Lectures on Science, Philosophy and Art (New York, 1908), p. 42.
[929]. Let me tell you how at one time the famous mathematician Euclid became a physician. It was during a vacation, which I spent in Prague as I most always did, when I was attacked by an illness never before experienced, which manifested itself in chilliness and painful weariness of the whole body. In order to ease my condition I took up Euclid’s Elements and read for the first time his doctrine of ratio, which I found treated there in a manner entirely new to me. The ingenuity displayed in Euclid’s presentation filled me with such vivid pleasure, that forthwith I felt as well as ever.—Bolzano, Bernard.
Selbstbiographie (Wien, 1875), p. 20.
[930]. Mr. Cayley, of whom it may be so truly said, whether the matter he takes in hand be great or small, “nihil tetigit quod non ornavit,”....—Sylvester, J. J.
Philosophic Transactions of the Royal Society, Vol. 17 (1864), p. 605.
[931]. It is not Cayley’s way to analyze concepts into their ultimate elements.... But he is master of the empirical utilization of the material: in the way he combines it to form a single abstract concept which he generalizes and then subjects to computative tests, in the way the newly acquired data are made to yield at a single stroke the general comprehensive idea to the subsequent numerical verification of which years of labor are devoted. Cayley is thus the natural philosopher among mathematicians.—Noether, M.
Mathematische Annalen, Bd. 46 (1895), p. 479.
[932]. When Cayley had reached his most advanced generalizations he proceeded to establish them directly by some method or other, though he seldom gave the clue by which they had first been obtained: a proceeding which does not tend to make his papers easy reading....
His literary style is direct, simple and clear. His legal training had an influence, not merely upon his mode of arrangement but also upon his expression; the result is that his papers are severe and present a curious contrast to the luxuriant enthusiasm which pervades so many of Sylvester’s papers. He used to prepare his work for publication as soon as he carried his investigations in any subject far enough for his immediate purpose.... A paper once written out was promptly sent for publication; this practice he maintained throughout life.... The consequence is that he has left few arrears of unfinished or unpublished papers; his work has been given by himself to the world.—Forsyth, A. R.