should but borrow other men's words, I will not trouble the reader with the repetition. True it is, that among many other benefits, for which it hath been honoured, in this one it triumpheth over all human knowledge, that it hath given us life in our understanding, since the world itself had life and beginning, even to this day: yea, it hath triumphed over time, which, besides it, nothing but eternity hath triumphed over; for it hath carried our knowledge over the vast and devouring space of so many thousands of years, and given so fair and piercing eyes to our mind, that we plainly behold living now, as if we had lived then, the great world, magni Dei sapiens opus, "the wise work," saith Hermes, "of a great God," as it was then, when but new to itself. By it, I say, it is that we live in the very time when it was created; we behold how it was governed; how it was covered with waters, and again repeopled; how kings and kingdoms have flourished and fallen; and for what virtue and piety God made prosperous, and for what vice and deformity He made wretched, both the one and the other. And it is not the least debt we owe unto history,

that it hath made us acquainted with our dead ancestors; and, out of the depth and darkness of the earth, delivered us their memory and fame. In a word, we may gather out of history a policy no less wise than eternal; by the comparison and application of other men's fore-passed miseries with our own like errors and ill deservings.

(History of the World, Oxford Edition, vol. 2, Preface v. and vi.)

66

JOHN LYLY.

[Born 1553. Published "Euphues: the Anatomy of Wit," 1579; Euphues and his England," 1580. Died, 1606.]

BOOKS BETTER THAN RICHES.-Thou art an heyre to fayre lyuing, that is nothing, if thou be disherited of learning, for better were it to thee to inherite righteousnesse then riches, and far more seemely were it for thee to have thy Studie full of bookes, then thy pursse full of mony: to get goods is the benefit of Fortune, to keepe them the gifte

of Wisedome.

As therfore thou art to possesse

them by thy fathers wil, so art thou to encrease them by thine owne wit.

(Euphues: the Anatomy of Wit, Arber's Ed.,

p. 192.)

LYLY ON HIS BOOK.-I was driven into a quandarie Gentlemen, whether I might sende this my Pamphlet to the Printer or to the pedler, I thought it too bad for the presse, and too good for the packe, but seeing my folly in writing to be as great as others, 1 was willing my fortune should be as ill as anies. We commonly see the booke that at Easter lyeth bounde on the Stacioners stall, at Christmasse to be broken in the Haberdashers shop, which sith it is the order of proceeding, I am content this Summer to have my dooinges read for a toye, that in Winter they may be readye for trash. is not strange when as the greatest wonder lasteth but nine daies, that a new worke should not endure but three months. Gentlemen vse bookes as Gentlewomen handle their flowers, who in the morning stick them in their heads, and at night strawe them at their heeles. Cherries be fulsom when they be through ripe, because they be

It

plentie, and bookes be stale when they be printed in that they be common. In my minde Printers and Tailers are chiefly bound to pray for Gentlemen, the one hath so many fantasies to print, the other such divers fashions to make, that the pressing yron of the one is never out of the fire, nor the printing presse of the other at any time lieth still. But a fashion is but a daies wearing and a booke but an houres reading: which, seeing it is so, I am of the shoomakers minde, who careth noc so the shooe hold the plushing on, nor I, so my labours last the running over. He that commeth in print because he woulde be knowen, is like the foole that commeth into the Market because he would be seene.

(Euphues, Second Ed., 1581. To the Gentlemen Readers, p. 205.)

BOOKS AND BAGS-My good sonne, thou art to receive by my death wealth, and by my counsel wisdom, and I would thou wert as willing to imprint the one in thy heart, as thou wilt be ready to beare the other in thy purse: to bee rich is the gift of Fortune, to bee wise the grace of God.

D

Haue more minde on thy bookes then my [thy] bags, more desire of godlinesse then gold, greater affection to dye well, then to liue wantonly.

(Euphues and his England, p. 228.)

RICHARD HOOKER.

[Born (about) 1553. Appointed Master of the Temple, 1585. Published Four Books of the "Lawes of Ecclesiastical Politie," 1594; the Fifth Book in 1597. Died, 1600. The remaining Three Books published, 1618.]

THE SOUL OF MAN AS A BOOK.-In the matter of knowledge, there is between the angels of God and the children of men, this difference: angels already have full and complete knowledge in the highest degree that can be imparted unto them; men, if we view them in their spring, are at the first without understanding or knowledge at all. Nevertheless from this utter vacuity they grow by degrees, till they come at length to be even as the angers themselves are. That which agreeth to the one now, the other shall attain to in the end; they