Among the rest no man doth lament him more than I, not only for the excellent learning that I see in him, but also because there hath passed privately betwix him and me sure tokens of much good will and friendly opinion, the one toward the other. And surely the distance betwixt London and Lisbon should not stop any kind of friendly duty that I could either show to him or do to his, if the greatest matter of all did not in certain points separate our minds.

"And yet, for my part, both towards him and divers others here at home, for like cause of excellent learning, great wisdom, and gentle humanity, which I have seen in them, and felt at their hands myself: where the matter of difference is mere concience in a quiet mind inwardly, and not contentious malice with spiteful railing openly, I can be content to follow this rule, in misliking some one thing, not to hate for anything else.' .......

"Some will judge much boldness in me thus to judge of Osorius's style; but wise men do know that mean lookers on may truly say, for a well made picture, 'This face had been more comely if that high red in the cheek were somewhat more pure sanguine than it is; and yet the stander-by cannot amend it himself by any way. ...

"Although a man groundly learned already may take much profit himself in using by epitome to draw other men's works for his own memory sake into shorter room (as Canterus hath done very well the whole Metamorphosis of Ovid, and David Chythræus a great deal better the Nine Muses of Herodotus, and Melancthon, in mine opinion, far best of all, the whole Story of Time, not only to his own use, but to other men's profit, and his great praise); yet epitome is most necessary of all in a man's own writing, as we learn of that noble poet

Virgil, who, if Donatus say true, in writing that perfect work of the Georgics, used daily, when he had written forty or fifty verses, not to cease cutting, paring, and polishing of them, till he had brought them to the number of ten or twelve.

"And this exercise is not more needfully done in a great work than wisely done in our common daily writing, either of letter or other thing else; that is to say, to peruse diligently, and see and spy wisely, what is always more than needeth. For twenty to one offend more in writing too much than too little; even as twenty to one fall into sickness rather by over much fulness than by any lack or emptiness....

"And of all other men, even those that have the inventivest heads for all purposes, and roundest tongues in all matters and places (except they learn and use this good lesson of epitome), commit commonly greater faults than dull, staying, silent men do. For quick inventors, and fair ready speakers, being boldened with their present ability to say more, and perchance better too, at the sudden for that present than any others can do, use less help of diligence and study than they ought to do, and so have in them commonly less learning and weaker judgment for all deep considerations than some duller heads and slower tongues have.

"And therefore ready speakers generally be not the best, plainest, and wisest writers, nor yet the deepest judgers in weighty affairs; because they do not tarry to weigh and judge all things as they should, but having their heads over full of matter, be like pens over full of ink, which will sooner blot than make any fair letter at all. Time was, when I had experience of two ambassadors in one place, the one of a hot head to invent,

aud of a hasty hand to write; the other cold and staid in both; but what difference of their doings was made by wise men is not unknown to some persons. The Bishop of Winchester, Stephen Gardiner, had a quick head and a ready tongue, and yet was not the best writer in England. Cicero in Brutus doth wisely note the same in Serg. Galba and Q. Hortensius, who were both hot, lusty, and plain speakers, but cold, loose, and rough writers. And Tully telleth the cause why, saying, when they spoke, their tongue was naturally carried with full tide and wind of their wit; when they wrote, their head was solitary, dull, and calm; and so their style was blunt and their writing cold.". The author then quotes a remark from Cicero, to the effect, that the fault in question is one by which men of much natural ability, but insufficiently instructed, are often found to be characterised. And therefore," he concludes, "all quick inventors and ready fair speakers must be careful that, to their goodness of nature, they add also in any wise study, labour, leisure, learning, and judgment, and then they shall indeed pass all other (as I know some do in whom all those qualities are fully planted), or else if they give over much to their wit, and over little to their labour and learning, they will soonest overreach in talk, and farthest come behind in writing, whatsover they take in hand. The method of epitome is most necessary for such kind of men."

V. Imitation Ascham defines to be "a faculty to express lively and perfectly that example which you go about to follow." "All languages," he continues, "both learned, and mother tongues, be gotten, and gotten solely, by imitation. For as ye use to hear, so ye

learn to speak; if ye hear no other, ye speak not yourself; and whom ye only hear, of them ye only learn.

"And therefore if ye would speak as the best and wisest do, ye must be conversant where the best and wisest are; but if you be born or brought up in a rude country, ye shall not choose but speak rudely. The rudest man of all knoweth this to be true.

"Yet nevertheless, the rudeness of common and mother tongues is no bar for wise speaking. For in the rudest country, and most barbarous mother language, many be found that can speak very wisely; but in the Greek and Latin tongues, the two only learned tongues, which be kept not in common talk, but in private books, we find always wisdom and eloquence, good matter and good utterance, never or seldom asunder. For all such authors, as be fullest of good matter and right judg ment in doctrine, be likewise always most proper in words, most apt in sentence, most plain and pure in uttering the same.

"And contrariwise, in those two tongues, all writers, either in religion or any sect of philosophy, whosoever be found fond in judgment of matter, be commonly found as rude in uttering their minds. For stoics, ana baptists, and friars, with epicures, libertines, and monks, being most like in learning and life, are no fonder and pernicious in their opinions, than they be rude and barbarous in their writings. They be not wise, therefore, that say, 'What care I for man's words and utterance, if his matter and reasons be good!' Such men say so, not so much of ignorance, as either of some singular pride in themselves, or some special malice of others, or some private and partial matter, either in religion or other kind of learning. For good and choice meats be no

more requisite for healthy bodies, than proper and apt words be for good matters; and also plain and sensible utterance for the best and deepest reasons: In which two points standeth perfect eloquence, one of the fairest and rarest gifts that God doth give to man.'

"Ye know not what hurt ye do to learning, that care not for words, but for matter, and so make a divorce betwixt the tongue and the heart. For mark all ages, look upon the whole course of both the Greek and Latin tongues, and ye shall surely find, that when apt and good words began to be neglected, and properties of those two tongues to be confounded, then also began ill deeds to spring; strange manners to express good orders; new and fond opinions to strive with old and true doctrine, first in philosophy, and after in religion; right judgment of all things to be perverted; and so virtue with learning is contemned, and study left off.

Of ill thoughts cometh perverse judgment; of ill deeds springeth lewd talk.' Which four misorders, as they mar man's life, so destroy they good learning withal."

Our author then instances, as illustrating "the goodness of God's providence for learning," the circumstance (which, however, is not quite the fact), that the books of the old Stoics and Epicureans (the sects "which were fondest in opinion and rudest in utterance") have all perished. But "again," he exclaims, "behold on the other side, how God's wisdom hath wrought that, of the Academics and Peripatetics, those that were wisest in judgment of matters, and purest in uttering of their minds, the first and chiefest that wrote most and best in either tongue (as Plato and Aristotle in Greek, and Tully in Latin), be so either wholly, or sufficiently left unto us, as I never knew yet scholar,