The construction of the wonderful canon of logarithms

To THE Reader,
Nor do I doubt, but that this posthumous work would
have seen tJie light in a much more perfect and finished
state, if God hadgranted a longer enjoyment of life to the
Author, my most dearly loved father, in whom., by the
opinion of the wisest men, among other illustrious gifts
this showed itselfpre-eminent, that the most difficult matters
were unravelled by a sure and easy method, as well as
in thefewest words.
You have then {kind Reader) in this little book m,ost
amply unfolded the theory ofthe construction of logarithms,
{here called by him artificial numbers, for he had this
treatise written out beside him. several years before the
word Logarithm was invented^ in which their nature,
characteristics, and various relations to their natural
numbers, are clearly demonstrated.
It seemed desirable also to add to the theory an Appendix
as to the construction of another and better kind of logarithms
{mentioned by the Author in the preface to his
Rabdologiae) in which the logarithm of unity is o.
After this follows the last fruit of his labours, pointing
to the ultimateperfecting ofhis Logarithmic Trigonometry,
namely certain very remarkable propositions for the resolution
ofspherical triangles not quadrantal, without dividing
them, into quadrantal or rectangular triangles. These
propositions, which are absolutely general, he had determined
to reduce into order and successively to prove, had he
not been snatched away from us by a too hasty death.
We have also taken care to have printed some Studies on
the above-mentioned Propositions, and on the new kind of
Logarithms, by that most excellent Mathematician Henry
Briggs, public Professor at London, who for the singular
friendship which subsisted between him. and my father of
illustrious mem,ory, took upon himself in the most willing
spirit, the very heavy labour of com.puting this new Canon,
the method of its creation and the explanation of its use
being