252 JEROME CARDAN. 



at Pavia, when the disease returned upon him. Then his 

 impious master ordered him to be taken to the poor-house 1 ; 

 where the next morning he died of the disease and of 

 distress of mind, and night chills. By this misfortune I 

 was so overcome, that I seemed to have lost another of my 

 sons." 



Thus William died ; and the philosopher was again 

 smitten in conscience when he saw that another being 

 whom he had loved was ruined by his carelessness. He 

 accused himself most justly, and not in a word too heavily 

 for his neglect of duty. He had assumed lightly a 

 grave responsibility, and it was well that he should grieve 

 when he saw the wretched end of the boy, well-born and 

 quick-witted, who had been confided to him by strangers 

 as to the most learned man in Europe, in the hope that he 

 too might become learned and famous. If William had 

 lived, he would have become an idle tailor ; but he 

 perished of neglect. Cardan went back to Pavia full of 

 grief, and set to work upon the only act of atonement that 

 occurred to him. He would compensate in some measure 

 for the youth's death by conferring upon him literary im- 

 mortality, and for that express purpose wrote a Dialogue on 

 Death, of which the English William was the theme. In 

 the preface he told candidly the story of his conduct in 

 the matter, concealing nothing that told hardly on him- 

 self, acknowledging the full extent of his neglect. The 

 1 Xenodochium. 



