A NEW HOPE A NEW DISASTEK. 271 



by a rebuff of the most unexpected kind. The senate 

 suddenly expunged him from the list of scholars qualified 

 to lecture, warned him that he was accused of two most 

 grave crimes, the witnesses against him being two physi- 

 cians ; and adding that it was only out of respect to his 

 station in life, and his connexion with the college, that 

 they refrained from laying hands upon him, they informed 

 him that he was sentenced to perpetual exile from their 

 territory. This was all hasty enough, and, in the absence 

 of those who could by a word have proved his innocence 

 of the crimes charged against him, Cardan wasted much 

 time in prayers and petitions. But at last the necessary 

 vindications came, and he escaped from his brief trouble 

 from beginning to end three weeks long not only 

 unscathed, but with a positive accession of renown. 

 " Freed from those calumnies," he says, "I grew in fame. 

 The citizens, indeed almost the whole state, embraced me 

 with peculiar love, admired my innocence, and pitied my 

 misfortunes: my books, too, were set free from all sus- 

 picion Then there came to me from cardinals and 



councillors at Rome soothing and flattering letters, so 

 that in my whole life I never met with a success greater 

 or more splendid." 



The accusations are not named, but from the last fact 

 we may conclude reasonably that this was the occasion, or 

 one of the occasions, on which the precaution he had taken 



