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 pedenti; so it was again, for
ten years’ space or more, during the minority
of Gordianus the younger, with great applause and
contentation in the hands of Misitheus, a 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, as
by name, into the government of Pius Quintus and Sextus
Quintus in our times, who were both at their entrance
esteemed but as pedantical friars, and he shall find
that such Popes do greater things, and proceed upon
truer principles of state, than those which have ascended
to the papacy from an education and breeding in affairs
of state and courts of princes; for although men bred
in learning are perhaps to seek in points of convenience
and accommodating for the present, which the Italians
call ragioni di stato, whereof the same Pius Quintus
could not hear spoken with patience, terming them
inventions against religion and the moral virtues;
yet on the other side, to recompense that, they are
perfect in those same plain grounds of religion, justice,
honour, and moral virtue, which if they be well and
watchfully pursued, there will be seldom use of those
other, no more than of physic in a sound or well-dieted
body. Neither can the experience of one man’s
life furnish examples and precedents for the event
of one man’s life. For as it happeneth
sometimes that the grandchild, or other descendant,
resembleth the ancestor more than the son; so many
times occurrences of present times may sort better
with ancient examples than with those of the later
or immediate times; and lastly, the wit of one man
can no more countervail learning than one man’s
means can hold way with a common purse.
(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