versal world, and joyful to receive the impression | darkness: and that the wise man's eyes keep watch thereof, as the eye joyeth to receive light; and not in his head, whereas the fool roundeth about in only delighted in beholding the variety of things, darkness: but withal I learned, that the same morand vicissitude of times, but raised also to find out tality involveth them both." And for the second, and discern the ordinances and decrees, which certain it is, there is no vexation or anxiety of throughout all those changes are infallibly observed. mind which resulteth from knowledge, otherwise And although he doth insinuate, that the supreme than merely by accident; for all knowledge and or summary law of nature, which he calleth, "The wonder (which is the seed of knowledge) is an work which God worketh from the beginning to the impression of pleasure in itself: but when men end, is not possible to be found out by man;" yet fall to framing conclusions out of their knowledge, that doth not derogate from the capacity of the applying it to their particular, and ministering to mind, but may be referred to the impediments, as themselves thereby weak fears, or vast desires, there of shortness of life, ill conjunction of labours, ill groweth that carefulness and trouble of mind which tradition of knowledge over from hand to hand, and is spoken of: for then knowledge is no more Lumen many other inconveniences, whereunto the condition siccum, whereof Heraclitus the profound said, of man is subject. For that nothing parcel of the "Lumen siccum optima anima;" but it becometh world is denied to man's inquiry and invention, he Lumen madidum, or maceratum, being steeped and doth in another place rule over, when he saith, infused in the humours of the affections. And as "The spirit of man is as the lamp of God, where- for the third point, it deserveth to be a little stood with he searcheth the inwardness of all secrets." If upon, and not to be lightly passed over: for if any then such be the capacity and receipt of the mind man shall think by view and inquiry into these of man, it is manifest, that there is no danger at sensible and material things to attain that light, all in the proportion or quantity of knowledge, how whereby he may reveal unto himself the nature or large soever, lest it should make it swell or out- will of God, then indeed is he spoiled by vain phicompass itself; no, but it is merely the quality of losophy: for the contemplation of God's creatures knowledge, which, be it in quantity more or less, if and works produceth (having regard to the works it be taken without the true corrective thereof, hath and creatures themselves) knowledge; but having in it some nature of venom or malignity, and some regard to God, no perfect knowledge, but wonder, effects of that venom, which is ventosity or which is broken knowledge. And therefore it was swelling. This corrective spice, the mixture most aptly said by one of Plato's school, "That the whereof maketh knowledge so sovereign, is charity, sense of man carrieth a resemblance with the sun, which the apostle immediately addeth to the former which, as we see, openeth and revealeth all the terclause; for so he saith, "knowledge bloweth up, restrial globe; but then again it obscureth and conbut charity buildeth up;" not unlike unto that cealeth the stars and celestial globe: so doth the which he delivereth in another place: "If I sense discover natural things, but it darkeneth and spake," saith he, "with the tongues of men and shutteth up divine." And hence it is true, that it angels, and had not charity, it were but as a hath proceeded, that divers great learned men have tinkling cymbal;" not but that it is an excellent been heretical, whilst they have sought to fly up to thing to speak with the tongues of men and the secrets of the Deity by the waxen wings of the angels, but because, if it be severed from charity,❘ senses: and as for the conceit, that too much knowand not referred to the good of men and mankind, it ledge should incline a man to atheism, and that the hath rather a sounding and unworthy glory, than a ignorance of second causes should make a more meriting and substantial virtue. And as for that devout dependence upon God, who is the first cause: censure of Solomon, concerning the excess of writ- First, it is good to ask the question which Job asked ing and reading books, and the anxiety of spirit of his friends: "Will you lie for God, as one man which redoundeth from knowledge; and that admo- will do for another, to gratify him ?" For certain nition of St. Paul, "That we be not seduced by it is, that God worketh nothing in nature but by vain philosophy;" let those places be rightly under- second causes; and if they would have it otherwise stood, and they do indeed excellently set forth the believed, it is mere imposture, as it were in favour true bounds and limitations, whereby human know- towards God; and nothing else but to offer to the ledge is confined and circumscribed; and yet without Author of truth the unclean sacrifice of a lie. But any such contracting or coarctation, but that it may farther, it is an assured truth, and a conclusion of comprehend all the universal nature of things: for experience, that a little or superficial knowledge of these limitations are three: the first, that we do not philosophy may incline the mind of man to atheso place our felicity in knowledge, as we forget our ism, but a farther proceeding therein doth bring the mortality. The second, that we make application mind back again to religion; for in the entrance of of our knowledge, to give ourselves repose and con- philosophy, when the second causes, which are tentment, and not distaste or repining. The third, next unto the senses, do offer themselves to the mind that we do not presume by the contemplation of of man, if it dwell and stay there, it may induce nature to attain to the mysteries of God. For as some oblivion of the highest cause: but when a touching the first of these, Solomon doth excellently man passeth on farther, and seeth the dependence expound himself in another place of the same book, of causes and the works of providence; then, accordwhere he saith; "I saw well that knowledge re-ing to the allegory of the poets, he will easily believe cedeth as far from ignorance, as light doth from that the highest link of nature's chain must needs be tied to the foot of Jupiter's chair. To conclude | Julius Cæsar the dictator; whereof the one was : therefore let no man, upon a weak conceit of sobriety, or an ill-applied moderation, think or maintain, that a man can search too far, or be too well studied in the book of God's word, or in the book of God's works; divinity or philosophy; but rather let men endeavour an endless progress, or proficience in both; only let men beware that they apply both to charity, and not to swelling; to use, and not to ostentation; and again, that they do not unwisely | mingle, or confound these learnings together. And as for the disgraces which learning receiveth from politicians, they be of this nature; that learning doth soften men's minds, and makes them more unapt for the honour and exercise of arms; that it doth mar and pervert men's dispositions for matter of government and policy, in making them too curious and irresolute by variety of reading, or too peremptory or positive by strictness of rules and axioms, or too immoderate and overweening by reason of the greatness of examples, or too incompatible and differing from the times, by reason of the dissimilitude of examples; or at least, that it doth divert men's travails from action and business, and bringeth them to a love of leisure and privateness; and that it doth bring into states a relaxation of discipline, whilst every man is more ready to argue than to obey and execute. Out of this conceit, Cato, surnamed the Censor, one of the wisest men indeed that ever lived, when Carneades the philosopher came in embassage to Rome, and that the young men of Rome began to flock about him, being allured with the sweetness and majesty of his eloquence and learning, gave counsel in open senate, that they should give him his despatch with all speed, lest he should infect and enchant the minds and affections of the youth, and at unawares bring in an alteration of the manners and customs of the state. the same conceit, or humour, did Virgil, turning his pen to the advantage of his country, and the disadvantage of his own profession, make a kind of separation between policy and government, and between arts and sciences, in the verses so much renowned, attributing and challenging the one to the Romans, and leaving and yielding the other to the Grecians; "Tu regere imperio populos, Romane, memento, Hæ tibi erunt artes, etc." So likewise we see that Anytus, the accuser of Socrates, laid it as an article of charge and accusation against him, that he did, with the variety and power of his discourses and disputations, withdraw young men from due reverence to the laws and customs of their country; and that he did profess a dangerous and pernicious science, which was, to make the worse matter seem the better, and to suppress truth by force of eloquence and speech. Out of But these, and the like imputations, have rather a countenance of gravity, than any ground of justice: for experience doth warrant, that, both in persons and in times, there hath been a meeting and concurrence in learning and arms, flourishing and excelling in the same men, and the same ages. For, as for men, there cannot be a better, nor the like instance, as of that pair, Alexander the Great and Aristotle's scholar in philosophy, and the other was Cicero's rival in eloquence or if any man had rather call for scholars that were great generals, than generals that were great scholars, let him take Epaminondas the Theban, or Xenophon the Athenian; whereof the one was the first that abated the power of Sparta, and the other was the first that made way to the overthrow of the monarchy of Persia. And this concurrence is yet more visible in times than in persons, by how much an age is a greater object than a man. For both in Ægypt, Assyria, Persia, Græcia, and Rome, the same times that are most renowned for arms, are likewise most admired for learning; so that the greatest authors and philosophers, and the greatest captains and governors, have lived in the same ages. Neither can it otherwise be for as, in man, the ripeness of the strength of body and mind cometh much about an age, save that the strength of the body cometh somewhat the more early; so, in states, arms, and learning, whereof the one correspondeth to the body, the other to the soul of man, have a concurrence or near sequence in times. : And for matter of policy and government, that learning should rather hurt, than enable thereunto, is a thing very improbable: we see it is accounted an error to commit a natural body to empiric physicians, which commonly have a few pleasing receipts, whereupon they are confident and adventurous, but know neither the causes of diseases, nor the complexions of patients, nor peril of accidents, nor the true method of cures: we see it is a like error to rely upon advocates or lawyers, which are only men of practice, and not grounded in their books, who are many times easily surprised, when matter falleth out besides their experience, to the prejudice of the causes they handle: so, by like reason, it cannot be but a matter of doubtful consequence, if states be managed by empiric statesmen, not well mingled with men grounded in learning. But contrariwise, it is almost without instance contradictory, that ever any government was disastrous that was in the hands of learned governors. For howsoever it hath been ordinary with politic men to extenuate and disable learned men by the names of pedants; yet in the records of time it appeareth, in many particulars, that the governments of princes in minority (notwithstanding the infinite disadvantage of that kind of state) have nevertheless excelled the government of princes of mature age, even for that reason which they seek to traduce, which is, that by that occasion the state hath been in the hands of pedants: for so was the state of Rome for the first five years, which are so much magnified, during the minority of Nero, in the hands of Seneca, a pedant: so it was again for ten years' space or more during the minority of Gordianus the younger, with great applause and contentation in the hands of Misitheus, a pedant : so was it before that, in the minority of Alexander Severus, in like happiness, in hands not much unlike, by reason of the rule of the women, who were aided by the teachers and preceptors. Nay, let a man look into the government of the bishops of Rome, as by name, into the government of Pius Quintus, and Sextus Quintus, in our times, who were both at their entrance esteemed but as pedantical friars, and he shall find that such popes do greater things, and proceed upon truer principles of state, than those which have ascended to the papacy from an education and breeding in affairs of state and courts of princes; for although men bred in learning are perhaps to seek in points of convenience, and accommodating for the present, which the Italians call ragioni di stato, whereof the same Pius Quintus could not hear spoken with patience, terming them inventions against religion and the moral virtues; yet on the other side, to recompense that, they are perfect in those same plain grounds of religion, justice, honour, and moral virtue, which if they be well and watchfully pursued, there will be seldom use of those other, no more than of physic in a sound or welldieted body. Neither can the experience of one man's life furnish examples and precedents for the events of one man's life: for, as it happeneth sometimes that the grandchild, or other descendant, resembleth the ancestor, more than the son; so many times occurrences of present times may sort better with ancient examples, than with those of the later or immediate times: and lastly, the wit of one man can no more countervail learning, than one man's means can hold way with a common purse. men to leisure and privateness, and make men slothful; it were a strange thing if that, which accustometh the mind to a perpetual motion and agitation, should induce slothfulness; whereas contrariwise it may be truly affirmed, that no kind of men love business for itself, but those that are learned: for other persons love it for profit; as an hireling, that loves the work for the wages; or for honour, as because it beareth them up in the eyes of men, and refresheth their reputations, which otherwise would wear; or because it putteth them in mind of their fortune, and giveth them occasion to pleasure and displeasure; or because it exerciseth some faculty wherein they take pride, and so entertaineth them in good humour and pleasing conceits toward themselves; or because it advanceth any other their ends. So that, as it is said of untrue valours, that some men's valours are in the eyes of them that look on; so much men's industries are in the eyes of others, or at least in regard of their own designments: only learned men love business, as an action according to nature, as agreeable to health of mind as exercise is to health of body, taking pleasure in the action itself, and not in the purchase: so that of all men they are the most indefatigable, if it be towards any business which can hold or detain their mind. And if any man be laborious in reading and study, and yet idle in business and action, it groweth from some weakness of body, or softness of spirit; such as Seneca speaketh of: "Quidam tam sunt umbratiles, ut putent in turbido esse, quicquid in luce est ;" and not of learning: well may it be, that such a point of a man's nature may make him give himself to learning, but it is not learning that breedeth any such point in his nature. And as for those particular seducements, or indispositions of the mind for policy and government, which learning is pretended to insinuate; if it be granted that any such thing be, it must be remembered withal, that learning ministereth in every of them greater strength of medicine or remedy, than it offereth cause of indisposition or infirmity: for if, by a secret operation, it make men perplexed and And that learning should take up too much time irresolute, on the other side, by plain precept, it or leisure I answer; the most active or busy man, teacheth them when, and upon what ground, to rethat hath been or can be, hath, no question, many solve; yea, and how to carry things in suspense vacant times of leisure, while he expecteth the tides without prejudice, till they resolve: if it make men and returns of business (except he be either tedious positive and regular, it teacheth them what things and of no despatch, or lightly and unworthily ambiare in their nature demonstrative, and what are tious to meddle in things that may be better done conjectural; as well the use of distinctions and ex- by others): and then the question is but, how those ceptions, as the latitude of principles and rules. If spaces and times of leisure shall be filled and spent; whether in pleasures, or in studies; as was well answered by Demosthenes to his adversary Æschines, that was a man given to pleasure, and told him, "that his orations did smell of the lamp:" "Indeed," said Demosthenes, "there is a great difference between the things that you and I do by will expulse business, but rather it will keep and defend the possession of the mind against idleness and pleasure; which otherwise, at unawares, may enter to the prejudice of both. it mislead by disproportion, or dissimilitude of examples, it teacheth men the force of circumstances, the errors of comparisons, and all the cautions of application: so that in all these it doth rectify more effectually than it can pervert. And these medicines it conveyeth into men's minds much more forcibly by the quickness and penetration of exam-lamp-light." So as no man need doubt, that learning ples. For let a man look into the errors of Clement the seventh, so livelily described by Guicciardine, who served under him, or into the errors of Cicero, painted out by his own pencil in his epistles to Atticus, and he will fly apace from being irresolute. Let him look into the errors of Phocion, and he will beware how he be obstinate or inflexible. Let him but read the fable of Ixion, and it will hold him from being vaporous or imaginative. Let him look into the errors of Cato the second, and he will never be one of the antipodes, to tread opposite to the present world. Again, for that other conceit, that learning should undermine the reverence of laws and government, it is assuredly a mere depravation and calumny, without all shadow of truth. For to say, that a blind custom of obedience should be a surer obligation, than duty taught and understood; it is to affirm, that a blind man may tread surer by a guide, than a seeing man can by a light. And it is without all conAnd for the conceit, that learning should dispose troversy, that learning doth make the minds of men gentle, generous, maniable, and pliant to govern- | learned men, are either in respect of scarcity of ment; whereas ignorance makes them churlish, means, or in respect of privateness of life, and thwarting, and mutinous: and the evidence of time meanness of employments. doth clear this assertion, considering that the most barbarous, rude, and unlearned times have been most subject to tumults, seditions, and changes. And as to the judgment of Cato the Censor, he was well punished for his blasphemy against learning, in the same kind wherein he offended; for when he was past threescore years old, he was taken with an extreme desire to go to school again, and | to learn the Greek tongue, to the end to peruse the Greek authors, which doth well demonstrate, that his former censure of the Grecian learning was rather an affected gravity, than according to the inward sense of his own opinion. And as for Virgil's verses, though it pleased him to brave the world, in taking to the Romans the art of empire, and leaving to others the arts of subjects; yet so much is manifest, that the Romans never ascended to that height of empire till the time they had ascended to the height of other arts. For in the time of the two first Cæsars, which had the art of government in greatest perfection, there lived the best poet, Virgilius Maro; the best historiographer, Titus Livius; the best antiquary, Marcus Varro; and the best or second orator, Marcus Cicero, that to the memory of man are known. As for the accusation of Socrates, the time must be remembered when it was prosecuted; which was under the thirty tyrants, the most base, bloody, and envious persons that have governed; which revolution of state was no sooner over, but Socrates, whom they had made a person criminal, was made a person heroical, and his memory accumulate with honours divine and human; and those discourses of his, which were then termed corrupting of manners, were after acknowledged for sovereign medicines of the mind and manners, and so have been received ever since, till this day. Let this therefore serve for answer to politicians, which in their humorous severity, or in their feigned gravity, have presumed to throw imputations upon learning; which redargution, nevertheless, (save that we know not whether our labours may extend to other ages,) were not needful for the present, in regard of the love and reverence towards learning, which the example and countenance of two so learned princes, queen Elizabeth and your majesty, being as Castor and Pollux, lucida sidera, stars of excellent light and most benign influence, hath wrought in all men of place and authority in our nation. Now therefore we come to that third sort of discredit, or diminution of credit, that groweth unto learning from learned men themselves, which commonly cleaveth fastest: it is either from their fortune; or from their manners; or from the nature of their studies. For the first, it is not in their power; and the second is accidental; the third only is proper to be handled: but because we are not in hand with true measure, but with popular estimation and conceit, it is not amiss to speak somewhat of the two former. The derogations, therefore, which grow to learning from the fortune or condition of Concerning want, and that it is the case of learned men usually to begin with little, and not to grow rich so fast as other men, by reason they convert not their labours chiefly to lucre and increase: it were good to leave the common place in commendation of poverty to some friar to handle, to whom much was attributed by Machiavel in this point; when he said, “that the kingdom of the clergy had been long before at an end, if the reputation and reverence towards the poverty of friars had not borne out the scandal of the superfluities and excesses of bishops and prelates." So a man might say, that the felicity and delicacy of princes and great persons had long since turned to rudeness and barbarism, if the poverty of learning had not kept up civility and honour of life; but, without any such advantages, it is worthy the observation, what a reverend and honoured thing poverty of fortune was, for some ages, in the Roman state, which nevertheless was a state without paradoxes; for we see what Titus Livius saith in his introduction: "Cæterum aut me amor negotii suscepti fallit, aut nulla unquam respublica nec major, nec sanctior, nec bonis exemplis ditior fuit; nec in quam tam seræ avaritia luxuriaque immigraverint: nec ubi tantus ac tam diu paupertati ac parsimoniæ honos fuerit." We see likewise, after that the state of Rome was not itself, but did degenerate, how that person, that took upon him to be counsellor to Julius Cæsar, after his victory, where to begin his restoration of the state, maketh it of all points the most summary to take away the estimation of wealth: "Verum hæc, et omnia mala pariter cum honore pecuniæ desinent: si neque magistratus, neque alia vulgo cupienda, venalia erunt." To conclude this point, as it was truly said, that "rubor est virtutis color," though sometimes it comes from vice; so it may be fitly said, that "paupertas est virtutis fortuna," though sometimes it may proceed from misgovernment and accident. Surely Solomon hath pronounced it both in censure, "Qui festinat ad divitias, non erit insons;" and in precept, "Buy the truth and sell it not ;" and so of wisdom and knowledge; judging that means were to be spent upon learning, and not learning to be applied to means. And as for the privateness, or obscureness (as it may be in vulgar estimation accounted) of life of contemplative men; it is a theme so common, to extol a private life, not taxed with sensuality and sloth, in comparison, and to the disadvantage of a civil life, for safety, liberty, pleasure, and dignity, or at least freedom from indignity, as no man handleth it, but handleth it well: such a consonancy it hath to men's conceits in the expressing, and to men's consents in the allowing. This only I will add, that learned men, forgotten in states, and not living in the eyes of men, are like the images of Cassius and Brutus in the funeral of Junia; of which not being represented, as many others were, Tacitus saith, “Eo ipso præfulgebant, quod non visebantur.” And for meanness of employment, that which is most traduced to contempt, is that the government corruptis moribus ludibrio sunt:" and Cicero noteth this error directly in Cato the second, when he writes to his friend Atticus; "Cato optime sentit, sed nocet interdum reipublicæ; loquitur enim tanquam in republica Platonis, non tanquam in fæce Romuli." And the same Cicero doth excuse and expound the philosophers for going too far, and being too exact in their prescripts, when he saith, "Isti ipsi præceptores virtutis et magistri, videntur fines officiorum paulo longius, quam natura vellet protulisse, ut cum ad ultimum animo contendissemus, ibi tamen, ubi oportet, consisteremus:" and yet himself might have said, "Monitis sum minor ipse meis;" for it was his own fault, though not in so extreme a degree. of youth is commonly allotted to them; which age, because it is the age of least authority, it is transferred to the disesteeming of those employments wherein youth is conversant, and which are conversant about youth. But how unjust this traducement is (if you will reduce things from popularity of opinion to measure of reason) may appear in that we see men are more curious what they put into a new vessel, than into a vessel seasoned; and what mould they lay about a young plant, than about a plant corroborate; so as the weakest terms and times of all things use to have the best applications and helps. And will you hearken to the Hebrew rabbins ? "Your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams;" say they, youth is the worthier age, for that visions are nearer apparitions of God than dreams. And let it be noted, that howsoever the condition of life of pedants hath been scorned upon theatres, as the ape of tyranny; and that the modern looseness or negligence hath taken no due regard to the choice of schoolmasters and tutors; yet the ancient wisdom of the best times did always make a just complaint, that states were too busy with their laws, and too negligent in point of education: which excellent part of ancient discipline hath been in some sort revived, of | late times, by the colleges of the Jesuits of whom, although in regard to their superstition I may say, "quo meliores, eo deteriores;" yet in regard of this, and some other points concerning human learning and moral matters, I may say, as Agesilaus said to his enemy Pharnabasus, "Talis quum sis, utinamendueth men's minds with a true sense of the frailty noster esses." And thus much touching the discredits drawn from the fortunes of learned men. As touching the manners of learned men, it is a thing personal and individual: and no doubt there be amongst them, as in other professions, of all temperatures; but yet so as it is not without truth, which is said, that "abeunt studia in mores," studies have an influence and operation upon the manners of those that are conversant in them. Another fault likewise much of this kind hath been incident to learned men; which is, that they have esteemed the preservation, good, and honour of their countries or masters, before their own fortunes or safeties. For so saith Demosthenes unto the Athenians: "If it please you to note it, my counsels unto you are not such, whereby I should grow great amongst you, and you become little amongst the Grecians: but they be of that nature, as they are sometimes not good for me to give, but are always good for you to follow." And so Seneca, after he had consecrated that Quinquennium Neronis to the eternal glory of learned governors, held on his honest and loyal course of good and free counsel, after his master grew extremely corrupt in his government. Neither can this point otherwise be; for learning of their persons, the casualty of their fortunes, and the dignity of their soul and vocation: so that it is impossible for them to esteem that any greatness of their own fortune can be a true or worthy end of their being and ordainment; and therefore are desirous to give their account to God, and so likewise to their masters under God, (as kings and the states that they serve,) in these words; "Ecce tibi lucrifeci," and not "Ecce mihi lucrifeci:" whereas the corrupter sort of mere politicians, that have not their thoughts established by learning in the love and apprehension of duty, nor ever look abroad into universality, do refer all things to themselves, and thrust themselves into the centre of the world, as if all lines should meet in them and their fortunes; never caring, in all tempests, what becomes of the ship of state, so they may save themselves in the cock-boat of their own fortune; whereas men that feel the weight of duty, and know the limits of selflove, use to make good their places and duties, though with peril. And if they stand in seditious and violent alterations, it is rather the reverence which many times both adverse parts do give to honesty, than any versatile advantage of their own carriage. But for this point of tender sense, and fast obligation of duty, which learning doth endue the mind withal, howsoever fortune may tax it, and many in the depth of their corrupt principles may despise it, yet it will receive an open allowance, and therefore needs the less disproof or excusation. But upon an attentive and indifferent review, I, for my part, cannot find any disgrace to learning can proceed from the manners of learned men not inherent to them as they are learned; except it be a fault (which was the supposed fault of Demosthenes, Cicero, Cato the second, Seneca, and many more) that, because the times they read of are commonly better than the times they live in, and the duties taught better than the duties practised, they contend sometimes too far to bring things to perfection, and to reduce the corruption of manners to honesty of precepts, or examples of too great height. And yet hereof they have caveats enough in their own walks. For Solon, when he was asked whether he had given his citizens the best laws, answered wisely, "Yea, of such as they would receive:" and Plato, finding that his own heart could not agree with the corrupt manners of his country, refused to bear place or office; saying, "That a man's country was to be used as his parents were, that is, with humble persuasions, and not with contestations." And Cæsar's counsellor put in the same caveat, Another fault incident commonly to learned men, "Non ad vetera instituta revocans, quæ jampridem | which may be more probably defended than truly |