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THE SECOND BOOKE 429
have done heretofore. Messala Corvinus lived two
yeeres without any memory at all, which is also reported
of George Trapezoncius. And for mine owne interest,
I doe often ruminate what manner of life theirs was,
and whether wanting that part, I shall have sufficient
to maintaine my selfe in any good sort: which looking
neere unto, I feare that this defect, if it be perfect,
shall lose all the functions of my soule.
Plenus rimarum sum, hac atque iliac perfluo. 1
I am so full of holes, I cannot hold,
I runne out ev'ry way, when tales are told.
It hath often befallen me to forget the word which
but three houres before I had either given or received
of another, and to forget where I had laid my purse ;
let Cicero say what he list. I helpe my selfe to loose
what I particularly locke up. Memoria certe non modo
philosophiam, sed omnis vitx usum, omnesque artes una
maxime continet: ' Assuredly memorie alone, of all
other things, compriseth not onely philosophy, but the
use of our whole life, and all the sciences. 1 Memorie
is the receptacle and the case of knowledge. Mine
being so weake, I have no great cause to complaine if
1 know but little. I know the names of Arts in
generall, and what they treate of, but nothing further.
I turne and tosse over bookes, but do not studie them ;
what of them remaines in me is a thing which I no
longer acknowledge to be any bodies else. Onely by
that hath my judgement profited : and the discourses
and imaginations wherewith it is instructed and trained
up. The authours, the place, the words, and other
circumstances, I sodainly forget: and am so excellent
in forgetting, that as much as any thing else I forget
mine owne writings and compositions. Yea, mine
owne sayings are every hand-while alleadged against
my selfe, when God wot I perceive it not. He that
would know of me, whence or from whom the verses
or examples which here I have hudled up are taken,
¹ TER. Eun. act i. sc. 2.