To the King
1. THERE were under the law, excellent King, both daily Sacrifices
and free-will offerings; the one proceeding upon ordinary Observance,
the other upon a devout cheerfulness: in like manner there belongeth to
Kings from their servants both tribute of duty and presents of
affection. In the former of these I hope I shall not live to be wanting,
according to my most humble duty, and the good pleasure of your
Majesty's employments: for the latter, I thought it more respective to
make choice of some oblation, which might rather refer to the propriety
and excellency of your individual person, than to the business of your
crown and state.
2. Wherefore, representing your Majesty many times unto my mind, and
beholding you, not with the inquisitive eye of presumption, to discover
that which the Scripture telleth me is inscrutable, but with the
observant eye of duty and admiration; leaving aside the other parts of
your virtue and fortune, I have been touched, yea, and possessed with an
extreme wonder at those your virtues and faculties, which the
Philosophers call intellectual; the largeness of your capacity, the
faithfulness of your memory, the swiftness of your apprehension, te
penetration of your judgment, and the facility and order of your
elocution: and I have often thought that of all the persons living that
I have known, your Majesty were the best instance to make a man of
Plato's opinion, that all knowledge is but remembrance, and that the
mind of man by nature knoweth all things, and hath but her own native
and original notions [1605: "motions"; 1629; 1633: "notions"] (which by
the strangeness and darkness of this tabernacle of the body are
sequestered) again revived and restored: such a light of nature I have
observed in your Majesty, and such a readiness to take flame and blaze
from the least occasion presented, or the least spark of another's
knowledge delivered. And as the Scripture saith of the wisest king, THAT
HIS HEART WAS AS THE SANDS OF THE SEA, which though it be one of the
largest bodies, yet it consisteth of the smallest and finest portions;
so hath God given your Majesty a composition of understanding admirable,
being able to compass and comprehend the greatest matters, and
nevertheless to touch and apprehend the least; whereas it should seem an
impossibility in nature for the same instrument to make itself fit for
great and small works. And for your gift of speech, I call to mind what
Cornelius Tacitus saith of Augustus Caesar: AUGUSTO PROFLUENS, ET QUAE
PRINCIPEM DECERET, ELOQUENTIA FUIT. For, if we note it well, speech that
is uttered with labour and difficulty, or speech that savoureth of the
affectation of art and precepts, or speech that is framed after the
imitation of some pattern of eloquence, though never so excellent; all
this hath somewhat servile, and holding of the subject. But your
Majesty's manner of speech is indeed prince-like, bowing as from a
fountain, and yet streaming and branching itself into nature's order,
full of facility and felicity, imitating none, and inimitable by any.
And as in your civil estate there appeareth to be an emulation and
contention of your majesty's virtue with your fortune; a virtuous
disposition with a fortunate regiment; a virtuous expectation (when time
[2] was) of your greater fortune, with a prosperous possession thereof
in the due time; a virtuous observation of the laws of marriage, with
most blessed and happy fruit of marriage; a virtuous and most Christian
desire of peace, with a fortunate inclination in your neighbour princes
thereunto: so likewise, in these intellectual matters, there seemeth to
be no less contention between the excellency of your Majesty's gifts of
nature, and the universality and perfection [1605: profection] of your
learning. For I am well assured that this which I shall say is no
amplification at all, but a positive and measured truth; which is, that
there hath not been since Christ's time any King or temporal Monarch,
which has been so learned in all literature and erudition, divine and
human. For let a man seriously and diligently revolve and peruse the
succession of the emperors of Rome; of which Caesar the Dictator, who
lived some years before Christ, and Marcus Antoninus were the best
learned; and so descend, to the emperors of Graecia, or of the West; and
then to the lines of France, Spain, England, Scotland, and the rest, and
he shall find this judgment is truly made. For it seemeth much in a
King, if, by the compendious extractions of other men's wits and
labours, he can take hold of any superficial ornaments and shows of
learning; or if he countenance and prefer learning and learned men: but
to drink indeed of the true fountains of learning, nay, to have such a
fountain of learning in himself, in a King, and in a King born, is
almost a miracle. And the more, because there is met in your Majesty a
rare conjunction as well of divine and sacred literature, as of profane
and human; so as your Majesty standeth invested of that triplicity,
which in great veneration was ascribed to the ancient Hermes; the power
and fortune of a king, the knowledge and illumination of a priest, and
the learning and universality of a philosopher. This propriety inherent
[the logical PROPRIUM QUOD CONSEQUITUR ESSENTIAM REI] and individual
attribute in your Majesty deserveth to be expressed not only in the fame
and admiration of the present time, nor in the history or tradition of
the ages succeeding, but also in some solid work, fixed memorial, and
immortal monument, bearing a character or signature both of the power of
a King, and the difference and perfection of such a King.
3. Therefore I did conclude with myself, that I could not make unto
your Majesty a better oblation than of some Treatise tending to that
end, whereof the sum will consist of these two parts; the former,
concerning the excellency of Learning and Knowledge, and the excellency
of the merit and true glory in the augmentation and propagation thereof:
the latter, what the particular acts and works are, which have been
embraced and undertaken for the Advancement of Learning; and again, what
defects and undervalues I find in such particular acts: to the end, that
though I cannot positively or affirmatively advise your Majesty, or
propound unto you framed particulars; yet I may excite your princely
cogitations to visit the excellent treasure of your own mind, and thence
to extract particulars for this purpose, agreeably to your magnanimity
and wisdom.
I. 1. IN the entrance to the former of these, to clear the way, and
as it were to make silence, to have the true testimonies concerning the
dignity of Learning to be better heard, without the interruption of
tacit objections, I think good to deliver it from the discredits and
disgraces which it hath received; all from ignorance; but ignorance
severally disguised, appearing sometimes in the zeal and jealousy of
Divines; sometimes in the severity and arrogancy of Politiques; and
sometimes in the errors and imperfections of learned men themselves.
2. I hear the former sort say, that Knowledge is of those things
which are to be accepted of with great limitation and caution, that the
aspiring to overmuch knowledge was the original temptation and sin
whereupon ensued the fall of man, that Knowledge hath in it somewhat of
the serpent, and therefore where it entereth into a man it makes him
swell; SCIENTIA INFLAT: that Salomon gives a censure, THAT THERE IS NO
END OF MAKING BOOKS, AND THAT MUCH READING IS WEARINESS OF THE FLESH,
and again in another place, THAT IN SPACIOUS KNOWLEDGE THERE IS MUCH
CONTRISTATION, AND THAT HE THAT INCREASETH KNOWLEDGE INCREASETH ANXIETY,
that St. Paul gives a caveat, THAT WE BE NOT SPOILED THROUGH VAIN
PHILOSOPHY, that experience demonstrates how learned men have been
arch-heretics, how learned times have been inclined to atheism, and how
the contemplation of second causes derogate from our dependence upon
God, who is the first cause.
3. To discover then the ignorance and error of this opinion, and the
misunderstanding in the grounds therof, it may well appear these men do
not observe or consider that it was not the pure knowledge of nature and
universality, a knowledge by the light whereof man did give names unto
other creatures in paradise, as they were brought before him, according
unto their proprieties, which gave the occasion to the fall: but it was
the proud knowledge of good and evil, with go intent in man to give law
unto himself, and to depend no more upon God's commandments, which was
the form of the temptation. Neither is it any quantity of knowledge, how
great soever, that can make the mind of man to swell; for nothing can
fill, much less extend the soul of man, but God and the contemplation of
God; and therefore Salomon, speaking of the two principal senses of
inquisition, the eye and the ear, affirmeth that the eye is never
satisfied with seeing, nor the ear with hearing; and if there be no
fulness, then is the continent greater than the content: so of knowledge
itself, and the mind of man, whereto the senses are but reporters, he
defineth likewise in these words, placed after that Kalendar or
Ephemerides, which he maketh of the diversities of times and seasons for
all actions and purposes; and concludeth thus: GOD HATH MADE ALL THINGS
BEAUTIFUL, OR DECENT, IN THE TRUE RETURN OF THEIR SEASONS: ALSO HE HATH
PLACED THE WORLD IN MAN'S HEART, YET CANNOT MAN FIND OUT THE WORK WHICH
GOD WORKETH FROM THE BEGINNING TO THE END: declaring not obscurely, that
God hath framed the mind of man as a mirror or glass, capable of the
image of the [3] universal world, and joyful to receive the impression
thereof, as the eye joyeth to receive light; and not only delighted in
beholding the variety of things and vicissitude of times, but raised
also to find out and discern the ordinances and decrees, which
throughout all those changes are infallibly observed. And although he
doth insinuate that the supreme or summary law of nature, which he
calleth THE WORK WHICH GOD WORKETH FROM THE BEGINNING TO THE END, is not
possible to be found out by man; yet that doth not derogate from the
capacity of the mind, but may be referred to the impediments, as of
shortness of life, ill conjunction of labours, ill tradition of
knowledge over from hand to hand, and many other inconveniences,
whereunto the condition of man is subject. For that nothing parcel of
the world is denied to man's inquiry and invention, he doth in another
place rule over, when he saith, THE SPIRIT OF MAN IS AS THE LAMP OF GOD,
WHEREWITH HE SEARCHETH THE INWARDNESS OF ALL SECRETS. If then such be
the capacity and receipt of the mind of man, it is manifest that there
is no danger at all in the proportion or quantity of knowledge, how
large soever, lest it should make it swell or out-compass itself; no,
but it is merely the quality of knowledge, which, be it in quantity more
or less, if it be taken without the true corrective thereof, hath in it
some nature of venom or malignity, and some effects of that venom, which
is ventosity or swelling. This corrective spice, the mixture whereof
maketh Knowledge so sovereign, is Charity, which the Apostle immediately
addeth to the former clause: for so he saith, KNOWLEDGE BLOWETH UP, BUT
CHARITY BUILDETH UP; not unlike unto that which he delivereth in another
place: IF I SPAKE, saith he, WITH THE TONGUES OF MEN AND ANGELS, AND HAD
NOT CHARITY, IT WERE BUT AS A TINKLING CYMBAL; not but that it is an
excellent thing to speak with the tongues of men and angels, but
because, if it be severed from charity, and not referred to the good of
men and mankind, it hath rather a sounding and unworthy glory, than a
meriting and substantial virtue. And as for that censure of Salomon,
concerning the excess of writing and reading books, and the anxiety of
spirit which redoundeth from knowledge; and that admonition of St. Paul,
THAT WE BE NOT SEDUCED BY VAIN PHILOSOPHY; let those places be rightly
understood, and they do indeed excellently set forth the true bounds and
limitations, whereby human knowledge is confined and circumscribed; and
yet without any such contracting or coarctation, but that it may
comprehend all the universal nature of things; for these limitations are
three: the first, THAT WE DO NOT SO PLACE OUR FELICITY IN KNOWLEDGE, AS
WE FORGET OUR MORTALITY: the second, THAT WE MAKE APPLICATION OF OUR
KNOWLEDGE, TO GIVE OURSELVES REPOSE AND CONTENTMENT, AND NOT DISTASTE OR
REPINING: the third, THAT WE DO NOT PRESUME BY THE CONTEMPLATION OF
NATURE TO ATTAIN TO THE MYSTERIES OF GOD. For as touching the first of
these, Salomon doth excellently expound himself in another place of the
same book, where he saith: I SAW WELL THAT KNOWLEDGE RECEDETH AS FAR
FROM IGNORANCE AS LIGHT DOTH FROM DARKNESS; AND THAT THE WISE MAN'S EYES
KEEP WATCH IN HIS HEAD, WHEREAS THE FOOL ROUNDETH ABOUT IN DARKNESS: BUT
WITHAL I LEARNED, THAT THE SAME MORTALITY INVOLVETH THEM BOTH. And for
the second, certain it is, there is no vexation or anxiety of mind which
resulteth from knowledge otherwise than merely by accident; for all
knowledge and wonder (which is the seed of knowledge) is an impression
of pleasure in itself: but when men fall to framing conclusions out of
their knowledge, applying it to their particular, and ministering to
themselves thereby weak fears or vast desires, there groweth that
carefulness and trouble of mind which is spoken of: for (gee knowledge
is no more LUMEN SICCUM, whereof Heraclitus the profound said, LUMEN
SICCUM OPTIMA ANIMA; but it becometh LUMEN MADIDUM, OR MACERATUM, being
steeped and infused in the humours of the affections. And as for the
third point, it deserveth to be a little stood upon, and not to be
lightly passed over: for if any man shall think by view and inquiry into
these sensible and material things to attain that light, whereby he may
reveal unto himself the Nature or Will of God, then indeed is he spoiled
by vain philosophy: for the contemplation of God's creatures and works
produceth (having regard to the works and creatures themselves)
knowledge, but having regard to God, no perfect knowledge, but wonder,
which is broken knowledge. And therefore it was most aptly said by one
of Plato's school, THAT THE SENSE OF MAN CARRIETH A RESEMBLANCE WITH THE
SUN, WHICH, AS WE SEE, OPENETH AND REVEALETH ALL THE TERRESTRIAL GLOBE;
BUT THEN AGAIN IT OBSCURETH AND CONCEALETH THE STARS AND CELESTIAL
GLOBE: SO DOTH THE SENSE DISCOVER NATURAL THINGS, BUT IT DARKENETH AMD
SHUTTETH UP DIVINE. And hence it is true that it hath proceeded, that
divers great learned men have been heretical, whilst they have sought to
fly up to the secrets of the Deity by the waxen wings of the senses. And
as for the conceit that too much knowledge should incline a man to
Atheism, and that the ignorance of second causes should make a more
devout dependence upon God, which is the first cause; first, it is good
to ask the question which Job asked of his friends. WILL YOU LIE FOR
GOD, AS ONE MAN WILL DO FOR ANOTHER, TO GRATIFY HIM ? For certain it is
that God worketh nothing in nature but by second causes: and if they
would have it otherwise believed, it is mere imposture, as it were in
favour towards God; and nothing else but to offer to the Author of Truth
the unclean sacrifice of a lie. But further, it is an assured truth, and
a conclusion of experience, that a little or superficial knowledge of
Philosophy may incline the mind of man to Atheism, but a further
proceeding therein doth bring the mind back again to Religion: for in
the entrance of Philosophy, when the second causes, which are next unto
the senses, do offer themselves to the mind of man, if it dwell and stay
there it may induce some oblivion of the highest cause; but when a man
passeth on further, and seeth the dependence of causes, and the works of
Providence; then, according to the allegory of the poets, he will easily
believe that the highest link of nature's chain must needs [4] be tied
to the foot of Jupiter's chair. To conclude 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.
II. 1. And as for the disgraces which Learning receiveth from
Politiques, 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
dispatch 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. Out of 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,
Hae 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.
2. 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 Julius Cesar the
Dictator; whereof the one was 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
Egypt, Assyria, Persia, Graecia, 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 strength of the body and mind cometh much
about an age, save that the strength of the body cometh 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.
3. 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 PEDANTES; 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 PEDANTES;
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
PEDANTI; 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 Mistheus, A PEDANTI: 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, [5] 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 estate, than those
which have ascended to the papacy from an education and breeding in
affairs of estate 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 well dieted 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 descendants, 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 latter 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.
4. 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
irresolute, on the other side by plain precept it teacheth them when and
upon what ground to resolve; yea, and how to carry things in suspense
without prejudice, till they resolve; if it make men positive and
regular, it teacheth them what things are in their nature demonstrative,
and what are conjectural, and as well the use of distinctions and
exceptions, as the latitude of principles and rules. If 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 examples. For let a
man look into the errors of Clement the seventh, so lively 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.
5. And for the conceit that Learning should dispose 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 a 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 reputation, 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 towards 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 such 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: for that
of all men they are the most indefatigable, if it be towards any
business which can hold or detain their mind.
6. 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.
7. And that Learning should take up too much time or leisure; I
answer, the most active or busy man that hath been or can be, hath, no
question, many vacant times of leisure, while he expecteth the times and
returns of business (except he be either tedious and of no dispatch, or
lightly and unworthily ambitious to meddle in things that may be better
done by others:) and then the question is, but how these 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 Aeschines,
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 LAMPLIGHT. So as no man need
doubt that learning 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.
8. 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 controversy, that
learning doth make the minds of men [6] gentle, generous, maniable, and
pliant to government; whereas ignorance makes them churlish, thwart, and
mutinous: and the evidence of time doth clear this assertion,
considering that the most barbarous, rude, and unlearned times have been
most subject to tumults, seditions, and changes.
9. 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 art 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 Caesars, 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 Politiques,
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 la.bours 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.
III. 1. 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 learned men, are
either in respect of scarcity of means, or in respect of privateness of
life and meanness of employments.
2. 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 MD THE SCANDAL OF THE SUPERFLOSTICS 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 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: CAETERUM AUT ME AMOR NEGOTII
SUSCEPTI FALLIT, AUT NULLA UNQUAM RESPUBLICA NEC MAJOR, NEC SANCTIOR,
NEC BONIS EXEMPLIS DITIOR FUIT; NEC IN QUAM TAM SERAE AVARITIA
LUXURIAQUE IMMIGRAVERINT; NEC UBI TANTUS AC TAM DIU PAUPERTATI AC
PARSIMONIAE 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 Caesar 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 HAEC, ET OMNIA MALA PARITER
CUM HONORE PECUNIAE 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 sometime it come from vice; so it
may be fitly said that Paupertas est virtutis fortuna, though sometime
it may proceed from misgovernment and accident. Surely Salomon 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 [with] 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 images of Cassius and Brutus in the funeral of Junia: of which
not being represented, as many others were, Tacitus saith, EO IPSO
PRAEFULGEBANT, QUOD NON VISEBANTUR.
3. And for meanness of employment, that which is most traduced to
contempt is that the government [7] 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
PEDANTES 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 of 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 Pharnabazus. TALIS QUUM SIS,
UTINAM NOSTER ESSES. And thus much touching the discredits drawn from
the fortunes of learned men.
4. 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.
5. 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
once, saying, THAT A MAN'S COUNTRY WAS TO BE USED AS HIS PARENTS WERE,
THAT IS, WITH HUMBLE PERSUASIONS, AND NOT WITH CONTESTATIONS. And
Caesar's counsellor put in the same caveat, NON AD VETERA INSTITUTA
REVOCANS QUAE JAMPRIDEM 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 REIPUBLICAE;
LOQUITUR ENIM TANQUAM IN REIPUBLICÂ PLATONIS, NON TANQUAM IN FAECE
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 IPSE PRAECEPTORES 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.
6. 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 YE, AND YE 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 endueth men's minds with a true sense of the
frailty 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 states that they serve) in these words; ECCE TIBI LUCREFECI,
and not ECCE MIHI LUCREFECI, whereas, the corrupter sort of mere
Politiques, that have not their thoughts established by learning in the
love and apprehension of duty, nor never 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 estates, so
they may save themselves in the cockboat of their own fortune: whereas
men that feel the weight of duty and know the limits of self love, 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.
7. Another fault incident commonly to learned men, which may be more
properly defended than truly [8] denied, is, that they fail sometimes in
applying themselves to particular persons: which want of exact
application ariseth from two causes; the one, because the largeness of
their mind can hardly confine itself to dwell in the exquisite
observation or examination of the nature and customs of one person: for
it is a speech for a lover, and not for a wise man: SATIS MAGNUM ALTER
ALTERI THEATRUM SUMUS. Nevertheless I shall yield, that he that cannot
contract the sight of his mind as well as disperse and dilate it,
wanteth a great faculty. But there is a second cause, which is no
inablity, but a rejection upon choice and judgment. For the honest and
just bounds of observation by one person upon another, extend no further
but to understand him sufficiently, whereby not to give him offence, or
whereby to be able to give him faithful counsel, or whereby to stand
upon reasonable guard and caution in respect of a man's self. But to be
speculative into another man to the end to know how to work him, or wind
him, or govern him, proceedeth from a heart that is double and cloven
and not entire and ingenuous; which as in friendship it is want of
integrity, so towards princes or superiors is want of duty. For the
custom of the Levant, which is that subjects do forbear to gaze or fix
their eyes upon princes, is in the outward ceremony barbarous, but the
moral is good: for men ought not by cunning and bent observations to
pierce and penetrate into the hearts of kings which the scripture hath
declared to be inscrutable. 8. There is yet another fault (with which I
will conclude this part) which is often noted in learned men, that they
do many times fail to observe decency and discretion in their behaviour
and carriage, and commit errors in small and ordinary points of action
so as the vulgar sort of capacities do make a judgment of them in
greater matters by that which they find wanting in them in smaller. But
this consequence doth often deceive men, for which I do refer them over
to that which was said by Themistocles, arrogantly and uncivilly being
applied to himself out of his own mouth, but, being applied to the
general state of this question, pertinently and justly when, being
invited to touch a lute, he said, HE COULD NOT FIDDLE, BUT HE COULD MAKE
A SMALL TOWN A GREAT STATE. So, no doubt, many may be well seen in the
passages of government and policy, which are to seek in little and
punctual occasions. I refer them also to that which Plato said of his
master Socrates, whom he compared to the gallipots of apothecaries,
which on the outside had apes and owls and antiques, but contained
within sovereign and precious liquors and confections; acknowledging
that to an external report he was not without superficial levities and
deformities, but was inwardly replenished with excellent virtues and
powers. And so much touching the point of manners of learned men.
9. But in the mean time I have no purpose to give allowance to some
conditions and courses base and unworthy wherein divers professors of
learning have wronged themselves and gone too far; such as were those
trencher philosophers which in the later age of the Roman state were
usually in the houses of great persons, being little better than solemn
parasites; of which kind Lucian maketh a merry description of the
philosopher that the great lady took to ride with her in her coach, and
would needs have him carry her little dog, which he doing officiously
and yet uncomely, the page scoffed and said, THAT HE DOUBTED, THE
PHILOSOPHER OF A STOIC WOOLD TURN TO BE A CYNIC. But above all the rest,
the gross and palpable flattery, whereunto many not unlearned have
abased and abused their wits and pens, turning, as Du Bartas saith,
Hecuba into Helena, and Faustina into Lucretia, hath most diminished the
price and estimation of learning. Neither is the moral dedication of
books and writings, as to patrons, to be commended: for that books, such
as are worthy the name of books, ought to have no patrons but truth and
reason. And the ancient custom was to dedicate them only to private and
equal friends, or to entitle the books with their names: or if to kings
and great persons, it was to some such as the argument of the book was
fit and proper for: but these and the like courses may deserve rather
reprehension than defence.
10. Not that I can tax or condemn the morigeration or application of
learned men to men in fortune. For the answer was good that Diogenes
made to one that asked him in mockery, HOW IT CAME TO PASS THAT
PHILOSOPHERS WERE THE FOLLOWERS OF RICH MEN, AND NOT RICH MEN OF
PHILOSOPHERS? He answered soberly, and yet sharply, BECAUSE THE ONE SORT
KNEW WHAT THEY HAD NEED OF, AND THE OTHER DID NOT. And of the like
nature was the answer which Aristippus made, when having a petition to
Dionysius, and no ear given to him, he fell down at his feet; whereupon
Dionysius staid, and gave him the hearing, and granted it; and afterward
some person, tender on the behalf of philosophy, reproved Aristippus
that he would offer the profession of philosophy such an indignity as
for a private suit to fall at a tyrant's feet: but he answered, IT WAS
NOT HIS FAULT, BUT IT WAS THE FAULT OF DIONYSIUS THAT HAD HIS EARS IN
HIS FEET. Neither was it accounted weakness, but discretion in him that
would not dispute his best with Adrianus Caesar; excusing himself, THAT
IT WAS REASON TO YIELD TO HIM THAT COMMANDED THIRTY LEGIONS. These and
the like applications, and stooping to points of necessity and
convenience, cannot be disallowed; for though they may have some outward
baseness, yet in a judgment truly made they are to be accounted
submissions to the occasion, and not to the person.
IV. 1. Now I proceed to those errors and vanities which have
intervened amongst the studies themselves of the learned, which is that
which is principal and proper to the present argument; wherein my
purpose is not to make a justification of the errors, but by a censure
and separation of the errors to make a justification of that which is
good and sound, and to deliver that from the aspersion of the other. For
we see that it is the manner of men to scandalize and deprave that which
retaineth the state and virtue, by taking advantage upon that which is
corrupt and degenerate: as the heathens in the primitive church used to
blemish and taint the Christians [9] with the faults and corruptions of
heretics. But nevertheless I have no meaning at this time to make any
exact animadversion of the errors and impediments in matters of
learning, which are more secret and remote from vulgar opinion, but only
to speak unto such as do fall under or near unto a popular observation.
2. There be therefore chiefly three vanities in studies, whereby
learning hath been most traduced. For those things we do esteem vain,
which are either false or frivolous, those which either have no truth or
no use: and those persons we esteem vain, which are either credulous or
curious; and curiosity is either in matter or words: so that in reason,
as well as in experience, there fall out to be these three distempers,
as I may term them, of learning: the first, fantastical learning; the
second, contentious learning; and the last, delicate learning; vain
imaginations, vain altercations, and vain affectations; and with the
last I will begin.
(a) Martin Luther, conducted no doubt by a higher providence, but in
discourse of reason finding what a province he had undertaken against
the bishop of Rome and the degenerate traditions of the church, and
finding his own solitude, being no ways aided by the opinions of his own
time, was enforced to awake all antiquity, and to call former times to
his succours to make a party against the present time. So that the
ancient authors, both in divinity and in humanity, which had long time
slept in libraries, began generally to be read and revolved. Thus by
consequence did draw on a necessity of a more exquisite travail in the
languages original, wherein those authors did write, for the better
understanding of those authors, and the better advantage of pressing and
applying their words. And thereof grew again a delight in their manner
of style and phrase, and an admiration of that kind of writing; which
was much furthered and precipitated by the enmity and opposition that
the propounders of those primitive but seeming new opinions had against
the schoolmen; who were generally of the contrary part, and whose
writings were altogether in a different style and form; taking liberty
to coin and frame new terms of art to express their own sense, and to
avoid circuit of speech, without regard to the pureness, pleasantness,
and, as I may call it, lawfulness of the phrase or word. And again,
because the great la.bnur that then was with the people (of whom the
Pharisees were wont to say, EXECRABLIS ISTA TURBA, QUAE NON NOVIT LEGEM)
for the winning and persuading of them, there grew of necessity in chief
price and request eloquence and variety of discourse, as the fittest and
forciblest access into the capacity of the vulgar sort: so that these
four causes concurring, the admiration of ancient authors, the hate of
the schoolmen, the exact study of languages, and the efficacy of
preaching, did bring in an affectionate study of eloquence and copie of
speech, which then began to flourish. This grew speedily to an excess;
for men began to hunt more after words than matter; more after the
choiceness of the phrase, and the round and clean composition of the
sentence, and the sweet falling of the clauses, and the varying and
illustration of their works with tropes and figures, than after the
weight of matter, worth of subject, soundness of argument, life of
invention or depth of judgment. Then grew the flowing and watery vein of
Osorius the Portugal bishop, to be in price. Then did Sturmius spend
such infinite and curious pains upon Cicero the Orator, and Hermogenes
the Rhetorician, besides his own books of Periods and Imitation, and the
like. Then did Car of Cambridge, and Ascham with their lectures and
writings almost deify Cicero and Demosthenes, and allure all young men
that were studious, unto that delicate and polished kind of learning.
Then did Erasmus take occasion to make the scoffing Echo: DECEM ANNOS
CONSUMPSI IN LEGENDO CICERONE; and the Echo answered in Greek, <
w(/ve >, ASINE. Then grew the learning of the schoolmen to be utterly
despised as barbarous. In sum, the whole inclination and bent of those
times was rather towards copie than weight.
3. Here, therefore, is the first distemper of learning, when men
study words and not matter; whereof, though I have represented an
example of late times, yet it hath been and will be SECUNDUM MAJUS ET
MINUS in all time. And how is it possible but this should have an
operation to discredit learning, even with vulgar capacities, when they
see learned men's works like the first letter of a patent, or limned
book; which though it hath large flourishes, yet is but a letter? It
seems to me that Pygmalion's frenzy is a good emblem or portraiture of
this vanity: for words are but the images of matter; and except they
have life of reason and invention, to fall in love with them is all one
as to fall in love with a picture.
4. But yet notwithstanding it is a thing not hastily to be condemned,
to clothe and adorn the obscurity even of Philosophy itself with
sensible and plausible elocution. For hereof we have great examples in
Xenophon, Cicero, Seneca, Plutarch, and of Plato also in some degree;
and hereof likewise there is great use: for surely, to the severe
inquisition of truth and the deep progress into philosophy, it is some
hindrance; because it is too early satisfactory to the mind of man, and
quencheth the desire of further search, before we come to a just period.
But then if a man be to have any use of such knowledge in civil
occasions, of conference, counsel, persuasion, discourse, or the like;
then shall he find it prepared to his hands in those authors which write
in that manner. But the excess of this is so justly contemptible that as
Hercules, when he saw the image of Adonis, Venus' minion, in a temple,
said in disdain, NIL SACRI ES; so there is none of Hercules' followers
in learning, that is, the more severe and laborious sort of inquirers
into truth, but will despise those delicacies and affectations, as
indeed capable of no divineness. And thus much of the first disease or
distemper of learning.
5. The second which followeth is in nature worse than the former: for
as substance of matter is better than beauty of words, so contrariwise
vain matter is worse than vain words: wherein it seemeth the
reprehension of St. Paul was not only proper for those times, but
prophetical for the times following; [10] and not only respective to
divinity, but extensive to all knowledge; DEVITA PROFANAS VOCUM
NOVITATES, ET OPPOSITIONES FALSI NOMINIS SCIENTIAE. For he assigneth two
marks and badges of suspected and falsified science: the one, the
novelty and strangeness of terms; the other, the strictness of
positions, which of necessity doth induce oppositions, and so questions
and altercations. Surely, like as many substances in nature which are
solid do putrify and corrupt into worms; so it is the property of good
and sound knowledge to putrify and dissolve into a number of subtle,
idle, unwholesome, and, as I may term them, vermiculate questions, which
have indeed a kind of quickness and life of spirit, but no soundness of
matter or goodness of quality. This kind of degenerate learning did
chiefly reign amongst the Schoolmen: who having sharp and strong wits,
and abundance of leisure, and small variety of reading, but their wits
being shut up in the cells of a few authors (chiefly Aristotle their
dictator) as their persons were shut up in the cells of monasteries and
colleges, and knowing little history, either of nature or time, did out
of no great quantity of matter and infinite agitation of wit spin out
unto those laborious webs of learning which are extant in their books.
For the wit and mind of man, if it work upon matter, which is the
contemplation of the creatures of God, worketh according to the stuff,
and is limited thereby; but if it worl; upon itself, as the spider
worketh his web, then it is endless, and brings forth indeed cobwebs of
learning, admirable for the fineness of thread and work, but of no
substance or profit.
6. This same unprofitable subtility or curiosity is of two sorts;
either in the subject itself that they handle, when it is a fruitless
speculation or controversy, (whereof there are no small number both in
Divinity and Philosophy,) or in the manner or method of handling of a
knowledge, which amongst them was this; upon every particular position
or assertion to frame objections, and to those objections, solutions;
which solutions were for the most part not confutations but
distinctions: whereas indeed the strength of all sciences is, as the
strength of the old man's fagot, in the band. For the harmony of a
science, supporting each part the other, is and ought to be the true and
brief confutation and suppression of all the smaller sort of objections.
But, on the other side, if you take out every axiom, as the sticks of
the fagot, one by one, you may quarrel with them, and bend them, and
break them at your pleasure: so that, as was said of Seneca, VERBORUM
MINUTIIS RERUM FRANGIT PONDERA; so a man may truly say of the schoolmen,
QUAESTIONUM MINUTIIS SCIENTIARUM FRANGUNT SOLIDITATEM. For were it not
better for a man in a fair room to set up one great light or branching
candlestick of lights, than to go about with a small watch candle into
every corner? And such is their method, that rests not so much upon
evidence of truth proved by arguments, authorities, similitudes,
examples, as upon particular confutations and solutions of every
scruple, cavilation, and objection; breeding for the most part one
question as fast as it solveth another; even as in the former
resemblance, when you carry the light into one corner, you darken the
rest; so that the fable and fiction of Scylla seemeth to be a lively
image of this kind of philosophy or knowledge; which was transformed
into a comely virgin for the upper parts; but then
Candida succinctam latrantibus inguina monstris:
so the generalities of the schoolmen are for a while good and
proportionable; but then, when you descend into their distinctions and
decisions, instead of a fruitful womb for the use and benefit of man's
life, they end in monstrous altercations and barking questions. So as it
is not possible but this quality of knowledge must fall under popular
contempt, the people being apt to contemn truth upon occasion of
controversies and altercations, and to think they are all out of their
way which never meet; and when they see such digladiation about
subtilties, and matters of no use or moment, they easily fall upon that
judgment of Dionysius of Syracuse, VERBA ISTA SUNT SENUM OTIOSORUM.
7. Notwithstanding, certain it is that if those Schoolmen to their
great thirst of truth and unwearied travail of wit had joined variety
and universality of reading and contemplation, they had proved excellent
lights, to the great advancement of all learning and knowledge: but as
they are, they are great undertakers indeed, and fierce with dark
keeping: but as in the inquiry of the divine truth, their pride inclined
to leave the oracle of God's word, and to vanish in the mixture of their
own inventions; so in the inquisition of nature, they ever left the
oracle of God's works, and adored the deceiving and deformed images
which the unequal mirror of their own minds, or a few received authors
or principles did represent unto them. And thus much for the second
disease of learning.
8. For the third vice or disease of learning, which concerneth deceit
or untruth, it is of all the rest the foulest; as that which doth
destroy the essential form of knowledge, which is nothing but a
representation of truth: for the truth of being and the truth of knowing
are one, differing no more than the direct beam and the beam reflected.
This vice therefore brancheth itself into two sorts; delight in
deceiving, and aptness to be deceived; imposture and credulity; which,
although they appear to be of a diverse nature, the one seeming to
proceed of cunning and the other of simplicity, yet certainly they do
for the most part concur: for, as the verse noteth,
Percontatorem fugito, nam garrulus idem est,
an inquisitive man is a prattler; so, upon the like reason a
credulous man is a deceiver: as we see it in fame, that he that will
easily believe rumours, will as easily augment rumours, and add somewhat
to them of his own; which Tacitus wisely noteth, when he saith, FINGUNT
SIMUL CREDUNTQUE: so great an affinity hath fiction and belief.
9. This facility of credit and accepting or admitting things weakly
authorised or warranted, is of two kinds according to the subject: for
it is either a belief of history (as the lawyers speak, matter of fact);
or else of matter of art and opinion. As to the [11] former, we see the
experience and inconvenience of this error in ecclesiastical history;
which hath too easily received and registered reports and narrations of
miracles wrought by martyrs, hermits, or monks of the desert, and other
holy men, and their relics, shrines, chapels, and images: which though
they had a passage for a time by the ignorance of the people, the
superstitious simplicity of some, and the politic toleration of others
holding them but as divine poesies; yet after a period of time, when the
mist began to clear up, they grew to be esteemed but as old wives'
fables, impostures of the clergy, illusions of spirits, and badges of
Antichrist, to the great scandal and detriment of religion.
10. So in natural history, we see there hath not been that choice and
judgment used as ought to have been; as may appear in the writings of
Plinius, Cardanus, Albertus, and divers of the Arabians, being fraught
with much fabulous matter, a great part not only untried, but
notoriously untrue, to the great derogation of the credit of natural
philosophy with the grave and sober kind of wits: wherein the wisdom and
integrity of Aristotle is worthy to be observed; that, having made so
diligent and exquisite a history of living creatures, hath mingled it
sparingly with any vain or feigned matter: and yet on the other sake,
hath cast all prodigious narrations, which he thought worthy the
recording, into one book: excellently discerning that matter of manifest
truth (such whereupon observation and rule were to be built), was not to
be mingled or weakened with matter of doubtful credit; and yet again,
that rarities and reports that seem incredible are not to be suppressed
or denied to the memory of men.
11. And as for the facility of credit which is yielded to arts and
opinions, it is likewise of two kinds; either when too much belief is
attributed to the arts themselves, or to certain authors in any art. The
sciences themselves, which have had better intelligence and confederacy
with the imagination of man than with his reason, are three in number;
astrology, natural magic, and alchemy: of which sciences, nevertheless,
the ends or pretences are noble. For astrology pretendeth to discover
that correspondence or concatenation which is between the superior globe
and the inferior: natural magic pretendeth to call and reduce natural
philosophy from variety of speculations to the magnitude of works: and
alchemy pretendeth to make separation of all the unlike parts of bodies
which in mixtures of nature are incorporate. But the derivations and
prosecutions to these ends, both in the theories and in the practices,
are full of error and vanity; which the great professors themselves have
sought to veil over and conceal by enigmatical writings, and referring
themselves to auricular traditions and such other devices, to save the
credit of impostures: and yet surely to alchemy this right is due, that
it may be compared to the husbandman whereof Aesop makes the fable;
that, when he died, told his sons that he had left unto them gold buried
under ground in his vineyard; and they digged over all the ground, and
gold they found none; but by reason of their stirring and digging the
mould about the roots of their vines, they had a great vintage the year
following: so assuredly the search and stir to make gold hath brought to
light a great number of good and fruitful inventions and experiments, as
well for the disclosing of nature as for the use of man's life.
12. And as for the overmuch credit that hath been given unto authors
in sciences, in making them dictators, that their words should stand,
and not counsellors to give advice; the damage is infinite that sciences
have received thereby, as the principal cause that hath kept them low at
a stay without growth or advancement. For hence it hath come, that in
arts mechanical the first deviser comes shortest, and time addeth and
perfecteth; but in sciences the first author goeth farthest, and time
leeseth and corrupteth. So we see, artillery, sailing, printing, and the
like, were grossly managed at the first, and by time accommodated and
refined: but contrariwise, the philosophies and sciences of Aristotle,
Plato, Democritus, Hippocrates, Euclides, Archimedes, of most vigour at
the first and by time degenerate and imbased; whereof the reason is no
other, but that in the former many wits and industries have contributed
in one; and in the latter many wits and industries have been spent about
the wit of some one, whom many times they have rather depraved than
illustrated. For as water will not ascend higher than the level of the
first springhead from whence it descendeth, so knowledge derived from
Aristotle, and exempted from liberty of examination, will not rise again
higher than the knowledge of Aristotle. And therefore although the
position be good, OPORTET DISCENTEM CREDERE, yet it must be coupled with
this, OPORTO EDOCTUM JUDICARE; for disciples do owe unto masters only a
temporary belief and a suspension of their own judgment until they be
fully instructed, and not an absolute resignation or perpetual
captivity: and therefore, to conclude this point, I will say no more,
but so let great authors have their due, as time, which is the author of
authors, be not deprived of his due, which is, further and further to
discover truth. Thus have I gone over these three diseases of learning;
besides the which there are some other rather peccant humours that
formed diseases: which nevertheless are not so secret and intrinsic but
that they fall under a popular observation and traducement, and
therefore are not to be passed over.
V. 1. The first of these is the extreme affecting of two extremities;
the one antiquity, the other novelty; wherein it seemeth the children of
time do take after the nature and malice of the father. For as he
devoureth his children, so one of them seeketh to devour and suppress
the other; while antiquity envieth there should be new additions, and
novelty cannot be content to add but it must deface. Surely the advice
of the prophet is the true direction in this matter, STATE SUPER VIAS
ANTIQUAS, ET VIDETE QUAENAM FIT VIA RECTA ET BONA ET AMBULATE IN EA.
Antiquity deserveth that reverence, that men. should make a stand
thereupon and discover what is the best way; but when the discovery is
well taken, then to make progression. And to speak truly, ANTIQUITAS
SAECULI JUVENTUS MUNDI. These [12] times are the ancient times, when the
world is ancient, and not those which we account ancient ordine
retrogrado, by a computation backward from ourselves.
2. Another error induced by the former is a distrust that anything
should be now to be found out, which the world should have missed and
passed over so long time; as if the same objection were to be made to
time, that Lucian maketh to Jupiter and other the heathen gods; of which
he wondereth that they begot so many children in old time, and begot
none in his time; and asketh whether they were become septuagenary, or
whether the law PAPIA, made against old men's marriages, had restrained
them. So it seemeth men doubt lest time is become past children and
generation; wherein, contrariwise, we see commonly the levity and
inconstancy of men's judgments, which till a matter be done, wonder that
it can be done; and as soon as it is done, wonder again that it was no
sooner done: as we see in the expedition of Alexander into Asia, which
at first was prejudged as a vast and impossible enterprise; and yet
afterwards it pleaseth Livy to make no more of it than this: NIL ALIUD
QUAM BENE AUSUS VANA CONTEMNERE; and the same happened to Columbus in
the western navigation. But in intellectual matters it is much more
common; as may be seen in most of the propositions of Euclid; which till
they be demonstrate, they seem strange to our assent; but being
demonstrate, our mind accepteth of them by a kind of relation (as the
lawyers speak), as if we had known them before.
3. Another error, that hath also some affinity with the former, is a
conceit that of former opinions or sects, after variety and examination,
the best hath still prevailed and suppressed the rest; so as, if a man
should begin the labour of a new search, he were but like to light
somewhat formerly rejected, and by rejection brought into oblivion: as
if the multitude, or the wisest for the multitude's sake, were not ready
to give passage rather to that which is popular and superficial than to
that which is substantial and profound; for the truth is that time
seemeth to be of the nature of a river or stream, which carrieth down to
us that which is light and blown up, and sinketh and drowneth that which
is weighty and solid.
4. Another error, of a diverse nature from all the former, is the
over early and peremptory reduction of knowledge into arts and methods;
from which time commonly sciences receive small or no augmentation. But
as young men, when they knit and shape perfectly, do seldom grow to a
further stature; so knowledge, while it is in aphorisms and
observations, it is in growth: but when it once is comprehended in exact
methods, it may perchance be further polished and illustrate and
accommodated for use and practice; but it increaseth no more in bulk and
substance.
5. Another error, which doth succeed that which we last mentioned, is
that after the distribution of particular arts and sciences, men have
abandoned universality, or PHILOSOPHIA PRIMA; which cannot but cease and
stop all progression. For no perfect discovery can be made upon a flat
or a level: neither is it possible to discover the more remote and
deeper parts of any science, if you stand but upon the level of the same
science, and ascend not to a higher science.
6. Another error hath proceeded from too great a reverence, and a
kind of adoration of the mind and understanding of man; by means whereof
men have withdrawn themselves too much from the contemplation of nature,
and the observations of experience, and have tumbled up and down in
their own reason and conceits. Upon these intellectualists, which are
notwithstanding commonly taken for the most sublime and divine
philosophers, Heraclitus gave a just censure, saying, MEN SOUGHT TRUTH
IN THEIR OWN LITTLE WORLDS, AND NOT IN THE GREAT AND COMMON WORLD; for
they disdain to spell, and so by degrees to read in the volume of God's
works: and contrariwise by continual meditation and agitation of wit do
urge and as it were invocate their own spirits to divine and give
oracles unto them, whereby they are deservedly deluded.
7. Another error that hath some connection with this latter, is, that
men have used to infect their meditations, opinions, and doctrines, with
some conceits which they have most admired, or some sciences which they
have most applied; and given all things else a tincture according to
them utterly untrue and unproper. So hath Plato intermingled his
philosophy with theology, and Aristotle with logic; and the second
school of Plato, Proclus and the rest, with the mathematics. For these
were the arts which had a kind of primogeniture with them severally. So
have the alchymists made a philosophy out of a few experiments of the
furnace; and Gilbertus, our countryman, hath made a philosophy out of
the observations of a lodestone. So Cicero, when reciting the several
opinions of the nature of the soul he found a musician that held the
soul was but a harmony, saith pleasantly, HIC AB ARTE SUA NON RECESSIT,
etc. But of these conceits Aristotle speaketh seriously and wisely, when
he saith, QUI RESPICIUNT AD PAUCA DE FACILE PRONUNCIANT.
8. Another error is an impatience of doubt and haste to assertion
without due and mature suspension of judgment. For the two ways of
contemplation are not unlike the two ways of action commonly spoken of
by the ancients; the one plain and smooth in the beginning, and in the
end impassable; the other rough and troublesome in the entrance, but
after a while fair and even. So it is in contemplation; if a man will
begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts; but if he will be
content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties.
9. Another error is in the manner of the tradition and delivery of
knowledge, which is for the most part magistral and peremptory, and not
ingenuous and faithful; in a sort as may be soonest believed, and not
easiliest examined. I: is true, that in compendious treatises for
practice that form is not to be disallowed: but in the true handling of
knowledge, men ought not to fall either on the one side into the vein of
Velleius the Epicurean: NIL TAM METUENS, QUAM NE DUBITARE ALIQUA DE RE
VIDERETUR; [13] nor on the other side into Socrates his ironical
doubting of all things; but to propound things sincerely with more or
less asseveration, as they stand in a man's own judgment proved more or
less.
10. Other errors there are in the scope that men propound to
themselves, whereunto they bend their endeavours; for whereas the more
constant and devote kind of professors of any science ought to propound
to themselves to make some additions to their science, they convert
their labours to aspire to certain second prizes: as to be a profound
interpreter or commenter, to be a sharp champion or defender, to be a
methodical compounder or abridger; and so the patrimony of knowledge
cometh to be sometimes improved, but seldom augmented.
11. But the greatest error of all the rest is the mistaking or
misplacing of the last or farthest end of knowledge: for men have
entered into a desire of learning and knowledge, sometimes upon a
natural curiosity and inquisitive appetite; sometimes to entertain their
minds with variety and delight; sometimes for ornament and reputation;
and sometimes to enable them to victory of wit and contradiction; and
most times for lucre and profession; and seldom sincerely to give a true
account of their gift of reason, to the benefit and use of men: as if
there were sought in knowledge a couch whereupon to rest a searching and
restless spirit; or a tarrasse, for a wandering and variable mind to
walk up and down with a fair prospect; or a tower of state, for a proud
mind to raise itself upon; or a fort or commanding ground, for strife
and contention; or a shop, for profit or sale; and not a rich
storehouse, for the glory of the Creator and the relief of man's estate.
Rut this is that which will indeed dignify and exalt knowledge, if
contemplation and action may be more nearly and straitly conjoined and
united together than they have been; a conjunction like unto that of the
two highest planets, Saturn, the planet of rest and contemplation, and
Jupiter, the planet of civil society and action: howbeit, I do not mean,
when I speak of use and action, that end before-mentioned of the
applying of knowledge to lucre and profession; for I am not ignorant how
much that diverteth and interrupteth the prosecution and advancement of
knowledge, like unto the golden ball thrown before Atalanta, which while
she goeth aside and stoopeth to take up, the race is hindered;
Declinat cursus, aurumque volubile tollit.
Neither is my meaning, as was spoken of Socrates, to call philosophy
down from heaven to converse upon the earth, that is, to leave natural
philosophy aside, and to apply knowledge only to manners and policy. But
as both heaven and earth do conspire and contribute to the use and
benefit of man; so the end ought to be, from both philosophies to
separate and reject vain speculations, and whatsoever is empty and void,
and to preserve and augment whatsoever is solid and fruitful: that
knowledge may not be, as a curtesan, for pleasure and vanity only, or as
a bondwoman, to acquire and gain to her master's use; but as a spouse,
for generation, fruit, and comfort.
12. Thus have I described and opened, as by a kind of dissection,
those peccant humours, (the principal of them,) which hath not only
given impediment to the proficience of learning, but have given also
occasion to the traducement thereof: wherein if I have been too plain,
it must be remembered, FIDELIA VULNERA AMANTIS, SED DOLOSA OSCULA
MALIGNANTIS. [--] This, I think, I have gained, that I ought to be the
better believed in that which I shall say pertaining to commendation;
because I have proceeded so freely in that which concerneth censure. And
yet I have no purpose to enter into a laudative of learning, or to make
a hymn to the Muses; (though I am of opinion that it is long since their
rites were duly celebrated:) but my intent is, without varnish or
amplification justly to weigh the dignity of knowledge in the balance
with other things, and to take the true value thereof by testimonies and
arguments divine and human.
VI.1. First therefore let us seek the dignity of knowledge in the
archetype or first platform, which is in the attributes and acts of God,
as far as they are revealed to man and may be observed with sobriety;
wherein we may not seek it by the name of Learning; for all Learning is
Knowledge acquired, and all knowledge in God is original: and therefore
we must look for it by another name, that of Wisdom or Sapience, as the
Scriptures call it.
2. It is so then, that in the work of the creation we see a double
emanation of Virtue from God; the one referring more properly to Power,
the other to Wisdom; the one expressed in making the subsistence of the
matter, and the other in disposing the beauty of the form. This being
supposed, it is to be observed that for anything which appeareth in the
history of the creation, the confused mass and matter of Heaven and
Earth was made in a moment; and the order and disposition of that chaos
or mass was the work of six days; such a note of difference it pleased
God to put upon the works of Power, and the works of Wisdom; wherewith
concurreth, that in the former it is not set down that God said, LET
THERE BE HEAVEN AND EARTH, as it is set down of the works following; but
actually, that God made Heaven and Earth: the one carrying the style of
a Manufacture, and the other of a Law, Decree, or Counsel.
3. To proceed to that which is next in order from God, to spirits. We
find, as far as credit is to be given to the celestial hierarchy of that
supposed Dionysius the senator of Athens, the first place or degree is
given to the angels of Love, which are termed Seraphim; the second to
the angels of Light, which are termed Cherubim; and the third, and so
following places, to Thrones, Principalities, and the rest, which are
all angels of power and ministry; so as the angels of Knowledge and
Illumination are placed before the angels of Office and Domination.
4. To descend from Spirits and Intellectual Forms to Sensible and
Material Forms; we read the first Form that was created was Light, which
hath a relation and correspondence in nature and corporal things to
Knowledge in Spirits and incorporal things.
[14] 5. So in the distribution of days we see the day wherein God did
rest and contemplate His own works, was blessed above all the days
wherein He did effect, and accomplish them.
6. After the creation was finished, it is set down unto us that man
was placed in the garden to work therein; which work, so appointed to
him, could be no other than work of Contemplation; that is, when the end
of work is but for exercise and experiment, not for necessity; for there
being then no reluctation of the creature, nor sweat of the brow, man's
employment must of consequence have been matter of delight in the
experiment, and not matter of labour for the use. Again, the first acts
which man performed in Paradise consisted of the two summary parts of
knowledge; the view of creatures, and the imposition of names. As for
the knowledge which induced the fall, it was, as was touched before, not
the natural knowledge of creatures, but the moral knowledge of good and
evil; wherein the supposition was, that God's commandments or
prohibitions were not the originals of good and evil, but that they had
other beginnings, which man aspired to know; to the end to make a total
defection from God and to depend wholly upon himself.
7. To pass on: in the first event or occurrence after the fall of
man, we see, (as the Scriptures have infinite mysteries, not violating
at all the truth of the story or letter,) an image of the two estates,
the contemplative state and the active state, figured in the two persons
of Abel and Cain, and in the two simplest and most primitive trades of
life; that of the shepherd, (who, by reason of his leisure, rest in a
place, and living in view of heaven, is a lively image of a
contemplative life,) and that of the husbandman: where we see again the
favour and election of God went to the shepherd, and not to the tiller
of the ground.
8. So in the age before the flood, the holy records within those few
memorials which are there entered and registered have vouchsafed to
mention and honour the name of the inventors and authors of music and
works in metal. In the age after the flood, the first great judgment of
God upon the ambition of man was the confusion of tongues, whereby the
open trade and intercourse of learning and knowledge was chiefly
imbarred.
9. To descend to Moses the lawgiver, and God's first pen: he is
adorned by the Scriptures with this addition and commendation, THAT HE
WAS SEEN IN ALL THE LEARNING OF THE EGYPTIANS; which nation, we know,
was one of the most ancient schools of the world: for so Plato brings in
the Egyptian priest saying unto Solon: YOU GRECIANS ARE EVER CHILDREN;
YOU HAVE NO KNOWLEDGE OF ANTIQUITY, NOR ANTIQUITY OF KNOWLEDGE. Take a
view of the ceremonial law of Moses; you shall find, besides the
prefiguration of Christ, the badge or difference of the people of God,
the exercise and impression of obedience, and other divine uses and
fruits thereof, that some of the most learned Rabbins have travailed
profitably and profoundly to observe, some of them a natural, some of
them a moral sense, or reduction of many of the ceremonies and
ordinances. As in the law of the leprosy, where it is said, IF THE
WHITENESS HAVE OVERSPREAD THE FLESH, THE PATIENT MAY PASS ABROAD FOR
CLEAN; BUT IF THERE BE ANY WHOLE FLESH REMAINING, HE IS TO BE SHUT UP
FOR UNCLEAN; one of them noteth a principle of nature, that PUTREFACTION
IS MORE CONTAGIOUS BEFORE MATURITY THAN AFTER: and another noteth a
position of moral philosophy, that MEN ABANDONED TO VICE DO NOT SO MUCH
CORRUPT MANNERS, AS THOSE THAT ARE HALF GOOD AND HALF EVIL. So in this
and very many other places in that law, there is to be found, besides
the theological sense, much aspersion of philosophy.
10. So likewise in that excellent book of Job, if it be revolved with
diligence, it will be found pregnant and swelling with natural
philosophy; as, for example, cosmography, and the roundness of the
world, QUI EXTENDIT AQUILONEM SUPER VACUUM, ET APPENDIT TERRAM SUPER
NIHILUM; wherein the pensileness of the earth, the pole of the north,
and the finiteness or convexity of heaven are manifestly touched. So
again, matter of astronomy; SPIRITUS EJUS ORNAVIT COELOS, ET
OBSTETRICANTE MANU EJUS EDACTUS EST COLUBER TORTUOSUS. And in another
place; NUNQUID CONJUNGERE VALEBIS MICANTES STELLAS PLEIADAS, AUT GYRUM
ARCTURI POTERIS DISSIPARE ? Where the fixing of the stars, ever standing
at equal distance, is with great elegancy noted. And in another place,
QUI FACIT ARCTURUM, ET ORIONA, ET HYADAS, ET INTERIORA AUSTRI; where
again he takes knowledge of the depression of the southern pole, calling
it the secrets of the south, because the southern stars were in that
climate unseen. Matter of generation; ANON SICUT LAC MULSISTI ME, ET
SICUT CASEUM COAGULASTI ME ? etc. Matter of minerals; HABET ARGENTUM
VENARUM SUARUM PRINCIPIA: ET AURO LOCUS EST IN QUO CONFLATUR, FERRUM DE
TERRA TOLLITUR, ET LAPIS SOLUTUS CALORE IN AES VERTITUR: and so forwards
in that chapter.
11. So likewise in the person of Salomon the King, we see the gift or
endowment of wisdom and learning, both in Salomon's petition and in
God's assent thereunto, preferred before all other terrene and temporal
felicity. By virtue of which grant or donative of God Salomon became
enabled not only to write those excellent Parables or Aphorisms
concerning divine and moral philosophy; but also to compile a Natural
History of all verdure, from the cedar upon the mountain to the moss
upon the wall, (which is but a rudiment between putrefaction and a
herb,) and also of all things that breathe or move. Nay, the same
Salomon the King, although he excelled in the glory of treasure and
magnificent buildings, of shipping and navigation, of service and
attendance, of fame and renown, and the like, yet he maketh no claim to
any of those glories, but only to the glory of inquisition of truth; for
so he saith expressly, THE GLORY OF GOD IS TO CONCEAL A THING, BUT THE
GLORY OF THE KING IS TO FIND IT OUT; as if, according to the innocent
play of children, the Divine Majesty took delight to hide His works, to
the end to have them found out; and as if kings could not obtain a
greater honour than to be God's playfellows in that game; considering
the great commandment of wits and means, whereby nothing needeth to be
hidden from them.
[15] 12. Neither did the dispensation of God vary in the times after
our Saviour came into the world; for our Saviour Himself did first show
His power to subdue ignorance, by His conference with the priests and
doctors of the law, before He showed His power to subdue nature by His
miracles. And the coming of the Holy Spirit was chiefly figured and
expressed in the similitude and gift of tongues, which are but VEHICULA
SCIENTIAE.
13. So in the election of those instruments, which it pleased God to
use for the plantation of the Faith, notwithstanding that at the first
He did employ persons altogether unlearned, otherwise than by
inspiration, more evidently to declare His immediate working, and to
abase all human wisdom or knowledge; yet, nevertheless, that counsel of
His was no sooner performed, but in the next vicissitude and succession
He did send His Divine Truth into the world waited on with other
learnings, as with servants or handmaids; for so we see St. Paul, who
was the only learned amongst the Apostles, had his pen most used in the
Scriptures of the New Testament.
14. So again, we find that many of the ancient Bishops and Fathers of
the Church were excellently read and studied in all the learning of the
heathen; insomuch that the edict of the Emperor Julianus, whereby it was
interdicted unto Christians to be admitted into schools, lectures, or
exercises of learning, was esteemed and accounted a more pernicious
engine and machination against the Christian Faith, than were all the
sanguinary prosecutions of his predecessors; neither could the emulation
and jealousy of Gregory the first of that name, bishop of Rome, ever
obtain the opinion of piety or devotion; but contrariwise received the
censure of humour, malignity, and pusillanimity, even amongst holy men;
in that he designed to obliterate and extinguish the memory of heathen
antiquity and authors. But contrariwise, it was the Christian Church,
which, amidst the inundations of the Scythians on the one side from the
north-west, and the Saracens from the east, did preserve in the sacred
lap and bosom thereof the precious relics even of heathen learning,
which otherwise had been extinguished as if no such thing had ever been.
15. We see before our eyes, that in the age of ourselves and our
fathers, when it pleased God to call the Church of Rome to account for
their degenerate manners and ceremonies, and sundry doctrines obnoxious
and framed to uphold the same abuses; at one and the same time it was
ordained by the Divine Providence that there should attend withal a
renovation and new spring of all other knowledges. And on the other side
we see the Jesuits, (who partly in themselves, and partly by the
emulation and provocation of their example, have much quickened and
strengthened the state of learning,) we see, I say, what notable service
and reparation they have done to the Roman see.
16. Wherefore, to conclude this part, let it be observed, that there
be two principal duties and services, besides ornament and illustration,
which philosophy and human learning do perform to faith and religion.
The one, because they are an effectual inducement to the exaltation of
the glory of God: for as the Psalms and other Scriptures do often invite
us to consider and magnify the great and wonderful works of God, so if
we should rest only in the contemplation of the exterior of them, as
they first offer themselves to our senses, we should do a like injury
unto the Majesty of God, as if we should judge or construe of the store
of some excellent jeweller, by that only which is set out toward the
street in his shop. The other, because they minister a singular help and
preservative against unbelief and error: for our Saviour saith, YOU ERR,
NOT KNOWING THE SCRIPTURES, NOR THE POWER OF GOD; laying before us two
books or volumes to study, if we will be secured from error; first, the
Scriptures, revealing the Will of God; and then the creatures expressing
His Power; whereof the latter is a key unto the former: not only opening
our understanding to conceive the true sense of the Scriptures, by the
general notions of reason and rules of speech; but chiefly opening our
belief, in drawing us into a due meditation of the omnipotency of God,
which is chieflysigned and engraven upon His works. Thus much therefore
for divine testimony and evidence concerning the true dignity and value
of Learning.
VII. 1. As for human proofs, it is so large a field, as in a
discourse of this nature and brevity it is fit rather to use choice of
those things which we shall produce, than to embrace the variety of
them. First, therefore, in the degrees of human honour amongst the
heathen, it was the highest to obtain to a veneration and adoration as a
God. This unto the Christians is as the forbidden fruit. But we speak
now separately of human testimony: according to which, that which the
Grecians call APOTHEOSIS, and the Latins, RELATIO INTER DIVOS, was the
supreme honour which man could attribute unto man: especially when it
was given, not by a formal decree or act of state, as it was used among
the Roman Emperors, but by an inward assent and belief. Which honour,
being so high, had also a degree or middle term; for there were reckoned
above human honours, honours heroical and divine: in the attribution and
distribution of which honours, we see antiquity made this difference:
that whereas founders and uniters of states and cities, law-givers,
extirpers of tyrants, fathers of the people, and other eminent persons
in civil merit, were honoured but with the titles of worthies or
demi-gods; such as were Hercules, Theseus, Minos, Romulus, and the like:
on the other side, such as were inventors and authors of new arts,
endowments, and commodities towards man's life, were ever consecrated
amongst the gods themselves; as were Ceres, Bacchus, Mercurius, Apollo,
and others: and justly; for the merit of the former is confined within
the circle of an age or a nation; and is like fruitful showers, which
though they be profitable and good, yet serve but for that season, and
for a latitude of ground where they fall; but the other is indeed like
the benefits of heaven, which are permanent and universal. The former,
again, is mixed with strife and perturbation; but the latter hath the
true character of Divine Presence, coming in AURA LENI, without noise or
agitation.
[16] 2. Neither is certainly that other merit of learning, in
repressing the inconveniences which grow from man to man, much inferior
to the former, of relieving the necessities which arise from nature;
which merit was lively set forth by the ancients in that feigned
relation of Orpheus' theatre, where all beasts and birds assembled; and,
forgetting their several appetites, some of prey, some of game, some of
quarrel, stood all sociably together listening to the airs and accords
of the harp; the sound whereof no sooner ceased, or was drowned by some
louder noise, but every beast returned to its own nature: wherein is
aptly described the nature and condition of men, who are full of savage
and unreclaimed desires of profit, of lust, of revenge; which as long as
they give ear to precepts, to laws, to religion, sweetly touched with
eloquence and persuasion of books, of sermons, of harangues, so long is
society and peace maintained; but if these instruments be silent, or
that sedition and tumult make them not audible, all things dissolve into
anarchy and confusion.
3. But this appeareth more manifestly, when kings themselves, or
persons of authority under them, or other governors in commonwealths and
popular estates, are endued with learning. For although he might be
thought partial to his own profession, that said, THEN SHOULD PEOPLE AND
ESTATES BE HAPPY, WHEN EITHER KINGS WERE PHILOSOPHERS, OR PHILOSOPHERS
KINGS, yet so much is verified by experience, that under learned princes
and governors there have been ever the best times: for howsoever kings
may have their imperfections in their passions and customs; yet if they
be illuminate by learning, they have those notions of religion, policy,
and morality, which do preserve them, and refrain them from all ruinous
and peremptory errors and excesses; whispering evermore in their ears,
when counsellors and servants stand mute and silent. And senators or
counsellors likewise, which be learned, do proceed upon more safe and
substantial principles, than counsellors which are only men of
experience: the one sort keeping dangers afar off, whereas the other
discover them not till they come near hand, and then trust to the
agility of their wit to ward or avoid them.
4. Which felicity of times under learned princes, (to keep still the
law of brevity, by using the most eminent and selected examples,) doth
best appear in the age which passed from the death of Domitian the
emperor until the reign of Commodus; comprehending a succession of six
princes, all learned, or singular favourers and advancers of learning,
which age for temporal respects, was the most happy and fiourishing that
ever the Roman empire, (which then was a model of the world,) enjoyed: a
matter revealed and prefigured unto Domitian in a dream the night before
he was slain; for he thought there was grown behind upon his shoulders a
neck and head of gold: which came accordingly to pass in those golden
times which succeeded: of which princes we will make some commemoration;
wherein although the matter will be vulgar, and may be thought fitter
for a declamation than agreeable to a treatise infolded as this is, yet
because it is pertinent to the point in hand,
Neque semper arcum
Tendit Apollo,
and to name them only were too naked and cursory, I will not omit it
altogether. The first was Nerva; the excellent temper of whose
government is by a glance in Cornelius Tacitus touched to the life:
POSTQUAM DIVUS NERVA RES OLIM INSOCIABILES MISCUISSET, IMPERIUM ET
LIBERTATEM. And in token of his learning, the last act of his short
reign left to memory, was a missive to his adopted son Trajan,
proceeding upon some inward discontent at the ingratitude of the times,
comprehended in a verse of Homer's:
Telis, Phoebe, tuis lacrymas ulciscere nostras.
5. Trajan, who succeeded, was for his person not learned: but if we
will hearken to the speech of our Saviour, that saith, HE THAT RECEIVETH
A PROPHET IÎ THE NAME OF A PROPHET, SHALL HAVE A PROPHET'S REWARD; he
deserveth to be placed amongst the most learned princes: for there was
not a greater admirer of learning, or benefactor of learning; a founder
of famous libraries, a perpetual advancer of learned men to office, and
a familiar converser with learned professors and preceptors, who were
noted to have then most credit in court. On the other side, how much
Trajan's virtue and government was admired and renowned, surely no
testimony of grave and faithful history doth more lively set forth, than
that legend tale of Gregorius Magnus, bishop of Rome, who was noted for
the extreme envy he bore towards all heathen excellency: and yet he is
reported, out of the love and estimation of Trajan's moral virtues, to
have made unto God passionate and fervent prayers for the delivery of
his soul out of hell: and to have obtained it, with a caveat that he
should make no more such petitions. In this prince's time also, the
persecution against the Christians received intermission, upon the
certificate of Plinius Secundus, a man of excellent learning, and by
Trajan advanced.
6. Adrian, his successor, was the most curious man that lived, and
the most universal inquirer; insomuch as it was noted for an error in
his mind, that he desired to comprehend all things, and not to reserve
himself for the worthiest things: falling into the like humour that was
long before noted in Philip of Macedon, who, when he would needs
over-rule and put down an excellent musician in an argument touching
music, was well answered by him again, GOD FORBID, SIR, saith he, THAT
YOUR FORTUNE SHOULD BE SO BAD, AS TO AVOW THESE THINGS BETTER THAN I. It
pleased God likewise to use the curiosity of this emperor as an
inducement to the peace of His Church in those days. For having Christ
in veneration, not as a God or Saviour, but as a wonder or novelty; and
having His picture in his gallery, matched with Apollonius, with whom in
his vain imagination he thought he had some conformity; yet it served
the turn to allay the bitter hatred of those times against the Christian
name, so as the Church had peace during his time. And for his government
civil, although he did not attain to that of Trajan's glory of arms, or
perfection of justice, yet in deserving of the weal of the subject he
[17] did exceed him. For Trajan erected many famous monuments and
buildings; insomuch as Constantine the Great in emulation was wont to
call him Parietaria, wall-flower, because his name was upon so many
walls: but his buildings and works were more of glory and triumph than
use and necessity. But Adrian spent his whole reign, which was
peaceable, in a perambulation or survey of the Roman empire; giving
order and making assignation where he went, for re-edifying of cities,
towns, and forts decayed; and for cutting of rivers and streams, and for
making bridges and passages, and for policing of cities and commonalties
with new ordinances and constitutions, and granting new franchises and
incorporations; so that his whole time was a very restoration of all the
lapses and decays of former times.
7. Antoninus Pius, who succeeded him, was a prince excellently
learned; and had the patient and subtle wit of a schoolman; insomuch as
in common speech, which leaves no virtue untaxed, he was called Cymini
Sector, a carver or divider of cummin, which is one of the least seeds;
such a patience he had and settled spirit to enter into the least and
most exact differences of causes; a fruit no doubt of the exceeding
tranquillity and serenity of his mind; which being no ways charged or
incumbered, either with fears, remorses, or scruples, but having been
noted for a man of the purest goodness, without all fiction or
affectation, that hath reigned or lived, made his mind continually
present and entire. He likewise approached a degree nearer unto
Christianity, and became, as Agrippa said unto St. Paul, half a
Christian; holding their religion and law in good opinion, and not only
ceasing persecution, but giving way to the advancement of Christians.
8. There succeeded him the first DIVI FRATRES, the two adoptive
brethren, Lucius Commodus Verus, (son to Aelius Verus, who delighted
much in the softer kind of learning, and was wont to call the poet
Martial his Virgil,) and Marcus Aurelius Antoninus; whereof the latter,
who obscured his colleague and survived him long, was named the
philosopher: who, as he excelled all the rest in learning, so he
excelled them likewise in perfection of all royal virtues; insomuch as
Julianus the emperor, in his book entitled CAESARES, being as a pasquil
or satire to deride all his predecessors, feigned that they were all
invited to a banquet of the gods, and Silenus the jester sat at the
nether end of the table, and bestowed a scoff on every one as they came
in; but when Marcus Philosophus came in, Silenus was gravelled, and out
of countenance, not knowing where to carp at him; save at the last he
gave a glance at his patience towards his wife. And the virtue of this
prince, continued with that of his predecessor, made the name of
Antoninus so sacred in the world, that though it were extremely
dishonoured in Commodus, Caracalla, and Heliogabalus, who all bore the
name, yet when Alexander Severus refused the name, because he was a
stranger to the family, the senate with one acclamation said, QUOMODO
AUGUSTUS, SIC ET ANTONINUS. In such renown and veneration was the name
of these two princes in those days, that they would have it as a
perpetual addition in all the emperors' style. In this emperor's time
also the Church for the most part was in peace; so as in this sequence
of six princes we do see the blessed effects of learning in sovereignty,
painted forth in the greatest table of the world.
9. But for a tablet, or picture of smaller volume, (not presuming to
speak of your majesty that liveth,) in my judgment the most excellent is
that of Queen Elizabeth, your immediate predecessor in this part of
Britain; a princess that, if Plutarch were now alive to write lives by
parallels, would trouble him, I think, to find for her a parallel
amongst women. This lady was endued with learning in her sex singular,
and great even amongst masculine princes; whether we speak of learning,
of language, or of science, modern or ancient, Divinity or Humanity: and
unto the very last year of her life she was accustomed to appoint set
hours for reading, scarcely any young student in a university more
daily, or more duly. As for her government, I assure myself I shall not
exceed, if I do affirm that this part of the island never had forty-five
years of better times; and yet not through the calmness of the season,
but through the wisdom of her regiment. For if there be considered of
the one side, the truth of religion established; the constant peace and
security; the good administration of justice; the temperate use of the
prerogative, not slackened, nor much strained; the fiourishing state of
learning, sortable to so excellent a patroness; the convenient estate of
wealth and means, both of Crown and subject; the habit of obedience, and
the moderation of discontents: and there be considered on the other side
the differences of religion; the troubles of neighbour countries; the
ambition of Spain, and opposition of Rome; and then, that she was
solitary and of herself: these things, I say, considered, as I could not
have chosen an instance so recent and so proper, so I suppose I could
not have chosen one more remarkable or eminent to the purpose now in
hand, which is concerning the conjunction of learning in the prince with
felicity in the people.
10. Neither hath learning an influence and operation only upon civil
merit and moral virtue, and the arts or temperature of peace and
peaceable government; but likewise it hath no less power and efficacy in
enablement towards martial and military virtue and prowess; as may be
notably represented in the examples of Alexander the Great, and Caesar
the dictator, mentioned before, but now in fit place to be resumed: of
whose virtues and acts in war there needs no note or recital, having
been the wonders of time in that kind: but of their affections towards
learning, and perfections in learning, it is pertinent to say somewhat.
11. Alexander was bred and taught under Aristotle, the great
philosopher, who dedicated divers of his books of philosophy unto him:
he was attended with Callisthenes and divers other learned persons, that
followed him in camp, throughout his journeys and conquests. What price
and estimation he had learning in doth notably appear in these three
particulars: first, in the envy he used to express that he bore towards
Achilles, in this, that he had so good [18] a trumpet of his praises as
Homer's verses; secondly, in the judgment or solution he gave touching
that precious cabinet of Darius, which was found among his jewels;
whereof question was made what thing was worthy to be put into it; and
he gave his opinion for Homer's works: thirdly, in his letter to
Aristotle, after he had set forth his books of nature, wherein he
expostulated with him for publishing the secrets or mysteries of
philosophy; and gave him to understand that himself esteemed it more to
excel other men in learning and knowledge than in power and empire. And
what use he had of learning doth appear, or rather shine, in all his
speeches and answers, being full of science, and use of science, and
that in all variety.
12. And herein again it may seem a thing scholastical, and somewhat
idle, to recite things that every man knoweth; but yet, since the
argument I handle leadeth me thereunto, I am glad that men shall
perceive I am as willing to flatter, if they will so call it, an
Alexander, or a Caesar, or an Antoninus, that are dead many hundred
years since, as any that now liveth: for it is the displaying of the
glory of learning in sovereignty that I propound to myself, and not an
humour of declaiming in any man's praises. Observe then the speech he
used of Diogenes, and see if it tend not to the true state of one of the
greatest questions of moral philosophy; whether the enjoying of outward
things, or the contemning of them, be the greatest happiness: for when
he saw Diogenes so perfectly contented with so little, he said to those
that mocked at his condition, WERE I NOT ALEXANDER, I WOULD WISH TO BE
DIOGENES. But Seneca inverteth it, and saith; PLUS ERAT, QUOD HIC NOLLET
ACCIPERE, QUÀM QUOD ILLE POSSET DARE. There were more things which
Diogenes would have refused, than there were which Alexander could have
given.
13. Observe again that speech which was usual with him, THAT HE FELT
HIS MORTALITY CHIEFLY IN TWO THINGS, SLEEP AND LUST, and see if it were
not a speech extracted out of the depth of natural philosophy, and liker
to have come out of the mouth of Aristotle or Democritus, than from
Alexander.
14. See again that speech of humanity and poesy; when upon the
bleeding of his wounds, he called unto him one of his flatterers, that
was wont to ascribe to him divine honour, and said, LOOK, THIS IS VERY
BLOOD; THIS IS NOT SUCH A LIQUOR AS HOMER SPEAKETH OF, WHICH RAN FROM
VENUS HAND, WHEN IT WAS PIERCED BY DIOMEDES.
15. See likewise his readiness in reprehension of logic, in the
speech he used to Cassander, upon a complaint that was made against his
father Antipater: for when Alexander happened to say, DO YOU THINK THESE
MEN WOULD HAVE COME FROM SO FAR TO COMPLAIN, EXCEPT THEY HAD JUST CAUSE
OF GRIEF ? And Cassander answered, YEA, THAT WAS THE MATTER, BECAUSE
THEY THOUGHT THEY SHOULD NOT BE DISPROVED. Said Alexander laughing: SEE
THE SUBTILTIES OF ARISTOTLE, TO TAKE A MATTER BOTH WAYS, PRO ET CONTRA,
ETC.
16. But note again how well he could use the same art, which he
reprehended, to serve his own humour: when bearing a secret grudge to
Callisthenes, because he was against the new ceremony of his adoration,
feasting one night where the same Callisthenes was at the table, it was
moved by some after supper, for entertainment sake, that Callisthenes,
who was an eloquent man, might speak of some theme or purpose at his own
choice; which Callisthenes did; choosing the praise of the Macedonian
nation for his discourse, and performing the same with so good manner,
as the hearers were much ravished: whereupon Alexander, nothing pleased,
said, IT WAS EASY TO BE ELOQUENT UPON SO GOOD A SUBJECT. But, saith he,
TURN YOUR STYLE, AND LET US HEAR WHAT YOU CAN SAY AGAINST US: which
Callisthenes presently undertook, and did with that sting and life, that
Alexander interrupted him, and said, THE GOODNESS OF THE CAUSE MADE HIM
ELOQUENT BEFORE, AND DESPITE MADE HIM ELOQUENT THEN AGAIN.
17. Consider further, for tropes of rhetoric, that excellent use of a
metaphor or translation, wherewith he taxed Antipater, who was an
imperious and tyrannous governor: for when one of Antipater's friends
commended him to Alexander for his moderation, that he did not
degenerate, as his other lieutenants did, into the Persian pride, in use
of purple, but kept the ancient habit of Macedon, of black; TRUE, saith
Alexander, BUT ANTIPATER IS ALL PURPLE WITHIN. Or that other, when
Parmenio came to him in the plain of Arbela, and showed him the
innumerable multitude of his enemies, especially as they appeared by the
infinite number of lights, as it had been a new firmament of stars, and
thereupon advised him to assail them by night: whereupon he answered,
THAT HE WOULD NOT STEAL THE VICTORY.
18. For matter of policy, weigh that significant distinction, so much
in all ages embraced, that he made between his two friends, Hephaestion
and Craterus, when he said, THAT THE ONE LOVED ALEXANDER, AND THE OTHER
LOVED THE KING: describing the principal difference of princes' best
servants, that some in affection love their person, and others in duty
love their crown.
19 Weigh also that excellent taxation of an error, ordinary with
counsellors of princes, that they counsel their masters according to the
model of their own mind and fortune, and not of their masters', when,
upon Darius' great offers, Parmenio had said, SURELY I WOULD ACCEPT
THESE OVERS, WERE I AS ALEXANDER; saith Alexander, SO WOULD I, WERE I AS
PARMENIO.
20. Lastly, weigh that quick and acute reply, which he made when he
gave so large gifts to his friends and servants, and was asked what he
did reserve for himself, and he answered, HOPE: weigh, I say, whether he
had not cast up his account right, because HOPE must be the portion of
all that resolve upon great enterprises. For this was Caesar's portion
when he went first into Gaul, his estate being then utterly overthrown
with largesses. And this was likewise the portion of that noble prince,
howsoever transported with ambition, Henry Duke of Guise, of whom it was
usually said, that he was the greatest usurer in France, because he had
turned all his estate into obligations.
[19] 21. To conclude, therefore: as certain critics are used to say
hyperbolically, THAT IF ALL SCIENCES WERE LOST THEY MIGHT BE FOUND IN
VIRGIL! so certainly this may be said truly, there are the prints and
footsteps of learning in those few speeches which are reported of this
prince: the admiration of whom, when I consider him not as Alexander the
Great, but as Aristotle's scholar, hath carried me too far.
22. As for Julius Caesar, the excellency of his learning needeth not
to be argued from his education, or his company, or his speeches; but in
a further degree doth declare itself in his writings and works; whereof
some are extant and permanent, and some unfortunately perished. For,
first, we see there is left unto us that excellent history of his own
wars, which he entitled only a Commentary, wherein all succeeding times
have admired the solid weight of matter, and the real passages and
lively images of actions and persons, expressed in the greatest
propriety of words and perspicuity of narration that ever was; which
that it was not the effect of a natural gift, but of learning and
precept, is well witnessed by that work of his, entitled, DE ANALOGIA,
being a grammatical philosophy, wherein he did labour to make this same
VOX AD PLACITUM to become VOX AD LICITUM, and to reduce custom of speech
to congruity of speech; and took, as it were, the picture of words from
the life of reason.
23. So we receive from him, as a monument both of his power and
learning, the then reformed computation of the year; well expressing
that he took it to be as great a glory to himself to observe and know
the law of the heavens, as to give law to men upon the earth.
24. So likewise in that book of his, ANTI-CATO, it may easily appear
that he did aspire as well to victory of wit as victory of war:
undertaking therein a conflict against the greatest champion with the
pen that then lived, Cicero the Orator.
25. So again in his book of Apophthegms, which he collected, we see
that he esteemed it more honour to make himself but a pair of tables to
take the wise and pithy words of others, than to have every word of his
own to be made an apophthegm or an oracle; as vain princes, by custom of
flattery, pretend to do. And yet if I should enumerate divers of his
speeches, as I did those of Alexander, they are truly such as Solomon
noteth, when he saith, VERBA SAPIENTUM TANQUAM ACULEI, ET TANQUAM CLAVI
IN ALTUM DEFIXI: whereof I will only recite three, not so delectable for
elegancy, but admirable for vigour and efficacy.
26. As, first, it is reason he be thought a master of words, that
could with one word appease a mutiny in his army, which was thus: The
Romans, when their generals did speak to their army, did use the word
milites, but when the magistrates spake to the people, they did use the
word QUIRITES. The soldiers were in tumult, and seditiously prayed to be
cashiered; not that they so meant, but by expostulation thereof to draw
Caesar to other conditions; wherein he being resolute not to give way,
after some silence, he began his speech, EGO, QUIRITES, which did admit
them already cashiered; wherewith they were so surprised, crossed, and
confused, as they would not suffer him to go on in his speech, but
relinquished their demands, and made it their suit to be again called by
the name of MILITES.
27. The second speech was thus: Caesar did extremely affect the name
of king; and some were set on as he passed by in popular acclamation to
salute him king: whereupon, finding the cry weak and poor, he put it off
thus, in a kind of jest, as if they had mistaken his surname; NON REX
SUM, SED CAESAR; a speech that if it be searched the life and fulness of
it can scarce be expressed. For, first, it was a refusal of the name,
but yet not serious: again, it did signify an infinite confidence and
magnanimity, as if he presumed Caesar was the greater title; as by his
worthiness it is come to pass till this day: but chiefly it was a speech
of great allurement toward his own purpose; as if the state did strive
with him but for a name, whereof mean families were vested; for REX was
a surname with the Romans, as well as KING is with us.
28. The last speech which I will mention, was used to Metellus, when
Caesar after war declared did possess himself of the city of Rome; at
which time entering into the inner treasury to take the money there
accumulated, Metellus being tribune forbade him: whereto Caesar said,
THAT IF HE DID NOT DESIST, HE WOULD LAY HIM DEAD IN THE PLACE. And
presently taking himself up, he added, ADOLESCENS, DURIUS EST MIHI HOC
DICERE QUÀM FACERE. YOUNG MAN, IT IS HARDER FOR ME TO SPEAK THAN TO DO
IT. A speech compounded of the greatest terror and greatest clemency
that could proceed out of the mouth of man.
29. But to return and conclude with him; it is evident, himself knew
well his own perfection in learning, and took it upon him; as appeared
when, upon occasion that some spake what a strange resolution it was in
Lucius Sylla to resign his dictature; he scoffing at him to his own
advantage answered. THAT SYLLA COULD NOT SKILL OF LETTERS, AND THEREFORE
KNEW NOT HOW TO DICTATE.
30. And here it were fit to leave this point, touching the
concurrence of military virtue and learning; (for what example would
come with any grace after those two of Alexander and Caesar?) were it
not in regard of the rareness of circumstances that I find in one other
particular, as that which did so suddenly pass from extreme scorn to
extreme wonder; and it is of Xenophon the philosopher, who went from
Socrates' school into Asia, in the expedition of Cyrus the younger,
against King Artaxerxes. This Xenophon at that time was very young, and
never had seen the wars before; neither had any command in the army, but
only followed the war as a voluntary, for the love and conversation of
Proxenus his friend. He was present when Phalynus came in message from
the great king to the Grecians, after that Cyrus was slain in the field,
and they a handful of men left to themselves in the midst of the king's
territories, cut off from their country by many navigable rivers, and
many hundred miles. The message imported, that they should deliver up
[20] their arms, and submit themselves to the king's mercy. To which
message before answer was made, divers of the army conferred familiarly
with Phalynus, and amongst the rest Xenophon happened to say, WHY,
PHALYNUS, WE HAVE NOW BUT THESE TWO THINGS LEFT, OUR ARMS AND OUR
VIRTUE; AND IF WE YIELD UP OUR ARMS, HOW SHALL WE MAKE USE OF OUR VIRTUE
? Whereto Phalynus smiling on him, said, IF I BE NOT DECEIVED, YOUNG
GENTLEMAN, YOU ARE AN ATHENIAN: AND, I BELIEVE YOU STUDY PHILOSOPHY, AND
IT IS PRETTY THAT YOU SAY: BUT YOU ARE MUCH ABUSED, IF YOU THINK YOUR
VIRTUE CAN WITHSTAND THE KING'S POWER. Here was the scorn; the wonder
followed: which was, that this young scholar or philosopher, after all
the captains were murdered in parley by treason, conducted those ten
thousand foot through the heart of all the king's high countries from
Babylon to Graecia in safety, in despite of all the king's forces, to
the astonishment of the world, and the encouragement of the Grecians in
time succeeding to make invasion upon the kings of Persia: as was after
purposed by Jason the Thessalian, attempted by Agesilaus the Spartan,
and achieved by Alexander the Macedonian, all upon the ground of the act
of that young scholar.
VIII. 1. To proceed now from imperial and military virtue to moral
and private virtue: first, it is an assured truth, which is contained in
the verses:
Scilicet ingenuas didicisse fideliter artes,
Emollit mores, nec
sinit esse feros.
It taketh away the wildness and barbarism and fierceness of men's
minds; but indeed the accent had need be upon FIDELITER: for a little
superficial learning doth rather work a contrary effect. It taketh away
all levity, temerity, and insolency, by copious suggestion of all doubts
and difficulties, and acquainting the mind to balance reasons on both
sides, and to turn back the first offers and conceits of the mind, and
to accept of nothing but examined and tried. It taketh away vain
admiration of anything, which is the root of all weakness: for all
things are admired either because they are new, or because they are
great. For novelty, no man that wadeth in learning or contemplation
thoroughly, but will find that printed in his heart NIL NOVI SUPER
TERRAM. Neither can any man marvel at the play of puppets, that goeth
behind the curtain, and adviseth well of the motion. And for magnitude,
as Alexander the Great, after that he was used to great armies, and the
great conquests of the spacious provinces in Asia, when he received
letters out of Greece, of some fights and services there, which were
commonly for a passage or a fort, or some walled town at the most, he
said, IT SEEMED TO HIM THAT HE WAS ADVERTISED OF THE BATTLE OF THE FROGS
AND THE MICE, THAT THE OLD TALES WENT OF. So certainly, if a man
meditate much upon the universal frame of nature, the earth with men
upon it (the divineness of souls except,) will not seem much other than
an ant-hill, whereas some ants carry corn, and some carry their young,
and some go empty, and all to-and-fro a little heap of dust. It taketh
away or mitigateth fear of death, or adverse fortune; which is one of
the greatest impediments of virtue, and imperfections of manners. For if
a man's mind be deeply seasoned with the consideration of the mortality
and corruptible nature of things, he will easily concur with Epictetus,
who went forth one day and saw a woman weeping for her pitcher of earth
that was broken; and went forth the next day and saw a woman weeping for
her son that was dead, and thereupon said: HERI VIDI FRAGILEM FRANGI,
HODIE VIDI MORTALEM MORI. And therefore Virgil did excellently and
profoundly couple the knowledge of causes and the conquest of all fears,
together, as concomitantia:
Felix, qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas,
Quique metus omnes, et
inexorabile fatum
Subjecit pedibus, strepitumque Acherontis avari.
2. It were too long to go over the particular remedies which learning
doth minister to all the diseases of the mind; sometimes purging the
ill-humours, sometimes opening the obstructions, sometimes helping
digestion, sometimes increasing appetite, sometimes healing the wounds
and exulcerations thereof, and the like; and, therefore, I will conclude
with that which hath RATIONEM TOTIUS, which is, that it disposeth the
constitution of the mind not to be fixed or settled in the defects
thereof, but still to be capable and susceptible of growth and
reformation. For the unlearned man knows not what it is to descend into
himself, or to call himself to account; nor the pleasure of that
SUAVISSIMA VITA, INDIES SENTIRE SE FIERI MELIOREM. The good parts he
hath he will learn to show to the full, and use them dexterously, but
not much to increase them: the faults he hath he will learn how to hide
and colour them, but not much to amend them: like an ill mower, that
mows on still, and never whets his scythe: whereas with the learned man
it fares otherwise, that he doth ever intermix the correction and
amendment of his mind with the use and employment thereof. Nay, further,
in general and in sum, certain it is that VERITAS and BONITAS differ but
as the seal and the print: for Truth prints Goodness; and they be the
clouds of error which descend in the storms of passions and
perturbations.
3. From moral virtue let us pass on to matter of power and
commandment, and consider whether in right reason there be any
comparable with that wherewith knowledge investeth and crowneth man's
nature. We see the dignity of the commandment is according to the
dignity of the commanded: to have commandment over beasts, as herdmen
have, is a thing contemptible; to have commandment over children, as
schoolmasters have, is a matter of small honour; to have commandment
over galley-slaves is a disparagement rather than an honour. Neither is
the commandment of tyrants much better, over people which have put off
the generosity of their minds: and therefore it was ever holden that
honours in free monarchies and commonwealths had a sweetness more than
in tyrannies; because the commandment extendeth more over the wills of
men, and not only over their deeds and services. And therefore, when
Virgil putteth himself forth to attribute to Augustus Caesar the best of
human honours, he doth it in these words:
[21]--------------------------------Victorque volentes
Per populos
dat jura, viamque affectat Olympo.
But yet the commandment of knowledge is yet higher than the
commandment over the will; for it is a commandment over the reason,
belief, and understanding of man, which is the highest part of the mind,
and giveth law to the will itself. For there is no power on earth which
setteth up a throne or chair of state in the spirits and souls of men,
and in their cogitations, imaginations, opinions, and beliefs, but
knowledge and learning. And therefore we see the detestable and extreme
pleasure that arch-heretics, and false prophets, and impostors are
transported with, when they once find in themselves that they have a
superiority in the faith and conscience of men; so great as if they have
once tasted of it, it is seldom seen that any torture or persecution can
make them relinquish or abandon it. But as this is that which the author
of the Revelation calleth the depth or profoundness of Satan: so by
argument of contraries, the just and lawful sovereignty over men's
understanding, by force of truth rightly interpreted, is that which
approacheth nearest to the similitude of the Divine Rule.
4. As for fortune and advancement, the beneficence of learning is not
so confined to give fortune only to states and commonwealths, as it doth
not likewise give fortune to particular persons. For it was well noted
long ago, that Homer hath given more men their livings, than either
Sylla, or Caesar, or Augustus ever did, notwithstanding their great
largesses and donatives, and distributions of lands to so many legions.
And no doubt it is hard to say. whether arms or learning have advanced
greater numbers. And in case of sovereignty we see, that if arms or
descent have carried away the kingdom, yet learning hath carried the
priesthood, which ever hath been in some competition with empire.
5. Again, for the pleasure and delight of knowledge and learning, it
far surpasseth all other in nature: for, shall the pleasures of the
affections so exceed the senses, as much as the obtaining of desire or
victory exceedeth a song or a dinner; and must not, of consequence, the
pleasures of the intellect or understanding exceed the pleasures of the
affections? We see in all other pleasures there is satiety, and after
they be used, their verdure departeth; which showeth well they be but
deceits of pleasure, and not pleasures: and that it was the novelty
which pleased, and not the quality; and therefore we see that voluptuous
men turn friars, and ambitious princes turn melancholy. But of knowledge
there is no satiety, but satisfaction and appetite are perpetually
interchangeable; and therefore appeareth to be good in itself simply,
without fallacy or accident. Neither is that pleasure of small efficacy
and contentment to the mind of man which the poet Lucretius describeth
elegantly,
Suave mari magno, turbantibus aequora ventis, etc.
IT IS A VIEW OF DELIGHT, saith he, TO STAND OR WALK UPON THE SHORE
SIDE, AND TO SEE A SHIP TOSSED WITH TEMPEST UPON THE SEA; OR TO BE IN A
FORTIFIED TOWER, AND TO SEE TWO BATTLES JOIN UPON A PLAIN; BUT IT IS A
PLEASURE INCOMPARABLE, FOR THE MIND OF MAN TO BE SETTLED, LANDED, AND
FORTIFIED IN THE CERTAINTY OF TRUTH; AND FROM THENCE TO DESCRY AND
BEHOLD THE ERRORS, PERTURBATIONS, LABOURS, AND WANDERINGS UP AND DOWN OF
OTHER MEN.
6. Lastly, leaving the vulgar arguments, that by learning man
excelleth in in that wherein man excelleth beasts; that by learning man
ascendeth to the heavens and their motions, where in body he cannot
come, and the like; let us conclude with the dignity and excellency of
knowledge and learning in that whereunto man's nature doth most aspire,
which is, immortality or continuance: for to this tendeth generation,
and raising of houses and families; to this buildings, foundations, and
monuments; to this tendeth the desire of memory, fame, and celebration,
and in effect the strength of all other human desires. We see then how
far the monuments of wit and learning are more durable than the
monuments of power or of the hands. For have not the verses of Homer
continued twenty-five hundred years, or more, without the loss of a
syllable or letter; during which time, infinite palaces, temples,
castles, cities, have been decayed and demolished? It is not possible to
have the true pictures or statues of Cyrus, Alexander, Caesar; no, nor
of the kings or great personages of much later years; for the originals
cannot last, and the copies cannot but leese of the life and truth. But
the images of men's wits and knowledges remain in books, exempted from
the wrong of time, and capable of perpetual renovation. Neither are they
fitly to be called images, because they generate still, and cast their
seeds in the minds of others, provoking and causing infinite actions and
opinions in succeeding ages: so that, if the invention of the ship was
thought so noble, which carrieth riches and commodities from place to
place, and consociateth the most remote regions in participation of
their fruits, how much more are letters to be magnified, which, as
ships, pass through the vast seas of time, and make ages so distant to
participate of the wisdom, illuminations, and inventions, the one of the
other? Nay further, we see some of the philosophers which were least
divine, and most immersed in the senses, and denied generally the
immortality of the soul, yet came to this point, that whatsoever motions
the spirit of man could act and perform without the organs of the body,
they thought might remain after death, which were only those of the
understanding, and not of the affection: so immortal and incorruptible a
thing did knowledge seem unto them to be. But we, that know by divine
revelation that not only the understanding but the affections purified,
not only the spirit but the body changed, shall be advanced to
immortality, do disclaim in these rudiments of the senses. But it must
be remembered both in this last point, and so it may likewise be needful
in other places, that in probation of the dignity of knowledge or
learning, I did in the beginning separate divine testimony from human,
which method I have pursued, and so handled them both apart.
7. Nevertheless, I do not pretend, and I know it will [22] be
impossible for me, by any pleading of mine, to reverse the judgment,
either of Aesop's Cock, that preferred the barleycorn before the gem; or
of Midas, that being chosen judge between Apollo, president of the
Muses, and Pan, god of the flocks, judged for plenty: or of Paris, that
judged for beauty and love against wisdom and power; nor of Agrippina,
OCCIDAT MATREM, MODO IMPERET, that preferred empire with conditions
never so detestable; or of Ulysses, QUI VETULAM PRAETULIT IMMORTALITATI,
being a figure of those which prefer custom and habit before all
excellency; or of a number of the like popular judgments. For these
things continue as they have been: but so will that also continue
whereupon learning hath ever relied, and which faileth not: JUSTIFICATA
EST SAPIENTIA A FILIIS SUIS.