ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING 67 



purpose to enter into fulsome laudations of learning, or to 

 make a hymn to the Muses, though we are of opinion that 

 it is long since their rites were celebrated; but our intent is 

 to balance the dignity of knowledge in the scale with other 

 things, and to estimate their true values according to uni 

 versal testimony. 



Next, therefore, let us seek the dignity of knowledge in its 

 original; that is, in the attributes and acts of God, so far as 

 they are revealed to man, and may be observed with sobriety. 

 But here we are not to seek it by the name of learning; for 

 all learning is knowledge acquired, but all knowledge in God 

 is original: we must, therefore, look for it under the name 

 of wisdom or sapience, as the Scriptures call it. 



In the work of creation we see a double emanation of 

 virtue from God; the one relating more properly to power, 

 the other to wisdom; the one expressed in making the 

 matter, and the other in disposing the form. This being 

 supposed, we may observe that, for anything mentioned 

 in the history of the creation, the confused mass of the 

 heavens and earth was made in a moment; whereas the 

 order and disposition of it was the work of six days: such 

 a mark of difference seems put between the works of power 

 and the works of wisdom; whence, it is not written that 

 God said, &quot;Let there be heaven and earth,&quot; as it is of the 

 subsequent works; but actually, that &quot;God made heaven 

 and earth&quot;; the one carrying the style of a manufacture, 

 the other that of a law, decree, or counsel. 



To proceed from God to spirits. We find, as far as 

 credit may be given to the celestial hierarchy of the sup 

 posed Dionysius the Areopagite, the first place is given to 

 the angels of love, termed Seraphim; the second, to the 

 angels of light, called Cherubim ; and the third and follow 

 ing places to thrones, principalities, and the rest, which are 

 all angels of power and ministry; so that the angels of 

 knowledge and illumination are placed before the angels 

 of office and domination. 73 



18 See Dionys. Hierarch. 7, 8, 9. 



