[245] “El Perfecto Privado, Carta de Lelio Peregrino á Estanislao Bordio, Privado del Rey de Polonia.” It was first printed in 1625, (Antonio, Bib. Nov.,) but I know it only in a collection called “Varios Eloquentes Libros recogidos en uno,” (Madrid, 1726, 4to,) a volume which, besides the above work of Navarrete, contains the “Retrato Político del Rey Alfonso VIII.,” by Gaspar Mercader y Cervellon, (see Ximeno, Tom. II. p. 99,) the “Govierno Moral” of Polo, noticed, II. 544, III. 111, with some discussions which it excited, and the “Lagrimas de Heraclito defendidas,” a tract by Antonio de Vieyra, read before Christina of Sweden, at Rome, to prove that the world is more worthy of being wept over than laughed at; all of them attempts at wisdom and wit in the worst taste of their times.
[246] “Empresas Políticas, Idea de un Príncipe Christiano, por Diego Saavedra Faxardo.” The number of editions is very great, and so is that of the translations. There are, I think, two in English, one of which is by Sir J. Astry, London, 1700, 2 vols. 8vo. A Latin version which appeared at Brussels in 1640, the year in which the original Spanish appeared at Munster, has also been reprinted.
[247] “El Perfeto Señor, etc., de Antonio Lopez de Vega,” 1626 and 1652, the latter, Madrid, 4to. He published, also, (Madrid, 1641, 4to,) a series of moral Dialogues, on various subjects connected with Rank, Wealth, and Letters, under the title of “Heraclito y Demócrito de nuestro Siglo,” and giving the opposite views of each, which the names of the interlocutors imply; a book that affords sketches of manners and opinions at the time it was written, that are often amusing, and generally delivered in an unaffected style. The poetry of Antonio de Vega has been noticed, II. 529.
[248] “Obras y Dias, Manual de Señores y Príncipes, por Juan Eusebio Nieremberg,” Madrid, 1629, 4to, ff. 220. His father and mother were Germans, who came to Spain with the Empress of Austria, Doña Maria, but he himself was born at Madrid in 1595, and died there in 1658. Antonio (Bib. Nov., Tom. I. p. 686) and Baena (Tom. III. p. 190) give long lists of his works, chiefly in Latin. The “Contemplations on the State of Man,” published in 1684, seventeen years after the death of Jeremy Taylor, as his work, turns out to have been substantially taken from a treatise of Nieremberg, first published as early as 1654, and entitled “Diferencia de lo Temporal y Eterno”; the “Contemplations,” however, being a rifacimento of an English translation of the work of Nieremberg, by Sir Vivian Mullineaux, published in 1672. (See an interesting pamphlet on this subject, “Letter to Joshua Watson, Esq., etc., by Edw. Churton, M. A., Archdeacon of Cleveland,” London, 1848, 8vo.) Why the fraud was not earlier detected, since Heber and others had noted the difference between the style of this work and that of Bishop Taylor’s works generally, it is difficult to tell. The treatise of Nieremberg has always been valued in Spanish, and, besides being early translated into Latin, Italian, French, and English, was published in Arabic in 1733-34, at the Convent of St. John, on the Mountain of the Druses. See Brunet.
[249] “Advertencias para Reyes, Príncipes, y Embaxadores, por Don Christóval de Benavente y Benavides,” Madrid, 1643, 4to, pp. 700. It a good deal resembles the “Embaxador” of Vera y Zuñiga; and, like the author of that work, Benavente had been an ambassador of Spain in other countries, and wrote on the subject of what may be considered to have been his profession with experience and curious learning.
[250] His “República Literaria” is a light work, in the manner of Lucian, written with great purity of language, and was not printed till 1670. A spirited dialogue between Mercury and Lucian, on “The Follies of Europe,” in which Saavedra defends the House of Austria against the attacks of the rest of the world, remained in manuscript till it was produced, in 1787, in the sixth volume of the Seminario Erudito.
[251] “Primera Parte de la Rhetórica, etc., por Juan de Guzman,” Alcalá, 1590, 12mo, 291 leaves. It is divided affectedly into fourteen “Combites,” or Invitations to Feasts. Its author was a pupil of the famous Sanctius, “El Brocense.”
[252] The “Galateo” was several times reprinted. It is a small book, containing, in the edition of Madrid, 1664, only 126 leaves in 18mo. Antonio, Bib. Nov., Tom. II. p. 17.
[253] “Libro de la Gineta de España, por Pedro Fernandez de Andrada,” Sevilla, 1599, 4to, 182 leaves.—“Modo de pelear á la Gineta, por Simon de Villalobos,” Valladolid, 1605, 18mo, 70 leaves.
[254] “Eloquencia Española en Arte, por el Maestro Bartolomé Ximenez Paton,” Toledo, 1604, 12mo. The extracts from old Spanish books and hints about their authors, in this treatise, are often valuable; but how wise its practical suggestions are may be inferred from the fact, that it recommends an orator to strengthen his memory by anointing his head with a compound made chiefly of bear’s grease and white wax.