Now my own talent is slender and my education scanty, but at least I've always aimed at doing good, if I could, or anyway at hurting no one. Homer worked off his hatred for Thersites by drawing a cruel picture of him in the Iliad. Plato censured a lot of people by name in his dialogues, and whom did Aristotle spare, when he had no mercy for Plato and Socrates? Demosthenes could vent his fury on Aeschines, Cicero on Piso, Vatinius, Sallust and Antony, and many names mentioned by Seneca are the victims of his ridicule and scorn. To turn to more recent examples, Petrarch similarly took up his pen against a doctor, Lorenzo against Poggio, and Politian against Scala. Can you name me a single person whose self-restraint is sufficient to stop him writing a harsh word against anyone? Even Jerome, serious and pious as he was, sometimes couldn't prevent himself from flaring up against Vigilantius, or from excessive abuse of Jovinian and bitter attacks on Rufinus. The learned have always been in habit of committing their joys and sorrows to paper, as a faithful companion into whose bosom they can pour out all the turbulence of the heart. Indeed, there are people to be found whose sole purpose in starting to write a book is to find an outlet for their emotions and thus transmit these to posterity.²