The deuce of any other rule have I to govern myself by in this affair—and if I had one—as I do all things out of all rule—I would twist it and tear it to pieces, and throw it into the fire when I had done—Am I warm? I am, and the cause demands it——a pretty story! is a man to follow rules——or rules to follow him? Now this, you must know, being my chapter upon chapters, which I promised to write before I went to sleep, I thought it meet to ease my conscience entirely before I laid down, by telling the world all I knew about the matter at once: Is not this ten times better than to set out dogmatically with a sententious parade of wisdom, and telling the world a story of a roasted horse——that chapters relieve the mind—that they assist—or impose upon the imagination—and that in a work of this dramatic cast they are as necessary as the shifting of scenes——with fifty other cold conceits, enough to extinguish the fire which roasted him?—O! but to understand this, which is a puff at the fire of _Diana_’s temple—you must read _Longinus_—read away—if you are not a jot the wiser by reading him the first time over—never fear—read him again—_Avicenna_ and _Licetus_ read _Aristotle_’s metaphysicks forty times through a-piece, and never understood a single word.—But mark the consequence—_Avicenna_ turned out a desperate writer at all kinds of writing—for he wrote books _de omni scribili_; and for _Licetus (Fortunio)_ though all the world knows he was born a fœtus,[13] of no more than five inches and a half in length, yet he grew to that astonishing height in literature, as to write a book with a title as long as himself——the learned know I mean his _Gonopsychanthropologia_, upon the origin of the human soul. So much for my chapter upon chapters, which I hold to be the best chapter in my whole work; and take my word, whoever reads it, is full as well employed, as in picking straws. [13] _Ce Fœtus_ n’étoit pas plus grand que la paume de la main; mais son pere l’ayant éxaminé en qualité de Médecin, & ayant trouvé que c’etoit quelque chose de plus qu’un Embryon, le fit transporter tout vivant à Rapallo, ou il le fit voir à Jerôme Bardi & à d’autres Médecins du lieu. On trouva qu’il ne lui manquoit rien d’essentiel à la vie; & son pere pour faire voir un essai de son experience, entreprit d’achever l’ouvrage de la Nature, & de travailler à la formation de l’Enfant avec le même artifice que celui dont on se sert pour faire écclorre les Poulets en Egypte. Il instruisit une Nourisse de tout ce qu’elle avoit à faire, & ayant fait mettre son fils dans un pour proprement accommodé, il reussit à l’elever & a lui faire prendre ses accroissemens necessaires, par l’uniformité d’une chaleur étrangere mesurée éxactement sur les dégrés d’un Thermométre, ou d’un autre instrument équivalent. (Vide Mich. Giustinian, ne gli Scritt. Liguri à Cart. 223. 488.)