Riccius & Co

On avait déjà, en 1621, de bonnes raisons de se méfier des Chinois, la preuve, ce court passage trouvé dans l'Anatomy of Melancholy (cf. "Lords of the World") : Riccius, the Jesuit, and some others, relate of the industry of the Chinese most populous countries, not a beggar or an idle person to be seen, and how by that means they prosper and flourish. We have the same means, able bodies, pliant wits, matter of all sorts, wool, flax, iron, tin, lead, wood, &c., many excellent subjects to work upon, only industry is wanting. We send our best commodities beyond the seas, which they make good use of to their necessities, set themselves a work about, and severally improve, sending the same to us back at dear rates, or else make toys and baubles of the tails of them, which they sell to us again, at as great a reckoning as the whole. Le Riccius dont parle Democritus Junior (alias Robert Burton) dans son adresse à son lecteur, n'est autre que Matteo Ricci, né en 1552 et mort à Pékin le 11 mai 1610, représenté ici en compagnie de l'Allemand Adam Schall von Bell (1592-1666) et du Flamand Ferdinand Verbiest (1656-1688).