with whom he kept up the most tender friendship till his death, in
return for the care he had taken of his education. Before he was twelve,
he was sent to the famous university of Leyden to perfect himself: and
continued there three years with the learned Francis Junius, who was so
kind to superintend his behaviour. Joseph Scaliger, the ornament of the
university of Leyden, who enjoyed the most brilliant reputation among
the learned, and whom his worshippers regarded as the Dictator of the
republic of Letters, was so struck with the prodigious capacity of young
Grotius, that he condescended to direct his studies. In 1597 he
maintained public theses in Mathematics, Philosophy, and Law with the
highest applause. Hence we may judge with what ardour he applied to
study. He tells us himself that he spent a part of the night in it.[21]
The device which he adopted[22] shews that he had reflected on the
swiftness of time, and the necessity of employing it well.

The reputation of this learned youth spread every-where; and learned men
spoke of him in their works as a prodigy. So early as the year 1597
Isaac Pontanus calls him a young man of the greatest hopes; Meursius, in
1599, declared he had never seen his equal. James Gilot, in a letter
written from Paris to Meursius in 1601, affirmed the capacity of young
Grotius bordered on prodigy; the famous Poet Barlæus said the childhood
of Grotius astonished all the old men. Daniel Heinsius maintained that
Grotius was a man from the instant of his birth, and never had
discovered any signs of childhood. He was scarce eleven when John Dowza
bestowed the highest encomiums on him in some verses that might deserve
to be copied entire: he can scarce believe that the great Erasmus
promised so much as the young Grotius: and foretels that he will soon
excel all his cotemporaries, and be fit to be compared with the most
esteemed of the Antients.