New Philosophy of Our Sublunary World

...through his illustrious friendship, I should acknowledge the gift of the two manuscript copies original: gemini MS. codicis from which this polished edition has been prepared for you, Reader. However, the labor involved was immense. This project was a most vexing undertaking, where troublesome difficulties nearly choked any hope of success. Both manuscript copies suffered from the hands of the worst scribes—men who did not even know Latin. They were filled with "monsters of errors" scattered everywhere, casting a thick shroud of darkness over the original meaning.

My attention had to be constantly fixed as I struggled against frustrations that were almost too much to stomach. I had to persist stubbornly through diligent reading and comparison collation: the process of comparing different copies of a text to identify variations and errors, which, after being repeated accurately several times, finally brought the work into the light. Thus, the mind of Gilbert gradually revealed itself from the midst of that dark and corrupted Latin into which the ignorance of the copyists had forced him. He was a sagacious Philosopher and a pioneer in Physics original: novaturientem, literally "desiring to innovate," referring to Gilbert's revolutionary approach to experimental science who is usually his own best interpreter when he is not hindered by external errors.

Yet, I did not indulge in rash corrections or wanton conjectures—even though I felt I understood the Author's genius from his books On the Magnet William Gilbert's most famous work, De Magnete (1600), which established the study of magnetism. I have conducted myself with such care that, although the text is now intelligible to readers, I have left a significant "gleaning" original: spicilegium; a metaphor for the remaining work or insights to be gathered by future scholars for the skill of those who will follow. They will see the exhaustion we felt in "breaking the ice" and clearing away the obstacles that would have surely exhausted the patience of anyone trying to avoid such mental torments original: cruces ingenii, literally "crosses of the intellect". Regarding the mathematical diagrams, the other