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mathematician, he would reason well; as mere mathematician, he could
not have reasoned at all, and thus would have been at the mercy of the
Prefect."
"You surprise me," I said, "by these opinions, which have been
contradicted by the voice of the world. You do not mean to set at naught
the well-digested idea of centuries. The mathematical reason has long
been regarded as the reason par excellence."
"'Il y a à parièr,'" replied Dupin, quoting from Chamfort, "'que toute
idée publique, toute convention reçue est une sottise, car elle a
convenue au plus grand nombre.' The mathematicians, I grant you, have
done their best to promulgate the popular error to which you allude, and
which is none the less an error for its promulgation as truth. With an
art worthy a better cause, for example, they have insinuated the term
'analysis' into application to algebra. The French are the originators
of this particular deception; but if a term is of any importance--if
words derive any value from applicability--then 'analysis' conveys
'
algebra' about as much as, in Latin, 'ambitus' implies 'ambition,'
religio' 'religion,' or 'homines honesti,' a set of honorablemen."
'
"
You have a quarrel on hand, I see," said I, "with some of the
algebraists of Paris; but proceed."
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