%0 Journal Article %T The Newtonian limit of fourth and higher order gravity %A Ines Quandt %A H. -J. Schmidt %J Mathematics %D 2001 %I arXiv %R 10.1002/asna.2113120205 %X We consider the Newtonian limit of the theory based on the Lagrangian L = R + \sum a_k R \Box^k R. The gravitational potential of a point mass turns out to be a combination of Newtonian and Yukawa terms. For sixth-order gravity the coefficients are calculated explicitly. For the general case one gets as a result: The the potential is always unbounded near the origin. %U http://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/0109005v1