I have found a very great number of exceedingly beautiful…

Mathematics does not grow through a monotonous increase of the number of indubitably established theorems but through the incessant improvement of guesses by speculation…

— Imre Lakatos

It is a melancholy experience for a professional mathematician to find himself writing about mathematics. The function of a mathematician is to do something,…

— G. H. Hardy

There are very few theorems in advanced analysis which have been demonstrated in a logically tenable manner. Everywhere one finds this miserable way of…

— Niels Henrik Abel

Without computers we will be stuck only proving theorems that have short proofs.

— Kenneth Appel

A mathematician is a device for turning coffee into theorems.

— Paul Erdos

The "seriousness" of a mathematical theorem lies, not in its practical consequences, which are usually negligible, but in the significance of the mathematical ideas…

— G. H. Hardy

Theorems often tell us complex truths about the simple things, but only rarely tell us simple truths about the complex ones. To believe otherwise…

— Marvin Minsky

But it is impossible to divide a cube into two cubes, or a fourth power into fourth powers, or generally any power beyond the…

— Pierre de Fermat

All I remember about the examination is that there was a question on Sturm's theorem about equations, which I could not do then and…

— Louis J. Mordell

Now, one of my beliefs, one of my theorems that I have evolved over the years is that when it comes to Democrats and…

— Rush Limbaugh

For what is important when we give children a theorem to use is not that they should memorize it. What matters most is that…

— Seymour Papert

In 1975, ... [speaking with Shiing Shen Chern], I told him I had finally learned ... the beauty of fiber-bundle theory and the profound…

— Chen-Ning Yang

The scientist has to take 95 per cent of his subject on trust. He has to because he can't possibly do all the experiments,…

— Christopher Zeeman

The great poem and the deep theorem are new to every reader, and yet are his own experiences, because he himself recreates them.

— Jacob Bronowski

How can you shorten the subject? That stern struggle with the multiplication table, for many people not yet ended in victory, how can you…

— Stephen Leacock