First Sentence

"If anyone had any question as to whether the words of holy Scripture or the teachings of any secular author were of greater force and effect to the well-being and profit of the human soul, then-letting pass the many short and weighty sayings spoken by the mouth of Christ our Savior himself, to whose heavenly wisdom the wit of no earthly creature can be comparable-this one text written by the sage in the seventh chapter of Sirach is such that it contains more fruitful advice and counsel for the forming and framing of our ways in virtue and avoiding of sin than do many entire large volumes of the best of the old philosophers or any others that ever wrote in secular literature."