TO THE

ILLUSTRIOUS AND NOBLE

COUNT AND LORD,

LORD GEORGIUS LUDOVICUS,

Count of Schwartzberg, Lord in

Hohenlandesberg and Murau, etc.

Councilor to his Sacred Imperial Majesty, Chamberlain, and Supreme

Marshal of the Court, his most clement Lord.

I am mindful of those things which, Noble Lord,
after the light of your illustrious face was granted to me
under the guidance of Apollo the god of healing and light.
This was when that great-hearted Hero,
Tilly Johann Tserclaes, Count of Tilly, a famous general,
lay dying, his legs pierced by fire-spewing metal original: "ignivomo... metallo," referring to a gunshot wound from the Battle of Rain in 1632.
Indeed, even when threatening Sicilian Death a reference to a fatal or sudden death
sought your own vital organs, meeting you with fatal blows
directed at both Him and You. Yet these were driven away
by the power of our Art alchemy and medicine,
blessed by the sacred breath of the Divine.
What good deeds followed then, and what Grace
accompanied my Muses! And how our Apollo the author's medical genius
then congratulated himself for the honor of such a great Patron!
These memories sit in my mindful soul, and as is right,
they occasionally release my grateful voice in speech
when the opportunity arises. Why then should I not allow
these same things to go further and travel through the learned world?