Isaac Newton — "The particles of light are exceedingly small, and move with exceeding swiftness."
The particles of light are exceedingly small, and move with exceeding swiftness.
Get This Quote & Author's Image Illustrated On:
Click any product to generate a realistic preview. Up to 3 at a time.
* Initial load can take up to 90 seconds — revising the preview in another color is nearly instant.
Kitchen
Apparel
Other
More from Isaac Newton
"For if the experiments which I relate be accurate, the science of colours will be a new one; for although colours have been observed from antiquity, yet the cause of their productions has remained unk…"
"The best and safest method of philosophizing seems to be, first to inquire diligently into the properties of things, and to establish those properties by experiments, and then to proceed more slowly t…"
"What goes up must come down."
"If I have seen further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants."
"In the absence of any other proof, the thumb alone would convince me of God's existence."
Verification
Unverifiable
Found in 1 providers: grok
1 source checked
Understanding this quote
What it means
Light is made of extremely tiny particles traveling at incredible speed. Newton is asserting a physical claim about the fundamental nature of light itself — that it has a corpuscular (particle-based) structure and that its velocity surpasses anything else in the observable world. He's grounding an abstract optical phenomenon in concrete physical terms anyone can grasp.
Relevance to Isaac Newton
Newton championed the corpuscular theory of light in his Opticks (1704), directly opposing Huygens' wave theory. This reflects his empiricist commitment to observable, mechanical explanations for natural phenomena. His work on prisms, reflection, and refraction all built toward this particle model, and he defended it with the same mathematical rigor he applied to gravity and motion.
The era
The late 1600s–early 1700s saw fierce debate over light's fundamental nature — particle versus wave — as natural philosophy shifted from Aristotelian tradition toward experimental science. The Royal Society era demanded mechanistic explanations. Newton's authority was so immense that his particle theory suppressed the wave theory for over a century, until Young's double-slit experiment in 1801 revived it.
AI-generated insights based on extensive research and information for context. Factual errors? Email [email protected].