CHAPTER him; he seeth more cleere and further into matters:

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his spirit pickes and ransaketh the whole store-house of words and figures, to shew and present himselfe ; and he must have them more then ordinary, as his conceit is beyond ordinary. Plutarch saith, that he discerned the Latine tongue by things. Here likewise the sense enlightneth and produceth the words: no longer windy or spongy, but of flesh and bone. They signifie more then they utter. Even weake ones shew some image of this. For, in Italie, I spake what I listed in ordinary discourses, but in more serious and pithy, I durst not have dared to trust to an Idiome, which I could not winde or turne beyond it's common grace, or vulgar bias. I will be able to adde and use in it somewhat of

mine owne. The managing and emploiment of good wits, endeareth and giveth grace unto a tongue: Not so much innovating as filling the same with more forcible and divers services, wresting, straining and enfolding it. They bring no words unto it, but enrich their owne, waigh-downe and cramme-in their signification and custome; teaching it unwonted motions; but wisely and ingenuously. Which skill how little it is given to all, may plainly bee discerned by most of our moderne French Writers. They are over-bold and scornefull, to shunne the common trodden path: but want of invention and lacke of discretion looseth them. There is nothing to be seene in them but a miserable strained affectation of strange Inke-pot termes; harsh, cold and absurd disguisements, which in stead of raising, pull downe the matter. So they may gallantize and flush it in noveltie, they care not for efficacie. To take hold of a new farre-fetcht word, they neglect the usuall, which often are more significant, forcible and sinnowy. I finde sufficient store of stuffe in our language, but some defect of fashion.

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For there is nothing but could be framed of our CHAPTER Hunters gibbrish words or strange phrases, and of our Warriours peculiar tearmes; a fruitfull and rich Upon some soile to borrow of. And as hearbes and trees are Virgil bettered and fortified by beiny transplanted, so formes of speach are embellished and graced by variation. I finde it sufficiently plenteous, but not sufficiently plyable and vigorous. It commonly faileth and shrinketh under a pithy and powerfull conception. If your march therein be far extended, you often feele it droope and languish under you, unto whose default the Latine doth now and then present his helping hand, and the Greeke to some others. By some of these words which I have culled out, we more hardly perceive the Energie or effectuall operation of them, forsomuch as use and frequencie have in some sort abased the grace and made their beauty vulgar. As in our ordinary language, we shall sometimes meete with excellent phrases, and quaint metaphors, whose blithenesse fadeth through age, and colour is tarnished by too common using them. But that doth nothing distaste those of sound judgement, nor derogate from the glory of those ancient Authors, who, as it is likely, were the first that brought these words into luster, and raised them to that straine. The Sciences handle this over finely, with an artificiall maner, and different from the vulgar and naturall forme. My Page makes love, and understands it feelingly; Read Leon Hebræus or Ficinus unto him; you speake of him, of his thoughts and of his actions, yet understands he nothing what you meane. I nor acknowledge nor discerne in Aristotle, the most part of my ordinary motions. They are clothed with other robes, and shrouded under other vestures, for the use of Academicall schooles. God send them well to speed: but were I of the trade, I would naturalize Arte, as much as they Artize nature. [There let us

CHAPTER leave] Benbo and Equicola. When I write, I can

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well omit the company, and spare the remembrance of books; for feare they interrupt my forme. And in truth, good Authors deject me too-too much, and quaile my courage. I willingly imitate that Painter, who having bungler-like drawn, and fondly represented some Cockes, forbad his boies to suffer any live Cocke to come into his shop. And to give my selfe some luster or grace have rather neede of some of Antinonydes the Musicians invention; who when he was to play any musick, gave order that before or after him, some other bad musicians should cloy and surfet his auditory. But I can very hardly be without Plutark; he is so universall and so full, that upon all occasions, and whatsoever extravagant subject you have undertaken, he intrudeth himselfe into your work, and gently reacheth you a helpeaffording hand, fraught with rare embelishments, and inexhaustible of precious riches. It spights me, that he is so much exposed unto the pillage of those which haunt him. He can no sooner come in my sight, or if I cast but a glance upon him, but I pull some legge or wing from him. For this my dissignement, it much fitteth my purpose, that I write in mine owne house, in a wild country, where no man helpeth or releeveth me; where I converse with no body that understands the Latine of his Pater noster and as little of French. I should no doubt have done it better else where, but then the worke had beene lesse mine: whose principall drift and perfection, is to be exactly mine; I could mend an accidentall errour, whereof I abound in mine unwary course; but it were a kinde of treason to remove the imperfections from me, which in me are ordinary and constant. When any body else, or my selfe have said unto my selfe: Thou art too full of figures or allegories; here is a word meerely-bred

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Gaskoyne; that's a dangerous phrase: (I refuse none CHAPTER that are used in the frequented streets of France; those that will combat use and custome by the Upon some strict rules of Grammar do but jest) there's an Virgil ignorant discourse, that's a paradoxicall relation: or there's a foolish conceit: thou doest often but dally one will thinke thou speakest in earnest, what thou hast but spoken in jest. Yea (say I) but I correct unadvised, not customarie errors. Speake I not so every where? Doe I not lively display my selfe? that sufficeth I have [my] will: All the world may know me by my booke, and my booke by me: But I am of an Apish and imitating condition. When I medled with making of verses (and I never made any but in Latine) they evidently accused the Poet I came last from reading: And of my first Essayes, some taste a little of the stranger. At Paris I speake somewhat otherwise then at Montaigne. Whom I behold with attention, doth easily convay and imprint something of his in me. What I heedily consider, the same I usurpe: a foolish countenance, a crabbed looke, a ridiculous manner of speach. And vices more: Because they pricke mee, they take fast hold upon mee, and leave mee not, unlesse I shake them off. I have more often beene heard to sweare by imitation, then by complexion. Oh injurious and dead-killing imitation like that of those huge in greatnesse and matchlesse in strength Apes, which Alexander met withall in a certaine part of India: which otherwise it had beene hard to vanquish. But by this their inclination to counterfeit whatsoever they saw done, they afforded the meanes. For, thereby the Hunters learn't in their sight to put on shooes, and tie them with many strings and knots; to dresse their heads with divers strange attires, full of sliding-knots; and dissemblingly to rub their eyes with Glew, or

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CHAPTER Birde-lime. So did those silly harmelesse beasts indiscreetly employ their Apish disposition. They Upon some ensnared, glewed, entrameled, haltred and shackled themselves. That other faculty of Extempore and wittily representing the gestures and words of another, which often causeth sport and breedeth admiring, is no more in me then in a blocke. When I sweare after mine owne fashion, it is onely by God; the directest of all oathes. They report that Socrates swore by a Dogge; Zeno by that interjection (now a daies used amongst the Italies) Capari; and Pithagoras by water and by aire. I am so apt at unawares to entertaine these superficiall impressions, that if but for three daies together I use my selfe to speake to any Prince with your Grace or your Highnesse, for eight daies after I so forget my selfe, that I shall still use them for your Honour or your Worship: and what I am wont to speake in sport or jest the next day after I shall speake in good serious earnest. Therefore in writing I assume more unwillingly much beaten arguments, for feare I handle them at others charges. All arguments are alike fertile to me. take them upon any trifle. And I pray God this were not undertaken by the commandement of a minde as fleeting. Let me begin with that likes me best, for all matters are linked one to another. my conceit displeaseth me, for somuch as it commonly produceth most foolish dotages from deepest studies; and such as content me on a suddaine, and when I least looke for them; which as fast fleete away, wanting at that instant some holde fast. On horse backe, at the table, in my bed; but most on horse-backe, where my amplest meditations and my farthest reaching conceits are. My speach is somewhat nicely jealous of attention and silence; if I be in any earnest talke, who interrupteth me, cuts me off. In travell, even the necessity of waies

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But