JEROME CARDAN 217 



of hostile prejudice, and to make friends of those in 

 authority, care being taken not to let himself become 

 involved in their private affairs, and not to seek too 

 close an acquaintance. 1 



Up to this date, Cardan, when he visited his patients, 

 had either walked or ridden a mule. In 1562 he began 

 to use a carriage, but this change of habit brought ill 

 luck with it, for, in this same year, his horses ran away; 

 he was thrown out of the vehicle, and sustained an injury 

 to one of the fingers of his right hand, and to the right 

 arm as well. 2 The finger soon healed, but the damage 

 to the right arm shifted itself over to the left side, leav- 

 ing the right arm sound. The foregoing details, taken 

 chiefly from the Paralipomena (Book III. ch. xii.), are 

 somewhat significant in respect to the serious trouble 

 which came upon him soon afterwards. 



Though he had now secured a class-room for himself, 

 the malice of his enemies was not yet abated. Just 

 before the end of his term, certain of them went to 

 Cardinal Morone and told him that it would be inex- 

 pedient to allow Cardan to retain his Professorship any 

 longer, seeing that scarcely any pupils went to listen to 

 him. The terms Cardan used in describing this hostile 

 movement against him, 3 rouse a suspicion that there may 



1 Opera, torn. x. p. 464. 



2 De Vita Propria, ch. xxx. p. 80. He seems to have had many 

 untoward experiences in driving. He tells of another mishap (Opera, 

 torn. i. p. 472) in June 1570; how a fellow, some tipstaff of the 

 courts, jumped into his carriage and frightened the mares Cardan 

 was driving, jeering at them likewise because they were rather bare 

 of flesh. 



3 " Demum sub conductionis fine, voces sparserunt, et maxime 

 apud Moronum Cardinalem, me exiguo auditorio profited, quod 

 quanquam non omnino verum esset, quinimo ab initio Academiae 

 multos, et usque ad dies jejunii haberem auditores." De Vita 

 Propria, ch. xvil p. 56. 



