfall |first=Richard&nbsp;S. |title=The Life of Isaac Newton |publisher=Cambridge University Press |date=1994 |isbn=978-0-521-47737-6 |url=https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%28westfall%29%20newton}}
* {{cite book |author-link=Michael White (author) |title=Isaac Newton: The Last Sorcerer |first=Michael |last=White |publisher=Fourth Estate Limited |date=1997 |isbn=978-1-85702-416-6}}
{{refend}}

== Further reading ==
=== Primary ===
{{refbegin|colwidth=30em}}
* Newton, Isaac. ''The Principia: Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy.'' [[University of California Press]], (1999)
** Brackenridge, J. Bruce. ''The Key to Newton's Dynamics: The Kepler Problem and the Principia: Containing an English Translation of Sections 1, 2, and 3 of Book One from the First (1687) Edition of Newton's Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy'', University of California Press (1996)
* Newton, Isaac. ''The Optical Papers of Isaac Newton. Vol. 1: The Optical Lectures, 1670–1672'', Cambridge University Press (1984)
** Newton, Isaac. ''Opticks'' (4th ed. 1730) [https://archive.org/details/opticksoratreat00newtgoog online edition]
** Newton, I. (1952). Opticks, or A Treatise of the Reflections, Refractions, Inflections & Colours of Light. New York: Dover Publications.
* Newton, I. ''Sir Isaac Newton's Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy and His System of the World'', tr. A. Motte, rev. [[Florian Cajori]]. Berkeley: University of California Press (1934)
* {{cite book |editor-link=Tom Whiteside |editor-last=Whiteside |editor-first=D.&nbsp;T. |title=The Mathematical Papers of Isaac Newton |location=Cambridge |publisher=Cambridge University Press |date=1967–1982 |isbn=978-0-521-07740-8}}&nbsp;– 8 volumes.
* Newton, Isaac. ''The correspondence of Isaac Newton,'' ed. H.W. Turnbull and others, 7 vols (1959–77)
* ''Newton's Philosophy of Nature: Selections from His Writings'' edited by H.S. Thayer (1953; online edition)
* Isaac Newton, Sir; J Edleston; [[Roger Cotes]], ''Correspondence of Sir Isaac Newton and Professor Cotes, including letters of other eminent men'', London, John W. Parker, West Strand; Cambridge, John Deighton (1850, Google Books)
* Maclaurin, C. (1748). ''An Account of Sir Isaac Newton's Philosophical Discoveries, in Four Books''. London: A. Millar and J. Nourse
* Newton, I. (1958). ''Isaac Newton's Papers and Letters on Natural Philosophy and Related Documents'', eds. I.B. Cohen and R.E. Schofield. Cambridge: Harvard University Press
* Newton, I. (1962). ''The Unpublished Scientific Papers of Isaac Newton: A Selection from the Portsmouth Collection in the University Library, Cambridge'', ed. A.R. Hall and M.B. Hall. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
* Newton, I. (1975). ''Isaac Newton's 'Theory of the Moon's Motion''' (1702). London: Dawson
{{refend}}

=== Alchemy further reading ===
{{Refbegin}}
* {{cite book |last=Craig |first=John |date=1946 |title=Newton at the Mint |location=Cambridge, England |publisher=Cambridge University Press |oclc=245736525}}
* {{cite book |last=Craig |first=John |year=1953 |chapter=XII. Isaac Newton |title=The Mint: A History of the London Mint from A.D. 287 to 1948 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge, England |pages=198–222 |asin=B0000CIHG7 |oclc=977070945}}
* {{cite book |last=de Villamil |first=Richard |author-link=Richard de Villamil |year=1972 |orig-date=1931 |title=Newton, the Man |url=https://archive.org/details/newtonman0000rich |url-access=registration |others=Preface by Albert Einstein |location=New York |publisher=Johnson Reprint Corporation |lccn=71-166282 |oclc=314151}}
* {{cite book |last=Dobbs |first=B. J. T. |year=1975 |title=The Foundations of Newton's Alchemy or "The Hunting of the Greene Lyon" |location=Cambridge |publisher=Cambridge University Press |oclc=5894382246}}
* {{cite book |last=Keynes |first=John Maynard |author-link=John Maynard Keynes |year=1933 |orig-date=1923 (reprint) |chapter=Newton, the Man |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.462938/page/n309/mode/2up |editor-last=Keynes |editor-first=Geoffrey |title=Essays in Biography |url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.462938 |location=London |publisher=Rupert Hart-Davis |oclc=459767439}} Keynes took a close interest in Newton and owned many of Newton's private papers.
* {{cite book |last=Stukeley |first=W. |year=1936 |orig-date=1752 |editor-last=White |editor-first=A. H. |title=Memoirs of Sir Isaac Newton's Life |location=London |publisher=Taylor and Francis |oclc=1333392}}
* {{cite journal |last=Trabue |first=J. |date=January–April 2004 |title=Ann and Arthur Storer of Calvert County, Maryland, Friends of Sir Isaac Newton |journal=[[The American Genealogist]] |volume=79 |issue=1–2 |pages=13–27}}
{{Refend}}

=== Religion ===
{{refbegin|colwidth=40em}}
* Dobbs, Betty Jo Tetter. ''The Janus Faces of Genius: The Role of Alchemy in Newton's Thought.'' (1991), links the alchemy to Arianism
* Force, James E., and Richard H. Popkin, eds. ''Newton and Religion: Context, Nature, and Influence.'' (1999), pp.&nbsp;xvii, 325.; 13 papers by scholars using newly opened manuscripts
* {{cite journal |last1=Pfizenmaier |first1=Thomas&nbsp;C. |title=Was Isaac Newton an Arian? |journal=Journal of the History of Ideas |year=1997 |volume=58 |issue=1 |pages=57–80 |doi=10.1353/jhi.1997.0001 |jstor=3653988 |s2cid=170545277}}
* {{cite journal |last1=Ramati |first1=Ayval |title=The Hidden Truth of Creation: Newton's Method of Fluxions |journal=The British Journal for the History of Science |date=2001 |volume=34 |issue=4 |pages=417–38 |doi=10.1017/S0007087401004484 |jstor=4028372 |s2cid=143045863}}
* {{cite journal |last1=Snobelen |first1=Stephen&nbsp;D. |title='God of Gods, and Lord of Lords': The Theology of Isaac Newton's General Scholium to the Principia |journal=Osiris |date=2001 |volume=16 |pages=169–208 |doi=10.1086/649344 |jstor=301985 |bibcode=2001Osir...16..169S |s2cid=170364912}}
* {{cite journal |last1=Snobelen |first1=Stephen&nbsp;D. |title=Isaac Newton, heretic: the strategies of a Nicodemite |journal=The British Journal for the History of Science |date=December 1999 |volume=32 |issue=4 |pages=381–419 |doi=10.1017/S0007087499003751 |jstor=4027945 |s2cid=145208136}}
{{refend}}

=== Science ===
{{refbegin|colwidth=40em}}
* {{cite book |last=Bechler |first=Zev |title=Contemporary Newtonian Research (Studies in the History of Modern Science)(Volume 9) |date=2013 |publisher=Springer |isbn=978-94-009-7717-4}}
* Berlinski, David. ''Newton's Gift: How Sir Isaac Newton Unlocked the System of the World.'' (2000); {{isbn|0-684-84392-7}}
* {{cite book |title=Newton's Principia for the Common Reader |last=Chandrasekhar |first=Subrahmanyan |publisher=Clarendon Press |year=1995 |isbn=978-0-19-851744-3 |location=Oxford |author-link=Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar}}
* Cohen, I. Bernard and Smith, George E., ed. ''The Cambridge Companion to Newton.'' (2002). Focuses on philosophical issues only; excerpt and text search; complete edition online {{cite web |url=http://www.questia.com/read/105054986 |title=The Cambridge Companion to Newton |access-date=13 October 2008 |archive-date=8 October 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081008010311/http://www.questia.com/read/105054986}}
** {{cite book |title=The Cambridge Companion to Newton |publisher=Cambridge University Press |date=2016 |isbn=978-1-139-05856-8 |doi=10.1017/cco9781139058568 |ref={{sfnref|Cambridge University Press|2016}} |editor-last1=Iliffe |editor-last2=Smith |editor-first1=Rob |editor-first2=George E.}}
* {{cite book |last=Christianson |first=Gale |title=In the Presence of the Creator: Isaac Newton & His Times |location=New York |publisher=Free Press |date=1984 |isbn=978-0-02-905190-0 |url=https://archive.org/details/inpresenceofcr00chri}} This well documented work provides, in particular, valuable information regarding Newton's knowledge of [[Patristics]]
* {{cite book |last=Cohen |first=I.&nbsp;B. |title=The Newtonian Revolution |date=1980 |location=Cambridge |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-22964-7}}
* {{cite journal |last=Craig |first=John |title=Isaac Newton&nbsp;– Crime Investigator |journal=Nature |year=1958 |volume=182 |issue=4629 |pages=149–52 |doi=10.1038/182149a0 |bibcode=1958Natur.182..149C |s2cid=4200994}}
* {{cite journal |last=Craig |first=John |title=Isaac Newton and the Counterfeiters |journal=Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London |volume=18 |issue=2 |year=1963 |pages=136–45 |doi=10.1098/rsnr.1963.0017 |s2cid=143981415}}
* {{cite book |last=Gleick |first=James |title=Isaac Newton |publisher=Alfred A. Knopf |date=2003 |isbn=978-0-375-42233-1}}
* {{cite journal |last=Halley |first=E. |title=Review of Newton's Principia |year=1687 |journal=[[Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society|Philosophical Transactions]] |volume=186 |pages=291–97}}
* [[Stephen Hawking|Hawking, Stephen]], ed. ''On the Shoulders of Giants''. {{isbn|0-7624-1348-4}} Places selections from Newton's ''Principia'' in the context of selected writings by Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo and Einstein
* {{cite book |last=Herivel |first=J.&nbsp;W. |title=The Background to Newton's Principia. A Study of Newton's Dynamical Researches in the Years 1664–84 |url=https://archive.org/details/backgroundtonewt0000heri |url-access=registration |publisher=Clarendon Press |location=Oxford |date=1965}}
* Newton, Isaac. ''Papers and Letters in Natural Philosophy'', edited by [[I. Bernard Cohen]]. [[Harvard University Press]], 1958, 1978; {{isbn|0-674-46853-8}}.
* {{cite journal |last=Pemberton |first=H. |title=A View of Sir Isaac Newton's Philosophy |journal=The Physics Teacher |volume=4 |issue=1 |pages=8–9 |year=1728 |bibcode=1966PhTea...4....8M |doi=10.1119/1.2350900}}
* {{cite book |last=Shamos |first=Morris&nbsp;H. |title=Great Experiments in Physics |location=New York |publisher=Henry Holt and Company, Inc. |date=1959}} Reprinted, Dover Publications, 1987, {{isbn|978-0-486-25346-6}}.
{{refend}}

== External links ==
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{{Spoken Wikipedia|Isaac Newton.ogg|date=30 July 2008}}
* {{UK National Archives ID}}
* {{NPG name|name=Sir Isaac Newton}}
* {{Gutenberg author |id=6288| name=Isaac Newton}}
* {{Internet Archive author |sname=Isaac Newton}}
* {{Librivox author |id=2836}}

===Digital archives===
* [https://www.newtonproject.ox.ac.uk/ The Newton Project] from [[University of Oxford]]
* [https://makingscience.royalsociety.org/s/rs/people/fst01801333 Newton's papers] in the [[Royal Society]] archives
* [https://www.nli.org.il/en/discover/humanities/newton-manuscripts The Newton Manuscripts] at the [[National Library of Israel]]
* [http://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/collections/newton Newton Papers (currently offline)] from [[University of Cambridge|Cambridge]] Digital Library
* [https://archive.org/details/bim_early-english-books-1641-1700_geographia-generalis-_varen-bernhard_1681 Bernhardus Varenius, ''Geographia Generalis'', ed. Isaac Newton, 2nd ed. (Cambridge: Joann. Hayes, 1681)] from the [[Internet Archive]]
{{Isaac Newton|state=collapsed}}
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