A Budget of Paradoxes Volume I Part 51

Charles Piazzi Smyth (1819-1900), astronomer Royal for Scotland (1845-1888) was much carried away with the number mysticism of the Great Pyramid, so much so that he published in 1864 a work ent.i.tled _Our Inheritance in the Great Pyramid_, in which his vagaries were set forth. Although he was then a Fellow of the Royal Society (1857), his work was so ill received that when he offered a paper on the subject it was rejected (1874) and he resigned in consequence of this action. The latest and perhaps the most scholarly of all investigators of the subject is William Matthew Flinders Petrie (born in 1853), Edwards professor of Egyptology at University College, London, whose _Pyramids and Temples of Gizeh_ (1883) and subsequent works are justly esteemed as authorities.

[705] As De Morgan subsequently found, this name reversed becomes Oliver B...e, for Oliver Byrne, one of the odd characters among the minor mathematical writers of the middle of the last century. One of his most curious works is _The first six Books of the Elements of Euclid; in which coloured diagrams and symbols are used instead of letters_ (1847). There is some merit in speaking of the red triangle instead of the triangle ABC, but not enough to give the method any standing. His _Dual Arithmetic_ (1863-1867) was also a curious work.

[706] Brenan also wrote on English composition (1829), a work that went through fourteen editions by 1865; a work ent.i.tled _The Foreigner's English Conjugator_ (1831), and a work on the national debt.

[707] See note 211, page 112.

[708] See note 592, page 261.

[709] Sir William Rowan Hamilton (1805-1865), the discoverer of quaternions (1852), was an infant prodigy, competing with Zerah Colburn as a child. He was a linguist of remarkable powers, being able, at thirteen years of age, to boast that he knew as many languages as he had lived years. When only sixteen he found an error in Laplace's _Mecanique celeste_. When only twenty-two he was appointed Andrews professor of astronomy, and he soon after became Astronomer Royal of Ireland. He was knighted in 1835. His earlier work was on optics, his _Theory of Systems of Rays_ appearing in 1823. In 1827 he published a paper on the principle of _Varying Action_. He also wrote on dynamics.

[710] "Let him not leave the kingdom,"--a legal phrase.

[711] Probably De Morgan is referring to Johann Bernoulli III (1744-1807), who edited Lambert's _Logische und philosophische Abhandlungen_, Berlin, 1782. He was astronomer of the Academy of Sciences at Berlin.

[712] Jacob Bernoulli (1654-1705) was one of the two brothers who founded the famous Bernoulli family of mathematicians, the other being Johann I.

His _Ars conjectandi_ (1713), published posthumously, was the first distinct treatise on probabilities.

[713] Johann Heinrich Lambert (1728-1777) was one of the most learned men of his time. Although interested chiefly in mathematics, he wrote also on science, logic, and philosophy.

[714] Joseph Diez Gergonne (1771-1859), a soldier under Napoleon, and founder of the _Annales de mathematiques_ (1810).

[715] Gottfried Ploucquet (1716-1790) was at first a clergyman, but afterwards became professor of logic at Tubingen.

[716] "In the premises let the middle term be omitted; what remains indicates the conclusion."

[717] Probably Sir William Edmond Logan (1789-1875), who became so interested in geology as to be placed at the head of the geological survey of Canada (1842). The University of Montreal conferred the t.i.tle LL.D. upon him, and Napoleon III gave him the cross of the Legion of Honor.

[718] "So strike that he may think himself to die."

[719] "Witticism or piece of stupidity."

[720] A very truculently unjust a.s.sertion: for Sir W. was as great a setter up of some as he was a puller down of others. His writings are a congeries of praises and blames, both _cruel smart_, as they say in the States. But the combined instigation of prose, rhyme, and retort would send Aristides himself to Tartarus, if it were not pretty certain that Minos would grant a _stet processus_ under the circ.u.mstances. The first two verses are exaggerations standing on a basis of truth. The fourth verse is quite true: Sir W. H. was an Edinburgh Aristotle, with the difference of ancient and modern Athens well marked, especially the _perfervidum ingenium Scotorum_.--A. De M.

[721] See note 576, p. 252. There was also a _Theory of Parallels_ that differed from these, London, 1853, second edition 1856, third edition 1856.

[722] The work was written by Robert Chambers (1802-1871), the Edinburgh publisher, a friend of Scott and of many of his contemporaries in the literary field. He published the _Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation_ in 1844, not 1840.

[723] Everett (1784-1872) was at that time a good Wesleyan, but was expelled from the ministry in 1849 for having written _Wesleyan Takings_ and as under suspicion for having started the _Fly Sheets_ in 1845. In 1857 he established the United Methodist Free Church.

[724] Smith was a Primitive Methodist preacher. He also wrote an _Earnest Address to the Methodists_ (1841) and _The Wealth Question_ (1840?).

[725] He wrote the _Nouveau traite de Balistique_, Paris, 1837.

[726] Joseph Denison, known to fame only through De Morgan. See also page 353.

[727] The radical (1784?-1858), advocate of the founding of London university (1826), of medical reform (1827-1834), and of the repeal of the duties on newspapers and corn, and an ardent champion of penny postage.

[728] I. e., Roman Catholic Priest.

[729] Murphy (1806-1843) showed extraordinary powers in mathematics even before the age of thirteen. He became a fellow of Caius College, Cambridge, in 1829, dean in 1831, and examiner in mathematics in London University in 1838.

[730] See note 442, page 196.

[731] Sir John Bowring (1792-1872), the linguist, writer, and traveler, member of many learned societies and a writer of high reputation in his time. His works were not, however, of genuine merit.

[732] Joseph Hume (1777-1855) served as a surgeon with the British army in India early in the nineteenth century. He returned to England in 1808 and entered parliament as a radical in 1812. He was much interested in all reform movements.

[733] Sir Robert Harry Inglis (1786-1855), a strong Tory, known for his numerous addresses in the House of Commons rather than for any real ability.

[734] Sir Robert Peel (1788-1850) began his parliamentary career in 1809 and was twice prime minister. He was prominent in most of the great reforms of his time.

[735] See note 627, page 290.

[736] John Taylor (1781-1864) was a publisher, and published several pamphlets opposed to Peel's currency measures. De Morgan refers to his work on the Junius question. This was done early in his career, and resulted in _A Discovery of the author of the Letters of Junius_ (1813), and _The Ident.i.ty of Junius with a distinguished living character established_ (1816), this being Sir Philip Francis.

[737] See note 665, page 308.

[738] See page 348.

[739] See note 348, page 160.

[740] Sir Nicholas Harris Nicolas (1799-1848) was a reformer in various lines,--the Record Commission, the Society of Antiquaries, and the British Museum,--and his work was not without good results.

[741] See note 98, page 69.

[742] In the _Companion to the Almanac_ for 1845 is a paper by Prof. De Morgan, "On the Ecclesiastical Calendar," the statements of which, so far as concerns the Gregorian Calendar, are taken direct from the work of Clavius, the princ.i.p.al agent in the arrangement of the reformed reckoning.

This was followed, in the _Companion to the Almanac_ for 1846, by a second paper, by the same author, headed "On the Earliest Printed Almanacs," much of which is written in direct supplement to the former article.--S. E. De Morgan.

[743] It may be necessary to remind some English readers that in Latin and its derived European languages, what we call Easter is called the pa.s.sover (_pascha_). The Quartadecimans had the _name_ on their side: a possession which often is, in this world, nine points of the law.--A. De M.

[744] Socrates Scholasticus was born at Constantinople c. 379, and died after 439. His _Historia Ecclesiastica_ (in Greek) covers the period from Constantine the Great to about 439, and includes the Council of Nicaea. The work was printed in Paris 1544.

[745] Theodoretus or Theodoritus was born at Antioch and died about 457. He was one of the greatest divines of the fifth century, a man of learning, piety, and judicial mind, and a champion of freedom of opinion in all religious matters.

[746] He died in 417. He was a man of great energy and of high attainments.

[747] He died in 461, having reigned as pope for twenty-one years. It was he who induced Attila to spare Rome in 452.

[748] He succeeded Leo as pope in 461, and reigned for seven years.

[749] Victorinus or Victorius Maria.n.u.s seems to have been born at Limoges.

He was a mathematician and astronomer, and the cycle mentioned by De Morgan is one of 532 years, a combination of the Metonic cycle of 19 years with the solar cycle of 28 years. His canon was published at Antwerp in 1633 or 1634, _De doctrina temporum sive commentarius in Victorii Aquitani et aliorum canones paschales_.

[750] He went to Rome about 497, and died there in 540. He wrote his _Liber de paschate_ in 525, and it was in this work that the Christian era was first used for calendar purposes.

[751] See note 259, page 126.

[752] Johannes de Sacrobosco (Holy wood), or John of Holywood. The name was often written, without regard to its etymology, Sacrobusto. He was educated at Oxford and taught in Paris until his death (1256). He did much to make the Hindu-Arabic numerals known to European scholars.