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Wallis rejected as absurd and inconceivable the now usual idea of a negative number as being less than nothing, but accepted the view that it is something greater than infinity.

— W. W. Rouse Ball A History of the Study of Mathematics at Cambridge (1889)

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Mathematics

More quotes by W. W. Rouse Ball

Gauss calculated the elements of the planet Ceres and his analysis proved him to be the first of theoretical astronomers no less than the greatest of 'arithmeticians.'

Babbage was one of the founders of the Cambridge Analytical Society whose purpose he stated was to advocate "the principles of pure d-ism as opposed to the dot-age of the university.

The history of mathematics cannot with certainty be traced back to any school or period before that of the…Greeks…. Though all early races …knew something of numeration yet the rules…were neither deduced from nor did they form part of any science.

It was, however, from Spain, and not from Arabia, that a knowledge of eastern mathematics first came into western Europe. The Moors had established their rules in Spain in 747, and by the tenth or eleven century had attained a high degree of civilisation.

A Short Account of the History of Mathematics (1888)

Foreshadowings of the principles and even of the language of [the infinitesimal] calculus can be found in the writings of Napier, Kepler, Cavalieri, Fermat, Wallis, and Barrow. It was Newton's good luck to come at a time when everything was ripe for the discovery, and his ability enabled him to construct almost at once a complete calculus.

A Short Account of the History of Mathematics (2012)

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Anyone who believes exponential growth can go on forever in a finite world is either a madman or an economist.

Kenneth Boulding to Kenneth Boulding in: United States. Congress. House (1973)

If the doors of perception were cleansed, everything would appear to man as it is: infinite.

William Blake The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790)

Pure mathematics consists entirely of assertions to the effect that, if such and such a proposition is true of anything, then such and such another proposition is true of that thing.

Bertrand Russell

The land of easy mathematics where he who works adds up and he who retires subtracts.

Núria Añó

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: W. W. Rouse Ball (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.