suppose it vile for me to write: and though to have written it in another tongue had been both more profitable for my study and also more honest for my name, yet I can think my labour well bestowed, if with a little hindrance of my profit and name may come any furtherance to the pleasure or commodity of the gentlemen and yeomen of England, for whose sake I took this matter in hand. And as for the Latin or Greek tongue, every thing is so excellently done in them, that none can do better: in the English tongue, contrary, every thing in a manner so meanly, both for the matter and handling, that no man can do worse. For therein the least learned, for the most part, have been always most ready to write. And they which had least hope in Latin have been most bold in English: when surely every man that is most ready to talk is not most able to write. He that will write well in any tongue, must follow this counsel of Aristotle, to speak as the common people do, to think as wise men do: as so should every man understand him, and the judgment of wise men allow him. Many English writers have not done so, but using strange words, as Latin, French, and Italian, do make all things dark and hard. Once I communed with a man which reasoned the English tongue to be enriched and encreased thereby, saying, Who will not praise that feast where a man shall drink at a dinner both wine,

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ale, and beer? Truly (quoth I) they be all good, every one taken by himself alone, but if you put malvesye1 and sack, red wine and white, ale and beer, and all in one pot, you shall make a drink not easy to be known, nor yet wholesome for the body. Cicero in following Isocrates, Plato, and Demosthenes, encreased the Latin tongue after another sort. This way, because divers men that write, do not know they can neither follow it, because of their ignorance, nor yet will praise it for over arrogancy; two faults, seldom the one out of the other's company. English writers, by diversity of time, have taken divers matters in hand. In our fathers' time nothing was read but books of feigned chivalry, wherein a man by reading should be led to none other end, but only to manslaughter and baudry. If any man suppose they were good enough to pass the time with all, he is deceived. For surely vain words do work no small thing in vain, ignorant, and young minds, especially if they be given any thing thereunto of their own nature. These books (as I have heard say) were made the most part in abbeys and monasteries, a very likely and fit fruit of such an idle and blind kind of living. In our time now, when every man is given to know, much rather than to live well, very many do write, but after such a fashion as very many do shoot. Some shooters take in hand stronger 1 malmsey.

bows than they are able to maintain. This thing maketh them some time to overshoot the mark, some time, to shoot far wide, and perchance hurt some that look on. Other, that never learned to shoot, nor yet knoweth good shaft nor bow, will be as busy as the best.

The Schoolmaster,

"Or plain and perfect way of teaching children to understand, write, and speak the Latin tongue; but specially purposed for the private bringing up of youth in gentlemen and noblemen's houses; and commodious also for all such as have forgot the Latin tongue, and would by themselves without a schoolmaster, in short time, and with small pains, recover a sufficient hability to understand, write, and speak Latin."

The occasion of his writing the Schoolmaster, was the following. Being in company with some people of consequence about the court, a dispute of considerable warmth arose respecting the best manner of educating youth; and this accidental occurrence, aided by a particular request from sir Richard Sackville, who was one of the company, gave birth to

this celebrated work. It was first printed in 1573; but it is best known to the public by the edition of Mr. Upton, in 1711, and illustrated with notes. Of the Schoolmaster, Johnson observes, that it " is conceived with great vigour, and finished with great accuracy; and perhaps contains the best advice that was ever given for the study of languages." We may also add, that it is justly esteemed for its judicious characters of ancient authors, for the many just observations it contains, and the various agreeable and valuable passages of English history interspersed throughout.

Ascham very wisely recommends an intermixture of elegant accomplishments and manly exercises with the pursuits of knowledge. After speaking of learning and of the advantages of a good education from various topics, he proceeds:

And I do not mean, by all this my talk, that young gentlemen should always be poring on a book, and by using good studies, should leese' honest pleasure, and haunt no good pastime; I mean nothing less for it is well known, that I both like and love,

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and have always, and do yet still use all exercises and pastimes, that be fit for my nature and hability. And beside natural disposition in judgment, also I was never, either stoic in doctrine, or anabaptist in religion, to mislike a merry, pleasant, and playful nature; if no outrage be committed against law, measure, and good order.

Therefore I would wish, that beside some good time, fitly appointed, and constantly kept, to encrease by reading the knowledge of the tongues, and learning, young gentlemen should use, and delight in all courtly exercises, and gentlemanlike pastimes. And good cause why: for the self same noble city of Athens, justly commended of me before, did wisely, and upon great consideration, appoint the muses, Apollo, and Pallas, to be patrons of learning to their youth. For the muses, besides learning, were also ladies of dancing, mirth, and minstrelsy: Apollo was god of shooting, and author of cunning playing upon instruments; Pallas also was lady mistress in wars. Whereby was nothing else meant, but that learning should be always mingled with honest mirth, and comely exercises; and that war also should be governed by learning and moderated by wisdom; as did well appear in those captains of Athens named by me before, and also in Scipio and Cæsar, the two diamonds of Rome. And Pallas was no more feared in wearing Egida, than she was praised for choosing