Evariste (son of Nicholas-Gabriel) Galois, French mathematician, is killed in a duel for reasons of love; The night before his death, he spent it by candlelight, writing down his unpublished mathematical discoveries, including the solution to solvable fifth-degree equations and a method for determining which ones were solvable for the 5th, 6th, and 7th degrees. His father, Nicholas-Gabriel Galois, had committed suicide only two years earlier and left his son the following letter: “My dearest son, this is the last letter you will receive from me. When you read these words, I will no longer be among the living, but I do not want you to despair or grieve. Try to resume a normal life as much as possible. I know it will be difficult for you to forget a father who was also a friend to you. I want to try to explain to you as best I can why I have decided to take this one-way step. You know, my little one, that I have been mayor of this city for seventeen years. After Waterloo, the enemies of Liberty tried to oust me, but in vain. They knew all my political beliefs and my My opinion on the Bourbons and the Jesuits. I am certain, my son, that the parish priest and the men who sent him knew they could not undermine my authority in an open confrontation, and so they changed their methods. I was no longer an adversary to be feared, but rather to be ridiculed. Some began to give me barely suppressed smiles. Others, my lifelong enemies, laughed in my face, singing songs about Bourg-la-Reine, which, having chosen a crazy mayor, had become the laughing stock of the country. If I didn’t react, they laughed in my face; if I tried to use persuasion, they laughed in my face; if I got angry, they laughed doubly. With this extreme gesture, I can at least regain the respect they felt for me and my family. So no one will be able to mock your mother and you. I am dying of suffocation. I am dying from lack of fresh air. This poisoned air that Kills has been spoiled by the citizens of Bourg-la-Reine, you must know and understand this. It is very painful for me to say goodbye to you, my dear son. You are my firstborn, and I have always been proud of you. One day you will be a great man, a famous man. I know that day will come, but I also know that suffering, struggle, and disappointment await you. You will become a mathematician. But even mathematics, the noblest and most abstract of all sciences, however ethereal it may be, is equally rooted deeply in the Earth on which we live. Not even mathematics will allow you to escape your own suffering and that of others. Fight, my dear, fight with greater courage than I. May you, before you die, hear the tolling of the bell of Liberty.
