great applause and contentation in the hands of Misitheus, a
pedanti: so was it before that, in the minority of Alexander
Severus, in like happiness, in hands not much unlike, by reason of
the rule of the women, who were aided by the teachers and
preceptors. Nay, let a man look into the government of the Bishops
of Rome, as by name, into the government of Pius Quintus and Sextus
Quintus in our times, who were both at their entrance esteemed but
as pedantical friars, and he shall find that such Popes do greater
things, and proceed upon truer principles of state, than those which
have ascended to the papacy from an education and breeding in
affairs of state and courts of princes; for although men bred in
learning are perhaps to seek in points of convenience and
accommodating for the present, which the Italians call ragioni di
stato, whereof the same Pius Quintus could not hear spoken with
patience, terming them inventions against religion and the moral
virtues; yet on the other side, to recompense that, they are perfect
in those same plain grounds of religion, justice, honour, and moral
virtue, which if they be well and watchfully pursued, there will be
seldom use of those other, no more than of physic in a sound or
well-dieted body. Neither can the experience of one man's life
furnish examples and precedents for the event of one man's life.
For as it happeneth sometimes that the grandchild, or other
descendant, resembleth the ancestor more than the son; so many times
occurrences of present times may sort better with ancient examples
than with those of the later or immediate times; and lastly, the wit
of one man can no more countervail learning than one man's means can
hold way with a common purse.

(4) And as for those particular seducements or indispositions of the
mind for policy and government, which learning is pretended to