who sinks under his load, makes a discovery of his best, and the weakness
of his shoulders. This is the reason that we see so many silly souls
amongst the learned, and more than those of the better sort: they would
have made good husbandmen, good merchants, and good artisans: their
natural vigour was cut out to that proportion. Knowledge is a thing of
great weight, they faint under it: their understanding has neither vigour
nor dexterity enough to set forth and distribute, to employ or make use
of this rich and powerful matter; it has no prevailing virtue but in a
strong nature; and such natures are very rare--and the weak ones, says
Socrates, corrupt the dignity of philosophy in the handling, it appears
useless and vicious, when lodged in an ill-contrived mind. They spoil
and make fools of themselves:

"Humani qualis simulator simius oris,
Quern puer arridens pretioso stamine serum
Velavit, nudasque nates ac terga reliquit,
Ludibrium mensis."

["Just like an ape, simulator of the human face, whom a wanton boy
has dizened up in rich silks above, but left the lower parts bare,
for a laughing-stock for the tables."
--Claudian, in Eutrop., i 303.]

Neither is it enough for those who govern and command us, and have all
the world in their hands, to have a common understanding, and to be able
to do the same that we can; they are very much below us, if they be not
infinitely above us: as they promise more, so they are to perform more.

And yet silence is to them, not only a countenance of respect and
gravity, but very often of good advantage too: for Megabyzus, going 'to