ma] ‘THE FIRST BOOK. 19 
fortune or condition of learned men, are either in respect 
of scarcity of means, or in respect of ae aac 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, Zhat the kingdom of the clergy had 
been long before at an end, tf the reputation and reverence 
towards the poverty of friars had not borne out the scandal 
of the superfiuities 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 advan- 
tages, it is worthy the observation what a reverent and 
honoured thing poverty of fortune was for some ages in 
the Roman state, which nevertheless was a state without 
paradoxes. For we see what Titus Livius saith in his 
introduction: Cwlerum aut me amor negotit suscepti fallit, 
aut nulla unquam respublica nec major, nec sanctior, nec 
bonis exemplis ditior futt; nec in quam fam sere avaritia 
luxurtaque immigraverint ; nec ubt tantus ac tam diu pau- 
pertatt ac parsimonie 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 Cesar after his victory where to begin his restora- 
tion of the state, maketh it of all points the most sum- 
mary to take away the estimation of wealth: Verum hec 
el omnia mala pariter cum honore pecunie desinent; sit neque 
magistratus, neque alia vulgo cupienda, venalia erunt. To 
C2 
