JB/018/167/001

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13 April 1815
Chrestom. Tab. II. Inserenda

Of the language employed in Algebra, the whole of that part in and by
which the existence of the species of quantities called
negative quantities is affirmed and thereby asserted,
is from beginning to end a source of perplexity
and confusion: of a confusion which in few minds
if in any, is ever compleatly dispelled. A degree of
certainty and that not merely equal to that on which
the ordinary causes of human life prudence is obliged to ground
itself but that infinitely superior degree which is considered
as exclusively peculiar to mathematics is
on these occasions ascribed to propositions of which
the falshood is most palpable.

Yet under this perplexing and delusive veil, a
quantity of truth and that useful and instructive, is on
most occasions if not on every occasion, concealed.
What on no one occasion ever does exist is – a quantity
less than nothing. But what does exist, on every occasion
in which a quantity is exhibited brought to view in the character of a
negative quantity does exist is a quantity of which on
the occasion in question is productive of an effect opposite
to that which produced by a every quantity which in the
character of a positive quantity is placed on the opposite
side of the account.

Identifier: | JB/018/167/001 "JB/" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 18.
Date_1	1815-04-13	Marginal Summary Numbering
Box	018	Main Headings	chrestomathia
Folio number	167	Info in main headings field	chrestom. tab. ii inserenda
Image	001	Titles
Category	text sheet	Number of Pages	1
Recto/Verso	recto	Page Numbering	c4 / d18 / e6
Penner	jeremy bentham	Watermarks
Marginals		Paper Producer
Corrections		Paper Produced in Year
Notes public		ID Number	6576
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