It appears to me that if one wants to make progress in mathematics, one should study the masters and not the pupils.

The mathematicians have been very much absorbed with finding the general solution of algebraic equations, and several of them have tried to prove the impossibility of it. However, if I am not mistaken, they have not as yet succeeded. I therefore dare hope that the mathematicians will receive this memoir with good will, for its purpose is to fill this gap in the theory of algebraic equations.

It appears to me that if one wants to make progress in mathematics, one should study the masters and not the pupils.

By studying the masters and not their pupils.

He is like the fox, who effaces his tracks in the sand with his tail.

I shall devote all my efforts to bring light into the immense obscurity that today reigns in Analysis. It so lacks any plan or system, that one is really astonished that there are so many people who devote themselves to it - and, still worse, it is absolutely devoid of any rigor.

With the exception of the geometrical series, there does not exist in all of mathematics a single infinite series the sum of which has been rigorously determined. In other words, the things which are the most important in mathematics are also those which have the least foundation.