ning of a man who, nevertheless, knows that learning, or at
least literature, is the only cure for his disease.

In mere style there is perhaps nothing very strongly characteristic in
Burton, though there is much that is noteworthy in the way in which he
adapts his style to the peculiar character of his book. Like Rabelais, he
has but rarely occasion to break through his fantastic habit of stringing
others' pearls on a mere string of his own, and to set seriously to the
composition of a paragraph of wholly original prose. But when he does, the
effect is remarkable, and shows that it was owing to no poverty or
awkwardness that he chose to be so much of a borrower. In his usual style,
where a mere framework of original may enclose a score or more quotations,
translated or not (the modern habit of translating Burton's quotations
spoils, among other things, the zest of his own quaint habit of adding, as
it were, in the same breath, a kind of summary or paraphrase in English of
what he has said in Latin or Greek), he was not superior to his time in the
loose construction of sentences; but the wonder is that his fashion of
writing did not make him even inferior to it. One of his peculiar
tricks--the only one, perhaps, which he uses to the extent of a
mannerism--is the suppression of the conjunctions "or" and "and," which
gives a very quaint air to his strings of synonyms. But an example will do
more here than much analysis:--

"And why then should baseness of birth be objected to any man?
Who thinks worse of Tully for being _Arpinas_, an upstart? or
Agathocles, that Sicilian King, for being a potter's son?
Iphicrates and Marius were meanly born. What wise man thinks
better of any person for his nobility? as he[64] said in
Machiavel, _omnes codem patre nati_, Adam's sons, conceived all
and born in sin, etc. _We are by nature all as one, all alike, if
you see us naked; let us wear theirs, and they our clothes, and
what's the difference?_ To speak truth, as Bale did of P.
Schalichius, _I more esteem thy worth, learning, honesty, than
the nobility; honour thee more that thou art a writer, a doctor
of divinity, than earl of the Hunnes, baron of Skradine, or hast
title to such and such provinces, etc. Thou art more fortunate
and great_ (so Jovius writes to Cosmus Medices, then Duke of
Florence) _for thy virtues than for thy lovely wife and happy
childr