54 ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING 



he replied, &quot;It was not his fault if Dionysius 1 ears were 

 in his feet,&quot; 48 Nor was it accounted weakness, but dis 

 cretion, in him 49 that would not dispute his best with the 

 Emperor Adrian, excusing himself, &quot;That it was reasonable 

 to yield to one that commanded thirty legions. &quot; 50 These 

 and the like condescensions to points of necessity and con 

 venience, cannot be disallowed; for though they may have 

 some show of external meanness, yet in a judgment truly 

 made, they are submissions to the occasion, and not to the 

 person. 



We proceed to the errors and vanities intermixed with 

 the studies of learned men, wherein the design is not to 

 countenance such errors, but, by a censure and separation 

 thereof to justify what is sound and good; for it is the 

 manner of men, especially the evil-minded, to depreciate 

 what is excellent and virtuous, by taking advantage over 

 what is corrupt and degenerate. We reckon three principal 

 vanities for which learning has been traduced. Those things 

 are vain which are either false or -frivolous, or deficient in 

 truth or use; and those persons are vain who are either 

 credulous of falsities or curious in things of little use. But 

 curiosity consists either in matter or words, that is, either 

 in taking pains about vain things, or too much labor about 

 the delicacy of language. There are, therefore, in reason 

 as well as experience, three distempers of learning; viz., 

 vain affectations, vain disputes, and vain imaginations, or 

 effeminate learning, contentious learning, and fantastical 

 learning. 



The first disease, which consists in a luxuriance of style, 

 has been anciently esteemed at different times, but strangely 

 prevailed about the time of Luther, who, finding how great 

 a task he had undertaken against the degenerate traditions 

 of the Church, and being unassisted by the opinions of his 

 own age, was forced to awake antiquity to make a party 

 for him; whence the ancient authors both in divinity and 



48 Laert. Life Arist. 49 Demonax. 



60 Spartianua, Vit. Adrian!, 15. 



