The difficulty with such a system is that it rapidly grows cumbersome, requiring the use of so many figures for indicating any number.

But Leibnitz found in the representation of all numbers by means of the two digits 0 and 1 a fitting symbolization of the creation out of chaos, or nothing, of the entire universe by the power of the Deity.

In commemoration of this invention a medal was struck bearing on the obverse the words Numero Deus impari gaudet, and on the reverse, Omnibus ex nihilo ducendis sufficit Unum.[166] This curious system seems to have been regarded with the greatest affection by its inventor, who used every endeavour in his power to bring it to the notice of scholars and to urge its claims.

But it appears to have been received with entire indifference, and to have been regarded merely as a mathematical curiosity.
Unknown to Leibnitz, however, a binary method of counting actually existed during that age; and it is only at the present time that it is becoming extinct.

In Australia, the continent that is unique in its flora, its fauna, and its general topography, we find also this anomaly among methods of counting.