Youri Kraskov - The Wonders of Arithmetic from Pierre Simon de Fermat

If the support of Pierre Fermat’s career had ended on that, then there could be no question of a future senator since in those times even simple lawyer activity demanded the highest royal deigning. From this it becomes clear why the decisive step in Pierre’s parental care was his marriage in 1631 to Louise de Long, who was a distant relative (the fourth cousin) of his mother. It is clear that such a decision could not be spontaneous especially since such kindred marriages could be concluded only with the permission of the Pope of Rome. And once again the Dominic Fermat's money solved this not simple problem.

Louise's father was an adviser to the Toulouse Parliament and being in the service of King Louis XIII, received a noble title, so Pierre had no problems with employment. But it would be a delusion to expect that also further everything will go on easily and smoothly. After the end of the study, marriage and the beginning of work, the reality seemed to Pierre as at all not so rosy. The gray days of the hustle and bustle of earning money for daily bread went day after day and did not leave any hopes to be engaged in science. And then it was still a very great good to have within the framework of lawyer activity the ability to support though not a luxurious, but still a well-off life in those difficult times for France.

A new danger for Pierre appeared unexpectedly. The next plague epidemic claimed the life of his father-in-law and this could have a very bad effect on his fate. However, by that time he had already managed to establish friendly relations with other senators what opened for him the way to parliament and as a result it made possible to turn the misfortune in his favor. With the help of a fair amount of money, he still managed to take the vacant position of an official in charge of receiving complaints in the cassation chamber of the Toulouse parliament.

The biographers of Pierre Fermat rate his career as simply brilliant, but at that they lose sight of one very significant detail. Exactly such a career tightly closes him all even the slightest opportunities to be engaged in science. They did not take into account the fact that there is a royal directive forbidding the posts of councilors of parliament for the people engaged in scientific research that may contradict the Holy Scriptures. But since Pierre became a senator, this will put a big fat cross on his dreams of being engaged in science on a professional basis. He will carry this cross for the rest of his life.

Moreover, as a Catholic he should not commit any mortal sin and is obliged to confess regularly once a year about the pardonable sins committed by him. As such a pardonable sin Pierre reports at confession about his moderate idleness after reading the books by Diophantus of Alexandria “Arithmetic” and “Tasks undertraining and pleasant, related to numbers”.

Pic. 6. Diophantus of Alexandria

The risk of falling into disfavor by such a sin fall was small because the book was published by Claude Gaspard Bachet de Méziriac a flawless in every respect a high-ranking linguist and future member of the French Academy established by Cardinal Richelieu in 1635. Here of course, there will be a question about the secret of confession. But if even in our time with respect to the Catholic Church this question looks very naïve, then what is to say about the times when the supreme executors of the royal power were cardinals. All priests were obliged to inform the authorities about what their parishioners live and especially officials in government posts. Information from the priests was also controlled, for which authorized inspectors were sent to the places.

Pic. 7. Bachet de Méziriac

It is understandable that Pierre could not expect anything good from meeting with such an inspector, but he had no choice and was ready to put up the complete impossibility of his dream. But then of course, he could not have known that he was destined to another fate and it was to decide at that very moment. It is even difficult to imagine his amazement when an arrived inspector turned out to be the priest Marin Mersenne … a passionate lover and connoisseur of mathematics!!!

Pic. 8. Marin Mersenne

Pierre took it as the supreme wonder bestowed on him from heaven by the Almighty. And how else could this be understood since Reverend Father Mersenne managed miraculously to organize for him the possibility of correspondence with René Descartes himself as well as with other elite representatives of the French creative aristocracy what about he could not ever to dream. Pierre went through the test brilliantly when he was able to solve several problems at the request of Mersenne and in particular quickly calculate some of the so-called perfect numbers moreover, also those that were previously unknown. Hardly anyone else could to solve or at least somehow cope this task.

Historians in their studies see only pure randomness in the coincidence of interest to the numbers of Mersenne and Fermat, and Mersenne himself in their presenting is a weirdo acting on his whim. However, in real history so does not happen and there should be a more reasonable explanation of events. In this sense, it would be much more logical to believe that Mersenne was no more than a performer of some instruction from above, and since he came from church nobility, only one person could give such an instruction to him – it was no one other as Cardinal Armand-Jean du Plessis Duc de Richelieu!

Pic. 9. René Descartes

This implies the activity of the association of learned nobility created by Mersenne, could not be just his initiative, but was sanctioned by the highest authorities of that time, otherwise this activity could not be deployed or it would curtail after the death of Mersenne in 1648. However, his brainchild continued to function for a long time and successfully until the creation of the French Academy of Sciences in 1666.

As for Pierre Fermat who became a Senator, he found himself in a difficult position. His abilities were now in demand, but he could develop them only at his own expense and without the right of publication because no one has repealed the royal prescription for restricting appointments to the posts of advisers to parliaments and he had no other means to earn a living. So, for his future opponents, he will appear as a recluse who does not want to share the secrets of his scientific discoveries. Even his friend Blaise Pascal in one of his letters sincerely wondered why he did not publish his works. To this Fermat also sincerely replied, he did not at all want his name to appear in print. Well, he really could not refer to the royal directive, which does not allow any scientific activity on the position he occupies.

Pic. 10. Blaise Pascal

For Fermat everything was happened so that he had no opportunity to solve this problem otherwise as by his direct participation in the preparation of the royal decree on the creation of the French Academy of Sciences. This is indicated by his correspondence with Mersenne and Pierre de Carcavy who was involved in the preparation of this decree. Fermat received a desired noble title only after 17 years of diligent service becoming in 1648 a member of Edicts House, which met regularly in the little town of Castres near Toulouse. But this promotion only increased his workload and further limited his opportunity for science activity.