But this Platonic picture is far different
from the modem idea of these pedants. Those
Ancient and ^^^'^ ^uvied for raising them-
modern pedants selves above the common sort of
contrasted. ^^^^ . ^^^ despisiug the ordinary

actions and offices of life ; for having a par-
ticular and inimitable way of living, and for
using bombastic and obsolete language quite
different from the ordinary way of speaking.
But our pedants are condemned for being as
much below the usual man as they are incapa-
ble of public employment ; for leading the
life and comforming themselves to the mean
and vile manners of the vulgar. " Odi homines
ignavos opere, philosophos sententia." ^* ("T
hate men who are fools in working and phi-
losophers in speaking.")



90 THE EDUCATION OP CHILDEEN.
The true philosopliers, if they were great
in knowledge, were yet much greater in action.
True phiioso- I* ^^ ^^^^ ^^ ArcMniedes, the
phers are great geometrician of Syracuse, being
inaction. disturbed from his contempla-

tion to put some of his skill in practice for
the defence of his country, that he suddenly
constructed prodigious and dreadful engines,
that wrought effects beyond all human expec-
tations. Nevertheless, he himself disdained
all this mechanical work, thinking in this he
had violated the dignity of his art, of which
these performances were but trivial experi-
ments. Philosophers generally, whenever they
have been required to show the proof of action,
have been seen to fly so high as to make it
very evident that their souls were strangely
elevated and enriched with the knowledge of
things.
