104 ARTHUR E. SHIPLEY 



it is not easy to do so — was, for some years, a 

 schoolmaster. He took a view of his profes- 

 sion which even now would be thought liberal; 

 he advocated the teaching of medicine, agri- 

 culture and fortification, and, when studying 

 the last of these, remarked that it would be 

 "seasonable to learn the use of the Globes and 

 all the maps." Like Lord Herbert of Cher- 

 bury, he held that the student should acquire 

 some knowledge of medicine, he should know 

 "the tempers, the humors, the seasons and 

 how to manage a crudity." Himself, a suf- 

 ferer from gout, he learnt, at any rate, the 

 lesson of moderation. Mathematics, in his 

 curriculum, led to the "instrumental science of 

 Trigonometry and from thence to Fortifica- 

 tion, Architecture, Enginery or Navigation." 



At the time of the writing of Paradise 

 Lost, the learned had accepted the theory of 

 Copernicus, although the mathematical proof 

 afforded a few years later by Newton was still 

 lacking. But the world at large still accepted 

 the Ptolemaic system, a system which,^ as a 

 schoolmaster, Milton taught. Mark Pattison 

 has pointed out that these two 



