On Phoenician Letters

continues from previous page: ...as if the fountain of truth is divinely placed) may the King possess no knowledge, yet nonetheless transfer the highest generosity to the professors of those letters? Truly, this must be ascribed to the agreement of the King himself. But whoever recognizes a man of such high nobility, authority, character, wealth, and learning, and one who possesses such great friendship, familiarity, and authority with the King, will judge that it is owed to the sacrosanct counsels of Charles, Cardinal of Lorraine, as if to the primary source. For although there are many other upright and learned men, perhaps preeminent in all or at least some desirable gifts of fortune in the court or in France, there is nonetheless no one (I say this with peace to all) to whom divine providence has granted this highly desirable gift in life to such a degree, that he is as great and is held as such by the Most Christian King in this kind of counsel, as is the one Henry Achates original: "Henricus Achates"; a classical allusion comparing a trusted advisor to Aeneas's loyal companion, Achates, if I may be permitted to compare these great men with those small ones. Therefore, this must be credited to Charles, Cardinal of Lorraine.