TO MY LORD

THE MARSHAL OF MONTMORENCY, KNIGHT OF THE KING'S ORDER, CAPTAIN OF FIFTY LANCES, GOVERNOR OF PARIS, AND OF THE ISLE OF FRANCE.

My Lord, although some would never want to hear mention of the Holy Scriptures, I have found nothing better than to follow the counsel of God, his Edicts, statutes, and ordinances: and in looking at what was His will, I found that by His last Testament, He commanded his heirs that they should eat bread by the labor of their bodies, and that they should multiply the talents He had left them by His Testament. Having considered this, I did not wish to hide in the earth the talents it pleased Him to distribute to me: rather, to make them profit and increase, following His commandment, I wished to exhibit them to everyone, and singularly to Your Lordship, knowing well that they will not be despised by you, even though they have proceeded from a very poor treasury, being carried by a person very abject and of low condition. Nevertheless, since it pleased My Lord the Constable, your father, to do me the honor of employing me in his service for the construction of an admirable rustic Grotto of new invention, I have not feared to address to you part of the talents that I have received from Him who has them in abundance. My Lord, the talents that I send you are, in the first place, several beautiful secrets of nature and of agriculture, which I have put in a book, tending to the end of inciting all men of the earth to make them lovers of virtue and just labor: and singularly in the art of agriculture, without which we could not live. And because I see that the earth is cultivated most often by ignorant people, who cause it only to miscarry, I have put several teachings in this book, which may...