Page:The Labyrinth of the World and the Paradise of the Heart.pdf/137

Rh at him they threw sneers from all directions, so that they used their art only either to flatter or to sting. Having now remarked what passionate folk they were, I gladly turned away from them.

5. Then proceeding onward, we enter another building where they manufactured and sold spyglasses. I asked: "What is this?" The answer was that these were "Notiones secundæ," and that he who had them perceived everything, not superficially only, but also to the innermost core; particularly one man could see into the brain of another and sift his mind. And many came forward and purchased these glasses, and masters taught them how to fasten them on, and, if necessary, how to turn them. The masters, then, who made them were peculiar in this, that they had their workshops in remote corners. But they did not make them uniform; one made small, another large ones, one round, the other square ones, and each one praised his own wares and enticed the buyers, and they quarrelled implacably, and pelted one another. Some purchased glasses from all the dealers and placed them on their noses; others chose only one and fixed it on. Then some said that they yet could not see far; others said they could see, and showed each other their innermost brain and intellect. But I saw that of these not a few, when they began to step forward, fell over stones and blocks or into pits (of such things, as I have