The Life and Exploits of the Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote De La Mancha, Vol. 2 of 2: Translated From the Original Spanish of Miguel De Cervantes Saavedra; Now Carefully Revised and Corrected, to Which Is Prefixed a Life of the Author (Classic Reprint)

Excerpt from The Life and Exploits of the Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote De La Mancha, Vol. 2 of 2: Translated From the Original Spanish of Miguel De Cervantes Saavedra; Now Carefully Revised and Corrected, to Which Is Prefixed a Life of the Author

What I cannot forbear resenting, is, that he upbraids me with my age, and with having lost my hand, as if it were in my power to have hindered time from passing over my head, or as if my injury had been got in some drunken quarrel at a tavern, and not on the noblest occasion that past or present ages have seen, or future can ever hope to see 996. If my wounds do not reflect a lustre in the eyes of those who barely behold. Them, they will, however, be esteemed by those who know how I came by them; for a soldier makes a better figure dead in battle, than alive and at liberty in running away. I am so firmly of this opinion, that could an impossibility be rendered practicable, and the same opportunity he recalled, I would rather be again present in that prodigious action, than whole and sound without having shared the glory of it. The scars a soldier shows in his face and breast are stars which guide others to the haven of honour and the desire of just praise. - And it must be observed that men do not write with grey hairs, but with the understanding which is usually improved by years.

I have also heard with anger that he taxes me with envy, and describes to me, as to one utterly ignorant, what envy is; and, in good truth, of the two kinds of envy, I am acquainted only with that which is sacred, noble and well meaning. This being so, as it really is, I am not inclined to reflect on any ecclesiastic, especially if he is besides dignified with the title of a familiar of the Inquisition 297. If he said what he did for the sake of that person for whom he seems to have said it, he is utterly mistaken, for I adore that gentleman's genius, and admire his works, and his constant and virtuous employments. But in fine, I own myself obliged to this worthy author for saying that my Novels are more satirical than moral, but, however, that they are good, which they could not be without some share of both.

Methinks, reader, you tell me that I proceed with much circumspection, and confine myself within the limits of my own modesty, knowing that we should not add affliction to the afflicted; and this gentleman's must needs be very great.

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