Page:The reflections of Lichtenberg.djvu/118

 any other language either Christian or heathen second conclusion: mathematics is terribly difficult. For some of his books he had a steady market, others stuck and stuck almost for ever—third conclusion: certain branches of mathematics must pay, yet without being pursued with quite the same zeal. He observed how eclipses were foretold, and how this was done with such accuracy that, as he himself expressed it, the calculators were seldom out of their reckoning by more than a paternoster or twofourth conclusion: there is something extraordinary in mathematics. Taken together, his definition would look somewhat as follows: Mathematics is a profession in which your honest man needs to have all his wits about him, a profession which yields both bread and honour, and yet is not overcrowded. Certain branches of it must be about as useful as the pandects. It teaches one to foretell the future, and that in a permissible way. Mathematicians can probably tell when we are going to die, but do well to keep it from us, and God grant that they may never be allowed to gossip about it. So far as I could gather, his Table of Human Knowledge was arranged in the following order: BRANCHES OF KNOWLEDGE YIELDING Bread and Honour Jurisprudence Medicine Theology Analysis of infinities No Bread and no Honour Metaphysics Logic Criticism

Honour and no Bread Poetry Belles-Lettres Philosophy

Bread and no Honour Advocacy Economics Anatomy Writing & arithmetic