Elements of Analytic Geometry (Classic Reprint)

Excerpt from Elements of Analytic GeometryAlthough writing a text-book for the use of beginners following a short course, the tendency of an author is to sacrifice the practical value of the treatise to completeness, generalization, and scientific presentation. I have endeavored to avoid this error, which renders many works unsuitable for the class-room, however valuable they may be for reference, and yet to encourage the habit of generalization. To this end I have attempted to shun the difficulties involved in introducing the beginner to the copies, before he is familiar with their forms, through the discussion of the general equation; and at the same time to secure to him the advantages of a general analysis of the equation of the second degree. The teacher will observe the same effort to cultivate the power of general reasoning, which it is one of the objects of Analytic Geometry to promote, in the preliminary construction of loci, a process too often left in the form of a merely mechanical construction of points by substitution in the equation. In passing from Geometry to Analytic Geometry, the student should see that, while the field of operations is extended, the subject matter is essentially the same; and that what is fundamentally new is the method, the lines and surfaces of Geometry being replaced by their equations.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com