To Charles Diodati. (Familiar Letters, No. VI.)
Now at length I see plainly that what you are driving at is to vanquish me sometimes in the art of obstinate silence; and, if it is so, bravo! have that little glory over us, for behold! we write first. All the same, if ever the question should come into contention why neither has written to the other for so long, do not think but that I shall stand by many degrees the more excused of the two,—manifestly so indeed, as being one by nature slow and lazy to write, as you well know; while you, on the other hand, whether by nature or by habit, are wont without difficulty to be drawn into epistolary correspondence of this sort. It makes also for my favour that I know your method of studying to be so arranged that you frequently take breath in the middle, visit your friends, write much, sometimes make a journey, whereas my genius is such that no delay, no rest, no care or thought almost of anything, holds me aside until I reach the end I am making for, and round off, as it were, some great period of my studies....
London, September 2, 1637.