To the READER.
new ones, tho' ſometimes I choſe rather to do it. For the ſame reaſon I was willing to uſe for the moſt part Euclide's own Demonſtrations, having only expreſs'd them in a more ſuccinct Form, unleſs perhaps in the ſecond, thirteenth, and very few in the ſeventh, eighth, and ninth Book, in which it ſeem'd not worth my while to deviate in any particular from him. Therefore I am not without good hopes that as to this part I have in ſome meaſure ſatisfied both my own Intentions, and the Deſire of the Studious. As for ſome certain Problems and Theorems that are added in the Scholions (or ſhort Expoſitions) either appertaining (by reaſon of their frequent Uſe) to the nature of theſe Elements, or conducing to the ready Demonſtration of thoſe things that follow, or which do intimate the reaſons of ſome principal Rules of practical Geometry, reducing them to their original Fountains, theſe I ſay, will not, I hope, make the Book ſwell to a Size beyond the deſign'd Proportion.
The other Butt, which I levell'd at, is to content the Deſires of thoſe who are delighted more with ſymbolical than verbal Demonſtrations. In which kind, whereas moſt among us are accuſtom'd to the Symbols of Gulielmus Oughtredus, I therefore thought beſt to make uſe, for the moſt part, of his. None hitherto (as I know of) has attempted to interpret and publiſh Euclide after this manner, except P. Herigonius; whose Method (tho' indeed moſt excellent in many things, and very well accommodated for the particular purpoſe of that moſt ingenious Man) yet ſeems in my Opinion to labour under a double Defect. Firſt, in regard that, altho' of two or more Propoſitions, produ-
