ches (which are covered
with the rust of cares) than to be shackled with the greed of them and
with their burden. Likewise thou hast set about an amazing work upon
the reverend tenets of the faith; and in thy zeal to set the service of
public religion before thy private concerns, hast, by the lesson of thy
wholesome admonitions, driven those men who refused payment of the dues
belonging to religion to do to holy things the homage that they ought;
and by thy pious gift of treasure hast atoned for the ancient neglect of
sacred buildings. Further, those who pursued a wanton life, and yielded
to the stress of incontinence above measure, thou hast redeemed from
nerveless sloth to a more upright state of mind, partly by continuing
instant in wholesome reproof, and partly by the noble example of simple
living; leaving it in doubt whether thou hast edified them more by word
or deed. Thus thou, by mere counsels of wisdom, hast achieved what it
was not granted to any of thy forerunners to obtain.

And I would not have it forgotten that the more ancient of the Danes,
when any notable deeds of mettle had been done, were filled with
emulation of glory, and imitated the Roman style; not only by relating
in a choice kind of composition, which might be called a poetical work,
the roll of their lordly deeds; but also by having graven upon rocks
and cliffs, in the characters of their own language, the works of their
forefathers, which were commonly known in poems in the mother tongue.
In the footsteps of these poems, being as it were classic books of
antiquity, I have trod; and keeping true step with them as I translated,
in the endeavour to preserve their drift, I have taken care to render
verses by verses; so that the chronicle of what I shall have to
write, being founded upon these, may thus be known, not for a modern
fabrication, but for the utterance of antiquity; since this present work
promises not a trumpery dazzle of language, but faithful information
concerning times past.

Moreover, how many histories must we suppose that men of such genius
would have written, could they have had skill in Latin and so slaked
their thirst for writing! Men who though they lacked acquaintance with,
the speech of Rome, were yet seized with such a passion for bequeathing
some record of their history, that they encompassed huge boulders
instead of scrolls, borrowing rocks for the usage of books.

Nor may the pains of the men of Thule be blotted in