THE FIRST BOOK 47 



evidence concerning the true dignity and value of 

 learning. 



VII. 1. As for human proofs, it is so large a field, 

 as in a discourse of this nature and brevity it is fit 

 rather to use choice of those things which we shall 

 produce, than to embrace the variety of them. First 

 therefore, in the degrees of human honour amongst the 

 heathen, it was the highest to obtain to a veneration 

 and adoration as a God. This unto the Christians is 

 as the forbidden fruit. But we speak now separately 

 of human testimony : according to which, that which 

 the Grecians call apotheosis, and the Latins relatio 

 inter divos, was the supreme honour which man could 

 attribute unto man : specially when it was given, not 

 by a formal decree or act of state, as it was used among 

 the Roman Emperors, but by an inward assent and 

 belief. Which honour, being so high, had also a degree 

 or middle term : for there were reckoned above human 

 honours, honours heroical and divine : in the attribu 

 tion and distribution of which honours we see antiquity 

 made this difference : that whereas founders and 

 uniters of states and cities, lawgivers, extirpers of 

 tyrants, fathers of the people, and other eminent 

 persons in civil merit, were honoured but with the 

 titles of worthies or demi-gods ; such as were Hercules, 

 Theseus, Minos, Romulus, and the like : on the other 

 side, such as were inventors and authors of new arts, 

 endowments, and commodities towards man s life, 

 were ever consecrated amongst the gods themselves ; 

 as was Ceres, Bacchus, Mercurius, Apollo, and others ; 

 and justly ; for the merit of the former is confined 

 within the circle of an age or a nation ; and is like 

 fruitful showers, which though they be profitable and 

 good, yet serve but for that season, and for a latitude 

 of ground where they fall ; but the other is indeed like 

 the benefits of heaven, which are permanent and 

 universal. The former again is mixed with strife and 

 perturbation ; but the latter hath the true character 

 of Divine Presence, coming in aura leni, without noise 

 or agitation. 



