Jesuit mathematical texts about weight, equilibrium, machines and motion from approximately 1630 to 1685 represent an interesting intersection between two different, but inter-related, clusters of problems. While these texts contain relevant information about the nature and internal development of the science of mechanics, they also clarify the more contextual issue of the status of science in the Catholic world between Galileo and Newton.
The accepted view of the scientific revolution as a late convergence, in the work of Newton, between Galilean mathematical science, presumably rejected by the Catholic Church after the trial of galileo, and Baconian experimental science wholly rooted in the English Protestant tradition, should, we think, be modified.
a systematic reading of Jesuit texts on mechanics may, in fact, show that the Newtonian model of mathematical-experimental science had antecedents in the work of Catholic mathematicians and natural philosophers, who disseminated and transmitted it through a higly developed and communicative network of hundreds of Jesuit colleges and universities.
Through the study of a number of Jesuit contributions to mechanics we hope to develop a different approach to the study of its development during the Scientific Revolution.
Mechanics was not simply a "new science" arising out of the genius of a few brave heroes who dared to reject and annihilate the tradition. Rather, it was a field of possibilities and constraints, of tradiotion modified by new applications and of innovation delayed by old categories of thought and old practices.

The special problems for any comprehensive treatment of the scientific investigations of Leibniz arise, on the one hand, from the fact that essential parts of his work have not been edited and, on the other hand, from the universality of his scientific interests (in his case ranging from physics through theory of law, linguistic philosophy, and histeriography to particular questions of dogmatic theology). In view of this diversity of interests and the fragmentary, or rather encyclopedic, character of his work, the expositor is confronted with the task of achieving, at least in the part, what Leibniz himself, following architectonic principles (within the framework od scientia generalis), was unable to accomplish.
Leibniz' work is rather a marked metapysical and methodological concern that systematically expresses variations on the same theme in various special fields and underlies Leibniz' quest to establish a unified system of knowledge.
The writings of Leibniz are based on his search for the ultimate grounds of mechanism that led him to metaphysics and the doctrine of entelechies. Instead of setting out his philosophy systematically in a magnum opus, Leibniz presented piecemeal clarifications of his views in works that, in various ways, were inspired by the publications of others, among them Huygens, Hobbes, Descartes, Malebranchem Papin, Arnauld, and Newton.

According to a well established view Galileo's theory of motion as it is laid down in his Discorsi ("Discourse on Two new Sciences") marks the beginning of classical mechanics. His work does not yet represent the full fledged classical theory as it emerged in the contributions of Newton and others, but following this widespread interpretation, Galileo did take the first decisive steps: he criticized and overcame the traditional Aristotelian world picture, he introduced the experimental method, he concentrated on a systematic and concise description of single phenomena rather than searching for their causes and elaborating an overarching philosophy of nature, and he succeeded in the mathematical analysis of some of the key problems of classical mechanics such as the the law of fall or the proposition that the trajectory of projectile motion is parabolic in shape.
Galileo's notes on motion and mechanics (Ms. Gal 72) document his work on these and other mechanical problems over a period of more than forty years. The manuscript consists of more than 300 pages. They contain numerous short texts in Latin and Italian, representing sketches of proofs, but also extended drafts intended for publication, calculations, tables of calculated numbers, diagrams, and even some documents pertaining to experiments performed by Galileo. The manuscript is considered the essential source of information on the intellectual route followed by Galileo in achieving the insights he submitted in the Discorsi .

Galileo's De Motu Antiquiora ('Older Writings on Motion') comprise a set of unpublished documents dating most probably from Galileo's Pisan period (1589-1592). These manuscripts include the Text of an essay on motion (pp. 251-419 in Favaro's edition), two alternative versions of material found in the above essay (pp. 341-43 and 344-66), a dialogue on motion (pp. 367-408), a set of fragmentary notes or memoranda dealing with motion (pp. 409-17), and an outline of topics to be covered in a work on motion (pp. 418-19). These writings document Galileo's early concern with questions such as the speed at which objects fall in different media, the speed of an object moving along an inclined plane, and projectile motion.