Library of Samuel Teleki: Part One

or the Furies; has the reading of books made the Ciceros inept at conducting the greatest affairs? Has it softened their spirits? These certainly, being the wisest, most moderate, and most courageous of men, would never have turned themselves to the study of letters if they had not understood that they were aided by letters in perceiving and cultivating virtue. Hence Plato, a grave proclaimer of matters, thought that states would only then be blessed if either learned and wise men ruled them, or those who governed them had dedicated all their study to doctrine and wisdom; and he judged that this conjunction of power and wisdom could be for the salvation of states. 1.) On the Republic, Book V. The same is confirmed by Ph. Melanchthon, a man of splendid genius and disciplined judgment, in his preface to P. Terence, who said that states would be blessed if a youth refined by letters approached the conducting of greater affairs, and he adds as if it were the cause of the public calamity of his own times: because when there is no literature, no knowledge of either religion or virtue in those who hold the republics, their ignorance causes all things sacred and profane, divine and human, to be confounded.

Nor did Demetrius Phalereus advise King Ptolemy less truly than prudently to prepare and read books on kingship and leadership; for those things which friends do not dare to advise to Kings are extant in books.