Historical Introduction
beyond the limits of Ultima Thule. Nay, more, they will read of men and books before unknown; and some perchance in their pride and stiffneckedness will go so far as to dispute the existence thereof.
And at once to put an end for ever to all objections on the matter, I will demonstrate how it has come to pass that such weighty and erudite doctors as Gulielmus Septemhorologiensis, Johannes de Grotibus, Margites Dummerkopfius, and others have been hitherto unknown to mankind.
Know, then, that when it is said of Pythagoras, "With an elementary work on arithmetic in his pocket he visited the East for the acquirement of knowledge," only a part is told, and that a small one. For the truth is that after journeying through Persia and Arabia, and paying a short but lively visit to the land of the Anthropophagi,[1] he proceeded still fur-
- ↑ Iamblichus, however, sayeth that his sojourn was a long one, and that he enjoyed the patronage of Helluo XV., King of the Cannibal Isles, who at that period gathered round him the most illustrious poets
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