THE FIRST BOOK OF THE COURTIER
other than that proper to them, to transpose them aptly, and as it were to graft them, like the branch of a tree, upon a more appropriate trunk,— so as to, make them more attractive and beautiful, and as it were to bring things within the range of our vision, and within hand-touch as we say, to the delight of him who hears or reads. Nor would I have him scruple to form new words and in new figures of speech, deriving them tastefully from the Latins, as of old the Latins derived them from the Greeks.
35.— "Now if among the lettered men of good talent and judgment who to-day are found in our midst, there were a few who would take care to write in this language (as I have described) things worthy of being read, we should soon see it studied and abounding in beautiful terms and figures, and capable of being written in as well as is any other whatsoever; and if it were not pure old Tuscan, it would be Italian,— universal, copious and varied, and in a way like a delightful garden full of various flowers and fruits. Nor would this be a novel thing; for from the four dialects that the Greek writers had in use,90 they culled words, forms and figures from each as they saw fit, and thence they brought forth another dialect which was called 'common,' and later they called all five by the single name Greek. And although the Attic dialect was more elegant, pure and copious than the others, good writers who were not Athenians by birth did not so affect it as to be unrecognizable by their style and by the perfume (as it were) and essence of their native speech. Nor yet were they disprized for this; on the contrary those who tried to seem too Athenian, were censured for it. Among the Latin writers too, many non-Romans were highly esteemed in their day, although there was not found in them that typical purity of the Roman tongue which men of other race can rarely acquire. Thus Titus Livius was not at all discarded, although someone professed to have detected a Paduan flavour in him;91 nor was Virgil, albeit reproached with not speaking Roman. Moreover, as you know, many writers of barbarian race were read and esteemed at Rome.
"We, on the contrary, much more strict than the ancients, needlessly impose certain new laws upon ourselves, and with the
