232 JEROME CARDAN 



of a brain overburdened with thought ; but suddenly his 

 memory flies back to an experience of his twentieth year, 

 upon which he proceeds to build a story, wild and fanci- 

 ful even for his powers of imagination. " What man was 

 it," he asks, " who sold me that copy of Apuleius when 

 I was in my twentieth year, and forthwith went away ? 

 I indeed, at that time, had made only one essay in the 

 literary arena, and had no knowledge of the Latin tongue; 

 but in spite of this, and because the book had a gilded 

 cover, I was imprudent enough to buy it. The very 

 next day I found myself just as well versed in Latin as 

 I am now. Moreover, almost at the same time I acquired 

 knowledge of Greek and Spanish and French, sufficient 

 for reading books written in these languages." 



Cardan was by this time completely possessed by the 

 belief in his attendant genius, and the flash of memory 

 which recalled the purchase of some book or other in his 

 youth, suggested likewise the attribution of certain mystic 

 powers to this guardian genius, and conjured up some 

 fanciful explanation as to the way these powers had 

 been exercised upon himself; he, the person most closely 

 concerned, being entirely unconscious of their operation 

 at the time when they first affected him. This recorded 

 belief in a gift of tongues is one of the most convincing 

 bits of evidence to be gleaned from Cardan's writings of 

 the insanity which undoubtedly afflicted him, at least 

 periodically, at this crisis of his life. 



