Let R be a ring with radical
(all rings have a unit element, all modules are unital). Often, one wishes to lift modules modulo
, that is, to a given, say, left R/
-module U find a left R-module E with the property that E/
E ≃ U. This is of course not always possible. Here I prove, roughly, that if a finitely generated projective U can be lifted at all, it can be lifted to a projective. Or rather, if U can be lifted to an E satisfying a certain mild condition, then E is projective (Lemma).