From the time when the first volume of my Commentaries on Genesis, most ample Cardinal, came forth into public, as great an accumulation accrued to the magnitude of your praises, so much faculty also would have accrued to me for treating the Sacred letters according to their dignity: I do not indeed hope that, as that first volume of Commentaries by no means displeased the learned, so this second too should pleasantly please. For at that time was accomplished that memorable legation of yours — which, as it was undertaken most amply, of the gravest labors and dangers and most troublesome cares, so was for you a most fruitful harvest of the highest praise and immortal glory. You indeed poured out in that legation, and almost overturned, your patrimony; yet so for the public cause of Religion, that you poured it out in defending and protecting a Kingdom once most flourishing [France] — for which it was glorious to pour out even one's very blood and life. But that matter was assuredly greater than could be sufficiently proclaimed in a copious and rounded oration, much less be praised at the present time briefly and in haste according to its merit. It is certainly agreed (it suffices me only to have touched on it at this time) that there was no one at that time in France who was a greater object of hatred and terror to the heretics, or of solace and protection to the Catholics, than you. The heretics, that is, hated and at once feared and dreaded you — for [your] uncovering and unraveling of their hidden designs…²

…and your marvelously perspicacious and vigilant prudence in crushing their attempts. And in bravely enduring the evils that could not be avoided, even unwilling they were compelled to admire the unconquered constancy of your mind. But above all it galled them that, by your authority especially, your counsel, and your eloquence, they saw the minds of the Catholics strengthened and sustained, lest they be weakened in such straits. But on the contrary, the lovers and defenders of the Catholic faith and religion fled to you as to a most firm pillar and most safe bulwark of the Gallican Church. And so, as all good men wonderfully revered you when present — for your exceptional gentleness and your greatness both of counsel and of spirit ready for all things — so at your departure and absence you left an incredible longing for you in their minds. Having therefore discharged your office excellently (which in so arduous and perplexed a business was indeed rare), you returned to us with your private fortune much diminished and worn away, yet rich in the consciousness of a Christian cause prudently, piously, and faithfully conducted, and most wealthy in renown most celebrated among all. Therefore, since — just as Noah by the Ark freed those few men from the destruction of the Flood — so you have saved very many from the deadly inundation of evils threatening from the heretics, we have thought it fitting to offer and dedicate to you those things which we have commented on concerning Noah, the Ark, the Flood, the animals which, received into the Ark, escaped the disaster of the Flood, and other matters pertaining to that History, and have enclosed, committed to type, in this second volume. I do not beg of you that you hold this gift of mine pleasing and accepted: for that humanity toward all, that benignity, and that singular benevolence and grace with which you have deemed me worthy, do not allow me to doubt it. Rather I ask this: that you incline and apply the sons of the most excellent Duke Honoratus your brother — most choice young men, destined for ecclesiastical offices and honors — to these studies of divine letters above all; that you wish them to be kept in these, and to rejoice and delight in these above all. For in these studies the true glories of Christian nobility shine forth; from these the chief ornaments of ecclesiastical dignity are to be sought; these abound in the most honorable delights of the mind and the sweetest pleasures; in these, finally, are contained the treasures not of earthly and quickly-perishing wealth, but of immortal and heavenly riches.³