14 OF THE ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING 



years, which are so much magnified, during the minority 

 of Nero, in the hands of Seneca a pedanti : 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 prin 

 ciples of estate, than those which have ascended to 

 the papacy from an education and breeding in affairs 

 of estate 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 events of one man s 

 life. For as it happeneth sometimes that the grand 

 child, 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 indis 

 positions of the mind for policy and government, which 

 learning is pretended to insinuate ; if it be granted that 



