Leipzig, Scultetus, five are preserved, although of these but three are printed in accessible places;[1] one of these (of 1581) deals chiefly with the comet of 1577, for which Scultetus also imagined that he had found a parallax; another (of 1592) is written in a jovial manner, Tycho promising to drink his friend's health that evening, and expecting him to return the compliment. Another former University acquaintance with whom Tycho occasionally exchanged letters was Professor Brucæus, who had been appointed to a chair of medicine in the University of Rostock in 1567 while Tycho was studying there. He was one of the comparatively few learned men of the time who would have nothing to do with astrology, and it is therefore not to be wondered at that he expressed his disapproval on hearing about the intended printing of an astrological calendar by Elias Olsen at Hveen. He wrote, for instance, that weather predictions reminded him of Cato's saying of the Roman haruspices, that he wondered if they could keep from laughing whenever they met each other.[2] But though adverse to astrology, Brucæus had no objection to an astronomer dabbling in medicine, and in one of his letters he asked Tycho to let him know if he was in possession of any remedy against epilepsy. They also corresponded on astronomical matters, and Tycho pointed out to him the difficulty in accepting the theory of Copernicus, and commented on the errors of the Alphonsine and Prutenic tables.[3]
Of far greater importance than the above correspondence
- ↑ The first one in T. B. et Doct. Vir. Epist., p. 57; the second in Kästner's Geschichte der Mathematik, ii. p. 409. The source of both is Singularia Historico-literaria Lusatica oder historische und gelehrte Merckwürdigkeiten von Ober- und Nieder-Lausitz, 27te Sammlung, 1743, pp. 178 et seq., where there are two more letters printed. Scultetus (Schultz) died in 1614 as burgomaster at Görlitz. A letter dated January 1600 is printed in Aus T. Brahes Briefwechsel, von F. Burckhardt. Basel, 1887.
- ↑ T. B. et Doct. Vir. Epist., p. 93.
- ↑ Ibid., p. 75 et seq.
