"...mine are essays, who am but newly bound prentice to the inquisition of knowledge, and use these pages as a painter's boy a board, who is trying to bring his hand and his fancy well acquainted. It is a manner of writing well befitting undigested motions, or a head not knowing his strength like a circumspect runner trying for a start, or providence that tastes before she buys."
Sounds like a blogger, if they had blogs in 1600. It is, in fact, Sir William Cornwallis, though I got it from Brian Dillon's Essayism, which melds a pleasingly unsystematic investigation into the essay with a bit of autobiography. I'm very much liking it.
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