_Tansillo_--Know for certain, my brother, that such as these are beasts.
They do not consider that those rules serve principally as a frame for
the Homeric poetry, and for other similar to it; and they set up one as
a great poet, high as Homer, and disallow those of other vein and art
and enthusiasm, who in their various kinds are equal, similar,
or greater.

_Cicada_--So that Homer was not a poet who depended upon rules, but was
the cause of the rules which serve for those who are more apt at
imitation than invention, and they have been used by him who, being no
poet, yet knew how to take the rules of Homeric poetry into service, so
as to become, not a poet or a Homer, but one who apes the Muse
of others?

_Tansillo_--Thou dost well conclude that poetry is not born in rules, or
only slightly and accidentally so: the rules are derived, from the
poetry, and there are as many kinds and sorts of true rules as there are
kinds and sorts of true poets.

_Cicada_--How then are the true poets to be known?

_Tansillo_--By the singing of their verses: in that singing they give
delight, or they edify, or they edify and delight together.

_Cicada_--To whom then are the rules of Aristotle useful?

_Tansillo_--To him who, unlike Homer, Hesiod, Orpheus, and others, could
not sing without the rules of Aristotle, and who, having no Muse of his
own, would coquette with that of Homer.

_Cicada_--Then they are wrong, those stupid pedants of our days, who
exclude from the number of poets those who do not use words and
metaphors conformable to, or whose principles are not in union with,
those of Homer and Virgil; or because they do not observe the custom of
invocation, or because they weave one history or tale with another, or
because they finish the song with an epilogue on what has been said and
a prelude on what is to be said, and many other kinds of criticism and
censure; from whence it seems they would imply that they themselves, if
the fancy took them, could be the true poets: and yet in fact they are
no other than worms, that know not how to do anything well, but are born
only to gnaw and befoul the studies and labors of others; and not being
able to attain celebrity by their own virtue and ingenuity, seek to put
themselves in the front, by hook or by crook, through the defects and
errors of others.

_Tansillo_--There are as many sorts of poets as there are sentiments and
ideas; and to these it is possible to adapt garland