A PARADOX, IN THE PRAISE OF A DUNCE, TO Smectymnuus.  
By H. P.  
LONDON, Printed for Thomas Paybody, in Queen's Head Court in Pater Noster Row. 1642.   

A Paradox In the praise of a dunce.  
WHen I undertook this subject and seriously bethought me of the Title, (as Pliny's advice to every Author) The praise of a Dunce, I considered whether I were myself a Dunce or no, than it had been true, proprio laus sordet in ore. again, Qui alterum incusare vol●● scips●● intueri opertet. But when I saw that I had spent no small a time in the university, published some useful books (as well in Latin as English) to the commonwealth, which have taken in the world, and I could never get any thereby, but {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} as Plutarch calls them, silken words, I concluded I was no Dunce; But the greatest reason of all that persuaded me was, that for all my pains I could never get any preferment, had I been Dunce, without question, I had long ere this, perhaps been double or treble beneficed, been a lazy Prebend, or Deane of some cathedral myself, or kept a fellowship with a good Living to boot in some college or other, as long as I had lived. But to our purpose. There is no question, but a Dunce deriveth his name from Duns Scotus, who was a tolerable writer in his time; and no doubt but they deserve to be commended, for that they are pretenders to his knowledge and learning, and though they cannot attain to the same, yet in rebus magnis est vol●isse satis.  
They commonly keep good houses, and give entertainment to Learned men, and so they do (as Erasmus saith) sarcire officium Hospitalitate. Yea while they are in the university; they are very beneficial by bestowing Suppers and breakfasts, (besides their liberality in Money) upon such learned scholars as make their Declamations and other exercises for them.  
They love and make much of their Wives above other (whom they choose commonly the handsomest in the whole Country) keeping them in their Coaches, their taffeta, or Plush gowns, themselves clad in damask, with their broad Beavers, Hats turned up, or crushed close before like a Court dripping-pan. They make good sport in their exercises, by speaking of false Latin, making absurd arguments, to the exceeding recreation of others. And since taciturnity, or silence is a virtue, they are to be commended for their silence, for in learned company where matter of knowledge or Learned discourse is offered, he always holds his peace. I remember in a Christmas time as I was at Dinner in the company of one who was a Doctor, and had some 800l. by the year in spiritual living, when a learned friend of mine a Doctor of the civil Law, told him that I was a stranger lately come from beyond the Seas, and could speak little or no Latin, and desired to speak to him in Latin, which I did, the Doctor by an interpreter, answered me, it was not the custom of England to speak Latin in a Christmas time, and so drinking to me we had no more discourse.  
He can in his preaching please both Country and city, and give them content. In the country he will never stand above three quarters of an hour, whereby young men of the parish have leisure enough in the afternoon to recreate themselves at any exercise they please: in the city he will not stick to preach (such as they are) three or four Sermons in a day. Learned B. Andrew's when he was Vicar of St. Giles without Cripplegate would often say, that if he preached twice in one day, his second Sermon was rather a prating than a preaching, for indeed every Sermon he made was throughly studied, and fraught with abundance of reading and learning.  
The best scholars commonly are slovens in respect of one of them, they go spruce and so neat, and whatsoever their Doctrine or divisions be, if they be handsome men and wear pontifical Beards, they are much commended by the feminine Auditory, for saith Erasmus merrily, In Far. Ep. Foemina laudant concionem a vultu Concionatoris, Women commend a Sermon from the Preachers countenance.  
They never make any quarrel between our Church and the Church of Rome, neither meddle th●y with controversy, or ever write against Bellarmine, Bucanu●, Suarez, and the rest. He will hardly suffer any Living to fall into the lapse, which rather than it should he will engross three or four into his own hands. He seldom falleth out or quarrelleth with any man, now and then he will break Priscian's head till the blood runs about his ears.  
Again though he be no scholar himself, he will provide of some more able than himself to preach, which as a foil sets him off the better.  
Sometimes if he be ambitious of popular applause, he will turn schismatic in some kind or other sowing his Tares and Cockle, in woods and corners, to the hazard of his ears; This proceedeth both from want of learning, and want of wit, wherein he is to be pitied veritas non quaerit angulos.  
A Dunce also makes us good sport with any of his works that he publisheth himself, or that is published by another, witness, Epistolae obscurorum virorum, where you shall see Duncery to the life, that if a man be extremely melancholic, let him read that book, and I will warrant it to cure him.  
If a Dunce falls into a scholar's company in travel upon the way, or meet at an inn at night, he is the most boon companion of the world, he will call for Wine, and the best meat in the house (for observe it, they are commonly the sons of wealthy men and left exceeding rich, which indeed maketh them Dunces) and in the end pay for all, which, who can deny but to be a most honest and a generous part. He commonly playeth well at bowls, and is so valiant that he scorns to give ground to any man. He hath an especial care of the burning of pigs upon the spit, and the overbaking of Pies in the Oven, therefore by his good will, he will make short work upon a Sunday, and he thinks an Homily well read to be sufficient.  
If he be a Separatist (as many of them affecting singularity above the●● fellows prove,) he puts his Auditors to little or no charge at all for his Pulpit, a Velvet Cushion for his desk, or so rich a Pulpit Cloth as they have at St. martin's in the Fields, nor ever troubles he his officious clerk to wait at his opened Pulpit door for his coming in, for in plain truth his preaching place or Pulpit, is either a two-eared Bucking-tub, or at the best the one half of a vintner's cask, without any door at all. The Bishop of his diocese commonly bears with him and much delighteth in his company at public entertainments and meetings. For many of them though they want learning, yet have they oft times good natural wits, and ripe conceits upon any occasion. As one came before Bishop B. to be examined and posed of the Bishop for a Living (which was bestowed upon him) when he came for his institution, and it fell out to be late at night, and at such a time the B. was writing of a letter, Mr. B. quoth the Bishop, you have picked out an ill time, for me to examine you in, neither am I at leisure to ask you many questions, come one quoth the Bishop; what is Latin for this candlestick, and if it please your Lordship quoth the other, the candlestick is Latin of itself, so it was, indeed a Latin candlestick, the B. not knowing whether he spoke it out of simplicity, or in way of jest, gave him his institution, without further questioning.  
A Dunce commonly will tell the people of their faults truly and roundly, or if they hear of any misbehaviour or abuse in a Parish they will not stick (though he leaves his Text altogether) to correct and ●ea●e it down, and many times will tell such as are guilty to their faces of such and such faults they have committed. One preached at Barkeway, and after he had read his Text told the people their town consisted of many Lordships, and how he was informed of one notable abuse amongst them in that Parish, which was, if a Cow or ox of another man's were strayed away and happened into any of their grounds, they would with a rye loaf hot out of the Oven bend his horns which way they listed, so that when the owner came to challenge his own Cow he knew not whether that were she or no, for quoth he my cow's horns stood backward, these stand before and hang down her forehead, surely this is not she; and thus men were cozened of their cattle, but the truth was, none in the Town knew this trick before, but after he had preached it amongst them, presently after they began to practise it.  
Another came by chance as a stranger unto a shire town that shall be nameless, some day or two before a Visitation in the same Town he sent to the archdeacon residing then in the town, that he might have leave to preach, which (to gratify him being a stranger and very formal in his habit) was granted: upon the day, before the whole clergy, the archdeacon, Chancellor, and most of the officers of the spiritual Court, he went into the Pulpit, after he had made his prayer, he read his Text, Come and See. My Text divideth itself (quoth he) most naturally into two parts, the one is Come, the other See, Come I apply to ourselves of the clergy, and See to the laity: for the first, Come I divide it into three parts, whither we Come, than who they be that Come, than how they Come: we Come hither to a Visitation, which is derived from an old Latin verb of the first Conjugation Visit●, visit-as, Visitavi, withal he makes an obeisance to the archdeacon, and to visit is a Metaphor borrowed from the visiting of Patients by the physician, for they visit them to see whether they be sick or sound in the Body, & these Visitations to see whether the country men be sick or sound in the purse or no, &c. who they be that Come, (for (quoth he) I comprehend under the name of Visitation all manner of your ecclesiastical Courts) here come to your Courts and visitations, Swine, men presented for drunkenness, goats and town Bulls, for lying with their own maids, or their neighbour's Wives, and what become of them after they have dearly paid for their poundage in your spiritual (or rather fleshly), Courts, they run again into other men's corn, and do as much mischief as they did before, &c. How they come, your rich and double benefited Parsons come a day or too before, and feast the archdeacon Chancellors, Proctors, sparing neither for Sack nor Claret, the poor Curate except his churchwardens be the more merciful unto him to pay for his dinner, he must fast and go home as he came: to be short, some Come with money, and some Come with none, if you do not believe me Come and See. So he fell into his Text again, &c. Now See for the Lai●ie, I see a 〈◊〉 sit and stand at the nether end of this Church, who if they had been thrifty and good husbands when they were young, they might have had their places above and had heard me better: and I see a great fault in you innkeepers of this ancient city or Town, who lodge a footman who hath travailed hard all day upon a Mattris or a flock-bed at the best, if an horse man comes to your houses, riding upon an ambling nag, or an easy trotting Gelding you lay him upon the best feather bed you have, and sometimes 〈…〉 with this fault amended, the poor footman hath more need of a feather bed than the other, after this manner he proceeded, till the glass was run out, when he had made an end, and was come down, the Proctors, Apparators, and other officers of the Court, had like to have torn him in pieces, but the archdeacon and Chancellor would not suffer them, but cited him next morning to come before them, but after dinner he had taken his horse and was never heard of after. Notable are the absurdities of dunstical schoolmasters, as one at Dunstable was so precise, that he would not teach his scholars to say Amo I love, but amorett I am in charity, quoth a Boy wiser than him, than Master I must construe, Cum amarem eram miser, when I was in Charity, I was a wretch.  
I had myself a schoolmaster who is yet living, who I well remember construed unto me Maecenas atavis edite regibus, edite, set you forth Maecenas the sports, atavis regibus, of ancient Kings.  
One Sir Hugh a Welshman who was a Brownist or the l●ke, taught a school in Gloustershire, who when he was accused before the Major of the town for teaching his boys to speak false Latin, and that they profited little or nothing, he told their fathers, they should play at Cat, or spanne Counter with all the boys in the country.  
Your very Dunce is commonly like Ignoramus, an excellent solicitor in Law business, and many country Parsons are fitter for pettifogging than for p●eaching.  
One, a Dunce in grain after he had read his Text, fell a railing against Church Government, for which his Sermon he was cited before Bish. Barlow, whom upon his horse back he met coming out of Gate at Buckden house, he riding upon a white Gelding with a red Saddle and a yellow Saddle Cloth, how now Mr. G. quoth the Bishop, is this canonical, a Red Saddle, and a yellow Saddle Cloth for a Minister? My L. quoth the Parson, though you have Canons for me, you have none for my horse.  
And the common reason why most of our Dunces care not for Learning, is because say they, Scientia inflat, knowledge puffeth up: and in very truth as our Times are, the matter is not great whither a man be learned or a Dunce, for he may come to preferment as soon by the one as the other, though he were but a Tradesman, or a Mechanike.  
Let not my Reader be offended at what I have written, for like a suit in Birchen Lane, if any thing here fit him let him wear it.  
FINIS.