John Playfair/Bibliography

A collected edition of Playfair's works, with a memoir by James G. Playfair, appeared at Edinburgh in 4 volumes. His writings include a number of essays contributed to the Edinburgh Review from 1804 onwards, various papers in the ''Phil. Trans. His Elements of Geometry appeared in 1795 and passed through many editions; his Outlines of Natural Philosophy'' (1812-1816) consist of the propositions and formulae which were the basis of his class lectures. Playfair's contributions to pure mathematics were not considerable, his paper "On the Arithmetic of Impossible Quantities," that "On the Causes which affect the Accuracy of Barometrical Measurements," and his Elements of Geometry, all already referred to, being the most important. His lives of Matthew Stewart, Hutton, Robison, many of his reviews, and above all his "Dissertation" are of the utmost value.