hereof wrote it doubtlesse with great iudgement, trayned thereto with a feruent desire that their doctrine shoulde not onely remayne in perpetuitie for euer, but that it shoulde also be imprinted in the Readers minde, assuring themselues it shoulde profite all, and dislyke none. For it maye in maner be called an artificiall memorie, to benefite themselues at all times and seasons, and in all argumentes, with euerye perticular thing these wise and graue men haue inuented, shadowed with tales and parables, and with the examples of brute and dumme beastes.
The Sages of auncient nations (expert in all the Sciences) diʃrous to publiʃhe to thoʃe that came after them their great knowledge and wiʃedome, euen with a determinate minde and counʃell premeditate decreed to ʃet foorth a peece of woorke, adapted with diuers ʃimilitudes andʃundrie compariʃons of vnreaʃonable beaʃts and birds, by which they might greatly beautifie their doctrine, and this they did for diuers reʃpectes. Firʃt, to give occaʃion that their wiʃedome and learning ʃhould be knowne to the worlde. Secondly, that men of iudgement and diʃcretion reading the ʃame might reape the benefite of their rules to direct this fraile lyfe. Thirdlye, that hee thatunderstandeth
