It is well known that the central problem of the whole of modern mathematics is the study of transcendental functions defined by differential equations.
Felix KleinThus, in a sense, mathematics has been most advanced by those who distinguished themselves by intuition rather than by rigorous proofs.
Felix KleinThe teacher manages to get along still with the cumbersome algebraic analysis, in spite of its difficulties and imperfections, and avoids the smooth infinitesimal calculus, although the eighteenth century shyness toward it had long lost all point.
Felix KleinThe developing science departs at the same time more and more from its original scope and purpose and threatens to sacrifice its earlier unity and split into diverse branches.
Felix KleinThe presentation of mathematics in schools should be psychological and not systematic. The teacher, so to speak, should be a diplomat. He must take account of the psychic processes in the boy in order to grip his interest, and he will succeed only if he presents things in a form intuitively comprehensible. A more abstract presentation is only possible in the upper classes.
Felix Klein