The Marriage of Philology and Mercury

The secrets of natural science original: "naturalis scientiæ"; referring to the study of the physical world and its laws (which the ancients obscured with the fictions of false deities) are brought forth under a certain guise of Philology original: "Φιλολογίας"; the love of learning and literature. From here,
Praise of Grammar.

the author proceeds to the explanation of Grammar, or literature, which is a certain fountain and origin of all disciplines, and without whose support no art and no science can subsist. Formerly, there was a great (and deservedly so) zeal for this study among the Romans; so much so that not even the most famous men were ashamed either to frequent the schools of the Grammarians, or even to write something about the subject themselves. After Lælius Stilo A distinguished Roman scholar and teacher of Cicero, who lived under Sylla Lucius Cornelius Sulla, the Roman dictator, it is certain that there were twenty most celebrated schools, and very ample salaries for men of letters. Indeed, the esteem for this art had so deeply taken root even among the leading men—