The Pneumatics of Hero of Alexandria

which she is continually gathering, with praise all the greater, in comparison to all those who ever assembled famous libraries, as much as others did so for vanity and for pomp; whereas she does it only to extract the richest treasure of the sciences, and those habits and ornaments of the soul that render her far more admirable in the eyes of the whole world than being a Most Serene Prince does; since, in this, she indeed has some peers, but in knowledge and in the art of governing peoples well (an art truly architectural above all others), she is alone and without example. As is very well demonstrated by the quiet state in which the peoples subject to her live, free through her prudence from those many calamities of famine and other turmoils, which we see the neighboring peoples miserably suffering. May God keep you healthy and happy for a long time, so that you may exercise your worth with excellent success for the benefit of those who remain under your government, and may He grant me the grace to be able, as I hope, to make with another greater gift, one day, a more ample demonstration of my pure affection toward Your Most Serene Highness, to whom, with this end, I make, as I ought, most humble reverence. From Urbino, the 3rd day of August, 1592.