heaven, and nothing lower by its little
towers of Arrogance—it cannot be too
Steadfastly resisted. We should be always
on our guard against it.

Another practice with the writers of a past
time was to garnish their books with laudatory
letters and verses from distinguished
men or partial friends. They often composed
for themselves letters of this kind, to which
they put various initials; just as Charles the
Fifth, when on one occasion he had beaten
the Protestants in battle, is said to have
caused a number of guns to be founded upon
the pattern of those he had captured, and
inscribed with the devices of the enemy, to
drag as trophies into Spain, and magnify his
triumph.

Others have sought to catch attention, not
by a parade of success and satisfaction, but
by a parade of discontent. They attack everything,
they wish to make a noise in the world,
and know that of all work fighting is the
noisiest; therefore they fight, they combat
every opinion, attack every eminent man, or,
taking in an anonymous way their own
eminence for granted, even attack themselves,
as did Garopolus when he published a remorseless
criticism on his own poem of Charlemagne.
Great men do not notice such attacks, for
eagles do not catch flies. When Ziegler wrote
Commentary upon Grotius, Henninger
wrote a cruel commentary upon Ziegler.
"This little fellow," Ziegler said, "wishes to
be dragged out of his obscurity. Good sense
forbids me to grant his petition." One of the
most quarrelsome of these men was James
Gronovius, the son of John; yet John was
the most peaceful writer of his age. In
youth he had written a book called
Elenchus Anti-Diatribæ, which contained one or
two sharp expressions levelled at some
commentator. He afterwards, for that reason,
bought up and burnt every copy, and would
not spare one even to Grœvius, his most
intimate friend. Yet it was this man's son
who lived by snarling.

Of men who have in direct and plain terms
called attention to their own surpassing
merits—a vast host—I will mention only
one or two. A famous lawyer, Charles
Dumoulin, according to Balzac, wrote often
at the top of his opinions given upon
consultation: " I, who yield to no man, and
who have from no man anything to learn "—
A Greek who wrote the life of Alexander,
promised to equal Alexander's actions with
his words. Claveri, an Italian, gave money and
sweetmeats to the children of his town to sing
about the streets, ballads of his own making in
honour of himself. He finally collected them in
two volumes as evidence of his own popularity.
Giacomo Mazzoni declared himself ready to
answer on the spot, every question that
could be asked him. Messrs. Gaulmin, Saumaise
(Milton's Salmasius), and Maussac
being together in the Royal Library, " I
think," said Gaulmin, " that we three can
match our heads against all that there is
learned in Europe." To which Salmasius
replied, " Add to all that there is learned in
Europe, yourself and M. du Maussac, and I
can match my single head against the whole
of you." Not to convey a false impression,
let me add that Salmasius was a very learned
man indeed, and was treated by our Milton
more in the spirit of controversy than of
justice.

When publishers for the same community
of readers lived in all parts of Europe, it was
convenient for authors to drop hints about
unpublished works in their possession that
might be treated for by any firm in Italy,
France, Germany, or Switzerland. These
hints grew, however, sometimes into forms of
great pretension, and there were not a few
who claimed to themselves vast credit for
writings that had never come to light. La
Croix du Maine carried his boasting in this
way as far as any man. In an epistle
dedicatory addressed to Henry the Third, of
France, he said, "My library now contains
eight hundred volumes of various memoirs
and collections, written by my hand or by an
amanuensis, all the produce of my invention
or research, and extracted from all the books
that I have read up to this date, of which
the number is infinite, as may easily be seen
by the twenty-five or thirty thousand heads
and chapters of all kinds of matter that may
fall under the cognizance of man; which
treat of things so different that it is almost
impossible to speak of, see, or imagine
anything into which I have not made curious
research. The whole collection is classed
according to sciences, arts, and professions,
and arranged in a hundred cases, for each of
which two hundred dollars will content me.
This sum would seem so little to so great a
king, that I am ashamed to have set down so
low a price."—In fact, he only wanted twenty
thousand dollars for his giant scrap-book.

Of critics and grammarians the conceits
used to be endless, and nothing ever was more
vain than their disputes. Their follies of
enthusiasm are respectable; one may almost
admire Becatelli, who sold all he had to buy
a rotten manuscript of Livy. But in their
hands criticism that was to discern truth
from error became itself the overflowing
source of error and of discord. As for work
at the text of authors, on the whole the
saying first applied to copies of Homer
must be pretty generally true—that, in
any old writer, that is most correct which
has been least corrected. 'What would not
these men quarrel about? Two fell into kicks
and cuffs in open street over the question
whether the verb Inquam belonged to the
third or fourth conjugation. Nizolius and
Maioragius held a notable dispute as to
which of the two most thoroughly admired
Cicero. Politian refused to read the Bible,
but spent time and toil in settling whether
he should write Vergil or Virgil, and amused