Évariste Galois

"He was now a prisoner on parole and took advantage... to carry on an intrigue with a woman... probably not... reputable ("une coquette de bas etage," says Raspail) ."

"[G]enius possessing... a mere boy, a fragile little body divided within itself by disproportionate forces, an undeveloped mind crushed mercilessly between the exaltation of scientific discovery and the exaltation of sentiment."

"The Galois theory of equations itself was the concluding episode in about three centuries of effort to penetrate the arithmetical nature of the roots of algebraic equations."

"The earliest discussion from the standpoint of groups of the (modular) equations arising in the division of s was by Galois."

"An excessive desire for conciseness was the cause of this fault which one must try to avoid when writing on the mysterious abstractions of pure Algebra. Clarity is indeed an absolute necessity. ... Galois too often neglected this precept."

"Preserve my memory, since fate has not given me life enough for the country to know my name."