RePoSS #11: The Mathematics of Niels Henrik Abel: Continuation ...

11.6. Early reception of CAUCHY’s new rigor 219
2. Others, primarily Germans, felt a similar need for a new rigorous foundation
of the calculus. Often inspired by needs stimulated by the German educational
reforms, they sought to distill a combinatorial theory from the approaches of
LAGRANGE and others.
3. The rest, and the vast majority, were mostly concerned with contributing new
mathematical knowledge. Although they probably also sometimes worried about
the foundations of their discipline, they left it to the teachers and experts to
straighten it out.
In the 1820s, the need for rigorization had entered the agenda and at least two
programs had been suggested for resolving the need. In the course of the century,
the need became even more urgent and CAUCHY’S conception became the preferred
solution — after it had undergone the interpretations of ABEL, G. P. L. DIRICHLET
(1805–1859), G. F. B. RIEMANN (1826–1866), K. T. W. WEIERSTRASS (1815–1897) and
others.