tter in my
opinion to separate the adventures, to form divers Histories of
them, and to make persons acting, thereby to appear both fertile and
judicious together, and to be still within this so necessary true
resemblance. And indeed they who have made one man alone defeat
whole Armies, have forgotten the Proverb which saith, _not one
against two_; and know not that Antiquity doth assure us, how
_Hercules_ would in that case be too weak. It is without all doubt,
that to represent a true heroical courage, one should make it
execute some thing extraordinary, as it were by a transport of the
_Heros_; but he must not continue in that sort, for so those
incredible actions would degenerate into ridiculous Fables, and
never move the mind. This fault is the cause also of committing
another; for they which doe nothing but heap adventure upon
adventure, without ornament, and without stirring up passions by the
artifices of Rhetorick, or irksome, in thinking to be the more
entertaining. This dry Narration, and without art, hath more of an
old Chronicle, than of a _Romanze_, which may very well be
imbellished with those ornaments, since History, as severe and
scrupulous as it is, doth not forbear employing them. Certain
Authors, after they have described an adventure, a daring design, or
some surprising event, able to possess one with the bravest
apprehensions in the world, are contented to assure us, that such a
_Heros_ thought of very gallant things, without telling us what they
are; and this is that alone which I desire to know: For how can I
tell, whether in these events Fortune hath not done as much as he?
whether his valour be not a brutish valour? and whether he hath born
the misfortunes that arrived unto him, as a worthy man should doe?
it is not by things without him, it is not by the caprichioes of
destiny, that I will judge of him; it is by the motions of his soul,
and by that which he speaketh. I honour all them that write at this
day; I know their persons, their works, their merits; but as
canonizing is for none but the dead, they will not take it ill if I
do not Deifie them, since they are living. And in this occasion I
propose no other example, than the great and incomparable _Urfe_;
certainly it must be acknowledged that he hath merited his
reputation; that the love which all the earth bears him is just; and
that so many different Nations, which have translated his Book into
their tongues, had reason to do it: as f