more excellent or more useful has been given by the Creator to mankind, if we except only the knowledge and true worship of Himself, than these studies, which not only lead to the ornament and guidance of human life, but are applicable and useful to every particular situation; in adversity consolatory, in prosperity pleasing and honourable; insomuch, that without them we should be deprived of all the grace of life and all the polish of social intercourse." He goes on to say that "the security and extension of these studies" seem to depend chiefly on two things,—"the number of men of learning, and the ample supply of excellent authors." As to the first, it has always been his earnest desire to encourage men of letters; and as to the acquisition of books, he rejoices when an opportunity is afforded him of thus "promoting the advantage of mankind." It would be a mistake to discount such language as conventional. Whatever else in the literary fashions of that time may have been hollow, this feeling, at least, as to the value of the classics, was thoroughly real.
I have insisted on this larger scope of the Renaissance humanism, because we are naturally apt to think of it as having been primarily a cult of style and form, an effort to imitate and reproduce the excellence of the ancient models. And of course this was one of its chief aims,—nay, perhaps, the most characteristic of the special activities which the revival called forth. But we should be in danger of taking this imitatio veterum for something less significant than it really was, if we did
