to understand some word in Plautus or Varro which denotes some Office of a Slave to be ignorant of some formality of their publick Assemblies provided that it be remembred that the Romans well understood their business both private and publick and that they were very diligent in it and that all those great Men whom we admire in their History did not make themselves great each of them according to his genius but by this application Thus this Study of Law would not only make young Men capable of business but contribute more than any other to the rendring their Minds solid and Forming their Judgments Since it would consist only in making them know the Truth of those things which are the most fit for Men to know Now in my Opinion this Solidity and this Rectitude of judgment is that which should chiefly be sought in Studies There is but too much of the Sparkish humour in the World but there never will be enough of good sense Why should this Glittering Fiery Spirit be so much recommended to Scholars which cannot be given to those who have it not naturally and which usually doth more harm than good to those who have it Let us improve in good Sense and Judgment All who are not Born Stupid may arrive to this Rectitude of Mind provided that they be accustomed to apply themselves to it and not to Precipitate their Judgments And 't is only by this that Men succeed in Business and in the whole Conduct of their Lives The knowledge of Business also would contribute to the reclaiming young Men from vain Fooleries and to the making them serious For we become such as our Thoughts are with which we are taken up This will accustom them to be diligent to be careful to love Rule and Justice which a Man must needs love if he knows it before it comes to be his interest to oppose it Now young Persons are not as yet sensible of interest Avarice is the least of their Vices And to make them diligent and careful it would be very desireable that the Practick might be joyn'd to the Instructions That the Father should enter his Son into the Counsels appertaining to his Houshold Affairs that he would make him Discourse of whatever occurs That he would commit to his Care some of the Less difficult of them That he would put some part of his Estate into his Management whereof he should give an account Nothing would be more advantageous than for a Person of a great Estate to be thus Educated to be so capable of Business that he should have no Intendants Agents and Sollicitors but only to ease him and might not altogether rely upon them that he should himself Manage all Affairs in chief leaving to his Servants only the Execution of them in particular In a word that he should govern those under him and not as it too often happens be governed by them For is it not evident that the absolute Dependance wherein Stewards and Bayliffs hold their Masters and that carelessness which ruins so many Families proceeds from the ignorance of Persons of Quality and their ill Education I know very well that they cannot be excused from a great deal of Idleness and Love of Pleasure But it happens sometimes that they take a distaste against Pleasure and do shake off Idleness Whereas when they are past a certain Age there is no more time for Instruction At first they entertain an aversion for business because they do not understand the Terms and have no Knowledge of the Maxims They flatter themselves that good sense is sufficient for the ordering their concerns and every one thinks he is well enough provided therewith But they do not consider that Law is mixed with an abundance of Matters of Fact and Rules Established by Men which it is impossible to Divine And when they come to see the necessity of being instructed they are ashamed to confess their ignorance Lastly the long habit of applying themselves to nothing and not being confined makes them often over-look their most important Interests This is what I understand by the Names of Grammar Arithmetick Oeconomicks and skill in Law and these are the Studies which I account most necessary THey who by their Birth are designed for great Imployments have need of some Instructions more extensive than meer private Persons require Their skill in Law should comprehend the publick Right Their Morality should extend to Policy For as for Common People these Studies can only be reckoned amongst the number of Curiosities It is hard to hinder Men from talking but it is also difficult for Princes and Ministers of State to keep from Laughing when they see Citizens and Artisans Dispute about the Interests of Potentates and prescribe to them Rules for their Government But as for Children who it may be reasonably foreseen will one day come to be preferr'd to high Places it is of consequence early to instill into them Right Maxims least they should imbibe false or act only at a venture I would then have them know in the first place the State of the present Government of their Country the different parts of which this Body is Compounded the Names and Functions of the Officers which Govern it The manner of rendering Justice of Administring the Revenues of Exercising the Policy thereof and the like as also the Way of consulting about Publick Affairs I would have every one begin with the State of his own Country as being most necessary and most easie to know and that in the next place he should consider the Condition of those Foreign Countries which are nearest and to which he has most Relation By shewing him how things are really and in truth I would shew him how they ought to be not as yet according to the Opinions of the Philosophers and pure Reasoning but according to the Laws of the State it self and its ancient Customs This is that which I call Publick Right The Rules according to which each State is Governed The Rights of the Soveraign and the Officers he makes use of The Rights of States and Soveraigns in Respect of one another This Study is more positive than Reasoning and it contains much more History which may make it pleasant Policy consists more in Reasoning and should Ascend as high as to search after Principles It considers not only how France and Germany ought to be Governed according to the particular Form of their Constitution and the Laws which are there Established But it inquires in general what is Civil Society what Form of Constitution is the best what are the best Laws and the best means to preserve Quiet and Concord amongst Men. These general considerations are very useful to give unto the Mind Elevation and Extention provided that Application of them be made to particular Examples not those of Athens or Lacedaemon but of the Moderns which affect us more and instruct us better The Advice which to me seems of greatest Importance
made Discourses upon Morality and so few govern'd their practice according to its Rules that they render'd it Ridiculous For many made the profession of Philosophy only to lacquey after their little Interests as to make their Court to Princes or get Money And they who sought after Wisdom more seriously gave great offence by the multitude of their Sects for they treated one another as Fools and Mad-men The Romans seeing the Greeks in this condition for a long time despised Studies as Childish Vanities and Idle Amusements not worthy of their pains who altogether apply'd themselves unto Business Each particular Man endeavoured to increase his patrimony by Husbandry Traffick and Frugality and all of 'em together jointly concurr'd in making the State to flourish by applying themselves to War and Politicks But though they wou'd have it believed that this frugality this military Discipline this firmness in their Conduct which made them so powerful were owing to none but themselves and their own vertuous Resolutions yet their own History makes it appear that they had borrow'd much from the Greeks even at that time before there were in Greece either Oratours or Philosophers by profession The first Tarquin was a Corinthian by Birth and he had instructed Servius Tullius Pythagoras lived in the time of the latter and it is very probable that some of his Disciples had correspondence with the Romans their severe and frugal way of living so much resembling this Italick Philosophy However it is certain that they brought the Laws of the Twelve Tables out of Greece which Cicero valued more than all the Books of the Philosophers Applying themselves with great diligence to these Laws and their Domestick Affairs they form'd a Study which was particular to themselves and lasted as long as their Empire This Study is Civil Law which we do not find that any Nation had cultivated before Not but that the Greeks had diligently Studied the Laws but they did it rather as Oratours than Lawyers I am not Ignorant that they very well knew the order and disposition of them that they dived also into the Reasons of them and with good effect apply'd themselves unto business both publick and private But I do not find that they had any who made it their profession to explain them unto others and to give Counsel nor that they wrote Commentaries upon their Laws For as for the Formularies it is certain that the Greek Oratours left the care of them to an inferiour sort of Men whom they called Pragmaticks or Practitioners 'T is true there were in Greece Legislatours and Philosophers who had studied the Laws after a more noble and extensive manner since it must needs argue a greater Genius to Compile a whole body of Laws than to apply them in particular to the least Affairs And they confess'd that this Knowledge so useful to the World came to them from Aegypt and the East as did all the rest of their Learning To return to Rome To the end of the Sixteenth Age after its foundation Children were then Taught only to Read and Write and cast Account Men Studied the Laws and the Formularies either indifferently for their own particular use or more Curiously to give Counsel unto others and gain Credit and Reputation They did not begin to enter upon the Curiosities of the Greeks ordinarily to Learn their Tongue and to Read their Works till after the Second Punick War Hitherto there were to be seen some Ordinances of the Senate against Rhetoricians and Philosophers by profession as Men who introduced dangerous Novelties into the Commonwealth The Romans when they apply'd themselves to the Studies of the Greeks did it according to their own Genius that is they sought therein what was best most solid and most useful for the Conduct of Life The old Cato Scipio and Laelius were not Men who wou'd burden themselves with Trifles They Studied the Historians and Oratours to profit by their Excellent Examples and good Maxims of the ancient Greeks and to Learn how to Speak as perswasively upon the Affairs of Rome as Pericles and Demosthenes had done upon those of Athens at the same time studiously avoiding to imitate the Greeks of their times or to take up with the Trifles of the Grammarians and Rhetoricians Nay they were even afraid of this Cicero says of the greatest Oratours of his time they were fearful it shou'd be perceived that they had Studied the Books of the Greeks least it shou'd be thought that they overmuch valued them and so their Reputation of being Learned might make their Discourses to be suspected of too much artifice The Wise Romans came afterwards to Philosophy and there fix'd upon the principles and Reasons of Morality and Politicks of which they already had much Experience and many Domestick Examples Lastly they knew how to take what was best in the Poets Hence proceeded so many great Oratours in the last Age of the Republick from the Gracchi to Cicero and they also who may be called the Roman Philosophers as Atticus Cato of Vtica and Brutus But the Establishment of the Monarchy at Rome having rendred great Eloquence and the Motives to it useless since the People did no longer give their Votes in Publick Affairs nor bestow great Places Poetry got the upper hand and flourished under the Reign of Augustus 'T is true it fell soon afterwards having nothing that was solid to sustain it and being look'd upon only as a sport and diversion of the mind Thus within the space of about Two Hundred Years the Studies of the Romans came to be in the same condition wherein they had found those of the Greeks Every place was full of little Grammarians Rhetoricians and idle Declamers of prating Philosophers Historians and Poets who tired the World in reciting their Works Only the Civil Law was always preserv'd because it was always necessary and depended less upon the form of Government or the particular manners of Men. There were also some true Philosophers though we should reckon only the Emperour Marcus Aurelius and several others of whom mention is made in Pliny's Epistles But these Philosophers went rather for Greeks than Romans The greatest part of 'em also wore the Greek Habit in what Country soever they dwelt and of what Nation soever they were In the mean time a much more Sublime Philosophy began to be Established I mean the Christian Religion which soon made this purely Humane Philosophy to vanish and did yet more severely Condemn all those other Studies which were less serious The Principal Study of Christians was the meditation of the Law of God and all the Holy Scriptures according to the Tradition of the Pastours who had faithfully preserv'd the Doctrine of the Apostles They call'd all the rest Strange and Foreign Studies and rejected them as inticing the Reader to the manners of the Heathens In Truth the greatest part of their Books were either useless or
The Decretal also was taught there that is Gratian's Compilation which was look'd upon as an intire Body of the Canon Law There also Medicks were Studied And thus joyning these four principal Studies which were called Faculties together they named the Compound of them all Vniversity of Studies And at last simply Vniversity To denote that in one City alone all things were Taught which were useful to know This Establishment seemed so considerable that the Popes and Kings favoured it with great Privileges Persons came to Study at Paris from all Parts of France Italy Germany and England in a word from all Parts of Latin Europe and thus the private Schools of Cathedrals and Monasteries came to be neglected Let us see more particularly what was Taught in each Faculty UNder the Name of Arts were comprehended Grammar and Humanity the Mathematicks and Philosophy But to speak properly this Name ought only to comprehend the Seven Liberal Arts of which we find Treatises in Cassiodore and Bede viz. Grammar Rhetorick Logick Arithmetick Musick Geometry and Astronomy A Master of Arts should be one capable to teach all these For Grammar they read Priscian Donatus or some other of the ancients who had Writ upon th◠Latin Tongue rather to acquaint the Roman of their Times to whom it was natural with its utmost Niceties than to teach its Elements to Strangers In the Thirteenth Age Latin was no longer in Common use amongst the People in any place of the World and in France the ordinary Tongue was that which we see in Ville-hardoüin in Joinville and other Romancers of the same time It seems to me that they ought to have apply'd the Art of Grammar to this Language chusing the most proper Words and the most natural Phrases fixing the inflexions and giving Rules for Construction and Orthography The Italians did so and about the end of the same Age there were some Florentines who Studied to Write well in their Vulgar Tongue as Brunetto Latini John Villani and the Poet Dante As for our Language it was not purified but by Time and they did not set upon it by publick order in the French Academy till Four Hundred Years after the Institution of Vniversities 'T is true that Latin was still necessary for the reading of good Books and the Exercise of Religion and they who Studied at that time were all Church-men Latin also was necessary for business and for publick Acts and so it was for Travel so that Interpreters were called Latinizers It was therefore impossible to be without Latin but it was also impossible to Establish the ancient purity of it by reason of scarcity of Books and upon other accounts which I have observed They were forc'd to be contented with speaking and Writing it meanly They made no scruple of mixing therewith many Barbarous Words and to follow the Phrase of the Vulgar Tongues they were satisfied with barely observing the Cases Numbers Genders Conjugations and Principal Rules of Syntax To this they wholly reduc'd the Study of Grammar looking upon all the rest as an unprofitable Curiosity seeing Men speak only to be understood and a more Elegant sort of Latin would have been more hardly understood And thus that Barbarous Latin came to be formed which has so long been used in the Palace which is with difficulty corrected in the Schools and which is spoken yet in Germany and Poland for the convenience of Travel Thence comes the necessity of Glosses and Commentaries for the Explication of the ancient Books Written in a pure Style Poetry consisted only in knowing the measure of Latin Verse and the quantity of Syllables for they went not so far as to distinguish the Characters of Composures and the difference of Styles This appears by the Poems of Gunther and William of Breton which are only meer Histories of a flat Style and as bad Latin as that wherein they wrote in Prose To the restraint of quantity and cuttings off they added that of Rhimes which made their Leonine Verses and often neglecting even quantity they only made simple Rhimes in Latin as in French and this was that which they called the Church Hymns this was all the Poetry of Men which were serious As for the Vulgar Poetry which began to be in request about the Twelfth Age as may appear by so many Romances and Ballads it soon became the peculiar Talent of Debauchees and Libertines Such generally were the Country Trombadours and other Poets of this time who followed the Courts of Princes In the mean time it must be confess'd that several of them were Men of Wit and considering the time of Politeness also yet their Works were full of fulsom Love and Extravagant Fictions From this time they continued more and more to separate the pleasure of Discourse from reasoning and solid Studies and this is that which made Rhetorick neglected in the Schools for there they were not solicitous either to please or to move the Passions They chiefly apply'd themselves to Philosophy and they believed that it needed no Ornament of Language or any Figure of Discourse Thus endeavouring to render it Solid and Methodical they made it very dry and ungrateful not considering that a Natural and Figured Discourse spares a great many Words and helps the Memory by the lively Images it imprints upon the Mind In the mean time there being no Study without Curiosity and Emulation Our Learned Men did as the Arabians had done either through imitation or by the same principle and stuff'd their Philosophy with an infinite number of Questions more subtle than solid falling short extreamly of the Idea of the ancient Graecians The Logick of Socrates which we see in Plato and Xenophon was an Art of seriously seeking after Truth and he call'd it the Dialectick Art because this search cannot be well made but by Conversation betwixt two Persons both careful to reason well This Art then consisted in answering rightly to every Question in making exact Divisions in well defining Words and Things and attentively weighing every Consequence before 't was granted without being in an Heat without fearing to be overcome and to confess their Errours and without desiring through Prejudice or any By-respects that one proposition should be true rather than another So that in this Logick Morality enter'd and Eloquence found a Place For since Men are usually Passionate or prevented with some Errour their Passions must first be calm'd and their Prejudices removed before Truth be proposed which without this preparation would only offend them Now this Method requires marvellous Discretion and Address for Men to accommodate themselves to the infinite variety of Minds and their Distempers And this is that which we admire in Plato 'T is upon this Foundation that Aristotle Parallels Logick with Rhetorick and says that both the one and the other has the same Design which is to perswade by Discourse Logick uses more solid and convincing Reasons because in particular Conversation we better know
of Men giving all the rest of Nature even the Organs of Human Bodies to their direction They believed that there was a sort of Natural Magick and every thing of which they knew not the Cause they ascribed to that which was Supernatural that is the Power of Wicked Spirits For being assured by Religion that there are such Spirits and that God permits them sometimes to Deceive Men nothing did more handsomly conceal their Ignorance than to attribute to them all that of which they could give no Account Thus the Fictions of the Poets of this time were not by much so absurd as they appear to us It was probable even in the Opinion of their Learned Men that there had been and that there were still in divers parts of the World Diviners and Enchanters and that Nature Produced Flying Dragons and divers kinds of Monsters This Belief of Fables in Natural History introduced a great many Superstitious Practices especially in Medicks where People always love to do something that is Useless rather than omit any thing that may be of Advantage To Study Natural Philosophy under which was comprehended Medicks was onely to Read Books and Dispute as if there had been no Animals to Dissect no Plants or Minerals whose Effects were to be Try'd as if Men had not had the Use of their Senses to have satisfy'd themselves of the Truth of that which others had said In a word as if no such thing as Nature had been in the World to have been Consulted in her Self Much after this manner were Arts and especially Medicks treated in the Universities THe same Method was pursued in Law Since the ignorance of Latin and History hinder'd them from Understanding the Texts they betook themselves to the Summaries and Glosses of those who were presumed best to Understand them and who themselves having not the help of other Books did onely Explain one place of the Digest or the Decretal by another comparing them as exactly as they could The Faults of these Masters easily deceived their Disciples and some so far abused their Credulity as to mix with their Glosses Ridiculous Etymologies and Absurd Fables Whether it was that they did not Apprehend that they could not Practise the Laws if they did not understand them or that they despaired to understand them better However it was their greatest Endeavour was to Reduce them to Practise to handle Questions upon the Consequences which they had drawn from the Texts to give Counsel and Decide Cases But when they undertook to apply this Roman Law to our Affairs which was so ill understood by us and so different from our Manners and yet at the same time preserve our Customs which it was impossible to Change The Rules of Justice became much more uncertain All Civil Law was reduc'd to School-Disputes and the Opinions of Doctors who having not sufficiently penetrated into the Principles of Morality and Natural Equity sought sometimes their particular Interests They also who sought after Justice knew no other Means of procuring it but particular Remedies against Injustice which made them invent so many New Clauses for Contracts and so many Formalities for Judgments They as the Physicians did labour'd onely to heal Present Evils without taking care to stop the Fountains of them and prevent 'em for the future or rather they could not do it For to take away the General Causes of Vexatious Process and Injustice it is requisite that the Soveraign Power be Concern'd that there be some certain and stable Laws known to all the World and Publick Officers fully Authorized A great many Means of Inriching as well as Ruining themselves must be taken away from particular Persons and as far as possible they must be reduc'd to the most Simple and Natural Way of Living as we see in that Law which God himself gave to his People and which whilst they observ'd it made them so happy But then Europe was so divided and Princes so weak both in Power and Intellectuals that it never came into their heads to make such Laws DIvinity was more purely Studied And indeed we find in all Times a Sensible Protection of God over his Church always to preserve therein the Sound Doctrin But though the Doctrin was the same as in the foregoing Ages the manner of Teaching was different The Fathers of the Church being for the most part Bishops very much imploy'd scarce Writ any thing but when they were necessitated for the Defence of Religion against Hereticks and Pagans and they Treated onely of such Questions as were really proposed A good part of their Works are Sermons which they made to the People in Explaining the Holy Scripture But the Doctors of the Vniversities being wholly taken up in Studying and Teaching did separate even all the parts of Ecclesiastical Studies one from another Some confin'd themselves to the Explication of Scripture which they called Positive Theology Others to the Mysteries and Speculative Truths which is called by the general Name of Scholastick Others to Morality and the Decision of Cases of Conscience Thus their end in the Schools being to Teach they made it their Business to Treat of as many Questions as they could and to place them Methodically They thought that to Exercise their Disciples and prepare them for Serious Disputes against the Enemies of the Faith they ought to examine all the Subtilties which Human Reason could furnish them with upon these Subjects and Obviate all the Objections of Curious and Restless Spirits They had Leisure for it and they were provided with Means of doing it out of Aristotle's Logick and Metaphysicks together with the Commentaries of the Arabians Thus they did much the same thing which is done in Fencing-Schools and the Academies where to give Activity and Spirit unto Young Men they Teach them many things which are very rarely made use of in Real Encounters In Explaining the Master of the Sentences whose Book was lookt upon as the Body of Scholastick Divinity they form'd every day New Questions upon those which he had Propounded and afterwards they did the same upon St. Thomas's Sums But now it must be confess'd that this Forming and Resolving of Questions and in general This meer Reasoning did for a long time Lessen Mens Application to Positive Studies which consist in Reading and Criticism as the knowing the Literal Sense of Scripture the Sentiments of the Fathers and Matters of Fact in Ecclesiastical History 'T is true these Studies were very difficult through the great scarcity of Books and the little Knowledge of Ancient Languages A Bible with the ordinary Gloss Compleat was not to be found but in Great Libraries A private person was rich when he had Gratian's Decretal and the greatest part knew not the Fathers but by this Collection THis was very much the State of Studies in France and in Europe when Men began to apply themselves to Humanity I mean chiefly to Grammar and History This Restoration may be