156 JEROME CARDAN 



to colophon, Scaliger's name never once occurs. The 

 gist of the book may best be understood by quoting an 

 extract from the criticism of Cardan by Naud6 prefixed 

 to the De Vita Propria. He writes : " This proposition 

 of mine will best be comprehended by the man who 

 shall set to work to compare Cardan with Julius Caesar 

 Scaliger, his rival, and a man endowed with an intellect 

 almost superhuman. For Scaliger, although he came upon 

 the stage with greater pomp and display, and brought 

 with him a mind filled with daring speculation, and ade- 

 quate to the highest flights, kept closely behind the lattices 

 of the humaner letters and of medical philosophy, leaving 

 to Cardan full liberty to occupy whatever ground of argu- 

 ment he might find most advantageous in any other of 

 the fields of learning. Moreover, if any one shall give 

 daily study to these celebrated Exer citations, he will 

 find therein nothing to show that Cardan is branded 

 by any mark of shame which may not be removed 

 with the slightest trouble, if the task be undertaken 

 in a spirit of justice. For, in the first place, who can 

 maintain that Scaliger was justified in publishing his 

 Exercitations three years after the issue of the second 

 edition of the Libri de Subtilitate, without ever having 

 taken the trouble to read this edition, and without 

 exempting from censure the errors which Cardan had 

 diligently expunged from his book in the course of his 

 latest revision, lest he (Scaliger) should find that all 

 the mighty labour expended over his criticisms had 

 been spent in vain ? Besides, who does not know that 

 Cardan, in his Actio primain Calumniatorem, blunted the 

 point of all his assailant's weapons, swept away all his 

 objections, and broke in pieces all his accusations, in 

 such wise that the very reason of their existence ceased 

 to be ? Cardan, in sooth, was a true man, and held all 



