saith) artificialia delectant, sed mox fastidimus, artificial toys please but for a time; yet who is he that will not be moved with them for the present?  When Achilles was tormented and sad for the loss of his dear friend Patroclus, his mother Thetis brought him a most elaborate and curious buckler made by Vulcan, in which were engraven sun, moon, stars, planets, sea, land, men fighting, running, riding, women scolding, hills, dales, towns, castles, brooks, rivers, trees, &c., with many pretty landscapes, and perspective pieces:  with sight of which he was infinitely delighted, and much eased of his grief.

[3315] “Continuo eo spectaculo captus delenito maerore
        Oblectabatur, in manibus tenens dei splendida dona.”

Who will not be affected so in like case, or see those well-furnished cloisters and galleries of the Roman cardinals, so richly stored with all modern pictures, old statues and antiquities? Cum se—­spectando recreet simul et legendo, to see their pictures alone and read the description, as [3316]Boisardus well adds, whom will it not affect? which Bozius, Pomponius, Laetus, Marlianus, Schottus, Cavelerius, Ligorius, &c., and he himself hath well performed of late.  Or in some prince’s cabinets, like that of the great dukes in Florence, of Felix Platerus in Basil, or noblemen’s houses, to see such variety of attires, faces, so many, so rare, and such exquisite pieces, of men, birds, beasts, &c., to see those excellent landscapes, Dutch works, and curious cuts of Sadlier of Prague, Albertus Durer, Goltzius Vrintes, &c., such pleasant pieces of perspective, Indian pictures made of feathers, China works, frames, thaumaturgical motions, exotic toys, &c.  Who is he that is now wholly overcome with idleness, or otherwise involved in a labyrinth of worldly cares, troubles and discontents, that will not be much lightened in his mind by reading of some enticing story, true or feigned, whereas in a glass he shall observe what our forefathers have done, the beginnings, ruins, falls, periods of commonwealths, private men’s actions displayed to the life, &c. [3317] Plutarch therefore calls them, secundas mensas et bellaria, the second course and junkets, because they were usually read at noblemen’s feasts.  Who is not earnestly affected with a passionate speech, well penned, an elegant poem, or some pleasant bewitching discourse, like that of [3318] Heliodorus, ubi oblectatio quaedam placide fuit, cum hilaritate conjuncta?  Julian the Apostate was so taken with an oration of Libanius, the sophister, that, as he confesseth, he could not be quiet till he had read it all out. Legi orationem tuam magna ex parte, hesterna die ante prandium, pransus vero sine ulla intermissione totam absolvi. [3319]_O argumenta!  O compositionem!_ I may say the same of this or that pleasing tract, which will draw his attention along with it.  To most kind of men it is an extraordinary delight to study.  For what a world of books offers itself, in all subjects,