“We give thanks to your venerable piety that you have caused to be read to the ears of your wisdom the booklet sent to you in accordance with the injunction of your command; and that you have had errors in it noted, and have sent it back for correction. It would, however, have been better corrected by yourself, because in any work the judgement of another is most frequently of more value than that of the actual author.
“You have done somewhat less than the full office of love demanded, in that you have not in like manner noted opinions not learnedly set forth or catholically worked out. I have a suspicion that your letter indicates that not all which is written in my booklet has your approval. For you have directed a defence of the work to be sent to your excellency, whereas my poor words could have no defender or emender better than yourself. The authority of him who commands should defend the work of him who obeys.
“That the booklet does not run so scholarly in letter and punctuation as the order and rule of the art of grammar demands is no unusual effect of rapidity of thought, while the mind of the reader forestalls the action of the eyes. Wearied with a bad headache I cannot examine the words which flow by a sudden rush from my mouth as I dictate; and one who is not willing to impute to himself the negligence of another should not impute negligence to another.
“The account of the disputation of Felix with a Saracen I have not seen, nor can we find it here; indeed I never heard of it before. But in the course of very diligent inquiry whether any of our people have heard of its existence, I have been told that it might be found with Laidrad the Bishop of Lyon. I have at once sent a messenger to the said bishop in order that if it can be found there it may be sent as quickly as possible to your presence.
“When I went as a young man to Rome, and spent some days in the royal city of Pavia, a certain Jew, Lullus by name, had a disputation with Master Peter, and I heard in the same city that there was a written record of the controversy. This was the same Peter who with such clearness taught grammar in your palace[260]. Perhaps our Homer[261] has heard something about it from him.
“I have sent to your excellency some modes of expression, supported by examples or verses from venerable fathers, and also some figures of arithmetical subtlety for your amusement, on the blank part of the paper which you have sent to us; in order that what offered itself to our eye naked may come back to you clothed. It seemed right that paper which came to us ennobled by your seal should receive honour from our letters. And if any of the said forms of expression are inadequately supported by examples, Beselel[262] your familiar—yea and ours too—will be able to add others. He can also make out the arithmetical puzzles.
“The major and minor distinctions of punctuation add greatly to the beauty of sentences; but the use of them has been almost lost by the rusticity of our scribes. Now that the beauty of all wisdom and the ornament of salutary learning is beginning to be renewed by the exertions of your nobility, so there is good hope that the use of punctuation is to be restored in the hands of scribes.
“I for my part, though little proficient, fight daily against rusticity at Tours. Let your authority teach the palace youths to produce in the most elegant manner whatsoever your most lucid eloquence shall have dictated, that documents which circulate in the name of the king may bear on their face the nobility of the royal wisdom.”