86 ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING 



in many of her undertakings. But to your Majesty, whom 

 God has blessed with so much royal issue, worthy to im 

 mortalize your name, it particularly appertains to extend 

 your cares beyond the present age, which is already illu 

 minated with your wisdom, and extend your thoughts to 

 those works which will interest remotest posterity. Of such 

 designs, if affection do not deceive me, there is none more 

 worthy and noble than the endowment of the world with 

 sound and fruitful knowledge. For why should a few 

 favorite authors stand up like Hercules Columns, to bar 

 further sailing and discovery, especially since we have so 

 bright and benign a star in your Majesty to guide and 

 conduct us? 



It remains, therefore, that we consider the labors which 

 princes and others have undertaken for the advancement 

 of learning, and this markedly and pointedly, without di 

 gression or amplification. Let it then be granted, that to 

 the completion of any work munificent patronage is as 

 essential as soundness of direction and conjunction of 

 labors. The first multiplies energy, the second prevents 

 error, and the third compensates for human weakness. But 

 the principal of these is direction, or the pointing out and 

 the delineation of the direct way to the completion of the 

 object in view. For &quot;claudus in via antevertit cursorem 

 extra viam&quot;; and Solomon appositely says, &quot;If the iron 

 is not pointed, greater strength is to be used&quot; * so what 

 really prevaileth over everything is wisdom, by which he 

 insinuates that a wise selection of means leads us more 

 directly to our object than a straining or accumulation of 

 strength. Without wishing to derogate from the merit of 

 those who in any way have advanced learning, this much 

 I have been led to say, from perceiving that their works 

 and acts have tended rather to the glory of their name than 

 the progression or proficiency of the sciences to augment 

 the man of learning in the minds of philosophers, rather 

 than reform or elevate the sciences themselves. 



