A wide rectangular woodcut headpiece displays a repeating pattern of decorative floral and foliated scroll motifs.

TO THE MOST ILLUSTRIOUS AND EXCELLENT

L O R D

LORD ANDREA

CONCUBLET

MARQUESS OF ARENA.

GIOVANNI ALPHONSO BORELLI SENDS GREETINGS.

A small decorative woodcut ornament consists of four stylized floral scroll elements.

If noble birth deserves any praise and commendation, some wise men have judged that it should certainly be attributed to the ancestors rather than to the children. Therefore, they said that whoever boasts of nobility commends the glory and good of another, not his own. This would indeed be true if parents were foreign and not the natural causes of their children, or if they did not provide the matter and influence in the act of generation. But the matter stands otherwise. Just as the sprouts and fruits of plants conform to the trees and seeds themselves, a rose is never produced from a poppy original: papauere, nor are sweet apples produced from an oak.