198 JEROME CARDAN. 



must not censure Jerome too severely, if his love exceeded 

 his discretion. By crippling his own means, he further 

 hurt the prospects of the English boy, then a fine youth, 

 full of affection, whom he called tenderly his Guglielmina, 

 and who had been with him six years to little purpose. 

 The troubled physician said that he was ashamed in the 

 sixth year to send him away untaught and unremunerated 

 for his loss of time, but he could spare nothing, he said, 

 " on account of the many expenses into which I at that 

 time was plunged by my sons 1 ." He had loved them 

 both, but he had been incompetent to educate them pro- 

 perly, and they had too soon lost their mother. They 

 were, indeed, partly his own sins that were being punished 

 in him through his children. 



The intention to seek office again mentioned by Cardan 

 in his letter to his son resulted in his return, four months 

 afterwards, at the beginning of the next year, to the 

 University of Pavia. A professorship was again accepted, 

 the offer of which had been obtained through the good 

 offices of his friends the Cardinals Alciati and Borromeo. 



Cardan then sought to provide for the boy William, 

 whom he had held bound to him by daily kindness, while 

 he dared not send him home, and could not afford to 

 establish him in life. He resolved to put him into busi- 



1 For this and the following, see preface to the Dialogue de Morte. 



