R type conversion expression() function()

I've been trying to write a program in R that implements Newton's method. I've been mostly successful, but there are two little snags that have been bothering me. Here's my code:

Newton<-function(f,f.,guess){
    #f <- readline(prompt="Function? ")
    #f. <- readline(prompt="Derivative? ")
    #guess <- as.numeric(readline(prompt="Guess? "))
    a <- rep(NA, length=1000)
    a[1] <- guess
    a[2] <- a[1] - f(a[1]) / f.(a[1])
    for(i in 2:length(a)){
        if(a[i] == a[i-1]){
           break
        } 
        else{
           a[i+1] <- a[i] - f(a[i]) / f.(a[i])
        }
    }   
    a <- a[complete.cases(a)]
    return(a)
}

1. I can't get R to recognize the functions f and f. if I try using readline() to prompt for user input. I get the error "Error in Newton() : could not find function "f."" However, if I comment out the readlines (as above), define f and f. beforehand, then everything works fine.

2. I've been trying to make R calculate the derivative of a function. The problem is that the class object with which R can take symbolic derivatives is expression(), but I want to take the derivative of a function() and have it give me a function(). In short, I'm having trouble with type conversion between expression() and function().

I have an ugly but effective solution for going from function() to expression(). Given a function f, D(body(f)[[2]],"x") will give the derivative of f. However, this output is an expression(), and I haven't been able to turn it back into a function(). Do I need to use eval() or something? I've tried subsetting, but to no avail. For instance:

g <- expression(sin(x))
g[[1]]
sin(x)
f <