It was a long time before the first edition of this History of
Humanism went out of print. Comparatively protracted, too, was the
silence with which it was received by reviewers. But it would be
wrong of me to complain of either. That time, that silence, were
propitious to the success of the ideas embodied in the work.

The difficulties with which a book has to contend on first contact
with its readers, are nobody's fault, nor are they, even, the fault
of fortuitous circumstances: they are co-essential with the book itself.

When this volume of mine came out, the idea that Humanism and
Renaissance (distinguishable, and even "gradable," for the public's
convenience, insofar as some of their theoretical nuances are con-
cerned) are inseparably connected in historical treatment, was, in the
realm of Sapientia, peacefully unquestioned. No one dared to chal-
lenge that idea by thinking in terms of opposition to its framework.
In spite of the fact that I had dearly spelled out on the cover:
History of Humanism--that, therefore, its title was not History of
the Renaissance--readers insisted upon interpreting me as saying that
Humanism was approximately identical with Renaissance. When quickly
scanning the work, they did not admit the dissociation of the two
concepts; nor did they think of that dissociation after a more detained
perusal. Benevolent or scowling, they always referred to the work as
to "a synthesis of the Renaissance," an unprejudiced "revisal of the
Renaissance." Whether in dissent or consent, they delighted in "look-
ing out from the luminous balconies of the Renaissance"; they mistook,
in conclusion, with such constant absentmindedness, the word Human-
ism for the word Renaissance, that I did not wish to stage a vertical
plunge to the bottom of the earth out of sympathetic shame for them,
but certainly wished that I might clutch at the hope that they had
failed to read me.

More than once, unfortunately, I had to surrender to factual
evidence.

Things remained more or less in this plight, when, one fine day,
the idea that Humanism and Renaissance are distinct from each other,
are marked off by differences more profound than sheer ideological
nuances, rang out suddenly upon the horizon with the shattering
clangor of a gong.

-XXIX-