Incipit prologus Gumpoldi Mantuani episcopi
The Restless Pursuits of the Human Mind
Human reason, though noble in rank, is burdened by restless anxieties as it reshapes the world for useful and pleasant ends.
So then, the kinds of pursuits are many and varied, and they commonly press upon each person a host of restless intellectual anxieties — pursuits in which the human mind, by its very nature and also by its effort and ingenuity, takes the highest rank, since it is through reason that we discern whatever things the senses present in any way, and we delight in reshaping them to suit our human aims for useful and pleasant ends.
The Contrasting Passions of Youth and Age
Human lives diverge sharply: some rise above perishable things while others burn with ambition, driven by youth, age, war, or toil.
Here is someone composed in spirit who, treating the fleeting show of perishable things as beneath him, sets his mind on what is above; there is another who, burning with thirst for things that pass away, longs for honors raised on high. Youth often drives a young person beyond what is right; the ripe old age of a cold senescence shapes another into strict and wholesome habits. One person, bold in the art of war, wins through cunning the glory of praise that is so desirable; another, laboring at many kinds of work, is kept from idleness by craft and toil, and has his mind's natural keenness wrung out of him.
The Liberal Arts and Their Subtle Toils
Some devote themselves entirely to literature, astronomy, geometry, music, and philosophical disputation, pursuing these arts with minute and exhausting subtlety.
Others, however, are so absorbed in the study of literature and devoted to the leisure of the liberal arts that they pursue, with the highest admiration, the wondrous beauty of eloquence — eager to understand by what order the motions and fixed positions of the stars are arranged, or what measure of earthly magnitude the world's extent encompasses (as though by some hidden reason, through geometrical formulas, it could be grasped with a sure and certain measurement), or how the whole sum of quantity and solidity runs its course through number, or by what proportions of consonances a natural melody is tempered, or again, under what image of opinions, set before the purpose of truth and falsehood with their difficult and profound mingling, the disputes of eloquent men creep in — and they toil to investigate all these things through the minute subtleties of the arts.
Poetry's Misleading Charms
Others turn their finest minds to poetry, only to waste their talents on the idle chatter of silly songs.
Others, however, are stirred by the study of poetry and, absorbed in poetic play, turn their best minds to the idle chatter of silly songs.
Truth Neglected for Fables
The memorable deeds of the saints are shut out, as people prefer fables over the truth, risking fatal negligence.
But the renown of the truth — the memorable deeds of the saints toward God, so often revealed to mortal eyes by heavenly kindness — they do not fear to shut out, taking more delight in fables than in the ruin that comes from fatal negligence.
Pagan Learning Over Divine Simplicity
Many wise men, clinging to pagan writings, have cast aside the simple and divine truths of sacred deeds as though they were useless.
And it's no wonder if wise men have turned away from the simple sequence of settled compositions to lofty and philosophical questions of this kind, since many of them, clinging eagerly to pagan writings, have not only set aside what must be brought forward from the sacred deeds for the praise of God and published through the records of literature for future generations, but have also cast aside entirely whatever seems most divine and most gently suited to a devoted mind — whatever appears simply and without the tangle of difficulty — as though it were utterly useless.
A Humble Commission from the Emperor
The author, removed from great wisdom, receives a sacred imperial commission to record the deeds of a saint, trusting that the saint's dignity will adorn the work despite the writer's fault.
And so, as many believe, with the wheel of human affairs turning and the keen minds of the lofty gazing at ever higher things — we who are quite removed from such great wisdom and learned eloquence — a brief and modest little work, though set down in corrupt form, was laid upon our rustic simplicity by the sacred command of the most victorious emperor Augustus Otto the Second, and it will soon make known the name of a memorable man and the distinguished mention of his deeds, preceding the rarity of the text that follows. Indeed, to whatever degree the fault of a faulty writer diminishes it, to that same degree the high dignity of the saint adorns it, since the sacred authority of the One who designates the matter gives weight to the works.
Read the original Latin
Studiorum igitur genera multiformia varias cuique mortalium ingerere solent ingeniorum curas, quibus id genus racione prestantissimum imaginationis potentia interioris, tum natura, tum etiam industria, res quoquo modo sensibus sublectas intellectu discernere, et ad vota humana in usus lucundos gaudet diffingere. Hic namque mente moderatus, spreto caducorum ludicro, superna intendit, ille extructos in altum honores ardenti rerum fugacium siti exaestuans desiderat; hunc aetas iuvencula contra fas plerumque illicit, illum frigidae senectutis matura longaevitas in mores severos ac salubres coaptat; huic artis bellicae audax prudencia appetibilem laudis gloriam promeretur, illi operum diversorum labor artificiosus desidiam eximit, mentisque naturalem subtilitatem extorquet. Quidam vero litteralis speculacione profunditatis infixi, necnon liberali ocio per miras eloquiorum venustates perspicatius dediti, frequentissima reputacione, quo ordine siderum motus ac fixione non mutabili disponantur, quae aut qualis mensura terrenae magnitudinis ambitum, quadam quasi latenti racione, per formulas geometricales ad certam metiendi comprelensionem asstringat, quove dictu tota per numerum decurrat summa quantitatis soliditatisque, aut per quas consonantiarum proportiones cantilena temperetur naturalis, vel qua opi- nionum imagine sub veri falsique proposito eorumque difficili commixtione tam profunda eloquentium subrepat disputacio, per artium scrupulositates investigare desudant. Alii autem studiis incitati carminum, ludo insistentes poetico, ad naeniarum garrulitates alta divertunt ingenia. Famam autem veritatis erga dei sanctorum memoranda gesta, coelesti benignitate mortalium obtutibus toties designatam, incuriae quam exiciali neglegentia, fabulis delectati, non pavent subcludere. Nec mirum, si grandia ac philosophicas questiones moventia huiusmodi sapientes a simplici composicionum serie transduxerint, cum plures eorum, ardentius inhaerendo gentilium scriptis, non tantum quid in sacris gestis laudi divinae proferendum ac litterarum indiciis in posteros divulgandum postposuerint, veruni quiequid divinum ac menti devotae mitissimum simpliciter ac sine difficultatis perplexione videtur, penitus id quasi utilitate carens abiecerint. Hac denique fortuna, uti plures existimant, res hominum volvente ac sublimium sagacitate rethorum magis altiora spectante, nobis a tanta sapientum ac docta loquacitate admodum seiunctis, brevis tamen seriola subnotacionis, quamvis corrupte prolata, victoriosissimi imperatoris augusti Ottonis secundi sacro iussu rusticitati nostrae imposita, memorabilis viri nomen gestorumque insignes mentiones paulo post declaratura, sequentis praecedat textus raritatem; quem vero quantum attenuat culpa viciose scribentis, tantum exornat sancti excelsa dignitas, materiae causam operum sacra auctoritate designantis.
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