Besides, Our Wits Are Not Altogether So Grosse And Barren, As The Philosophers Seeme To Assigne Vnto This Our Aier, And These Nourishments, Which Perhaps Many Of Our Countreymen Could Much Rather Verifie In Deeds Then In Words, If (As The Poet Sayth) Enuious Pouerty Did Not Holde Vs Downe.

But here the iudgement of the common people, as often in other matters, doth too plainly deceiue (I except

All good and well experienced men) some of them which would seeme to be wise, namely, that whatsoeuer their vse doth admit, or that they haue not seene, nor had trial of beforetime, they presently condemne. As for example, he that neuer saw the sea will not be persuaded that there is a mediterrane sea; so doe they measure all things by their owne experience and conceit, as though there were nothing good and profitable, but that onely wherewith they mainteine their liues. But we are not growen to that pitch of folly, that because we haue heard of certaine people of Aethiopia, which are fed with locusts, being therefore called by Diodorus, Acridophagi, and of a certaine nation of India also, whom Clitarchus and Megasthenes haue named Mandri, as Agatarchides witnesseth, or of others that liue vpon frogs or sea-crabs, or round shrimps, which thing is at this day commonly knowen, that (I say) we should therefore presume to make them a laughing stocke to the common people, because we are not accustomed to such sustenance.

SECTIO DECIMASEXTA.

[Sidenote: 10. Conuicium.] Decimo. Hospitalitatem nostris hominibus inhumanissimus porcus obijcit. Marsupium inquit, non cirumferunt, nec hospitiari aut conuiuari gratis pudor est. Nam si quis aliquid haberet, quod cum alijs communicaret, id faceret sane in primis ac libenter. His quoque annectamus, quod templa, seu sacras adiculas domi propria a multis Islandorum extructas velut pudendum quiddam commemorat: quodque eas primum omnium de mane oraturi petant, nec a quoquam prius interpellari patiantur. Hac ille velut insigne quoddam dedecus in Islandis notauit.

Scilicet, quia nihil cum Amaricino, sui:

Nec porci diuina vnquam amarunt: quod sane metuo ne nimis vere de hoc conuiciatore dicatur, id quod vel ex his vltimis duabus obiectionibus constare poterit.

Verum enimuero cum ipse suarum virtutum sit testis locupletissimus, nos Lectorem eius rei cupidum ad ipsius hoc opus Poeticum remittimus, quod is de Islandia composuit, et nos tam aliquot proximis distinctionibus examinauimus: cuius maledicentia et foeditatis nos hic pro ipso puduit; ita, vt qua is Satyrica, at quid Satyrica? Sathanica, inquam, mordacitate et maledicentia in nostram gentem scribere non erubuit, nos tamen referre pigeat: Tanta eius est et tam abominanda petulantia, tam atrox calumnia. DEVS BONE: Hoc conuiciorum plaustrum (paucissima namque attigimus: Nolui enim laterem lauare, et stulto, vt inquit ille sapientissimus, secundum stultitiam suam respondere, cum in ipsius Rhythmis verbum non sit quod conuicio careat) qui viderit, nonne iudicabit pasquilli istius autorem hominem fuisse pessimum, imo facem hominum, cum virtutis ac veritatis contemptorem, sine pietate, sine humanitate?

Sed hic merito dubitauerim, peiusne horum conuiciorum autor de Islandis meritus sit, an vero Typographus ille Ioachimus Leo (et quicunque sunt alij, qui in suis editionibus, nec suum nec vrbis sua nomen profiteri ausi sunt) qui illa iam bis, si non sapius Typis suis Hamburgi euulgauit. Hoccine impune fieri sinitis, o senatus populusque Hamburgensis?

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