Quicksilver (The Baroque Cycle, #1)

by Neal Stephenson

if money is a science, then it is a dark science, darker than Alchemy. It split away from Natural Philosophy millennia ago, and has gone on developing ever since, by its own rules . . .”

All through the play he had been trying and trying to suspend his disbelief, but the damned thing just wouldn’t suspend.

I know the zargon and the code-signs of Vagabonds, who, taken together, constitute a sort of (if I may speak poetically) network of information, spreading all over the world, functioning smoothly even when damaged,

“I am not explaining it very well,” Daniel admitted, “because I do not quite understand it, yet.”

for fame’s a weed, but repute is a slow-growing oak, and all we can do during our lifetimes is hop around like squirrels and plant acorns.

Next, Huygens writes from London that the Government there has hit upon the idea of financing the Army and Navy by creating a national debt—using all of England as collateral, and levying a special tax that is earmarked for paying it back.