Bolingbroke,however, replies,—
“O, who can hold a fire in his hand
By thinking on the frosty Caucasus?”
The indestructibility of adamant by force or fire had for ages been a received truth.
QVEM NVLLA PERICVLA, TERRENT.
Le Bey de Batilly, 1596.
“Whom no dangers terrify,” is a fitting motto for the Emblem that pertains to such as fear nor force nor fire.
Speaking of the precious gem that figures forth their character, it is the remark of Lebeus-Batillius (Emb. 29), “Duritia ineharrabilis est, simulque ignium victrix naturâ & nunquam incalescens,”—for which we obtain a good English expression from Holland’s Pliny (bk. xxxvii. c. 4): “Wonderfull and inenarrable is the hardnesse of a diamant; besides it hath a nature to conquer the fury of fire, nay, you shall never make it hote.”