64 ABVANCEMliiNT OP LEARKIKO. [bOOK I. 



For however common it has been with politicians to dis- 

 credit learned menj by the name of pedants, yet it appears 

 from history, that the governments of princes in minority 

 have excelled the governments of princes in maturity, merely 

 because the management was in learned hands. The state 

 of E,om.e for the first five years, so much magnified, during 

 the minority of Nero, was in the hands of Seneca, a pedant : 

 so it was for ten years, during the minority of Gordianus the 

 younger, with great applause in the hands of Misitheus, a 

 pedant ; and. it was as happy before that, in the minority of 

 Alexander Severus, under the rule of women, assisted by 

 preceptors. And to look into the government of the bishops 

 of Rome, particularly that of Pius and Sextus Quintus, who 

 were both at their entrance esteemed but pedantical friars, 

 we shall find that such popes did greater things, and pro- 

 ceeded upon truer principles of state, than those who rose to 

 the papacy from an education in civil afiairs, and the courts 

 of princes. For though men bred to learning are perhaps at 

 a loss in points of convenience, and present accommodations, 

 called-'' reasons of state, yet they are perfect in the plain 

 grounds of rehgion, justice, honour, and moral virtue, which, 

 if well pursued, there will be as little use of reasons of state, 

 as of physic in a healthy constitution. Nor can the ex- 

 l^erience of one man's life furnish examples and precedents 

 for another's : present occurrences frequently correspond to 

 ancient examples, better than to later. And lastly, the 

 genius of any single man can no more equal learning, than a 

 privaote purse hold way with the exchequer. 



3. As to the particular indispositions of the mind for 

 politics and government, laid to the charge of learning, if 

 they are allowed of any force, it must be remembered, that 

 learning afibrds more remedies than it breeds diseases ; for 

 if, by a secret operation, it^ renders men perplexed and 

 irresolute, on the other hand, by plain precept, it teaches 

 when, and upon what grounds, to resolve, and how to carry 

 things in suspense, without prejudice : if it makes men 

 ])ositive and stiff", it shows what things are in their nature 

 demonstrative, what conjectural ; and teaches the use ot 

 distinctions and exceptions, as well as the rigidness of prin- 



« By tlic Italians "Ragioni di stato,** 



