In trying to compose the present small work, I have placed my faith not in my literary knowledge, of which I have very little, but rather in the spiritual authority of the history events themselves, for I have always been certain that it was brought to completion only by the power of God alone, and through those men whom he willed. Likewise, the story undoubtedly was written down by whatever men, even if uneducated, God willed. I am unable to doubt that He who guided their steps through so many difficulties, who removed the many military obstacles that lay before them, will implant within me, in whatever manner he pleases, the truth about what happened, nor will he deny to me the ability to choose the correct and fitting words. A version of this same history, but woven out of excessively simple words, often violating grammatical rules, exists, and it may often bore the reader with the stale, flat quality of its language. It works well enough for the less learned, who are not interested in the quality of the diction, but only in the novelty of the story, nor is it the case that the author should have spoken in a way that they do not understand. Those, moreover, who think that honesty nourishes eloquence, when they see that the words have been chosen less carefully than the narrative demands, and that the story is told briefly where the elaborate variety of mollifying[44] eloquence was appropriate, when they see the narration proceed bare-footed, then, as the poet says, they will either sleep or laugh.[45] They hate a badly performed speech, which they judge should have been recited in a much different way. The style of writers should fit the status of the events: martial deeds should be told with harsh words; what pertains to divine matters must be brought along at more controlled pace. In the course of this work, if my ability is equal to the task, I should perform in both modes, so that haughty Gradivus[46] may find that his lofty crimes have been represented in matching words, and, when piety is the subject, gravity is never violated by excessive cleverness.[47] Even if I have been unable to follow these standards, nevertheless I have learned to admire or praise for the most part what is done well by someone else. Therefore I confess that I, with shameless temerity, but out of love of faith, have run the risk of being criticized by judges whom I do not know because, when they find that I have taken up this project with a vow to correct a previous work, they may value the second less than the first. Since we see a passion for grammar everywhere, and we know that the discipline, because of the number of scholars that now exist, is now open to the worst students, it would be horrid thing not to write, even if we write only as we are able, and not as we should, about this glory of our time, or even to leave the story hidden in the scabbiness of artless speech. I have seen what God has done in