ute dominion
over the wit of all authors, who are subjected to me as the greatest of
critics or hypercritics.

_Virgil_.--Your jurisdiction, great sir, is very extensive. And what
judgments have you been pleased to pass upon us?

_Scaliger_.--Is it possible you should be ignorant of my decrees? I have
placed you, Virgil, above Homer, whom I have shown to be--

_Virgil_.--Hold, sir. No blasphemy against my master.

_Horace_.--But what have you said of me?

_Scaliger_.--I have said that I had rather have written the little
dialogue between you and Lydia than have been made king of Arragon.

_Horace_.--If we were in the other world you should give me the kingdom,
and take both the ode and the lady in return. But did you always
pronounce so favourably for us?

_Scaliger_.--Send for my works and read them. Mercury will bring them to
you with the first learned ghost that arrives here from Europe. There is
instruction for you in them. I tell you of your faults. But it was my
whim to commend that little ode, and I never do things by halves. When I
give praise, I give it liberally, to show my royal bounty. But I
generally blame, to exert all the vigour of my censorian power, and keep
my subjects in awe.

_Horace_.--You did not confine your sovereignty to poets; you exercised
it, no doubt, over all other writers.

_Scaliger_.--I was a poet, a philosopher, a statesman, an orator, an
historian, a divine without doing the drudgery of any of these, but only
censuring those who did, and showing thereby the superiority of my genius
over them all.

_Horace_.--A short way, indeed, to universal fame! And I suppose you
were very peremptory in your decisions?

_Scaliger_.--Peremptory! ay. If any man dared to contradict my opinions
I called him a dunce, a rascal, a villain, and frightened him out of his
wits.

_Virgil_.--But what said others to this method of disputation?

_Scaliger_.--They generally believed me because of the confidence of my
assertions, and thought I could not be so insolent or so angry if I was
not absolutely sure of being in the right. Besides, in my controversies,
I had a great help from the language in which I wrote. For one can scold
and call names with a much better grace in Latin than in French or any
tame modern tongue.

_Horace_.--Have not I heard that you pretended to derive your descent
from the princes of Verona?

_Scaliger_.--Pretended! Do you presume to deny it?

_Horace_.-