[24] It may be necessary to explain to the unmathematical reader and to the ex-Chancellor of the Exchequer that impossible quantities in algebra are something like mare’s-nests in ordinary life.
Yet should any unexpected course of events ever raise the {111} ex-Chancellor of the Exchequer to his former dignity, I am sure he will be its friend as soon as he is convinced that it can be made useful to him.
It may possibly enable him to un-muddle even his own financial accounts, and to ———
But as I have no wish to crucify him, I will leave his name in obscurity.
The Herostratus of Science, if he escape oblivion, will be linked with the destroyer of the Ephesian Temple.
CHAPTER VIII. OF THE ANALYTICAL ENGINE.
Man wrongs, and Time avenges.
BYRON.—The Prophecy of Dante.