I've discussed this before but it seems an apt moment to mention it again, following comments on the Besslerwheel forum.
Many people search for the word "gravity" in Bessler's writings and some suggest that since he didn't use the word he did not ascribe the energy which drove his wheel to gravity.
Sir Isaac Newton described gravity, but he didn't use that word either. He wrote his book, 'Philosophiæ naturalis principia mathematica', entirely in Latin, because that was the language used by the learned, and many books on academic and scientific subjects were written in Latin so that they could be read by people in all the European countries regardless of the reader's own native language. The name "gravity" comes from the Latin word, "gravitas", which means "heaviness".
"Gravity" is a force that's exerted between heavy bodies that had what Newton called mass, Newton was saying that weight shouldn't any longer be regarded as simply a property possessed by a "heavy body", but that a body that seems to be heavy is in fact being attracted by another body with mass, in this case, the earth.
The fact that Bessler used all kinds or words to describe gravity is simply because the word, "gravity" had not yet been recognised in its own right as a name for the force of attraction Newton was describing. He describes it as a heaviness, out of balance, preponderance, etc etc.
"Principia" came out in 1687 and took many years to become known throughout Europe and it's unlikely that Bessler ever had access to the book, but even so the word used was simply "heaviness" in Latin, and was not generally understood as an attraction between two masses.
So accept, as I have always done, that Bessler's wheel derived its energy from gravity - or the force of heaviness.
NOTE - you can read Newton's Principiua on line at the Cambridge digital library. The website is http://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/PR-ADV-B-00039-00001/1
JC
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