ARABIC NUMERALS AND CIPHER

Will you suffer me to add some further remarks on the subject of the Arabic numerals and cipher; as neither the querists nor respondents seem to have duly appreciated the immense importance of the step taken by introducing the use of a cipher. I would commence with observing, that we know of no people tolerably advanced in civilisation, whose system of notation had made such little progress, beyond that of the mere savage, as the Romans. The rudest savages could make upright scratches on the face of a rock, and set them in a row, to signify units; and as the circumstance of having ten fingers…