Joseph-Louis, comte de Lagrange, born Giuseppe Lodovico Lagrangia (January
25, 1736 Turin, Kingdom of Sardinia - April 10, 1813
Paris) was an Italian mathematician and astronomer who made important contributions to all
fields of analysis and number theory and to
classical and celestial mechanics as
arguably the greatest mathematician of the 18th century. It is said that he was able to
write out his papers complete without a single correction required. Before the age of 20 he was professor of geometry at the royal artillery school at Turin. By his mid-twenties he was recognized as one of the greatest
living mathematicians because of his papers on wave propagation and the maxima and minima
of curves. His greatest work, Mécanique Analytique (Analytical Mechanics)
(4. ed., 2 vols. Paris: Gauthier-Villars et fils, 1888-89. First Edition: 1788), was a mathematical
masterpiece and the basis for all later work in this field. On the recommendation of Euler and D'Alembert, Lagrange succeeded the former as
the director of mathematics at the Prussian Academy of Sciences in
Berlin. Under the First French Empire, Lagrange was
made both a senator and a count; he is buried in the
Panthéon.
It was Lagrange who created the calculus of variations which was later
expanded by Weierstrass, solved the isoperimetrical
problem on which the variational calculus is in part based, and made some important discoveries on the tautochrone which would contribute substantially to the then newly formed subject. Lagrange
established the theory of differential equations, and provided many new solutions
and theorems in number theory, including Wilson's theorem. Lagrange's classic
Theorie des fonctions analytiques laid some of the foundations of group theory,
anticipating Galois. Lagrange developed the mean
value theorem which led to a proof of the fundamental theorem of
calculus, and a proof of Taylor's theorem. Lagrange also invented the method of
solving differential equations known as variation of parameters,
applied differential calculus to the theory
of probabilities and attained notable work on the solution of equations. He
studied the three-body problem for the Earth, Sun, and Moon (1764) and the movement of Jupiter’s satellites (1766), and in 1772 found the special-case solutions to this problem that are now known as Lagrangian points. But above all he impressed on mechanics, having transformed Newtonian mechanics into a branch of analysis, Lagrangian
mechanics as it is now called, and exhibited the so-called mechanical "principles" as simple results of the variational
calculus.
Biography
Early years
He was born, of French and Italian descent, as Giuseppe Lodovico Lagrangia in Turin. His father, who had charge of the Kingdom of
Sardinia's military chest, was of good social position and wealthy, but before his son grew up he had lost most of his
property in speculations, and young Lagrange had to rely on his own abilities for his position. He was educated at the college of
Turin, but it was not until he was seventeen that he showed any taste for mathematics – his interest in the subject being first
excited by a paper by Edmund Halley which he came across by accident. Alone and unaided he
threw himself into mathematical studies; at the end of a year's incessant toil he was already an accomplished mathematician, and
was made a lecturer in the artillery school.
Letters
The first fruit of Lagrange's labours here was his letter, written when he was still only nineteen, to Leonhard Euler, in which he solved the isoperimetrical problem
which for more than half a century had been a subject of discussion. To effect the solution (in which he sought to determine the
form of a function so that a formula in which it entered should satisfy a certain condition) he enunciated the principles of the
calculus of variations.
Euler recognized the generality of the method adopted, and its superiority to that used by himself; and with characteristic
courtesy he withheld a paper he had previously written, which covered some of the same ground, in order that the young Italian
might have time to complete his work, and claim the undisputed invention of the new calculus. The name of this branch of analysis
was suggested by Euler. This paper at once placed Lagrange in the front rank of mathematicians then living.
Miscellanea Taurinensia
In 1758, with the aid of his pupils, Lagrange established a society, which was subsequently
incorporated as the Turin Academy, and most of his early writings are to be found in the five
volumes of its transactions, usually known as the Miscellanea Taurinensia. Many of these are elaborate papers. The first
volume contains a paper on the theory of the propagation of sound; in this he indicates a mistake made by Newton, obtains the general differential equation for the
motion, and integrates it for motion in a straight line. This volume also contains the complete solution of the problem of a
string vibrating transversely; in this paper he points out a lack of generality in the solutions previously given by
Brook Taylor, D'Alembert, and Euler, and
arrives at the conclusion that the form of the curve at any time t is given by the equation 
. The article concludes
with a masterly discussion of echoes, beats, and compound sounds. Other articles in this volume are on recurring series, probabilities, and the calculus of variations.
The second volume contains a long paper embodying the results of several papers in the first volume on the theory and notation
of the calculus of variations; and he illustrates its use by deducing the principle
of least action, and by solutions of various problems in dynamics.
The third volume includes the solution of several dynamical problems by means of the calculus of variations; some papers on
the integral calculus; a solution of Fermat's problem mentioned above, to find a number x which will make (x²n + 1) a
square where n is a given integer which is not a square; and the general differential equations of motion for three bodies moving under their mutual attractions.
Health Problems
In 1761, Lagrange stood without a rival as the foremost living mathematician; but the unceasing
labor of the preceding nine years had seriously affected his health. Furthermore, his doctors refused to be responsible for his
life unless he would rest and exercise, temporarily abandoning the pursuit of further mathematical innovations. Although his
health was temporarily restored, his nervous system never quite recovered, and thus, Lagrange constantly suffered from attacks of
severe melancholy, which have been hypothesized to be the cause of his death.
Middle years
The next work he produced was in 1764 on the libration of the
Moon, and an explanation as to why the same face was always turned to the earth, a problem which he
treated by the aid of virtual work. His solution is especially interesting as containing
the germ of the idea of generalized equations of motion, equations which he first formally proved in 1780.
Royal court
He now set off on a visit to London, but on the way fell ill at Paris. There he was received with marked honour, and it was with regret that he left the brilliant
society of that city to return to his provincial life at Turin. His further stay in the province of Piedmont was, however, short.
In 1766 Euler left Berlin, and Frederick the Great wrote to Lagrange expressing the wish of "the greatest king in Europe" to
have "the greatest mathematician in Europe" resident at his court. Lagrange accepted the offer and spent the next twenty years in
Prussia, where he produced not only the long series of papers published in the Berlin and
Turin transactions, but his monumental work, the Mécanique analytique. His residence at Berlin commenced with an
unfortunate mistake. Finding most of his colleagues married, and assured by their wives that it was the only way to be happy, he
married; his wife soon died, but the union was not a happy one.
Lagrange was a favourite of the king, who used frequently to discourse to him on the advantages of perfect regularity of life.
The lesson went home, and thenceforth Lagrange studied his mind and body as though they were machines, and found by experiment
the exact amount of work which he was able to do without breaking down. Every night he set himself a definite task for the next
day, and on completing any branch of a subject he wrote a short analysis to see what points in the demonstrations or in the
subject-matter were capable of improvement. He always thought out the subject of his papers before he began to compose them, and
usually wrote them straight off without a single erasure or correction.
Treatises
His mental activity during these twenty years was amazing. Not only did he produce his splendid Mécanique analytique,
but he contributed between one and two hundred papers to the Academy of Turin, the Royal Academy of
Berlin, and the Académie française. Some of these are really treatises, and
all without exception are of a high order of excellence. Except for a short time when he was ill he produced on average about one
paper a month. Of these, note the following as amongst the most important.
First, his contributions to the fourth and fifth volumes, 1766–1773, of the Miscellanea Taurinensia; of which the most important was the one in 1771, in which he discussed how numerous astronomical
observations should be combined so as to give the most probable result. And later, his contributions to the first two volumes,
1784–1785, of the transactions of the Turin Academy; to the first of
which he contributed a paper on the pressure exerted by fluids in motion, and to the second an article on integration by
infinite series, and the kind of problems for which it is suitable.
Most of the papers sent to Paris were on astronomical questions, and among these one ought to particularly mention his paper
on the Jovian system in 1766, his essay on the problem of three bodies in 1772, his work on the secular equation of the Moon in 1773, and his treatise on cometary perturbations in 1778. These were all written on subjects proposed by the
Académie française, and in each case the prize was awarded to him.
Lagrangian mechanics
Between 1772 and 1788, Lagrange re-formulated Classical/Newtonian mechanics to simplify formulas and ease calculations. These
mechanics are called Lagrangian mechanics.
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Algebra
The greater number of his papers during this time were, however, contributed to the Royal Berlin
Academy. Several of them deal with questions on algebra. In particular:
- His discussion of the solution in integers of indeterminate quadratics,
1769, and generally of indeterminate equations, 1770.
- His tract on the theory of elimination, 1770.
- His theorem that the order of a subgroup H of a group G must
divide the order of G.
- His papers on the general process for solving an algebraic equation of any
degree, 1770 and 1771; this method fails for equations of an order above the fourth, because it then involves the solution of an
equation of higher dimensions than the one proposed, but it gives all the solutions of his predecessors as modifications of a
single principle.
- The complete solution of a binomial equation of any degree; this is contained in the papers last mentioned.
- Lastly, in 1773, his treatment of determinants of the
second and third order, and of invariants.
Number Theory
Several of his early papers also deal with questions of number theory. Among these are the following:
- His proof of the theorem that every positive integer which is not a square can be expressed as the sum of two, three or four integral squares, 1770.
- His proof of Wilson's theorem that if n is a prime, then (n − 1)! + 1
is always a multiple of n, 1771.
- His papers of 1773, 1775, and 1777, which give the demonstrations
of several results enunciated by Fermat, and not previously proved.
- He was the first to prove that Pell's equation always has a solution.
- And, lastly, his method for determining the factors of numbers of the form x2 +
ay2.
Miscellaneous
There are also numerous articles on various points of analytical geometry. In two
of them, written rather later, in 1792 and 1793, he reduced the
equations of the quadrics (or conicoids) to their canonical
forms.
During the years from 1772 to 1785, he contributed a long series
of papers which created the science of partial differential equations. A
large part of these results were collected in the second edition of Euler's integral calculus which was published in
1794.
He made contributions to the theory of continued fractions.
Astronomy
Lastly, there are numerous papers on problems in astronomy. Of these the
most important are the following:
- Attempting to solve the three-body problem resulting in the discovery of
Lagrangian points, 1772
- On the attraction of ellipsoids, 1773: this is founded on Maclaurin's work.
- On the secular equation of the Moon, 1773; also noticeable for the earliest introduction of the idea of the potential. The
potential of a body at any point is the sum of the mass of every element of the body when divided by its distance from the point.
Lagrange showed that if the potential of a body at an external point were known, the attraction in any direction could be at once
found. The theory of the potential was elaborated in a paper sent to Berlin in 1777.
- On the motion of the nodes of a planet's orbit, 1774.
- On the stability of the planetary orbits, 1776.
- Two papers in which the method of determining the orbit of a comet from three
observations is completely worked out, 1778 and 1783: this has not indeed proved practically available, but his system of
calculating the perturbations by means of mechanical quadratures has formed the basis of most subsequent researches on the
subject.
- His determination of the secular and periodic variations of the elements of the
planets, 1781-1784: the upper limits assigned for these agree closely with those obtained later by Le Verrier, and Lagrange proceeded as far as the knowledge then possessed of the masses of the planets
permitted.
- Three papers on the method of interpolation, 1783, 1792 and 1793: the part of finite differences dealing therewith is now in
the same stage as that in which Lagrange left it.
Mécanique analytique
Over and above these various papers he composed his great treatise, the Mécanique analytique. In this he lays down the
law of virtual work, and from that one fundamental principle, by the aid of the calculus of variations, deduces the whole of
mechanics, both of solids and fluids.
The object of the book is to show that the subject is implicitly included in a single principle, and to give general formulae
from which any particular result can be obtained. The method of generalized co-ordinates by which he obtained this result is
perhaps the most brilliant result of his analysis. Instead of following the motion of each individual part of a material system,
as D'Alembert and Euler had done, he showed that, if we determine its configuration by a sufficient number of variables whose
number is the same as that of the degrees of freedom possessed by the system, then the kinetic and potential energies of the
system can be expressed in terms of those variables, and the differential equations of motion thence deduced by simple
differentiation. For example, in dynamics of a rigid system he replaces the consideration of the particular problem by the
general equation, which is now usually written in the form
T for the Kinetic energy and V for the Potential energy. Amongst other minor theorems here given it may mention the
proposition that the kinetic energy imparted by the given impulses to a material system under given constraints is a maximum, and
the principle of least action. All the analysis is so elegant that Sir
William Rowan Hamilton said the work could only be described as a scientific
poem. It may be interesting to note that Lagrange remarked that mechanics was really a branch of pure mathematics analogous to a
geometry of four dimensions, namely, the time and the three coordinates of the point in space; and it is said that he prided
himself that from the beginning to the end of the work there was not a single diagram. At first no printer could be found who
would publish the book; but Legendre at last persuaded a Paris firm to undertake
it, and it was issued under his supervision in 1788.
Later years
France
In 1786, Frederick died, and Lagrange, who had found the climate of Berlin trying, gladly
accepted the offer of Louis XVI to migrate to Paris. He received similar invitations
from Spain and Naples. In France he was received with every mark
of distinction and special apartments in the Louvre were prepared for his reception, and he became a member of the
French Academy of Sciences, which later became part of the National Institute. At the beginning of his residence in Paris he was seized with an attack of the
melancholy, and even the printed copy of his Mécanique on which he had worked for a quarter of a century lay for more than
two years unopened on his desk. Curiosity as to the results of the French revolution
first stirred him out of his lethargy, a curiosity which soon turned to alarm as the revolution developed.
It was about the same time, 1792, that the unaccountable sadness of his life and his timidity
moved the compassion of a young girl who insisted on marrying him, and proved a devoted wife to whom he became warmly attached.
Although the decree of October 1793 that ordered all foreigners to
leave France specifically exempted him by name, he was preparing to escape when he was offered the presidency of the commission
for the reform of weights and measures. The choice of the units finally selected was largely due to him, and it was mainly owing
to his influence that the decimal subdivision was accepted by the commission of 1799. In 1795,
Lagrange was one of the founding members of the Bureau des Longitudes.
Though Lagrange had determined to escape from France while there was yet time, he was never in any danger; and the different
revolutionary governments (and at a later time, Napoleon) loaded him with honours
and distinctions. A striking testimony to the respect in which he was held was shown in 1796 when
the French commissary in Italy was ordered to attend in full state on Lagrange's father, and tender the congratulations of the
republic on the achievements of his son, who "had done honour to all mankind by his genius, and whom it was the special glory of
Piedmont to have produced." It may be added that Napoleon, when he attained power, warmly
encouraged scientific studies in France, and was a liberal benefactor of them.
École normale
In 1795, Lagrange was appointed to a mathematical chair at the newly-established
École normale, which enjoyed only a brief existence of four months. His
lectures here were quite elementary, and contain nothing of any special importance, but they were published because the
professors had to "pledge themselves to the representatives of the people and to each other neither to read nor to repeat from
memory," and the discourses were ordered to be taken down in shorthand in order to enable the deputies to see how the professors
acquitted themselves.
École Polytechnique
On the establishment of the École Polytechnique in 1797, Lagrange was made a professor; and his lectures there are described by mathematicians who had the good
fortune to be able to attend them, as almost perfect both in form and matter. Beginning with the merest elements, he led his
hearers on until, almost unknown to themselves, they were themselves extending the bounds of the subject: above all he impressed
on his pupils the advantage of always using general methods expressed in a symmetrical notation.
His lectures on the differential calculus form the basis of his Théorie des fonctions analytiques which was published
in 1797. This work is the extension of an idea contained in a paper he had sent to the Berlin papers in 1772, and its object is
to substitute for the differential calculus a group of theorems based on the development of algebraic functions in series. A
somewhat similar method had been previously used by John Landen in the Residual
Analysis, published in London in 1758. Lagrange believed that he could thus get rid of those difficulties, connected with the
use of infinitely large and infinitely small quantities, to which philosophers objected in the usual treatment of the
differential calculus. The book is divided into three parts: of these, the first treats of the general theory of functions, and
gives an algebraic proof of Taylor's theorem, the validity of which is, however, open
to question; the second deals with applications to geometry; and the third with applications to mechanics. Another treatise on
the same lines was his Leçons sur le calcul des fonctions, issued in 1804. These works may
be considered as the starting-point for the researches of Cauchy, Jacobi, and Weierstrass.
Infinitesimals
At a later period Lagrange reverted to the use of infinitesimals in preference to
founding the differential calculus on the study of algebraic forms; and in the preface to the second edition of the
Mécanique, which was issued in 1811, he justifies the employment of infinitesimals, and
concludes by saying that: :"when we have grasped the spirit of the infinitesimal method, and have verified the exactness
of its results either by the geometrical method of prime and ultimate ratios, or by the analytical method of derived functions,
we may employ infinitely small quantities as a sure and valuable means of shortening and simplifying our proofs."
Continued fractions
His "Résolution des équations numériques", published in 1798, was also the fruit of his
lectures at the Polytechnic. In this he gives the method of approximating to the real roots of an equation by means of
continued fractions, and enunciates several other theorems. In a note at the end he
shows how Fermat's little theorem that
- ap−1 − 1 ≡ 0 (mod p)
where p is a prime and a is prime to p, may be applied to give the complete algebraic solution of any
binomial equation. He also here explains how the equation whose roots are the squares of the differences of the roots of the
original equation may be used so as to give considerable information as to the position and nature of those roots.
The theory of the planetary motions had formed the subject of some of the most
remarkable of Lagrange's Berlin papers. In 1806 the subject was reopened by Poisson, who, in a paper read before the French Academy, showed that Lagrange's formulae led to
certain limits for the stability of the orbits. Lagrange, who was present, now discussed the whole subject afresh, and in a
letter communicated to the Academy in 1808 explained how, by the variation of arbitrary constants,
the periodical and secular inequalities of any system of mutually interacting bodies could be determined.
Death
Lagrange's tomb in the crypt of the
Panthéon.
In 1808, Napoleon made Lagrange a Grand Officer of
the Legion of Honour and a Comte of the Empire. In
1810, Lagrange commenced a thorough revision of the Mécanique analytique, but he was able to
complete only about two-thirds of it before his death. He was awarded the Grand Croix of the Ordre
Impérial de la Réunion in 1813, a week before his death in Paris. He was buried that same
year in the Panthéon in Paris. The French inscription on his tomb there reads:
JOSEPH LOUIS LAGRANGE. Senator. Count of the Empire. Grand Officer of the Legion of Honour. Grand Cross of the Imperial Order
of Réunion. Member of the Institute and the Bureau of Longitude. Born in Turin on 25 January 1736. Died in Paris on 10 April
1813.
A street in Paris is named rue Lagrange in his honour. In Turin, the street where the house of his birth still stands
is also named via Lagrange.
Appearance
He was of medium height and slightly formed, with pale blue eyes and a colorless complexion. He was nervous and timid, he
detested controversy, and, to avoid it, willingly allowed others to take credit for what he had done himself.
Pure mathematics
Lagrange's interests were essentially those of a student of pure mathematics: he sought and obtained far-reaching abstract
results, and was content to leave the applications to others. Indeed, no inconsiderable part of the discoveries of his great
contemporary, Laplace, consists of the application of the Lagrangian formulae to
the facts of nature; for example, Laplace's conclusions on the velocity of sound and the secular acceleration of the Moon are
implicitly involved in Lagrange's results. The only difficulty in understanding Lagrange is that of the subject-matter and the
extreme generality of his processes; but his analysis is "as lucid and luminous as it is symmetrical and ingenious."
A recent writer speaking of Lagrange says truly that he took a prominent part in the advancement of almost every branch of
pure mathematics. Like Diophantus and Fermat, he
possessed a special genius for the theory of numbers, and in this subject he gave solutions of many of the problems which had
been proposed by Fermat, and added some theorems of his own. He created the calculus of variations. To him, too, the theory of
differential equations is indebted for its position as a science rather than a collection of ingenious artifices for the solution
of particular problems. To the calculus of finite differences he contributed the formula of interpolation which bears his name
(although the formula was known to Euler). But above all he impressed on mechanics (which it will be remembered he considered a
branch of pure mathematics) that generality and completeness towards which his labours invariably tended.
Notes
References
See also
External links
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