A PROLIFIC AUTHOR. 277 



CHAPTER XIV. 



THE CONQUEST OF AN ADVERSE WORLD. 



TARTALEA could not get on with algebra for twenty 

 years because he was translating Euclid; Cardan in five 

 years had advanced the science by great strides, and was 

 at the same time engaged upon a dozen other works 1 . In 

 the year 1543 the separate works written by him amounted 

 to the number of fifty-three, divided into a hundred and 

 fifty-eight books, technically so called 2 ; and from that 

 date the number of them multiplied so rapidly that an 

 attempt to give even the shortest tolerable account of 

 them all would make this narrative unreasonably long. 



A very few more notes will enable us to complete in 

 sufficient detail that essential part of Jerome's life which 

 describes the steps by which he worked his way to fame 

 and general acceptance as an author. After the publica- 

 tion of the Book of the Great Art his way was easy, and 



1 " Neque enim mens tandiu intenta uni negocio esse potest." De 

 Libr. Prop. (1557) p. 12. 



2 Ibid. The same authority or reference to the subsequent book 

 De Libris Propriis will justify whatever else is said in this chapter 

 upon the order of publication of Cardan's writings. 



