But if we please to visit the heavenly inhabitants, Taurus,
Caucasus, and Olympus are at hand, from which we pass beyond the
realms of Juno and mark out the territories of the seven planets
by lines and circles. And finally we traverse the loftiest
firmament of all, adorned with signs, degrees, and figures in the
utmost variety. There we inspect the antarctic pole, which eye
hath not seen, nor ear heard; we admire the luminous Milky Way
and the Zodiac, marvellously and delightfully pictured with
celestial animals. Thence by books we pass on to separate
substances, that the intellect may greet kindred intelligences,
and with the mind's eye may discern the First Cause of all things
and the Unmoved Mover of infinite virtue, and may immerse itself
in love without end. See how with the aid of books we attain the
reward of our beatitude, while we are yet sojourners below.
Why need we say more? Certes, just as we have learnt on the
authority of Seneca, leisure without letters is death and the
sepulture of the living, so contrariwise we conclude that
occupation with letters or books is the life of man.
Again, by means of books we communicate to friends as well as
foes what we cannot safely entrust to messengers; since the book
is generally allowed access to the chambers of princes, from
which the voice of its author would be rigidly excluded, as
Tertullian observes at the beginning of his Apologeticus. When
shut up in prison and in bonds, and utterly deprived of bodily
liberty, we use books as ambassadors to our friends, and entrust
them with the conduct of our cause, and send them where to go
ourselves would incur the penalty of death.
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