Advancement of Learning 41 



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 contrari 

 wise, it was the Christian Church, which, amidst the inunda 

 tions 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. 



(And we see before our eyes, that in the age of ourselves 

 andjourjathers. whep it pleased God to call the~ChurcrTor^ 

 ^Rome to^account for their degenerate manners and cere 

 monies, ana sundry doctrines obnoxious and framed to 

 Upjioid the same abuses : at one and the same timelFwas 

 oj^ajnfidjbyjthe Divine Providence that there should attend 

 withal arenovaHbn and new spring of all other 



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 thpy have done to the Roman see. 



Wherefore, to conclude this part, let it be observed, that 

 there be two jin^ri pa ^duties and services, besides ornament 

 and illustration, Tyhirh philosophy and t^man learning ,do__ 

 perfonp +n faith anH rplifHnn The one, because they are an 

 ptfprhj^l inducement to the exaltation of the gloryjyf_God : 

 for as the Psalms and other Scriptures do often invite~us to 

 consider and magnify the great and wonderful works of 

 God, 1 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 singularjhelj^ 

 and preservative against unbelief and error : for our Saviour 

 saith, You err, not knowing the Scriptures, nor the power of 

 God ; 2 laying before us two books or volumes to study, if 



the Palatine Library is now rejected; but as to his aversion to pro 



fane letters there can be no doubt. Milman s Latin Christianity, 

 bk. iii. c. 7. 



1 Ps. xix. civ. * Matt. xxii. 29. 



