_Ambrose_ tho he be a patriarke in _mediolan[=u]_ loveth versising. _Beda_ shameth not ye science that shamelesse _Gosson_ misliketh. Reade over _Lactantius_, his proofe is by poetry, and _Paul_ voutsafeth to overlooke _Epimenides_; let the Apostle preach at Athens he disdaineth not of Aratus authorite. It is a pretye sentence yet not so prety as pithy, _Poeta nascitur orator fit_, as who should say, Poetrye commeth from above from a heavenly seate of a glorious God unto an excellent creature man, an orator is but made by exercise. For if wee examine well what befell _Ennius_ amonge the Romans, and Hesiodus among his co[u]ntrimen the Gretians, howe they came by theyr knowledge whence they receved their heavenly furye, the first will tell us that sleping upon the Mount of Parnassus he dreamed that he received the soule of _Homer_ into him, after the which he became a Poete, the next will assure you that it commeth not by labor, nether that night watchings bringeth it, but yt we must have it thence whence he fetched it w^c was (he saith) fro[m] a wel of ye Muses w^c _Cabelimus_ calleth _Por[=u]_, a draught whereof drewe him to his perfection, so of a shephard he becam an eloque[n]t poet. Wel the[n] you see yt it commeth not by exercise of play making, nether insertio[n] of gawds, but from nature and from above: and I hope yt _Aristotle_ hath sufficiently taught you that _Natura nihil fecit frustra_. _Perseus_ was made a poete _divino furore percitus_. And whereas the poets were sayde to call for the Muses helpe ther mening was no other as _Iodocus Badius_ reporteth, but to call for heavenly inspiration from above to direct theyr ende[a]vors. Nether were it good for you to sette light by the name of a poet since ye oftspring from whence he cometh is so heavenly. _Sibilla_ in hir answers to _Æneas_ against hir will as the poet telleth us was possessed with thys fury, ye wey consideratly but of the writing of poets, and you shal se[e] than whe[n] ther matter is most heavenly, their stile is most loftye, a strange token of the wonderfull efficacy of the same.