Ingenious Designs of Various Mills

Lords. The wise pagan original: "Heyd"; here referring to the pre-Christian era of classical antiquity Cicero has said very well that a human is not born for their own benefit alone, but rather that their parents, their fatherland, and their friends each claim a certain share of them. What parents require is known, as it were, by nature; what one owes to friends is likewise shown by daily experience. But what the fatherland requires remains, for the most part, somewhat hidden. Just as one finds some who define their fatherland far too narrowly, so too are there many who deny it the duty they owe. The first are those who believe that the only place that is their fatherland is the spot where they were born and took their first breath, and where their friends and blood-relatives live. These, however, define it far too narrowly; for although it is true that this same place is more pleasant than all others, even by natural impulse, and that even the wise Ulysses desired nothing more than to be able to see the smoke from his father's hearth original: "Fumum de patriis posse videre focis"; a reference to the Odyssey via the Roman poet Ovid, symbolizing the deep longing for home—that is, that he might see the smoke from his father's hearth—it is nonetheless as the ancients have laudably said: the fatherland is everywhere for the brave man original: "forti ubique Patria est". This means that a brave and sensible man is at home everywhere. Another, when he was asked where he was from, said: I am a citizen of the world original: "Mundanus sum", meaning the world was his home. This was to show that whoever is graced above others with any useful gift is duty-bound to serve not only one place but, as much as possible, the entire world with it.

As for the others, who hide their gifts, keep them secret, and [serve] no one therewith to... The text cuts off here at the syllable "die-"; the catchword for the next page is "nen," completing the word "dienen," meaning "to serve."

Cicero (Marcus Tullius Cicero, a Roman statesman and philosopher whose works on duty were central to Renaissance education) Ulysses (Odysseus, the Greek hero known for his long journey home) Citizen of the world (A Cosmopolitan; a concept often attributed to Socrates or Diogenes the Cynic)