Bernardo de Montaños.

Happy time, fortunate Era;
For like a clear and sweet Springtime
When it wishes to give us a fertile Summer,
It scatters with its hand
Pearls, and beautiful flowers
Of diverse colors:
So your cultured, sovereign genius,
Which does not seem human,
Gives us such clear light, that to the wise Apollo
Your book alone grants immortality.

Filippo Nicoletti, to the Author.

In order not to feel death,
To sing sweetly
Upon the shore of the sea,
Is the custom of the lovely Bird A reference to the "swan song" myth. near its passing:
You, PIETRO, with your divine singing,
On the banks of the Brembo A river in Lombardy, Italy, near Cerone's birthplace., more constant and strong,
With lovely and sweet temperaments
Sing joyfully, only to live forever.

From Mr. Luca Nadagnoli.

These sacred Swans,
That make the sandy shore
Of the Adriatic resound with sweet accents;
Learning from you how the harmonies
Might be formed better,
Already prepare themselves with a clear cry:
In order not to take from you your earned honors,
They carry, CERONE, your fame and name
Beyond the sea, which makes the waves blood-red;
So that while Phoebus The sun god, Apollo.
Unfurls his golden hair, they may live
On earth, waging illustrious war against Death.

From Martio Fiascone.

If like songful Swans
We sometimes spread, CERONE, our wings to heaven;
It is not because of honors
That we hope to crown our years:
But seeing in you things so high and beautiful,
That they equal the stars;
We seek with providence, industry, and art,
To know from which Planet they were scattered into you.

---

TO THE FRIENDS OF BREVITY.

I keep imagining that one of the reasons why Music flourishes so little in Spain is that its writers write laconically original: "Laconice scribunt" — writing in a very brief, concise style.; priding themselves very much on being more than brief in their musical Arts; saying that elegance consists in brevity; and they do not say that the same Quintilian A famous Roman rhetorician., who teaches us this, follows with "and clarity"; that is to say, that elegance consists in brevity and clarity; but in brevity and obscurity, he does not allow it; nor is there reason for it. And when Horace the Poet said:

Whatever you teach, be brief, so that the docile minds
May quickly perceive what is said, and the faithful retain it:
Everything superfluous flows away from a full heart.
original Latin: "Quicquid precipis esto breuis..." from Horace's Ars Poetica.

he did not say by this that we should be stingy with words when we teach. And that, what we say with five or six words obscurely, we should not say with ten or twelve, if necessary, so that what is said or written may be clearer, and in a way that can be understood without a gloss An explanatory note or translation., and without so many external annotations: especially since it must serve young people. God help me! How do they expect a beginner in Music to understand what he reads in some little Treatises very brief in words, and very scarce in examples, if there are Masters who, for the same reasons, do not understand them? Just as not everyone can dive to retrieve pearls, except for masters and good craftsmen; so for the most part, musical documents are not well understood (writing them, I mean, with as much brevity as they write,) except by those who are very well-versed and very practical in Music. And let this be said with the indulgence of some who write so obscurely and so shortly, that an Oedipus A reference to the mythological figure who solved the riddle of the Sphinx; meaning a master riddle-solver. is not enough to understand them. Many go about heedlessly, writing whatever they fancy; rather it seems that on purpose and by industry, they make the writing obscure; making at times, of the matter they write, a contrary judgment. And so, with what they think to give some light to the new Reader, they blind him more; and according to the proverb of the Greeks; They throw dust in the eyes: original: "Puluerem oculis effundunt." so that, well considered, we can say of them; They write not on paper, but in water. original: "Non in carta, sed in aqua scribunt." They say little, and that abbreviated with a small "&c." and I fear that at times it happens to be read by a person who knows no more of the "Etcetera" than those wise Basques original: "Bizcaynos." knew: when an Investigator, reading them a provision regarding a riot...