of all sorts, though never so mean and mechanical; every man strains his
fortune to keep his children at school; the cobbler will clout it till
midnight, the porter will carry burdens till his bones crack again, the
ploughman will pinch both back and belly to give his son _learning_, and I
find that this ambition reigns no where so much as in this island. But,
under favour, this word, _learning_, is taken in a narrower sense among us
than among other nations: we seem to restrain it only to the _book_,
whereas, indeed, any artisan whatsoever (if he knew the secret and mystery
of his trade) may be called a learned man: a good mason; a good shoemaker,
that can manage St. Crispin's lance handsomely; a skilful yeoman; a good
ship-wright, &c. may be all called learned men, and indeed the usefullest
sort of learned men.

"The extravagant humour of our country is not to be altogether
commended--that all men should aspire to book-learning; there is not a
simpler animal, and a more superfluous member of a state than a mere
scholar, a self-pleasing student. Archimedes, though an excellent
engineer, when Syracuse was lost, was found in his study, intoxicated with
speculations; and another great, learned philosopher, like a fool or
frantic, when being in a bath, he leaped out naked among the people, and
cried, 'I have found it, I have found it,' having hit then upon an
extraordinary conclusion in geometry. There is a famous tale of Thomas
Aquinas, the angelical doctor, and of Bonadventure, the seraphical doctor,
of whom Alexander Hales, our countryman, reports, that these great clerks
were invited to dinner by the French King, on purpose to observe their
humours, and being brought to the room where the table was laid, the first
fell to eating of bread as hard as he could drive, at last, breaking out
of a brown study, he cried out '_Conclusum est contra Manichaeos;_' the
other fell a gazing upon the Queen, and the King asking him how he liked
her, he answered, 'Oh, sir, if an earthly Queen be so beautiful, what