To the Reader.

arranged on their North and South sides. It would be a trivial vanity to preach only when Saint Paul is in the ascendant original: "ascendent"; an astrological term referring to a planet or sign rising on the eastern horizon, and would not a Catholic original: "Papist" smile to have his Pope elected under the sign of Saint Peter?

Reader, if I studied these things referring to astrology and superstitious timing, I would think myself worse employed than the Roman Chaucer likely referring to the poet Boccaccio, whose work inspired Chaucer was in writing his Troilus. I come forth as if there were no Hours in the day, nor Planets in those Hours. I do not care for anything except for that interlude of Perendenga in the works of Miguel Cervantes: Let the old man my master live, and Christ be with us all.

You will wonder now where this is leading, for I have neither a Count of Lemos Cervantes' famous patron nor a Cardinal to pray for. I pray for the dead; that is, I wish a fair remembrance for him whose labors have deserved it. It happened that while exposing my former discourse to criticism original: "censure"; in this context, it means formal review or judgment—a custom that has strangled many truths in their cradle—a learned man suggested to me a negative opinion he held regarding my author, Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa A famous 16th-century German polymath, physician, and occult writer.