Niels Henrik Abel

Analysis is just like an immense forest into which one can penetrate only along the paths which the masters have cleared.

I hope that after me, others will find something of value in my works.

The problem of solving the general equation of the fifth degree proved impossible.

I am living very quietly and working as much as my health permits.

The difficulties I have had to contend with have not been few.

One of the most remarkable properties of the transcendent functions I am studying is that they can have two distinct periods.

I have submitted a memoir to the French Academy; I fear it has been mislaid.

Without the support of my friends, I would have succumbed long ago.

The integral of an algebraic differential may be expressed by logarithmic and algebraic functions, provided that a certain condition is satisfied.

I have discovered a source of great pleasure in the study of mathematics.

The path I have chosen is thorny, but it is my own.

A mathematician is a machine for turning coffee into theorems.

It is extraordinary to what lengths one must go to achieve rigor in analysis.

I have succeeded in proving the impossibility for the quintic.

My greatest ambition is to do something lasting for science.

The infinite! No other question has ever moved so profoundly the spirit of man.

I am poor, but I am not unhappy because of it.

The works of the great masters are the best teachers.

I have been ill, but my mind is clear and I continue to work.

The theory of equations has occupied me for a long time.